Back in 2009, President Obama showed Trump how the drawing-a-crowd thing is done.

Donald Trump always needs to be the biggest and best, and if reality doesn’t cooperate, he’s willing to do a little false marketing. Since his inauguration is shaping up to be something of a dud, it’s a good thing he’s getting an early start pretending it’s something it’s not:

x People are pouring into Washington in record numbers. Bikers for Trump are on their way. It will be a great Thursday, Friday and Saturday! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 17, 2017

Item: Trump recorded a Facebook message offering free inauguration tickets. (Better still: free tickets for events that don’t require tickets to attend at all.)

Item: Trump had trouble attracting entertainers to perform at inauguration, and then he had trouble keeping them. Paul Anka and Broadway singer Jennifer Holiday backed out. So did a Bruce Springsteen cover band.

Item: Scalpers are taking a loss on inauguration tickets.

On the plus side for Trump, the 200 buses that had requested parking permits for inauguration have doubled to 400. On the minus side, at the time that only 200 buses were coming for inauguration, there were 1,200 bus parking applications for the Women’s March taking place the next day. Now that there are 400 inauguration buses—and 1,800 for the march. Look for Trump to brag that the number of buses for inauguration doubled in just a few days while the number coming for the march only increased by 50 percent. Donald Trump: If there’s a way to make 200 sound bigger than 600, he’ll do it!

It’ll be interesting watching him try to make attendance at his inauguration sound bigger than the 1.8 million who flooded the District for President Obama’s 2009 inauguration.