A White House of Dynamite

Trump's Nuke Delusions on Display

Donald Trump loves nukes the way a 10-year-old loves fireworks: not for what they do, but for how loud they are and how much everyone looks at him when he shows the other kids the M-80s in his gym bag.

The 60 Minutes interview was, naturally, a farrago of lies, a reeking gumbo of Trumpian self-regard, open boasts about his own corruption, and his favorite tell, “If I wanted to, I could,” on everything from immigration to the Insurrection Act to punishing his enemies.

We watched it with mounting horror, knowing someone in the editing room made repeated decisions to let the lies stand. Norah O’Donnell played by the rules and Trump, as Trump does, ate the pieces. If Bari Weiss wanted to convince me and millions of others she was going to preserve 60 Minutes as an investigative standout, last night’s show was… less than desirable.

For this Cold War guy, his answers on nuclear weapons were what really made me climb the walls.

I have long waited for the moment he orders an aboveground test just for the transgressive fun of it.

As with so many things where I was told, “Trump would never do that…,” I fear my role as the Cassandra of Bad Things Trump Will Do (always right, never believed) may be headed for a new, terrible moment where he has become Donnie, Destroyer of Nuclear Treaties.