Tag: presidents
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Biden his time
Continuing my tradition of doing a presidential postmortem for the outgoing commander-in-chief (see Bush and Obama and Trump), here are my brief and bumpy thoughts on the brief and bumpy Biden era:
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On the ballot
Election Day is upon us. My wife and I already voted, and I’m very grateful to live in a state that supports pro-democracy initiatives like early voting, vote by mail, and automatic voter registration. Illinois has its issues, to be sure, but it’s a leader in this regard—along with book ban bans, Midwest abortion access,…
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4 lessons from the Trump years
It’s been a tradition on this blog since its inception to do a kind of presidential postmortem for the outgoing commander-in-chief (see Bush and Obama), assessing both the political takeaways and my personal life during their administration. (I planned to publish this on Inauguration Day, but as the actual end date of the Trump administration…
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Grant me a Roosevelt biopic
Why didn’t anyone tell me there are Ulysses Grant and Theodore Roosevelt biopics in the works from Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese? And that Leonardo DiCaprio is attached to star in both of them? The Hollywood Reporter asked a bunch of historians whether Leo should play Grant or Roosevelt. Looking at their pictures above I’d…
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And John Tyler too
When I realized I had yet to read a presidential biography this year, I decided to tackle one that was more obscure and therefore more likely to be shorter. For some reason, tenth president John Tyler came to mind. I opted for John Tyler by Gary May, part of the American Presidents series of short books.…
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Lincoln’s letter to Grant: ‘You were right, and I was wrong’
This letter from President Lincoln to Major General Ulysses Grant in July 1863 might be the last documented instance of a president apologizing for anything: My dear General I do not remember that you and I ever met personally. I write this now as a grateful acknowledgment for the almost inestimable service you have done…
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Trump’s Razor
Trump is either hiding something so threatening to himself, or he’s criminally incompetent to be commander in chief. It is impossible yet to say which explanation for his behavior is true, but it seems highly likely that one of these scenarios explains Trump’s refusal to respond to Russia’s direct attack on our system — a…
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Fakelin Newsevelt
Learned a lot from Susan Douglas’s Listening In: Radio And The American Imagination about the development of radio technology and culture, and their impact on 20th century America. Also learned, in a tidbit about Franklin Roosevelt’s crusade against newspapers, that he sounded a lot like another ostensibly anti-media president: Privately, the president in 1940 ask the…
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What I Think Right Now
This all continues to be insane. It’s like being in a car with a drunk driver. I don’t care whose idea it was to let him drive; I don’t care about his protests that Relax I’m fine and You’ll thank me later for driving—I just want to get home safely, whatever it takes.
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The Bullies Pulpit
From Politico: More than 100 years ago a Republican president worried that America wasn’t doing enough to protect its most treasured wild and sacred places from over-development, mining and drilling. So Congress passed and President Teddy Roosevelt signed the Antiquities Act of 1906, giving presidents the authority to preserve imperiled mountains, forests, cultural treasures and…
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Glass Case of Delusion
Today in “Donald Trump doesn’t realize he is the President of the United States”: President Trump refused to back down on Friday after his White House aired an unverified claim that Britain’s spy agency secretly monitored him during last year’s campaign at the behest of President Barack Obama, fueling a rare rupture between the United…
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Lucille Trump
The eerie similarities between Donald Trump and Lucille Bluth from Arrested Development have already been documented. One Lucille moment came to me recently, as I absorbed the latest whiny tweets and self-pitying/antagonistic statements from the purported president and his obedient surrogates, that I thought was clarifying: “Stop lying. Stop manipulating. Just be nicer.” In the episode “My Mother,…