News about Trump’s malfeasance is reaching such a volume that any analysis is nearly superfluous. There are no hidden mysteries to tease out, no nuances to explore. It’s the sort of situation that gives an opinion writer like me impostor syndrome: anyone could take a look at the news and do my job. Things are exactly what they appear to be, and any attempt to make them seem otherwise would be doing a disservice to readers in the service of a hot take.
In many ways, it’s easier for a writer to focus on the Democratic side of politics these days because the disagreements within the left are much more interesting and open to interpretation. But Trump? His story is somehow, at the same time, engrossing and shocking. Yet it is also depressingly dull—like watching the initial stages of a trial against a dumb, reckless mafia don. Did he do the bad thing? Yes. Oh look. Here’s another bad thing. Oh look again, another witness pointing out another crime.
So it is today. The four big stories are all of a piece. First, Trump capo John Kelly wishes he had stayed on longer with the goal of preventing some of the more stupid crimes, having warned his boss that investigators would close in—which they have.