Flood The Zone

Everyone who reads this column experiences what is known as “flood the zone” even if we cannot define it.  “Flood the zone” refers to the practice of the Trump Administration to overload the news we hear from and about Donald Trump on a daily and even hourly basis.

In any given week, it’s possible to hear that Trump is planning to bomb Iran; is railing against the Supreme Court for declaring his tariffs unconstitutional; is telling some professional sports league that it needs to change a rule; is blasting American Olympic athletes who went public with their ambivalent feelings about representing our country in his era; is broadcasting his opinion that Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, and Samuel L. Jackson are overrated actors; is screaming about what Jimmy Fallon or SNL said about him; is defending ICE shootings; is fantasizing about cancelling elections in the fall; is threatening Greenland—again; and is insisting that his wife’s documentary is a cinematic masterpiece. 

The morning after all that activity, we can wake to the numerous tweets Trump that sent out overnight against his many, many critics.   He must not sleep.  

We get the picture.  So many of his rages and bizarre comments come at us that we can’t focus.  And that’s the point.  Even political junkies like me tire when trying to discern what, if any, policy underscores his often-contradictory actions. 

My mind goes back to 1987 when Gary Hart’s run for the presidency ended because of a photo of him with a bikini-clad woman—not his wife—on board a yacht.  One compromising photo was enough to stop everything while the media forced the American public to decide if such behavior was unpresidential. 

Now, almost forty years later, we come to two recent Trump stories which make Gary Hart’s transgression look not worth mentioning.  In the past month, Trump seems to have posted, and then defended, a racist smear, in which he portrayed the Obamas as apes.  Then, seventy-nine-year-old Trump drooled over Black rapper Nicki Minaj’s skin and nails, leading her to say she wasn’t comfortable with his comment.    

In my world of higher education, had an administrator, faculty member, or student publicly committed either of those actions and then seemed to brag about them, he would have been tossed out on his ear.

So why isn’t Trump embarrassed by these acts?   And why haven’t we stopped everything to weigh in as a nation on what we should expect from our president?    

The answer is “flood the zone.”  Before political analysts can even comment on his egregious actions, Trump has deliberately created ten to fifteen other stories for the news cycle to deal with.  It’s an intentional strategy to distract our country from staying on a single subject, such as the Epstein files, his offending loyal allies such as NATO, his hunger to attack other nations without Congressional approval, and, did I say, the Epstein files?  

“Flood the zone” is like the difficulty many people have in focusing.  Only with “flood the zone,” the goal is to turn that difficulty into a nationwide epidemic.   “Don’t look at what I put online about the Obamas.  That’s old news.   Look over here at my plans to attach a ballroom to the White House, or better yet, listen to me attack Seth Meyers or CNN.”  

So, if you are confused as you try to understand news coming out of the White House, don’t blame yourself.  We are all being played with this “look over here; no, over here” strategy.   Take a deep breath and ask yourself each day which national or international issue is worth our attention.  The cure to “flood the zone” is focus, focus, focus.