I’ve been getting grief from several directions — accusing comments that I’ve been (a) soft on Trump, (b) in the bag for Trump, (c) too hard on Trump, and (d) changed my tune on Trump. Each claim is a mystery to me. My practice is rarely to comment directly on day-to-day or week-to-week political issues […]
Emotion trumping Trump assessments Read More »
Let me see if I understand the reasoning: 1. Argentina’s and Brazil’s governments have screwed up their economies over the years. 2. So they devalued their government-controlled currencies. 3. That means American farmers earn less on their exports to Argentinean and Brazilian customers. 4. So the US government will retaliate by taxing steel imports from Argentina and Brazil. 5. Therefore, steel-makers in Argentina and Brazil will earn
Trumpian trade wars, Argentina and Brazil edition Read More »
As part of my Neither right nor left mantra, another datum. Most people use “right” and “left” journalistically: to designate shifting bundles of social-political beliefs and attitudes. The bundles are usually not internally coherent. So more analytic thinkers try to bring order out of mush by identifying multiple dimensions of contrast: individual versus collective, liberty
Against the new post-2016-Trump right too Read More »
From a review of always-thoughtful Mark Lilla’s 2018 book on how to revive liberalism. The question, says Samuel Moyn, is: “How did we get here? Much depends on how one narrates the path from 1968 to Trump’s election.” Moyn’s suggestion is: ‘After 1968, disaster set in. Faced with the sins of Vietnam, the Democrats flirted
A leftist on how we got to Trump Read More »
Thinking about what, if I were on the left, I’d do with this trio of beliefs: 1. I know Trump is now in charge of the government. 2. And I believe Trump is basically Hitler. 3. Yet I favor gun control — I want the government to take everyone’s guns away. Something’s gotta give. But
The Trump-Guns-Government-Hitler package Read More »
[A discussion post.] President Trump’s now-serious proposal to eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities has elicited the first round of responses ranging from Philistine! to It’s about time! Both agencies were created in 1965 by President Lyndon Johnson, who said at the time: “it is necessary and
Trump’s Call to Eliminate Government Art Funding Read More »
At TRI, my short article “Trump’s Corruption Mandate” begins this way: “Donald Trump’s astonishing election victory was in part a backlash against increasingly corrupt American politics. “Transparency International publishes an annual Corruption Perceptions Index, ranking all nations from most to least clean in their political conduct. The United States entered the twenty-first century by falling
Trump’s Corruption Mandate Read More »
Donald Trump’s astonishing election victory was in part a backlash against increasingly corrupt American politics. Transparency International publishes an annual Corruption Perceptions Index, ranking all nations from most to least clean in their political conduct. The United States entered the twenty-first century by falling out of the top ten. Scandinavian nations such as Finland, Denmark, and Sweden
Trump’s Corruption Mandate Read More »
First in a series tracking Donald Trump’s presidency and its anti-free-market policies. 1. Pence and Trump explicitly criticize free markets. The New York Times. 2. Direct dealing with an individual company: Carrier will not move. The Fiscal Times. 3. Close up parts of the Internet. “We’re losing a lot of people because of the Internet,”
Trump versus Free Markets, late 2016 edition Read More »
My anti-Trump street cred is here. But acting like an immature asshole (to use technical philosophical terminology) is no way to fight back against the man or his policies. Minimal civility is essential for a politics to function peacefully. Some disturbing anecdotes: * Senator Joseph McCarthy was demonized for going after artists and others who
Civility down the toilet: intolerance, anti-Trump style Read More »