You are right once again—in your idea of plausibility.
Everything is possible at the NY Times too.
Name-calling by its journalists (cybercop Melania, torture queen, new breed of swamp creatures, character out of “The Sopranos,” mongoose of a lawyer, his punch-drunk performance)?
Used to be even lowly newspaper writers used civilized language.
Now it's all trashing—because the comments compete with this gutter language.
What happened to civility?
This subject of vulgarity is very important as it should be.
Americans learn how to conduct themselves through the media; how to love, how to conduct war, how to behave honorably (or not), etc
When vulgarization takes place in the media it leads to the degradation of civility and society.
The media is responsible for much of the vulgarization of America.
Another thing; Print is not the same as digital or spoken words which vanish quickly into the ether.
Print is there forever.
4
Peace on the Korean subcontinent? Never happen.
USA embassy in Jerusalem? Over our dead bodies.
Woman automobile drivers in Saudi Arabia, driving to movie theatres? The tooth fairy.
Calling China out for industrial espionage and unfair trade practices? This ain't Disneyland.
Joe Biden eyeing another run at the White House? Happens all the time.
1
Everything is plausible?
Really?
Will Maureen Dowd ever apologize for having maligned the Clintons, Al Gore, and President Obama?
Will Dowd ever apologize for calling our former President, Barry?
Will Dowd ever admit, not apologize, just admit, that in giving Donald Trump the benefit of the doubt, no matter what, before the election and presuming the absolute worst about Hillary, no matter what the circumstance, she was in the wrong?
ALL of that's implausible.
63
Ah, but now the greatest improbability of them all: DJT is going to work with the Department of Commerce to bring back jobs to .... China!
Just when you think you have heard about all the scandals, read about all the power-hungry men who take out their frustrations on women, and chuckled over catching AT&T with their figurative pants down side-by-side with a porn star, here comes the president to mix it up just a little bit more. Is there any country out there that does not have some sort of leverage on this man?
It would be wildly amusing, if this weren't our own country the president is selling out. Again.
21
Perhaps this all is just a glitch in the matrix and we really are living a computer simulation.
10
There's a fascinating book about Erdogan's Turkey called "Turkey: The Insane and the Melancholy". The author, Ece Temelkuran, a secular feminist, describes the dystopian, mind-bending world of a country where authoritarian right-wing populism has ruled for fifteen years and keeps getting tighter.
A huge series of trials, lasting years, were conducted about a shadowy organization that turned out not to exist at all. Critical news organizations were slowly shut down with a combination of dubious fines on one hand and imprisonment of journalists on the other. Twitter - briefly a liberating source of information - turned into a tool used by the government and its supporters to dox and harass its opponents and to spread propaganda. Wedge issues such as the wearing of headscarves were used to further divide the conservative majority from the liberal minority. Conspiracy theories - some true - fly around wildly. Even the language changed, with people avoiding certain words that had become taboo, both in the 1980s following a violent coup and after Erdogan's rise.
Similar events have occurred in Putin's Russia - for that, the book "Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible" is very revealing. Chavez did this sort of thing in Venezuela as well. Ditto Orban's Hungary.
Postmodern authoritarian states seem to have this quality where anything, however bizarre, is believable and the whole concept of truth falls apart. It's clear that the US is very far down this path too.
23
Lewis Carroll would be proud . . . or perhaps jealous . . . of Ms. Doud's brilliant 21st century update of the travels down the rabbit hole. Of course, Trump’s Mad Hatter role is almost transparent in its stereotyping as he stuffs the dormouse Sessions into teapots. But, bringing on Gina Haspel as the off-with-their-heads Red Queen seems to be close to adding over-the-top perfection to the satire-become-nightmare.
10
Maureen, I have looked forward to your columns for a very long time. Rarely have I been disappointed, except on those weeks when your column does not appear. I don't pay much attention to the readers' comments, or I used not to until I noticed that almost every week at least one person tries to make you responsible for Hillary's loss. Even this week with your excellent listing of all the horrors that Trump inflicts on us, one of these nitwits, sure enough, brings up Hillary and implies that it is your "snarkiness" that caused her to lose. Somebody needs to say it: Hillary lost the election. She did it on her own. Maureen Dowd had nothing to do with it.
10
Trump has laid the groundwork for all his little Trump soldiers to chuck their weight around and say nasty callous remarks.
8
Kanye West is likely suffering from manic depression brought about by toxic levels of THC he's been ingesting. What's our excuse? So much hate wears out a person. Burn out has occurred. The comedians are cutting back on Trump humor can the media be far behind? Is he still money in the bank? Will real news as boring and complicated as it is make a comeback?
I don't know if I still care.
4
Not only was Woody Harrelson a schoolmate of Mike Pence, he is also the son of a convicted organized crime member who murdered a federal judge.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Harrelson
Only In America.
6
Well, this huge dysfunctional "family" of Trump's continues marching on. His family of origin effects combined with biological brain issues have resulted in personality disorder(s) that have NO boundaries in producing chaos, sleaze, incompetence, harm to others. I guess we can just hope that any quality helps the emergence of it's opposite - I think this is happening.
6
Priceless...Maureen Dowd, you have outdone yourself....our world, in so many ways, is unfathomable.
We need to strive for, kindness and peace...especially with one another.
6
Thank you, for the implausible now plausible, now reality dark humor. I could not decide whether to laugh or cry. But that last one about Harrelson and Pence being college pals? Now that is a black pearl. That deserves every dark laughter. Harrelson whose only vocabulary consists of swear words and Pence with white wings who calls his wife, mama - I would loved to be the fly on the wall when they communicated. Harrelson still is his true self but Pence? He has morphed into this smiling Buddha standing besides Harrelson in the White House. A leopard cannot change it's spots. ( sorry leopard! )
4
Poor infrastructure, poor medical system, poor education system, stuff that can get people down and repleous.
5
I enjoy Dowd's writing and clever turn of phrase, but I want to ask her: do you really think if HRC had become president that our heads would be spinning the way they are now? Or would the Republicans, in control of the legislative branch, have done everything to impeach her if she had pulled the same stunts Trump has? There is no balance, no restraint so there is time to employ sound judgment. I for one am tired of the sleaze. And I would like to see Dowd a little contrite for her anti HRC snark.
16
It's plausible we're existing "in a nightmare within a nightmare within...", with no escape from the Entrenchment of Kleptocracy. Witness the daily nightmares of the Trump administration, his comrades colluding in Congress, SCOTUS, Russia, fixers, money laundering, tax evasion, pay for play, emoluments... Though someday perhaps gone, we may never fully scrub away the stains they're leaving on America. We'll still be haunted by the 60+ million Trump voters, networked into alt-Right, Faux News, Sinclair TV, the right wing fear mongering Echo Chamber, Tea Party, white supremacists, and government haters. Their power may grow, as dissatisfaction is blamed on liberal lefty socialist obstructionist Democrats. There's no awakening from the nightmare of "money = speech", corporations have the rights of individuals, billionaire donors funding PACs, think tanks, Kochs, Mercers, and the colluding Supreme Court. The nightmare of our rigged political system persists. The Electoral College gives citizens of small states as much as 70 times the power as the largest states in senate votes to declare war or subsidize hog farming. The "EC" is the only non-democratic structure on earth to award an election to the loser. Members of SCOTUS have "lifer" government jobs, and choose who replaces them. Voter suppression flourishes across the fruited plains. No one knows if their votes have ever been counted correctly, while recounts always yields a different total.
Sweet Dreams America.
10
I find all kinds of pots and kettles on this board. HRC WAS increasingly paranoid. Why else move the State Departments email server for the Sec of State into her basement where nobody could see it?
Swamp? New Trump swamp. Well lets see. The old swamp used a fictional "Intelligence" report to generate a FISA court order to listen into a presidential campaign without tell the FISA court that the "intelligence" was paid for by a lawyer for the HRC campaign. The same swamp that leaked the faked report as a fact to the major newspapers then used that leak as a secondary proof of the validity of the proof.
Then the Ambassador to the UN requested the unmasking of people from the campaign who were overheard in the illegally acquired FISA warrant so their names could be leaked to the press. Can anybody explain the the ambassador to the UN needs that information??? I can't.
Then the head of the FBI illegally leaks to his personal lawyer to be leaked later personal notes of his meetings with President - probably illegally though the courts haven't ruled on that yet.
I don't know about you - but when the unelected decide they have a superior right to decide who resides in that office to the people of the nation - we have a very serious problem.
That is a swamp. It was supposed to a a nation for the people - not for the bureaucrats.
5
It does seem that in this upside down world that everything is plausible but it is also predictable. Anger and rage begets stupidity. People who feel entitled and blame others for what they have not will act implausibly.
Trump is president because of Russian money and interference coupled with the implausible claims against Clinton and anger at how certain white people didn't get their due.
We worship celebrity but don't question their morals or values but we are judgmental when they fail. We accuse others of what Trump has done but the evangelicals abandon their so-called values to embrace him because he will help with their agenda even though he doesn't live their values.
Yes, everything is plausible because some of us don't know who we are anymore or what we are in danger of losing.
This country is run by mean people who only care about winning and throw bits of red meat to the people they claim to care about but are essentially screwing because in the age of implausibility no questions are being asked anymore.
7
Yeah. Thanks Maureen and the rest of the media that just couldn't get enough of Trump's circus in 2016. Great job elevating him and dumping on Hillary every chance you got.
30
Instead of going after ideas, which can get pretty complicated, Trump goes after people. This is the "fighting back" his fans adore. In this pursuit, nothing is too low, not even military families who've lost their children or a POW dying from brain cancer. Oh well, nobody's perfect but you'd think a public servant who's never done anything wrong would focus on public service, not on attacking an investigation that will prove his innocence.
8
The only reason Madame Dowd's head is spinning is from whip-sawing from Trump-lover / Hillary-Obama-hater to Trump-hater and back again.
Maybe SHE is shocked that her one-time hero, who was ALWAYS this way, but she played down in the campaign, really IS this way. He's a thug, who got ahead by always being outrageous. Not smart, not clever, not hard-working. Just willing to ignore the norms and pay for "fixers".
Today, on the other pages, there's an article on how Betsy de Vos is gutting ALL protections against for-profit school fraud. Is it any wonder? Her boss had to pay $25 million in a settlement for HIS for-profit-school fraud! We knew he'd lose that legal battle before a single vote was cast.
It's not even brain-scrambling that, had this been ANY other President, by this time BOTH parties would have agreed to an impeachment with a sure-fire conviction. But there doesn't seem to be any transgression that Trump and his team can make where Congress finally says "ENOUGH! You've damaged the nation enough and now it stops!" Instead, they gleefully jump in to help cover up, obstruct, and bury the investigation.
Mike Pence says "one year is more than enough!" But the Benghazi investigation lasted 4 years with no indictments. The Clinton eMails lasted 2 with no indictments.
In just 1 year Mueller has 21 indictments, 3 convictions, with 2 more near-certain and he's barely scratched the surface! No my brain isn't scrambled. It's just been terrified for 18 months!
17
Follow the Quid Pro Quo and you will find Republicans every time. Trump is being supported simply because he is giving his base what they want: a white culture revival from the times when whites claimed cultural superiority in and dominance over all aspects of American life. No need to get upset about everything Trump does... just understand the specific QPQ of any situation. Then Bingo, you will get the symbiosis taking place. Leave morals and ethics out of the equation...their exponent is zero anyway. Also remember, Democratic torment is Republican delight. So expressing pain and anger only provides proof their schemes are working. Think Reptilian brain at work in TrumpWorld and you will find a strange kind of peace envelop you... How do animals settle disputes...they fight it out... So 1) take them to court everytime, and 2) vote November...
7
It seems as if we've entered the Matrix of cartoon character characters. We now have The Hulk as President who is always green with envy and going on destructive rampages. We have new Trump attorney the Joker played with grinning glee by Rudy (I'm getting my "facts straight") Giuliani. We have fixer, bag man, Trump personal attorney in a long-running performance as Count Dracula draining the blood out of any woman whoever shared a pillow with his boss. And don't forget new major foreign policy Yosemite Sam acted by John ("Blowtorch") Bolton. We have in lesser roles Cat Woman as Betsy DeVos, and of course, Scott Pruitt who's really Loki. Now this Rubik's cube all seems quite "plausible."
8
American greed is coming home to roost. The machine is a sick, sick puppy. War with Iran is next.
8
Trump is scheduled to meet up with Kim on June 12.
I haven’t the foggiest clue about what will happen that day.
But I can tell you about June 13th with something close to absolute certainty.
Which is that on that day, both countries will still be presided over by seriously disturbed buffoons with aspirations to take over the world.
25
Looking at some of the comments here, it's clear that there are some Americans who have some ideas about life that are diametrically opposed to the values I was raised with.
I was taught to care for my fellow human beings, to have compassion for the less fortunate, & to lend a helping hand wherever I could. I was taught to participate in civil life & civil discourse with politeness. I was discouraged from gloating over my own good fortune, but encouraged to share it with others. If someone gave me a handful of cookies, I was expected to share them, not keep them for myself. I was taught that giving to others & helping people who, for whatever reason, cannot help themselves, was the highest & best thing one could do on this planet. I was taught that members of a healthy family & a healthy community help & support each other. I was raised to believe that every human being deserves love, a good home, decent food, & dignity.
Apparently, though, there are people who think that helping oneself is the most important thing in life. That no one else is important. That one's only business in life is to make as much money as one possibly can, & ensure that no one else benefits from one's own money. That the only person who counts is oneself. That people have no duties or obligations to anyone but themselves. That people who help others are to be labeled "fools" or "socialists."
Worshipping the individual at the expense of society is becoming a widespread sickness in America.
45
Thanks Allison, you put into my thoughts into well crafted words. Our nation has hit a very low point, and it's only going to get worse if our citizens who care don't get out to vote in November.
10
I like where you are going, however it is in fact the left that daily spews hate on those who disagree with the program's some call helping out those in need. I believe we have 50 years of proof that the left has destroyed more lives. We all know the poverty and death caused by our welfare and education system. A System owned and operated by the left and women as a rule. Republicans are afraid to stand up to people who spew accusations on the fly. Until President Trump who used the exact tactics the left has used for years. We are enjoying the war he started with the real enemy's of fairness and love for one another. I am still weeping for the entire African American Male that has suffered greatly under the lefts so called help.
4
Couldn't resist calling HRC "increasingly paranoid," I guess. Obviously no one was out to get her.
19
Prez Trump and Cohen are linked to mafiosi while Vanessa Trump is linked to street gangsters. Perfectly normal American family.
17
Maureen, you got one thing wrong. Cohen did not sell access without permission. A captain always gets permission from the Don and pays him a cut.
19
The best part is, there are signs Trump may just get away with it and be well down the road before us suckers figure out that he's sold off another big chunk of our future.
7
Absurdity in the political arena? This is not a discovery of any note. What is truly absurd however is the media's sudden "discovery" of this element in the body politic, which has existed for decades. Ms. Dowd should be focused on the results - and so far, under President Trump, the results have been pretty good. Outcomes count for more than style - style is merely a passing fad. No doubt, President Trump is out-of-step with the Establishment's "style" of governance. To many, this is a badge, not a shame.
3
"...and so far, under President Trump, the results have been pretty good. Outcomes count for more than style.."
Um, the poor, the middle class, women, people of color, immigrants, all minority groups and a vast majority of US allies might disagree as honesty, the US Constitution, democracy, diplomacy, decency, ethics, morality and civility are routinely ignored by Trump. Mob boss and despotic style of governance might not be establishment but it is most certainly not considered a "badge" by decent, ethical, honest and truly patriotic Americans or genuine Christians. Period.
13
Agree with Spinach Jam, Ms. Doug you are on fire!
As they say in my hood," You've got a dope beat"
And that Rose Garden religion love-in climaxed by a hug from the ever righteous Ralph Reed. Now that’s preposterous.
8
Your paper, my favorite, is printing more columns by very conservative writers. This is what money does.
Our world is surely run by money & that dynamic has become much worse since the Reagan years & 'trickle down' tax cuts. We the People are losing.
Now, We the People are doing this to ourselves, partly by being ignorant & partly by acting ignorant. We don't want to know, including we don't want to know the answers to our problems (because that means we'd have to change).
This world's climate is in dire straits and that envelopes us. But, we elect, & the Republicans and many Independents support this bully-in-chief that says climate change is no problem. That's reassuring - not a problem, no change necessary, carry on. We walk with evil to avoid hard choices.
The world's complicit; we do relatively nothing. We're unsure we can meet this challenge. But, of course we can. We can do anything, even if it's very difficult. Together we are an amazing world.
The rich, led by the rich Trump, doesn't really care. They're doing great. They have so much and that's increasing. So the rich and near-rich and almost-near-rich like Trump and the Republican tax cuts, the retreat of government helping the poor and near-poor, the disregard for the environment.
Money and wealth are a fever. Compassion and giving are an honor and duty. Today, we've let the fever take over our country, and it will be a true war to try and bring back a good and decent place for us all to live. But we can.
