For much of the world’s media, Donald Trump’s affliction with Covid-19 has been some kind of karmic justice, a sort of divine retribution for his insouciant handling of the epidemic. You get the distinct impression, reading between bilious lines of condemnation, that in the view of the commentator class, the only truly condign outcome to this latest episode in the Trump melodrama would be his timely demise, just weeks before the election.
It may have been his stubborn failure to die, in fact, as much as his apparently negligent behaviour in getting infected and perhaps exposing others to the virus, that was the main reason for much of the outrage expressed in the past week.
The operatic return to the White House on Monday, the flourish of self-unmasking on the balcony, was variously described on TV and in print as some sort of grotesque homage to Benito Mussolini or Eva Peron, two equally colourful and controversial historical figures who also, it should be noted, died somewhat before their time.
Both the president and his critics thrive on this never-ending antiphony of rage and outrage. The only thing in America larger than Mr Trump’s capacity for self-absorption is the media’s capacity to fulminate about him. But the show is getting old, the melodrama becoming too familiar for an audience that is simply exhausted. It looks increasingly likely that Mr Trump is confronting electoral, if not actual mortality, next month, and it may well be that the main reason is as much to do with simple popular fatigue. An enervated electorate, drained by the virus and lockdown, fearful about their livelihoods, alarmed about the very future of America as a unified nation, may simply have had enough of this craziness.
You may not much like Mr Trump but you certainly can’t deny his near-infinite capacity to occupy the limelight. Not long after his return to the White House from his brief stay at the Walter Reed medical centre last weekend, he was at it again. Just hours before Mike Pence, his vice-president, was due to sit down for a primetime debate with his Democratic opponent, Kamala Harris, Mr Trump took to Twitter to deliver a lengthy update on his progress in battling Covid.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 5, 2020
Religious observance is declining in America, but politicians, especially Republican ones, are still expected to make the usual obeisances towards it. Mr Trump, in an unaccustomed moment of modesty, attributed his brush with the malady to God. In a passage that could have been drawn from Exodus, he claimed that the Almighty had used the plague to send a message to his people: in this case, that the antibody cocktail Mr Trump had been given was the remedy to the virus that the world had been waiting for.
He singled out for praise the American companies Regeneron and Eli Lilly, two of the drugmakers producing the therapy. Those of us of a more conventional religious disposition might question whether God really does product promotions for pharmaceutical companies, but the president was clear.
A MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT! pic.twitter.com/uhLIcknAjT
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 7, 2020
Vice-presidential debates are never very consequential, even in normal times. These are not normal times and this is not a normal week. Not long after Mr Pence and Ms Harris had battled it out, more courteously than Mr Trump and Mr Biden had conducted themselves in their first debate last week, the president was back first thing Thursday morning, once again demonstrating his unstinting need for attention.
Earlier, the Commission on Presidential Debates had announced that the second debate between the two main candidates, scheduled for next week in Florida, would be conducted virtually rather than in person. They didn’t state the obvious but Mr Trump’s infection, along with that of much of the White House and other senior staff, presumably inclined them to caution. Mr Trump told the Fox Business network that he would not take part. “I’m not going to waste my time on a virtual debate,” he said.
The president’s performance in the first debate was so widely condemned, and seemed to be followed by such a significant fall in his opinion poll ratings, that cynics immediately assumed this was an excuse to avoid another debacle. But it fits better with Mr Trump’s larger narrative of his Covid experience. The president insists he is - less than a week after testing positive for the virus, and thanks in part to those divinely distributed drugs - fighting fit. He’s eager to demonstrate in person what he has been saying for months, that the virus is survivable and manageable and that life must go on as normal. It fits with his “Be not afraid” message on his return to the White House, and in the process he is doubtless hoping to draw attention again to his own vigour, in apparent contrast to a frail and fearful Mr Biden. In the end, both sides agreed to postpone next week’s debate by a week.
It’s not clear that any of this will have much effect. With just a few weeks until the election, the Democrat’s lead in the polls is widening - his average lead is now about 10 per cent.
Polls have been wrong before and could be wrong again. Events could yet intervene to change enough minds. But it’s getting late. For all the outrage Mr Trump routinely generates - the denunciations of his recklessness, his irresponsibility, the extremism of his language, his trashing of political norms - it’s hard to shake the impression that too many Americans are now too tired of it all to give him another four years.
The Times
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