ArcaMax

Few in American politics are as desperate as California Gov. Gavin Newsom is right now.

Newsom, long considered — by himself, anyway — a frontrunner for the Democratic nomination for president, has been positioning himself and repositioning himself to be next in line for years.

And this week, through the Los Angeles smog, he can see the ...Read more

There’s nothing Donald Trump believes in more than his own power of persuasion.

From “The Art of the Deal” to Trump Steaks to his foray into politics, Trump’s North Star has always been his confidence that he can convince anyone of anything.

Remember, simply by assuming the office of the president, Trump promised he’d end the Russian...Read more

He shot onto the political scene seemingly out of nowhere.

But Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, made his presence known in short time.

After acquiring Twitter in 2022 and wading into the controversial politics of free speech and misinformation, Musk’s first big...Read more

On Thursday morning, a gleeful GOP celebrated the passing of President Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” by the House. It didn’t come easy — there were a few dissenters — but eventually, fear of Trump’s retribution likely pushed it through.

But it’s a Pyrrhic victory, if a victory at all, and we’re undoubtedly worse off for it.

...Read more

“He totally f***ed us.”

It’s rare to hear a political party operative speak this way about one of his own. It’s almost unheard of to hear a well-known campaign adviser like David Plouffe speak this way on the record about the former president of the United States, Joe Biden. Especially in this Democratic Party.

But that’s exactly ...Read more

Among the many problems Democrats faced in the 2024 election — former President Joe Biden’s obvious decline, a rejiggered ticket at the 11th hour, a slumbering economy and border crisis that Dems took too long to acknowledge — was their terrible timing.

When Biden won in 2020, it was with an implicit promise to be a one-term president, a ...Read more

This week, President Trump’s second term turned 100…days, that is.

And to mark the occasion, he held a rally in Michigan where he touted what he thinks of as his biggest accomplishments — tariffs, deporting alleged gang members to El Salvador, and his creation of the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE.

But one look under the ...Read more

Pete Hegseth came in hot.

The tatted-up warhawk who’d spent the past seven years as a “Fox & Friends” weekend host was on nobody’s short list for defense secretary when incoming President Trump made him his pick to lead the largest organization in the world.

His lack of experience running a large organization was only one problem. Few ...Read more

Better buy your “Forever” stamps now, because the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) has announced another price increase. On July 13, the cost of a first- class stamp is scheduled to rise from 73 cents to politics/fromtheright/secupp/s-3676773">Read more

Our long national nightmare is over. Or is it?

After the longest week of economic uncertainty and peril Americans have endured in a long time, President Donald Trump finally caved and announced a 90-day pause on his ham-fisted, hairbrained, ill-advised and ill-conceived trade war with the world.

The 10% baseline tariffs will stay, but the ...Read more

Here’s a nice trick for the misanthropic: Mention “import substitution industrialization” at the next dinner party you attend, and watch eyes glaze over and bodies slowly depart your general area.

Talking economic theory isn’t usually exciting. And talking trade theory, including the supporting theory for tariffs, even less so.

But, ...Read more

“Michael Waltz has learned a lesson, and he’s a good man.”

This was the president of the United States’s defense of his national security adviser who’s embroiled in a humiliating, alarming, and ...Read more

Back in 2020, while Donald Trump and Joe Biden were locked in a close race for the White House, some of us who’d covered Trump for years were ringing alarm bells that, if he lost, he would not go quietly.

To us, this was more than obvious. In 2016, he’d teased that his first election, which he won, was going to be rigged. In 2020, he’d ...Read more