I think I am in a bad dream and soon I will wake and find Donald J. Trump didn’t happen.

I listen to hours of podcasts where pundits try to make sense of this creature. Like Atlas, he holds the world on his shoulders. Will he be doomed like the Titan God or smash us all before he is done?

We know who voted for him. Men and women who felt deeply aggrieved by the system. He told them he could fix it all, and they believed him or thought it worth a try. Trump won because he is a master manipulator of the media he now dominates television, social media and AI.

Popular culture often shows foresight. In 1957, Elia Kazan directed A Face in the Crowd starring Andy Griffiths. It is a story about a drunken drifter, singer and raconteur, dubbed Lonesome Rhodes who, given a spot on radio, becomes an overnight sensation, ad libbing effectively, poking fun at sponsors and criticising local politicians. Those who have promoted Rhodes see the error of their ways but too late.

He is taken off air but his adoring audience revolts. So Rhodes is invited back, but now he has new awareness of his persuasive power. His fame, influence and ego increase and his friendly onscreen persona disguises his contempt for his followers. He is exposed when a live microphone is activated during the end credits of his television show, as he mocks his “idiot” viewers. His popularity plummets, advertisers cancel their sponsorships. His allies desert him. Alone, he goes mad. A character comments that a faker like Rhodes may fool people for a while, but “we get wise to him―that’s our strength”.

That’s how Hollywood depicted the venal hypocrite Rhodes 70 years ago. But today, exposing Trump’s true self to his followers does him no electoral damage. It did not matter that he is, demonstrably, a charlatan, a liar, a bully, corrupt, paranoid, narcissist, a sexual predator, who can’t put a coherent idea together. He was impeached twice in his first term. He lauded a mob that marched on the Washington Capitol to revenge his fanciful electoral loss, resulting in the death of five people. But he was re-elected and those jailed for offences were pardoned the day Trump took office for a second term.

During his first campaign, Trump declared, “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters, OK? It’s, like, incredible.” It is incredible. His character, his ethics and morality don’t matter.

Trump, who had been the celebrity host of the reality program The Apprentice from 2004-2015, saw an opportunity and decided to run for president. He had seeped into the consciousness of the US masses in the role he played as the wealthy successful business tycoon who brooked no nonsense and fired apprentices with abandon.

The series promoted his properties, products and brand, constructing a strong, favourable image with viewers. Behind the scenes, as the producer Bill Pruit has noted, “he could barely put a sentence together" and post-production editing made him appear articulate. But in the years acting that role, Trump learnt media skills: how to hold an audience, speak with impact with the style of one in complete control.

It was all make-believe but in his campaign for the presidency in 2016, Trump was seen in the eyes of alienated voters as a powerful domineering businessman who would get the deals done. He performs that role every day and fiction becomes reality.

It is not uncommon for individuals to trade on their fame to enter politics. Ronald Reagan and Arnold Schwarzenegger made the move; in Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, although a qualified lawyer, pursued a career in comedy and entertainment before politics.

But Trump is something else. He is the greatest rogue of all time, in charge, treating the world as a giant monopoly board where he holds the get-out-of-jail-free cards for those who would murder for him; he trades tariff deals for billion-dollar golf courses, grand hotels and bullion. He has decorated the Oval Office with gold fittings. He sells bibles embossed with the Trump name and golden sneakers. He is crass, vulgar, rude, unrefined, boorish and tasteless but has a brand to rival Mickey Mouse and Barbie.

He plans to stay president. To achieve this end, he is undermining the judicial and the electoral system. He conducts his presidency on social media. Cross him and you’re fired online or deported. The Commissioner of Labor is a recent victim, because Trump didn’t want to hear the latest unemployment figures. Paul Krugman, the Nobel prize winning economist, invoked Hannah Arendt when speaking of Trump.

‘Totalitarianism in power invariably replaces all first-rate talents, regardless of their sympathies, with those crackpots and fools whose lack of intelligence and creativity is still the best guarantee of their loyalty."

Listen to Trump’s entourage when they speak. Are they fools? Does Hegseth, the US Secretary of Defence, really mean women shouldn’t be allowed to vote?

The world is watching Trump’s every move. International opinion surveys are showing Australians are, to our great credit, close to the top in world loathing of Donald Trump. We don’t like the braggart’s grandstanding or any of his policies except for spending more on defence, and that’s because we know we can’t trust the US anymore.

Is Trump the quintessential contemporary hero? Not a paragon of virtue but one who can cut a swathe through America’s institutions. USAID, the departments of homeland security, education, health and welfare, cultural institutions and universities are all being decimated. The legal system can’t keep pace and the world’s political leaders, except Putin and Netanyahu, are tiptoeing around, rightly worried about putting a foot wrong, while the tradies in US cities are afraid to go outside.

Yet Trump is embraced as a hero for contemporary America. He is Magaman fighting for justice and the American way. For the rest of us, it seems more like South Park.

What is to be done? The Fourth Estate seems to be our only hope. In the end, public opinion is what will matter. It has never been more important for the news media to do what they are required to do. But Trump is playing them like an orchestra, and they are cowed. The mighty Jeff Bezos muzzled his Washington Post; CBS and NBC backed off from lawsuits because business was more important than journalistic principles. If a journalist asks Trump a difficult question or persists with the Epstein issue, they are cut out.

Trump, more than anyone, has concocted and exploited the concept of fake news. News and facts are what Trump decides they will be. He spends the first 2-3 hours of each day watching television and texting on his social media platform called, of all things, Truth Social.

Media diversity and the competition for eyeballs has backfired on the Fourth Estate. Collectively, they have become hopelessly incompetent at sorting and reporting fact from fiction or exposing truth from deception. We, the people, don’t believe in the news anymore, unless, of course, it is used as a vehicle for propaganda; as Trump’s megaphone. He knows how effective media can be.

We do need journalists to continue to face the ridicule and do their job, calling out concisely, every day, the actions of Trump and his team. Trump’s support has fallen to 38% since he was elected, the lowest rating for any president at this point in their term of office. Some news must be getting through. And he got no deal with Putin.

The views expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Pearls and Irritations.