It's no surprise that Bruce Springsteen isn't a fan of our idiot President-elect, Donald Trump. But in a wide-ranging, wild, and innocent discussion with Marc Maron on his excellent WTF podcast that was released this week, he talked at length about his deep fears for the country and Trump's lack of competency. "I’ve felt disgust before, but never the kind of fear that you feel now," he said. "It’s as simple as the fear of, is someone simply competent enough to do this particular job? Do they simply have the pure competence to be put in the position of such responsibility?"
Still promoting his autobiography Born To Run, Springsteen talked with Maron about his childhood and his relationship with his father, dealing with mental illness, and the creation of Nebraska, among other things. But there was no getting around the orange-haired elephant who will be in every room in the country for at least the next four years.
"When you let that genie out of the bottle — bigotry, racism, intolerance... they don’t go back in the bottle that easily if they go back in at all," Springsteen said. "Whether it’s a rise in hate crimes, people feeling they have license to speak and behave in ways that previously were considered un-American and are un-American. That’s what he’s appealing to. So my fears are that those things find a place in ordinary, civil society."
The Boss said that Trump's lies—including building a wall between the US and Mexico—were based in "very simplistic, but very powerful and simple ideas...they can’t occur. But if you’ve struggled for the past 30 or 40 years...and somebody comes along and offers you something else, particularly after you feel you’ve been failed by the two parties, it’s a compelling choice." While Springsteen can understand Americans feeling left behind by globalization, technological advances and the "browning of America," he has a hard time reckoning with people embracing hatred and fear that Trump espouses: "It just appeals to your worst angels and under certain circumstances, enough people went for it. Not a majority, but enough."
You can listen to the entire interview here. Springsteen also noted that he isn't working on a Trump-themed record at the moment (he does have a completed orchestral rock album that will likely be released this year), but he will do his best to play a "very, very small part" in trying to ensure America keeps trying to live up to its ideals.
