He’s the hunch-back of the Rose Garden.

Tossing out a rambling intuition here, a baseless vibe there, a scientifically discredited prognosis hither, a belied conjecture yon.

President Hunch — Donald Trump — has been the embodiment of leadership incompetence as the United States plunges further into the pandemonium of a pandemic.

Even flanked by some of the leading scientific brilliants on infection and contagion — Dr. Anthony Fauci wincing in dismay — Trump zooms off into untethered rhetoric and reflexive gibberish, humping back his earlier debunked assertions, the invalidated hunches, in staggered zigzag steps, only when arm-twisted into beating a retreat.

Thank your lucky stars for the measured stoicism of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the unexpectedly impressive helming of Premier Doug Ford, revealing that a crisis of mass proportion is right in his wheelhouse.

While, from Trump, signature narcissism and vainglorious boasting, misstatements and misinformation, obfuscation and mendacity, spiked through with taunting of journalists who dare hold him to account.

“Aspirational,’’ Trump called it on Sunday, about his previous divination that America could be reopened by Easter Sunday, the pews filled and the economy rebounding.

Aspirational: An abracadabra word some speech-writing cipher must have tucked into his talking notes.

Just to remind where Trump has gone, slapdash oratorically, in recent weeks about coronavirus:

“I alone can fix it.’’

“I don’t take responsibility at all.’’

“We have it under control. It’s going to be just fine.’’

“By April 1, you know, in theory, when it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away.’’

“We’re going very substantially down, not up … We have it so well under control. I mean, we have done a really good job.’’

“WE CANNOT LET THE CURE BE WORSE THAN THE PROBLEM ITSELF.’’

A capitalized tweet. Being real dramatic, like.

The same go-to platform on which Trump Monday reprised an observation made in a New York Times article: “President Trump is a ratings hit. Since reviving the daily White House briefing, Mr. Trump and his coronavirus updates have attracted an average audience of 8.5 million on cable news, roughly the viewership of the season finale of ‘The Bachelor’. Numbers are continuing to rise…’’

Yes, the numbers are rising precipitously — surging past 2,950 deaths in the U.S. as of Monday evening — the worst 24-hour period so far — America racing ahead of Italy and China and Iran in exponential mortalities.

In any event, Trump had indulged in a bit of self-serving editing. The lead sentence in that Times piece said: “President Trump is a ratings hit, and some journalists and public health experts say that could be a dangerous thing.’’

The point being that some have called for the networks and cable news programs to stop airing his daily briefings, which have taken on the acrid aroma of his falsehood-infused campaign rallies.

But Trump, who endlessly claims his remarks are taken out of context by “the lamestream media’’ — sometimes true — is shameless about massaging the messaging when it suits his purpose.

Indeed, his Nielsen ratings have been off the charts, surpassing Monday Night Football. And of course that would be so as a frightened nation turns its eyes to their commander-in-chief.

Quackery-in-chief, more like, this the man who’d recklessly promoted a prophylactic mixture of drugs espoused by researchers in France (their work not peer-reviewed) — an anti-malarial drug in combination with an antibiotic.

“Very, very encouraging early results,’’ Trump said. “I think it could be, based on what I see, it could be a game changer.’’

To which Fauci retorted, at a subsequent presser: “The answer is no.’’

Trump, of course, has scorn for rigorous science. His administration shuttered the National Security Council Directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense, just one from a myriad of reasons America was so slow off the mark in grasping the dire threat of COVID-19; doing something about it pre-emptively and proactively.

The self-professed “stable genius” only on Friday invoked emergency powers under the Defense Production Act forcing manufacturers such as General Motors to repurpose factories and crank out ventilators that are in such desperate shortage.

All through this crisis, Trump has been — no different from the very beginning of his Oval Office occupation, Inauguration Day, flat-out lies about crowd size — enabled by idolators and self-abasing coattail clingers.

After continuously minimizing the public health risk and putting the stock market over human lives, Trump may have been jolted into acquiescence — extending federal social distancing guidelines for at least another 30 days, from the initial 15-day timeline — when confronted with the staggering numbers indicated by predictive models prepared for his own task force: 100,000 to 200,000 dead, with a worst-case scenario of 1.6 to 2.2 million fatalities.

“A lot of people were saying, ‘Maybe we shouldn’t do anything, just ride it.’ They said, ‘Ride it like a cowboy. Just ride it. Ride that sucker through.’

“That’s where 2.2 million people come in — would have died, maybe … and that’s not acceptable.’’

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Or perhaps the confounding figures resonated less than the personal eye-opening that Trump recounted to reporters. Seeing the havoc at an overwhelmed hospital in Queens, where he grew up, refrigerated trucks being used as makeshift morgues, and a friend now in a coma from coronavirus.

Monday was National Doctors Day in the U.S. and yet Trump went on Fox News — echo-chamber cradle — to repeat an undocumented allegation thrown out the previous evening, about some kind of nefarious goings-on in New York hospitals, the purported hoarding and squandering of medical equipment. “Are they going out the back door? Somebody should probably be looking into that.’’

New York state is the epicentre of the pandemic, with nearly 60,000 positive cases and almost 1,000 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University, and emergency medical facilities erected in Central Park.

Trump’s unfounded accusation was dimly received by Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

“I don’t know what that means. I don’t know what he’s trying to say. If he wants to make an accusation, then make an accusation.’’

(It should be noted, however, that several state pharmaceutical boards have condemned physicians apparently writing multiple prescriptions for themselves and family members — that’s hoarding — for chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, the drugs promoted by Dr. Trump.)

Cuomo added: “This is no time for politics. Lead by example.’’

But Trump, who revels in the sophomoric insulting of political enemies, went there again on FOX, trashing Nancy Pelosi, as a “sick puppy’’ after the House Speaker said he’d mishandled the pandemic with a laggard response.

From a non-political quarter, Keith Martin, director of the Consortium of Universities for Global Health, who told the New York Times: “President Trump will have blood on his hands.’’

In his Monday evening press conference, Trump said more than one million Americans have been tested for coronavirus, upwards now of 100,000 tests being performed daily.

Yet Fauci and others are warning of rapid contagion acceleration in smaller cities across the country, cities like New Orleans and Detroit. “They’re going to pick up.’’

Otherwise, Trump — who claimed the U.S. infection peak will crest around Easter — was still hitting the usual self-congratulatory notes.

“We altogether have done a really good job.

“The choices and sacrifices we make will determine the fate of this virus and really the fate of our victory. We will have a great victory.’’

This is not what victory looks like: Stacked body bags and refrigeration trucks and planeloads of doctors being parachuted into New York City.

Rounding on a CNN reporter who asked if Trump regretted his initial assurances to Americans, just stay calm and the overstated horror wound go away: “Instead of asking a nasty, snarky question like that, you should have asked a real question.’’

Yet this is the Trump who won a fraught, polarizing election and may do so yet again in November.

Most recent polls are turning in his favour.

A Gallup poll released Monday: Trump’s approval rating has shot up to 49 per cent, matching the best of his presidency, with a five-point boost since the outbreak started. Real Clear Politics, which averages polls: 47.3 per cent approval. ABC/Washington Post: 49 per cent. Reuters/Ipsos online survey: 49 per cent approve of the president’s handling of the COVID-19 crisis.

It is to weep. Or go quite mad.

Rosie DiManno is a columnist based in Toronto covering sports and current affairs. Follow her on Twitter: @rdimanno

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