President Donald Trump went to Capitol Hill on Tuesday to double-down on his support for an unpopular and unworkable Republican health care bill — one that seems destined to break promises he made to his blue-collar supporters and make health care unaffordable for many of them.

He warned GOP House members that they could be defeated in 2018 if the bill doesn't pass. For many of them, the opposite is true.

This was the morning after a campaign-style rally in Louisville, Ky., where he summoned the adulation of 20,000 supporters to rinse off a stain of a very bad day back in Washington. It began with another set of petulant tweets and continued into hearings of the House Intelligence Committee, where the director of the FBI refuted Trump's March 4 tweets claiming President Barack Obama had wiretapped him. James Comey also said the FBI was still investigating Russian interference with last fall's election, possibly with the involvement of Trump's associates.

His nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court, Neil Gorsuch, had made a well-received first-day appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Yet Trump barely mentioned him in Louisville except to note that Gorsuch had an "unbelievably wonderful wife."

It was a bizarre 36 hours for the president, underscoring fears by his staff and allies that his Twitter compulsion and need for public adulation are damaging his credibility and ability to lead.

A Fox News poll last week showed only 16 percent of voters — and only 35 percent of those who say they voted for him in November — approve of his Twitter habit. Fifty percent disapprove and 32 percent "wish he'd be more careful."

The Louisville rally was like a campaign event, where crowds are worshipful, boasting is expected and every promise will come true. Trump played his greatest hits, especially his unconvincing pledge to kill the "disaster" of Obamacare.

In fact, polls show increasing support for the Affordable Care Act and only 30 percent support for a GOP replacement. It could cost 24 million lower- and middle-class Americans their health coverage. If it's catastrophe you're looking for, this would be it, except the revision that the House hopes to pass Thursday could be even worse. House leaders are trying to weaken it to appease Dickensian conservatives who think it's too generous.

Trump trotted out his campaign boasts about tough trade restrictions for the Kentucky crowd: "We sacrificed our own middle class to finance the growth of foreign countries."

If Trump follows through on trade restrictions and sets off a trade war, the Brookings Institution reports, the places most likely to suffer are smaller cities in the Midwest and Southeast — Trump country.

Trump doesn't seem to realize the difference between campaign-style tweeting and showboating and the hard work of reality-based governing. It may be that he doesn't care.

REPRINTED FROM THE ST LOUIS POST DISPATCH