It may yet turn out that Donald Trump is subject to the law just like everyone else.

The courts keep taking Donald Trump both seriously and literally. And the president’s word choices are proving to be a real headache.

A federal judge in Kentucky is the latest to take Trump at his word when he says something controversial. Judge David J. Hale ruled against efforts by Trump’s attorneys to throw out a lawsuit accusing him of inciting violence against protesters at a March 2016 campaign rally in Louisville.

At the rally, Trump repeatedly said “get ’em out of here” before, according to the protesters, they were shoved and punched by his supporters. Trump’s attorneys sought to have the case dismissed on free speech grounds, arguing that he didn’t intend for his supporters to use force. But Hale noted that speech inciting violence is not protected by the First Amendment and ruled that there is plenty of evidence that the protesters’ injuries were a “direct and proximate result” of Trump’s words.

It’s laughable to pretend he didn’t really mean “get ’em out of here” as a physical act. Of course he did. He’s a bully.

Trump and his team will undoubtedly dismiss this latest example as yet another activist judge who is out to get him. But yet again, they are forced into the position of saying that Trump’s words shouldn’t be taken at face value — that he didn’t mean what he actually, literally said.

I’ve argued before that this is a completely unworkable standard when it comes to the media’s coverage of Trump. It allows Trump team members to retroactively downgrade whatever they want to, while leaving the good stuff intact — essentially a Get Out of Jail Free card they can redeem anytime they want.

Instead he’s landed on Boardwalk with a hotel on it.

Lordy lordy lordy.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson takes a private elevator to his palatial office on the seventh floor of the State Department building, where sightings of him are rare on the floors below.

On many days, he blocks out several hours on his schedule as “reading time,” when he is cloistered in his office poring over the memos he prefers ahead of in-person meetings.

Most of his interactions are with an insular circle of political aides who are new to the State Department. Many career diplomats say they still have not met him, and some have been instructed not to speak to him directly — or even make eye contact.

If he happens to pass them in the halls, are they supposed to turn around and face the wall?

On his first three foreign trips, Tillerson skipped visits with State Department employees and their families, embassy stops that were standard morale-boosters under other secretaries of state.

Well, that certainly sounds like a bad fit for the job. He’s shy and introverted and fond of peace and quiet…so he’s not cut out to be Secretary of State, is he.

Eight weeks into his tenure as President Trump’s top diplomat, the former ExxonMobil chief executive is isolated, walled off from the State Department’s corps of bureaucrats in Washington and around the world. His distant management style has created growing bewilderment among foreign officials who are struggling to understand where the United States stands on key issues. It has sown mistrust among career employees at State, who swap paranoid stories about Tillerson that often turn out to be untrue. And it threatens to undermine the power and reach of the State Department, which has been targeted for a 30 percent funding cut in Trump’s budget.

Many have expressed alarm that Tillerson has not fought harder for the agency he now leads.

Oh well, it’s only the State Department.

He curbed his enthusiasm about the annual human rights report, too.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who during his confirmation hearings repeatedly vowed to promote human rights as a core American value, alarmed human rights advocates when he did not appear in person to present the State Department’s annual human rights report, released Friday.

In a break with long-standing tradition only rarely breached, Tillerson’s remarks were limited to a short written introduction to the lengthy report. Nor did any senior State Department official make on-camera comments that are typically watched around the world, including by officials in authoritarian countries where abuses are singled out in the report.

Instead, a senior administration official talked to reporters by phone and only on the condition of anonymity.

“The report speaks for itself,” the administration official said. “We’re very, very proud of it. The facts should really be the story here.”

But Tillerson’s absence underscored how the former ExxonMobil executive remains more comfortable with an aloof, corporate style of governance than the public diplomacy practiced by his predecessors.

Governance isn’t supposed to be aloof.

Tillerson drew fire from some members of Congress and advocates who said his decision not to personally unveil the report suggested the Trump administration places a low priority on advancing human rights.

“While the U.S. commitment to human rights has been imperfect, it has always been one of the key pillars of foreign policy,” said Sarah Margon, the Washington director for Human Rights Watch. “That seems to be under dramatic threat right now. The fact he’s not personally involved makes it much easier for other governments to ignore its findings.”

It’s not surprising that Trump doesn’t care about human rights, because we already know that Trump doesn’t care about anything that matters. He cares about himself, and money, and winning, and grabbing them by the pussy. Human rights are about other people, so of course he’s not interested.

In the past, secretaries of state have taken the attitude that their presence in unveiling the report lends weight to its findings. John F. Kerry delayed its release twice because he was traveling and wanted to present it himself. Kerry, Hillary Clinton and Madeleine Albright all showed up for the release in their first year in office. Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice missed the first year but made personal appearances in subsequent years.

