8 October—A reader who insists she is not a Trumpublican, claims to be a proud life-long liberal and registered Democrat, swears she did not vote for Trump, and agrees with “everything [I’ve] ever written” about the “psychopath” she calls “a blight on humankind” nevertheless asks why I never refer to Donald Trump as “President Trump” or “the president.” (Everything she’s ever read, anyway. And I really appreciate the decade-long devotion.)

She asks a fair question. For all it’s worth, then, I accept, however grudgingly, that the blight on humankind (an undeserved euphemism for Donald Trump) was elected through a constitutionally mandated, pseudo-democratic, presumably free and fair electoral process in which he received only 1.5 percent more popular votes than his inept opponent and came up just short of 50 percent of the 152,320,193 votes cast, but won 312 electoral votes in 31 states to Whatshername’s 226 electoral votes in 19 states.

Trump shouldn’t have been reelected, but he was. That’s the process. And we have to live with it. And we have to hope the Trump pestilence passes by peaceful means before it does permanent damage to the republic and everything it’s stood for and valued for 250 years. Or is it too late?

In all events, writer’s block and self-discipline prevent me from juxtaposing the esteemed and honorable position and the contemptible and dishonorable person currently contaminating it. To syntactically associate that position with that person’s name is the obscenity of obscenities. And Trump isn’t only an irredeemable scumbag (with apologies to scumbags), he’s shown himself to be an inept executive, an incompetent leader, and an ignorant commander-in-chief—and nothing a president should be.

Then again, Trump isn’t a president at all. He’s an incorrigible con man and tyrant pure and simple.

And count on Trump pardoning Sean Combs who was just convicted of prostitution-related charges, and Kosta Diamantas who will be convicted of bribery, extortion, conspiracy, and other corruption. And he owes a pardon to Ghislaine Maxwell, who has been protecting him. But he’ll make her sweat . . .