Source: The Atlantic
by Franklin Foer
“Donald Trump’s rise tracks the decline of that thing we once agreed to call reality. He cemented his place in the popular imagination with the advent of reality television, a genre that promised authenticity, even as the supposedly unscripted scenes were carefully manipulated by producers. On The Apprentice, which debuted in 2004, Trump was the embodiment of a culture just beginning to blur the line between what was real and what merely looked like it. In his second term as president, Trump — now with the help of artificial intelligence — is completing the revolution that made him.” (10/22/25)