Trump's RNC just broadcast his corruption to the entire nation: columnist

Writing in the Washington Post this Wednesday, Greg Sargent contends that the GOP convention managed to accomplish something counterintuitive in politics: it flaunted President Trump’s "corrupt manipulation of the levers of government to remain in power — on national television, with absolute impunity."

"It also showcased a party that’s equally confident in its power to create a hermetically sealed-off alternate universe in which the only corrupt party is the opposition," Sargent writes. "Completing this picture, the levers of government are currently being manipulated to manufacture that invented reality about the opposition, too."

Sargent wonders what will happen to the U.S. political system if this goes unchallenged. "Taken along with the blatant lawbreaking at the convention on Tuesday, it all demonstrates a level of seething contempt for our political system and institutions — and even for the very idea that there should be baseline standards in political competition — that the media still struggles to convey faithfully," he writes.

In many ways, Trump campaigned on his corruption.

"His standard authoritarian populist trope was that, since it’s a hopelessly rigged system — and since politicians piously claiming to care about democratic norms aren’t delivering and are on the take themselves — voters might as well pick someone who will bend and break rules on their behalf."

According to Sargent, Trump is trying that strategy all over again.

Read the full op-ed over at The Washington Post.