Dear President Trump, One of the things I read this morning was the Q&A between readers and the WP authors who wrote and researched the multi-part story about the Afghanistan War. The whole Q&A piece was interesting, but it was the last line of the last answer to the last question that seriously caught my … Continue reading The Taliban and Trump’s GOP; compare and contrast
Power
The McConnell Menace
Dear President Trump, Typing out today’s date I see that we’ve landed on a “Friday the 13th” for the Judiciary Committee Impeachment vote. I kind of doubt Nadler decided ahead of midnight last night that it would be better to have the vote on such a Friday, but maybe he had an eye on the … Continue reading The McConnell Menace
Abuse of power, abusive power
Dear President Trump, I know a fair bit happened with the impeachment process today and that you made an ass of yourself in Europe this week, but I’m not going to focus on either of these things today. Instead I want to tell you about three recent encounters with sexism. The first was yesterday on … Continue reading Abuse of power, abusive power
‘Garbage Morn’
Dear President Trump, It’s garbage day today in our neighborhood (we call Tuesday mornings “Garbage Morn” while Monday nights are “Garbage Eve”) and everything looked exceptionally orderly and tidy on my walk this morning. The crows were still asleep so they hadn’t pried off any lids to get to potential foodstuffs and it’s not a … Continue reading ‘Garbage Morn’
History lessons
Dear President Trump, In the midst of all my imagining of a democratic society that finally fully embraces empowerment for all of America’s diverse peoples, it occurred to me that I needed a better historical handle on what motivated White men to enfranchise Black men and then eventually men to enfranchise women. All I knew … Continue reading History lessons
It’s not about Vladimir’s vanity
Dear President Trump, What’s the thread connecting a call from our daughter in the middle of the night last night about the Cave fire evacuation zone closing in on Santa Barbara and the following happy quip from your BFF Vladimir? “Thank God no one is accusing us anymore of interfering in the U.S. elections,” Russian … Continue reading It’s not about Vladimir’s vanity
It is our duty to overthrow despotism
Dear President Trump, While we wait to see what those tapes and other detritus that Lev Parnas has handed over to the House Intelligence Committee reveal about you and Rudy, I’m going to finish out the first section of the Declaration of Independence, which is basically the poetic portion most relevant today. The last two … Continue reading It is our duty to overthrow despotism
Early voting rights and lack thereof
Dear President Trump, Yesterday I told you that I want to refocus my attention on the work we’ll need to do after you’ve finally high-tailed it out of office. We have such a tremendous amount of very, very hard work to do together to close all the loopholes you’ve managed to exploit and to do … Continue reading Early voting rights and lack thereof
Team-67
Dear President Trump, The other day a friend of ours told me that her son is playing club water polo at college. I knew he played throughout high school and really, really loves the sport so it was great to hear that he’s still at it. Apparently his team is doing incredibly well this year, … Continue reading Team-67
Showboaty rats
Dear President Trump, There’ve now been a handful of rat-sightings around our next-door neighbor’s house, which probably means they are scurrying around ours too. My favorite sighting was the other morning first thing when I let the dogs out in the front yard. It was still dark but with all the street lights it’s never … Continue reading Showboaty rats