TRUMP'S CAMPAIGN TALK

As you know, we just elected a president who either sexually assaults women or lies and says he sexually assaults women in order to get other guys to think he sexually assault women.

Donald Trump, famously, dismissed the whole bang-bus episode as "locker room talk."

By which he apparently means he was lying and everybody involved knew it—and you should, too. That's what locker room talk is, according to Trump: guys swapping lies about all the vaginas they have tried to get into.

And because everybody knows it's lies, no harm, no foul. So shut up about it.

Of course, there were women who came forward to substantiate his alleged actions, women Trump has yet to sue for defamation as he said he would. Still time for that, I guess.

But it got me thinking.

I had been wondering if Trump was aware of all the lies and exaggerations he told on the campaign trail.

Stuff like knowing ISIS better than the generals, and having a plan to defeat those bastards quickly and easily. Or a promise to replace Obamacare with something better and cheaper. Or that he would investigate Hillary Clinton for a variety of crimes. Or proclaiming repeatedly that if she became president she would confiscate all our guns. Or maintaining at every point that everybody else was lying about everything.

And much, much more. It wobbles the brain to contemplate the entire list.

Looking back, I was wondering if all those dubious statements passed through Trump's magnificent noggin and out his pouty mouth without being properly vetted. I was wondering if this was some sort of pathological weakness that might rise up to destroy us in the future.

But then it occurred to me something else might be going on. What if all the jacked-up nonsense that tumbled out of his pie-hole was just "campaign talk."

Like locker room talk, see, only it's stuff you just naturally say on the campaign trail. Stuff everybody knows is nonsense, and which nobody takes seriously. Because it's not meant to be taken seriously. It's just a bunch of crap people say when they're campaigning for national office in America.

Is that the way Trump saw it? Just a game he fell into, that he played along with, because that's what everybody does? Considering the gap between reality and political rhetoric, this conclusion is vaguely plausible.

Or wait! Is it actually true? Does everybody (but me) know better than to listen to a word any politician says?

Whatever the truth of that, the campaign is over now. Unfortunately, Trump can't stop tweeting trash as if it were still on going. Is that worrisome?

What if he thinks there is something called "presidential talk," a barrage of blather that all presidents have to blab out, and which everybody knows means nothing.

Trump has already questioned (more than once) the One China policy, and has wondered out loud why he can't use nuclear weapons. He appears to be considering a new nuclear arms race with his pal, V. Putin—and promises to win it. Yay!

(Good news there: Maybe he can nuke Mexico into paying for the Wall.)

But don't worry, boys and girls. No harm can come to this country owing to the words Mr. Trump says. Because everybody in the world knows our presidents are just playing a game.

Right?

(Quick, somebody remind China it's all a stupid game.)

TRUMP'S GOLDEN GLOBE

Without mentioning the man by name, while accepting a lifetime achievement award at the Golden Globes, Meryl Streep pointed out Donald Trump's penchant for being a bully and attacking those of lesser power.

Trump responded by calling Streep a highly overrated actress. Which should come as no surprise.

It's what he does. He can't help himself from attempting to blunt criticism by disparaging the source of that criticism.

If the New York Times prints an editorial attacking him, Trump points out the newspaper is a failing money-making operation. (Aren't pretty much all newspapers losing money these days?)

When Mike Pence caught some flak from the cast of the Broadway hit Hamilton, Trump defended his vice presidential choice by calling the show overrated.

It's the man's go-to move.

What's missing is any logical link to make his comment in any way legitimate.

Streep's prowess as an actress is unrelated to her ability to notice bad behavior in other people, despite the fact such ability is likely related to her craft.

The worse actress in the history of the world could still make a valid point about Trump's boorishness.

And I doubt anyone could make the connection between the New York Times and money problems by saying it was exactly this sort of off-the-wall and outrageously false opinion about public figures that is causing the slow-motion downfall of the paper.

And so forth.

Trump's attacks are all ridiculous on the face of them, and he seems unaware of his precarious position. Does he really think his response is an actual refutation?

If so, then his position has to be that winning is everything. That success makes you right—by definition. And failure in business makes all your opinions false—by definition.

Trump still apparently thinks he won a massive victory over Hillary Clinton. Is he really that delusional?

Of course he is. He's human. This sort of loopy nonsense is what defines us. We know what we know and we can't be wrong.

Sure, other people can be wrong. But not us!

The CIA is wrong about the Russian connection to the hacking of our recent election because they were wrong about Weapons of Mass Destruction more than a decade ago.

Pure logic, right?

Besides, the chairman of the DNC made it so easy to hack his emails that anyone could have done it—which means the Russians couldn't possibly have done so.

President Trump will never be able to stop tweeting out his vast store of cranial crap. Someone—or some country—will say something he doesn't like, and Trump's finely-tuned golden globe will whirl into operation and produce the perfect comeback.

It's inevitable as the coming daylight.

Or is that the heat-flash of enemy nukes going off?