Attention to the Unseen

The Washington Post reports: During a tense meeting at the White House in June, President Trump caught Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe off guard with a pointed remark. “I remember Pearl Harbor,” the president said, referring to the surprise attack that propelled the United States into World War II. Trump then launched into a blistering critique of Japan’s economic policies, according to people familiar with the conversation. He railed against the U.S. trade deficit with Japan and urged Abe to…

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David Smith writes: Much has been said about the contrast between the late John McCain – war veteran, bipartisan statesman, noble truth-teller – and a man who seemed way less likely to become president, Donald Trump. But as the Arizona senator, like Shakespeare’s John of Gaunt, spent his twilight years raging against the coarsening of civic life, he must have been aware that his legacy would include a decision that helped unleash the very forces he came to despise. Wednesday…

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The cynicism with which most Americans view most politicians, has long made it difficult to believe a claim such as John McCain’s stated goal during the 2000 presidential race — that he wanted ‘to inspire young Americans to devote themselves to causes greater than their own self-interest’ — and yet while travelling with the candidate, David Foster Wallace couldn’t ignore McCain’s moral authority — a very rare commodity on the campaign trail. In October of ’67 McCain was himself still…

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The Washington Post reports: The nation heard this week accusations that Donald Trump was personally involved in the decision to offer two women money shortly before the 2016 election to keep them from sharing stories of alleged affairs. Trump’s longtime personal attorney, Michael Cohen, admitted under oath to having been instructed by Trump to work with David Pecker, chairman and chief executive of American Media Inc., to arrange a payment to former Playboy model Karen McDougal. He also admitted to…

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Michael Kazin writes: On the evening of Aug. 26, 1968, I was arrested on a street corner in Chicago for a dubious crime: protesting a political event. This was, of course, the Democratic National Convention, which was about to nominate as its presidential candidate Hubert Humphrey, the vice president, who had staunchly supported the decision to send half a million troops to pursue a deeply immoral and doomed mission in Vietnam. I joined hundreds of others in jail that night….

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