"Though this be madness, yet there is method in it."—Shakespeare (Polonius,  act 2, scene 2, Hamlet)

How apt a description of the ongoing madness of Donald Trump, the purpose/method of which in its latest exemplification is to put those critical of him on the defensive . . . to point to an alternative culprit for misdeeds attributed to him . . . to steer attention off into the wilderness. To wit: suddenly out of nowhere his recent nocturnal tweets charging that former President Obama had tapped his phone prior to the election.  According to “reports,” he said.

Actually no such “reports” exist, unless one counts baseless vague conspiracy conjectures formulated by the likes of Fox News and alt-right Breitbart News. The latter, of course, was the proving ground of Trump’s chief advisor Steve Bannon. The FBI has demanded that the Justice Department retract this latest blatant lie by Donald Trump, which actually amounts to his having charged that agency, along with former President Obama, of breaking the law. A charge totally unsubstantiated by any evidence.

One can continue to visualize Trump in the continuing words of Shakespeare’s Polonius, who also said of the target of his remarks (Hamlet) that “He has a way with words, as crazy people often do, and that sane people don’t have a talent for.”

Our narcissistic,  thin-skinned chief executive,  throughout his campaign and during his tenure to date (about a quarter of which has been spent in Florida hob-nobbing with the ultra-rich) has been pitifully obvious in his outright lies (now known as “alternate facts”) and juvenile efforts to put his opponents and critics on the defensive instead of factually refuting their charges or answering their queries. He attempts to pull his critics into the gutter by dragging a parade of red-herring distractions under the noses of the public.  He apparently was thrilled and emboldened by the success of his “crooked Hillary” name-calling campaign. While his surrogates appear to have been chatting readily with Russian diplomats, he successfully made Hillary’s e-mail service the determination of who should be president of the United States.

He continues to blunder along his road to success in the crude manner of an uncaring bull with diarrhea. It will not end well for Donald Trump.  No matter how loudly he trumpets his Big Lie, he will be unable to muzzle or destroy the reputation of America’s Free Press via mere name-calling—“false news,” “lying press,” “made-up facts,” etc. He will not be able to lead the public, via blind ignorance,  to some sort of self-destructing “victory.”

 “There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge’.”—Isaac Asimov

Trump panders to that cult of ignorance. It all sort of makes one wonder how public education will be faring under his administration—early education, general upgrading, college tuition, student loans, etc.

A recent survey revealed that nearly two-thirds of American adults cannot name all three branches of government. “Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”—Martin Luther King Jr.

It’s interesting that since Trump took office, subscriptions have boomed at the New York Times, the leading target of his attack on the media. But remembering his success with his ridiculous “Crooked Hillary,” he persists in assaulting the public mind with reference to the “failing New York Times” in tweets seemingly inspired basically by little more than paranoia and the dark of night. He is vastly outclassed by the legitimate news media; and an honorable and resolute Press will persevere as it continues to ferret out the truth and publish it.

Breaking news continues to illustrate the predatory nature of the Trump administration. The current proposed GOP substitute for a portion of Obamacare heavily favors the rich and is rife with tax cuts to that effect—including also similar benefits for the insurance and pharmeceutical industries. The GOP’s plan also guts Medicaid expansion, defunds Planned Parenthood, and sunsets a federal rule that requires that qualified insurance plans cover things like mental health care, maternity care, and pediatric dental and vision care, among other things.

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