TO MAINTAIN ACCESS, THE NEW YORK TIMES PRINTS THE LEGEND

I'm back. Thank you, Yas and Tom, for some great posts while I was away.

Today we learn from Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan of The New York Times that Donald Trump has brought in someone new to help him with debate prep -- which he totally doesn't do, at least not in the traditional sense, Haberman and Swan insist:

Former President Donald J. Trump has begun preparing for his debate with Vice President Kamala Harris and has brought in the former Democratic congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard to help sharpen his attacks in a recent practice session at his private club and home, Mar-a-Lago, according to two people with knowledge of Mr. Trump’s schedule....

Mr. Trump likes to say he doesn’t need to prepare for debates, and his team is under instructions to use the term “policy time” to describe their sessions....

He still doesn’t do traditional debate prep. Nobody played Mr. Biden in his sessions ahead of their CNN debate on June 27. Instead, he sat with advisers for blocks of time or informally on plane trips and discussed potential topics and lines of questioning. In more formal sessions at Mar-a-Lago, aides have sat in chairs opposite him, playing the role of moderators.

Should we really believe this? Trump is about to debate a dark-haired, very self-possessed female Democrat, and in anticipation he's brought on ... a dark-haired, very self-possessed female ex-Democrat. And we're asupposed to believe that Gabbard isn't playing Harris in mock debates, just because the Trump campaign insists she isn't?

I don't need to do traditional debate prep is just the kind of empty boast you'd expect from Trump, who always wants the rubes to believe that he doesn't have to work hard because he has so many natural talents. He understand military issues more than the generals! His uncle taught at MIT, so he's an expert in geopolitics and "nuclear"! The message is always that Trump comes by his skills effortlessly. He's genetically superior to mere mortals.

I could be wrong in assuming that Gabbard is playing Harris in Trump's debate prep -- I'm not there, so I don't know for certain. But presumably Haberman and Swan aren't there either. They're just assuming that they're being told the truth by close allies of a pathological liar.

I guess they really believe that their sources wouldn't lie to them about this, and if they do, it won't matter in the end. Meanwhile, they retain access to Trump. And isn't that all that matters?