Trump's 'Weave' and His 'Smart' Defenders

Mardi Gras was great fun, but more on that some other time. The festivities included a ball that had me up past my writer's/old man's relatively early bedtime. A Trump follower made me aware (on that otherwise relatively Trump-free day) that he would be addressing Congress, not that I'd have watched it in real time anyway.

(A question: If Trump knows everything and is omnipotent as so many followers of his seem to imagine, why does he need to deliver a message to us poor slobs at all? Why delay America's Golden Age one more second by prattling about it? I find this question remarkably similar to ones I had as a boy starting off from the supposed need for imperfect, inefficient human missionaries to "spread the word" on behalf of a deity alleged to be omnipotent and ubiquitous -- i.e., more capable and better-placed to do so...)

This post won't be about whatever Trump bloviated on then, but about a couple of pieces I've run across that make interesting points about the President that I think are worth considering.

This post will, however, probably help the reader better grasp why the President does some of the things he does, and communicates about them the way he does.

The first and much longer (and better) of these is a Jonah Goldberg piece at The Dispatch, titled "Judge Trump's Motives, Not Just His Methods," and it is aimed at a common shortcoming in analyses of Trump's actions. (There are a few that aren't tribal embarrassments consisting of blind worship or hysterical smearing.).

Goldberg's piece is a bit long (about 2000 words), but uses multiple examples to build a case that many conservative defenders of Trump, while partly correct to push back against a certain hysterical kind of leftwing criticism of the President's actions, fail to impart true understanding of those actions:

This approach of taking each controversy as a single, isolated argument amounts to debating single trees while ignoring the forest.

To be blunt: This approach's fundamental problem is it treats Trump as a kind of academic abstraction. What can the president do? rather than the more pressing question: Why is this president doing this?

And, much later:

I do not think the smart conservatives I have in mind necessarily disagree with me in whole or in part. But the tendency to fall back on those academic -- and correct! -- arguments about the president's power often hinge on a false assumption about Trump's motives. The motives of a president matter a great deal. His politicization of government institutions is not simply a needed corrective to past politicizations, as sorely deserving those politicizations were in need of correction.

This is not normal. Trump's program isn't really ideological and certainly not "conservative" in any traditional sense. If Trump were overseeing the imposition of Reaganism, or even some ideological agenda I disagreed with, those arguments would have greater purchase with me. But MAGA at its best is a pretext, and more often it's not even that. This is the faux-ideology of one person, one person's vanity, grievances and personal glory.

That's why I think the "why" of it all is much more important than debates about "can." Sure, he can do a lot of things, because the Founders really didn't envision someone like Trump as president. They envisioned the man who presided over the Constitutional Convention, George Washington... [bold added, links omitted]

Regulars will know that Goldberg is no raving leftist willing to impute/project ridiculous alleged motives onto Trump. Goldberg instead follows the proper approach of abstracting a motive from the commonalities of the various controversies.

The second piece is mercifully short (coming as it does from a Trump acolyte) but also less helpful (again, coming as it does from a Trump acolyte). It is about the trademark rhetorical style Trump uses in front of supporters and other people he feels he has power over, and which he himself has called "the weave."

Like the first, what is probably most interesting is what modern conservatives are failing to notice.

Trump's rhetorical style, the piece claims, is intentional, with the President always returning to where he started from. (No, I have not myself verified the claim that the full text of his remarks will prove it, but let's accept the premise here.)

And indeed, this ability to touch on a vast array of topics is precisely what makes President Trump's "weave" so effective. From building his business empire to his time atop the entertainment industry, President Trump has spent his entire career learning to be an effective speaker. Unlike most career politicians who sound rigid and stale in front of a microphone, President Trump has an innate [sic] ability to feel the mood and energy of an audience and adjust accordingly.

Without becoming boring or dull, President Trump provides colorful context while helping anyone listening to him understand the broader connections between various different issues. Through the power of storytelling, he provides the American people with an inside look into the events and interactions that shape his thinking and decision-making. "The weave" is a central part of what makes him the most open and transparent president in American history. [bold added]

Setting aside for a moment, effective? at what?: Many commenters have noted the value of storytelling to build a connection with an audience, and it is well known that some orators are very good a reading a room and throwing out the right kind of red meat. Resist gagging at the obsequiousness and you can see a valid point.

But if Trump is as brilliant as he says he is and is as transparent as his toadies say, where is his ironclad case for tariffs? Or for continuing the "War on Drugs"? Or for releasing actual criminals during his blanket January 6 pardons?

There are no such arguments in these stories, and it is disturbing that so many conservatives are apparently okay with that.

Things work -- or don't -- for reasons in reality, and for the vast majority of matters in politics, ordinary men can understand those reasons.

And a truly honest and effective leader will be able to explain those things to the public in a succinct way they can understand. (Indeed, this is why good leaders make cases so clear that opponents hang themselves when they continue to present opposition.) That is about the one thing "the weave" leaves out altogether.

-- CAV

Happy Mardi Gras!

Or: Down, But Not Out

The first part of this week was already going to be hectic for me, but I fell ill Friday on top of everything. I'm better, but have a weekend's worth of chores and errands to catch up on, and, if my improved health holds up, a Mardi Gras parade ride to do Tuesday.

That opportunity comes courtesy of a relative who is a member of one of the krewes that put on the parades. That will have me busy from the wee hours until the end of that parade Tuesday. And then there's a ball, which my wife is looking forward to.

While I am happy to learn even more about this new-to-me local holiday, and am grateful for the chance to participate in this way, I can't help but remember a parting comment I wrote comparing Christmas to Mardi Gras:

I forgot to mention in my analogy to Christmas, the lack of social pressure to stress out with gift-purchasing (along with outdoing the neighbors on decor). That's a great feature, so far, although I am not so sure the members of the Krewes -- the folks who plan all the parades, balls, and social gatherings -- share that luxury.

It is astounding how much time and effort go into these festivities -- as one can say about almost any field of endeavor one hasn't given much thought about in the past. I'll enjoy tomorrow, but would I want to do something like that every year? I have no idea, but lean to no as I am pretty introverted.

But the beauty is that there is no pressure to do anything, as far as I can tell. It's up to everyone to take it as far as they want or to leave it altogether, aside from the matter of joining a krewe, which I understand, can be an inscrutable process.

As I also said then:

I'm more than happy to have a new reminder to celebrate being alive, and I hope this holiday long outlives the unhappy circumstances of its birth.

Happy Mardi Gras, and I'll be back here Wednesday.

-- CAV

Four Nifty Tech Things

A Friday Hodgepodge

1. How many times have you said or heard, I'd pay for [whatever]? Conversely, have you ever wished you knew what other people would pay for that you might be able to create?

Someone out there thinks people would pay for that and created the site willpayforthis.com to collect and distribute such information to paying customers.

2. Fellow Linux geeks around my age might enjoy reading this fairly detailed history of S.u.S.E. Linux.

Freshly divorced and in the middle of grad school years ago, I wanted a way to rehabilitate my already-obsolete 486 (!) PC, which ran Windows 3.1 (! again!) and a bunch of crippleware.

Inspired after reading Neal Stephenson's "In the Beginning Was the Command Line," I went to Fry's and bought a boxed set of S.u.S.E. CDs, a larger hard drive, a Zip drive, and a Matlab license with the money I saved. (I had to compile my own kernel to get the Zip drive to work.). At the end, I had my own workstation at home that I could use to get real work done.

That brought back good memories from a difficult, but good time in my life.

3. This device isn't quite my cup of tea, but it might interest anyone wanting a distraction-free writing device.

A commenter at Hacker News aptly describes it as "kind of like if an Apple IIc and a computer from Brazil had a baby -- in a good way."

It reminds me a little of a TRS-80.

4. If you're stuck using Microsoft Teams for some reason, and want to avoid being distracted by any particular meeting attendee, there is now a solution:

I have solved that problem by sticking a post-it over the distracting person's little rectangle before. Not an optimal solution, but needs must.

I dislike Teams (for other reasons) so much that I've taken short drives to nearby meetings to attend them personally.

It's good to know about this all the same.

-- CAV

Don't (Necessarily) Toss out Your Maps!

