"I WANT NOTHING. I WANT NOTHING. I WANT NO QUID PRO QUO. TELL ZELLINSKY TO DO THE RIGHT THING. THIS IS THE FINAL WORLD FROM THE PRES OF THE U.S." Those were the notes that Donald Trump, American president, took with him when he went out to address the press during the impeachment hearings on Wednesday. The first four sentences seem to quote Gordon Sondland's testimony, which the president apparently found exculpatory, despite the fact that Sondland also said there was a quid pro quo and the president was directly implicated in it. Sondland testified that Trump withheld a White House meeting from Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky until he announced investigations into 2016 and the Bidens. And he said he could see no other reason that the military aid was withheld, given the context, though he grants that is an assumption.

Still, the president—who is not mad—felt compelled to go see the press. Normally, he can recite his insane nonsense off the dome, but for some reason, this occasion required notes. The question is, why did his good brain need backup to remember I WANT NOTHING? Whatever the reason, the prompts were scribbled in his trademark giant Sharpie letters, so you know none but the presidential hand was involved here. You can also tell because the Ukrainian president's name is misspelled.

"TELL ZELLINSKY." Mark Wilson Getty Images

This is considered normal.

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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