As we stagger into the homestretch of an absolute dumpster fire of a year — a year that couldn’t possibly become any more odd or outlandish — 2020 just grinned that sadistic grin and said, Hold my Everclear.

So it was just after midnight last night, when President Donald Trump tweeted, “FLOTUS and I tested positive for COVID-19. We will begin our quarantine and recovery process immediately. We will get through this TOGETHER!”

His announcement came just hours after one of his top advisers, Hope Hicks, had tested positive.

True to form, The New York Times couldn’t resist the urge to ignore the first lady while mocking the president in the wake of this unequivocally awful news. “The president’s result,” the Times sneered, “came after he spent months playing down the severity of the outbreak that has killed more than 207,000 in the United States and hours after insisting that ‘the end of the pandemic is in sight.’”

As if we hadn’t heard the first time, the Times doubled down in its second paragraph: “Mr. Trump, who for months has played down the seriousness of the virus and hours earlier on Thursday night told an audience that ‘the end of the pandemic is in sight,’ will quarantine in the White House for an unspecified period of time, forcing him to withdraw at least temporarily from the campaign trail only 32 days before the election on Nov. 3.”

The schadenfreude is strong with these sick puppies. We can practically hear them in their newsroom, chortling away and fist-bumping with glee.

All this, of course, is indicative of the Left’s response generally. While the president has consistently conveyed hope, strength, and reassurance throughout the pandemic, his enemies — let’s call them what they are — have retreated to a dark and foreboding place. COVID, then, is the risk that a strong, resolute, and action-oriented president accepts while lesser men launch slings and arrows from the safety of their basements.

But enough about the Times and the hate-addled Left.

As for the remaining weeks of the campaign, those who think President Trump will simply kick back and rest comfortably might want to hedge their bets. The president will, of course, have to cancel all his in-person events — an unfortunate blow to his campaign — but there are other ways to communicate. And it simply isn’t in this man’s nature to take it easy, not when so much is at stake.

As The Wall Street Journal reported, “White House physician Sean Conley said in a memo early Friday that the president and first lady were both ‘well at this time’ and planned to remain at the White House while they recovered. He said the medical team would ‘maintain a vigilant watch.’” Later this morning, however, White House officials said Trump was “feeling mild symptoms.”

To the president and the first lady, we join all Americans of goodwill and decency in wishing Godspeed and a quick recovery.