For those of you who have been waiting for Donald Trump to finally crack wide open and devolve into madness, that time has come. Sure, there are those who will that say it happened long ago, but now the cracks are rupturing into massive fissures that threaten to swallow the entirety of Trump’s frazzled psyche and, if we’re not careful, the whole nation..

Trump is sweating out the prospect of his impending impeachment with the worst imaginable reactions. If he were smart he’d just resign now. His tweets and public comments reveal someone who has given up on reality in favor of throwing bizarre tantrums and lashing out at his perceived enemies. He has actually warned that criticism of him could lead to civil war. But on Wednesday morning he whined that “the press has gone crazy” because they reported on his unspeakably cruel proposal to shoot migrants and to build a border moat stocked with snakes and alligators. By the way, Fox News confirmed those reports, so they must be crazy too.

Trump also ranted about what he called the “Do Nothing Democrats.” Nevermind that the House has passed more than 200 bills that are being blocked by GOP Senate Leader Mitch McConnell. Trump complained that Democrats were “wasting everyone’s time and energy on BULLSHIT.” And isn’t that a lovely presidential expression of bipartisanship.

Trump’s derangement continued during a press avail wherein he attacked the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, impotently calling for him to resign and recklessly accusing him of treason. This obsession with Schiff stemmed from a brief passage in Schiff’s opening statement at a committee hearing. Trump has been incessantly whimpering that Schiff fraudulently put words in his mouth. But the truth is that Schiff merely paraphrased Trump and said he was doing so in advance. But Trump leaves that part out.

However, the most disturbing recent remarks from Trump concern his allegation that the efforts to impeach him are a coup. That’s a charge that Trump picked up from the wingnut media that has been bellowing this absurdity for several days. But it’s one thing for right-wing propagandists to spew these ludicrous conspiracy theories, and another when it comes straight from the President as it did when he tweeted that “what is taking place is not an impeachment, it is a COUP.” And now Trump has included this preposterous nonsense in an official campaign ad:

Democrats are trying to undo the Election regardless of FACTS! pic.twitter.com/cQ3B1bGD4L

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 2, 2019

This video is abhorrent for many reasons. It is filled with lies about Democrats “trying to undo an election.” The video includes a clip of Fox News host Mark Levin making a declarative, and ignorant, statement that Trump broke no laws. Levin asks his Fox colleagues if they can name one. They can’t, but I can: The laws that Trump can be charged with violating right now include extortion, campaign finance, witness intimidation, obstruction of justice, and conspiracy against the United States.

The video also falsely alleges that Democrats are “fabricating evidence.” It includes images of mostly women in Congress including Nancy Pelosi, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, and Rashida Tlaib. And it closes with the abhorrent charge that the Ukraine affair and the whistleblower complaint are “nothing short of a coup.” And remember, this is an official campaign ad that Trump was required to approve.

Apparently Trump has no idea what a coup is. For the record, it’s an illegal, and often violent, overthrow of a government by force. Impeachment, on the other hand, is the constitutional provision for removing a corrupt leader through a defined legal process that requires the bipartisan affirmation of Congress.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

So you have to wonder what Trump is so afraid of. There is a Republican majority in the Senate. It would take twenty of them to join with every Democrat to convict Trump and remove him from office. If Trump is scared – and he obviously is – it suggests that he knows something about what he did that could result in enough Republicans voting against him. And that fear would explain the extreme hysteria he’s displaying by his lies, insults, and paranoid references to coups. Because he knows that soon we will all know the gravity of his crimes. It’s just a matter of time, which he is rapidly running out of.