Do President Donald Trump’s “clownishness” and “lack of ideology” make him less dangerous? A columnist at The Guardian says no.

“Trump’s seeming lack of vision or ideology are misread as attributes that make him somehow less dangerous than the authoritarians of the past who have become the template for what evil looks like,” writes Nesrine Malik. But, “Trump’s presidency is what evil looks like.”

She points to images she remembers from “movies not seen since childhood,” or art and literature, tied together by “kitschy evil.”

She writes that those images seem to be standing in for horrific current events: “the bodies pulled from the rubble in Gaza, a school full of young pupils blown apart in Iran. The more than 1 million people in southern Lebanon expelled en masse from their homes.”

Malik calls it “bewildering” how the “casualness” of the cruelty “has been allowed to pass,” as Donald Trump, who “defies attempts to make his actions cohere with any particular strategy … hovers above the circus of death and chaos.”

Trump and his threats, like those where he threatened “entire civilizations,” are “reshaping the world, but without him even having orchestrated some master plan.”

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Trump “does not adhere to the style or affect of the fascist model,” she argues, “he doesn’t hold rallies, wear uniforms or make fiery speeches from balconies to flag-waving throngs. He hasn’t (entirely yet) overturned the constitution and dismantled democracy.”

“He is an addled comic figure, a man whose very soul is bared in his angry outbursts on social media or in rambling speeches without self-awareness or self-consciousness. He talks about the war on Iran flanked by a gigantic Easter bunny, posts an image of himself as Jesus. He ‘always chickens out‘.”

And yet, Malik asks, “isn’t this what evil is? A projection on to the world not of overbearing and large intent, but smallness and fear?”

Evil creeps up on you, she writes, “because it’s hard for the human brain to encounter evil in ludicrous form, and still recognize it as such.”

“That’s why you ask how such crimes were allowed to happen in the past,” she says.

Composed of “frivolity and nonchalance and fragility, as well as relentlessness and insatiability and brutality,”  evil “rarely arrives with the intent and identifying hallmarks of a villain. It arrives in the form of broken people, whose power lies in their unquenchable desire to make themselves whole no matter the consequences.”

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Image via Reuters 

President Donald Trump spent Monday afternoon contradicting his own claims about an Iran peace deal, declaring he is “winning” a war and faces no pressure — just one day after saying a deal would be signed by Monday night.

On Sunday, the president reportedly told Fox Business’ Maria Bartiromo that he expected a deal with Iran “will be signed” by Monday night. But on Monday, Trump lashed out at Democrats (“TRAITORS ALL“), and insisted that “If a Deal happens under ‘TRUMP,’ it will guarantee Peace, Security, and Safety, not only for Israel and the Middle East, but for Europe, America, and everywhere else.” No mention of a deal being signed imminently.

In fact, Trump appeared to suggest he was in no rush to sign a deal.

“I read the Fake News saying that I am under ‘pressure’ to make a Deal. THIS IS NOT TRUE! I am under no pressure whatsoever, although, it will all happen, relatively quickly!”

He also insisted that he is not going to let Democrats “rush the United States into making a Deal that is not as good as it could have been.”

Meanwhile, as CBS News reports, Iran “said Monday that it has no plans to attend peace talks in Pakistan with President Trump’s top three negotiators, including Vice President JD Vance, as Tehran balks at what it considers ‘unreasonable and unrealistic demands’ by the White House.”

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In his posts, the president compared the length of his war in Iran with World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the Iraq War, in an effort to suggest his war is being executed in a judicious manner and insisting that he is “winning.”

Trump claimed that his war is being “perfectly executed, on the scale of Venezuela, just a bigger, more complex operation.” And he claimed, “I am properly and judiciously using our Military to solve problems left to us by others of far less understanding or competence.”

“I’m winning a War, BY A LOT, things are going very well,” he insisted, stating that “our Military has been amazing,” while lashing out at “the Fake News, like The Failing New York Times, the absolutely horrendous and disgusting Wall Street Journal, or the now almost defunct, fortunately, Washington Post, you would actually think we are losing the War,” he said.

While claiming that the “enemy is confused, because they get these same Media ‘reports,'” Trump hailed what he claimed was successful “Regime Change.”

“The Anti-America Fake News Media is rooting for Iran to win, but it’s not going to happen, because I’m in charge! Just like these unpatriotic people used every ounce of their limited strength to fight me in the Election, they continue to do so with Iran. The result will be the same — It already is!”

Critics slammed the president’s comments.

“This is a war he started to: – distract from the Epstein files – make money from manipulating markets – boost profits for his oil donors – as an excuse to give his family lucrative military contracts,” wrote organizer and healthcare advocate Melanie D’Arrigo. “His tantrums always need context.”

Jonah Allon, deputy communications director for New York Governor Kathy Hochul, wrote, “amazing this whole counter-messaging effort is happening now.” He said, “there was never going to be a communications strategy that could have sold this hideously unpopular war, but one really is struck by the sloth and lack of coordination since trump announced the strikes in late february.”

READ MORE: Supreme Court Justices Making Bank on Books: Report

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From children’s books to multi-million-dollar memoirs, several Supreme Court justices are cashing in on their celebrity.

Justices are limited to accepting a maximum of $30,000 in outside income, but royalties and advances for books are exempt. And the payoff for “political celebrities” can be big, The Washington Post reports. Some justices have received million-dollar book advances.

Children’s books, which are easier to write, can net justices “big paydays” — tens of thousands of dollars, or more. They appear to be a particular favorite for several justices, although there tends to be more big money for non-children’s books.

Justice Neil Gorsuch has written an illustrated children’s storybook about America’s Founding Fathers, timed to coincide with the nation’s 250th birthday, according to the Post, titled “Heroes of 1776: The Story of the Declaration of Independence.”

“I just wanted to share with children some stories about the courage and sacrifice of the heroes behind 1776, who gave us our Constitution and our liberties,” he told Fox News in November, pointing to “so many ordinary people who did extraordinary things.”

Justices have “name recognition, particularly among people who share their ideological values,” the Post notes, which “creates built-in audiences that publishers see as a safe bet.”

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Justice Sonia Sotomayor earned $870,000 from 2017 to 2024 for publishing three children’s books and one for young adults.

“In September,” according to the Post, “Sotomayor released her most recent children’s book, ‘Just Shine! How to Be a Better You’ — a tribute to her mother, with an audiobook version narrated by the Cuban American singer Gloria Estefan.”

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, who retired in 2006, was the first justice to publish a children’s book, “Chico,” a picture book published in 2005 about her childhood pony.

But the bigger money is not in children’s books.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett reportedly received $2 million for “Listening to the Law: Reflections on the Court and Constitution,” which came out in September.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson received a nearly $3 million advance for her autobiography, “Lovely One,” published two years after her confirmation to the Supreme Court. There is now a young adult version.

She also received a Grammy nomination for the audiobook version. Justice Jackson attended the awards ceremony, despite not having won, causing some controversy.

Part of her job, she said, during an appearance on the talk show “The View,” is “public outreach and education.”

“When the justices are on recess — which is what we are doing right now — we really have an opportunity to go out into the community in various different ways,” she said in February, responding to right-wing criticism of her decision to attend the ceremony.

“How much Gorsuch received in advance for his children’s book, or how much Jackson received for the young-adult version of her autobiography, is unknown,” the Post noted.

But it was Justice Clarence Thomas who “broke the mold” when he released his autobiography in 2007, Gabe Roth, executive director of the ethics watchdog group Fix the Court, told the Post. Justice Thomas, the Post noted, “received a $1.5 million advance, which at the time was the most for a sitting member of the court.”

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Images: Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons