I saw Jean Genet's play "The Balcony" many years ago, in a more innocent era. A wicked parody I thought. Never ever did I imagine it would be re-enacted so closely in real life.

Trump says America is under invasion across the Mexican border.

An assertion that leads to electoral victory becomes truth in the political sphere.

"Skeets" is yucky. The obvious choice was "bleets".

Trump is the first postmodern capitalist. He's worked all his life to position himself where now he can make unlimited money just by working his network of connections, and no one can tell what value is anymore because there are no more hierarchies.

He's the Chippendale cap to the economic pyramid.

China has Trump in a finger trap now. Once a bluff is called it's a new game. Xi knows that at this point the more Trump raises tariffs, the more isolated the US will become, and others like Japan and Korea will be drawn closer to China.

So of course Xi will goad Trump to pour it on going forward

Trump's chief problem, which he shares with many of his followers, is that he assumes he's smart enough to understand everything about how the world works, and when people try to point out factors he hasn't considered and can't grasp, he assumes they're trying to put one over on him and he gets mad.

... "Ok guys, just for laughs, let's start with an idea so crazy the American government would never actually implement it!"

Those brainstorming sessions in the Kremlin figuring out what to tell Trump to do to destroy America must have been hella fun!

The world economy interprets tariffs as damage and will route around them.

Researching #generativeart is like a pop quiz on your preconceptions and prejudices about what art is, and your confidence in assigning merit to works in an unfamiliar medium that is developing at unprecedented speed.

Can someone contact Fareed Zakaria and ask his opinion on who became what at the White House yesterday?

Canada, Mexico, the UK and the EU really need to stop thinking about how to respond to the USA and start working together right now to plan for the post-USA future.