A ‘Simpsons’ Episode About Garbage Predicted The Rise Of Donald Trump

This feature is part of our Politics and Entertainment week, looking at the points where art and issues overlap.

South Park famously once said “Simpsons did it,” the “it” being literally every idea ever. The Ebola outbreak? Simpsons did it. The mass of the Higgs boson particle? Simpsons did it. The outcome of the 2014 Super Bowl? Simpsons did it. Roy of Siegfried and Roy getting attacked by a tiger? Simpsons did… well, everyone saw that one coming. More recently, The Simpsons was credited with “predicting” the political uprising of Donald Trump, who, as you might have heard, is running for president. Not the president of, like, TCBY’s fan club, either, but the President of the United States. I know, right? Surely this race-baiting, orange-skinned, fear-mongering titan of sexism has no shot at…

Even though Hillary Clinton is technically winning (and other polls have her in even better shape), this two-person race — sorry, Jill, Gary, and Harambe, probably — is still too close for comfort. Clinton should be destroying Trump by double digits, and she would be if only women voted. But people, be they deplorables or otherwise, like a loudmouth, and fewer mouths are louder and spit more empty promises than Trump. He’ll build a wall! He’ll fix the economy! He’ll ban “terrorists” from the country! He’ll throw Hillary in prison! He’ll slash taxes! Those are enticing offers for the lazy and pissed off; never discount the lazy and pissed off. They hear what they want to hear, without doing a smidgen of research, and they like what they’re hearing from Trump. He’s adept at manipulation, bending the media to his will with outrageous statements and by talking over his rivals. Including “Crooked Hillary,” the safe, boring candidate who picked a mall mannequin as her running mate.

Clinton’s the reliable Honda Civic; nothing flashy, but it gets the job done. Trump, meanwhile, is a fancy sports car in the city. It’s unreliable, impractical, and foolishly expensive, but damned if it doesn’t make a lot of noise. That’s Trump’s campaign in a nutshell: buy now, worry about the insurance later. Hopefully that “later” never comes, but what if it does? What if Donald Trump becomes America’s next president? Honestly, I’m not even sure he wants that. (Michael Moore even has a theory.) Trump sees politics the way he does business and pretty much everything in his privileged life: as a dick-measuring contest. He doesn’t just want to win; he wants to crush his opponents to prove he can.

Trump’s lack of interest in anything other than attention might also explain why he spends too much time deflecting. Every time he’s been asked about how he plans to defeat ISIS, for instance, he’s replied with something along the lines of, “I’m not gonna tell you what it is… I don’t want the enemy to know what I’m doing,” or “I have a great plan. It’s going to be great. They ask, ‘What is it?’ Well, I’d rather not say. I’d rather be unpredictable,” or, “What am I, the answer man? Just vote for me.” That last one wasn’t actually Trump — it was Homer Simpson, but it’s hard to tell the difference sometimes.

In the season nine episode “Trash of the Titans,” which originally aired on Apr. 26, 1998, the Simpsons have their waste pickup services revoked after Homer calls two garbagemen “trash-eating stinkbags.” Marge solves the problem with a simple apology, but Homer marches down to the office of Springfield’s sanitation commissioner, Ray Patterson (voiced by a wonderfully droll Steve Martin), demanding that he take his wife’s mea culpa back.

Ray is calm, cool, and collected, unlike Homer, who, after stirring up some controversy and rattling a few cages, decides he wants Ray’s job. “I’m the last angry man, Patterson,” Homer yells. “A crusader for the little guy!” Ray says that he’s been elected for 16 straight years by the fine people of Springfield, “so they must think I’m doing a damn good job.” When Homer replies, “You wanna know what I think?” Ray fires back, “No! Nobody wants to hear the nonsensical ravings of a loudmouthed malcontent!” Sound familiar?

After a failed campaign stop at a U2 concert, Homer winds up at Moe’s, where he complains, “My campaign is a disaster, Moe. I hate the public so much! If only they’d elect me. I’d make ’em pay! Aw, Moe, how do I make ’em like me?” Moe suggests a catchy slogan, something like “Can’t Someone Else Do It.” The meaningless catchphrase — which suggests that a faceless “someone else” will take care of your dirty problems, consequences be damned — is an instant success, despite Sideshow Mel deeming the trash service in Springfield “excellent.” Homer essentially creates a problem out of thin (or in his case, king-sized) air. He takes that momentum into a debate, which Ray shows up late to after someone tampered with his brakes. Homer fires back, “Well, then you should have been early.” The audience roars in laughter; Homer has them eating out of the palm of his four-fingered hands, without actually saying anything that matters. “Oh, come on, people. This man has promised round-the-clock trash pickup. That’s impossible,” Ray complains, hoping that common sense will prevail. It doesn’t. Homer yells over him, guaranteeing that his men will “wash your car, scrub your shower, air out your stinkables.” Sensing a lost cause, Old Man Patterson (he’s only two years older than Homer — when Trump sniffles, it’s nothing; when Clinton coughs, it’s a national scandal) mutters, “Fine. If you want an experienced public servant, vote for me. But if you want to believe a bunch of crazy promises about garbagemen cleaning your gutters and waxing your car, then by all means vote for this sleazy lunatic.”

Homer wins in a landslide.

That’s where his troubles begin. Homer spends his yearly budget in a single month and turns Springfield into America’s trash hole by letting other cities dump their garbage in the abandoned mine. To paraphrase the immortal Dr. Ian Malcolm, Homer was so preoccupied with whether or not he could that he didn’t stop to think if he should. (He shouldn’t.) Trash begins to literally explode from the ground due to Homer’s quick-solution mismanagement, and the town chooses to have him fired and horse-whipped. Ray gets his job back, a job he shouldn’t have lost in the first place, but he can’t resist twisting the dagger in the yokels who ousted him. “You know, I’m not much on speeches,” he says, “but it’s so gratifying to leave you wallowing in the mess you’ve made. You’re screwed, thank you, bye.” (Moe: “He’s right, he ain’t much on speeches.”) It’s not hard to imagine Clinton wanting to say the same thing every time Trump bellows over her, or says something truly asinine (which is often). “This? This is the man you want with his finger on the button? Fine, sure, whatever. But when this country turns into Mad Max: Fury Road, don’t come crawling back to me. You’re screwed, thank you, bye.” Instead, she channels her incredulous, thinly veiled rage into a meme-worthy shimmy.

“Trash of the Titans” ends with the entire town of Springfield — every building, every resident, every Lard Lad monument — moving five miles down the road, away from the waves of festering detritus. America doesn’t really have that option.