Conservative columnist says GOP should be terrified by Trump’s worsening incoherence

Conservative Washington Post columnist Jennifer Rubin on Monday noted that President Donald Trump appears to be "teetering on the brink of a complete meltdown" in response to mounting pressures both foreign and domestic.

"President Trump has never been a model of consistency or coherence," Rubin wrote. "However, as pressure builds both from looming investigations and the impending transfer of power in the House from the Republican majority to the Democrats, his ability to maintain even the pretense of normalcy and rationality begins to crumble."

The columnist pointed out that in the wake of the murder of American resident journalist Jamal Khashoggi, dismissed by Trump and assessed by the CIA as an order from Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, there is "likely to be a bipartisan effort to cancel Saudi arms sales and to sanction all those involved."

With Democrats soon to be in control of the House of Representatives, Rubin added, congressional committees will start investigating the president in earnest -- yet another pressure that's led to his increasingly public incoherence.

"As striking as Trump’s utter inability to grapple with basic problems," she observed, "his staff’s unwillingness to maintain any semblance of unity and loyalty suggests they no long er think it’s in their personal interest to be associated with a president who makes mincemeat of one policy issue after another."

"His childish inability to make hard decisions and engender possible complaints from his base makes him a hapless, inept figure," Rubin concluded. "He’s not so much leading as he is meandering  — with aides racing after him to prevent bigger disasters and embarrassments."