It was Sunday, the 1st of September 2019 when Trump discovered his superpower. But perhaps we must backtrack a few days to give context.
On Wednesday 29 August 2019, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) gave Trump a briefing on hurricane Dorian, potentially a category 5, which was heading on a trajectory to smack into Florida 4 days hence. Since Donald responds well to pretty pictures, they had their Advisory 21 from 5am that morning, pictorially showing the predicted track, blown up and displayed on an easel in the Oval Orifice. He probably saw this as an opportunity to show up previous presidents’ responses to natural disasters and so cancelled his visit to Poland. He must have cogitated a bit more on it as the weekend approached since his reptilian brain probably only remembered the chart’s prediction showing it hitting just to the north of Mar-a-Lago and a bulge extending to the Gulf of Mexico on the other side of the dangly Florida appendix.
Without consulting FEMA again, after all he was the resident ‘stable genius’, he tweeted on Sunday, 1 September: “In addition to Florida – South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, will most likely be hit (much) harder than anticipated. Looking like one of the largest Hurricanes ever. Already category 5.” The panic that ensued in Alabama where Dorian was not expected caused the Alabama office of the National Weather Service to issue an advisory 20 minutes later that Alabama “will NOT see any impacts from Dorian”.
If he had just consulted Advisory 32 from 5am that morning, he would have seen that the prediction was for the hurricane to hook north and follow the eastern seaboard. He took so much flak that on Wednesday 4 September, he held a televised press meeting showing the original Advisory 21 only now mysteriously marked up with a Sharpie to extend the vague 4-5 day prediction to include a nibble of Alabama as justification and presented it as the original! Note that it is a Federal offence to alter an official weather map but that was meaningless to Trump. He was now God and he wielded his Sharpie heroically.
Fast forward to 2025 and his second presidency. In some ways he had it tougher than Moses. After all, while waiting for Slo Joe to pop his clogs, he had to wander around his golf courses for four whole years buttonholing everyone about the election fraud committed against himself. He got his way when Slo Joe showed that beathing and stumbling around were a highly overrated path to success and Trump was elected president for the second time. He and Project 2025 had used the interregnum wisely: They had completed their 1000+ page revolutionary MAGAfesto while he sharpened his Sharpie and practiced his erratic signature which looks like the movements of a demented squirrel on tik.
When he returned to his rightful place, he was mightily upset. His people had been worshipping false gods in Biden, Harris et al and had embraced heretical concepts like DEI, gender affirmation, climate change and immigrant cat eaters. He signed edict after edict to eradicate these concepts and lead his people back onto the path of MAGA righteousness. Moses issued 10 commandments. With Sharpie in hand, Trump issued 143 edicts in the first 100 days on the throne with 26 coming on the first day – suck on that Moses! It was a dirty job but someone had to do it.