12
Switch to the WaPo. Even the token conservatives there, like Will and Rubin have given up on Trump.
7
It's all true. People, we don't know who voted for this mess. Most people, American people don't admit to have voted for Trump. But, somehow he got elected.
Okay. I have a simple solution. Don't ever admit your a Trump supporter.
4
I hope that his little boy is somehow withstanding the terrible circus his father’s and mother’s lives have become.
Were it within my power to do so today, I’d put him in touch some organization like this:
https://bigfluffydogs.com/our-dogs/atlas/
9
How gauche liberals must find it to show up to a gun fight with a gun, when it so much fun to discuss how ridiculous is everything. Would it really matter that much to upper crust NY, whether the White House is graced by a Sun King, or by Caligula? I guess not; it doesn't get that noisy or dusty beyond the 30th floor.
But I live in the noise and the dust. Middle income, suburban, vulnerable to a police that is paramilitary, a Charlottesville with nice Nazis, undrinkable water and un-affordable health care.
In my trench, I find no mirth given the signs of a collapsing civil society. Discourse is everything but open, civil, or tolerant; policy is designed now to hasten the agony of a gas chamber when it comes to health, education, and justice.
Yes, in the trench I have little use for the raw, unfiltered hatred of others - an affliction in which the American right is dyed. But I have no use for the left's mockery either.
Oh my lord the sneering, self-satisfied, entitled smugness of Madam Dowd. We should pay attention to her not because she has something to say in terms of intelligence, information, or analysis, but because she thinks we should pay attention to her. And how she mocks! And with each mocking statement, which I suspect I do not understand in nuance or substance, I feel belittled - what with me in the trenches with no real taste for upper crust reading habits or love of watercress.
You are producing revulsion Maureen. And helping Trump win again.
11
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin is smiling and smirking as his main pancing prop puppet manages to manufacture more mayhem in and for America. While Donald John Trump is profitably hiding his income tax returns and business records from the American people. From Bedminster to Mar-a-Lago to Trump Tower the plan to ' Make Russia Great Again' is the Trump guiding light paid for principle.
24
Not sure what the point of this article was.
Implicitly conflating a serial physical, emotional, psychological abuser of women with someone who had a one night stand with a porn star is not a plausible use of NY Times editorial space.
7
I had always thought that in a futuristic world where machines made most of the decisions and performed most of the work, men and women would be totally unmoored and resort to petty jealousies to pass time. A few will still work on Number Theory and try to come up with a formula for enumerating successive prime numbers but even that might come to an end.
And then what?
3
Your future is here already!
5
Everything is "plausible" because 40% of the people of America support Donald Trump no matter what. They are ignorant and are proud to be ignorant and want to be entertained by the lowest form of human behavior.
Never forget we are in this mess because the educated people of America are constantly fighting with each other over micro-aggressions = they are the stupidest smart people we have ever had.
Do the math and 80% of America are "implausible"
14
Maureen is on fire, her last few weeks worth of columns have been timely, spot on insights into the current state of our society.
4
She did a great job helping Trump get elected.
7
Trump is the quintessential Florida Man (see Atlanta — Season 2, Episode 1)
2
yes, everything is possible. You write Michael Cohen "made up a job selling access to a White House where he could not even get a job."
Why take a government job when you can rake in millions of dollars from corporations that the president disses on the campaign stump?
Donald complained about Ford's move to Mexico; about the AT&T/Time Warner merger; about drug prices... and Cohen was tapping those companies for big bucks payments.
It looks to me like Donald and Cohen were quite a team.
15
YOU voted for him. We all have to live with it.
15
What made America the "great" nation that Trump promises to make us gain?
Was it 165 years of slavery in which black lives were the property of rich whites and the myth of white superiority led poor whites to accept their own exploitation by these same rich whites? Was it a century of Jim Crow segregation, or the enduring institutional and renewed personal racism of today?
Or was it criminalizing unions and using the courts to thwart every attempt of ordinary workers to achieve a decent income earned in decent working conditions?
Or was it the obscene wealth disparities of the first Gilded Age that have returned in the 21st Century?
Or was it the Internment of Japanese-Americans as an expression of hysterical hatred in defiance of the reality of who and what threatened America in WWII?
Or was it McCarthyism?
Or was it the persistent personal, institutional and ideological subjugation of women to the control and interests of men that is still the subject of struggle today?
Or was it going to war in Iraq for no reason other than the the excessive testosterone levels of right-wing politicians?
Or was what made America great--and will make America great again--the democratic ideals, the sense of common destiny, the pragmatism, decency, self-deprecating humor, and persistent moral resistance that helped to overcome so much of our dark history?
It is this latter that Trump and his minions are destroying, a fact that we ignore--or participate in--at our own great peril.
23
Interesting that Slavery, Jim Crow laws, and the internment of Japanese Americans are all the legacy of the Democrat Party founded by Andrew Jackson (slave owner). Also interesting that illegal immigration for the purposes of cheap Democrat votes undercuts the wages of Union workers via increased worker supply.
2
Yes, it's called America. And you have one person to thank. And he is sitting in the oval office.
3
Maureen: Remember the McCarthy Hearings? Remember Bay of Pigs? Remember the assassinations of JFK, MLK, RFK? Remember Remember Vietnam and body bags? Remember Watergate? Remember Iran Contra? Remember WMD and Halliburton running the War on Terror?
We've always lived in utter weirdness. The pretense of sanity managed to prevail in the 50's when the economy went no where but up and America dominated the world, and everyone pretended to be Protestant, White, and happily married. And that was totally implausible, to say the least.
Hang on, Maureen, plausible left the gate long ago.
5
What is your point, Maureen? Do you have any suggestions about a course of action, or are you sitting on the sidelines above the fray? Perhaps you think there is nothing needed to be done about the situation? Your catalog of their depravity is entertaining reading, was that your intention?
12
Gail Collins can get away with a humorous approach to the Trump train wreck; Maureen Dowd, not so much. She has found religion a bit too late.
31
"Trump train wreck"? Where? I see peace and prosperity breaking out.
The most momentous week of Donald Trump's presidency and all the "resistance" can do is complain about silly stuff that hardly matters. It's background noise.
Time to get on board the Trump train and see where it takes you.
5
The Trump Train right now seems to be headed for a war with Iran and jail and disbarment for a lot of people riding on it.
9
We have a "Be Best" FLOTUS and a "Be Worst" POTUS a/k/a LOUT.
It gets harder to accept every day that goes by ... worse and worse ... lower and lower ...
The race toward the bottom isn't a look I ever expected for the United States of America.
20
If you are impressed by words, personality, and intentions, you likely don't like Trump and consider yourself a Progressivist. If you are more impressed by actions, policies, and results, you likely support Trump and are a Conservative/Americanist.
4
@Philpy: Well, so far, the results have been: we are becoming an untrustworthy rogue nation that no other country in the world has any faith in, some rich people are getting stinking rich, housing & education are even more unaffordable, healthcare is being undermined & costs are skyrocketing, we have an exploding population of homeless people, pollution is getting worse, nothing is being done about climate change, gas is more expensive, the cost of groceries is rising, several million kids are about to lose their health insurance, unions are fighting for their lives, it's becoming socially acceptable to be a bigot & a racist, the civil rights of women & minorities are under attack, income inequality is still killing this country, our free press & our system of justice & law enforcement are under attack by right-wing extremists, & a sexist mobster is sitting in the Oval Office enriching himself & his cronies on the backs of the middle class, while attacking more half of the country & most of the world.
I don't like these results and I doubt very much that the majority of Americans who did not vote for the gangster in the White House like them, either. If you're happy, fine. But I don't see how anyone who calls himself an American can be happy living in a land polluted by the high-level corruption and cronyism we are now witnessing, while the majority of people are rapidly losing economic power as it becomes consolidated in the hands of corrupt and selfish oligarchs.
21
Oh, Trump's infantile behavior and risky, short-sighted flailing, together with his greedhead policies and ugly results, are impressive, all right.
By the way...historically speaking, braying about how you're the only Real Amurrican and attaching, "ist," to nouns you use to describe yourself, well, that hasn't worked out so well.
9
"Finally, we learned from “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” on Tuesday that Woody Harrelson and Mike Pence were pals in college."
Well, whatta ya know. Maybe there is hope for Mike Pence after all.
1
Perhaps an overused word, but I'll say it anyway. Brilliant, Ms. Dowd.
1
Hey, it's just america. The land of the greedy and the home of the depraved. Trump is perfect for this rancid and bankrupt institution.
8
Thanks, Maureen. "Mongoose" was one of those words I'd always meant to look up. Now that I did, and saw photos of the ugly little critters, I will forever think of Michael (aka "Ray Donovan") Cohen. Great piece, but man, depressing.
8
I realized long ago that all bets are off when it comes to anything coming out of this president, since he's been off the chain his entire life.
That's what the privilege of being a rich, white male in America will do for you.
Think not?
Can you image Barack Obama getting away with even 1/1000th of what Donald Trump has gotten away with so far -- starting with how he even got into the White House with help from the Russians?
It's also not hard to imagine how outaged some members of Congress and the public would be if it was Obama who was embroiled in all the sordid sexual escapades and extra-marital affairs Trump has been involved in -- not to mention all the money he's making for himself and his administration of big-spenders.
So far, it's been one excuse after another for all of the crazy, outrageous things coming out of the current Oval Office, even when it costs this country its place and credibility on the world stage and no one seems to mind.
So, no. Nothing surprises me anymore.
20
MD gets increasingly strident in her hatred of nearly everybody but more particularly Donald Trump who has had rather astounding success in recent months. Will she ever come terms with that?
3
"Astounding success"? Is this a joke? An Alice in Wonderland view of the mess he's made while in office? The only promise he's kept so far is to trash an Iran deal that most sensible people think was working and a lot better than nothing. Everything else has been a grotesquely twisted version of a campaign promise, like the tax cuts for the rich, the busting up of the ACA with no replacement, a failure to pull us out of stupid wars, and just this week reneging on his promise to let the feds negotiate drug prices.
5
All of this insanity is fertile ground for nihilism. Why have hope when we witness a daily (hourly?) normalization of behavior that most of us are taught — and recognize — is so wrong as to be destructive to both individuals and society?
8
MAD Magazine is all true.
12
#MAGA. Donald Trump is keeping his promises and winning. After 8 long years of the worst management in history, we now have an improving economy and record low unemployment.
5
The current economy is still Obama's economy. These trends began long before 2016. However, gasoline prices have past $4/gal in California. There goes the tax cut for most Americans. Now THAT'S Trumps fault.
17
Obama was the worst president ever. He had an average 1.075 GDP which equals less than a third of the 3.405 % annual growth in real GDP the United States saw in the last two decades of the last century.
You're right, Maureen. If the world ever ends, one would hope it would be a tragedy, but the Trump administration is making it look like it is going to be a farce, an exaggerated twist on normality. Something like the movie Dr. Strangelove. I used to think that movie was flawed by being too exaggerated, too insane to be believable, but the Trump Administration is making it look like a documentary.
9
It's my favorite movie of all time ever since I saw it in 1962. It's never been rivaled by any of the other movies I've seen since.
And yet, the polls go up for Trump...yes, any behavior, no matter how morally and ethically depraved has now become plausible.
7
The weakness in our political system is that from the very beginning it relied on elites, or "gentlemen". There was always a caste system, but a growing middle class and farmers fought back during the Gilded Age. Progressivism gave us more democracy. But the fault was that it was led in DC by a plutocrat, our beloved FDR. As a biographer put it, he was "a traitor to his class".
We are in a difficult place now. Greedy elites have rediscovered ways to undermine democracy again. Propaganda has reached new potency with the expansion of media and the internet. Real knowledge has been replaced by poison pill entertainment that masquerades as news.
The answer should be more democracy. Redress the bias toward elites in our political system. But then I must acknowledge 40% of voters embrace the propaganda and vote wholeheartedly for those that undo stability and prosperity in their lives.
And I am left to wonder: how do you promote democracy until you have wiped out the stupidity that creates the mob mentality that gives scoundrels like Trump and his ilk their power? We must stop expressing our deepest fears and hates and counter them with higher callings and beliefs. But in a country where tens of millions blindly follow, how do we weaken the power of money and influence and find our better angels, saving our politics and our lives from a never ending stream of weak moments that are now the norm?
10
No sympathy for Republicans. Absolutely zero. They had a choice. They knew exactly who Trump was and let him get elected anyway. They let the scorpion ride on their back and now he's stinging them. They know they'll drown together and there is nothing they can do about it.
18
when everything is implausible but nothing is illegal, when it's implausible that Cohen selling access himself implying it's plausible that he did so alone without Trump's knowledge, when it's implausible that Trump is following the Nixon/Stone plan but outsourcing the dirty tricks this time, i find it implausible that you write a breezy op-ed that seemingly marvels at the audacity without being outraged at the lawlessness.
5
My recent real estate broker not stop talking about how wonderful Trump is. Yesterday, my cable TV installer wanted to talk about Trump and all the great things he is doing for this country. Both are young men in their 30s and are Hispanic. I wasn't the one starting these conversations. This is happening here in NYC. This Russia Russia Danger Danger Pants On Fire Trump Derangement Syndrome is getting pretty tired. I am waiting for the Inspector General reports to come out. Why are there about 25,000 sealed indictments ready and waiting, when an average year has about 1,900? Tick tock. It's coming.
5
Let’s face it, the ultimate expression of democracy is the uninhibited ability to do whatever you want regardless of the impact on others. When there no longer exists any shared values or norms to bind a society together, what Ms. Dowd describes is the result. It’s like a large proportion of Americans going off to college for the first time and acting out because there is no longer any parental supervision. Trumpworld is simply a manifestation of people finally feeling enabled to act without constraint on their innermost biases, be they greed, racial superiority, misogyny.......whatever.
What is most disturbing is the absence of adequate conscience for so many to see the destruction this is doing to America and the fabric of our society. I for one am sick and tired of trying to find politically correct explanations for the appeal of Donald Trump to so many people. The reality for me is that anyone who abides by his behavior, irrespective of his policies or politics, is contributing to the erosion of America.
8
"At long last, have you left no sense of decency?" These timeless words spoken by Joseph Welch ended McCarthyism. Have we as a country changed so much as to not have his insight and courage to stand up to a man not worthy of his title and position?
20
Maureen: No offense to you, your employer and the majority of your readers, but I think the answer may be a travel ban on New Yorkers. No wait, that's too broad; the courts would reject it in a New York minute. It should probably just include New York real estate developers and their lawyers, doctors, family members and personal acquaintances as well as former New York mayors, Congressmen, and attorneys general. I would have thrown in Wall Street bankers, but they look like choir boys compared to the others.
2
Couldn't find just the right place in the column section for my comment on John Kelly's interview with NPR. Seems the most important thing he had to apologise for was possibly his statement about trump being embarrassed. On this Mother's day I will be honoring my deceased Irish born mother
who came to this country with a sixth grade education from a farm, and extreme poverty. She assimilated very well despite many obstacles. She sacrificed to give me a good education and was proud of my educational achievements. Every first and second generation American should remember today those Mothers. John Kelly is a disgrace to every child of .an immigrant as he dissed his own immigrannt roots.
8
Maureen, in America, all things were always plausible. However, the news media studiously avoided presenting Americans with those facts. So, some folks, sheltered from America, thought that what the news media reported was the sum of America. But, it never was. Trump, a bombast member of the lower class, who, inherited enough money to become President.....has just made visible what has ALWAYS been present. Only a fraction of people are shocked at learning what others have always known was present.
3
Too many Americans equate gold bathroom fixtures with class.
3
Thanks to Maureen, these are the best of times in the worst of times. America has finally been exposed for the racist, sexist and every other "ist" characteristic of a nation that she truly is.
Americans have a very poor diet and are totally unhealthy. Most of our fresh produce: fruit, vegetables, nuts, legumes, etc. go to waste. They are not consumed by most Americans. Mr. Trump and the Ag. Dept. and BIG AG should cut way back on agricultural and other food production in America. This would solve the immigrant problem -- illegal, legal or otherwise. If we cut way back on harvested crops that Americans do not eat anyway, we can cut back on the harvesters of those crops. When a product is not there to be worked, the workers need not be there. In the process we would also streamline our entire grocery store and food process. It could be that we could eliminate immigrant labour from America starting in these fields and have only a Caucasian population feeding us. The question is, why are all these immigrants laboring or trying to labour in America and not in their own countries. Other nations have the same food requirements as America and probably more. Immigrants should be working in fields in their own impoverished nations.
1
Sir-- California is the biggest ag state. We also have the most illegal people from the south. They are not all "field workers" as you assert. They are everywhere, doing hard work others won't do (young men) or can't do(old out of shape white guys) your plan won't work.
2
Well then imagine that Iran is a hornets nest, that Trump just poked it by withdrawing from the Iran deal, and that Bolton has come to his aid wanting to exterminate the whole nest. That is what I am imagining will happen before a Democratically controlled congress can be elected to prevent it. Two men can throw the whole Middle East into a war and 330,000,000 Americans are powerless to prevent it. Imagine that!
