Dear Mrs. Trump

 Feedback

Isonomy guaranteed … equality, but not because all men were born or created equal, but, on the contrary, because men were by nature ... not equal, and needed an artificial institution, the polis, which by virtue of its νόμος would make them equal. --Arendt

I just came home and went to bed last night.

Apple has already phased out the iTunes from the iPhone and iPad, but now it’s expected to do the same on the Mac and other personal computers. Instead of iTunes, separate apps for music, video and podcasts are expected to be offered for computers, mirroring how Apple already handles those services on mobile devices.

Sorcerer's Apprentice update: A genetic mutation thought to make people resistant to the virus that causes AIDS could also shorten their lives, according to a new study that has renewed concern over a Chinese experiment that created the world’s first gene-edited babies.

Kamala Harris, who wants to lead the free world, has discovered a pay gap between men and women. The way she calculated this pay gap was by taking everyone who works 35 hours or more a week for the full year to find the median for women and the median for men. The problem is that these numbers don't compare women with men who perform the same jobs, work the same number of hours and have the same education. In addition, the work of Harvard economist Claudia Goldin, whose work is impossible to ignore on the left, has shown that when measured properly, the small pay gap that remains still isn't the product of discrimination. Instead, Goldin finds that men and women are paid differently because women demand what she calls "temporal flexibility." As she explained a few years ago in a "Freakonomics" podcast interview, this means "anything that leads you to want to have more time." Others call it the "caregiver" or "mommy tax." Some women care for children or aging parents, which requires more flexibility in the workplace — a choice or necessity that leads to differences in job selection for women and men. (from deRugy)

Peacock Clock:
https://www.youtube.com/embed/ilPlVRoUl_8

The Illinois legislature has just passed a $45 billion infrastructure program. It is over twice the state’s combined annual revenue from personal and corporate income taxes. It dwarfs all recent capital spending programs. The Illinois Jobs Now capital plan under Governor Pat Quinn was for $18.0 billion in new projects and $11 billion of re-appropriations from previous years. Governor George Ryan’s Illinois FIRST was for $12 billion. The Build Illinois program under Governor Jim Thompson was $2.3 billion.

This sounds like a classic straw man argument--but it strangely is not.  

"Each of us in modern society swims daily in a magnificent ocean of capitalism’s marvels – marvels now so commonplace that we take them for granted and assume, when we think of the matter at all, that they are somehow ‘natural.’ We are so fabulously rich that we have the luxury of asking ‘What causes poverty?’, oblivious to the reality that poverty is humanity’s default mode, and that what must be caused is wealth.Some people even write much-praised books that have among their premises the fantastic notion that, except in the most extreme circumstances, the value of capital – the tools used not only to keep filled, but to expand, this magnificent ocean of capitalism’s marvels – grows automatically, independently of human agency, ideas, effort, creativity, risk-taking, and institutions. Other people win political power by playing on the false belief that those whose glasses are ‘only’ 95 percent full are impoverished victims of those whose glasses are 99 percent full. “You’re poor because he’s rich” is today false in two ways. First, you’re not poor. Second, in almost all cases, not only did his riches not make you less-rich, his riches are a result of him making you richer than you would have been otherwise."--Bordeaux

On this day in 1942, the Battle of Midway–one of the most decisive U.S. victories against Japan during World War II–began. During the four-day sea-and-air battle, the outnumbered U.S. Pacific Fleet succeeded in destroying four Japanese aircraft carriers while losing only one of its own, the Yorktown, to the previously invincible Japanese navy.

                         Dear Mrs. Trump,

Some criticism has emerged over your husband's response to what Megan Markel, aka the Duchess of Cambridge, said, in 2016, would be her response to his election. This is the reported exchange:

“She said she’d move to Canada if you got elected,” said the Sun’s Tom Newton Dunn, who spoke to Trump in the Oval Office. “It turned out she moved to Britain.”

“A lot of people moving here, so what can I say? No, I didn’t know that she was nasty,” Trump said.

As most of your husband's spontaneous remarks, this was not taken either calmly or well. But it actually raises some interesting questions. The Duchess is postpartum and not available for social/political confrontation during your visit. This is probably just as well as she is from an American subset that demands disrespect to your husband and the royal family would rather all explode in flames than be publicly offensive.

You, probably the smartest one at every White House breakfast, have likely guessed where this is going. The two of you are quite fascinating. Both are immigrants, both from areas peripheral to their new country's identity, both arrive with elements ripe for bigotry--the Duchess partly black and you a model, neither background immune to irrational criticism. On the flip side, both of you are beautiful. And both of you are married to men of historic importance.

So here is my suggestion. While everyone is negotiating and blustering in the corridors of power, you make a little visit to see the Duchess. Say hi. See the baby.
Just you girls. 

And see what happens