ArcaMax

Call me a contrarian, but today I’m going to do something unpopular: I’m going to stand up for federal employees – and, while I’m at it, for city, county and state employees, too. You know, all those people Elon Musk and Donald Trump snidely dismiss as “bureaucrats.”

Unlike most presidents, who take office promising to create new ...Read more

You can’t say he didn’t warn us. In three weeks, Donald Trump has taken a wrecking ball to our democratic institutions, trying to deliver on every wild campaign promise he made.

The scope of his lawless actions even stunned some of his supporters. Oh, he won’t pardon all January criminals, they assured us, just those who’d not engaged ...Read more

We’ve survived two turbulent weeks of Trump Two. And, amid all the chaos, there’s no doubt who’s in charge. He’s the man of the hour. He’s everywhere: giving orders, making demands, blasting what he doesn’t like, and seizing the role of spokesman for the United States around the world. And, of course, I’m talking about – not ...Read more

One thing Donald Trump can never be accused of: getting off to a slow start. After the most divisive inaugural address in history – delivered on the “scene of the crime” – he hurried to sign 26 executive orders, 12 memos and four proclamations which, among other abuses of power, revoked 78 of former President Biden’s executive actions ...Read more

One of the great joys of living in Washington is access to the great Smithsonian museums, all free to the public. But no matter where you go in Washington, you can’t escape politics. As I realized again this week, visiting one of the greatest art exhibitions I’ve ever seen, “The Impressionist Moment,” at the National Gallery.

Over five ...Read more

Here’s how I’d sum up this week in Washington: I wouldn’t walk across the street to say hello to Donald Trump. But I waited in line for two and a half hours, most of it outside in 29-degree cold and snow, to say goodbye to Jimmy Carter.

And I was hardly alone. Washington’s dignitaries celebrated Carter’s life on Tuesday afternoon. But...Read more

If nothing else, 2024 was a year filled with mind-blowing, first-of-its-kind events: for the first time ever, a former president appeared in a courtroom charged with crimes; a sitting president suddenly dropped out of the race for re- election and endorsed his vice president; a former president was convicted on 34 counts and yet easily re- ...Read more

If boasts are to be believed, “Day One” of the second coming of Donald J. Trump promises an apoplectic unraveling of the federal government.

The department of education will crumble, and career civil servants will resign in droves. Legions of immigrant parents will line up to board awaiting buses and planes or simply self-deport, bidding ...Read more

Despite the gloom and doom surrounding the results of November 5, it would be nice to end the year with a glimmer of hope: the certainty that at least one guardrail against a Trump dictatorship was still in place. Alas, that’s not the case.

Two other guardrails, the courts and the Congress, were already lost. The Roberts Supreme Court has ...Read more

It’s a ritual as old as America. A new president is elected. He then selects the leaders of his team, who are subject to confirmation by the Senate based on their experience and qualifications for the office to which they were nominated.

There’s only one thing lacking today: a laugh-out loud test, whereby some nominees would never be ...Read more

It’s hard to know who’s more to blame for the insane reaction to Joe Biden’s pardon of his son Hunter: MAGA Republicans, the media or fellow Democrats. The response from all three has been overwrought, manufactured and pitifully sanctimonious.

Depending on which “absolutely horrified!” source you pick, Biden’s action was a “...Read more

“Kakistocracy” is trending again.

The obscure term, coined as early as the seventeenth century and defined by Merriam-Webster as “government by the worst people,” has surged on Google Trends since the election.

What does government by the worst look like? To the cynical, that question may call to mind Dorothy Parker’s famous response...Read more