THE PERSISTENCE OF TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME

TOP OF THE NEWS:

- The Persistence of Trump Derangement Syndrome (New Yorker) "We’re told by many wise and well-meaning people that it is a huge and even fatal mistake for liberals (and for constitutional conservatives) to respond negatively to every Trump initiative, every Trump policy, and every Trump idea. The problem is that it refuses to see, or to entirely register, the actual nature of Trump and his actions. Our problem is not Trump Derangement Syndrome; our problem is Deranged Trump Self-Delusion. This is the habit of willfully substituting, as a motive for Trump’s latest action, a conventional political or geostrategic ambition, rather than recognizing the action as the daily spasm of narcissistic gratification and episodic vanity that it truly is. The bombing of Syria, for instance, was not a sudden lurch either in the direction of liberal interventionism...nor was it a sudden reassertion of a neo-con version of American power... It was a detached gesture, unconnected to anything resembling a sequence of other actions, much less an ideology. ...it is self-deluding to think that Trump’s action was meant to be in any way remedial. It was purely ritual, and the ritual acted out was the interminable Trumpist ritual of lashing out at those who fail to submit, the ritual act of someone whose inner accounting is conducted exclusively in terms of wounds given, worship received, and winnings displayed. Similarly, the current revival of a repeal-and-replace plan for Obamacare is clearly empty of all value, in its promoter’s mind, save that of publicity. Instead, it was...a way of mouthing words that might placate a crowd or assert his own magical powers. Doubtless there will soon be revisionist trends in the assessment of Trump, with journalists insisting that beneath the flailing and lying there is something resembling a plan—that one can connect the dot, and see a real picture. Don’t buy it."

BUSINESS:

- Angela Merkel reportedly had to explain the 'fundamentals' of EU trade to Trump 11 times (Business Insider) "Merkel reportedly told her cabinet members that Trump had 'very basic misunderstandings' on the 'fundamentals' of the EU and trade."

ENTERTAINMENT:

- Inside the Trump Marriage: Melania’s Burden (Vanity Fair) "As Donald’s celebrity ballooned with The Apprentice, Melania was asked to tolerate even more. His public interchanges with Howard Stern, which provided a kind of Greek chorus to their relationship, went from lewdly objectifying to grotesque. He agreed with Stern that his daughter Ivanka was 'a piece of ass.' He joked that if Melania were in a horrible, mangling car crash he’d still love her as long as the breasts remained intact. When asked by Stern whether he’d be up for 'banging 24-year-olds,' Trump eagerly assented. It got worse. In October, the 'grab them by the pussy' tape was leaked—Trump’s bragging to Billy Bush of Access Hollywood about touching women’s private parts, recorded during the first year of his marriage to Melania. Donald dismissed his words as 'locker-room talk,' but then one woman after another came out of the woodwork to claim that these weren’t just words. But Donald boasted that he had never apologized to Melania, because there was nothing to apologize for. At campaign rallies, he made his case by saying that some of the accusers weren’t hot enough for him to hit on."

NEWS:

- O’Reilly, Ailes, and the Toxic Conservative-Celebrity Culture (National Review) "Time and again prominent conservative personalities have failed to uphold basic standards of morality or even decency. Time and again the conservative public has rallied around them, seeking to protect their own against the wrath of a vengeful Left. Time and again the defense has proved unsustainable as the sheer weight of the facts buries the accused. The cost has been a loss of integrity and, crucially, a loss of emphasis on ideas and, more important, ideals."

- Trump Unleashes the Generals. They Don’t Always See the Big Picture. (NYT) "When Adm. Harry B. Harris Jr., the military’s top commander in the Pacific, ordered the aircraft carrier Carl Vinson 'to sail north' from Singapore this month, he was oblivious to the larger — and incorrect — impression that he was rushing a naval strike force to confront an increasingly belligerent North Korea. Four days later, when Gen. John W. Nicholson Jr. dropped the most powerful conventional weapon in the American arsenal on Islamic State fighters in a tunnel complex in eastern Afghanistan, he not only seized headlines around the world but also unintentionally signaled to dictators in Syria and North Korea that they might be the next target of what the Pentagon called the 'mother of all bombs.' Instead of simply achieving tactical objectives, the timing of their actions surprised their bosses at the Pentagon, upset edgy allies and caught the White House flat-footed. Taken together, the episodes illustrate how even the military’s most seasoned four-star field commanders can fail to consider the broader political or strategic ramifications of their operational decisions, and it prompted some current and former senior officials to suggest that President Trump’s decision to unshackle the military from Obama-era constraints to intensify the fight against terrorists risked even more miscues ahead."

