Setup.

Last week, Donald Trump claimed that “thousands and thousands” of people in Jersey City turned out to celebrate the dropping of the World Trade Center towers by al Qaeda. Presumably they were Muslims, but his is New Jersey we are talking about so who knows.

“Hey, I watched when the World Trade Center came tumbling down. And I watched in Jersey City, N.J., where thousands and thousands of people were cheering as that building was coming down. Thousands of people were cheering.”

In pushing back against the tsunami of truth consuming his fanciful story, Trump and his campaign and apologists have started using a Washington Post story by Serge Kovaleski headlined Northern New Jersey Draws Probers’ Eyes to bolster their case.

In Jersey City, within hours of two jetliners’ plowing into the World Trade Center, law enforcement authorities detained and questioned a number of people who were allegedly seen celebrating the attacks and holding tailgate-style parties on rooftops while they watched the devastation on the other side of the river.

No mention, you’ll notice, of “thousands and thousands” but it does show that some people were celebrating. Again, I’ll note, this is New-freakin-Jersey we are talking about. This is the Land-of-the-Jersey-Neck-Warmer. These people could have thought they were looking at a Kiss concert.

Anyway, Mr. Kovaleski, who now works for the New York Times, seems to be uncomfortable with his reporting being Ground Zero of a food-fight involving his media brethren and Donald Trump and tried to extricate himself.

Serge Kovaleski, the lead reporter on the Washington Post story that Trump links to, said he doesn’t remember witnesses reporting large groups of people celebrating.

“We did a lot of shoe leather reporting in and around Jersey City and talked to a lot of residents and officials for the broader story. Much of that has, indeed, faded from memory,” said Kovaleski, who’s now an investigative reporter for The New York Times. “But I do not recall anyone saying there were thousands, or even hundreds, of people celebrating. That was not the case, as best as I can remember.”

A bit of background. Kovaleski has a very rare congenital condition called arthrogryposis.

Arthrogryposis is a general or descriptive term for the development of nonprogressive contractures affecting one or more areas of the body prior to birth (congenitally). A contracture is a condition in which a joint becomes permanently fixed in a bent (flexed) or straightened (extended) position, completely or partially restricting the movement of the affected joint.

And he and Trump know each other from when Kovaleski covered Trump for the New York Daily News.

That brings us up to the present.

Tuesday evening, Trump was at a campaign event in South Carolina. The subject of the phantom Muslims and Kovaleski’s not corroborating the version of the story Trump wanted to hear came up. Well, watch for yourself:

Via Politico:

Trump went on, “Now the poor guy — you ought to see the guy: ‘Uhh I don’t know what I said. I don’t remember.’ He’s going, ‘I don’t remember. Maybe that’s what I said.’” As he spoke, Trump launched into an impression which involved gyrating his arms wildly and imitating the unusual angle at which Kovaleski’s hand sometimes rests.

Now I realize that this isn’t going to make people who oppose Trump think less of him. Not only has that floor been reached but probably the sub-foundation as well. Sadly, it probably isn’t going to have much of an impact who support him. This will just be another blow Trump is striking against political correctness… or good manners were they not already dead.