For a while there, things didn’t look good for Donald Trump being named Time’s Person Of The Year for the second year in a row, a title we must remind readers and apparently the president that isn’t a superlative along the lines of “Best Hair” or “Most Likely To Succeed At Kicking Off World War III,” but an acknowledgment of the individual(s) who generated the most buzz. Sometimes, that news is a positive sign, such as the important work done by Black Lives Matter activists, who were named runner-up in 2015.
Over the Thanksgiving holiday, Trump’s odds at topping the list seemed about even, as the president claimed he was “probably” going to be crowned Person Of The Year (although he’d prefers “man”), but that was “no good” for someone who eats chicken fingers while on diplomatic missions. Time quickly clarified that its selection process doesn’t involve making make-believe phone calls about photo shoots, and that the announcement wouldn’t be made until December 6 anyway.
Well, it’s December 4, and we now know who’s in the running for Time’s Person Of The Year. It will probably thrill the president to learn that he is one of 10 candidates in a group that includes a crown prince (who probably knows a thing or two about golden toilets) and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, who became the richest man in the world this year. But he might have some issues with being so close to the Dreamers and athlete turned activist Colin Kaepernick, who are neither obscenely rich nor white. Trump is also competing with Kim Jong Un, who once called the president a “dotard,” an event that provided a bit of laughter amid all the war-mongering between world leaders.
Again, we have to note that Person Of The Year doesn’t mean best, although that’s the word that’s so frequently on Trump’s shriveled lips. We did a little number crunching, i.e., Google searches, and found that Trump did spark a lot of news coverage. The president’s name generates over 215 million search results, while Jong Un and Kaepernick trail with 65 and 10.5 million a piece. But before he celebrates with a Big Mac, Trump should know that about 7 million of those search results are for a query about how he will kill us all.