“Mad Men” vs. “Modern Family”

Donald Trump (left) and Jon Hamm as Don Draper on Mad Men

On November 12, 2012, 6 days after President Barack Obama was re-elected, with 51.1 percent of the popular vote, I read that an unidentified pundit wrote that the "Mad Men" found out that we are living in a "Modern Family" America; and that, unless the Republican Party reexamined its reckless hard turn to the right, it would render itself unviable for years to come.

Translation: The Republicans wanted a country like the one America was at the beginning of the 2007-15 AMC TV show Mad Men, set in 1960, when men were dominant, and could do what they want: Eat like a horse, smoke like a chimney, drink like a fish, and screw like a rabbit, with no consequences.

Meanwhile, women stayed in their place: The house, especially the kitchen. And, if they dared venture into the workplace, it was only in a few jobs that were "woman's work," and faced sexual discrimination and harassment -- again, without consequences for the men.

By the time the show ended, it was 1971, and things had changed tremendously. As a previous Democratic President, Bill Clinton, put it, "If you thought the 1960s were good, you're probably a Democrat. If not, you're probably a Republican."

In contrast, the American people followed the lead of Obama and his Democratic Party, wanting a country like the one America was on the then-current ABC show Modern Family. The patriarch might have been a bit set in his ways, but he was learning, faster than Archie Bunker ever did on the 1970s CBS sitcom All in the Family. He even married a Hispanic woman and treated her son as his own.

Meanwhile, his actual kids? His daughter was a working woman, with a goofy but supportive husband, and 3 kids; and his son was gay, and married to a gay stereotype who was nonetheless a former high school football star who became the local high school's coach. And they adopted a daughter from Vietnam, the country where the patriarch had once fought for his country. He had to adjust to all of this, starting with the show's beginning in 2009 (it took place in the present day); and, by the time it ended in 2020, he had done fairly well at it.

It's also worth noting that Mad Men was a drama, with some humor; while Modern Family was a situation comedy, with a lot of drama, but a very optimistic show in general.

So the election, and the re-election, of Obama, the nation's 1st black President, and a very liberal one, was proof that America was more like Modern Family than Mad Men, right?

But that was before 2016, just 4 years later, when Donald Trump brought to the Republican fold millions of voters who had never voted before, because no Republican nominee had ever been bigoted enough for them to come out to vote.

Put these people -- as Hillary Clinton called them, "deplorables" -- together with all the people who had always voted Republican, no matter what, even for somebody as bad as Trump is on so many levels, so long as they get their tax cuts, their deregulation, and their right-wing judges. Trump was able to realign the country, and give the Republicans enough voters to, if not outvote the Democrats, then get them enough votes in the right States to win the Electoral College -- 2 and nearly 3 times out of 3.

America is not going to elect a woman as President, not for at least another 20 years. That is damning for our country. But not as damning as voting for Trump, who, on top of all the other reasons that make him unacceptable to rational people, actually has a record on the job, and he failed spectacularly.

But Americans wanted a man. Instead, they voted for a 78-year-old TV addict with a 14-year-old bully's way of looking at the world.

Not a Mad Man, not a "Madison Avenue" advertising executive.

A madman.