Trump's election is part of an international trend that's no less alarming, in Britain, in France, in Germany, in Austria. Vladimir Putin wanted to see this outcome no less than he would like to see nationalists and anti-Europeanists win in France.

Donald Trump's temperament and character is precisely what you would hate to see in your children, much less your president.

What about our refusal to look squarely at the degradation of the planet we inhabit? In the last election cycle many candidates refused even to acknowledge the hard science, irrefutable science, of climate change. The president, while readily accepting the facts, has done far too little to alter them. How long are we, are you, prepared to wait?

The only reason the word "brand" gets a little tiresome is that something that is complex and wonderful and deep begins to sound like a can of tomato soup. I recoil at that, but I'm used to it. I know what it means: It means that The New Yorker is not merely the magazine that comes out in print once a week. It's the Web site, it's the festival, it's our mobile application - all these things - and what they stand for and what they mean.

I know from my conversations with people in the administration that every world leader that Obama met in Berlin, in Peru, in Athens was extremely alarmed by Trump's election. That very much includes Angela Merkel.

I would like to see Russia not invade Ukraine or put pressure on and threaten Baltic states. But we live in the real and existing world.

I would also like to see Russia not interfere in our elections.