Like most who probably are reading this, I tried during the ascent of Donald J. Trump to make sense of what on earth we were witnessing.

First there was the idea that he was a Clinton plant (which may be partially true) - there to be the perfect candidate for Clinton to defeat as she finally gets the presidency she has wanted for so, so long. Clinton and Trump were friends for quite a long time - there are social pictures of the Clinton and Trump camps together going back almost as far as I have been alive.

However, Trump seemed to believe his own hype and the friction between him and Hillary seemed pretty real unless they both are incredible actors (as we saw during the debate last night). That debate was filled with animosity and madness, the snarky comments of "You'd be in jail" from Trump, Trump's wandering, kicking of his feet and looming over Hillary during the debate, his bringing out former accusers of Bill Clinton. His comment especially, when asked to compliment to Hillary Clinton, that she was a "fighter" was telling particularly for me. There's several videos of him saying exactly that sort of thing of her during better times. During most of his career, Hillary seemed like someone he admired. Consider that for a minute. I could actually imagine saying something similar to people I have known and respected (including women) who became clouded in my life by disappointment and betrayal. This whole saga will make for one hell of a book and/or film.

Personal melodrama was driving this - a melodrama that may be worse than a man like Donald Trump would ever want to admit to himself. The thought occurred to me after that debate, as many individuals came around to say they had "worse" videos of Trump than his boasting of sexual assault by "grabbing them by the pussy," that this was a trap, that alot of people in media, in the housing industry and even in his own circle so loathed Donald Trump after years of dealing with him that they had decided to set a trap for him that would seem so attractive to him that he would walk right in to it.

There is precedent for this. There once was a millionaire alot like Donald Trump - Howard Hughes. Like Trump, Hughes was a beneficiary of privilege who nonetheless took his privilege to be a huge personality in public life, building planes, films and buildings with his name emblazoned on them. He flaunted women much like Trump does and eventually became the undoing both of public officials (in Hughes' case, Senator Ralph Owen Brewster, who tried to ruin Hughes' life by making him out as a war profiteer) and mental illness (it's anyone's guess what the fuck is wrong with Trump but Hughes had hardcore OCD).

(A little note - by comparing the persecution of Hughes to what is going on with Trump, I'm in no way victimizing Trump. They are very different people - one was a genius who genuinely contributed to the world. The other is one of the most disgusting creatures to infect our public space in memory. Nevertheless the situations are similar and illustrate precedence for this sort of thing.)

The evidence of a lynching seem in order. All these videos conveniently arrive of Trump in full glory, reported vehemently as if it's a shocking revelation that he's a piece of shit. News hosts like Joe Scarborough kept him as a regular guest and helped build him up, not casting him down until the general election was well in to swing. The people close to him don't seem too disrupted by his downfall - Melania Trump shook Bill Clinton's hand and wore a "Pussy Bow" shirt in the midst of the aforementioned controversy, Tiffany Trump avoided a kiss from her father and Ivanka Trump "liked" a news report of it being revealed that Trump once told Howard Stern it was okay to call her a "piece of ass."

All of that is anecdotal when not included with the fact that Trump's brand is devastated. He has spent huge sums of money during this last year, has far more debt than wealth and has admitted to not paying taxes. Many cities and countries have banned him and shut down his projects, from Canada all the way to India. Jennifer Rubin at Washington Post wrote a good explanation of how bad it is for Trump: 

Sure, there will be the less-educated, poor white men who admire Trump and maybe buy his books (when they come out in paperback), but these are not his core customers, his hotel guests, his business partners or his bankers. If doing business with Trump now earns you a slew of awful publicity (e.g. women boycotting, Hispanics picketing), why would you do business with the country’s most infamous sleazebag? His name has long been associated with crass excess and garish taste, a poor man’s version of how the rich live. Now his name is synonymous with gross lechery.

Suddenly a really rough explanation comes in to mind - that many of the people who worked with and were close to Trump hated his guts and worked out a way to really destroy his life and legacy. And it worked. Maybe he could earn a place for himself in the world of Alt Right extremists - talking amongst the like of Augustus Invictus or Jack Donovan (look them up) but the whole world he had most his life may be at an end for him.

There eventually is going to be a real alternative right candidate in the United States - someone like France's Marine Le Pen or Germany's Frauke Petry. They might even win, especially if they more intelligently connect themselves with Vladimir Putin's brand of conservative authoritarianism. However, Trump is not it. He may be remembered as a tragic figure to them, as someone who tried but was beaten down by the progressive/neoliberal establishment but he's not going to be the Alt Right revolutionary they seek. He's just a sad man reaching a very sad end.