My digestive system can only take Trump speeches in short bursts, but Friday night I took some Pepto and toughed it out longer than usual, watching and listening as he campaigned for Luther Strange in Alabama. Of course he never really campaigns for anyone but himself, he feeds off the frenzy of his followers, wallowing in their ignorance, hatred and blind adoration.

I’ve been trying to categorize our 45th President. Is he a narcissist? Definitely. Is he a sociopath? Arguably. I see elements of a televangelist preaching absurd interpretations of the Bible and lining his own pockets as he does so, as well as an old-time snake oil salesman, peddling toxic waste as a panacea for every ill in the country. “Drink my message, only I can make America great again!” I also see a carnival barker at a freak show, though in this case the freaks aren’t inside a big top tent, they’re sitting in Trump’s audience. Yesterday morning when I got up it finally hit me, what I really see in Donald Trump – a hybrid of Huey Long and Benito Mussolini; poor speaking skills, exaggerated and inappropriate gestures and pandering to the lowest elements in the audience, just as Long and Mussolini did. Long and Mussolini never had the best interests of their respective countries in mind, nor of their fellow citizens, certainly not of humankind. And neither does Donald Trump.

The current controversy stirred up by Trump is about NFL players who kneel during the National Anthem, and it’s amazing Trump is critical – this is the same Donald Trump who hid behind rich kid deferments throughout the Vietnam era. He equated his attendance at military school to active duty, ignoring the fact that his teachers didn’t shoot students who missed class or didn’t get good grades. He criticized John McCain, saying he preferred heroes who didn’t get captured. And he said his most difficult decisions during that awful time were about which starlet or socialite he was going to pick up at trendy clubs, then take them home and fuck them.

Nearly 9 million Americans served in the military during the Vietnam era, 2.7 million in Vietnam – Donald J. Trump was not among them, and apparently never gave it a thought. More than 60,000 Americans died in Vietnam, and some are still dying because of Agent Orange. And Donald Trump has the audacity to tell anyone how they can use their first amendment right to free speech, and tell team owners who they can employ? What a fucking hypocrite.