Trump’s Vile Response Made Rob Reiner’s Death All About Himself — And It Worked

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President Donald Trump’s reaction to reports surrounding the deaths of Rob Reiner and his wife was easy to condemn and harder to ignore. Not because it was shocking — Trump rarely is anymore — but because it demonstrated, once again, how reliably his worst instincts are rewarded.

Before authorities had confirmed having a suspect in custody, Trump had immediately folded the gruesome tragedy into a familiarly solipsistic narrative about himself. The violent deaths of a filmmaker and his wife were stripped of gravity and recast as proof of Trump’s favorite claim: that opposition to him is not disagreement, but pathology. The victims vanished almost instantly. Trump took their place.

This is usually where the criticism stops, with some variation on cruelty, narcissism, or indecency. But Shakespeare’s Polonius had it right: “Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t.” Focusing only on Trump’s character misses the more uncomfortable truth. He behaves this way because it works.

Trump does not respond to news so much as seize it. He has learned that speed beats accuracy, provocation beats restraint, and domination beats decorum. In an attention economy driven by algorithms and outrage, the fastest way to own a story is to refuse the norms that once governed public life. Verification slows you down. Silence costs you relevance. Trump has adjusted accordingly.

That adjustment matters because presidents are expected to do more than argue policy. They are supposed to signal limits — to recognize moments when politics pauses and something more basic takes over. Trump rejects that function entirely. He does not acknowledge events that demand restraint because restraint requires stepping aside, and stepping aside forfeits attention.

The Reiner response followed the same logic Trump applies to everything else. He did not lower his voice because the subject involved death. He did not wait because waiting would have meant surrendering narrative control. He sounded exactly as he does when attacking a critic or hyping himself, because in his mind there is no difference. Everything is content.

There is a problem with this analysis, though, and it implicates more than just Trump. His critics are part of the system that makes this behavior rational. The cycle is now automatic: provocation produces outrage, outrage produces coverage, and coverage recenters Trump. He knows this. He relies on it. His behavior is calibrated not just to offend, but to be amplified by those most appalled by it. And yet it cannot be ignored.

A political figure who understands that cruelty and distortion are rewarded — and chooses them as his primary tools — is not misfiring. He is operating efficiently within a broken system.

Trump often claims that he alone understands how power works now. He may be wrong about many things, but on this point, he isn’t wrong. The incentives favor him. The attention follows him. The norms that once constrained behavior have been converted into liabilities.

Which leaves an awkward question with no easy answer. If Trump is rewarded every time he behaves this way, and if condemnation only tightens his grip on the narrative, then what looks like unfitness may also be the most successful strategy available. Naming that reality does not solve it. But pretending it isn’t true only guarantees that it continues.

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.