We almost made it a whole 24 hours without someone in the news media comparing President Trump to Adolf Hitler, but then the Washington Post’s Greg Sargent came along and set the clock back to zero.

In an op-ed published Friday morning, the Post columnist theorized that Trump’s focus on the infamous migrant caravan — a "manufactured" crisis, Sargent calls it — is part of a larger strategy meant to shore up voter support. Worse still, the columnist suggests, Trump's proposal to send troops to the southern border is part of an insidious plot to amass power.

“This is Trump’s Reichstag fire,” Sargent writes. “Not in the sense that Trump is Hitler, but rather in the more general way this term is sometimes used: Trump is perverting imagery of a real event to create a false narrative about what is happening and why; to justify his chosen response to it; and to manipulate public opinion toward other ends. But the caravan’s existence, and Trump’s response to it, actually reveal that on his signature issue, he’s failing.”

Ha. Yes. You see, he is not saying Trump is Hitler. He’s just saying he couldn’t think of a single example of political opportunism in the whole of human history that doesn’t also involve the Nazis. It’s just really hard to think of examples, you know?

Sargent concludes: “Trump’s only real goal is to create a Reichstag fire situation for purposes of winning the midterms. This, by the way, would have another Reichstag-like effect: If Republicans do hold the House, it will further insulate Trump from accountability on many other fronts, consolidating his power. Which means we can only hope that the voters reject it decisively, ensuring it fails.”

Remember, though, he’s not saying Trump is Hitler. He’s just saying Trump is trying to amass power and insulate himself from political challenges like, uh ... Hitler.