These days, everyone is making closing arguments — Vice President Kamala Harris, former President Donald J. Trump, comedian Jimmy Kimmel of ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” — as if we the people were we, the jury, which I suppose we are. I might as well make one as well.
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Read MoreViolence is never the answer, but it is often the question. The attempt on former President Donald J. Trump’s life is nothing to celebrate as the taking of a life in anything but self-defense is morally and legally wrong.
But after almost 10 years of vitriol on the campaign trail and in office, he has come to his encounter with karma.
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Read MoreThe great comedian Red Skelton acidly remarked of the well-attended funeral of tyrannical movie boss Harry Cohn, “Well, it just goes to show you: Give the people what they want and they’ll turn out for it.”
President Donald J. Trump has given the people what they didn’t want — American carnage — and they’ve turned out for it anyway. Boy, have they turned out for it. Protesters from sea to shining sea this weekend have made the tiki torches of the white supremacists .who terrorized Charlottesville in 2017 look like candles in the wind. (I wonder if Trumpet is measuring the size of these crowds.)
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Read MoreThis past week produced two moments that were parsed endlessly and yet little understood. One involved former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg telling CBS’ Gayle King that his Democratic rivals could’ve made a lot of money to spend on their campaigns. The other involved House Speaker Nancy Pelosi separating President Donald J. Trump’s personhood from his actions in responding to Sinclair Broadcasting’s James Rosen asking her if she hated the president. Neither Bloomberg’s remark nor Pelosi’s response were satisfactory, revealing a lack of critical thinking.
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Read MoreThese are not the best of times for race relations in America – perhaps the understatement of five lifetimes. A year after Charlottesville, 61 percent of Americans see an increase in racial tensions, according to a new CBS News poll….
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Read MoreWe think of sports and the arts – as House of Representatives Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi described them to “Meet the Press” moderator Chuck Todd – as the great unifiers.
That’s partly because we expect athletes and artists of every ilk to entertain us in a manner devoid of politics. The thinking goes that since artists and athletes make a lot of dough – well, at least those in the popular sports and arts do – they should “play” and keep their mouths otherwise shut.
But what happens when politics interjects itself into sports and the arts? ...
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Read MoreDoes politics have a place in tragedy?
That depends on the tragedy. Politics was integral to Charlottesville. It has no place in Hurricane Harvey, still devastating southern Texas, particularly Houston, our nation’s fourth largest city. What’s needed there are prayers, money and assistance. There will be time for squabbles about climate change and government performance later.
What’s not needed is a presidential visit as the storm still rages. But then, you sense that President Donald J. Trump hates to be upstaged, even by Mother Nature. So he has to interject himself into the storm when he isn’t slipping something under the radar.
Like a presidential pardon. ...
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