Word.

Over the years the United States government and various analysts have labeled a range of designated enemies — Iraq, North Korea, Iran — as not just evil, but irrational, unpredictable, and therefore beyond the reach of diplomacy. As with Bush and Hussein, these characterizations often were as much excuse and rationalization for violence as analysis.

But we have at last found a global villain who matches the bugbear — an ill-informed violent despot who seems to enjoy carnage for its own sake, and who has the power and the will to project terror and violence anywhere on earth for any reason or for none.

That global villain is, of course, President Donald Trump.

I've heard some MAGA spokestrolls bleating about how good this war will be for Iranian women. But we heard that before in Afghanistan and Trump signed a deal to bail on them and hand that country back to the Taliban.