The political grandstanding started way back in 1973 when the irascible Marlon Brando stayed home from the Academy Awards but sent an Apache princess, one Sacheen Littlefeather, to the podium to decline his award (Best Actor for The Godfather) on account of the 71-day standoff at the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota between federal agents and Oglala Lakota activists who had seized the little town of Wounded Knee. President Trump completes the doom-loop circle because he is the mythic figure who prompts all the anxiety behind the “mass formation” phenomenon we are witnessing.