“America needs a superhero,” declares Donald Trump, barely audible over the cacophony of heroic music in a new campaign video dropped last night on Truth Social. It’s actually tough to imagine anything America needs less in a culture awash with comic-book entertainment, and cinemas filled with silly characters in tights shooting beams out of their eyes and fists.

Speaking of which, here’s the video that came from a declared presidential candidate last night:

The New York Post calls this a “bizarre video,” which is certainly accurate. It might be also called “a desperate attempt at relevance”:

Former President Donald Trump teased an upcoming announcement with a superhero-themed video Wednesday, baiting his Truth Social followers with a promise of a major announcement the following day.

In the 15-second clip, the 76-year-old Trump told viewers that “America needs a superhero!” Fantastical music blared as the screen cut away to an animation of the former president posing like Superman in front of Trump Tower, tearing open his business suit to reveal a chiseled T-logo bodysuit and laser-like eyes.

The message concludes with text promising a “MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT” Dec. 15.

Before we get to the possibilities of Trump’s major announcement, let’s first pose this question: to whom is this message intended to appeal? Even for comic-book imagery, it’s childish. If twelve-year-olds had the vote, this might get them interested. It’s doubly amusing in the context of Trump’s current position, having lost his own last election and then watching the candidates he recruited lose relatively easy elections in places like Pennsylvania, Nevada, Georgia, and New Hampshire, among others. That conjures up some imagery options, but “superhero” isn’t among them. This looks like overcompensation. A lot.

The Independent offers more on the context:

A new national poll found that Donald Trump’s favourability rating has dropped to its lowest level since 2015, as a separate one from the Wall Street Journal found that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is outpacing the one-term president among likely GOP primary voters in a hypothetical 2024 matchup.

The poll, released Wednesday from Quinnipiac University, showed that just 31 per cent of registered voters surveyed hold a favourable opinion of the twice-impeached president, with 59 per cent holding an unfavourable view.

The two surveys come at a time when Mr Trump faces a plethora of headaches on the legal front, including a recently emerged secret trial that the Trump Organization lost in 2021, resulting in the company being held in contempt of court.

It looks more like Trump needs a superhero rather than has his own superpowers.

So what kind of “major announcement” will Trump make today? He’s already officially launched his 2024 presidential election campaign, and it’s tough to see what would be more “major” than that. A withdrawal from the race would be super-major, of course, but that wouldn’t fit with the superhero imagery.

The New York Post offers a few suggestions:

• A return to Twitter
• A campaign for House Speaker
• Some updates on his legal issues or other mundane topics

Of these three, a Twitter return is the most likely, although that may create more problems for Trump. Trump’s Truth Social business model depends on Trump exclusives; it’s basically the only reason for its existence. If Trump started posting on Twitter again, Truth Social would collapse, which wouldn’t make Trump look superhero-y. Just a month ago, Truth Social’s CEO Patrick Orlando was desperately keeping its investors on board ahead of an expected IPO. Orlando got an extension from investors through September of next year to achieve it based on Trump remaining exclusive to Truth Social. Reneging on that might create even more legal headaches for Trump and no end of anger among his investors.

The campaign for House Speaker would be equally silly. For one thing, it would largely preclude Trump from running for president, since he’d have to be in Washington DC most of the time. Furthermore, he’s likely to lose such a contest and lose it badly. A handful of House Republicans claim to support the idea, but the end result would likely be to drive the rest of the caucus to rally around Kevin McCarthy, and to alienate Trump even further from his allies within the caucus. The attempt to inject himself into the House GOP leadership fight would look even more like a desperate attempt at attention and relevance than the above video, and for what? An attempt to participate in legislating, which isn’t a forte for Trump in any sense? Joining the swamp? Issuing parliamentary orders and controlling the clock for one-minute speeches?

What else would be so “major” as to justify this expectations-setting declaration? It’s difficult to imagine anything else other than a selection of running mate for his presidential campaign, but even that would be pretty anti-climactic for a “superhero” promise. It would certainly be novel, as such decisions usually come at the end of campaigns rather than the beginning. It would be vastly presumptuous considering that no one has even heard a debate yet, let alone cast a vote in the 2024 primaries. And one would have to wonder who would agree to join Trump’s ticket at this stage without any indication that Trump can outlast the 2024 field, and so risk the political consequences of failure.

Maybe this is just a test of the Trump Emergency Self-Promotional System. If so, well … congrats on its success, I guess. It worked; we’re discussing it. But that’s only of value if you truly believe that there’s no such thing as bad publicity.

Update: You gotta be kidding me:

Thank God, the digital trading cards are here. It was indeed a MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT. pic.twitter.com/T1nsqRwr92

— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) December 15, 2022

Collect the whole set! This must be a joke. One way or the other.