Whenever previous secretaries did not make it, the report was always made public on camera by a senior State Department official who answered questions about it.

But now we have an administration that wants to destroy the Deep State, so apparently that means global human rights too.

Some human rights advocates said their concerns are heightened by reports of budget cuts impacting humanitarian aid and Trump’s campaign remarks that he supports waterboarding and “much worse” for terrorist suspects.

Human Rights First said Tillerson’s decision to forgo a public rollout suggests U.S. leadership on the issue is waning.

“Such a decision sends an unmistakable signal to human rights defenders that the United States may no longer have their back, a message that won’t be lost on abusive governments,” said Rob Berschinski, a senior vice president at Human Rights First and a former State Department official in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor.

Not good.

Trump has been especially loathsome on Twitter this morning. He’s probably cranky because the grownups won’t let him go to Taco del Mar this weekend, on account of how the news media keep pointing out how very much time he is spending on vacation at our expense.

When will Sleepy Eyes Chuck Todd and @NBCNews start talking about the Obama SURVEILLANCE SCANDAL and stop with the Fake Trump/Russia story?

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2017

It makes me want to smash things to see our head of state publicly deploying rude nicknames as if he were five years old. He is degrading us all, and it makes me furious.

It is the same Fake News Media that said there is "no path to victory for Trump" that is now pushing the phony Russia story. A total scam!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2017

He’s so dense as well as malevolent. A mistake in prediction is not the same thing as fake news.

The failing @nytimes finally gets it – "In places where no insurance company offers plans, there will be no way for ObamaCare customers to..

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2017

The Times is not failing, and in fact Trump has boosted their circulation, but he always calls it that, as if he were five years old.

Wow, @FoxNews just reporting big news. Source: "Official behind unmasking is high up. Known Intel official is responsible. Some unmasked….

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2017

..not associated with Russia. Trump team spied on before he was nominated." If this is true, does not get much bigger. Would be sad for U.S.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2017

He was supposed to be working this weekend. Instead he’s just watching tv. At least we don’t have to pay the bill for the Secret Service to stay at Taco del Mar.

Mother Jones:

In an announcement late Friday, President Donald Trump proclaimed April as National Sexual Assault and Prevention Month, vowing to commit his administration to raising awareness on the issue and “reduce and eventually end violence” against women, children, and men.

“This includes supporting victims, preventing future abuse, and prosecuting offenders to the full extent of the law,” a statement from the White House read. “I have already directed the Attorney General to create a task force on crime reduction and public safety.  This task force will develop strategies to reduce crime and propose new legislation to fill gaps in existing laws.”

“In the face of sexual violence, we must commit to providing meaningful support and services for victims and survivors in the United States and around the world.”

The Huffington Post:

President Donald Trump, who has been publicly accused of sexual assault by more than 15 women and was caught on tape boasting he could grab women “by the pussy” without their consent, has officially proclaimed April 2017 to be National Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month.

In 2009, Barack Obama became the first president to officially proclaim April as Sexual Assault Awareness Month, although activists had recognized the month as a time to boost awareness of sexual violence for several decades. Since 2009, a proclamation has been released each year by the White House. But 2017 brings us the first year that a president who has been accused of committing sexual assault has issued such a proclamation.

This tweet is particularly infuriating:

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/847625389908217856

How can we possibly enlist the full potential of women in our society when women in our society are subject to so much contempt and predatory behavior from men like Trump? How can he mouth pious bullshittery about the full potential of women when he talks about women the way he does? Where does he get the nerve?

Ok my excuse is that yesterday was rushed because I had to do things out in the world, so I didn’t grasp what the news about the identity of the people who gave Nunes the sekrit info meant. Julie Hirschfeld Davis at the Times caused the penny to drop in a piece on Trump’s dopy tweet about Flynn and immunity and “Dems” this morning.

The credibility of the inquiry was thrown into question on Thursday after it emerged that a pair of White House officials helped provide Representative Devin Nunes of California, a Republican and chairman of the Intelligence Committee, with intelligence reports that showed Mr. Trump and his associates were incidentally swept up in foreign surveillance by American spy agencies.

Armed with the information, Mr. Nunes held a news conference and made a public show of going to the White House to hand-deliver information to Mr. Trump, an apparent effort to help the White House explain why the president had taken to Twitter early this month to accuse President Barack Obama of wiretapping his telephone. The chiefs of the F.B.I. and the National Security Agency have both testified that such surveillance never took place.

Ohh – right. The fact that they are White House people means that Nunes’s exciting dash to the White House to brief Donnie was a big fucking charade. White House people gave him the info, therefore Trump already knew about it, therefore Nunes’s “briefing” was a piece of theater.

