President Trump announced the “American AI initiative” with an executive order. Like many such presidential pronouncements (and not just from Trump), it’s somehow both blustery and mushy. Let’s take it apart and see if it makes sense. In what follows, commentary is mine. Passages in bold italic are passive voice, weasel words, or other notably…
Donald Trump’s State of the Union message sounded like a rational if self-serving laundry list of dozens of platitudes and programs — you know, just like every other president’s. Except for one thing: He invented facts that are easily proven false. Why? The rest of this post is based mostly on the fact checks in…
We’ve heard a lot about the border wall in the last week — especially since Donald Trump has shut down the government until he gets funding for it. The messaging around the wall reveals that to Trump and his administration and his followers, it is a philosophical worry-stone, not a physical construct. For Trump to…
Very soon after Donald Trump announced he would withdraw the US troops now in Syria and many of those in Afghanistan, Secretary of Defense Jim “Mad Dog” Mattis resigned. Let’s read between the lines in his resignation letter. Resignation letters in the Trump administration tend to be short and uncontroversial. If you’re not leaving because…
Donald Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, doesn’t get how Twitter works. He thinks the technology is biased against him. Look: if you don’t know how to use a tool properly, own up to it and get help. Don’t flail around blaming technology for your own ignorance. Giuliani tweeted this: Mueller filed an indictment just as the…
There was a time when the purpose of American politics was to get useful things done for the largest possible number of Americans. There was a shared understanding of the institutions of government and how it should work. President George H.W. Bush, who died on Friday, was the embodiment of that ideal, and his letter…
Saudis murdered the Washington Post columnist Jamal Kashoggi in their Turkish embassy. Now President Trump is making the case that we must stand by Saudi Arabia. The term for this sort of strategy is “realpolitik” — but the level of such arguments is typically intellectual, not playground taunts. What is realpolitik? It is international relations…
I see many, many posts, videos, and tweets telling people to vote. Meanwhile, 10,000 Twitter bots are apparently telling you not to vote. So which should you do? This election is a referendum on the policies of Donald Trump. But if you go to the voting booth, you will find you cannot vote for him…
The New York Times posted an op-ed from an unnamed “senior official” who is managing the chaos in the Trump Administration. To truly understand what’s going on here, you need to look at the writer’s motivation. ROAM is the perfect way to do that — but in this case, it only deepens the mystery. The…