Trump is not just a clown. He's Pennywise.

Many, many months ago, I wrote that Donald Trump and Joe Biden were both clowns- but that Biden would win, because he's Emmett Kelly, whereas President Trump was Pennywise.

That's the way it's turning out. Biden is essentially the Democratic version of George W. Bush, an essentially intelligent and capable man with an uncanny knack for stepping into verbal dogpiles. Dubya was generally incoherent when he was having a bad day, whereas Joe tends to say things that are more substantively embarrassing. But in both cases, we're talking about gaffes by fundamentally serious men.

There is nothing serious, at least on one level, about Donald Trump. He's a lightweight, an ignoramus, a fool- someone who should not be allowed in the Oval Office on a guided tour. He is simply not capable of doing the job. I thought even back in 2016- it was my one comfort- that there was simply no way the man was not going to screw up so badly that he would be denied a second term. I thought he would probably be impeached or forced to resign; I sadly overestimated the integrity of the Senate's Republican caucus, and the degree to which in both stature and integrity its membership had fallen from the levels of quality, patriotism, and integrity it exhibited during Watergate. The charges against Richard Nixon were less serious than those against Donald Trump, and Mr. Nixon didn't essentially confess. But the Republican caucus, like the Republican Party, wasn't into rationalization and denial back then nearly to the extent both are today.

But on another level, the case of Donald Trump is far more serious. He isn't simply a little venial and paranoid like President Nixon was. He is certainly a narcissist and may very well be a sociopath.

If there is any doubt about that, consider that when hospitalized with a virus which has run as far amok in America as it has largely because of his own foolishness and incompetence, he suddenly decided to endanger the health and even the lives of members of his Secret Service detail by leaving the hospital and going out for a drive while sharing a car with them. Nor was it their health and their lives alone that he was endangering. It was the health and the lives of their families, their friends, and everyone with whom they might come into contact.

Did Mr. Trump get COVID from his staff or from his wife, or was he the one who infected them? We may never know, but it was his negligence that turned the West Wing into a gigantic Petri dish. He was the one responsible for the superspreader rally in Tulsa that seems to have killed Herman Cain. By any measurement, there are tens of thousands of Americans who have died of COVID-19 who would still be alive today if nearly anyone else had been president during the pandemic.

Better Emmett Kelly than Pennywise. Better a clown who embarrasses himself once in a while than one whose clownishness sickens and kills people. The incumbent President of the United States is a cruel, nasty man who is not only irresponsible and erratic but dangerous and even lethal. As his contraction of COVID through his own negligence and his utter lack of concern for the well-being of his staff and his supporters and those tasked with keeping him safe demonstrates even more than his irresponsible handling of the nation's collective health and safety, he is a danger both to himself and to others and needs to be stopped this November.

ADDENDUM: This.