6
A recent headline from National Enquirer: "Nancy Pelosi Gets Makeup Tips from RuPaul." If it said, "POTUS Pays Hush Money to Porn Star" we might have laughed and disregarded it. In a post-Trump universe nothing is beyond the range of credulity. There are no norms, no boundaries. Once unimaginable behavior and corruption coming from the highest levels of government are now a part of our everyday reality.
We have been inoculated against being aghast. We are inured to vileness, uncivility and the bizarre. We are losing our sense of the ironic - as in Melania spearheading a campaign for kindness, which she literally stole from an Obama pamphlet. We no longer blink an eye at this incredulity; we expect it and wait for the next bit of insanity.
Bush once spoke of shock and awe. I have lost the ability to be shocked or awed at anything emanating from this administration. We now live in Bizarro World where anything most vile is possible and probable.
7
Harrelson and Pence pals? The only possible way was if Pence was better looking and could attract more women. Women show up and swoon over Bible Boy, Harrelson culls them out and takes the pick of the litter. What a story, what a scoop, what a fantasy. Somehow I think it was just because the bumpkin college they attended was so small everyone was your pal.
4
Please, can our country finally re-emerge from the rabbit hole?
6
I disagree.
it is plausible that Woody would be the perfect wingman for someone who is afraid to be alone in a room with a woman.
7
Am I to assume that given the “elites’” in-the-know status, that they shut their mouths against busting Trump before his Electoral College win because they didn’t think he would win — Maureen?
4
Wow... A bad case of Trump (or perhaps Republican) Derangement Syndrome on display!
I note with sorrow that everything Ms Dowd said was a condemnation of style and personality and not a single word concerning substance, as if Trump had been elected Boy Scout in Chief and was failing in that role.
"The White House" is not the nation's moral arbiter, it's a collective entity the purpose of which is to maintain the country's machinery. Trump is the head janitor, not some kind of secular pope.
As a man, Trump is a disgusting semi-human being, as are a lot of the people with whom he's surrounded himself. (I could, and have, said the same of Hillary...) But as Janitor in Chief, he's doing a great job. The economy is up and world tensions are down, and those are the things that matter most to most Americans or, at least, sensible Americans. Even Ms Dowd couldn't, apparently, find anything substantive to complain about concerning anything of import and instead was reduced to complaining about utter irrelevancies.
Unlike the Queen of England, the American President isn't just a figurehead. He's a working CEO. He doesn't have to be pretty in body or in spirit, he just has to get results, and Trump and his White House are doing precisely that--much, apparently, to Ms Dowd's dismay.
4
simple solution to this craziness. get out the vote.
4
Am I the only one who marvels that Cohen, and therefore likely Trump, knew that Schneiderman was a depraved sado-masochist, who saw his sick behavior only as money-in-the-bank, useful later revenge against the AG?
Couldn't/shouldn't Cohen/Trump have blown a social or legal whistle to help these women, and any subsequent women, out?
If this is not the definition of heinous cynicism and lack of moral compass, lest we need another example from this duo, what is?
Where is the outrage?
I get it, Ms. Dowd, we are in the Surreal New World.
7
Hidden, or not so hidden, in every Dowd column is the pro-Trump plug or smokescreen to throw voters off-track. This time she's plugging that Cohen and Trump aren't close - to try and undercut Cohen's importance to Trump, right after he was caught in a Trump-driven bribery scandal:
"Cohen, who once had to beg Trump to drop by his son’s bar mitzvah, elbowed into the swamp by pretending he had the president’s ear. He made up a job selling access to a White House where he could not even get a job."
Weak effort. This one's not so hidden.
6
Nothing surprises me. In a world where up is down and vice versa. We have half the nation that voted for a president that is banal and corrupt yet believe he is the Great White Hope to save our nation. Goes to show you folks can be led to believe anything even when its not true.
2
calling the lawyer for the patriot Stormy Daniels a mongoose makes no sense. is this because he so far has outplayed the president and his brain trust at every opportunity? in the president's eyes , possibly. but to cast such slander upon a man who has the legal acumen to bring this miscreant president to his knees.
9
Read Riki-Tiki-Tavi by Kipling. Mongooses kill cobras and in this case I hope Avenetti is able to do the job on the cobras in the Trump administration, including the king cobra himself. I would hope that is will be very apt.
5
One more "implausible" that has become plausible: so many Republican leaders becoming Trumplicans!
2
This cannot continue. Vote. Vote. Vote.
4
"her cyberbully husband unleashes his cruel Be Worst plot to slash the popular children’s health benefits program."
This is the type of dishonesty from Times' columnists that just leaves objective and informed people shaking their heads. The President is asking for the $15 billion in surplus unused funds back form from the CHIP program and there is no slashing.
3
@GaryTLee: Oh, so they're just politely requesting that states return unused CHIP money, huh? What are they going to do with it? Spend it on a military parade? Give some billionaires their tax refunds? Or spend it on a few more of Trump's trips down to Mar-a-Lago, so he can play a few more rounds of golf on everyone else's dime?
That money should stay with the states, which are going to need it to continue to subsidize children's health programs, as the ACA and Medicaid programs are being slashed everywhere. The health of our nation is being crushed under the weight of having to pay for the billionaires' tax cuts.
8
Maureen's graceful litany of graceless "American" idiocy---four decades-and-running--- is yet just another exposure of We The Outraged's impotence.
How many more anecdotes highlighting both the breath-taking stupidity, and shameless me-only "intellects" of the ruling class do we need before we finally recognize this doesn't change until WE do. And by the way, it's going to take a whole lot more than just voting to rectify this---as it stands---hopeless situation. A LOT more.
Until the entire process is overhauled, the system as envisioned by the Founders is a systemic JOKE, providing NO checks, NO balances, and NO reins on unchecked capitalism, a prophecy even Karl Marx seems to have gotten right.
2
Wow, only one back-handed stab at Hilly ... That said, since pretty much anybody who was paying attention shouldn't be too surprised by Trump's antics, where were you while the birther demon was inflating over all that time ? There's a bit of blood on your hands Ms. MacBeth ...
11
The most apposite criticism of Kelly Sadler's dismissive "He's dying anyhow" comment is one you do not hear being made: it has no relevancy whatsoever to the merits of Gina Haspell's nomination for CIA Queen, despite her history of condoning torture.
1
Obama for his Harvard Law degree and Georgetown urbane eloquence - never won the debate with the American public on Obamacare, Iran and TPP. And the voting then followed with more than 1200 seats changing from DEM to GOP. Now Obama’s legacy has been reduced to 120+ rounds of golf; a lot of frequent flier miles; and a Nobel Prize for who knows what?
3
Trump is the anti-government surreal performance artist. He is the antithesis of everything government stands for: the common good, community, respect for the law. Like a surrealist, he shakes things up in order to shock and offend. Republicans will pack the courts, dismantle protections, and stand aside as Trump performs his insane spectacle laying waste to everything in his path.
6
I've never watched Kimmel but did he also mention that in the early 60's, pence was a JFK Democrat? Did he also mention that Harrelson's father was on death row in Texas for 'contract' killing of a federal judge? We can see Woody's turned out alright. I'm not so sure about the future of this country under Soviet rule with trump leading the charge.
P.S. No matter how subtle, Mo just can't let Hillary alone. Please move on Dowd!
6
Yes, the irony about Melania Trump's campaign against cyberbullying is surreal. Maybe she is striking a subtle blow against her husband's own non-stop cyberbullying. (I look for any positive I can imagine right now.)
We are living in a vile, toxic atmosphere of sordidness that is beyond anything I could have dreamt. There is only scandal anymore, interspersed with the fear that we are about to become involved in some kind of nuclear holocaust. Is there anyone in politics with a moral compass anymore? (Afraid of the answer.) The Marquis de Sade seems to be alive and well, and perhaps residing in New York. Then there is Michael Cohen. It is becoming apparent that the depths of his corruption rivals any mafia kingpin. Which brings me to Trump, who seems to embody a bit of all the debased elements out there, and the most frightening part of it all, is the power this vulgarian yields. What on earth are parents telling their children?
We have a president whose behavior is anything but a role model for children, along with a host of other politicians and corrupt lawyers whose behavior is anything but exemplary. You feel as though you need a bath after reading about the unsavory dealings and exploits of people like Schneiderman, Giuliani, and Cohen. Who could have imagined the world we would be thrust into on November 8, 2016?
4
Most implausible of all is the fact that Trump was elected and did not even have a majority of the popular vote. Americans can be fooled so easily and have their pockets picked for the sake of getting a red hat. I'll tell you what is plausible. Mean and vile white people who can be made to turn against the "other". All for the satisfaction of not asking themselves "what you can do for the country."
5
A lot of this crazy stuff is timing. Can you imagine Trump-Cheney?
1
Maureen, you're beautiful when you're angry. I wish more people could focus their fury on those who deserve it.
Meanwhile, "Mongoose" Avenatti is having the time of his life chomping every poisonous snake that slithers into his orbit. He and Robert Mueller, who's busy sorting through his own collection of venomous reptiles, are about as opposite in style as any two people on this planet, but they have a lot in common, too. Their smarts. And their prey.
4
Sounds like America’s horrible, no good, miserable presidential term. We knew how bad Trump is, and yet, enough Americans were so angry and disillusioned, they voted for the King of Bad. Plausible, yes. Hopefully he won’t leave America in embers. And, Maureen, you should have been so vocal in 2016.
3
Everyone takes the high road when discussing torture and revel in their moral purity. But when Obama picked assassination targets, including Americans, from his folder supplied by the CIA, not one of these pure moralists said a thing. Hypocrites all or just picking issues they can feel good about themselves.
3
We don't need to watch TV anymore. The Trump Show is unparalleled comedic tragedy. And it's always on.
1
Author David Marranis wrote a book about Vince Lombardi titled 'when character mattered'. With the exception of John McCain, the persons mentioned in this column have no character and no shame.
2
"Everything is plausible"? Good. Like many Americans may the Fake President plausibly be impeached, convicted, removed from office and then, for an encore, be plausibly indicted, convicted, and imprisoned along with his supporting cast of criminals. Hopefully, and plausibly, before the New Year arrives.
3
Our government is corrupted from the top down.
Every agency is peppered with long-term bureaucrats, senior staff earning more than two hundred thousand yearly who, have yet to write a single administrative opinion after 40 years of service.
The political parties are not in our Constitution. The parties are funded by the money and power donors, not the citizenry.
Party managers from our villages on up to Washington D.C. politics, reflect the status quo agenda of the wealthy power players who support the managers, not us.
On top of this mess sits a president who cannot be corrupted by the swamp of lobbyists who surround him because Trump was completely corrupted by his own hand for his own purpose before he even entered our White House.
Trump's intent was and is to destroy everything we stand for.
What has yet to reach the public domain is why? What was it that made this poisonous, crude bully become so disgusting for life?
Why happened to Trump that he did not grow up like the rest of us, rather his emotional maturation was dramatically stunted? Trump is sad, a pile of damaged goods we need to dump.
What has happened to U.S. that our only leaders are teenage kids against mass murder guns being sold over our counters?
The Parkland kids are the culmination of the Free Speech Movement that began at Berkely, circa 1959. The kid leaders are alrfeady diminished because they've yet learn the key line of the original student leaders: "Don't trust anyone over twenty."
2
We now have thugs and crooks running the government. They are actively destroying Democratic institutions. There is a problem, we need to put guardrails in place for this situation. This is a weakness when a President can actively subvert the workings of the democracy he is elected to protect. When one party can bring in thugs and crooks and the other is helpless. This needs to be remedied.Stong measures are needed now. Otherwise we are going down the rabbit hole to disappear forevermore.
1
Maureen, the K-12 bullying Melania is addressing has a history of causing our children to commit suicide, number two cause of their deaths. Her husband's "bullying" causes individuals surviving under "liberal privilege" to be exposed. Such as, the print and televised media, political appointees in the FBI, Justice Department and courts, anti-Americanism Democrats, illegals in sanctuary cities, state, etc. The chaos you feel in America today may be rooted in decades of PC indoctrination disguised as an education the has caused an alarming drop in empathy (40%), critical thinking, and rise in a long list of psychiatric problems (50-60%) in today's college and non-college graduates of PC schools. Cultural wars are ugly. The 60s generation cultural revolution was energized by sex, drugs, and feelings the present cultural revolution is inspired by constitutional principles, a moral compass, free market capitalism and facts not feelings.
2
Questions:
1. It looks as if we now know Trump's price. AT&T lost their TW deal because they were so cheap. Novartis won with their $1.2 million offer. But, how did Cohen funnel the money to Trump?
2. Trump is now teasing his base with the idea that he might just extend his POTUS job indefinitely, beyond the 8 years as President for life. Plausible? Maybe. See Erdogan in Turkey.
3. Is Kim playing Trump? Probably. Why would anyone trust Trump? The NK play is setting Trump up for a major fail. Trump is not clever enough to escape this charade he has set in motion.
Plausible or Implausible? Who wins this ongoing pro wrestling match?
2
Speaking of Black Cube, I'm sure Netanyahu was somehow involved. An arch-opponent of the Iran nuclear deal, while also under investigation in Israel for corruption on a grand scale, will go to any lengths to achieve his aims, especially if they coincide with those of an American president who is also under investigation on many fronts, while opposing anything accomplished by his predecessor.
3
I have grave doubts that we can collectively handle "knowing" this "new truth".
Up until now, most of us have clung to the misguided and fantastical belief that our our institutions were impenetrable to chaos and foreign intervention and the people elected to run them were thoughtful, responsible and meritorious (for the most part).
But now, the party's over. Toto pulled back the curtain on our feeble, desperate delusions and revealed that our worst fears in the dark are indeed true and then some.
At least we have Rudy to cheer us up amidst all of this darkness and insanity. Calling Avenatti a "pimp" is the greatest moment so far in this ongoing White House soap.
Who could ever forget Brando as Don Corleone calling Tataglia a "pimp" when he was identified as a potential "Sonny" assassin.
"Tataglia's a pimp, he could never outfight Sonny".
Above all, Trump voters wanted to be entertained, and he is delivering.
1
Everything is plausible?
I’ve long been a subscriber to the theory that President Trump has an identical twin brother named Ronald who is also evil -- how else could one man acting alone do so much damage in just one year? -- who lives in the basement of the White House; who sleeps days and works nights and bears primary responsibility for composing their incredibly asinine tweets.
Ronald occasionally makes public appearances in the White House Rose Garden, at CIA Headquarters and at the Pentagon where he likes to denounce Sen. McCain, Sen. Schumer, Sen. Warren, Congresswoman Pelosi and Gold Star mothers.
Distinguishing between the two of them isn’t easy. Both of them are corpulent, have small hands, wear hideous orange hairpieces and possess a severe allergy to telling the truth.
The brothers get along famously, the only known friction between the two of them arising from that time long ago when Ronald -- or was it Donald? -- appeared on the Howard Stern program and said, “I would have dated Ivanka, if I wasn’t her father.”
One of the two of them will be running for President in 2020. Which one, I don’t know. As things are presently going, they may be in office until 2032.
2
Is it possible that Trump is an evil genius? In Trump’s world everything is upside down. Obama is bad. Putin is good. Past American administrations are incompetent.Russian leadership is never criticized. The malevolent dictator of North Korea is becoming Trump’s best friend. Ignore the past and start all over.Could this madness work? In Trump’s mind it already has.
1
And the underlying mystery:
How do Trump and Friends and Family, who behave like dolts, frequently talk like drunk football fans on anti-depressants, and can’t remember their own brazen lies from one day to the next, manage to find one another, contact rich Russians, rake in money ... and then find handy, foreign laundromats where they can put that money through a rinse and spin cycle?
Is there some kind of intercontinental tunnel system we don’t know about?
Got some big rats in it, maybe?
2
Avenatti is more like a honey badger than a mongoose.
1
Melania's husband is the poster child of a cyber bully. What's implausible is that we are having to tell our children that acting like the president of the United States will get you a visit to the principal's office.
2
As Sherlock explained to Watson, "Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however implausible, must be the truth." Today the impossible is that our so-called President is not a criminal, comprehends policy implications, cares about the future of our country or the well-being of the world, sees life as anything other than a zero-sum game, and has enough personal security not to need obsequious adulation from various members of the media, the GOP ("Guardians Of Privilege") and an assortment of celebrities, Playmates, and porn stars. And once we have the impossible out of the way, the possible implausible makes all the sense in the world.
2
Trump lying about things is more plausible than Trump being prescient.
He may have lucked out with his 2013 tweet on Scheiderman but that does not make him Nostradamus. Trump has tweeted nonsense and lies more often than he has been prescient in his tweets.
2
Mr. Payne, a fox business host on false and derogatory comments about Sen. McCain's POW imprisonment “Those reprehensible comments do not reflect how I feel or how this network feels about Senator McCain.”
Fox said on Friday that it would no longer book Mr. McInerney as a guest commentator. Fox doing the right thing?
