The New York Times had a headline on its website - Trump Turning To Ultra Wealthy To Steer Economic Policy. This doesn't sound very populist to me. Today's commerce secretary, the names being talked about for treasury secretary, I think there will be populist talk but maybe no populist action.
E. J. DionneThe madman theory can work, but it only works if it's strategic. And I think one of the problems that President Trump faces is people don't really know how much strategy is here and how much is he just sort of talking off the top of his head. And I think North Korea is a really classic case of a potentially insoluble problem, a problem that you have to manage.
E. J. DionneThe Democrats want to celebrate their successes but don't want to look out of touch with the people who haven't risen much in the last decade or so really.
E. J. DionneThe new culture war is about national identity rather than religion and 'transcendent authority.' It focuses on which groups the United States will formally admit to residence and citizenship. It asks the same question as the old culture war: 'Who are we?' But the earlier query was primarily about how we define ourselves morally. The new question is about how we define ourselves ethnically, racially and linguistically. It is, in truth, one of the oldest questions in our history, going back to our earliest immigration battles of the 1840s and 1850s.
E. J. Dionne