After dealing primarily with threat and bluster for much of his early administration, Donald Trump turned to his sledgehammer for the past several weeks to end Obamacare on his own, serve notice on the Iran agreement, demand his wall, enliven his base and widen the gap between himself and the political party he presumably represents. The only ray of hope discerned by these pages was preliminary acceptance of a bipartisan health care agreement, which we hasten to applaud in hope it will survive. There is as yet no hope that the president will not keep the nation in a state of continual high anxiety for the rest of his term. The worry is that he can take it even if the rest of us can’t.
All that didn’t stop one leading financial journal and the party’s own once presidential nominee from calling him out and the pundits to predict he would destroy the Grand Old Party to be replaced by a Trump-Bannon alt-right. Another journal was beginning to worry about what would happen were he really impeached. And, in one story there is a report that the social media stalwart Facebook, so loved if not beloved by the public at large, had irrevocably destroyed — whether or not deliberately — the roots of our electoral system. Not to mention what the electoral college may have done on its own.
All to say, the situation is fraught. But certainly interesting, for us and hopefully for you. With each new edition we offer our best in substance and ask in return even more in your attention. We hope you’ll find it a fair deal if not an always balanced one.
Don West for New Times Always!
Wall Street Journal editorial harshly rebukes Trump
Narrative ■
When so significant a bastion of conservatism as the Wall Street Journal turns its editorial page guns on a Republican president, it’s news — real, not fake. It comes at a time when the growing question is whether Trump is a Republican president or just his own.
Trump and McCain smack at each other
Narrative ■
Whatever the course of the Trump administration, the divide and the debate between him and so prominent a conservative as John McCain grows more prominent — as does the vitriol from both sides.
The drug industry’s triumph over the DEA
Narrative ■
Media disclosure of the drug industry’s legislative success in getting Congress to make it harder to rein in the bad actors ended up causing a leading Republican to withdraw from consideration as the new drug czar.
#MeToo: Thousands tell their own stories of abuse
Narrative ■
A nation of women increasingly angered by reports of sexual assault in Hollywood and elsewhere — and increasingly determined to do something about it — has given rise to a new slogan to accompany their new volume.
The politics of tax reform: 101
Narrative ■
The ABC’s and the D’s (for details) of tax reform are laid out in great precision in this report, which analyzes when it is and when it isn’t, and what great numbers in the public think about it. It’s great reading for those who think economics is meant for the guy next door.
The hidden battle of the sexes at work
Narrative ■
If you thought there was essential agreement on the battle of the sexes in the work place, think again. The two sides — to the extent that means men and women — still go to work each day with one thinking it has largely been accomplished, the other that it’s only begun.
The new reality of old age
Narrative ■
At the same time that corporate profits and the stock exchange continue to rise — while matters continue to worsen on the lower side of the divide between haves and have nots — a new reality is accelerating among those facing old age. It’s not pretty.