Kelly Sadler despite her apology still has a job?
And the White House says nothing.
Rudy calling Avenatti a pimp?
What does Rudy call a man like himself that "introduces" women who will be later paid for their company to donald?
Kent State Redux is no longer unthinkable.
2
Everything is plausible indeed! #sigh
I think a book was already written about this stuff. I think it was called “1984.”
2
Trump has been the creep that he us since he was a child. No one said "no" then and no he us surrounded by paid for with your tax dollars enablers of his creepiness.
War is coming. Ready?
2
And I thought the world was crazy when Obama submarined the banking and energy sectors of our economy with rhetoric and regulation, outright lied to us about keeping our doctors and lowering costs in his signature Obamacare legislation, stoked racial tensions with riots occurring in Baltimore or Ferguson (which now seem to be a thing of the past), promoted welfare and food stamps over jobs, promoted illegal immigration across our southern border including a Presidential decree for amnesty and finally we ignored the fact that he clearly told the Russian President that he was lying to the American people because he had to win a pesky Presidential race and "could be more flexible after the election".
1
So who changed? Was Was Woody Harrelson ever that pious? Was Mike Pence ever that raucous? Where would thy hang out, and what would they do? Now there's an article.
Yes, it *is* eerily like an episode in the Twilight Zone, Maureen. The endings of those episodes could put their characters in some really uncomfortable positions... like the famous one, "To Serve Man", in which the alien bible turned out to be a cook book.
Trump supporters in the heartland have blind faith in his proclaimed ability to make America great again, as evidenced by Dan Balz's study of them in the Washington Post.
But some are getting cold feet, given that over thirty of Trump's servants have been sacrificed. And there's Trump's vituperation at Kirstjen Nielsen that indicates that Trump served her up to his staff. Some Trump followers are getting skeptical that Trump's tweets just might be recipes for disaster.
Evangelicals love of Trump, despite his adulterous episode and Cohen's attempt to cover it up with the seamy Russian-funded payoff that you mention, Maureen, might indicate that they'll be barbecued in hell. We need to translate what the sauce is.
Well, speaking of Jimmy Kimmel and Woody Harrelson, I was at New York Military Academy for summers at sports camp the years that Trump was there, Maureen. Go figure. I can tell you that it does shed light on our chef d'horreur.
I can't speak much for the food there, but rumor was that they put saltpeter in the milk. Evidently this did not deter Trump from is seamy escapades later on in life. Melania should have tried it on him.
3
Maureen Dowd should study the French revolution. She will see many corollaries. She can also identify characters that resemble some who acted like today's players act. The point Maureen is missing is this a revolution, politically, socially and culturally: It's all there. Hillary is Marie Antoinette, "Let them eat cake!," vis.a.vis, "What difference does it make?" It's the typical revolt against the elitists. The core of any revolution is the common man gets tired of paying for the idiosyncrasies of the elites. In Russia under the Czar it was a war, in the U.S. today it is unbridled expensive social programs. Whether or not ACA was effective or not, the American people polled 2 to 1 against, they still got it. Not getting into the weeds on immigration, during the election the debate was about amnesty; the people polled 2 to 1 against. The elites pushed globalism and concentrated wealth at the cost of the common people losing life long jobs. That's why Donald Trump got elected. So Maureen Dowd is correct, but for all the wrong reasons. There us significant political and emotional dislocation, but that is what happens in a revolution.
6
Arthur, so in your estimation, Trump is fighting for the rights of the common man? He's fighting for a more equitable distribution of wealth?
7
You can't be serious! This is all due to the fact that a self proclaimed christian country has too many social programs that help the needy and disabled?
1
A good share of Trump voters benefit from those social programs.
2
Say what you will about the relevance or the tabloid scent or the election-tilting irresponsibility of Maureen Dowd’s work, but reading her words is like eating candy. I wake up Sunday looking forward to it.
7
Leftists like Dowd having been cheering on moral decay for the last 30 years with their "it depends on what the meaning of is is" logic, libsplaining that oral sex is not really sex and lecturing us that what elected officals do in their private lives doesn't matter, as long as they do their job. They have created the world they wanted and now complain about what we told them was going to happen while accusing us on the Right of promoting the "shithole" world that they have us live in. Sorry sister, we're not here to refill in the hole you dug, continue on your misguided path while the swill of your actions curl around you as you sink into your own foul smelling cesspool.
5
No. You are digging it deeper.
1
Oooh, the paper sharks are out today! What a nest of laughably self righteous ninnies. To be a "leftist" today you have to be a member of what is actually the majority of actual people living in the US.
3
I don’t want to live in a country where it is plausible for a proven racist rife with NARCISSISTIC PERSONAILTY DISORDER is Commander in Chief of great young warriors who of course would never include his children. It should not be plausible in the U.S.A. That we do nothing about our arch enemy Russia meddling in our election so successfully we ended up with a Dotard old man in the Oval Office. I pray it is plausible that the non racist whites outnumber the insecure racist ones and that minorities finally work together and stop being Crabs fighting each other in a bucket divided by their kings the white folks. Put together the intelligent non racist whites with youth, non racist women, Asians, African Americans and Latinos and voila you have America I fought for back on the rails. I pray for that plausibility.
18
The news of Vanessa Trump’s previous gig as a Latin Kings moll must be driving Trump batty. I LOVE it. I rarely laugh these days but that story had me rolling.
12
When I was in highschool I believed in the Illuminate (was obsessed w/the pyramid on $$) and Ice Cube had never been in a movie. This article sounds just like something I would have yammered on & on about, while stoned, and discussing conspiracy theories.
But…this is real. And everything you wrote is true.
Life, in the US, is incredulously insane in the membrane!
2
It's the revenge of the Carnivalesque . From Wikipedia:
Mikhail Bakhtin's four categories of the carnivalesque sense of the world:
Familiar and free interaction between people: carnival often brought the unlikeliest of people together and encouraged the interaction and free expression of themselves in unity.
Eccentric behaviour: unacceptable behaviour is welcomed and accepted in carnival, and one's natural behaviour can be revealed without the consequences.
Carnivalistic misalliances: familiar and free format of carnival allows everything that may normally be separated to reunite — Heaven and Hell, the young and the old, etc.
Sacrilegious: Bakhtin believed that carnival allowed for Sacrilegious events to occur without the need for punishment. Bakhtin believed that these kinds of categories are creative theatrical expressions of manifested life experiences in the form of sensual ritualistic performances.
We are inside the circus tent!
2
Hey Maureen, you forgot the one about an in power White House administration with it's weaponized FBI spying on an incoming one. I mean, you just can't make that stuff up, right?
4
Sorry, but you haven't identified the real weapon. The ex-KGB colonel and his cronies "weaponized" the occupant at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue! Putin is about the only man in the world that receives nothing but fawning praise from our leader. Didn't the fact that the first thing the incoming administration wants to do is call the Russian ambassador and open a back-channel for discussion make you scratch your head and wonder what is going on? Covert surveillance activities of foreign entities is part of the FBI's job along with the intelligence agencies. Is it really a revelation that our government was monitoring Russians, and people talking to them were swept up in this surveillance? Maybe Roy Cohen should have sent the FBI, NSA and CIA a cease and desist letter when this "spying" was uncovered?
2
Apparently you can, Gary.
2
Maureen, you have dropped more names than were hacked from Equifax.
2
What no mention of Scott Pruitt, the sleaziest Cabinet member ever? Or Trump being played by Putin even as he heads to Singapore....
5
She mentioned Pruitt. Did you read the column?
The swamp just devours then regurgitates it's creatures into something more foul. Who'd a thunk that a president would be brought down covering up an incredibly stupid and inept burglary into the rival party's headquarters. And I can still remember where I was when it was speculated that a Bill Clinton's denials of having sex with "that woman" hinged on his narrow definition of sex. "No! It couldn't be true!" I thought. But indeed it was. After those bits of stupidity and mendacity, and others, nothing will surprise me -- even the unveiling of the "pee tape" -- it's just a matter of time now.
5
Maureem Dowd seems to be stuck in a rut regarding her prose. She and the rest of the left cannot ever say anything good about President Trump.
The Economy is great, for instance.
Unemployment is way down.
The President will meet with Kim Jong Un.
Etc.
4
Economy: thanks President Obama
Unemployment: thanks President Obama
The president will meet with Kim Jong Un: stay tuned. Hahaha
2
Maybe the smart people who said that Trump was unfit were right, huh. Maybe even a few thought that the maelstrom Trump has caused would be this bad. They would be in the minority. Nothing is gained by playing Trump's filthy game of hatred and vileness. In fact, further damage is done. Such is the case with Philippe Reine's tweet. Yes, Trump is loathsome and unfit, but that tweet was, at best, ill-advised, at worst, gratuitously cruel. Lay with dogs and get fleas.
4
Our Minnesota Senator Amy Klobechar. I like her and she is down to earth. We have some real people out here, you should check them out.
5
Nailed it, Mo!
1
At the rate our country is going there is no need to worry about immigration. Even the illegals will stop coming
8
Perhaps if the NY Times and its opinion writers turned down the heat on their rhetoric, which is in the end, just virtue signaling among themselves and their chorus, Trump might not feel so completely embattled. You back a man into a corner, you should not be surprised if he fights back. You should not be surprised by his contempt.
He won. You lost. Don't overlook this fact.
Stop with the fake news and the baseless speculation. Do your job: go get some actual facts, and then file a report. No one needs to hear from you until then. No one needs this incessant, vindictive, petty badgering of everything irrelevant.
And what is it all for? Hillary? Give me a break.
Accept the vote, and you'll feel a whole lot better. Just as Obama argued against prosecuting the torturers, which the NY Times never protested, it's time to look forward, not back.
5
God know what happened to poor Stephen Miller in H.S.
7
The sanctimony is thick, both in this piece and the comments. But that's normal around here. The truth is that Trump exposes the ugliness of our entitled Western world and you can't take it. He holds up the mirror. You live in an empire, you reap its riches everyday. The house, the car, the food, the clothes, the electronic doodads that you're addicted to. Where do you think it all comes from? Is any of it bloodless? How do any of you think empires are built and maintained? The NY Times and its readership are nothing but whited sepulchres.
2
I, too, have a few observations about ‘implausibles’ as it relates to your opinion pieces. Your first editorial after the election examined the thoughts of your brother; it at least acknowledged that a significant (if not majority) part of America was ready for an honest, and blunt approach to this country’s disastrous march toward a socialist, borderless economic disaster. Trump told us what he planned to do about it, and yet you act surprised that he is actually keeping the promises he made to the people who elected him. That includes strengthening our border, revitalizing our economy, overhauling an out of control entitlement mess, including CHIP, and inspiring pride in America again.
You have been fair to Trump along the way in general, but now you obviously feel compelled to write lockstep with Krugman, Blow and all the hysterical NYT haters who can find not a single silver lining in the economy, a potential North Korea disarmament, stock market records, improved international relations across the globe, and more. That you stoop to personal ad hominem innuendos about just about anyone associated with Trump probably earns you props with your department colleagues, it is disappointing nonetheless.
Like the last election, I predict that you will again get your comeuppance in November. That all of the unreliable polls that predicted Hillary the last time are now projecting a wave of Democrat victories should give you pause about lowering your tone even further.
3
And ....swamps are exciting ecosystems teaming with life and vegetation.
Draining them would destroy and kill all of that. The Horror. The Horror.
2
>
“the world may sin, but not its emperor.”
Maximus, from a Dryden play
1
What was a presumably nice girl like Hope Hicks doing in a place like this? Apparently, she finally saw the light, and it was very dark.
2
Probably the most important week of Donald Trump's presidency and you write about this silly stuff? Sad.
3
And still no acknowledgement that your entertaining hounding of Hillary contributed this mess. The Clintons - especially Bill - had some faults but they aren’t in the Trump League. You didn’t weigh the difference properly in time. After the fact is entrrtainment; before is Pulitzer journalism.
7
I like it-- Rikki Tikki Avenatti!
4
I shook my head when Maureen Dowd wrote one pulverizing article after another attacking Hillary on almost personal terms while flirting with endorsing Trump
That’s when I knew anything was plausible
13
"Trump’s renovation of the Wollman Rink is nothing compared with his breathtaking expansion of the capital swamp. He has ushered in a bold new breed of swamp creatures, from Scott Pruitt to Ryan Zinke to Steve Mnuchin to the incomparable Michael “I’m Crushing It” Cohen."
Maureen,
Pls run this quote by your brother and find out if he's still overjoyed by so much winning.
And if he is, pls spare us his coming Thanksgiving column.
4
Nice one Mo.
Stay away from Trump’s highly successful North Korea strategy and bash him with trivialities.
2
You don't really think that Trump didn't know anything about the money and that Cohen was simply cashing in personally -- let's get real Maureen -- This is how Trump has always run his businesses -- stealing -- a true crook and thug.
I am surprised (but not really) to read about his take down of Schneiderman (although, it seems that he should have been taken down a long time ago)...We can only hope that Donald Trump's takedown will be spectacular.
I often wonder how your petulant brother Kevin feels about this thug-in-chief and, if he, like many other people who voted for Trump spends every day wishing that Hillary Clinton was our President. Clearly, she was the only choice (which was obvious during the campaign), but it seems bitter, easily propagandized people couldn't get past the fact that she had so many e-mails on her private server -- silly and ignorant is all I can say now -- way beyond deplorable.
7
Sorry: Forgot to put this in.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Cube
I would give half of Jeff Bezo's net worth to see Maureen as White House Press Secretary.
2
I stopped watching reality TV after (not because of) the first season of Survivor. I stopped watching all TV 10 years ago. I killed my FB the year photo tagging was invented. I killed my Twitter years before Trump declared his candidacy. I've been a mild evangelist for these actions right along, but I do realize most of you don't care. You're all addicts selling your most personal data for a clue as to what a distant acquaintance is having for dinner on her vacation. I'm 37 years old, and no kind of luddite, but I feel I'm the only one living in the real world. You're all inhabiting a contrived universe. It matters little whether it was contrived by Zuck or Putie; it's not the one created by The Creator. If you have social media, if you watch entertainment TV, you fertilized this swamp with your own excrement.
3
Trump is a reflection of us. Those of us who are racist, greedy, misogynistic, and xenophobic.
6
As long as the MSM doesn't do its job and merely reports the depravities of this administration, then the TRUE crimes, like congressional collusion with Russian oligarchs, will go unreported.
3
Avenatti, is not a mongoose, he is a African Honey Badger. He is little, he is unknown. there is no single bravado in Animal kingdom, would like to tackle or even engage with Honey badger.
Avenatti is a honey badger.
Food for thought.
1
A Trojan horse is unfolding before our eyes in North Korea. As Trump could not read through mythology, he and cronies only understand Trojan in the context condoms and they are even against those products! Echoes of History repeating itself...peace in our time..Chamberlain and Hitler....Were both nominated for the Nobel Peace prize...See nobelprize.org..meant to be a joke at the time but Hitler was nominated...so Maureen...nothing ventured..nothing gained.
1
Surreal? Just wait. The meeting between Trump and Kim will move the surreal needle into uncharted territory. Maybe Kanye West and Dennis Rodman will be invited to attend as dragon energy advisors?
The election of Trump allowed America to shed its pretentious mantle of self-righteousness and look what emerged! Corruption, influence peddling, neo-nazi’s, neocons,twisted evangelicals and porn stars! Trump sold America just what it wanted, a false sense of exceptionalism.
Trump’s supporters should enjoy the moment, it’s not going to last long. Even if a war doesn’t break out soon, expect the ballooning budget deficit to derail the economy. In the meantime enjoy the show!
4
Maureen, you are the originator (at least in the Paper of Record) of such false equivalence, What might have happened had you given more print to Hillary’s policies than her (perceived) social faux pas?
7
Yes Dowd Everything is plausible.
Another good one I wish this Dowd was around when trump was running for Presidency and Her was on the attack mode on Madame Hill.
Good Weiner is gone, but Spitzer needs to be back and run again and why not ?
One Good thing is that Maxine Waters is around and she may not be silenced.
Melania the First Lady could not stop her husband so she continues to borrow lines from the previous First Lady Michelle, that is plausible as well.
Harrelson and Mike Pence were pals in college ?
Hard to believe they were pals , Woody and Pence the devil ?
3
Amazing! Words, words , words....while all this passing time...We are under
"Presidential" Leadership of a clearly diagnosable Sociopathic Personality Disorder. Apparently....under such obvious Misdirection from our White House and the apparent complicity of his entire Entourage, we, the People,
have no choice but to simply acquiesce to this chronic American Farce.
No Bless a Blige.
1
Yes, Ms. Dowd, we can no longer be incredulous about the depravities and absurdities coming from the White House.
Pray tell, in retrospect, does respecting a law professor president really seem so beneath you? What about respecting a politically ambitious woman?
