Posts by Alex Miller

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Of Charities and Children

Two Trump-related stories came into focus in mid-June, just as the President celebrated his 72nd birthday. On the day of, June 14th, New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood gave Trump a rather unusual present, charging his charitable organization, the Trump Foundation, with state and federal charities law violations extending over a decade.

 

Meanwhile, controversy mounted over the Justice Department’s “zero tolerance” policy on immigration, which has been the cause of children being separated from their parents and held in detention. The debate came to a crescendo over the Father’s Day weekend,

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The Second Death of Mark Sanford

On Tuesday June 12th, 2018, US Representative Mark Sanford (R-SC) lost his primary bid for reelection, in a hotly contested race which went to his rival, state representative Katie Arrington, who had been endorsed by Donald Trump. Although Sanford had an 87% record of voting with the White House on the issues, he had also been deprecating about some of the Commander-in-Chief’s more egregious Tweets and statements, and Trump had trashed him in a fit of presidential pique.

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Donald Trump’s 2018 Solar Return: The Shit Hits the Fan

If Donald Trump maintains his grasp on the US presidency for the duration of his upcoming solar year, then he will likely complete his first term in office. He may even win reelection. But looking ahead at the year on tap, that’s a huge “if”. This appears to be the pivotal year for Trump, the one that decides how the remainder of his life unfolds.

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Celebrity Suicides: Spade & Bourdain

Two celebrity suicides shocked the world in the first week of June 2018. Kate Spade, New York fashion designer and sister-in-law of actor David Spade, was found hung by a scarf in the closet of her Manhattan apartment on June 5, and Anthony Bourdain, celebrity chef, food critic and global travel guide, was found unresponsive in his Strasbourg, France hotel room, an apparent suicide, on June 8.

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The Pardoner’s Tale

A few months ago I joked with a friend that the myriad bizarre stories coming out of the Trump administration had begun to read like something out of Chaucer – call them the “Trumperbury Tales” – stories which were individual, varied and specific, but tangentially related by a common venue, in the Oval Office. But the recent spate of presidential pardon-related stories seems to put us on a level playing field with the great medieval poet, in a direct comparison with Chaucer’s “The Pardoner’s Tale.”

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Let Them Eat Cake

On Monday June 4th, 2018, a much-anticipated ruling came down from the US Supreme Court. By a 7-2 majority, the justices upheld the right of a Colorado baker to refuse services to a gay couple, based in his religious beliefs. The case centered on a 2012 incident when David Mullins and Charlie Craig approached Jack Phillips, owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado, and asked him to bake a cake for their wedding.

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