Appalling. One of the nation’s leading newspapers — in the nation’s capital no less — driven into paroxysms of hysteria and racial spewings, the tell-tale signs of Trump Derangement Syndrome.

Consider these ravings from the latest — I’ve lost count of the number — hysterical editorial that shrieks forth from that Fortress of Delusions and Paranoia otherwise known as the Washington Post. Headline: 

To defend our democracy against Trump, the GOP must aim for a brokered convention

Here are a few selected ravings:

The mission of any responsible Republican should be to block a Trump nomination and election.

… No, Mr. Trump must be stopped because he presents a threat to American democracy. Mr. Trump resembles other strongmen throughout history who have achieved power by manipulating democratic processes. Their playbook includes a casual embrace of violence; a willingness to wield government powers against personal enemies; contempt for a free press; demonization of anyone who is not white and Christian; intimations of dark conspiracies; and the propagation of sweeping, ugly lies. Mr. Trump has championed torture and the murder of innocent relatives of suspected terrorists. He has flirted with the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacists. He has libeled and stereotyped wide swaths of humanity, including Mexicans and Muslims. He considers himself exempt from the norms of democratic contests, such as the release of tax returns, policy papers, lists of advisers and other information that voters have a right to expect.

… On Wednesday, Mr. Trump offered what was meant as an argument for his nomination. If he reaches the convention with a lead short of an outright majority, and then fails to win, “I think you’d have riots,” Mr. Trump said. “I think you’d have problems like you’ve never seen before. I think bad things would happen.”

A democrat disavows violence; a demagogue wields it as a threat. The Republican Party should recognize the difference and act on it before it is too late.

Where to begin to sort through such overwrought, emotional garbage? Not to mention a double-standard the dwarfs the Grand Canyon in size? Let’s try.

• “Mr. Trump must be stopped because he presents a threat to American democracy.” Let me see. Donald Trump has won primary elections — democratic elections — in New Hampshire, South Carolina, North Carolina, Nevada, Georgia, Alabama, Massachusetts, Michigan, Louisiana, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, Florida, and Vermont. Notice anything? Lo and behold, in this story on another day in the Washington Post:

No Republican nominee has ever won all of the different states Donald Trump has

The thrust of the story is the obvious. Democracy is alive and well and Donald Trump is winning in very different states all across the country. Yet there is the Washington Post insisting that all these elections are “a threat to democracy.” Elitism doesn’t get any purer than this.

• Donald Trump has a “casual embrace of violence.” Let me see if I understand this. President Obama once represented ACORN — the community organizing group infamous for, in the words of critic Matthew Vadum in his book Subversion Inc., “massive voter fraud, home invasions, rent-a-mob services, intimidation, corporate shakedowns, and brutal Saul Alinsky-approved tactics.” And knowing all this the Post endorses Obama — twice?

• Trump has “a willingness to wield government powers against personal enemies.” Excuse me? Hello? Has the Washington Post ever heard of Lois Lerner? Of the repeated targeting of Obama’s political adversaries by one of the most powerful agencies in the U.S. government? The IRS? Does the Post have an explanation as to exactly why Governor Chris Christie — an ex-U.S. Attorney himself — took a minute in a GOP debate to accuse the Obama Justice Department of being a “political Justice Department”? Might this have anything to do with the Obama pledge that “we’re gonna punish our enemies and… reward our friends”? Oh, please. 

• Trump has “contempt for a free press.” Does the name “Fox News” ring a bell? The repeated — make that serial — attempts to make war from the Obama White House on a major cable news network? 

• Trump has been engaged in the “demonization of anyone who is not white and  Christian” and “has flirted with the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacists.” What utter bunk. This is nothing more than the usual race card-playing leftism that began with Thomas Jefferson’s alliance with slave owners in 1800 and has continued through two-plus centuries of Democratic Party politics. There is Hillary Clinton running — right now — a commercial in Arizona that says to Latinos she is for “us.” Us? Isn’t her audience all Americans? Why play the race card to Latinos? Why doesn’t the Washington Post care about the utter, bald racial nature of her ad? For that matter, why did the Post not oppose the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court? She who said, “I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male.” Can you imagine what the Post would have said if, say, Bush nominee Samuel Alito was found to have said, “I would hope that a wise white male with the richness of his experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a Latina woman”? And can you imagine if it were discovered that Donald Trump sat in the pews of a racist, anti-Semitic pastor — and said he thought of the guy as like his “old uncle”? Which in fact then-Senator Obama said of his two decades listening to the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. Actually, I can imagine. The reason is obvious. The American Left has played the race card (to be polite) throughout its entire history. Demonizing because of race is exactly what the Washington Post is about every day. And you would think in the 21st century they would at least have a sense of shame. But no.

One could go on — and on. Trump Derangement Syndrome is in full flower at the Washington Post. Suffice to say this editorial is a pristine example of the moral rot that is at the center of not just the Post but the American Left. There is no cause and no candidate for which they are unwilling to play the race and violence and hysteria cards to further the progressive agenda. There is no situation in which the liberal privilege of liberal double-standards cannot be used. There is no situation in which the elitist, leftist contempt for average Americans cannot be vomited forth. 

One thinks of that famous quote from Joseph Welch, the Boston attorney from the Army-McCarthy hearings. Allow me to update Welch’s quote for relevance:

“Let us not assassinate Donald Trump further, editorialists at the Washington Post. You’ve done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sirs and madams? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?”

I can answer that question. The answer is no.