Donald Trump’s Latest Tweetstorm on ‘Fake News’ May Show Signs of Dementia

For most of Donald Trump’s presidency he has lashed out at what he calls “fake news.” His assaults on the press have been unprecedented in their hostility and absurdity. The result has been an environment that puts reporters at risk of physical attacks by unhinged Republicans and their supporters. That risk was made manifest last week when the GOP congressman from Montana, Greg Gianforte, body-slammed a reporter who was just doing his job.

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Of course, Trump’s definition of the fake news is entirely self-serving. In short it is any news that he doesn’t like. But setting that aside, Trump can’t even keep straight what forms the basis of his objections. Take for instance his Twitter disgorge Sunday morning. After a relatively quiet week while the President was busy embarrassing America overseas, Trump has resumed his pathetic Twimpering:

The use of anonymous sources is nothing new in journalism. It is a credible and necessary method of acquiring information that the public needs to know. Watergate was famously sourced to a figure known at the time only as “Deep Throat.” What’s more, anonymity is just as often a means for politicians to communicate with the public. They all do it, including Trump. Trump has even acted as his own anonymous source under pseudonyms like “John Barron.”

But what’s most troubling about Trump’s Sunday spew is that his outrage at fake news directly contradicts his prior complaints about “leakers” in his administration. He is now claiming that the leaks are “fabricated lies made up by the #FakeNews media,” and that “those sources don’t exist.” But if that’s so, then why did he order Attorney General Jeff Sessions to initiate an investigation into leaks. Was he ordering a probe into something he believes doesn’t occur?

Trump’s current position on leaks also calls into question his firing of former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn. The revelations about his clandestine meetings with Russian operatives were exposed by anonymously sourced news reports. Did Trump fire a top aide based on information he thinks was made up by unscrupulous reporters?

He can’t have it both ways. Either the leaks were credible and accurate and deserving of action, or they were invented and false and ought to have been ignored. Or there’s a third scenario. Trump is suffering from acute dementia and doesn’t know what he’s saying from one day to the next. Combine that with a dose of paranoia wherein everything he perceives as negative is a deliberate attack by a covert cabal of enemies and you have a recipe for chaos.

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It’s that third, and most likely, scenario that makes Trump so dangerous. He has already called the media the “enemy of the American people.” His relentless attacks only serve to destabilize the foundation of America’s free press. The organizations that represent the welfare of journalists regard Trump as an “unprecedented threat” to press freedom. And with each new day Trump seems determined to prove that that’s true.