Regarding the May 20 article “Trump allies lining up doctors to prescribe rapid reopening in U.S.,” Team Trump attempting to use media spin to subvert scientific facts isn’t surprising, since Trump’s disdain for reality and rules is even more predictable than Japanese trains’ arrival times.
For example, Trump’s refusal to wear a face covering during his recent Ford factory tour — ignoring explicit company policy — was a given. In disrespecting Ford — and flagrantly spurning Michigan law — he followed page one of his frayed political playbook.
Along with Trump’s perpetual eschewing of reality — mandatory on Team Trump — three interconnected factors frame his loathing of truth and directives: narcissism, insecurity and hubris.
First, narcissism: So unfathomable are the depths of Trump’s self-worship that he could never imagine having his "perfect" face covered on camera with anything but buckets of self-tanning lotion and anti-wrinkle cream.
Second, insecurity: So demoniacally focused is Trump with projecting a Kim Jong Un-like image of what he considers "strength" that he thinks accepting expert scientific opinions about COVID-19 would be like Superman promoting Kryptonite.
Third, hubris: So illiterate is Trump about constitutional and other legal limits to his power that, blissfully afloat in the Trumpiverse, he thinks he’s immune to all laws — even scientifically indisputable ones like the nature of viruses.
As always, it’s impossible to conceal the immense irony of Trump’s infantile impertinence: He won't cover his face on film, but a figurative covering is tattooed across his entire being — one of diabolical deceit; fantastical fabrications; counterfeit condolences; and cretinous contempt for critics on a corpuscular level.
If that covering was removed, then Trump would be revealed for everything he truly is: a perfidious, petulant pretender; a false-faced, finger-pointing finagler; a vacuous volcano of verbal vapor; an impudent, insensitive, imbecilic ingrate.
The opinions expressed in this letter to the editor are the writer's own and do not necessarily reflect the policies of The Japan Times.