Trump Goes Way Off Script Again

Rick Klein: “Raise your hand if you thought Afghanistan was the only war he was committing to this week. A day after President Trump called on the nation to ‘heal our divisions within,’ and where he sent thousands of additional Americans into combat, he spent 80-plus wild minutes picking at the nation’s freshest wounds.”

“The fact that he was eager to relitigate his response to Charlottesville – to suggest, falsely, that it was just a matter of the ‘dishonest media’ twisting his words – displays a stunning lack of understanding about the severity of the damage he did last week, to himself, his party, and maybe the nation. In understanding Trump’s strategy, tallying the deceptions, half-truths, non-truths, and selective recitation of nonfacts isn’t close to enough. Perhaps he can deceive himself, and even get many of what remain of his followers in the same frenzied place as he was in Phoenix Tuesday night. But President Trump is getting smaller even as he gets louder.”

Said Trump: “Most people think I’m crazy to have done this. And I think they’re right.”

James Hohmann: “The bigger picture is that the president is in denial. His tendency to gloss over mistakes and pass the buck by recasting history in terms most favorable to himself was on vivid display.”

New York Magazine: 23 outrageous moments from Trump’s rally in Phoenix.