Alec Baldwin is back in the news again, something which has become a regular feature of cable programming these days. It seems you can’t turn on the television without seeing his grizzled countenance splattered across your screen. When he’s not either hosting or appearing in skits for Saturday Night Live doing his tiresome imitation of Donald Trump, he’s milking this gig in other venues for all it’s worth. After having been recently urged to stand in for the President at the White House Correspondents Dinner, we now learn that he has inked a lucrative book deal. (Associated Press)

Alec Baldwin has found a new way to mock Donald Trump.

Baldwin is teaming with author Kurt Andersen on the satirical book “You Can’t Spell America Without Me: The Really Tremendous Inside Story of My Fantastic First Year as President Donald J. Trump,” Penguin Press announced Wednesday. The book is scheduled to come out Nov. 7, almost exactly a year to the day that Trump stunned the world by being elected president, and ensured many more appearances by Baldwin as Trump on “Saturday Night Live.”

There have been times recently when Baldwin’s antics really began getting on my nerves. I’m sure part of that comes from the fact that so much of the media has been focused on relentless attacks against the new White House administration before it even has a chance to get off the ground. But after having had some time to digest all of these comings and goings, a bit of sanity is required when dealing with the “Baldwin phenomenon.”

Don’t take this as some indication that I’ve suddenly developed a new appreciation for Baldwin’s particular style of “humor.” As I’ve said here repeatedly, I find his Trump impersonation tiresome, repetitive and rarely amusing. His routines lack creativity and consist entirely of the same three worn-out memes. Baldwin is, more than anything, a walking embodiment of your annoying and slightly delusional uncle who shows up at family gatherings telling the same three jokes over and over for years on end and then acts insulted when you don’t laugh.

His work stands in stark contrast to that of Melissa McCarthy, who has been doing a hilarious job lampooning White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer. Feel free to go ahead and label me a “traitor” for saying that, but the woman simply cracks me up, and the writing in those bits is probably worthy of an Emmy. If Sean allows it to get him worked up then he is probably too thin-skinned for the high profile job he stepped into.

But returning to Baldwin, the fact is that we really have nothing to complain about. After all, the guy is an actor and comedian who has to work for a living just like anyone else. No matter how dismal you may find his offerings, he has the right to go out and earn his daily bread like the rest of us. The fact is that he has found people in the private sector willing to pay him for his material and he would be foolish not to close the deal and take what the market will bear. Cutting him off from such opportunities is pretty much the antithesis of conservatism.

The far better approach as I see it is to simply adopt a policy of changing the channel when he comes on. Let Baldwin do his thing and we can do ours. Isn’t the free market wonderful?