10.22 Metaphor of the Year! According to the Washington Post, the Pentagon houses two giants floor globes said to be used by Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower during World War II. Pete Hegseth wanted one for his office–and pronto. “ Ordinarily, moving historical items within the building is a deliberate process overseen by trained curators. Instead, Hegseth’s staff dispatched its own team to relocate an Eisenhower globe. They lost control of the artifact and dropped it, sending the globe crashing onto its base and impaling the fragile shell near Antarctica. . . . . The resulting gash appears to be several inches wide.” The good news: at least this crashing disaster did not impede the flow of oil.10.20 Max Boot in The Washington Post: “What explains Trump’s bizarre affinity for Putin? . . . Zelensky had a compelling theory when he told the Financial Times last week that Trump simply has a fondness for autocrats and the uber-wealthy: “He speaks about it openly and loudly that he loves such people and he respects such people.” It hadn’t occurred to me that Trump views Putin as a fellow billionaire, but it’s true. Putin’s net worth has been estimated at $70 billion to $200 billion. Trump, who made more than $2 billion last year, no doubt respects anyone who manages to make so much money in office while clinging to power for so long. He seldom has a cross word for any dictator, while regularly berating democratic allies. Whatever the explanation, Trump’s willingness to do the bidding of a murderous despot is despicable and dangerous.”
10.19 Paul Krugman: “Trump says that he won’t order a strike [on Iran] before the midterms. But Robert Pape, author of the Substack Escalation Trap, argues that we shouldn’t believe him — that the bombs may well drop before the midterms. And while I am not a strategic expert, I believe that Pape may well be right, because his analysis of Trump’s political position is something I recognize from financial economics. You see, it’s a well-understood proposition that the owners of businesses that are on the verge of going bust often engage in destructive behavior. And Trump is about to go bankrupt — not financially (he’s made billions through corruption) but politically. So he, like a failing businessman, has strong incentives to wreak havoc…I suspect that Trump’s impending political bankruptcy will have even worse consequences than Pape suggests — and that these consequences will continue and intensify after the midterms. Freedom, wrote Kris Kristofferson, is just another word for nothing left to lose. Once the midterms are over, Trump, with nothing left to lose, will be free to be his worst self — a malignant narcissist who instinctively supports authoritarians and is preoccupied with revenge against anything and anyone that threatens his fragile grandiosity.”
10.19 Elon Musk on X: “Next year, I will give one of my SpaceX shares to every kid in America. This will be the first of many.”
10.18 Washington Post: “Alexander Hermann, a researcher at Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, said median homes used to cost three times the median income or less in 75 of the nation’s largest 100 housing markets in 1990. Today, that’s true in only three out of 100 markets. . . .[T]he average price-to-income ratio of homes shot up in the 2000s when interest rates were low. Amid today’s high rates, it hasn’t come down. It’s much harder to afford a house with a high interest rate when the house itself is far pricier.”
10.18 Steve Rosen, in Conversation with William Kristol: “Changes have taken place which fundamentally alter the strategic position of the United States globally. For the first time ever, the United States homeland cannot be taken for granted as a secure rear area against non-nuclear attacks. We’re just used to the idea of: At home, in North America, we’re safe from a physical attack. And we’re not. And that has repercussions quite up and down the strategic food chain….We need to think about doing business in a very different way. And we haven’t gone through that kind of radical rethinking of our defense position—or defense posture—and the character of forces since the 1930s, when, for the first time, the United States really had to take into account that there was a possibility of a massive Eurasian military power that could threaten the United States.. . . In December of 2023, there was a sustained, sophisticated drone incursion over Air Combat Command at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia, where our F-22s are based. It went on for days. These were not hobbyists. In March of 2026, there was a sustained drone incursion over Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, which is where American B-52s are home-based. The idea that people could, by very different means, introduce sophisticated precision strike weapons to neutralize the core of our strategic capabilities is no longer speculative; it’s no longer hypothetical—people are exercising this capability now. The deputy commander of the North American [Aerospace] Defense Command said two weeks ago, “The United States has no effective defenses against drones in the continental United States.”
10.18 Washington Post: “Two weeks from Election Day, Republicans face a bleak political landscape. President Donald Trump’s approval rating has fallen to a new low, and support for Democrats in the race for control of Congress is rising as inflationary pressures contribute to an acrid mood among voters, according to a Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll. Trump’s approval among U.S. adults now stands at 33 percent, with 66 percent disapproving; 52 percent said they disapprove strongly. That approval rating is four percentage points lower than in July and eight points lower than at this point last year. It’s lower than at any point in his first term. Among likely voters, Trump’s approval is 38 percent, with 62 percent disapproving.”
10.17 Sense and Sensibility
10.16 After five days on the job, White House Press Secretary Katie Zacharia resigns. Earlier in the day, Trump spoke to reporters about her. “We’re talking about doing something,” Trump said, adding that he told Zacharia to “reconsider” whether she “need[s] this” job. “I told her, ‘I think you’re better off being happy and I don’t think you could ever be happy in this job,'” Trump said. “I want her to have a good life. I don’t want [her] to have a life like she’s led in the last three days. She is being brutalized by the media.”