Newsweek reports on something that might seem of little import and consequence, but is actually somewhat of a mystery.

Former President Donald Trump was booed by his own supporters during a rally in Cullman, Alabama Saturday night after he encouraged the crowd to get vaccinated against COVID-19.

“I believe totally in your freedoms, I do, you gotta do what you gotta do, but I recommend take the vaccines. I did it. It’s good,” he said, drawing boos from the crowd of supporters.

“That’s okay, that’s alright,” Trump continued, brushing off the disapproval. “But I happen to take the vaccine. If it doesn’t work, you’ll be the first to know. But it is working. You do have your freedoms, you have to maintain that.”

I will never give Trump credit for anything. For me, he’s incapable of doing anything for the right reasons. This is a good example of how that plays out. Yes, he’s been telling people to get vaccinated, and he repeated that message on Saturday. But his other actions related to the pandemic have been so toxic that his positive and productive message cannot compete for influence with the overall impression he’s left with his base.

What they got from him was skepticism that COVID-19 is a real threat. Instead, they perceive it as a political weapon aimed at them. Religious leaders are familiar with cafeteria adherents who accept the teachings they like and ignore the teachings they find inconvenient, and this what we’re seeing here. Like a Catholic bishop, Trump is revered by the faithful, but he’s not treated as infallible. Even though he wrote the scriptures they follow, they’re not above booing him if he departs from his brand.

He created feelings and a disposition rather than tenets of belief and behavior. One can imagine Joseph Smith, Jesus or Mohammed being similarly heckled by their flock if they started emphasizing things that ran counter to the magnetic message they had initially used to attract support.

And Trump’s message isn’t about stamping out polytheism or reform of a sclerotic and hypocritical priestly caste. It’s not about some new divine revelation or a new system of ethics. It’s hard to put a finger on exactly what Trumpism is about, but it’s definitely hostile to reason, logic, education, and science. Vaccines are bad primarily because elites said they are good. They address a problem that was supposedly hyped for political advantage and so is not a problem at all.

Trump doesn’t like being booed, so it’s likely that he’ll drop his vaccination pitch from future rallies. Regardless, this event shows that the damage he’s done is extensive and has now slipped out of his control.