Season 2 of the Trump Show has been really tedious. The show hit its stride last summer, when there was a lot of plot momentum — in fact, it almost became “appointment television,” as people tuned in around close-of-business every day to learn of the exciting new developments. But as so often happens in American television, what should have been a UK-style limited series has been indefinitely extended. The characters are so thin, and the setup so improbable, that we get nothing but the repetition of the same scenarios. The attempt to inject some lurid interest with the porn star theme feels desperate, and bringing back the Giuliani character is some kind of weird fan service for a fan who doesn’t really exist. The one genuine comic relief, Sean Spicer, has been replaced by perpetual wet blanket Sarah Huckabee Sanders — a major casting mistake, though an understandable one after the blow-up with the Scarramucci character.
TV Recap: The Trump Show, Season 2
An und für sich 
You forgot to mention the Russia-Mueller arc that has no end in sight; the release of dueling House reports offers zero plot progression.
Hello, Mr. Kotsko, I am a fan of your work, especially Why We Love Sociopaths, The Prince of this World, and your work on Zizek’s relationship with theology.
I should also note that I am a high school senior as of now, so forgive me if I make intellectual errors.
I primarily draw my own thought from Altizer, George Fox, Zizek (mostly through you, and Michael Jiminez), Barth, Kierkegaard, James Cone, and David Congdon.
I am interested in reconciling Zizek’s view of the political subject, as outlined in The Parallax View, with my own theology. This is because I am trying to integrate Zizek’s insights on violence (from his books “Violence” and his introductory essay to Verso Book’s publication “Virtue and Terror”) into my own political theology, namely his ethical analysis of Divine Violence.
This is why, along my journey of scouring relationships of Zizek with Barth, I came across Paul Jones’ own review of Zizeks debate with John Milbank.
I have seen that you responded to Paul Jones’ critique of Zizek’s theology as found in “The Monstrosity of Christ,” but in the comments, I kinda got lost trying to track your debate with David Congdon. I was wondering if you could summarize his qualms with your defense of Zizek and your replies to these criticisms? Any feedback would be appreciated.
Again, love your work.
Thanks for the kind words — I’m glad you found my work helpful. That debate was a long time ago, so I don’t remember it clearly. Do you have a link so I can review?
In the comments here: http://derevth.blogspot.com/2010/11/2010-kbbc-week-3-day-1.html
I have also made an essay introducing what I am wanting to do with Zizek and Congdon, in case you are interested: https://thequakersocialist.wordpress.com/2018/05/10/synthesizing-congdon-and-zizek-introduction-to-my-dilemma/
Wow, reviewing those comments was frustrating! From my perspective, I kept asserting basically the same thing I said in my post, while he kept shifting the goalposts so that my critique of Barth or Christianity no longer quite worked. I’m glad you find his recent work useful, but most of our interactions those many years ago amounted to butting heads unproductively. I recommend you stick to our published work (and I would count my main response to Jones as a published work) and not try to draw old blog comments into the mix.