4
wow, The insiders are getting very angry, However, I am still laughing at the Nobel Peace Prize handed to the last President the owners chose, enlisting a Senator Zero as his foil. The real disgrace is he, Obama accepted it. That is a shameful lack of decency. Trump is a man that made money in a crime infested City owned and operated by the left. He is operating the same way in the belly of the beast. Anger is not good for you. calm down.
1
Maureen:
A lowly entrepreneur specialized in money laundering and stifling people, the purest of the conman, run on a "law and order platform", chanting lock her up. And won. You chanted too.
Misogyny and a deep hidden resentment has made everything plausible. And you lend a hand. What is the surprise now?
5
"You can't make this up." Don't have to, now that we have DJT. His base, ever loyal won't even blink a blindered eye.
3
And the saddest thing is, formally respectable news outlets like the NY Times report this salacious garbage, day after day, because it sells newspapers. Hillary and Donald are the gifts that keep on giving. Why would a competent person want to run for president when, instead of their proposals being discussed by the media, it's more likely every little piece of scuttlebutt will be breathlessly splashed across the front page 24/7?
2
Maureen,
You are a jewel. Your columns keep the libs focused on inane personality issues, while President Trump changes the country. The 2018 election for the Dems will be "Stormy", Russia and other fabricated "issues" which will be rightly ignored by the majority of Americans who care about national security, the economy and traditional values.
Keep up the good work!!
Hey Mo no mention of the dossier paid for by Hillary? How about the corrupt politically motivated Jim Comey? Maxine Waters, perhaps the dumbest human being to ever hold office? Clinton Foundation?
The best part of the Trump presidency is exposing the truth about the media and the DC swamp. You folks living in the liberal echo chamber don't get it, will never get it. Trump has done more than the past two presidents put together. Happy mothers day!
2
When a fat, spoiled little brat goes sugar high at a party, you'll do or say anything to have him just behave for two seconds. Welcome to the Trump presidency.
4
Sometimes, doesn’t it seem like the ruling class is purposely trying to keep as much of the citizenry ignorant and stupid? It makes them easier to manipulate. That stuff could happen. Just look at some of things people are saying and believing in social media.
4
Every day, sometimes hourly, the slime oozes out of the muck from the White House, a strangely orange color with clumps of funny hair, and infects anew Our American Life. Each day more and more people are infected by the ooze and, seemingly, rendered mute and helpless, by it's onslaught.
If the ooze isn't brought under control by November 6, 2018 then I fear that the once implausible reality of America turning into Trumplandia will arrive.
When 700 families are torn apart at our border as they ask for legal asylum (not entering illegally), then I know we are on the road to an era of American Fascism with Mr. Toady Trump and his illness ready to consume us all.
The ooze must be stopped. Don't snooze - vote and stop the ooze! Vote every immoral Republican out of office in November.
Because our lives depend upon it. America and our freedom depend upon it.
7
Look who runs Black Cube. Bibi Boys all, I'll be bound.
And this outfit was hired by "Trump aides"? Bet I can guess who.
2
Thanks Maureen!
1
"Stormy Daniels’s mongoose of a lawyer, Michael Avenatti,..." worth reading this piece just for this line. LOL. The rest - nauseatingly disturbing - AGAIN!.
Dowd is as much to blame for the "plausibility" of this current state of "affairs" as anyone else involved. Her own hypocrisy is just as plausible.
8
Sure, Mo.
And another newspaper, the NYT, couldn’t help itself and ran front page after front page dominated by stories of Donnie Dotard’s repulsive antics, with a heaping helping of your unabashed hatred of Clinton.
5
Why, Ms. Dowd, are you so offended by the tenor of a presidential administration that you cheer-led from the sidelines in 2015-2016? Or don’t you recall your “push ‘em back, push ‘em back—waaaaay back” bleatings? I think many of us do.
We “follow” this presidency that has etherized us for 16 months and you’re surprised?
I recall a Twilight Zone episode where a traveling salesman got lost one night on his way home and ended up at a creepy mansion. He regaled his strange host with tales of his wife and children. He retired.
In the morning, the owner, smiling, told him that he had anesthetized him and amputated his legs during the night, so eager was he to hear more stories about his guest’s family—a wife and children he would never see again.
Donald Trump is the mansion’s host; America is the guest that lost its way.
8
There are now only two reference points for moral turpitude--before and after Schneiderman. All else is extra calendrical. I think Maureen is out of date.
The Observer, another British paper, broke the news that Trump aides hired an Israeli private intelligence agency to run a “dirty ops” campaign against Obama administration officials who had helped negotiate the Iran nuclear deal, including Ben Rhodes, Barack Obama’s national security adviser.
Ever since Trump nixed the Iran Deal Israel has been on what appears to be a murderous rampage. Why isn't the Times covering this above the virtual fold? The cover of Der Spiegel has Trump's America literally giving the EU 'the finger'. America is circling the drain with this administration. Are tax cuts for the wealthiest really worth it? Only your dedicated team of accountants and tax attorneys know for sure.
6
"...former Hillary capo..."?? Really, Mo? The ultimate false equivocation - Hillary and tRump but you just can't help yourself can you? Pathetic.
6
"He made up a job selling access to a White House where he could not even get a job."
What's the value of "bagman-fixer" if employed in the White House? Zip.
The usefulness of having a bagman is to have him operate in the shadows...with shadowy people...on shadowy and stinky deals.
5
"...EXCLUSIVE: Steve Bannon was target of bribery plot by top Qatari who invested in Ice Cube's basketball league to get to Trump's strategist and boasted 'Mike Flynn took our money', rapper claims in court..."
When, in the eight doleful years of the stagnant and oh-so-humorless years of The Obama Depression did a headline like this put an ear-to-ear grin on your face? It never happened.
Trump has put the fun back in politics.
The dreary rantings of Colbert, Kimmel, the hacks at SNL and even the MoDo we grew to love during MonicaGate ('Monica Lewinski, Policy Advisor') have all turned into angry propagandists yelling predictable, trite Political Correctness at the tops of their lungs.
Dullness.
But us Deplorables have wall-to-wall laughter watching you highly-educated Snowflakes go completely non-linear with every new anonymously sourced Smoking Gun. The fun never stops for us.
And it's going to get better. After an energized El Donaldo's fall round of full football-stadium speeches gets us 60 seats in the Senate, a much more likely scenario than a ridiculous 'Blue Wave' that has Texas flipping Democrat, we'll get to enjoy the swearing-in of our newest Supreme Court Justice...Rush Limbaugh.
2
"We have crossed into a surreal dimension." Who's the "we"? The mother of all "implausibles", of course, was that Trump won. Then liberal America, in one fell swoop, completely lost it. Trump derangement syndrome became full blown. Trump has become his own singularity: everything flows from him, and towards him. Best to move on, Maureen. Isn't there a royal wedding coming soon?
1
This is way too much to absorb on a normal Sunday, let alone on Mother's Day; a day that is supposed to be of loving Hallmark memories of all that is good and pure. Its kind of like watching a split TV screen with "It's a Wonderful Life" on one side and "Apocalypse Now" on the other. No, I take it back. "Apocalypse Now" had a thread of logic in there somewhere.
4
And we thought Nixon was bad! Ha. The levels of depravity at Trump palace make those boys look mild and meek. No human kindness, no human decency, no respect for the office, no respect for tradition, no respect for heroes...We must not accept this as normal. Fight against it and resist.
17
And yet through all this, we still see Trump supporters at his rallies. What a small people we Americans have become.
16
Hillary was right all along. The deplorables elected the worst and dumbest president in the history of the republic.
13
This doesn't feel like the America I grew up in. Maybe it is and I was well sheltered. It is not the America I want my grandchildren to grow up in.
22
What is it about liberty, prosperity, security, patriotism, meaning, and fulfillment you don't like?
I really wouldn't concern myself with the "new breed of swamp creatures". Apparently their life cycle is shorter than Kim Jong Un's, fingers, (as per Trump's revolutionary system of measurement).
Is the Big Guy a cheeseburger eating scatter gram or a clever misdirection artist deflecting anyone person or group from his malfeasance in managing government affairs.
9
The Big Guy is a VERY clever misdirection artist.
He is also going to turn out to be one of the best Presidents America has ever had. He will probably be the first and last of his kind because he has changed
the Presidency forever. There will be no going
back to any style of Presidency that existed
through Obama.
1
There is a quote attributed to Mark Twain "Truth is stranger than fiction because fiction has to be believable". Unfortunately today neither has to be believable.
21
Of all these scandals, the most morally reprehensible is the refusal to apologize for mocking Senator McCain's illness.
First off, the moral conviction McCain holds about torture should be a lesson for the ages, outliving any single lifetime.
Secondly, it is contemptible for the White House not to apologize to John McCain and his family for the demaining remarks, regardless of which individual spoke them.
Third, Sanders' response was beyond offensive - that she would not dignify a 'leak,' not that a White House staffer had assaulted someone's human dignity. Sick priorities.
Whatever one thinks of McCain's political record, he is a respectable person. That's more than can be said for Trump and his inner circle.
277
Why does there have to be a "most reprehensible "?
And that NYTimes gives this comment a "gold star" highlights one of the main problems, media thrives in this garbage.
The central strain is money...
...from lawyers, to greedy narcissistic Trumps (and those like him), to media, to politicians...money.
And what Russia is doing is simply taking advantage of it.
As Mr. McCain says in his new book, Russia is fighting a war against the West and America by taking advantage of how a classless press feeds off the binary approach to American politics.
All those players I mention above are feeding off the cleavage.
WE have to get back to holding them accountable.
When we do, Russia doesn't have a prayer.
8
Agree, being no fan of McCain's politics, the attacks on the torture victim from Republicans in particular, as he's dying from cancer, are despicable. That Huckabee Sanders whines about leaks as her people attack the dying McCain only proves what she represents and who she speaks for, those bankrupt of humanity.
39
Tom Tomorrow is a welcome breath of sanity every week for me. Here's the latest on Sarah H. Sanders:
https://thismodernworld.com
Here's more on the cartoonist:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Tomorrow
NM, you speak truth to power -- to the powerful -- powerful derisive and denigrating idiots as they are. True, whatever one's final judgment is on the life of John McCain, it is truly sickening to contemplate what the Trump "administration" has said about him.
Trump's callous disregard for the lives of others is readily apparent every day. What he says reflects his thoughts, and his thoughts are precursors to his actions. We should vigilantly be listening to and analyzing what comes out of Trump's mouth all the time, because it all matters -- now -- and for the historical record.
We can't learn enough from this terrible mistake of a presidency.
24
Thanks to Michael Avenatti, everyone writes and talks about the deposits made to the slush fund at Republic Bank that Michael Cohen owned and controlled under the name Essential Consultants LLC. Over 4 million dollars passed through that account.
No one to date has talked about the withdrawals from that account.
Did Michael Cohen keep that money? Were any payments made to others? Who?
Special counsel Mueller has the bank accounts of Michael Cohen and Essential Consultants LLC, and he knows who received payments from Essential Consultants LLC. He knows who got paid.
Everyone also remembers how Trump behaved when he was in the real estate business in New York. Brokers in the real estate business are used to splitting commissions or otherwise.
Is it fair to wonder whether if Trump or anyone in his organization acting on his behalf knew about Cohen’s slush fund, wouldn’t you expect that Trump or the people who worked for him would expect a piece of the action?
Just wondering.
18
Michael Cohen "made up a job selling access to a White House where he could not even get a job."
Originally I thought that was pathetic but funny. Now I think it was not so much that he could not get a job in the White House but that he was taking in so much money between election day and the date of the Inauguration that he--and Trump?--realized it did not make sense to give up millions of dollars just to say he worked in the White House. As Deep Throat reminded us: "Follow the money."
31
It makes a sane person want to scream. Go right ahead. Then fight back and, come November, get thee to a voting booth where the madness can be tamed and shamed.
43
Well, the rotting carcass certainly stinks badly, and we are awakening to the truth about the sorry state of our country's supposed leaders. Cheney crawls out of his crypt; torturers are questioned under oath; Trump's pathetic louche behavior matches his avarice and fraud; a crime is disclosed, committed by a prestigious attorney general. It is all good, even if it makes us more than mildly nauseous. It is much better that the truth emerges. Perhaps some of the criminals of our age will be prosecuted for their crimes (Cheney). As for Kanye, well, he seems in need of psychiatric intervention. It would be far worse if all the rot were still there and we did not know it. We can change this. We are not dead yet.
25
Maureen, you've set the bar of plausibility at a level where even I have an insight to contribute.
Within this revolting saga, there are at least two undercover heroes carrying on a fight to save America and the world.
First there's Melania. The once-implausible truth is that she didn't marry Donald Trump because she was a gold-digger with a high tolerance for flabby over-the-hill sugar daddies, but because she was on a mission to place herself where she could one day counter Trump's evil machinations with a Be Best plan. Her smile was destined to tip the balance against his scowl.
Then there's Rudolph Giuliani. The truth here is that he nobly concealed his decency years ago and went under deep cover so that he could emerge now as a spokesman for Trump and get the truth out under the boss's very nose, cleverly making it seem accidental or weirdly protective. Even inviting ridicule is not too high a price for Rudy to pay in the line of patriotic duty.
How, you will ask, could anyone have foreseen the need for such long-range planning? By watching the Back to the Future movies. It had often been noted that Donald Trump could be the model for the dim-witted bully Biff Tannen, who soars to the pinnacle of power in one of the films' alternate worlds, and in 2015 it was confirmed by the screenwriter Bob Gale: Biff was Donald all along. The forces of Good must have been in on the secret.
If Doc can't get us all back to reality this time, let us hope agents Mel and Rudy can.
4
Melania is nothing but a copiest! Her mood operandi is drag out Michelles' unfinished initiatives and cut and paste her name on it as her own. How much more money has she negotiated for her starring roll in this charade?
That is what it is all about.
4
Barbara, thanks for your reply.
My insights are not at all reliable, but I hope this one was at least entertaining. Please take it for what it's worth, which is probably not more than a single "Ha".
This good recitation is why much of the world considers "American culture" to be an oxymoron.
18
Perfectly and succinctly said. It is astounding, the level to which our unmoored, reality-disconnected country has sunk. It's not just politics and scandal. It is rampant, blaring, self-serving consumerism posing as success and manifest destiny.
1
To make matters worse, the rabbit holes in the White House lawn have gone out of business, costing countless jobs. They simply couldn't compete with the bizarro surreality of All Trump All the Time.
4
What is the term "American values" supposed to mean? Today, it's a euphemism for AR-15 ownership, racism, xenophobia, hypocrisy, abandonment of moral compass... The astounding number of Americans, especially the GOP Congress, who don't hold Trump accountable for his serial lying and kleptocracy is astounding.
32
You just described my family members that no loner speak to me because I don't support idiots that occupy the White House!
2
Stopping trump is a national emergency. You're going to need to leave the guns out of it for one or two election cycles, or you're goingto lose again. The survival of tens of thousands depends on gun control, the survival of The United States Of America depends on trump control.
When trump was elected, I joked that I could hear the dinner bell at the pig trough. It doesn't seem very funny now.
22
What is implausible is the seepage of sewage into the White House; into our daily lives; into our history and into the very foundation of this nation. It is out and like it or not, it is real. We can hold our noses and make disgusted gestures or we can clean it up.
20
American's as well as rest of the world wondering why Trump is so malevolent and breaks the things , degrades everything with his existence.
I am not surprized , it was already foretold read.......
"The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men"
Tyranny of evil men......
Food for thought.
8
Mark Twain once said, "No matter how healthy a man's morals may be when he enters the White House, he comes out again with a pot-marked soul"
So what would Twain have said about a man who enters the White House with no morals combined with a "pot marked soul" to begin with?.
17
They'd call him Bill Clinton.
Perhaps you mean 'pock-marked'?
p.
Please don't imply, Ms. Dowd, that all of this has suddenly struck you like a bolt out of the blue... pardon, red. That what we're experiencing now is the "new normal" that many folks have been talking about and dreading as the horrid truth for well over a year.
14
In the anarchic Orwellian tawdry chaos that is Trumpworld where Reality TV and what we now vaguely remember as the reality that was "once upon a time" called "no drama Obama" were totally and safely separate. Now, as you note, it's hard to tell one from the other. The thin veneer of the civilized (aka P.C.) world has been ripped away by a hulking, mean-spirited narcissist opening a Pandora's box of bigotry, callousness, cruelty, degradation, depravity, greed, gluttony, infidelity, lying, and misogyny. We can only hope that still hiding at the bottom are "hope" and "truth."
18
Unfortunately, it's becoming more apparent that there is no bottom.
1
Why does all of the best writing about present times read a bit like Dickens? Thank you, Ms. Dowd.
5
Follow the Trump connection to setting up Schneiderman- way too coincidental and convenient. Amazing that Cheney is still alive- a cause for celebration when he’s dead- evil somehow lives forever.
6
This is a brilliant column that makes exotic yet utterly on-the-mark connections in the surreal Trumpean reality we now inhabit. I agree with Ms. Dowd that everything is plausible. But even worse, anything is possible.
