The Malignant Cruelty of Donald Trump (The Atlantic article that made Rump go into red rage)

[Celerity]

The president is defaming the memory of a woman who died nearly 20 years ago—and inflicting pain upon her family today.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/05/malignant-cruelty-donald-trump/612097/



“I’m asking you to intervene in this instance because the President of the United States has taken something that does not belong to him—the memory of my dead wife—and perverted it for perceived political gain.” There may be a more damning thing that’s been said about an American president, but none immediately comes to mind. This sentence is from a heartbreaking May 21 letter written by Timothy Klausutis to Jack Dorsey, the CEO of Twitter, asking Dorsey to delete a series of tweets by Donald Trump. Klausutis is the widower of Lori Kaye Klausutis, who died nearly 20 years ago. (Timothy Klausutis, who never remarried, still lives in the house he shared with his wife.) The autopsy conducted at the time of Lori’s death confirmed that it was an accident; she had fainted as the result of a heart condition, hitting her head on a desk. There’s not a thimble of evidence of foul play. But here’s where things go from being tragic to being twisted. When Lori Klausutis died, she worked for then–Republican Representative Joe Scarborough. Today, Scarborough is a fierce critic of the president from his perch at MSNBC, where he co-hosts Morning Joe. That is why the president has been peddling a cruel and baseless conspiracy theory that Scarborough had Klausutis murdered. This is a topic most journalists are inherently reluctant to cover, given the danger that it will draw more attention to a vile lie.

But with the president and his son Don Jr., who between them have more than 85 million Twitter followers, sending out lunatic tweets and calling for “the opening of a Cold Case against Psycho Joe Scarborough,” human decency requires a response. That Donald Trump would resort to conspiracy theories to attack his perceived enemies is hardly a revelation. After all, Trump employed a racist conspiracy theory against Barack Obama, which helped him gain political prominence in the Republican Party, and later claimed that President Obama had wiretapped his phones. During the 2016 primary, Trump linked Ted Cruz’s father, Rafael, to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and retweeted a supporter who claimed that Marco Rubio was ineligible to run because his parents were not natural-born U.S. citizens. Trump suggested that the suicide of Vince Foster, a former aide to President Bill Clinton, and the death of former Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia were murders; that childhood vaccines cause autism; and that windmills cause cancer. He’s claimed that climate change is “a total and very expensive hoax” by China’s government, that a cybersecurity company framed Russia for election interference, that Ukraine was hiding Hillary Clinton’s missing emails, and that voter fraud cost him the popular vote in 2016. (Business Insider provided a useful summary of more than two dozen of Trump’s conspiracy theories in October.)

Conspiracy theories have long been evidence of Trump’s twisted psychology. He has always traveled quite easily from the real world to the twilight zone, depending on which reality suits his needs at the moment. And when someone holds him accountable—when someone calls him out for his incompetence and ethical wrongdoing—conspiracy theories often become his weapon of choice. At such moments, conspiracy theories are fine, but conspiracy theories with the added element of cruelty are even better. Which brings us back to the heartbreaking letter from Timothy Klausutis. Donald Trump doesn’t merely want to criticize his opponents; he takes a depraved delight in inflicting pain on others, even if there’s collateral damage in the process, as is the case with the Klausutis family. There’s something quite sick about it all. A lot of human casualties result from the cruelty of malignant narcissists like Donald Trump—casualties, it should be said, that his supporters in the Republican Party, on various pro-Trump websites and news outlets, and on talk radio are willing to tolerate or even defend. Their philosophy seems to be that you need to break a few eggs to make an omelet. If putting up with Trump’s indecency is the price of maintaining power, so be it.

Will Trump’s white evangelical supporters—Franklin Graham Jr., Robert Jeffress, Eric Metaxas, Mike Huckabee, Ralph Reed—defend his behavior as the perfect embodiment of the New Testament ethic, the credo of Jesus, the message from the Sermon on the Mount? “Blessed are the brutal, for they shall inherit the Earth.” Some people will argue that Trump’s promotion of this conspiracy theory is just his latest distraction, a shiny object to pull our focus away from the human and economic cost of COVID-19. Maybe. But I’m not at all convinced that this will help Trump politically. Remember, Trump’s approval rating was often well under 50 percent even when the economy was doing well and America was at relative peace abroad. There’s plenty of evidence, including the 2018 midterm elections, that Trump’s dehumanizing tactics erode his support, especially among white suburban women. And I rather doubt that people will have forgotten Trump’s reckless handling of the pandemic by November; defaming the memory of a woman who died nearly two decades ago and causing renewed grief for her family isn’t likely to help him with most voters, either. But whatever the political ramifications of this current lie being promulgated by the president, the rest of us need to name it, and to make Trump supporters own it. They are his, and he is theirs.

snip

[dalton99a]

1. We are ruled by an evil monster.

[Chainfire]

8. Trump is just the festering

head of a malignant pimple that is Republicanism. We won't improve our government until we lance the entire boil and sterilize the hole from which it came.

[tulipsandroses]

2. A reporter asked him about the husband's letter. His response, I'm sure they want to know the truth

and went on with his conspiracy theory about this poor man's wife. When you think he can't sink lower, he goes lower than you would ever think.

[smirkymonkey]

3. K&R

We despise him for his cruelty and they love him for it.

He is evil, but what is really disturbing is how he has revealed the sick, hateful underbelly of racism, intolerance and resentment that resides in more than a third of the people of this nation.

Even if he goes away, they will still be with us. I am so tired of feeling sick to my stomach all the time because of him and his kind. I would give anything to bring us back to the relative peace of the Obama years. I'm afraid even if Biden wins, these people will not leave us in peace, ever. And he will never shut the fuck up until he is six feet under.

[a la izquierda]

6. I said yesterday that he's destroyed the US

Not the institutions necessarily, but that’s in part true.
He has opened the Pandora’s box of hatred and that might be very difficult to close.

I’ll be curious to talk to my German friends about this. Like, I need them to explain how a nation heals from hatred. Considering I don’t think we (dominant white society) have ever really healed the wounds of oppression of our indigenous, black or brown brethren, maybe it never happens. I don’t study the US for a living so I just don’t know.

[Hekate]

4. KnR

[mopinko]

5. it's a shame and a crime that so many believed this Liar

for a second. but anyone who doesnt see him now is in for a visit from karma. it wont be pretty.

[kentuck]

9. It's like a TV show...

He's playing to his audience.

[DesertRat]

10. k&r