Hectored by Chris Mathews of MSNBC, Donald Trump said that after abortion becomes illegal, women who get abortions should be punished. After a huge outcry, a few hours later he took it it back. His problem is that what he said originally makes too much sense to be politically effective. The logical case for punishing pregnant women…
Politicians (and other people) often can’t or won’t answer a question. How they respond says a lot about who they are. If they were honest, they would say “I won’t answer that” and then say why. But instead, they just take the airtime and answer some other question they’d rather talk about. For example, Mediaite recently…
There’s still blood on the ground in Brussels, a city I’ve spent time in with people I’ve befriended. I’d rather not look. But I must. Because this is when we make the worst mistakes. A friend sent me this observation yesterday: The optimal level of terrorist attacks is probably small, but not zero, just like the optimal level…
When I was young, I was certain I would be a mathematician. I still think like one. You should, too — and you don’t have to learn math to do it. A little background: I was an outstanding math student in high school and college, won an NSF Fellowship, and entered the math Ph.D. program at…
Adam Davidson’s New York Times Magazine article, “What Donald Trump Doesn’t Understand About ‘the Deal’,” provides fresh insight into Trump’s deal psychology. If you take the analysis a bit further, you get a window into the Trump presidency. In an ordinary deal (say, a consumer buying a washing machine or teams trading baseball players), there’s some transparency and…
Donald Trump rates high in polls on “tells it like it is.” And yet he seems to just make stuff up on the fly. How is this possible? Based on my extensive study of bullshit, I think I’ve got a handle on why: he’s a type of bullshitter we haven’t seen much of in America….
After his Super Tuesday wins, it’s likely that Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee for president. More than in any past election, his choice of VP makes all the difference — not just in electability, but because he might not last a full term. He needs to pick someone less wacko than he is. Super…
In the hands of a master, metaphor makes prose vivid and memorable. That’s what Matt Taibbi just did with his deconstruction of Donald Trump in Rolling Stone. I’ve written about how inadvertent metaphor overload destroys the lazily edited 500-word article. But metaphors — even lots of them — can make a longer narration dance in…
I challenge each of the remaining candidates for president. Do you have the courage to make this speech and save America from Donald Trump? My fellow Americans, today’s speech is not about me. It is about you. I speak to you today about the greatest threat to America’s future. It’s not ISIS. It’s not gun violence…