It was not clear from Mr. Trump’s post on Friday whether he fully appreciated the potential impact on his administration if Mr. Flynn received immunity to participate fully in the investigation. But he has said previously that seeking protection from prosecution is a telltale sign of wrongdoing.

“If you’re not guilty of a crime, what do you need immunity for, right?” he said at a campaign rally in Orlando, Fla., in September. Mr. Trump was referring to Hillary Clinton aides who received immunity during an F.B.I. inquiry into her private email server.

And Flynn led the crowd in chanting “Lock her up!”

The point about Nunes’s charade is in yesterday’s Times article but I was reading too fast (or skimming) and missed it.

The revelation on Thursday that White House officials disclosed the reports, which Mr. Nunes then discussed with Mr. Trump, is likely to fuel criticism that the intelligence chairman has been too eager to do the bidding of the Trump administration while his committee is supposed to be conducting an independent investigation of Russia’s meddling in the presidential election.

It is the latest twist of a bizarre Washington drama that began after dark on March 21, when Mr. Nunes got a call from a person he has described only as a source. The call came as he was riding across town in an Uber car, and he quickly diverted to the White House. The next day, Mr. Nunes gave a hastily arranged news conference before going to brief Mr. Trump on what he had learned the night before from — as it turns out — White House officials.

It has a cartoonish feel, doesn’t it. Ooh, a late night call while riding in an Uber car – oooh a quick diversion to the White House – ooh an emergency press conference followed by an emergency briefing to tell Trump what he already knew.

The government ethics duo Richard Painter and Norman Eisen on Flynn and immunity:

Instead of categorically rejecting Mr. Flynn’s offer, as the Senate Intelligence Committee appears to have done today, both houses of Congress and federal prosecutors should carefully review Flynn’s proffered testimony and the details of the immunity deal and then make a decision.

This is the latest development in a scandal more frightening than Watergate because it involves a foreign adversary attacking the American political system. We need to get to the bottom of it as soon as possible.

In this case need to know might outweigh need to punish.

This time, the stakes are too high to wait. Immunity should be granted as soon as Congress and prosecutors are persuaded that Mr. Flynn has information that will lead to a criminal case against one or more people at least as important to the alleged wrongdoing as Mr. Flynn may be. The overriding objective must be learning who if anyone in the United States collaborated with the Russians as well as who knew about it, what they knew and when they knew it.

This case is different from ordinary criminal investigations. Finding the truth is even more important than punishing the guilty, because it is critical to our national security and the future of our democracy.

It is also vitally important that decisions about whether to grant Mr. Flynn immunity, and all other decisions about the Trump-Russia investigation, be made only by people who are completely independent of anyone who could possibly be a subject or target of that investigation.

Like Trump, for instance. Like Trump especially.

Congress — particularly the House of Representatives — has also compromised its independence by treating the Trump-Russia investigation as a partisan issue. The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Devin Nunes, has turned it into a farce by running over to the White House to give and receive information in the dark of night, and even to possibly publicly divulge classified information. He must also recuse himself for purposes of the immunity grant and the investigation as a whole.

Because this scandal involves the hostile acts of a foreign adversary, it is a national security issue. We now have a witness who may help us get to the bottom of it. A prompt and proper grant of immunity can maximize our chances of finding out what happened — and making sure that those who may have betrayed the United States are never in a position to do so again.

Trump continues to act like a child.

Mike Flynn should ask for immunity in that this is a witch hunt (excuse for big election loss), by media & Dems, of historic proportion!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 31, 2017

There’s yet more confirmation that Devin Nunes is the White House’s fluffy fluffy poodle.

A pair of White House officials helped provide Representative Devin Nunes of California, a Republican and the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, with the intelligence reports that showed that President Trump and his associates were incidentally swept up in foreign surveillance by American spy agencies.

The revelation on Thursday that White House officials disclosed the reports, which Mr. Nunes then discussed with Mr. Trump, is likely to fuel criticism that the intelligence chairman has been too eager to do the bidding of the Trump administration while his committee is supposed to be conducting an independent investigation of Russia’s meddling in the presidential election.

Why, just because he did the White House’s bidding when it was the White House his committee was investigating? And because he did it all in secret?

Several current American officials identified the White House officials as Ezra Cohen-Watnick, the senior director for intelligence at the National Security Council, and Michael Ellis, a lawyer who works on national security issues at the White House Counsel’s Office and was previously counsel to Mr. Nunes’s committee. Though neither has been accused of breaking any laws, they do appear to have sought to use intelligence to advance the political goals of the Trump administration.

Emails! Abortion! Bad hombres! A squirrel!

