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The advantages of incumbency are crumbling away for Trump

President Trump had a bad week: That was the week before last. He had another one this past week. For someone trailing former vice president Joe Biden in the presidential race, Trump remains the biggest obstacle to reelection, an embattled incumbent who is frittering away the advantages of incumbency.

The week before last it was an article in the Atlantic by Jeffrey Goldberg that portrayed the president using derogatory language about military personnel killed or wounded in action. It was based on several unnamed sources, and Trump — and others now or formerly in the administration — vigorously disputed the account. Prominently absent from those publicly defending Trump were former defense secretary Jim Mattis and, critically, former White House chief of staff John F. Kelly.

This past week it was an entirely different issue for the president — a self-inflicted problem that was the result of his many hours of taped, on-the-record conversations with Washington Post associate editor Bob Woodward, whose book “Rage” will be published this week. Continue reading.

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