So much for shifting the focus to infrastructure. We’ll get to the moral questions associated with Donald Trump’s reaction to the events in Charlottesville, but let’s start with the political ones. This Monday, in an attempt to contain some of the harm he’d done himself with his equivocations Saturday, Trump delivered a statement denouncing hate groups as “repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans.” It came too late, but it at least mollified the bulk of his allies. Then came yesterday’s event, which was intended to move the conversation onto something normal and highlight a streamlining of infrastructure regulations. Instead, Trump got into a debate over what happened on Saturday and made excuses for the organizers of Unite the Right, noting that they don’t “put themselves down as neo-Nazis” and suggesting there were “very fine people on both sides.”

Let us recall that the point of this event was to move on from the weekend. It required a little message discipline and self-control. Once again, more spectacularly than ever, Trump reminded us that he doesn’t have it. Just as he once did after his first debate with Hillary Clinton, which led to a lunatic tweet storm about a former Miss Universe contestant, Trump got baited into reopening a discussion that promised to bury him. He also did so in front of his chief of staff, John Kelly, National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, and O.M.B. Director Mick Mulvaney. As an incredulous colleague of mine put it, “I sincerely can’t believe Trump re-fucked this.”

Let’s consider the moral questions. Can you make a case that there were “very fine people” attending Unite the Right? Only in the same way that some “very fine people” might be Stalinists. It’s true that fringe hangers-on often try to hijack political events and tarnish the vast majority, but that’s not what happened here. The very point of this gathering was to “unite the right,” meaning to do away with disavowals and for attendees to stress how much they had in common, whether they were neo-Confederates or Nazis or white nationalists like Richard Spencer or Klan veterans like David Duke. The iconography of its posters was unmistakably fascistic, with columns of marching Confederate soldiers in front of Nuremberg-style searchlights with eagles reminiscent of Reichsadler flying above. Slogans chanted included, “Jews will not replace us.” So The Onion summed it up best: “Trump Blasts Critics Who Judge Neo-Nazi Groups by Most Extreme Members.”

How should we assess the bat-swingers and projectile-throwers and mace-wielders of the “antifa” activists who showed up to attack the gathering? Not favorably, to be certain. They’re violent and destructive and dangerous to the country, and it’s dishonest of reporters to leave them out of the picture. But it was perverse of Trump, who isn’t a reporter but the head of state, to condemn antifa’s misdeeds when he did. A member of the right-wing fringe had just allegedly murdered a young woman named Heather Heyer. When there’s a killer on one side and a dead body on the other, the all-sides stance becomes inoperative.

(That’s not a partisan statement. When Barack Obama paid tribute to five murdered police officers in Dallas in the summer of 2016, but devoted a fair portion of his speech to the argument that some grievances against police are legitimate, his timing was, in my view, uncharacteristically indecent. Still, let’s be clear: Obama had showed up to pay tribute to those killed. He was meeting with their families. He had denounced the killing as a hate crime. Trump, as of now, still has not even contacted the family of Heather Heyer. It’s a different league altogether.)

None of this was Trump as usual, either. His presidency has reached a turning point. It gets much darker from here.

First, this White House feels like it’s about to come apart. The C.E.O.s advising him were starting to flee, and now Trump has dissolved his advisory councils. Gary Cohn has let it be known that he was disgusted by the press conference. Mike Pence has cut short a trip abroad, officially to attend a foreign-policy meeting on Friday. Kelly must be considering whether his country is better served by his continued service or by his resignation.

Second, what we’ve seen over the past few weeks is that Trump is more ideological than many people thought. It came out first in the leaked transcripts of Trump’s phone call with Australia’s prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, during which Trump reacted with sincere forcefulness in his resistance to taking in refugees, worrying they might “become the Boston bomber in five years.” Then came a leaked memo penned by one Rich Higgins, who had worked on the National Security Council until he was pushed out by National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster. It spoke of the “deep state” and “cultural Marxist memes that dominate the prevailing cultural narrative,” and, according to Foreign Policy, Trump loved it. Finally, of course, came Trump’s embrace of the white nationalists gathered in Charlottesville. All of this is incompatible with some of the common theories about Trump—that he pursued the presidency for financial gain or that he believes in nothing but winning or that he’s an empty vessel waiting to be filled with liberalism, among others. He’s a believer.

Now, his supporters might think that’s a good thing, but most of them, too, should be seriously unsettled. That Trump is distrustful of the federal bureaucracy and the establishment narratives is to be expected. That he’s sincerely committed to a hard-line view on immigration was always part of his pitch. But insisting that there were “very fine people” at the rally in Virginia—well, now we’re on a different level. It’s not even dog whistling. It’s taking the dog onto your lap.

If there’s any cunning behind the crazy, it’s that Trump intends to govern from the fringe. His game seems now to be to play to his base, hard, and go down in flames if he must. His most unswerving loyalists will stand by him if efforts to oust or impeach Trump gain steam, and Trump needs them to keep scaring mainstream Republicans in Congress. So, yes, it’s getting dark.

Amid all of this bleakness, there’s one good but beleaguered actor that deserves a mention, namely the American Civil Liberties Union. Everyone has been angry at the A.C.L.U. at some point. It’s always standing in the way of some sensible policy that you or I might favor. But its willingness to go to bat on principle for society’s most despised people, whether it’s Nazi sympathizers or Muslim radicals, is still noble. As H.L. Mencken famously remarked, “the trouble with fighting for human freedom is that you have to spend much of your life defending sons of bitches, for oppressive laws are always aimed at them originally,” a point admirably echoed by the Intercept’s Glenn Greenwald in a recent article defending the organization. The failure of authorities to keep the peace in Charlottesville, allowing police to stand by as violence unfolded, should be investigated, and the attempt by Virginia’s governor, Terry McAuliffe, to blame the A.C.L.U. for McAuliffe’s titanic failure is disgraceful. Let his career in politics be over soon. Meanwhile, if you’re one of those who seesaw between saying “I’m done with the A.C.L.U.” and “It’s time to donate to the A.C.L.U.,” seesaw toward the latter.