2019.02.21
Sort of tangentially related, in the sense of appreciation of the world and the particular kind of mindfulness and attention he cultivated: the medium-thick layer of snow, bonded with a bit of ice, was immensely satisfying to brush off the car this morning, sliding off in gratifyingly large hunk sheets.
Also I'd love to see more of his ("Old Friends...New Friends") 1978 series (20 episodes) targeted at grown-ups. Had no idea such a thing existed.
The Three Rhetorical Tricks That Bind Trump to his Base
Hmm. There's this idea in the Scot Adams crew that Trump is a "master persuader" and "playing 4 dimensional chess". That's only partially true - he's not good at persuading people in general, but he gets more and more loyalty from his base, and he has excellent instincts for playing a room (probably honed during his WWE wrasslin' + Vince McMahon shaving days) as long as it is supportive people - and then by being utterly willing to ignore standards of decency and respectful conversation. Or conversation, for that matter, from him the sh*t only rolls downhill (with Sean Hannity and Fox News carrying the buckets up and getting him all hot and bothered.)