4
Human nature is the same across different countries and continents . Humans are ridiculous creatures in the USA , Russia and everywhere . Recently I saw a picture called " The Death of Stalin " . The picture presented what is known about the death of the Soviet dictator in a very factual manner . But it presented it as a farce . The same could be done in the future about Trump`s presidency . Is it a farce or a factual account of the facts ? . In the future would people believe that we elected such a ridiculous man as President ? . Do not worry about the solid base that support Trump . They are the " deplorables " . The important thing is that the majority of the Country abhors this man . There is nothing wrong with America . There is everything wrong with a tiny sliver of the our population . The same thing happens in every country on Earth .
4
Finally someone has aptly described Gina Haspel ... "the evidence destroying torture queen" . Thank you for that decisive description ! This beating around the bush and acting like maybe it's ok for the United States to have someone so intrinsically involved with torture as the head of the CIA is incredible, scary and sometimes just infuriating.
12
"Evidence destroying" moniker belongs to Hillary Clinton.
The videos Gina Haspel destroyed were clearly evidence of obscene, brutal,humiliating and inhumane torture carried out in the name of the United States.
Can you tell me what was the evidence that Hillary Clinton destroyed ?Also what exactly it was evidence of?
Thank you.
John
1
Please make it stop. Impeach him, indict him, de-twitter him. Do whatever it takes to help us get back to normal. Oh, but wait, if he is impeached, we get Mike Pence, "the worst person in government" according to that dyed in the wool conservative George Will. I just don't see any light at the end of this tunnel. Just who is the adult in this room that will lead us out of this mess?
18
Why is any of this surprising? There's crazier stuff in the Bible, Homer and the Greek tragedians.
2
To paraphrase Ice Cube:
Trump is what AmeriKKKa’s most Wanted,
The spelling signifies the political lean, painting a picture of the degenerate America being experienced at this time.
1
Nearly got me this time.
1
Some of us have brains that are not, nor have been, scrambled. Some of us saw this freak show coming, long, long ago. Some of us tried to slow down or stop the obvious, oncoming catastrophe.
Unfortunately, some other people choose the selfish, spiteful option, for their own reasons. Be Best, Ms.Dowd, Be Best.
15
the last line should have ended with question mark. n,est ce pas?
I think I read that Billy Joel’s great song “Uptown Girl” was inspired by his romance with Christie Brinkley, but sounds like it could have been about Vanessa King’s dalliance with “Latin King” Valentin Rivera. One big difference between Trump Jr. and Rivera is that unlike Rivera, Don Jr. has so far been able to avoid jail time for his criminal activities in real estate and Russian collusion. I hope that ends soon.
6
Have you ever seen how beautifully grass grows where there’s been a forest fire? Maybe we can remake the whole nation.
5
The truly frightening thing, the thing that literally wakes me up nights, is the realization that not a single Trump supporter I know, and unfortunately I know many, has expressed the least misgiving, the least discomfort in the direction of events. In fact, quite the contrary, they're elated by "the greatest president in American history". I am resigned to the fact that Mueller's findings will not matter, and that, barring a catastrophe, Trump will be re-elected. Trump's strutting immorality, corruption, and crassness have all been thoroughly compartmentalized, and there is a herculean effort on the part of many, especially on the right, to normalize this absurd situation. Tragically, those efforts appear to be succeeding. Numbness is setting in, there is simply too much to process. As Bannon stated, the strategy is to "flood the zone with BS". It's "The Big Lie" - too outrageous to actually be a lie, so it must be true - the "deep state", media the "enemy of the people", and the real winner, "crooked Hillary". If nothing changes in November, we're toast. All of us.
15
This week's column was spot on, Trump's just a cumulative product of our corrupt post Eisenhower world starting with JFK's assassination through to today with the only real moral turn being Jimmy Carter's short tenure. He even had to fight Trump-like Republican trolls who turned his presidency into a Monty Python skit about killer rabbits and Carter paddling away.
We've been a bitter and twisted culture for decades, maybe we should drop the phony exceptionalism schtick except where it's true- we are exceptional pretenders no better than anyone else and often much worse and our leadership reflects rather than leads our society.
159
EC: After reading your up front comment, I found myself reflecting back 40 years ago to the 1970's and a conversation with a fellow worker who had just returned from two years of overseas work. I was struck by his comment that many people from Europe thought of him as "the ugly American." Is history repeating itself? Are we once again "ugly Americans?"
16
... and another real moral turn being Obama's, albeit obstructed, 8 year tenure
18
Every day I am reminded of "Lord of the Flies," when the sub surfaces and the adults enter to save the children. But when the children of Trump make their exit, soon enough, Golding's central question remains: who will be there to save the adults?
8
Hopefully people with a certain level of academic achievement and success will accept the result of the last presidential election. They can even try to replace the current president with someone they like better by winning the 2020 election. It is this group of disappointed technocrats and fans of technocrats who are the problem, and their journey back from being enemies of the U.S. constitution to working within the constitution is something that I hope starts now.
1
Maureen, while you were rolling your eyes, you were a very willing party to being hacked, deftly or not.
29
Very simply, Mo, Trump represents most of our citizens. The United States lost it's soul a long time ago. Plausible....more like undeniable. It's all in the open now.
10
don represents the majority vote of the electoral college, not the majority of citizens who voted.
8
True....but his support seems to be stronger than ever and it is either A. Money B. Racism C. Poor white me they are taking my jobs while I sit on the couch and watch Fox News all day long. D. The economy which is basically handing money over to the corporations, banks and rich of this nation while the poor, environment, disadvantaged, women rights suffer. No one seems to really care any more. Scandal after scandal and we just move on.
I would have thought that Maureen Dowd would have written, this week, about the WH aide, Kelley Sandler's "joke" that Senator John McCain is "dying anyway". I bet that instructions that there should be no apology whatsoever by anyone in the WH came directly from Trump itself. A direct result of Trump being told to stay away from the Senator's funeral.
Likewise, I am sure that Trump's decision to renege from the Iran deal, against all advice, was a direct consequence of his being mocked so mercilessly by President Obama at the WH press corps dinner. Trump just cannot stand being scorned.
28
As the Bard wrote "...what fools these mortals be".
I see it in my own family! The absurd is becoming the new normal. Once peace loving, hard working, well educated relatives are now entertaining thoughts of packing a weapon, cheering on DJ's insanity, and championing the tax cuts which will one day do them in. This after only a year and one half. It is as if Trump has unleashed a fever infecting normally sane people, provoking them into horrific, or at least more extreme behavior. They are dominated by their demons, not their angels.
Your own Brooks and Stephens are slowly morphing into the same, by tacitly approving of Trump's policies. They cannot say the ends justify the means when the price one has to pay is an end to civility, intellectualism, science, social norms, and our coveted institutions. Any approval of this menace (DJ) means they are complicit. It also fuels the notion that perhaps this is OK. It's not OK!
Maureen, please keep the heat on and don't revert back to your former self.
28
Sadly, this all seems like a logical progression. The Bush administration's use of 9/11 to propagandize our way into war in Iraq, the 70% of Americans polled at the time supporting the attack. Obama's ready use of drones for hundreds of targeted assassinations and the ready shrug by most on the American left regarding such war crimes. The financial collapse of 2008, precipitated on a corrupt financial system and the greedy mavins of Wall Street finance. The racism, the police violence waged upon African American males. The mass shootings and the insane gun culture. Trump and his corrupt minions seem to be some kind of logical progression from the last 18 years of insanity...hard to see how the USA will work it's way out of this mess. Maybe it is indeed time for a revolution.
10
I for one am thankful that I can usually afford a fifth of decent Islay Single Malt, but am a bit alarmed at my consumption during the last 18 months. And it doesn’t show any signs of abating any time soon. I honestly can not accept the crassness, vulgarity, and plain idiocy that assaults us on a daily basis from this circus we call the Trump Administration. I hear that the economy of Scotland is doing well of recent and that the distilleries are sound. Perhaps my Scottish ancestors knew something important.
14
I used to think that every day in the Trump White House was "Take Your Daughter to Work Day" but now I see that it is also always "Opposite Day." Melania says "Be Best" (no the?) while the smiling blond haired guy in the red necktie standing behind her says, "Are there no work houses?"
Meanwhile, a Novartis paid Cohen $1.2 million for work he can't perform. To think, Stormy Daniels only got paid $130,000 for work Trump/Cohen claim she never performed either. She should have approached Novartis.
21
It seems to me that Americans are having to face the sad truth that the republic does not work. You might have been better with a parliamentary system of government.
Its clear that the so called "checks and balances" don't work. You have no laws about ethics and influence peddling. The President is profiting off his office, as if it were another one of his fraudulent scams. The government and elections are awash in money and corruption. There seems to be no method of removing anyone who is negligent, incompetent and corrupt from office . There are no qualifications required of anyone, even appointees to the federal judiciary. Where are the values of your democracy when cruelty is inflicted on children? What do you stand for?
The appearance of normalcy was a facade that worked up until now because of tradition, norms and the values held by some politicians.
The whole thing is rotten. Fix the constitution and get some laws on the books.
48
And here we go with the false equivalency between Trump's river of unethical and immoral conduct and one statement by a former Hillary adviser.
23
The veneer of civilization is so thin. Money and corruption go hand in hand, and in our country, we have enough money to put lots of glitter on top of the dirt. We need to wake up as a nation because our complacency is destroying us.
13
I'm reminded of the movie Sliding Doors -- about the two different lives that ensue for a person based on one scenario where she makes it onto the subway train, the other where the doors close in her face. What if McCain, a person I greatly admire, hadn't had a typical Republican view on the environment, and hadn't chosen Palin? Maybe I would have voted for him. Maybe he would have won, and his presidency likely would have meant no Trump. Of course I also often play the same mental game about JFK/Oswald, MLK/Ray, Sirhan Sirhan/BK, and Ted/Chappaquiddick. We can't change history, I just hope I survive it. Too many people don't.
77
I'll be honest here - it was Palin that kept me from voting for McCain. I didn't want a trashy loon in the Oval Office. (always a possibility with the vice-president). Just imagine how unhappy I am today.
11
I might have voted for him in 2000 had the Republicans chosen him instead of Bush. It would have depended on his campaign and running mate. When Bush became the candidate it was then that I understood just how dumb and disgusting the Republicans could be. In 2000 McCain was a maverick. He gave up too much of that in the Bush years to get ready to run again. Palin was certainly the guarantee that I would not vote Republican, but I had lost interest in McCain too, Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran and his vote on Iraq made me lose interest.
However the Republican attacks on him now are a disgrace and the fact that hardly anybody but his friend Lindsey Graham have condemned them shows how spineless the Republicans really are.
2
I wonder if the Roman Empire felt surreal before it collapsed.
23
A couple of months ago I had the misfortune of clicking into a series of Facebook feeds and landing on a pro-Trump post. The photo was of Trump sitting on the edge of a couch in a private jet, mans-spreaded, with his head and long tie hanging down in the middle. The caption on the pic was something like: “Our brave President left a lucrative career and a luxurious life to help his country in crisis, and all he gets is abuse.” There was only one response, a crying emoji.
I wondering what rabbit hole I had fallen into. Who created that parallel universe? Who believed it to be the truth and who promoted it? Was it a Russia ad? How many Americans see this as reality?
This is parallel reality is the implausibility behind the implausible antics. I do not know what to think about human consciousness anymore. But then we are capable of buying anything, and the lessons we learn from our follies are temporary. The rise of fascism is a function of the wild crests and troughs of capitalism. We never learn that one.
18
Coincedences?
Well--especially in reading detective fiction--nope.
Apparently the spoils are just too tempting, and despite
1
Maureen, we hope you recover from the effects of election night which seemed to linger. Variations of Remus on the top of the car on a cross-country trip doesn't work anymore.
"I never thought I'd see the day" has been turned on its head. People voted for Trump because he promised to drain the swamp in Washington. People were tired of watching and paying for the show called " our government" that didn't listen to their needs. And they really got what they asked for. A different show called the cesspool, not the swamp. Even dirtier and more smelly than the previous show. The characters far more pathetic and sinister than those that came before. And with every admission vote they were given one free small bag of popcorn for every family. It never dawns on them that they bought the whole family because the stars of the show insisted on Fox it was rated G. It never dawns on them that all the evil and violent images and sexual references should have resulted in a R rating. And they should have stayed home. There is no doubt, though, when we get to the climax of this show that the bag of popcorn will be empty, there are no free refills, and the ending leaves the viewer wanting so much more. They have to cover the eyes and ears of their children. And the plot line is just like the last movie they saw. The one they found so unappealing. Then they look and see the run was cut short because of its reviews and poor attendance. But they will buy the Blue Ray when it comes out and watch it over and over every family movie night. Because, after all, it's a Classic.
1
Some, I emphasize, some, Trump voters surely won't find it implausible if frogs next rain from the sky. This is all part of the plan, oh ye who insist on plausibility.
2
"We need a purge."
"Donald Trump is not a real president."
"Not my president."
I get that you're angry. Practically everyone is angry. However, Trump really is *the* president, and he is *your* president and, unless you long for the kind of political excitement we read about happening in Haiti or Egypt, you really don't want a purge.
It's fine to demonstrate about something Trump has done or said. However it's not fine to demonstrate and say that he is not your president. The fact that he won through a peaceful election is much more important than anything horrible he may try to do as president. If you don't believe me, then ask an immigrant from one of the *over 100* countries which have had a government violently overthrown in the past 100 years.
3
You are right, he is our president, wether you voted for him or not, but when will he be president of everybody?
He “won” through a tainted election and because of a slavery-era Electoral College system.
Of course, we should protest the president. He is undermining the Constitution, the rule of law, and our democracy. He represents the worst impulses of our racist, xenophobic history, not the higher ideals on which our great nation was founded.
Protesting, taking to the streets, writing, campaigning, and voting against him and the cowardly Republican leadership are as American as apple pie!
4
Traveling in the UK for several weeks this month. Trying to avoid the news, but when it creeps in I find myself thinking that we may have been better off without the Revolution.
8
Perhaps your column should have been titled from "Ice Cube to Black Cube to Black Hole." It is only very recently that two LIGO instruments confirmed the existence of a gravity wave detected here on earth formed by a black hole colliding with a massive dead star 1 billion light years from earth. The ultimate consequence of this confirmation of Einstein's special theory of relativity is that our universe will end in the nothingness of colliding black holes. Trump's nihilism is but an attempt to move our planet not towards reducing global warming, but towards the ulimate end of all matter and energy in our universe. Of course he doesn't know this, but he knows very little and he is the happier for it.
52
I sometimes think we would all be happier without such knowledge of black holes, but then I remember that physicists not only do not know what time is, but, when honest, don’t even believe that time exists, thus their pronouncements about the history of the universe (where time has to have meaning) are pretty much bunk, just like Trump’s. I’m more worried about Trump’s however.
4
I will use your comment to make a correction in mine. I should have said have said "general" theory of relativity.
The Special Theory of Relativity has nothing to do with black holes nor gravity. It deals with the speed of light being a universal constant. The General Theory of Relativity postulates that mass warps space time which we call gravity. What LIGO detected was five colliding black holes and one colliding neutron stars.
When 68% of reality is an unknown force called dark energy and another 27% is an unknown mass called dark matter we are ignorant about the nature of 95% of reality black holes are not relevant. Dark energy and matter are the ultimate mysteries.
5
Maureen, I truly love this column and especially the repetition
Everything is plausible
which takes me and us to two novels that add branches to your tree.
These final lines in Elizabeth Strout's, "Anything Is Possible" a positive take on possibility: "And if such a gift could come to him (Abel)...he opened his eyes, and yes, there it was, the perfect knowledge: Anything is possible."
and the alternative negative take in Ali Smith's "Autumn"
"All across the country, there was misery and rejoicing
All across the country people threatened other people.
All across the country, people told people to leave.
All across the country, politicians lied.
All across the country, ..."
And then?
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Dual citizen US SE
14
So one has to ask, exactly what are American values in practice? Absent practice, values are simply noble words.
20
@ Dan Welch East Lyme CT - Dan, in both my countries, SE and USA I see and hear endless references to American values or Swedish values, values that even if noble are, as you note, absent practice just empty (not noble) words.
Here in Sweden we read all the time about the search for "svenskheten", Swedishness that will magically help someone separate true Swedes from the rest of us, citizens but not quite Swedes. Sad to say, it is not only the Swedish neo-Nazi SD party that engages in this practice but people from all factions. I experience this in a fairly harmless way when some true Swede strikes up a conversation with me and suddenly bursts out "Men du är inte svensk." My last name is Swedish and except for my choice of clothing, I look Swedish. But the second some Swedes hear my American accent I can no longer be a Swede. I will vote, however, in September as a Swede.
Quite unrelated, I have just been reading the US Geological Survey report, Bedrock Geology of the Old Lyme Quadrangle, in which 4 USGS scientists bring up to date my CGNHS report, 30 years and giant scientific advances later. Will look to see if East Lyme is just outside that map area, do not remember.
Good comment.
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
"We have crossed into a surreal dimension where we are limited only by our imaginations." This says it all.
