I'm sitting here today making the probable mistake of trying to figure out what's on Donald Trump's mind: Does he have an endgame strategy to this government shutdown? Why did he think this moment — when Democrats are about to take control of Congress — was a good time for this battle? It seems to me like a general saying, "No, let's not attack the enemy until they get stronger."
On Thursday, I was coming out of a building in Beverly Hills and I witnessed an argument with a man getting out of an Uber car and its driver yelling at each other. Near as I could tell, the driver was telling the passenger what a great man Donald Trump is and the passenger was saying Trump wasn't fit to slop pigs, let alone be President of the United States and it reached the point where the passenger said, "Pull over and let me out" and the driver said, "With pleasure." I wonder what you tip for that kind of ride.
Eliot A. Cohen is a professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. He has penned a good essay on the resignation of Secretary of Defense James Mattis, and I would imagine that its lesson also applies to Brett McGurk, the special presidential envoy who also resigned the other day. The lesson is that you can serve the needs of the United States of America or you can serve the needs of Donald J. Trump…but no way can you do both at the same time.
I just saw a Grubhub commercial that tells me I can order from "over 85,000 restaurants nationwide" and they'll deliver. That's not true. I can order from any restaurant within about six miles from me. I can't get a hot, fresh pie from John's Pizza of Bleecker Street in New York delivered to my door in half an hour. Believe me. If I could, I would.
It is my solid belief that 100% of folks who claim to be able to read minds, contact the dead, sense the future via psychic powers or heal via such abilities are crooked and often dangerous frauds. And by "100%," I do not mean "almost 100%" or 99.9%." I mean every dishonest, lying one of 'em. This especially applies to John Of God, a much-heralded (and as criminal as any of them) faith healer in Brazil who scamming thousands of people…and raping the cuter ones. My pal Paul Harris can tell you about the guy better than I can.
Mary Poppins Returns has gotten mostly great reviews but a couple of wide-circulation critics have dumped on it, in some cases for being too much like the original and too unlike it, both at the same time. Don't believe 'em. Get a kid or become one for a while and go see it.