“Trump has always been malignant and incompetent. As president, he has coasted on economic growth, narrowly averted crises of his own making, and corrupted the government in ways that many Americans could ignore. But in the pandemic, his vices—venality, dishonesty, self-absorption, dereliction, heedlessness—turned deadly. They produced lies, misjudgments, and destructive interventions that multiplied the carnage. The coronavirus debacle isn’t, as Trump protests, an ‘artificial problem’ that spoiled his presidency. It’s the fulfillment of everything he is.” Slate’s William Saletan with a blow-by-blow account of how the president killed thousands of Americans. It’s worth noting that he still has a perfectly reasonable chance of being reelected. That remarkable disconnect is a more serious threat than he is.

+ “Odious as he may be, Trump is less the cause of America’s decline than a product of its descent. As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country.” Wade Davis: The Unraveling of America. Don’t read these accounts because you hate America. Read them because you love it.