James Corden's dumb idea for a Trump interview is not what anybody needs right now

James Corden, the white man whose only difference from the sea of white male late night television show hosts is that he has an accent, may finally be joining his peers in taking more open cracks at Donald Trump. After dedicating a cute line to the president in his big Grammy number, Corden stepped his game up earlier this week, when he and some Broadway stars performed “Donald: The Musical,” lampooning the president, Sean Spicer, Kellyanne Conway, and Steve Bannon.

Clearly, Corden is still feeling out just how far he can go in criticizing Trump, although he’s nowhere near the level of Seth Meyers and Stephen Colbert. But if given the opportunity to actually interview the president, it looks like Corden may not really be up to the task.

Corden recently appeared at PaleyFest for a conversation and was asked if he would ever have Donald Trump on the show. Via Vulture:

“We’re not a political show, but you know where we stand. We talk about Trump every night,” he began. “When he announced the travel ban, we did a video about that.”

He mentioned that the backlash Jimmy Fallon received for rubbing Trump’s hair wasn’t “fair” but also mentioned he didn’t think anybody “took Trump to task or asked him the questions that needed to be asked.” Corden then went on to describe a bit he came up with should Trump be on the show. It’s called “Stand By or Take It Back”:

“I’d read stuff he said on the campaign trail,” Corden explained, “and he’d have to say whether he’d stand by the statement or take it back.”

Um. If Corden thinks this constitutes taking Trump to task or asking questions that need to be asked, he’s pretty far off the mark. First, the campaign is long over. There are more recent things to talk about. And if Corden was so outraged about Trump’s campaign behavior…where was he when it was happening? I don’t remember him leading the protest movement against candidate Trump.

And then, of course Trump is going to stand by everything he said! His various executive orders are proof of his standing by his racist campaign promises! He literally takes nothing back! Even if they’re lies! He literally hired Kellyanne Conway to reinterpret his dumb tweets and statements and twist logic beyond its limits so that he doesn’t have to take it back!

Also, unless Corden plans on truly pressing the president on his various statements, turning them into some arch game doesn’t create some new platform for discourse. It continues to render the president into a novelty. He may as well do Carpool Karaoke with Trump, but with speeches instead of songs.