In the good 'ol days the good cowboys wore white hats and the bandits wore black. Right and wrong were easily distinguishable. This all changed when Clint Eastwood 'spaghetti-Westerns' made us love the bad guy, the anti-hero.
Today, 'Realpolitik' means the good and bad guys are whomever you want them to be, and depending on political developments they are interchangeable or expendable at the drop of a hat or a politician's whim.
More troubling than the Keystone Kops "War OF Terror" (Thanks, Ali G.) is the inordinate power of corporations whose wealth exceeds those of most nations and enables them to influence laws and evade taxes both at home and abroad; all of this while the middle class and the poor suffer the misery of low wages, high taxes, inflation and a 'justice' system that locks up minor offenders and lionizes banksters. The Wealth Gap rises inexorably across the globe.
In summary, we live in a Twilight Zone where terrorists are friends, corporations pass laws, pacifists are vilified and chicken-hawks start wars. These Orwellian developments do not make for a promising future. I fear for the future of all our children and grandchildren, irrespective of race or origin: Like climate change, political extremism and deteriorating moral standards will eventually affect everyone.
47
"Cohen, who once had to beg Trump to drop by his son’s bar mitzvah, elbowed into the swamp by pretending he had the president’s ear. He made up a job selling access to a White House where he could not even get a job."
I think you're being naive if you think Cohen did this himself.
58
Empires don't last forever. Our system of government put together 240 years ago may no longer be working. It's all dependent on honesty and trust. Greed over takes these. When people in power can game the system, they will. Perhaps a revolution is well into the making and if the citizens don't step up we are in trouble. Current events are giving the populace the creeps. It's up to us to right this listing ship of state.
107
Honesty and trust were not features of the Continental Congress that so tormented George Washington and his army during the Revolution. Human nature has not changed, nor American political nature.
What has changed is that we allow the worst among us to do their worst. We encourage them with money, the political donations that we allow to shape our politics.
The problem isn't Americans, it is the way we've let our politics evolve over the last 50 years or so, marching off to the right wing of greed and I've-got-mine funded by rank corruption we pretend isn't corruption.
64
"The problem isn't Americans, it is the way we've let our politics evolve over the last 50 years or so..."
If not Americans, who exactly is this "we"?
4
"If all men were angels no government would be be necessary." J. Madison
2
One of the fundamental principles of all art, according to Aristotle (slightly modified): The plausible impossible is preferable to the implausible possible.
Following this principle, Trump and his administration have created an artful alternative universe, in which we're all condemned to live.
Hopefully, however, not past 20 January 2021.
34
Motile is US. In the cultural grid of America every space on the board has to be occupied. It's not so much that nature abhors a vacuum. It's that being weird is the best way to get attention and Attention is the coin of the realm.
12
"Attention is the coin of the realm."
Yes, the other descriptors can be boiled down to that. Campaign donations buy it. Name recognition is part of it. Organizations of grass roots provide it.
13
Mo, it's the opposite! Imagination is exceeded by the new unlimited; we are witnessing an axis of evil trying to shroud itself in human sin, in order to feint redemption and human failing. Look again: It is evil, stepped up/ramped up, disguised in human skin, but evil, nonetheless.
Too often evil is thought to be catastrophic; many times it is not. Like so many dark powers (fission, for instance), its first forms are small forces which quickly engulf and destroy. We are trading human rights and death for nuclear disarmament, initiating proxy wars in the Middle East, framing trade in fiat pricing and quotas, removing black people from the public landscape, breaking up Hispanic families, carrying out a forced migration and attacking women's rights, and lying about healthcare under a man whose visceral racism and hatred is a black hole of destruction.
But there is more, something more: evil. Unlimited by our imaginations.
81
"Surreal" is an apt word, for sure. And our brains are indeed so scrambled that we are beginning to make sense of the scrambling. It's kind of like an omelet, Ms Dowd, when we have to whirl and whip those eggs but can still manage to create this orderly cylindrical concoction. On the outside, however. But what if we use rotten eggs or soured milk or worm-infested ham or bacon? We get food poisoning.
This is what is happening to our nation today. It is being poisoned by an utterly corrupt, lying, and amoral president...the above egg, let us say. Add that curdled milk in the form of the Cabinet and its ilk and that bad pig's meat as manifested by this Congress, and lo and behold, "Where did our democracy go?"
But our minds can handle this new paradigm, and we can find a way to treat ourselves back to health. It just takes some doing, and the voting booth may just hand us that good prognosis for which we so yearn.
79
The looking glass we have gone through, where nothing is implausible anymore, has a word: propaganda.
It’s poisonous effects wear us down, distort and cause us to doubt a shared reality, even a shared decency.
What’s changed? What made the world turn a gaseous green, here in America and elsewhere?
The nature of information has changed, it’s had noise pollution added, hate and pettiness shouted from the digital ramparts, trolls pouncing on every sentence, hammering, hammering doubt.
Democratization displaced the guardians of information, and the press has clearly tripped over false equivalence in an effort to be fair. Hate speech could be called what it is, but it’s been given a kind of alt-legitimacy instead.
If we are suiting dumbfounded, exhausted of even incredulity then we are sitting in the paralysis wrought by propaganda- that’s its point. Knowing this has happened to us is the first step to reclaiming our bearings.
112
Spot on analysis. Well said.
3
We have entered the period of a "Camp" Presidency. "Camp" as a movement is intended to be a send-up. It is intended to turn the world on its head and force you to question everything. We love it in the theatre because we know the play will soon be over and we'll be free to escape to our secure, more predictable and stable world.
But Drumf's world knows no bounds. He is pure camp, and unable to tell the difference between smart governance and championship wrestling. We are force to live in his unstable, camp environment 24/7. It is both dangerous and exhausting.
50
Re: camp -- our government became entertainment when the real duties slid off out of our attention. So a camp candidate serves that.
6
I try to take Maureen Down seriously, but struggle. I don't care that her politics are different from mine, it's just that I blame her as one of the many people who made Trump possible.
458
It was ultimately the Hillary supporters who made Trump possible. They did it, not her, by their arrogance driving away their own base.
19
She did her best to tear Hillary down for a very long time. Most of us who are long-term readers of her column won't forget. I once really looked forward to her writings. Now, I read but find that I always come back to her thoughts about Trump, even if they are on the nose, as being too little too late. If Hillary had won, she would have had a field day tearing her down for four more years. Now, she can't make an impact on DJT no matter what she says. She weakened herself by fighting someone she should have supported. Karma?
75
Thank you Kim.
I strongly support your statement.
Dowd has always been part of the problem and never part of any solution.
31
After Trump's Boy Scout Jamboree speech last summer, I declared immunity from the boring and corrosive Trump Reality Show. My strategy worked. My political sensibilities are no longer scrambled by his antics. I am now focused on the best people on the Left. An insight arrived in this morning's email from my lifelong friend Frank who said, "I have always been and will always be a Republican. Teddy Roosevelt is my man." On the importance and inspiration of TR, Frank and I agree. In my imagination I pictured the Democrats using the rallying cry, "Who is our Teddy Roosevelt?!" Bumper sticker: "TR in 2020!"
9
Trump is a symptom. The NY times, CNN as well as Bill Krystal, and the elite cast of never Trumpers are the cause. Decades of shifting the country ever more leftward and ignoring the working class voters (of all colors, etc) that Ds used to support are also the problem.
13
It has been shifting rightward. That is where the money went, and the power.
The left got lip service. Minorities get empty promises. The rich get the money and power and things are done as they want them done for their benefit.
26
How is it Democrats fault? By your logic it should be the people who left the Democratic party to vote for compliant Republicans, and a dishonest president. It's not solely up to a political party to sell themselves to every group of individuals – they work for us. We choose who best represents us, and who will act in our best interest. Republicans never started being the party that was best for unions and workers. Democrats just stopped being the party that wouldn't stay quiet about racial inequality and immigration to keep the Southern vote, but that's been happening for decades. Nothing changed in that regard during the last election, except Trump and Republicans gave people a place to focus their animosity towards.
6
Leftward? Please explain. What are you referring to? From where I sit, it sure looks full-on right wing to me. The left would never think of privatizing fire departments; the right is doing it. Same with demonizing, demoralizing, and destroying public education. Suggesting the answer to rising medication costs is to "make pharmaceutical companies compete"? They price fix. It's their business model. Nothing "left" about that move.
So, you have me baffled. What are you thinking?
14
All I can say is that America voted for a showman, and we are getting quite the show. To quote Maximus: "Are you not entertained?"
48
Don't like this show. Not entertained.
11
For a ray of hope and sanity check, go see
RBG, Notorious Ruth Bader Ginsberg documentary, Having lived through the McCarthy era, she lends perspective.
42
Saw “RBG” this evening. Do see it. She is amazing.
1
Just saw it and agree completely!
1
Plausible, implausible? We are in the box with Schrodinger's cat, both dead and alive, depending on who's looking. We've fallen, with Alice, into the rabbit hole, and as Dorothy surmised, "I don't think we're in Kansas anymore."
Is there a way back? Perhaps, but it will never be the same as it was. Still, at some point we will have reached the bottom. From there it's only up. The question is that asked of the limbo dancers, "how low can we go?"
38
The quantum state is a vibration between. When the exact moment of vibration is seen, we know that somewhere the opposite could be seen entangled with it.
Thus, somewhere there may be an America that is all things not-Trump. We just are not in it, and have not been for a very long time. It has been a long slide. We made our observation of that cat back around Nixon.
3
Cohen "was not connected," and trump didn't take his cut from the scam for Cohen's use of his brand. Right! And history never repeats itself.
44
Nothing is plausible in America today, Ms. Dowd. We pluribus unum are all numbly living in a senseless world. Trump's hinge of history is like old age, according to Golda Meir: "Old age is like a plane flying through a storm. Once you are aboard, there is nothing you can do."
54
"Once I would have rolled my eyes at a “Homeland” season in which the Russians deftly maneuvered to control whether a Democratic woman, "an increasingly paranoid former junior senator from New York", would occupy the Oval Office."
Perhaps Ms. Dowd's all-time most subtle jab at Sec. Clinton.
107
Subtle?
6
Correction for Mary Ann.
Dowd's jabs at Sec. Clinton have never been subtle by any sense or definition of that word.
5
Seems to me that the 'junior Senator' was not paranoid enough, not by a long shot, and neither at the time was Ms Dowd, who now so aptly describes the implausible world we have been ushered into as a result.
Great writting though. Always a pleasure to read. Thank you.
2
Sometimes, like Ryan as the "Irish undertaker" Maureen Dowd's turn of phrase is outstanding. "Mongoose": savor it!
Mongoose, indeed, ready to take down the cobra. But honestly, Trump is a lower form of life than snakes.
Thanks also for bringing up Black Cube, but you failed to credit appealing Ronan Farrow at The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/israeli-operatives-who-aided-ha...
In the hurly-burly of daily Trumpian excess and nastiness, this has mostly gone missing, and it is a scandal that should be shouted from the rooftops.
"Black Cube is known for its close ties to current and former power players in Israeli politics and intelligence. The late Meir Dagan, a former Mossad director, once served as the company’s president. Ehud Barak, the former Israeli Prime Minister, has publicly acknowledged that he introduced Weinstein to Black Cube’s leadership. (Barak said he did not know the nature of Weinstein’s concerns at the time.) The Observer reported that officials linked to Trump’s team had made contact with Black Cube days after Trump visited Tel Aviv in May, 2017, during his first foreign tour as President. Standing next to Netanyahu during that trip, Trump promised, “Iran will never have nuclear weapons, that I can tell you.”"
Riiight. Trump does his best to ensure that Iran gets nuclear weapons, while supporting his buddy Netanyahu's bid for WWIII. Nice work!
138
Trump and Bibi are desperate for a distracting war, the extremists in all three religions of Abraham can't wait for Armageddon, and the arms merchants and oilmen are just licking their chops. And so many are getting their megalomanias and ricebowls fulfilled in the path to war, from John Bolton to Qasim Soleimani to Avigdor Lieberman and countless others. And the common people will pay with their blood and their traumatized and disrupted lives. For what? Once again, for what?
13
Rocky, you nailed it! Keep on truckin'
4
What, at first, seems just implausible,
upon reflection, is just American.
While we may wonder what we've become,
I'm afraid, it's what we've always been.
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@ Ono LA - Just a slight rephrasing of your closing line
"I'm afraid, it's what all too many of us have always been and always will be."
We, the country, that in 1790 took the first step to create a racial order in which each individual was and still is to be assigned to the "Fatal Invention" of racists, a "race" only one at the top.
Note: The phrase "Fatal Invention" comes from the title of Dorothy Roberts' "Fatal Invention - How Science, Politics, and Big Business Re-create Race In The Twenty-First Century".
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Dual citizen US SE
3
How true. How true. Just like Dorian Gray once we saw his portrait it was all revealed.
3
Well, at least half of the country has been for a while.
There isn't an incentive to change the narrative of divisiveness by the politicians, media or religions. Its good business.
It does appear that Ms. Dowd has stopped her HRC bashing. Now she is just numbfounded.
1
I'm disgusted, stunned, exhausted, by the Trump administration, every 24 hours, and sometimes every hour, Ms. Dowd.
The hatefulness coming out of this White House, the denigration of actual war heroes and sitting senators, is demoralizing, upsetting, strange. Why are the Trumpists so hateful? I really don't get it?
The Trump motto, adhered to by him and his sycophants, seems to be, "They go low, we go lower than low."
Instead of reprimanding Kelly Sadler, who is a government employee and whose salary is paid for by us, the taxpayers, (think about the irony that DJT probably doesn't even pay taxes), President Trump will probably promote her next week because she has out-Trumped Trump. He must be so proud.
A pox on you, President Trump. You really are a sad, hateful man who has everything, but will never have the respect of the majority of the people in this country.
You have to earn respect and all the bombast, and sniveling accolades coming out of your cabinet members can't fool us.
You are the Emperor wearing new clothes -- you aren't wearing anything at all.
534
So am I dear V.
Then comes John Kelly a four star general is now becoming donald`s hunch man ?
That is plausible as well in the era of trump , the liar, thug, and a sociopath.
12
Recall that only 52 % or so of Americans disapprove of Trump (538/nlog). A pretty narrow majority.
3
Unfortunately what seems implausible is that Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnel and the rest of the GOP (except John McCain) will even look at the mountain of evidence piling up on the POTUS. Also Scott Pruitt and Devin Nunes appear to be battling for the worst in the swamp status.
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After a while you learn that lies can get you where you want to go but when you get there you know there is something missing - the truth.
After a while even the wealthy and powerful learn that their wealth and power are only tools that in themselves have limits and when those limits are reached if they never had much character in the first place they won't find it magically later on. Remember this from Catholic grad school: "What does it profit a man to gain the whole world if he suffers the loss of his own soul."
After a while you learn that electing someone without integrity is a fool's bet because you spend all your precious time explaining that he/she is a person of integrity when you know in your conscience they are anything but.
After a while you learn that people running for elected office fall into two camps, namely, the ones who are in it for themselves and the ones who are idealistic about serving their country and all the people and not just their friends. The problem we face is that there are way too many of the former and not nearly enough of the latter.
After a while you begin to wonder if all of the effort, the outcry, the determination to prevail is worth it, and then you think of the men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice for this country and you renew your efforts and outcry with a little more fervor gained from that reflection.
After a while reading Ms. Dowd's column you learn that while it is all implausible it is also very, very real.
55
Everyday is like waking from a night of bizarre dreams, resulting from watching a really bad movie just before going to sleep. Then you turn on the morning news and it is all reality.
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Dowd, we are left send guessing ourselves precisely because we are POWERLESS. Get it, you still think there are magic stability that our culture, and our (little d) Democracy can help. You are under the illusion, an existential necessity, that we control our fate in the US. It looks like we've gone 'through the looking glass", because we have no power.
51
Dear Madam: "Nulla dies sine line." Rather, the Principium Rationis Reddendae Sufficientis", "Nothing is without sufficient reason rendered." tells us that the daily scoop on Trumpia, or "Trumpistan", as one of your co-workers called it some time ago, is always something to do with either his imagination, incompetence, largess or the parochial nature of D.C. which is then reformulated via the airwaves for an exact fit with the mediocrity which the country is being transmogrified into. It was nice of the "Billionaire" to repair and revamp the skating rink, but his choice of charities might be said to have left something to be desired. That's the big trouble with this political "phenom": no one is really getting anything, except Trump, his exposure... at least not yet. Strumpets come and strumpets go... as do big names, big deals, etc. The reason? It is the inexhaustible quest for profit inherent in Capitalism, which has a built-in retardant function, which cheapens virtually everything a Midas could touch. Time was, if you put an ice cube on the edge of the stove, at the same time you were slowly bringing the stock to the simmer to clarify it, by the time it melted, the right temperature was there. Now, "all mire and complexity", superfluously at that. Listen to Caruso sing "The Spanish Aria"...that will cure these ills temporarily.
8
Dude.
