Tuesday Morning

During Watergate, the comedian Jackie Mason had a great joke. He said, referring to Richard Nixon, "Because of him, I get up every morning and run out to see if my furniture is still there." Nixon created that kind of mindset in this country…that constant sense of "We don't know what he's going to do but it won't be good." But it's worse with Trump.

Each morning when I awake, I fumble for my cell phone by the bed, open my app for news headlines and wonder, "Well, let's see how things got worse today." There's always something. This morning, it seems to be how bad things are getting to be in Syria and how little thought and consultation Trump seems to have had in making that decision. Hell, even Lindsey Graham couldn't get behind it. The bonus "how bad things are" is how bad they are for Rudy Giuliani.

Remember how for weeks here, I've been saying that it wouldn't surprise me if Trump wasn't on the 2020 final ballot? I'm still not predicting that'll be the case but doesn't it look a tiny bit more possible than it did two weeks ago?

Yes, yes…I know some of you — including some who like Trump even less than I do — wish I'd stop writing about this stuff and would instead talk about comic books or old comedians or cole slaw or where Frank Ferrante's appearing. (I can help you with that last one: In less than an hour, he's appearing across a table from me for lunch.) But the premise of this blog is that I write what's on my mind and it's tough to get Trump off it for very long. You're annoyed that I'm not providing your desired means of escape for a few moments because you find it tough to stop thinking about him, too.

This will pass. It may not pass as quickly as we wanted but I'll tell you this: I didn't expect him to be in this much trouble this far before Election Day. I really didn't. Until the ballots are counted and we feel confident they've been counted honestly — if indeed that happens — I will never say Trump can't win a second term. But it feels good that the trajectory of his popularity is only going in one direction and it ain't up.