Washington (CNN) — There have been many weeks when the Trump train has looked like it's going to jump the tracks. But in the seven days since the Republican convention, the President has come perhaps as close as he ever has to a full derailment.
The outrages, conspiracy theories and drama have come so fast that it's almost impossible to believe
Donald Trump can keep this up for another eight weeks until Election Day. But as Democratic nominee
Joe Biden begins to travel and to offer an alternative vision of sober presidential-style leadership, events of the last few days have clarified the personality clash and issues that will decide the race.
On Thursday, even the President and the White House seemed to think
he might have gone too far with his suggestion that
North Carolinians try to vote twice to test election security, a potential crime and the latest attempt by the President to cast as illegitimate an election that polls suggest he may lose. At a rally on Thursday in Pennsylvania, Trump again said mail-in ballots are a "disgrace," charging that dogs have received them in the mail. He advised his supporters to "follow" their ballots and go vote if they're not tabulated.
In just the latest sign that astounding developments are the norm in Trump's presidency, he pulled aside the White House press pool after returning to Andrews Air Force base from his rally on Thursday night to
deny that he had mocked the sacrifice of America's war dead and had yet again insulted the late Sen. John McCain following an article published in
The Atlantic magazine Thursday about him disparaging the military. CNN has not independently verified The Atlantic's reporting.
Biden issued a statement saying that if the allegations were true, they would be "yet another marker of how deeply President Trump and I disagree about the role of the President of the United States."
Trump will ignite a new uproar soon enough. It's clearer than ever that his platform for this election is his own wild behavior that animates his hyperbolic claim that a Democratic presidency would see the suburbs torched by rioters -- not the statesmanlike script
choreographed at the RNC.
No President in modern history has gone into a reelection race warning that the process of choosing a government that is the bedrock of American democracy is illegitimate. Trump's conduct risks a full-on post-election constitutional crisis.
As well as the North Carolina furor, Trump this week claimed that plane-loads of dark-clad rioters were crisscrossing the country. He appeared to justify the actions of a teenage vigilante who killed two protesters in Kenosha, Wisconsin. He
denied he had a series of "mini strokes," sparking speculation about his health. It emerged that the President and Russia, yet again,
are on the same page, as an intelligence briefing revealed that Moscow is also spreading misinformation about mail-in voting to harm the integrity of the election. And he
mocked Biden for wearing a mask as the country continues to lead the world in coronavirus cases, with more than 6 million infections.
Trump also visited Kenosha, the latest US city consumed by racial tensions and protests that turned violent following the shooting of a Black man by police. Trump didn't bring reconciliation, however, and
appeared to shut down Black pastors about to talk about racial injustice. He compared the brutality of police officers who shoot armed Black men to golfers with the yips who choke over a "three foot putt."
And as always, the President has been ignoring the worst domestic crisis since World War II, a pandemic that has killed 185,000 Americans and counting -- as
a key model predicts 410,000 US coronavirus deaths by the end of the year.
On Thursday, hours after final death figures for the day before showed another 1,000 lost Americans, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany played a video of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi without a mask on a loop at the start of her briefing. The speaker's slip exposed her to deserved accusations of hypocrisy and was a bad gaffe. Yet it was hardly the biggest crisis facing the nation that needs to be addressed by a White House that has repeatedly demonstrated a profound lack of seriousness during the pandemic.
Still, while Trump's constantly disruptive behavior and refusal to play the role of a traditional president horrifies Beltway elites, it's exactly what makes him attractive to supporters who long ago soured on conventional politicians. The more he trolls the media, the more his base and his conservative media cheerleaders love it. The question is whether a President who looked every day for four years like he's waging an endless GOP primary campaign can secure a path to victory without broadening his base.