I've always liked maps and am fortunate to have a both a good sense of direction and a good memory for routes. This caused me to be a slower adopter and more cautious user than most of audio navigation aids. (I wondered at first if they would impair my memory of new routes. I have found that they do not.) From the Garmin device of yesteryear to the Waze app of today, I'd say they have their roles, but are no substitute for understanding where you are going.

Image by Pierre le Blond de la Tour, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.

Case in point: I had a Mardi Gras-related social obligation to attend yesterday in the French Quarter. I went to the same event last year, and allowed myself lots of extra time to get there since I was new to the area.

Good thing: Waze was uncharacteristically off the scent in that older, denser part of town, and I ended up having to call the owner of the pre-paid parking I'd bought and ... consult a map to find it. On top of that, the parking place I'd bought was in very tight quarters, and I reached it after passing a couple of lots with what seemed like acres of empty places in them.

This year, with some familiarity with the area under my belt and those memories, I realized I could probably find an easy-to-remember, stress-free route directly to the huge lot, which I knew from the prior trip to be a short walk from where I needed to go.

Great move!

As good as the combination of navigation and parking apps are for strange areas, they are not necessarily a match for a local's knowledge. While it is great to get directions by ear, freeing up one's eyes, there remains the matter of having to find street signs or other indications of where to turn (that may or may not actually be there), which I find stressful, on top of the lack of memory for any landmarks I might normally use.

(I am not a nervous driver, but I value calmness enough that I will happily take a slightly slower route if it is a more relaxed experience.)

As seen above, parking apps get the job done, but since they're, for example, (a) helping lesser-known lots get customers and (b) have only a few parameters (like distance from event or price) to go on, using one can result in missing a better overall alternative, as we see here.

This year, I looked at my map in advance and at a couple of scales. Viewing freeways caused me to discover that an exit and route I frequently use would get me pretty close to the huge lot, at a minor time expense that the bad layout of the Big Easy's obsolete freeways makes more than worthwhile.

At a closer scale, I confirmed that, while the huge lot was hardly the closest to the event, it was still only a short walk away. (I also found the best walking route to my event while I was at it.)

A few zooms later, I put together a sequence of five turns that I wrote down in large print even though I'd probably remember them anyway in the context of the street layout, which is nice grid.

It was a relaxing, scenic drive that got me there almost on time, despite my starting the trip 20 minutes later than I wanted.

I'll need to attend this event again, and the route is useful for other things, so I saved the map, but I probably won't need it in the future -- unless friends or family turn out to have a use for it. For that last possibility, I annotated an electronic copy of the map with the turn sequence.

-- CAV

P.S. I did miss a turn, but recovered easily. Looking at Google Maps street view later, I found a landmark (that I recalled from the drive because it was so distinct) that will help me make that turn the next time.

Pacific Legal to Challenge Jones Act

Despite the fact that it has decimated the U.S. shipbuilding industry, handicaps the economies of outlying parts of the country, and even inspires hoop-jumping worthy of Soviet Russia (See video embedded below.), our legislative and executive branches seem to be quite happy to leave the protectionist Jones Act alone.

The Bayside Canadian Railway ran back and forth on 200 feet of track in an effort to get around the even more ridiculous requirements of the Jones Act.

But now, thanks to the intrepid legal team at the Pacific Legal Foundation, there is hope that this anachronistic violation of individual rights and roadblock to prosperity might finally be consigned to history:

With businesses trapped under high costs and crippled by impossibly unfair competition, the economic damage inflicted on citizens in Hawaii and Alaska alone has already reached billions of dollars -- and continues to mount.

The Jones Act isn't just bad for business -- it's illegal. The Constitution's Port Preference Clause prohibits Congress from favoring ports of one state over those of another to ensure equal treatment in interstate commerce. The Jones Act, however, was specifically designed to disadvantage Hawaii and Alaska, then territories, despite strong opposition to the law's discriminatory effects from Hawaiian and Alaskan officials.

Despite many attempts to repeal or reform the Jones Act, including the recent "Open America's Water Act," powerful entrenched interests maintain this protectionist scheme.

