The peril of Trump keeps growing nearly 8 months after he left the White House

[superadmin]

CNN)Add another evidence dump to the growing case that a second Donald Trump presidency would be more extreme and dangerous than the first.

In new examples of the threat the ex-President poses, a bombshell book by Washington Post legend Bob Woodward and his newspaper stablemate and co-author, Robert Costa, laid bare another view into the frightening, unchained few weeks inside Trump's inner circle around the Capitol insurrection.

The problem posed by Trump is now not an aberrant past presidency -- it's the corrosive impact he could have on the nation in the future.

It's not just his previous behavior that was shocking. Before California's Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom survived Tuesday's recall election, according to a CNN projection, the ex-President was opening a new front in his "Big Lie" that now effectively claims that anytime a Republican loses it is a product of massive fraud. It's a falsehood that could tarnish American democratic elections for years to come but is eagerly accepted by millions of Trump voters. And the former President's behavior over the weekend -- using September 11 commemorations to slam his successor, President Joe Biden -- looked rather like an attempt to launch himself back onto the national stage at a moment when the former commander in chief, who was thrown off social media for inciting violence, could claim an easy spotlight.

As Trump teases another run at the White House, his behavior and new accounts of his wild final days in office are becoming too outlandish to ignore, given that he's already the prohibitive favorite for the Republican nomination. Before that, he's the tip of the spear of the GOP bid to retake the House in midterm elections next year. The price for entry for any party candidate is fealty to the flagrant lie sold to millions that Trump is still the rightful President. And he's undoubtedly the dominant force in Republican politics -- even if his ever more radical conduct may make his appeal in a national election more doubtful. At least in an election that is free and fair.

- More -