[E]ven before Thursday, the view among Democrats and even some Republicans was that Mr. Nunes was given access to the intelligence reports to divert attention from the investigations into Russian meddling, and to bolster Mr. Trump’s debunked claims of having been wiretapped.

On both counts, Mr. Nunes appears to have succeeded: The House inquiry into Russian meddling that he is leading has descended into a sideshow since he disclosed the information, and the administration has portrayed his information as vindicating the president’s wiretapping claims.

The failing New York Times! Fake news! Enemy of the people! Big truck!

Meanwhile, Trump is leaving executive branch science jobs unfilled, which means he has no science advisers on staff.

Mr. Trump’s first budget proposes slashing $5.8 billion, or 18 percent, from the National Institutes of Health and $900 million, or about 20 percent, from the Energy Department’s Office of Science, which runs basic research at the national laboratories. The Environmental Protection Agency would be cut by 31 percent.

On Tuesday, Mr. Trump issued executive orders that roll back Mr. Obama’s Clean Power Plan, which would have closed hundreds of coal-fired power plants in an effort to curb planet-warming carbon dioxide emissions.

Those actions have been taken without advice or guidance from scientists and engineers inside the White House. The few remaining policy advisers have ceased distributing daily memos on policy issues like climate change, machine-learning regulation, or the ethics of big data collection.

“They are flying blind when it comes to science and tech issues,” said Kumar Garg, who left the Office of Science and Technology Policy as a senior adviser after the election.

And they’re hardly a scientifically literate crowd.

Obama expanded the office from 50 people to 130.

Mr. Obama turned to the science office during crises like the 2014 Ebola outbreak in Africa; the 2011 nuclear spill in Fukushima, Japan; and the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.

The staff of the science office developed the White House’s recommendations for regulation of commercial drones and driverless cars at the Transportation Department. Last year, the staff produced an attention-grabbing report that raised concerns about the threat that robots posed to employment and that advocated retraining Americans for higher-skilled jobs. The staff also put on the annual White House science fair.

Trump doesn’t understand enough about science to understand how it can be useful to him. He doesn’t even understand enough about it to understand that he doesn’t understand.

Under Mr. Obama, the science and technology office included 19 policy advisers in the environment and energy division, 14 in the national security and international affairs division, nine in the science division and 20 in the technology and innovation division.

“We are all sitting on the edge of our seats hoping nothing catastrophic happens in the world,” said Phil Larson, a former senior science and technology adviser to Mr. Obama. “But if it does, who is going to be advising him?”

Oh I’m sure Steve Bannon will step up.

Today in Trump.

The Freedom Caucus will hurt the entire Republican agenda if they don't get on the team, & fast. We must fight them, & Dems, in 2018!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 30, 2017

Fight them, and the Dems, and the 65% of the population who think Trump is a trainwreck. That should go well.

The Times attempts to pick its way through the debris field, starting with that tweet.

The post from Mr. Trump did not seem to have been impulsive: Mr. Bannon, who has counseled a tough tone with the rebels, has instructed his staff to more closely monitor the president’s Twitter messages to use them as leverage in negotiations.

Dan Scavino, an aide who controls Mr. Trump’s official White House Twitter account, recently moved into Mr. Bannon’s West Wing office, where he closely monitors social media activity by and about the president, according to two officials.

Minutes after Mr. Trump’s post, his Republican critics took to Twitter to respond, in Trump-ese: “It’s a swamp not a hot tub. We both came here to drain it. #SwampCare polls 17%. Sad!” wrote Representative Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican who often sides with the caucus on votes.

“It didn’t take long for the swamp to drain @realDonaldTrump,” said Representative Justin Amash of Michigan, a member of the Freedom Caucus who has emerged as one of Mr. Trump’s most caustic Republican critics. “No shame, Mr. President. Almost everyone succumbs to the D.C. Establishment.”

Michael Flynn Jr., a conservative activist — and son of Michael T. Flynn, Mr. Trump’s former national security adviser — went even further. “Why is @realDonaldTrump siding w/ estab Repubs (which we know r closet Dems) and looney Dems like Pelosi and Schumer? NOT WHAT WE VOTED FOR,” he said on Twitter.

I wonder if Steve Bannon is now worrying that he’s not reactionary enough.

Trump, at any rate, quickly returned to more comfortable territory.

About an hour after he stepped up his criticism of his own party, Mr. Trump trained his fury on a more familiar target, The New York Times, posting on Twitter a link to a New York Post editorial critical of the paper.

“The failing @nytimes has disgraced the media world. Gotten me wrong for two solid years. Change libel laws?” Mr. Trump wrote.

Sure, Donnie. Let’s change the libel laws so that they carve out an exception for a thin-skinned asshole from Queens who can dish it out all day long but can’t take it for one second.