Donald Trump Jr.

The White House has announced that everyone coming into range of President Trump will be tested for COVID-19. Trump, meanwhile, insists that he won’t wear a mask when meeting other leaders — or, as he put it in order of reverse dignity, ‘presidents, prime ministers, dictators, kings, queens’.Unfortunately the worst-case scenario — that a 73-year-old might catch a dose and get seriously ill — no longer seems outlandish. On Sunday night, Britain’s prime minister Boris Johnson was hospitalized after falling sick 10 days ago. Today he went into critical care. What if someone sneezes and Trump catches a cold?Welcome to the nasty, brutish and short Pence presidency.

The battle for the soul of the Republican party after President Trump has begun. Last week former United States ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, gave a provocative speech to the Hudson Institute setting herself up for a 2024 run on a largely free market platform. The speech has been published by Stand for America, an advocacy organization founded by Haley after standing down as ambassador in December 2018. Haley argues that capitalism has lifted billions out of poverty, improved the environment, and created immense prosperity – including the electricity, cars, airplanes, the internet and much more.

Why did Donald Trump choose Orlando, near Disney World, for his campaign kickoff Tuesday night? Because he appears to be living in a fantasy land.Trump reached the White House by promising a border wall, a national industrial policy and a restrained foreign policy. He has delivered near none of those things, but the Mickey Mouse president is running for re-election anyway.Trump repeated some familiar cartoons on Tuesday, ridiculing Hillary Clinton a mere three years after defeating her. But it was a night for the hits. He also served up an old slapstick favorite, claiming that the media deflate his crowd sizes. The New York Times confirmed the number in attendance to be north of 20,000. Trump's goofy claim that there were 'over 100,000 requests' to get in remains unconfirmed.

After his soporific performance last night on national television, Donald Trump is back in form. He just engineered a fresh shutdown this afternoon. At a meeting with congressional Democrats this afternoon, Trump threw a temper tantrum, slamming his fist on the Resolute Desk and exiting the Oval Office. He tweeted, ‘Just left a meeting with Chuck and Nancy, a total waste of time. I asked what is going to happen in 30 days if I quickly open things up, are you going to approve Border Security which includes a Wall or Steel Barrier? Nancy said, NO. I said bye-bye, nothing else works!’By the bye, Trump is insisting that Republicans have never been more unified.

The Democratic Party appears to see its red-state Senate races as sticky short-term exercises in triangulation and coalition-building, best conducted as far from the national spotlight as possible. It has neglected the opportunity of grouping this handful of candidates behind an assertive vision of its own future leadership in rural and small-town America. Take the Democratic senator Jon Tester, the only working farmer in the United States Senate. ‘Jon? He’s just real,’ said Martha Small, a member of the Northern Cheyenne tribe I spoke to. ‘He’s a real person. My concerns are his concerns. Public lands, Native American issues – suicide among our 18-24 youths being the number one.

Will the King be toppled? No one is likely to observe of Steve King of Iowa, as nasty a piece of work as has ever served as a Congressman, ‘My heart is inditing of a good matter: I speak of the things which I have made unto the King.’ Intel and Land O’Lakes have rescinded their financial backing for him. King isn’t running any ads or even much of a campaign for reelection. His challenger J.D. Scholten, by contrast, has raised some $641,000 in the past two days. At the same time, the press is brimming with stories about young people turning out in droves to vote. The Cook Report has revised its predictions to indicate that the Democrats may win up to 40 seats in the House.