The Trump Apocalypse Watch is a subjective daily estimate, using a scale of one to four horsemen, of how likely it is that Donald Trump will be elected president, thus triggering an apocalypse in which we all die.
Ye gods. This campaign has been a dark one, but I’m not sure anything has struck me as being quite as appalling as today’s news about the slur-filled rants, many of which involve calls for President Obama to be killed, that the “historian” at Trump’s Florida estate has posted to Facebook in recent years. This individual, Anthony Senecal, was Trump’s personal butler for 20-plus years before moving into his emeritus position as “historian” at Trump’s Palm Beach property. His Facebook posts, uncovered by Mother Jones, involve references to “negroes” and “goat screwing” Muslims; he calls Hillary Clinton a “lying bitch” and suggests that Obama should be hung and shot. Trump’s campaign condemned the statements, but, being that it is the Trump campaign, also got dishonest about it:
Senecal doesn’t “work” at the Mar-a-Lago estate in the sense that he reportedly retired from his paid position as butler in 2009, but he was identified as the estate’s historian—and was photographed on the grounds—in a March New York Times piece. And he told Mother Jones that he makes money at the estate by giving tours.
Meanwhile the Republican establishment is going through a big show of unifying around Trump, their party’s nominee. It’s gross and cowardly and even though it doesn’t make Trump more likely to be elected, I’m raising the apocalypse level today to three horsemen because even if he doesn’t get elected, isn’t this sort of an apocalypse anyway? What the hell is this world we’ve made?
Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by Getty Images, Wikimedia Commons
