Is Trump Still Dying?
A continuing series with a guaranteed happy ending
Getty photographers have repeatedly captured images of Donald Trump’s diseased hand, which he attempts to conceal with copious layers of Earl Sheib. Trump also attempts his own literal sleight-of-hand tricks in public, so no one can see the hideous appendage. Much like his tariff policy, this obviously doesn’t work. (Notice these images from the recent White House congressional ball.)
Trump has also apparently taken up the curious hobby of recreational MRIs. He’s had two physicals at Walter Reed just this year alone — pity the doctors and nurses who have to carefully examine his body. Trump claims that he has no idea why he received an MRI, as if he’d consent to the procedure without an explanation. An MRI scan takes detailed pictures of the inside of your body. According to the National Health Service, MRIs are used to help “diagnose conditions, plan treatment, and check how well treatment is working.”
A couple weeks ago, Trump was asked if he’d release the MRI results. His response was his typical unhinged bluster.
“If they want to release my MRI it’s ok with me,” Trump said. “It’s perfect like my phone call where I got impeached.” He of course lashed out when the reporter dared ask what specific part of his body was scanned.
“I have no idea,” Trump snapped. “It was just an MRI. It wasn’t the brain because I took a cognitive test and aced it, which you would be incapable of doing.” He keeps insisting he “aced” these cognitive tests he keeps receiving. The proof for such a claim is lacking. Once again, cognitive tests aren’t prescribed for fun, but are often used to screen older people for the condition known as mild cognitive impairment, particularly if they’ve demonstrated issues with memory, thinking, or other brain functions. Trump’s social media feed and rambling hate rallies would offer ample reason to suspect cognitive impairment. Trump was never a smart man but he’s even less coherent than usual. That’s when he manages to remain conscious during official meetings
Trump’s health issues are relevant information for the public. Once again, we are left to wonder if Trump is dying. Well, other people might wonder. I’m already moved on to “daring to hope.”
Last week, during a White House press briefing, a reporter committed actual journalism and asked Trump’s professional liar Karoline Leavitt about the bandages on his hands and his multiple cognitive tests.
“I obviously don’t have that in front of me,” Leavitt said with her usual lack of shame. “As for the bandages on the hand, we’ve given you an explanation for that. The president is literally constantly shaking hands.”
The White House has gone with this excuse for months now. Even though Trump’s a Boomer, they don’t bother trying to pass off his bruised hand as a pickleball injury. No, he simply can’t stop shaking hands.
Trump is an admitted germaphobe who has called the handshake “barbaric.” He’s also known for his awkward, aggressive handshakes, which a CNN reporter once described as the “yank and pull” and the “grab and jerk.” If turning a simple greeting into another display of dominance has seriously injured Trump teeny hand, I’d be delighted, but it seems like the truth is much worse (for him, I mean). You can tell by how touchy Trump is over the talk about his health.
Likely parroting fascist adviser Stephen Miller, Trump ranted on social media that it was “seditious, perhaps even treasonous” for the media to suggest that he’s aging in place at the White House. Trump fancies himself a king, rather than an elected official in representative democracy, which reminds me of the scene in The Crown where King George learns from his doctor that he has terminal cancer and his royal advisers have kept this from him so he could “throw himself into his work without undue stress and worry,” until presumably he drops dead while shaking hands. (Watch below.)
While I do have a specific bottle of vintage champagne in mind for the moment when Trump departs this earth, I don’t share any particular optimism that Republicans will magically become less fascist-inclined once he’s gone. They’ve all seen what a Trump has gotten away with thanks to an enabling Congress and corrupt Supreme Court.
Max Burns wrote a piece for Dame Magazine that examines what a JD Vance presidency might look like. “A political chameleon with no fixed values,” Burns writes, “even Vance’s former Senate colleagues struggle to pin down who he is or what he truly believes.”
I might quibble with the assertion that Vance has “no fixed values.” A compelling argument can be made that deep-seated misogyny and cultural resentment have always motivated him. He perhaps once believed the appearance of proprietary and decency was necessary to advance in a political party whose leaders were more like Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan. Now, that the GOP is an unabashed incel gathering, Vance feels right at home.
Unlike Trump, who takes his own race-baiting rhetoric as a reflection of the true state of American society, Vance’s own memoir and past public comments suggest he’s aware the racist dogwhistles he’s pumping out are lies. But it would appear that Vance also understands that assuming the external forms of Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric would allow him an almost unchecked hand to build a personal power base that differs drastically from the one Trump assembled for his own political campaigns. Nowhere is that clearer than in the constellation of Silicon Valley power players, investment bankers, and ambitious technocrats Vance keeps as a core part of his inner circle.
Vance possess Trump’s pettiness, cruelty, and aversion to the truth. He lacks Trump’s cult-like charisma, but that has only succeeded in getting Trump elected. If Trump dies in office, Vance won’t have to win an election, and he’ll have the full force of the government to keep him in power, regardless of his approval rating. That’s not a pleasant thought, but I won’t allow it to diminish the pleasure I take in Trump’s obvious decline.