Source: The Atlantic
by Eliot A Cohen
“Like most administrations, including those of considerably more sedate chief executives, that of the 47th president has decided to way overinterpret its mandate. The brute facts remain: Donald Trump received a plurality of votes (albeit a decisive majority in the Electoral College); the Republican Party is holding on to the House of Representatives by a hair and has a slim majority in the Senate. … Gravity still works — if somewhat unreliably. Politicians who overinterpret narrow wins in a divided country get pulled back to Earth, usually by the midterms. But not just that — the federal system of government gives a lot of power to the states, and although Congress has become anemic and irresponsible, most state governments have not.” (01/27/25)