Every ridiculous action taken by Donald Trump makes a little more sense when viewed through the prism of re-election. Every terrible decision, every whiny outburst, every childish tweet is issued with the goal of helping Trump get re-elected, and of course re-election explains his horrifyingly incompetent response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Rather than safely and sanely handling the crisis, Trump continues to desperately rush things along like a Mountain Dew-guzzling little boy in the back seat of his parents’ car chanting, “Are we there yet?” Trump doesn’t know much, but he at least understands that the deeper the economy collapses into a historically massive recession, the worse his chances for re-election get, even with Russia’s help, even with disgruntled Bernie supporters refusing to vote for Joe Biden, even with voter ID and the possibility of limited mail-in ballots, and even with his $1 billion disinformation “Death Star” across the Potomac from Georgetown. 

Read the rest of Bob Cesca’s piece at Salon.