It’s not exactly a glass house — it’s a big white mansion with white columns and a missing wing — but its chief occupant is the master of stone-throwing. And he really hates it when someone returns fire.

Donald Trump has a hate-hate relationship with the media, missing no opportunity to insult and demean reporters and broadcasters who take him to task for his illegal and immoral abuse of the office and the country he swore to protect and preserve. And sometimes simple insults are not enough for him; he goes after their jobs and their reputations.

He has been trying to get Jimmy Kimmel fired for months. But Kimmel has survived, and has continued to call out the administration for every infraction, often using humor to make his point. This week, though, he may have taken it one step too far.

Don’t get me wrong — I am a fierce advocate of our right to free speech. In fact, I am a staunch and outspoken defender of our entire U.S. Constitution and every one of its Amendments. And I salute those who have a public voice and use it to shout the truth above all the chaos of today’s world.

But I also believe that our freedoms come with responsibilities, and that we should be big enough, and smart enough, not to stoop to the level of the very people we are criticizing.

We all heard recently that Trump was vicious enough to celebrate the death of former FBI Director Robert Mueller by saying, “Good, I’m glad he’s dead. He can no longer hurt innocent people!” But that should not compel us to follow suit by anticipating, wishing for, or hinting at Trump’s imminent demise.

Yet that is, in essence, what Kimmel did when he joked last week that first lady Melania Trump had “a glow like an expectant widow.”

I admire Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen Colbert, and the others who stand up to pressure and refuse to be intimidated. But joking about someone’s death — even about the most despicable of people — is just bad juju.

Did Kimmel bring about the event, just a couple of days later, when a man tried to shoot his way into the White House Correspondents’ Dinner at the Washington Hilton Hotel? No . . . I really don’t believe in hexes. But how would he have felt if something had gone terribly wrong, and Trump had been killed or wounded just days after Kimmel’s macabre comment?

Am I defending Donald Trump? Hell, no! As usual, he is now blaming the liberal left for creating the atmosphere of hatred — his so-called “Trump Derangement Syndrome” — for fomenting the violent acts of a lone, mentally-disturbed individual. But that, in itself, is meant to stir up even more hatred among his MAGA goons and others on the conservative right. It is a vicious circle; and the man in the glass — or white — house is most responsible for keeping it spinning. In fact, he’s the one who started it.

Whether or not Jimmy Kimmel’s jest was inappropriate, Donald Trump — being guilty of some of the most poisonous remarks about countless other people — is in no position to criticize or to threaten action against anyone for exercising their equal right to free speech. But that is what he is once again doing, in yet another display of pettiness and the most blatant hypocrisy. And nothing I, or anyone else, might say will ever change him.

But it’s exhausting, and demoralizing . . . and I just wish it would stop.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/28/26