President Donald J. Trump campaigned on the notion of a new deal, as it were, for the American worker.

So why is the American worker under siege three weeks into his presidency?

He has threatened to impose a 20-percent tariff on Mexican imports, which would no doubt ensure tariffs on American exports to Mexico like corn and soy.

He has instigated a ban on seven Muslim countries – a ban whose stay the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has just upheld – which would threaten American universities and a tech industry that relies on the best and the brightest worldwide.

And he has shamed a major retailer, Nordstrom, for dropping daughter Ivanka’s line – Neiman Marcus has dropped her jewelry – thereby giving pause to those who would do business with and in America. ...

The latest salvo in the culture war that is surely to deepen under President Donald Trump was fired by Meryl Streep in a graceful and grace-filled speech at the Golden Globes.

I’m not a fan of people using award shows as a bully pulpit, coming of age as I did in the 1970s when such Oscar speeches (think Vanessa Redgrave and an absent Marlon Brando) were a kind of cliché. I’m not a fan of gesture politics like refusing to stand for the National Anthem. I’m not even a fan of Meryl Streep, a sometimes mannered actress (“Sophie’s Choice,” “The Hours”) who’s nevertheless capable of great work (“Marvin’s Room,” “The Manchurian Candidate”).

But Streep – a hard-working craftswoman who has paid her dues – offered a master class in a performer giving a political speech by turning the concept of the politician as performer inside out. ...

Strictly business: Trump, Ivanka, Nordstrom and free enterprise

In defense of Streep, the humanities – and humanity