Weekly Wisdom: "Death To Traitors." I am totally down with this concept, and with Trump's incredible rhetoric: "If you think there may be some sabotage...get rid of them ruthlessly, viciously...just get rid of them, fast." Word, Trumpy. At the end of the day, I don't look as harshly upon the "traitors" in this episode as harshly as others do, because sin by omission is a titch less gross than what Lee and Tarek perpetrated a couple weeks ago, but I still agree. I really, really wish Pepi had set the precedent when he wanted to earlier, about just firing the fuck out of people. Did Kwame actually do that with Miss O? Or was it just a technicality? I can't remember. But anyway, she wasn't a candidate at the time, so it's different. Too bad he pulled back.

Showtime, Synergy! There's all manner of deliriously twee and fun Brini Maxwell music as Tammy investigates the space, talking a mauve streak about having a "red carpet theme," highlighting "entertainment" as something so transcendent that it doesn't approach the gaming thing at the heart of the brand. She talks about wanting them to "feel like they don't even need to leave their house," due to the wonder of the Xbox. And...sadly, this is a boy/girl thing. They're rare, but they happen, and not always when you expect. The thing is that Jay and Stephen and arrested-development Lee and Sean know a thing that Tammy does not know, which is: the Xbox is a gaming console. It's fun to say that it's all about home movies and DVD's of The Object Of My Affection and whatever, but the price alone dictates that it will be bought only by unmarried men. Married men are not going to sneak this whole "it's for the whole family" bullshit past their wives, and only the most overindulged children are going to be receiving it for their very own. By incorporating the huge lie of the "interactivity" marketing into their overall concept, while still marketing it as a big-boy toy, Gold Rush has already won. But the ugliness of this is that Roxanne and Allie both know this, as portrayed through their thinky faces, and they're going to let Tammy fuck this up, and that makes them jerks. Watching this show every week, as I was telling Joe R, you get used to the formula, and generally at this point in the formula, you see the dissenting team members giving other options and questioning the central thrust; there's no such footage in the episode here. Allie and Roxanne just roll their eyes and nod their heads. I'm not saying they didn't fight Tammy on this, but we don't see it if they did, and that stuck out on first viewing: not one second of dissent. Only condescension and "if you think so" bullshit.