Bozo took another restorative trip to The Heartland last night, to puff up his deflated ego again.

“This place is packed,” he exulted. “We’re in the heartland of America, and there is no place I would rather be.”

In the packed stands of Freedom Hall in Louisville, the swirl of questions back in Washington — about the Trump campaign’s ties with Russia or the president’s debunked assertions that he had been wiretapped by his predecessor — seemed a million miles away.

That was exactly the point. Mr. Trump’s aides have used these campaign-style events to buoy their boss and provide a respite from the pileup of pressures in Washington. Mr. Trump recycled many of his favorite lines from the aftermath of his election victory in November.

Of course it’s the point. It’s all he’s got. It’s all he knows how to do – stand in front of a crowd and preen, and then work the crowd up into a froth of rage. He’s an empty suit, with zero interest in the actual substantive work of the job he went after, and a bottomless need for adulation. I’ve never seen anyone so pathetic in my life.

The visit to a major coal-producing state also resonated in the context of Mr. Trump’s plans to lift emissions restrictions on coal-fired power plants, something he is expected to do with an executive order on climate issues that the administration has yet to release. Mr. Trump said he had already eliminated some regulations on the coal industry, and he promised that the executive order would do more.

“We are going to put our coal miners back to work,” he said. “They have not been treated well. But they are going to be treated well.”

Of course their children and grandchildren will have climate change to deal with, but oh well, that’s not Trump’s problem.