When candidate Trump said Hillary Clinton was a criminal who belonged in prison, he was exposing himself to a libel suit. And the suit might not have succeeded, because Trump could have said he was making a political argument rather…
Noted & Quoted
Robert Kagan: Republicans are becoming Russia’s accomplices – The Washington Post
The party’s current leader, the president, questions the intelligence community’s findings, motives and integrity. Republican leaders in Congress have opposed the creation of any special investigating committee, either inside or outside Congress. They have insisted that inquiries be conducted by…
Posted in Noted & Quoted, The Russian Angle
Shadi Hamid: The End of the End of History – Foreign Policy
We are now condemned to live in exciting times. Boredom is, quite clearly, underrated. At the same time, I must confess that as Trump’s victory settled, my despair was coupled with a rush of blood to the head. I felt…
Greg Sargent: At the root of Trump’s new fury: Total contempt for American democracy – The Washington Post
President Trump is now wallowing in fury, we are told, because he can’t make the Russia story disappear; he can’t stem the leaks to the media; and he can’t seem to realize his promises. Some reports tell us that unflattering…
Posted in Noted & Quoted, Operation American Greatness
One doctor’s experience telling patients Trump is president – Slate
What is your name? Where are we? What is the date? Who is the president of the United States? If the person knows all four answers, they are said to be “alert and oriented to person, place, time, and POTUS.”…
Posted in Noted & Quoted, Operation American Greatness
Susan B Glasser: Trump’s Alpha Male Foreign Policy – POLITICO Magazine
Sherman argues in the interview that without the Iran deal, “you’d probably be at war.” Flournoy agrees, in an answer that is particularly revealing as to how she and the others choose to interpret Trump’s Alpha Male theory of the…
Looking into the black hole at the heart of the Milky Way – The Guardian
[I]f Einstein’s equations break down anywhere, they are most likely to do so at the edge of a black hole, where the fabric of space-time is being stretched more severely than any other place in the cosmos. As Laing says:…
Bret Stephens: Don’t Dismiss Trump’s Attacks on the Media as Mere Stupidity – TIME
The most painful aspect of this has been to watch people I previously considered thoughtful and principled conservatives give themselves over to a species of illiberal politics from which I once thought they were immune. In his 1953 masterpiece, “The…
Anne Applebaum: The specter of Trump in Munich – The Washington Post
The precarious feeling of uncertainty will nonetheless persist, at least until U.S. authority, in Europe or anywhere else, is seriously challenged. And there are signs that a challenge is coming. In the past few days, the Russian government has recognized…
: The American Experiment in Exile – TPM
Our partners in the international order we created – some of whom we conquered to make it possible – are now seeking to defend it from us. Let’s say that again, Defend it from us. How do we now as…