Mythologies of Illegal Immigration
The illegal immigration debate has come to a head once again. Congress remains at an impasse over a temporary spending bill that Senate Democrats refuse […]
This is CNN . . . in 1945
What if something like CNN and modern communications were around in early 1945? What if the rules of presidential news coverage were then as they […]
Is Trump Really Crazy?
Michael Wolff’s sensational exposé of the supposed chaos of the Trump White House is no doubt largely a mix of fantasy, exaggeration, and some accidental […]
The View of the Blinkered
Sites like Vox, the Daily Beast, and the Weekly Standard have long praised the dossiers of Robert Mueller’s legal investigative team. The essays prove mostly […]
Back to the Future: From Scooter Libby to Donald Trump
Do we remember today the media hysteria between 2003 and 2007 that surrounded the special counsel’s investigation, prosecution, and trial of Scooter Libby? During the […]
A Jacksonian Manifesto
Administrations by law must publish strategic manifestoes. Indeed, the Goldwater–Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of October 4, 1986 required every subsequent government to issue […]
Fake Truth
The most effective way for the media to have refuted Donald Trump’s 24/7 accusations of “fake news” would have been to publish disinterested, factually based […]
Is a President’s Character His Presidency’s Destiny?
In the age of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, “character is destiny” sermons are now frequent. Clearly, a president who is “not a crook” or […]
The Case for Sexual Deterrence
Just like aggressive nations, so too people who are not innately moral are deterred from committing crimes by fear of punishment. The likelihood of arrest, […]
Never Mind ‘Trumpism’: What is ‘Deplorablism’?
There is lots of talk about a new nationalist populist worker movement. Supposedly, something quite new would institutionalize, define, and solidify the Trump base of […]
From One Frenzy to the Next
America is in another of its Salem moments. Frenzy is almost a living, breathing monster. It moves from host to host, fueled by rumor, gossip, […]
Crossing the Trump Rubicon
We are in a veritable war of competing visions. The strife inside the two parties is irrelevant—when compared to the larger existential war for the […]
When Fantasy Trumps Reality
The enemy of empiricism is ideology. Translated that means politics make people see the world as they want it to be, rather than as it […]
Investigating the Investigators
Despite having both an expansive budget and a large legal team, Special Investigator Robert Mueller likely will not find President Trump culpable for any Russian […]
The Method to Trump’s ‘Madness’
The Democratic Party, as it did after Hubert Humphrey’s close loss in 1968, seems still to be misdiagnosing its 2016 defeat. Democrats see too little […]
Message v. Messenger: The Trump Enigma
About 90 percent of Republican voters eventually supported the political novice Donald Trump by November 2016. Most conservatives saw him as the preferable alternative to […]
The Tragic Incoherence of the NFL Protests
It has become a sort of reflex to object to the National Football League’s players’ bended knee/sitting through the National Anthem—while also conceding that their […]
A Lying Quartet
Rarely has an intelligence apparatus engaged in systematic lying—and chronic deceit about its lying—both during and even after its tenure. Yet the Obama Administration’s four […]
Trump’s Immigration Deal at the Brink of Disaster
If Donald Trump wished to make a mega deal on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, or even put an end to illegal […]
Call It On—Or Call It Off?
Will America, nine months into Donald Trump’s unexpected presidency, continue to chase its tail while a nuclear Korea looms, tax and immigration reform are pending, […]