- The North Korea-Trump Nightmare (NYT) "The only option left, I think, is to apply relentless pressure together with China, while pushing for a deal in which North Korea would verifiably freeze its nuclear and missile programs without actually giving up its nukes, in exchange for sanctions relief. This is a lousy option, possibly unattainable, and it isn’t a solution so much as a postponement of one. But all the alternatives are worse."

- Millennials differ from other generations in almost every regard. Here's the data (USA Today) "The report looks at changes in social, economic and demographic trends among young American adults... It found they increasingly live at home and delay starting a family. The report also found young women are pulling ahead in employment and wages..."

SCIENCE:

- At the Bottom of the Sea, Glass Spheres Prepare to Hunt for Mysterious Neutrinos (Wired) "It works like this: Back on land, you wrap rope onto a spherical frame like a ball of yarn. Then, you fasten the glass orbs to the rope and carefully place them onto racks built into a frame. Then you load the entire frame onto a ship, and 25 miles off the southern coast of France, you lower the frame into the ocean with a winch. After the sphere has sank to the level you want, you fire an acoustic signal at it, and the ropes unwind. 'It’s like a yo-yo,' Circella says. The orbs fall from the frame in a vertical line, and the frame floats back to the surface of the water."

SPORTS:

- Daniel Murphy’s Keen Eye Bolsters a Nationals Pillar (NYT) "The team sits in first place in the National League East, and Zimmerman, the franchise pillar, is benefiting — at least to some degree — from Murphy’s example. He hit .347 last season and led the N.L. in on-base-plus-slugging percentage, at .985, validating his concerted effort to launch more balls into the sky. Zimmerman knows how to hit for power. But Murphy, an expert in the analytics of his craft, studied data last winter that indicated why Zimmerman was not being rewarded for his hard hits. He was hitting far too many ground balls, the numbers showed, and needed to raise his launch angle."

TECHNOLOGY:

- Palantir’s Relationship With The Intelligence Community Has Been Worse Than You’d Think (BuzzFeed) "As of summer 2015, the Central Intelligence Agency, a signature client, was 'recalcitrant' and didn’t 'like us,' while Palantir’s relationship with the National Security Agency had ended, Palantir CEO Alex Karp told staff in an internal video that was obtained by BuzzFeed News. The private remarks, made during a staff meeting, are at odds with a carefully crafted public image that has helped Palantir secure a $20 billion valuation and win business from a long list of corporations, nonprofits, and governments around the world." and Video Shows Palantir CEO Ridiculing Trump And Slamming His Immigration Rhetoric (BuzzFeed) "Karp’s comments in 2015 reveal an ideological divide between the Palantir CEO and the man who is now his most important customer. Among other projects, Palantir is currently working on software for the government’s immigration enforcers that observers say could be used to help carry out Trump’s deportation goals."

TRAVEL:

- Letter of Recommendation: Michigan (NYT) "My first gift to my future wife, a month after we’d started dating, was a Petoskey necklace. She looked at it as if I’d just handed her a macaroni bracelet. 'Are you being serious?' she asked. I was embarrassed by the rejection, but mostly confused. I’d spent my life believing that Michigan contains everything that a person could reasonably want or need. It has rock jewelry, perfect views of the aurora borealis, Mackinac Island fudge, winning college football teams, no toll roads, more than 120 lighthouses and endless beachfront property, stretched across a longer coastline than any state’s save for Alaska’s. We’re also the only state with hand-based cartography. You can hold up an open palm, point to exactly where you live in Michigan — as long as you live on the Lower Peninsula — and be immediately understood."

- Which Travel Search Site Is Best? It Depends on Your Goals (NYT) "Does it matter which site you use, or are they all basically the same? Let’s just say I was surprised by how mistaken I was."

WATCH THIS:

- Abstract: The Art of Design (Netflix) "Step inside the minds of the most innovative designers in a variety of disciplines and learn how design impacts every aspect of life."

BOTTOM OF THE NEWS:

- Why people in couples do more housework than singletons (Economist) "The extra burden is greatest for women in partnerships, who do on average five more hours of housework per week than single women. Men in couples do just half an hour more. So why do those in couples spend more time on them, and why is the difference bigger for women? Looking at routine housework, they found that almost half the difference for women is driven by the fact that the sort to join a couple does more housework in the first place. But it is different for men. The kind of man who spurns routine housework is more likely to couple up."

TODAY'S SONG:

- Light Me Up (Ingrid Michaelson)

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