Okay…it’s the season of good cheer, but there isn’t much of that on offer. In fact, quite the opposite. If you read Tom Edsall—and you always should—some of the leading academic psychologists believe that Donald Trump has moved on from mere narcissistic sociopathy right on up to full-bore, raging psychopathy. According to Brian Klass of the University of London, the 2024 race now pits:
a 77-year-old racist, misogynist bigot who has been found liable for rape, who incited a deadly, violent insurrection aimed at overturning a democratic election, who has committed mass fraud for personal enrichment, who is facing 91 separate counts of felony criminal charges against him and who has overtly discussed his authoritarian strategies for governing if he returns to power
against “an 80-year-old with mainstream Democratic Party views who sometimes misspeaks or trips.”
“One of those two candidates,” Klaas noted, “faces relentless newspaper columns and TV pundit ‘takes’ arguing that he should drop out of the race. (Spoiler alert: It’s somehow not the racist authoritarian sexual abuse fraudster facing 91 felony charges).”
Klaas asked:
What is going on? How is it possible that the leading candidate to become president of the United States can float the prospect of executing a general and the media response is … crickets?
How is it possible that it’s not front page news when a man who soon may return to power calls for law enforcement to kill people for minor crimes? And why do so few people question Trump’s mental acuity rather than Biden’s, when Trump proposes delusional, unhinged plans for forest management and warns his supporters that Biden is going to lead us into World War II(which would require a time machine), or wrongly claims that he defeated Barack Obama in 2016.
Well, the media response is not exactly “crickets”…not around here. At Sanity Clause, we’re in the midst of a Code Red Sky Is Falling Cataclysm, fearful that the Orange Nutball will win the 2024 election and destroy American democracy.
What’s a Sane Person to do? Well, you can spread the word. You can give the gift of Sanity this holiday season….
AND INDEED, WE HAVE A SPECIAL HOLIDAY GIFT SUBSCRIPTION OFFER!
YES, THAT’S 20% OFF! (FOR THE NEXT FEW WEEKS)
This newsletter will endeavor to proffer pithy insights, merciless wordplay, widespread panic—it seems panic might actually be a sane reaction to Trump—and historical perspective in the coming year. I may even offer a deathless, straight-forward, entirely credible account of the future of Artificial Intelligence (just kidding). Plus other stuff I haven’t yet figured out…perhaps even a free garden tour with Sanity Goddess! (Or maybe not.)
So get ‘em while they’re hot because, as Sanity Matriarch used to say, in her rich Outer Borough accent: Yah Nevah Know! If Trump wins, it may prove difficult to publish from one of his promised concentration camps. This could be Sanity’s last gasp. Don’t miss it!
Might be easier to sell sanity if you didn't quote so much fakeness. Tom Edsall and Brian Klass may affect to believe the MSM is uncritical of Trump, that Pelosi Productions told us the truth about Jan 6, that Joe Biden's primary deficiency is occasionally misspeaking, and so on, but one suspects they're merely pretending. "How is it possible...?" they ask, feigning simultaneous ignorance and curiosity about Trump's support, as if the MAGA movement were tight-lipped about its grievances.
No one is buying any of this. Even Biden supporters only pretend to believe it, out of desperate hope that louder professions of faith and solidarity will keep the balloon aloft through just this one more election. Level with us, Joe.
If Trump wins in 2024, true journalism will cease to be! Trump’s staff (cult executives) will either write all the news or will coerce a few journalistic sycophants to write the “gospel according to Trump!”