Dear President Trump, I just looked it up to make sure this angst I’m feeling over writing to you about you isn’t an existential crisis of some sort and it’s really not – it’s not at all that I feel my life lacks purpose or meaning. Rather, I think that once again you have me … Continue reading Gordian knots and fierce compassion
Distractions and Shell Games
“Hail the Chief” please
Dear President Trump, It’s so interesting what one finds when one follows a thread. This one started when I was reading about the horrible storms that hit the DC area yesterday, seeing the pictures of cars floating away, roads and parks swamped, and people looking confused and frightened. I decided to check your daily schedule … Continue reading “Hail the Chief” please
Ramming ramparts, airports, and Article 25
Dear President Trump, It appears we both had very long nights last night. I know mine was long because I lived it. We were awake until well after 2am because that’s when the wildly illegal fireworks finally stopped and our poor dogs could settle down. The firework situation here was off the hook out of … Continue reading Ramming ramparts, airports, and Article 25
Gaslighting on steroids
Dear President Trump, Rick Atkinson has an Opinions Essay in the WP wherein he summarizes the expansionism and attendant overreach of the British Empire. He is clear that there are myriad differences between Britain’s rise and fall and rise and fall and our own situation, but cautions that the apple (that is America) didn’t fall … Continue reading Gaslighting on steroids
The dictator-magnet
Dear President Trump, You and Kim Jong Un have been doing some serious fawning over each other lately, touting your terrific relationship and how it’s bound to lead to wonderful things (or the more syllabically manageable “very good things” that you offered). Here are a couple of highlights I pulled out of the WP yesterday: … Continue reading The dictator-magnet
Plausible ignorance
Dear President Trump, I just looked up “plausible deniability” again because I can’t keep the concept straight in my head and wanted to see if it might be a way of understanding what you said the other day about happily taking opposition information from foreign sources. It isn’t. It almost certainly does apply to other … Continue reading Plausible ignorance
Wasting our precious time
Dear President Trump, We have this plug-in thing in the bathroom upstairs that’s an all-in-one nightlight, digital clock, and thermometer. It’s not my favorite because the clock numbers are teeny-tiny and I can’t read them in the middle of the night when I don’t have my glasses on. The numbers reflecting the temperature, however, are … Continue reading Wasting our precious time
Our increasingly fraught relationship with reality
Dear President Trump, I found it! The badge button I was telling you about yesterday was in my pocket the whole time and I found it this morning when I put on that jacket again to take the dogs out. My hands were cold standing there waiting for them and so they (my hands) went … Continue reading Our increasingly fraught relationship with reality
Frighteningly unhinged POTUS
Dear President Trump, Before I get to the business end of today’s letter, I want to let you know that your contact page and the universe conspired in a pretty funny way. Yesterday’s letter was all about raising an alarm regarding the number of copyediting errors I’ve seen in the WP lately and at the … Continue reading Frighteningly unhinged POTUS
The biggest, most consequential question of our lifetimes
Dear President Trump, Our political essay instructor strongly cautions us against indulging in rants and strongly encourages us to make sure our work carries added value. The rant prohibition is self-explanatory (no fun, but clear), and the added value requirement is really just saying that it’s not enough to parrot what others have said about … Continue reading The biggest, most consequential question of our lifetimes