Listen, Andrew Yang is a likeable guy. I followed his presidential campaign from beginning to end.
And one of those takeaways regarding Yang, is that he likes to say a lot of popular things. But so few of those things come true mostly because he doesn’t have the authority to deliver on the promises he’s making.
One of those promises are regarding the conditions behind employment in pro wrestling. Specifically, the WWE.
Yang likes picking on the WWE because the McMahons are public supporters of Donald Trump. When he beats up on them, he scores points for his own political career, which is not over. Not even close.
The problem is that wrestling YouTubers, podcasters, and bloggers, don’t understand this and every time an athlete gets a bad deal, they tell themselves “Yang is coming soon”.
He’s not coming. Here’s why.
He doesn’t have the power to make change: Right now, he can tweet. That’s about it. Even if he gets a position in the Biden administration, or win a race for office (2-4 more years), he’s still got to get legislation moving. And that won’t happen because..
Washington has bigger problems at the moment: We’re dealing with a pandemic. After that pandemic, we’ve got to revive the economy, fight climate change, and install immigration reform. Congress doesn’t care about Vince McMahon. Pro wrestling labor reform doesn’t win a lot of votes back in districts come reelection time.
There will always be wrestlers ready to cross the line: Being a WWE superstar is the dream of tens of thousands of young athletes. You think they’re going to give up the chance to headline Wrestlemania for Andrew Yang? You know the answer to that question.
Andrew Yang is playing the political game here. It’s not anyone’s fault that they can’t see past the smoke here. It’s what politicians do. Even the cool ones like Yang.
Let’s stop pretending this is a thing.