By Terence Smith
I thought, naively, that Donald J. Trump’s craziness of the last three months on everything from Doge to tariffs to Gaza to Ukraine, would subside as we approached the 100-day mark of his second term. I thought even The Donald’s all-surpassing ego would have been sated by the headlines, the non-stop attention, the All-Trump-All-the-Time focus of our national conversation. I assumed he would settle down. Right?
Wrong!
Instead, his full-frontal assault on everything and anything, large and unbelievably petty, is continuing and even accelerating, as he attacks Harvard, law firms, DEI programs, migrants, China and — wait for it — congestion pricing in Manhattan! His record-setting pace of executive orders continues unabated. His list of pet peeves apparently has no end.
All these actions have one common purpose and goal: to keep The Donald atop Page One. As columnist Tom Edsall has noted, Trump’s hunger for attention is insatiable. Administratively, he is going to keep ploughing through the 900 pages of Project 2025’s blueprint as long as the spotlight is on him. Count on it.
And where is the Congress? Where is the Democratic opposition? Bernie and AOC are out there drawing big crowds, ordinary citizens are packing Town Halls, but to what effect? Who is the leader of the Democratic Party? Can we agree on one name, one voice? Not so far.
The stock market is up 1,000 points this morning. Yesterday, it was down 900. Chaos is the only word for it.
All this tumult poses a thorny dilemma for the Media from print to social. Trump’s actions have to be covered. But doing so guarantees more chaos, more silliness, more disruption. What to do? Context is the answer, Explain the action, the significance or lack thereof, put it in proportion, document the history behind it and find coherent, independent experts to comment on it. One other thing: report the consequences on people’s lives and futures. There are innocent victims in all of this tumult, and they should not be forgotten.