Over the last couple of weeks, we've seen Donald Trump question Kamala Harris's race and ethnicity in front of a group of Black journalists; hold a dumpster fire of a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort, in which he claimed the crowd at his January 6th rally was bigger than the one that attended Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I have a Dream" speech in 1963; accuse Harris of using artificial intelligence to manipulate the size of her crowd at a rally in Detroit; and appear in an infomercial with Elon Musk on Twitter [I refuse to call it X], in which both men took turns stroking their own enormous egos.
Unhinged doesn't begin to describe Trump's behavior. The size of Harris's crowds and her subsequent rise in the polls has really gotten under his skin. To paraphrase the late, great Archie Bunker, this isn't your typical ding bat we're seeing here; this is super ding bat.
Odds makers are now speculating how long it will be before Trump fires his campaign managers. The over / under appears to be right after the Democratic National Convention in Chicago next week. For a man who looks at the word responsibility the same way vampires look at sunrises, that would fit right in with his modus operandi. When in doubt, blame someone else. It's worked his whole life, so why stop now?
But here's the thing: while Trump's erratic behavior is both disturbing, as well as predictable, it is not accidental; it's actually on purpose. You see, there's a method to the man's madness that most of his critics still don't get. Not only does he know perfectly well what he's doing, he's made a calculated decision that this is the only way he can win the presidency. I'll explain.
As I mentioned in my last piece, most of the voters who intend on casting a ballot this November have already chosen who they're voting for. The top issues in the race - the economy, the border, abortion, democracy - have all been factored into their decision. The 5-7 percent of the remaining electorate - the undecideds, as they're known - have not yet been swayed by either candidate. In typical fashion, they're waiting until the last minute before making up their minds. Whoever gets the lion's share of this group will spend the next four years in the White House.
Harris's selection of Tim Walz as her running mate was a tacit admission by her campaign that they believe this will be a turnout election. The Trump campaign apparently agrees, hence the hyperbolic outbursts from the top of the ticket and the limped-dick compliance from the bottom. Trump knows full well he isn't going to expand his base; therefore he must make certain that that base is motivated to vote for him. What better motivation than to re-enact "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" for them? In Trump World, down is up and up is down. What would certainly spell doom for most political candidates has had the opposite effect of making him that much more appealing to his supporters. The man really could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and get away with it.
Now, whether Trump actually succeeds in his portrayal of Jack Nicholson remains to be seen. This is, after all, his third campaign, and there are clear signs, even among his devotees, that familiarity may be breeding a certain amount of contempt. At several of his rallies, people have been seen leaving early. Arenas that have seating capacities of 20,000 or more are barely half filled. As one political pundit put it, it's kind of like going to an Eagles concert. Once you hear Hotel California, the evening's kind of over.
In 2016, Trump had the advantage of running against a very flawed opponent in Hillary Clinton. She made one unforced error after another, practically handing him the election. Four years later, he ran against Joe Biden, who ran one of the most disciplined campaigns in modern history. This year, he's running against an opponent in Harris, who has, thus far, not made a single mistake; though to be fair, it's still quite early in the campaign. Anything can happen over the next eleven weeks.
But while the names on the ballot may have changed, the playbook hasn't. Trump's one, lone super power has been his ability to drag his opponents down to his level. In 2016, it was Lyin' Ted, Little Marco and Crooked Hillary; in 2020, it was Sleepy Joe. This time around, he's struggling to come up with a nickname for Harris, and it's driving him up the wall. So he's throwing darts at the blackboard hoping one of them will stick. To her credit, Harris hasn't taken the bait, which is also driving him nuts.
The thought of losing to a disciplined, strong-willed, African-American woman is something a sociopath like Trump can't fathom. The longer this goes on, the more erratic his behavior will get. If, as expected, Harris comes out of her convention with a two-point bump in the polls, we might see Trump go full Elmer J. Fudd on us.
How fitting that a man who has spent his entire adult life taking advantage of the gullible while avoiding any responsibility for his actions, should have his comeuppance against a career prosecutor whose specialty is holding people like him accountable.
Oh, irony, where is thy sting?
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