We know we shouldn’t be shocked by our president’s consistently disgusting behavior, and yet still we are.
Every. Single. Time.
This time, it surrounded the tragic murders of the great and beloved filmmaker Rob Reiner and his wife Michele Singer Reiner on Sunday.
No one seemed to know what was happening early Sunday afternoon, only that two people at the Reiners’ home in Brentwood were dead. Within hours, it would be confirmed that it was indeed the Reiners who were deceased, and soon the speculation fell on it resulting from a double homicide.
The bodies were not yet cold when the Grim Presidential Reaper himself felt compelled to weigh in early Monday morning:
“A very sad thing happened last night in Hollywood. Rob Reiner, a tortured and struggling, but once very talented movie director and comedy star, has passed away, together with his wife, Michele, reportedly due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME, sometimes referred to as TDS. He was known to have driven people CRAZY by his raging obsession of President Donald J. Trump, with his obvious paranoia reaching new heights as the Trump Administration surpassed all goals and expectations of greatness, and with the Golden Age of America upon us, perhaps like never before. May Rob and Michele rest in peace!”
There is just so much to unpack here, not least being the pointless and gloriously passive-aggressive kicker, “May Rob and Michele rest in peace!” But let’s acknowledge that simply shutting up so as not to intrude on a family’s grief never seems to be an option for him. Neither is allowing someone who failed to properly kiss his a-- in life to die in peace.
A lifelong vocal liberal Democrat, Rob Reiner made little secret of his disdain for Trump and all he stands for, so any semblance of class or decorum from this dude was off the table. It’s also an established fact that his wrenching insecurity won’t permit any perceived slight, real or imagined, from being immediately addressed.
With the Reiners’ son Nick having been arrested and booked on suspicion of murdering his parents, it appears that whatever issue Rob Reiner had with Trump played no role in his death. But that is naturally irrelevant to a man who has no filter and — equally to the point — no decency.
What a hopelessly appalling, wildly inappropriate, and unforgivably hateful thing to post mere hours after any person’s death, much less a figure who was so universally adored. It’s flat-out astonishing, not only for its sickening insensitivity but also the portrait of vile, malignant narcissism it paints.
But let’s back up for a moment, because the real problem isn’t with the emotional toddler who inhabits the Oval Office.
It‘s with us.
It surrounds our unreasonable expectation that Trump will at this point ever evoke a measure of empathy akin to that displayed by an actual human being. If the years have taught us anything, it’s that Trump is tragically incapable of doing so. This is meant quite literally. He completely lacks the compassion gene in much the same way he is powerless to feel shame for anything he says or does.
It was (reputedly) Albert Einstein who defined insanity as “doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” The madness, thus, resides within ourselves.
Let’s go back into the not-so-deep past, to examine some of the recent instances in which Trump has demonstrated a driving need to sink to the occasion.
October 2017: Trump placed a call to the widow of U.S. Army Sergeant La David Johnson, a fallen soldier who died in battle in Niger. Donning his cloak of sympathy, Trump assured her that her husband “knew what he signed up for.”
It wasn’t just that it was a cold and heartless thing to say: it was totally unnecessary. All he needed to tell her was, “He was a great man, and I feel your pain,” even if he didn’t actually feel it, since he feels nothing. But even this was beyond his capacity.
September 2018: Trump disputed the official death toll from Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, claiming the numbers were wildly inflated to make him look bad. Because everything, even destructive storms, are about him.
September 2019: Trump responded to a question about the death of journalist and author Cokie Roberts by responding, “I never met her” (translation: they met) and noting that “she never treated me nicely — but I would like to wish her family well.” Getting in the dig before awkwardly working to soften it with an insincere tagline is the Trump brand, merging lies and veiled hostility in a single superficial package.
September 2025: Trump gave a mind-numbingly heartless response when asked by a reporter about the death of his friend Charlie Kirk and how he was holding up less than two days after his murder.
“I think very good,” the president said energetically, adding a sprightly, “And by the way, right there, you see all the trucks? They just started construction of the new ballroom for the White House … and it’s gonna be a beauty. It’ll be an absolutely magnificent structure.”
Yes, regarding that last one, it was clear Trump had no intention of permitting sorrow to intrude on his joy at the creation of a golden monstrosity in his name. People and feelings take a back seat to bucks and buildings.
The bottom line is that this person isn’t like you and me. For him, emotions matter only in terms of how he can personally benefit from their use, taking his sensitivity cues from fellow felons.
In that sense, for Trump, Rob Reiner’s life was worthless and his death meaningless, because in his world, true mourning is for suckers.
- Ray Richmond is a longtime journalist/author and an adjunct professor at Chapman University in Orange, CA.
