After more than a year and a half of campaigns, the 2016 election season is almost over.
Last Week Tonight host John Oliver, however, does not want you to take it easy. On Sunday, he made his final argument against Trump — or, as Oliver described him, "the human equivalent of a clear plastic bag filled with cheeseburgers and Confederate flag belt buckles."
"You do have to vote, even if you live in a state where you think it won’t matter," Oliver said. "We are at a point where this man has a genuine shot at the presidency despite having blown up a political party, undermined confidence in our electoral system, declared open season on journalists, and unleashed a river of racism and misogyny. Also, and I feel like we’ve lost sight of this: He has really stupid hair."
But Oliver did take a bit of blame for what’s happened so far. He pointed to a Daily Show clip from three years ago in which he encouraged Trump to run. ("Do it! Look at me. Do it. I will personally write you a campaign check now on behalf of this country, which does not want you to be president, but which badly wants you to run.")
"Now, in my defense, I have no defense for that, I was hoping to think of one before finishing this sentence — which oh shit, it’s over," Oliver said.
"I want to believe that America will reject Donald Trump, that our innate sense of decency will kick in like some sort of moral autopilot. But I have been spectacularly wrong before," Oliver added, rolling a clip of him declaring that the Chicago Cubs will never win the World Series. "I’m an idiot. But that clearly shows no outcome is certain. So if you are thinking you don’t have to show up to vote on Tuesday because there is no way the impossible could happen, take it from somebody who has learned from painful experience you are wrong about that."
But, at the very least, we’re now near the finish line. "Barring recounts, this nightmare of a campaign will be over," Oliver said. "Which is good, because this election hasn’t so much appealed to our better angels as it has groped our better angels, mocked their weight, and called them 6’s at best."
