ANALYSIS/OPINION:

President Donald Trump is a criminal thug, a serial liar, a racist pig, a woman hater, and an all-around bad dude who’s been following in the footsteps of the devil, according to Cornell West, one of Harvard University’s supposed best and brightest of teaching class.

The proof?

Oh, there isn’t any — not really. This is just a classic example of what President Donald Trump means when he labels news as fake.

West was just weighing in with what’s on his mind about this president during an oh-so-friendly interview on “Anderson Cooper 360” on CNN supposedly staged to discuss South Africa’s farming situation.

This is the scholar who’s teaching the next generation in the way it should go.

More importantly: This is what’s being fed the American people as News You Need To Know.

“The important thing,” West said, Breitbart noted, “is that [special counsel Robert Mueller’s] at a moment in these last days where it looks like brother Donald Trump, gangster, racist, misogynist — he’s a brother because he’s made in the image of God, he’s a brother because he could change. He’s not a devil. He’s a human being who chooses devilish action. He’s a human being who chooses to be demonic. He is reaching the end. He is meeting his match with brother Mueller. When Mueller lays bare and discloses the facts, Donald Trump will not just be shaking in his boots, but we’ll be saying goodbye.”

That was the warm-up.

“The homophobia and the patriarchy running amok,” West blurted at one point.

And at another, speaking of Trump’s response to South Africa: “He’s in over his head … He’s got a white supremacist tilt, there’s no doubt about it,” West said.

And then this, speaking of Trump: “He is going under. And in many ways, you think of, I think of the tears of Fred and Mary Anne, his mother and father, ‘this is the son that we produced, look at the levels of mendacity and criminality,’” West went on.

Where was Cooper in all this?

Listening intently. Standing by. Playing the polite host to West’s off-his-meds-like commentary.

This wasn’t an interview. This was a soliloquy and CNN was West’s stage.

The travesty here isn’t so much West’s radical rants. The travesty is CNN host Cooper’s willingness to take this radical ride with West, and give him the national platform to spew his nonsense, largely uninterrupted.

This is a good example of why Trump distrusts the press. This is exactly why Trump calls out the media as the “enemy of the people,” bent on furthering “fake news.” And really, this is a classic example of why the media is so down in the dumps in favor and trust with the American people.

• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter, @ckchumley.

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