Perhaps you were awake last night when news broke that a former reality TV host had tested positive for Covid-19, as did his wife, who hates Christmas. It was a hell of a time to be on the internet. Someone on The Washington Post’s social team was definitely awake, because they were able to remove a previously-scheduled tweet in a real damn hurry. Gee, I wonder why:
Now, it apparently wasn’t intentional—and of course it wasn’t—but that doesn’t make it any less bonkers. The tweet in question linked to an opinion column from Eugene Robinson. At the time of this writing, it bears the headline, “Vote for Biden and get Trump out of your head.” And that is its central, very reasonable argument:
Through repetition and force of will, Trump creates his own “reality.” But we know it is not really real, so we must constantly spend time and effort dispelling the miasma of mendacity that pours out of Trump’s fog machine of a mouth. Doing so is exhausting, Sisyphean, psychic labor that drains the soul. Yet it is necessary — because the words of a president, by definition, are consequential — and so the only way to end this epistemological trench warfare is to end Trump’s presidency and send him home to Mar-a-Lago, where he can mutter at the walls.