Donald Trump is a man who only speaks of himself, and his circumstances, in superlatives.

Nobody knows more about deal-making that him. Nobody knows more about American history than him. Nobody understands military strategy better than him. The economy has never been as good as under him. No President has ever been more on top of things than him. He is less racist than any President, ever. Relations between the races are better under him than under him. Nobody had an inauguration crowd bigger than his. He is being harassed by Congress, more than any President, ever.

It is always “the most, the biggest, the best, the worst,” depending on what self-flatters.

This is, I learned before him, the standard behavior of people who know precisely nothing. For them, things are always more like they are now than they have ever been now, and this is honestly impervious to subsequent provision of facts. They will tell you that New York City currently has the highest murder rate ever, and you can tell them that, actually, it peaked in the early 1980s and that the numbers have been heading downward ever since, and they will simply go to the response preferred by the ignorant, the “All I Know.” “All I Know is, it’s never been as bad as it is now.” A simple restatement of the thesis, documenting that data bounced off the force fields and refused to enter.

Donald Trump is the President of the people with force fields protecting them from data.

And I am thinking of this in particular because of his current statement that he works longer hours than any President, ever; a claim that I am sure he makes without any consultation of a history textbook.

Richard Nixon was so proud of the hours worked that, even as the wolves started circling, he defensively invoked him in his speech. “I work 12 to 14 hours a day for the American People!” he protested, and the thing is, this was wholly believable; this was a guy who, urged to take a photo op on the beach, didn’t change out of his suit or find some appropriate shoes. Carter was just as inexhaustible, and was such a detail man that he ludicrously took out some time from his Presidency to draw up a schedule in a grid, that his staffers could use for reservations on the White House tennis courts. In neither case is this the same thing as being able to use what time they had, always, to make good decisions — and you can count FDR among those who almost always knocked off in time for happy hour — but at bare minimum, they showed up for the job.

Trump, who works a couple of hours a day carving up the nation and spends the rest of his time feeding his rage with Fox News and Twitter, honestly does think, and thinks only because he prefers to think, that he works longer hours than any President ever. He knows it because he wants to think it, and that is the source of all his knowledge, his gut.

But then he also thinks he’s not a racist, that he’s a self-made man, and that he’s a genius.

Tags: Assholes, Donald Trump, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jimmy Carter, Politics, Richard Nixon | Category Politics