Donald Trump, the 45th President of the United States, became the third of those 45 to be impeached in the House of Representatives on Wednesday. The two articles leveled against him, abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, concerned his official acts as the executive in our system, and much of the debate in the lead-up spoke in those terms. He'd extorted a foreign power by withholding official acts until they agreed to interfere in the 2020 election on his behalf. He betrayed his office of the public trust by stonewalling Congress and, in the process, denying that the legislature was a co-equal branch of government tasked with providing oversight of the executive. His offenses were against the Constitution and the republic as an officer thereof.

Those are reasons to impeach a president, but soon after the final votes were tallied, Donald Trump demonstrated a determination to remind us of his almost constant offenses against basic human decency as well. He held a "Merry Christmas" rally—to remind everyone there was definitely a War on Christmas afoot, which he definitely won—in Battle Creek, Michigan Wednesday night, and it was another grotesque freak show that drove home just what a problem we have on our hands.

The president is not well, something that has been clear for a long time, even if folks at the Paper of Record prefer to describe him during these rituals of cruelty and mass delusion as "combative" and "unbowed." The New York Times did grant the speech was "rambling," which is a typically polite—and honestly, so understated as to be misleading—way to describe two hours of mostly off-script blathering about personal grievances and how many times people have to flush the toilet. He also managed an assessment of the House Intelligence Committee chairman's appearance. But there was one moment that stood above the dense thicket of insults and lies the president planted, another personal beef he elevated to a national issue without the slightest regard for the people involved.

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Trump laments that Debbie Dingell voted to impeach him despite the fact that he allowed the normal state funeral to proceed for her late husband, former Rep. John Dingell. Trump then suggests John Dingell is in hell -- to audible groans. pic.twitter.com/wsYfddNIA9 — Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) December 19, 2019

Here is the President of the United States suggesting a former congressman and World War II veteran who passed away this year is in Hell. He said this because John Dingell was a Democrat, and his wife, Debbie, is too, and she had the gall to vote her conscience and back Trump's impeachment. Because, as others have pointed out, the president views everything as a transaction, he believes that because he called Dingell to offer her his condolences, she had no business voting for impeachment. He did the bare minimum human thing, and this is how she repays him?

Of course, this is the same transactionalism that informed his behavior towards Ukraine in the first place, except there it bled into his official duties and caused him to violate his oath of office. Here, his substitution of bartering for any kind of principled morality merely crushed a grieving widow shortly before Christmas.

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Mr. President, let’s set politics aside. My husband earned all his accolades after a lifetime of service. I’m preparing for the first holiday season without the man I love. You brought me down in a way you can never imagine and your hurtful words just made my healing much harder. — Rep. Debbie Dingell (@RepDebDingell) December 19, 2019

This is just so achingly sad, and it's a reminder that the president is someone who breaks things and does not stick around to clean them up. He responds to setbacks and shame by lashing out at people and attempting to make them feel what he is so outraged to feel himself. It's cruel retribution from a vindictive man. That's something we ought not to lose sight of while we assess his assaults on the Constitution. The president is almost primally vicious, and in many ways, that's what his supporters like about him. There were some murmurs and uneasiness here, but there were plenty of cheers and sneers, too. It's an exhibition of power to behave this way and get away with it.

This isn't even the first time this year the United States president has suggested a dead foe is in Hell. He hinted the same about John McCain back in June because McCain had the gall to vote against the Repeal and Go Fuck Yourself healthcare bill cooked up by Republicans. Meanwhile, it seems thoroughly unlikely Donald Trump believes in the existence of Heaven or Hell, mostly because it seems unlikely he believes in anything beyond himself. He routinely mocked religious believers during the 2016 campaign, and his displays of devout religiosity seem calibrated to convey disdain as much as membership in the faith.

Some supporters groaned, but others could be heard cheering. It’s an exhibition of power. Scott Olson Getty Images

The Evangelicals love him anyway. He is the avatar of white male power in this country, but he's also instituted policies towards Israel that some folks believe will hasten the arrival of the End Times. That's when members of the True Faith will get launched up to Heaven, while non-believers will supposedly be cast into the firepits of Hell for eternity. (The latter group includes most current residents of Israel, something Evangelical leaders will occasionally admit. One such leader is Robert Jeffress, whom Trump invited to speak at this year's White House Hanukkah party.) This raises the fascinating prospect that Donald Trump, whom they've always seen as a kind of battering ram anyway, might be headed South with the other obvious heathens, having brought about the cataclysm himself. Maybe he'll do some Artful Dealmaking with the Big Guy before his train leaves.

This is the other dimension of what we're dealing with now, beyond the constitutional abuses and the corrupt conflicts of interest and the for-sale sign now affixed to American foreign policy. The president, as an individual human being, is not a fully functioning adult. He does not behave in ways we expect—or really demand—from people in our own lives, be it at the office or at a restaurant. And yet some of our greatest journalistic institutions, full of the best and brightest in the field, seem paralyzed, unable to say what they can plainly see in front of them. Is it the old conventions of supposedly Objective Journalism, where journalists feel obligated to communicate a kind of View From Nowhere in which Both Sides Have a Point? Is it fear of retribution? Is it a genuine belief that Donald Trump is just a particularly eccentric figure to whom we handed control of the most powerful military force in the history of our species?

As it stands, it feels like a disordered tyrant could shatter the foundations of the republic while our titans of the Fourth Estate refer to him as "unconventional." After three years, we may have slid to a place where the people who must grapple with the whole truth of what's happening before them are no longer able to do so. The Times referred to the president's attack on a widow as "a false note."

Jack Holmes Politics Editor Jack Holmes is the Politics Editor at Esquire, where he writes daily and edits the Politics Blog with Charles P Pierce.

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