Why Trump lied about Rob Reiner’s death

Donald Trump’s post about the murder of director Rob Reiner and his wife isn’t just deranged. It’s a threat. Even though police arrested Reiner’s son, Nick Reiner, for the murder, Trump decided to blame — or perhaps credit — one of his own followers. He said Reiner brought on his own death through “the anger he caused others” by “his raging obsession of President Donald J. Trump.” (The actual wording is way more demented than that, but I have limited space.) 

It’s tempting to shrug this off as just more of Trump’s narcissism, which gets more unhinged as he ages. But it comes right after Indiana Republicans rejected Trump’s demand that they gerrymander their congressional maps, which they did despite being subject to a tidal wave of death threats from Trump fans. Trump is clearly worried that people are losing their fear of him. Taking credit for Reiner’s murder, even obliquely, felt like a pitiful attempt to restore his lost omnipotence, and that sense of terror.

Erika Kirk can’t talk Candace Owens out of it

If you haven’t read my Monday article about the ongoing feud between Charlie Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk, and podcaster Candace Owens, who has been pushing conspiracy theories about Charlie’s killing, I have to say I recommend it. This isn’t just dumb catfight stuff. It’s a cautionary tale. Charlie Kirk and Turning Point USA built themselves on MAGA paranoia. Charlie’s right hand man, Jack Posobiec, literally rose to prominence hyping proto-QAnon stuff. Now it’s coming around and biting them in the ass. 

After I published that column, I learned that Erika Kirk had announced that she and Owens would speak in private to resolve their beef. Initially, the plan had been to hash it out in public: TPUSA would air a podcast calling Owens out, and she would presumably respond on her own podcast. Since these people never turn down a chance to make potentially viral content, taking it offline seems like a big deal. 

It’s also, I will predict right now, not going to work. As I explain in my story, MAGA influencers like Candace Owens are sincere fascists, without a doubt. But their main priority isn’t building authoritarianism. It’s making money. Candace needs to up the ante constantly to get attention, clicks and cash. Fighting with Erika is doing just that. Why would she stop?

Owens has a good instinct for what women her audience is likely to hate most. Her bizarre conspiracy theories about Brigitte Macron, for instance, feed on people’s unease that the French first lady first met her much younger husband when he was her student. Owens has also made a fortune off bad-faith attacks on Blake Lively, who a lot of people think is stuck up. 

Whether we may personally believe, lots of people think there’s something off about Erika Kirk’s performance of public grief. Owens cannot possibly say no to another blonde woman she can turn into a villain. So, no, I don’t believe she’ll quit. 

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Bari Weiss is not very smart

Fun story: I was out at dinner Saturday night when the much-hyped CBS News interview between Bari Weiss and Erika Kirk aired. The staff at the pub was busy, and didn’t notice that whatever more-popular program was on TV before that switched to the Kirk interview at 8 p.m. But the women sitting right at the bar definitely noticed, and rapidly left. The staff changed the channel as fast as possible, to avoid driving more customers out the door. 

I told my partner that the rumor mill in the press has long had one opinion about Weiss: She’s just not very smart. She has skills at charming rich, bigoted men, and that’s about it. This chatter has only intensified since she took over CBS News. But her interview with Erika Kirk confirmed that on a big, public scale. 

Weiss really seems to believe that there’s a great wellspring of affection in the public for Erika Kirk. If you listen to literally anyone who isn’t a rich Republican, you’ll find that the more people see of Erika, the less they like her. Even in MAGA circles, there’s a growing sense that there’s something not quite right about Charlie Kirk’s widow. Such as the way she keeps insisting her hair is real, which even MAGA people struggles to believe. As noted above, there’s a reason Candace Owens thinks Erika makes a good target. 

But if you really want a laugh, watch this clip of Bari explaining how a “deeply religious Christian” can forgive her husband’s killer while also wanting him to go to prison. She talks as if she’s the first person ever to hear this rhetoric around Christian forgiveness and, golly, is she is impressed! It’s painfully dumb: Most Americans already know that Christians are expected to say they forgive other people’s misdeeds, whether they actually do or not. 

Weiss considers herself a journalist, but she doesn’t even possess basic knowledge of the society she lives in. Instead, she’s just a hack, and her story is about how far you can get on total incompetence, as long as you mirror the prejudices of rich people back at them. 

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What we're reading this week

• “There's a Reason Women Aren't Swooning Over AI Like Men Are,” Katie Jgln, 

  The Noösphere

• “Home-Schooled Kids Are Not All Right,” Stefan Merrill Block, New York Times

• “Rob Reiner’s Legacy Will Be One Of Humane Laughter,” Glenn Kenny, Decider

• “How the Phone Ban Saved High School,” Anya Kamenetz, New York

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