That is a good strong signal you are sending, and the carrier wave might be overwhelming some receivers, but whatever.
Nice riff, especially the Caruso part. Chase it with the air from Bach's Orchestral Suite No, 3 to revive hope.
If only John McCain had been nominated over W in 2000 and then elected president, just think how different the world would be.
51
If only the supreme court had refused to take the case in Bush v. Gore, we would be solvent; there would not have been a war in Iraq; inequality would not have been put on steroids (the Bush tax cuts); we would not have engaged in torture; and we would be addressing climate change instead of increasing it daily.
Yes, much better.
10
Or if we didn't have the electoral college. A Republican hasn't won the popular vote since the turn of this century. It's no wonder Republicans were so desperate during the last election.
8
Or, if yet again, the popular vote candidate had won....
8
Today's news is the equivalent of standing in a grocery line forty years ago and scanning the National Inquirer headlines. The major difference is we no longer recognize the absurdity and lies.
93
We must blink.
We must not accept all of these outrageous examples as plausible.
We must not be complacent.
None of thses should be considered normal behavior.
Stay awake!
Resist and make sure to vote.
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@ BSR - I wondered about her choice of "plausible" and filed a comment replacing "plausible" with "possible" as in Elizabeth Strout's "Anything Is Possible" or Ali Smith's "Autumn" Part 1, Ch. 7
But now after examining the etymology of the word "plausible" and learning of its evolution from at first being entirely positive in the 16th century to its more recent double-edged meanings I think Maureen chose well.
I join you and suggest that every comment writer should state "I will vote in November" and even "I will find at least one person who did not vote last time and persuade and help that person to vote in November 2018".
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Dual citizen US SE
6
"Last year, I shook my head at the “Billions” plotline showing a top New York law enforcement official fighting corruption by day and engaging in sadomasochism by night."
It is entirely possible they had heard the story making the rounds. Many did, even Trump's two-bit cab-company lawyer. This was art imitating life.
Harvey Weinstein was another story everybody knew but nobody said. It got around.
So, what else? What else has been going around for a few years, known only to those in-the-know and hangers-on?
There has got to be more. These can't be the only two dirt-balls.
And who already knows but isn't saying?
48
Just think, this is all fake news to a Republican. Those of the twisted minds, caught up in a state of denialism.
We read Kimberly Strassel writing about dear leader being under attack by the FBI, we see crowds cheering the Orang in chief, lies have become alternative facts. Daniel Henniger's column in the WSJ is titled Wonderland, but his wonderland is the Liberals, as for Rump, not a word.
As for the deep state, this state is deep in do do, unlike any of us have ever seen, it is a collection of weirdos run amuck.The funny farm is running the country, Caligula could not have done a better job than the current mad man in charge at present. Yes mad, mad I say, not just odd or tetched, in the head, but devoid of rational thought.
He will join other rulers in history being known as Donald the Mad. But what about those who believe him to be the second coming of their savior, what is it their heads are infected with?
Is it a bug, a fog, a quart of cheap booze? It appears to be some king of ideology that dulls the senses, creates an alternative world, gives pleasure to the possessed . If you know them, escape while you still can.
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The most implausible but most fun story is Vanessa's history with the Latin King. That Trump's everything as fodder for a great novel.
New Yorkers are colorful!
41
FYI
CPW is Central Park West.
A proud enclave of Dems intellectualism and ultra-liberalism. I am honored to call it home.
2
Yes. It's where we live and love it!
Maybe, Maureen.... we should start taking American reality a little seriously instead of treating it like a cheap reality show and a soap opera so that the cheesy reality show star don't get plausibly framed as plausible Presidential candidate and a plausible President when we all know such a character should remain imprisoned on a silver screen instead of being released on idiotic furlough to trash the entire nation.
Maybe if that darling Republican Party of yours hadn't assiduously hacked away at telling the truth and democracy for 38 years, it wouldn't have been remotely plausible that tyranny of the right-wing minority would have undemocratically appointed its second Idiot-In-Chief in 16 years, along with all its glorious right-wing accouterments of greed, pollution, Messianic Christianity, slave wages, systemic voter suppression, unaffordable healthcare and a 0.1% campaign finance bribery system that warms the cockles of sociopathic hearts.
Maybe having a Fake News channel and hate radio stations organ-harvesting the nation's heart, soul and IQ is not that amusing, but rather an act of slow-motion sedition that should be called out for the insidious successful nation-destroying track record it has.
Donald Trump is not a real President.
The Russian-Republican Congress is not a real Congress.
They're a direct result of the award-winning Republican campaign to drown the nation's IQ in a tax-cut bathtub.
Stop the soap opera and start reporting on the Grand Old Putsch.
954
Surprisingly, in an earlier incarnation Maureen Dowd campaigned for Hillary. Weird, but let's not make assumptions.
Otherwise, I'm with you 100%.
39
To Susan Anderson~ Very curious. When did Maureen Dowd campaign for Hillary?
Thank you in advance if you reply.
8
Socrates, I have never read a better encapsulation of what the Republican Party stands for today.
The accoutrements say it all precisely and succinctly.
131
Dowd perfectly captures the corruption side of the Trump administration but the tolerance of this without consequences by a sizeable portion of the American Public is what seems beyond plausible.
531
It's beyond plausible, it's undeniable.
13
These political messes in authoritarian nations always end as saying goes 'There will be blood'. It is simply logical digression that a few accomplices are killed or mysteriously missing if they pose hindrance to weakening the links for taking a nation to the ‘cleaners.’
The America’s epitaph will be that ‘they could have avoided an untimely ignominious end had those who knew better interrupted or warned populace, instead placed greed - amnesia-and misogyny ahead of nation’s greater good; “liberty."
After all, recent precedent (historically) to despots seeking absolute fidelity to self over welfare of country was not that long ago. And principle despots of that period 1920-30s both died in this season, a year before birth of current POTUS.
Thus we we beat on, but for how long?
16
Lost among the salacious and offensive from the Trump administration for this week was the absurdity that Trump described everyone (meaning his supporters) as saying that he deserved the Nobel Peace Prize (evidently, for occupying the White House while South and North Korea approached an end to hostilities). Equally unconvincingly, he added that he wanted peace for the world, not an award for himself.
That's doubly implausible in light of Trump making the world that much less stable when he walked away from the Iran Nuclear Accord.
Trump was quick, though, to run towards the cameras documenting the release of American captives from North Korea - an achievement reached by other people. Trump credits himself with accomplishments he didn't even realize, and washes his hands of what he is responsible for.
And that was a drop in the bucket for what unfolded since last weekend.
266
"Trump was quick, though, to run towards the cameras documenting the release of American captives from North Korea - an achievement reached by other people"
.... I only learned today that 11 North Koreans were released during the Obama administration. Why isn't this fact included in virtually every article describing the latest release?
Is it possible David Brooks and other pundits who are wringing their hands, wondering how it could be that possibly, just possibly, Trump is doing something right, because the 3 prisoners were released - is it possible they don't know this fact?
Can anybody explain this?
73
It's impossible to keep track of the hypocrisy and sheer awfulness coming from this White House because it's becoming an almost daily onslaught.
Melania Trump's "Be Best" initiative, however well-intentioned seemed such a phony gesture given her spouse's horrendous rhetoric and health care policies for children but when Jeff Sessions stated only an hour later that children would be separated from their mothers at the border and housed separately, it was as though the administration's policies were actually summed up better as being "Be Best at Being Mean."
It seems unimaginable that Trump killed the Iran deal to start the week or that our newly installed ambassador to Germany insulted the entire country the next day by issuing a statement that decreed, more or less that the Germans better stick with us on sanctions or else.
The unexpected and unimaginable comes at us with such velocity and at such volume, the disruption to our country and dissolution of our democracy begins to seem normal. We can't let that perception stand.
455
We were also informed that Kim of North Korea treated his American prisoners excellently.
5
Kirsten Gillibrand has NO chance at the presidency before 2030, even with Carrie Mathison running interference. The scariest thing about the last administration was that Obama’s favorite show, according to him, was “Homeland”. But she should buck up: in 2030, she’ll only be 62 which, by today’s standards, is a mere child. And Claire Danes as Veep will only be 51! (But sadly never with Selina Meyer‘s mouth.) Cynthia Nixon as Sec. of Political Correctness?
This “surreal dimension” is only compelling because we’re forced to peek into and share the most intimate parts of the lives of any leaders who foolishly get into the crosshairs of our press. Imagine how satisfying to so many couch potatoes (and greasy, to boot) it would have been if we’d been forced to share the intimate adventures of JFK or Bill Clinton!
For years we’ve been coming to this sad estate. Christopher Columbus now is condemned where once he was venerated: no longer historically important is it that he discovered the New World for Europeans; but that he inadvertently introduced the disease vectors that wiped out whole civilizations. No surprise that Gina Haspel is demonized as a “torture queen” sixteen years after she followed legal orders to find out what the grey-heads then thought was useful information from the masterminds and participants in the greatest single attack on our soil in our history, which murdered almost 3,000 of us and injured over 6,000.
We live in great times for sedentary voyeurs.
10
You have to wonder what it might have been like had Jefferson’s “Democrats” used James Callender to unearth and publish the most intimate details of Hamilton’s wild private life (come to think of it, he DID, to some extent); not considering the most intimate details of JEFFERSON’S wild private life.
You have to wonder whether we’ll go after the janitor of MSNB Healthcare because he happened to work for Martin Shkreli, if Trump decides to nominate him as Sec. of Energy (who cleans up nuclear waste).
But when our press flogs the most intimate and unsavory details of a politician’s life (because, hey, it’s what the peeeeple want!), then it’s clear that we’ll never exit this “surreal dimension” until we dig up Mother Teresa and clone her recovered DNA to produce a whole new generation of leaders.
Maureen needs to chill. Kevin would have a far more phlegmatic sense of humor.
4
When the most intimate and unsavory details of a politician’s life involve corruption, conflicts of interest, and possible violations of campaign-finance law, the press would be derelict if it didn’t “flog” these stories.
No one wants to think about Donald Trump having sex (including, it appears, Stormy Daniels). He got into “the crosshairs of the press” by having his lawyer pay her off 10 days before a presidential election. Under normal circumstances, no one would care where Scott Pruitt sleeps in Washington. He ran afoul of the press by accepting a sweetheart housing deal from the wife of an energy lobbyist who had business before the EPA—and lying about key details of the arrangement.
To portray these and other stories as nothing more than salacious muck-raking is, typically, disingenuous.
215
Philosophical mush, Richard. Did you really just attempt to conflate political ignorance with societal bliss? The fact that the general public knew far less about the personal lives of politicians even 50 years ago is why we now think people like Trump are incoherent and dangerous?
And did you trot out 9/11 once again, not to suggest we come together as a nation, to stand as one in the face of our fears, but as an excuse for torture?
There are always justifications we can make for our behavior, Richard. That's why being a moral and ethical person everyday is so hard.
Even though we seldom agree, you regularly offer viewpoints I find worth considering. This was was not one of them.
46
Man, Maureen, you be outdone yourself: finally revealing that Donald Trump not only poisons US politics, but international ones as well!
Next thing you know, Devin Nunes will turn up at George Papadopoulous's wedding or wait, was it Hilary Clinton showing up at Donald's a few years before Trump ended up entertaining Stormy Daniels apres golf.
What's left? Putin buying the National Inquirer? Giuliani getting the Nobel Peace Prize? Rocket man shooting someone on Fifth Avenue?
I think Homeland really is today's world: 6 Degrees of Separation, Crash, and Contagion all wrapped up into one big bungled mess, the fevered brains of a bipolar CIA agent that just happened to work for the current CIA agency nominee.
46
The monsters are due on Maple Street and will serve man. Anyone who objects will be sent to the corn field. People are alike everywhere.
I miss Rod Serling.
88
Those were not Rod Serling. They were adaptations of existing short stories whose writers seem grotesquely and unfairly to be forgotten. Naming the two I know: Damon Knight ("To Serve Man") and Jerome Bixby (corn field). I don't wish to take credit from Serling, who knew good material and knew how to use it.
26
Thomas, it looks like you live in Rod Serlings hometown, Binghampton. Fantastic. The Monsters on Maple Street was written by Serling though. Correct? That is perhaps the most relevant episode to this conversation.
Yes, his insight encapsulated the best of American values. Where have those values gone? They are certainly not found in the mantra of MAGA.
2
With thanks to Sir Walter Scott, my first thought: "Oh! What a Tangled Web We Weave/When First We Practice to Deceive!"
37
So the country is being run by idiots, crooks and incompetent mobster wannabes. What else is new?
Rod Serling talked about a surreal dimension that stretched our imaginations. Yet we’re not so much in an episode of the Twilight Zone as we are in a combination of Game of Thrones and Stranger Things, with a little Rick and Morty thrown in for comic relief. Every revelation is more absurd than the last, even when you think the last one took the cake. I can’t wait for Mueller to put that cake in the oven and turn up the heat.
But we’re at a point where mere impeachment won’t do the job. We need a purge. This administration has spread like a fungus, with its tendrils working their way into every corner of government. Removal of just one bit won’t suffice. Fumigation is in order. The next president should refuse to enter the Oval Office until that happens, and the executive chair is boiled in Purell.
So many questions remain. For one, why did Michael Cohen take out a home equity loan to pay Stormy Daniels if the slush fund she was paid out of was flush with Russian payola? Can you say money laundering?
When it all hits the fan we’ll be lucky to have a government left. The Republicans in Congress will have some ‘splainin’ to do regarding the bogus tax cuts for billionaires, for trying to kill Obamacare and for aiding and abetting this bête noire of a president. Let all the poisons that lurk in the mud get thrown out of office.
682
How much of our political angst these days is created by Donald Trump, and how much of it is attributable to simply aging Baby Boomers who are uncomfortable with change and think the sky is falling?
Get out and walk, people.
Circulate your blood, see new neighborhoods, and remember: just because you are getting older and your own lives are weakening does not mean the World really is coming to an end. Celebrate the good weeks for your country, and the low unemployment numbers and the possibility of peace through strength.
What do you have to lose?
12
"But we’re at a point where mere impeachment won’t do the job. We need a purge. "
This is exactly what I wrote here almost a year ago, except I was calling for Lavrentiy Beria style purge to cleanse the country of the deplorable. We need to purge the roots of the problem, not the acolytes.
I don't want my children or grandchildren to ever endure a Trump in their life again. Ever.
254
What do we have to lose?
- An independent, honest press;
- An actual balance of power among the branches of the federal government;
- Our First Amendment rights;
- The rule of law;
- The welcome concept of the US as a melting pot;
- Enthusiastic civic engagement to work for the common good.
34
America is entering into the desensitization phase of the campaign. By hanging everything out there, having Trump as POTUS is not so shocking anymore. Like junkies, you need higher and higher dose to get the same high for a shorter period of time (it is said opioid junkies certainly seek out fentanyl and OD is no accident!)
The NY concrete jungle is on par with the DC swamp, everyone knows. It is a matter of weaponizing the who-know-what.
But the real genius is not about knowing or even blackmail but it is about desensitize people's responses. This is not unlike what NRA has done. People were horrified about gun violence and mass shooting in the beginning. Now, it is a matter of fact. Once the news cycle moves on, what outrage?
In my response to your previous column, Ms Dowd, I have confessed I was dead wrong about America's love affair with reality shows. Evidently, the opposite is true, America is so addicted that she is seeking worse realities just to hold attention deficit disorder at bay
55
Mo, the danger is that Americans will succumb to the purpose of the fire-hose of effluent coming from The Rolling Trumpster Fire - mental numbness - and that the slow-motion Nixon Saturday Night Massacre redux will be so telegraphed as to be a ho-hum event when it happens; sometime after SCOTUS goes home on June 30.
The press has to keep Americans focused on the money trail, the methodical professionalism of Mueller and his band of heroes, and not let the episodes of POTUS Reality Circus achieve their purpose of sucking all the oxygen out of the news cycle.
p.s. - Since North Korea had agreements with Clinton and Bush, as well as U.S. hostages being released, then broke those agreements after sanctions were eased, let's all hold any kudos until the fine print on any agreement has been read, the Senate debate on any treaty which might emerge, and a track record of compliance established.
Besides, the Pumpkin Bambino could (quite) easily wake up some morning in a couple of years and decide he's changed his mind, tearing up any agreement he'd made, just like was done this week with Iran.
With all the guardrails off, you never can tell where His Unhinged Unraveling Unfitness might next careen the Rolling Trumpster Fire, with us in tow.
146
The U.S. broke those agreements. Congress refused to follow through on the Clinton agreement. I will let readers study the history to decide who was first to break.
9
With apologies to Lewis Carroll
The Fixer and the Donald
Did talk of tempting things,
Of porn stars and of pandering
Publicity that stings,
And how to launder Russian cash
The millions Counseling brings.
A shell comp did the Fixer form
A vessel cash to hide
When stuffed with full fat fees enorm'
A plunder place of pride
So comforting when you can have
Oligarchs at your side
284
Bravo!
7