Columns, pieces and posts
There’s a funny thing that happens in a nation’s thoughts. At some point everyone knows something is true, and talks about it with each other. The truth becomes a cliché before it becomes actionable. Then a person of high respect, a good-faith scholar who respects data, say, comes forward with evidence proving what everyone knows, […]
Easter’s coming, Holy Week’s here and Passover is a few weeks away, so it’s a good time to look at the work of a great artist who’s brought considerable beauty into the world, Paul Simon. Alex Gibney’s two-part MGM+ documentary on the making of his most recent album is also beautiful—moving, mellow, sweet and deep. […]
The heartening story this week was the House vote to force TikTok, the video sharing platform, to stop acting as what U.S. officials have long warned it is, a true and grave security threat to the United States. In this, the House showed what it rarely shows, self-respect. Its members said: You can’t harm America […]
How much can one speech do? When you’re a president in a hole (approval numbers stubbornly stuck below 40%, a re-election campaign under way) a big speech can help a lot or a little, be a wow or a mess. You know fairly quickly when the speech didn’t work: People start making jokes and the […]
A man on CNN is reporting live from outside a polling place in suburban South Carolina and recounts a small story. An 18-year-old man had just voted, and the election clerk called out, “Ladies and gentlemen we have a first-time voter.” The room burst into applause. “They say that’s a tradition here,” the reporter said. […]
You know that look everybody gets when a long, bad Zoom meeting ends and you’ve said goodbye and you’re searching for the Leave Meeting button while keeping a determinedly pleasant look on your face? That’s how I’m feeling about our national political life! Or that tingly feeling you get when the novocaine starts to wear […]
The only time Democrats get excited now is when the subject is Donald Trump. Then they get marvelously worked up. An official of the administration called to let off steam. “Trump says NATO doesn’t pay its bills—has anyone noticed the irony? Donald Trump is the biggest deadbeat in history. How many hundreds of contractors did […]
How should the press cover a presumable Trump-Biden presidential rematch? More pointedly, how should it cover Donald Trump? The history that precedes that question is well known. In 2015-16 the media, having discovered that Mr. Trump was a walking talking ratings bump and being honestly fascinated by his rise, turned the airwaves over to him […]
It was the first time I felt hope. Then I felt irritated with myself for feeling hope. But it was a heck of a hearing. (Was it what used to be called boob bait for Bubba, Bubba being American parents?) It was Wednesday’s Senate Judiciary Committee grilling of the heads of social-media companies—Meta, TikTok, X, […]
This shouldn’t even be a question. A great party is trying to produce its presidential nominee. Donald Trump is the leader in the contest so far, and looks likely to be the victor. But the cycle has just started (61 delegates allocated, 2,368 to go) and the party isn’t united, it’s split, roughly 50/50 pro-Trump […]