Represented at no charge by Pacific Legal Foundation, Bob and Kōloa Rum Company are fighting back with a federal lawsuit challenging the Jones Act's constitutionality under the Port Preference Clause. Victory would restore equal footing among Hawaiian businesses and their competitors and finally cast away one of the nation's most egregious examples of economic protectionism. [bold added]

This is wonderful news and could represent an unexpected win for freedom of trade (and perhaps also a teachable moment) in this new era of economic illiteracy and indifference to individual rights.

-- CAV

Dishonest Crank Now Heads Trump's OMB

Trump has saddled America with another charlatan in an important post.

Economist Tara Jirari raises the alarm over the new Chief Economist at the Office of Management and Budget because he once headed the Coalition for a Prosperous America (CPA), which not only supports tariffs, but notably used dishonest arguments to do so.

Jirari supports her charge by citing an analysis by Joseph Francois of the World Trade Institute and Robert Koopman of American University.

They note among other things that the CPA's claims "rest on assumptions that that run against established empirical evidence, contradicting hundreds of papers and decades of economic analysis on the effects of tariffs," and make more detailed commentary on some of these assumptions, including:

The next key assumption that tariffs will raise U.S. productivity growth finds absolutely no support in the economic literature. Tariffs tend to reduce productivity growth as firms face less competition and therefore less incentive to innovate and reduce costs, resulting in more scarce resources flowing to less competitive firms and sectors and away from more competitive and innovative firms and sectors, and reduce scale economies as firms now operate in a smaller, domestic market rather than a larger global market. Indeed, this assumption implies that the Smoot-Hawley tariffs should have brought the U.S. out of the Great Depression. In their underlying model, a full-blown trade war is good for everyone.

The analysis thoroughly eviscerates the CPA analysis and concludes that "this study is not only misguided, but also intentionally misleading and would not find support in a serious economics journal."

I cannot top economist Jessica Riedl's analogy, so I'll repeat it here: "This is like hiring a NASA administrator who believes the Earth is flat, an Attorney General with no legal training ... or an HHS secretary who is an anti-vaxxer (oh wait)."

-- CAV

Will 'Hot Potato' Derail Milei?

Shortly after Milei's election in Argentina, I recall seeing something about him on the news at a relative's house. I said something to the effect of I want to like him, but between his inconsistency and political opposition, I don't see him doing much good.

I was thinking both of his being a professed anarchist and of the altruist-collectivist influence of Catholicism on the culture of Argentina. I could not have foreseen Milei's evolution as a political thinker, nor, as best I can surmise, did I appreciate how badly-off Argentina was.

The latter might explain why his explanations of his agenda have such a receptive audience and why that agenda has so quickly borne fruit, as John Stossel recently reported:

I wish America's politicians would pay attention to Milei's free market reforms.

Argentina's rent controls had caused a shortage of apartments.

"When Milei lifted rent controls," says [Cato's Ian] Vasquez, "the supply of apartments in Argentina tripled and their price fell by about half!"

He also deregulated airlines, allowing new routes, pricing, and competition.

Argentina still has big problems, like lots of poverty. Argentina's tariffs, import bureaucracy, and high sales taxes make consumer goods expensive; an $800 iPhone costs almost $3,000 there.

...

Milei's success not only shows that cuts are possible, but that when they are explained intelligently, they are popular. After Milei cut government, his approval rating rose 6 points.

Sadly, I also could not have foreseen what is at best a horrendous misstep: Milei's tweet in support of a meme coin. Although he quickly retracted the statement, the damage -- to investor portfolios and his reputation -- was already done.

Yaron Brook discussed the breaking news of the Libra token scandal in Argentina.

As Yaron Brook notes (embedded above), the tweet amounted to government intervention in the economy, coming as it did from a government official. Worse, since such currencies are not backed by commodities, they are not safe stores of value, as their notorious volatility should indicate. (The Reuters piece aptly likens "investment" in such instruments to a game of hot potato.)

The move looks careless at best and corrupt at worst, and Milei is facing impeachment over it.

I completely agree with Yaron Brook that, for whatever faults Milei has, his downfall, should it occur, will be tragic for the cause of freedom, and not simply because of his pro-freedom economic moves.

-- CAV