Having vanquished all prominent Republican presidential contenders, and also Jeb Bush, Donald Trump now turns his attention to the general election. This means firing some folk, and fumigating the campaign's empty money coffers to get rid of the brown recluse spiders that have moved in, and convincing America's most prominent Jesus-For-Money people that you can Jesus with the best of them.
But if you can't even do that? What the hell—just call everyone else a Muslim!
Speaking to a group of top social conservative evangelical Christian leaders at a gathering in New York City, Trump said, “we don't know anything about Hillary in terms of religion.”
“Now, she's been in the public eye for years and years, and yet there's no — there's nothing out there,” Trump said. “There's like nothing out there. It's going to be an extension of Obama but it's going to be worse, because with Obama you had your guard up. With Hillary you don't, and it's going to be worse.”
There are so many little strands wrapped around each other in those sentences. It's like a tangled box of Christmas lights. For starters, this would be Donald Trump saying this, a man whose religion is, as near as anyone can make out, a rigorous program of daily self-worship. There is the "extension of Obama" morsel: Why would Clinton's religion be an "extension of Obama," other than Donald Trump wanting to say so? Is she a secret Muslim as well? Is it contagious? Why is it that Obama caused social conservative evangelicals to have "your guard up"? Is it because he is black? Because he was, as a young child, exposed to insufficiently conservative evangelical Christian things?
And the religious suppositions surrounding Hillary Clinton, Donald says, are going to be worse than a good portion of the nation supposing the president before her was a Sekrit Muslim with Sekrit Muslim sympathies? It is a fascinating thought. I'm actually eager for Trump to explain his Clinton theories here. Don't leave us hanging, Donald. There is an army of steadfast conspiracy-peddling lunatics eagerly awaiting word on just what rabbit hole they should skulk down next; spin the wheel, raggedy man, and send them a-skulking.
In order to even get to all of that, however, you first have to get past this central conceit: A group of "top social conservative evangelical Christian leaders" ...
... is meeting with Donald Trump. So that he can explain religion at them.
Because throughout this summer, "top social conservative evangelical Christian leaders" are going to have to figure out how to bullshit each of their respective holy flocks into supporting a thrice-married, belligerent greed-monster who debated the size of his penis in front of a live audience, a man who can't think of a single sin he might ask forgiveness for, who is the subject of constant lawsuits from people who say he has cheated them, and whose adherence to social conservative causes can best be described as You've Got To Be Kidding Me.
You'd think it was a tall order. You'd be wrong. You don't get to be a top social conservative evangelical Christian leader without knowing how to fleece the rubes—taking casino money under the banner of stopping casinos, supporting the family values man who got caught frequenting prostitutes, explaining why Jesus demands another upper-class tax cut—and by this time next month we'll have our pick of a dozen or so videos explaining why Donald Trump, of all candidates, has good Christian values oozing out from his every pore.