I don't know why Donald Trump said the things he reportedly said to Myeshia Johnson, whose husband, 25-year-old U.S. Army Sgt. La David T. Johnson, died in Niger two weeks ago.

I don't know why it took the president two weeks to even reach out to Johnson, and to the families of the other Special Forces soldiers who were killed in action. And I certainly don't know why, when asked about the delay, he elected to utter an outrageous falsehood about the practices of his predecessor, falsely stating that President Obama hadn't called the loved ones of fallen servicemembers, either.

It doesn't matter, honestly. Donald Trump flouts norms and ignores conventions and tells lies all the time. He lies about anything and everything, without a second thought for the consequences. Trying to understand the logic behind his latest astonishing fabrication is like imputing specific motives to the movements of a fish swimming in an aquarium. Lying is what he does, and the time and energy we could expend parsing the intricacies of each one is better spent elsewhere.

I do know that there is no humanity in this.

In his call with Sgt. La David T. Johnson’s widow, Myeshia Johnson, Trump told her, “He knew what he was signing up for, but I guess it hurts anyway,” according to the account of Rep. Frederica S. Wilson (D-Fla.), who was riding in a limousine with Johnson when the president called and heard the conversation on speakerphone.

Or this:

“She was in tears. She was in tears. And she said, ‘He didn’t even remember his name.’”

On Wednesday, Trump hotly disputed Wilson's description of her experiences, calling it a "total fabrication" and adding, without explanation, that he has "proof." (Which, I assume, he will be disclosing posthaste along with the "proof" purportedly in his possession that President Obama wiretapped Trump Tower and forged his own birth certificate.)

Although recollections of the president's verbatim phrasing differ slightly, each account shares the same common thread of callousness that renders distinctions irrelevant. His tone was "almost like joking," says Wilson, who sat with Sgt. Johnson's widow at Miami International Airport while she waited for his remains to arrive home. "You know, just matter-of-factly, that this is what happens, anyone who is signing up for military duty is signing up to die." The president "did disrespect my son and my daughter and also me and my husband," added Sgt. Johnson's mother, Cowanda Jones-Johnson, who was also present for the exchange. She later declined to elaborate, but when asked "whether Wilson's account of the conversation between Trump and the family was accurate," writes the Washington Post, "She replied: 'Yes.'"

From the ABC affiliate on the scene in Miami:

Wilson watched as the widow, who is expecting their third baby in January, leaned over the U.S. flag that was draping Johnson's casket. Her pregnant belly was shaking against the casket as she sobbed uncontrollably. Their daughter stood next to her stoically. Their toddler waited in the arms of a relative.

There was silence.

Myeshia Johnson deserved better than this. Her children deserved better than this. Sgt. Johnson's grieving parents and family and friends and loved ones deserved better than this. They deserve a president who is capable of empathy, and who exhibits compassion, and whose actions sincerely convey a nation's gratitude for their family's terrible sacrifice. Yet in their darkest hour, the same commander-in-chief who professes to care so deeply about honoring and respecting America's military heroes could muster only a cruelly flippant shrug.

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