Perhaps the most enlightening comment former special counsel Jack Smith offered during his hours-long testimony before the Republican-led House Judiciary Committee centered not on Trump but on what Smith was tasked with doing.

The case his team had assembled in obtaining an indictment against the then-former president, Smith said, was ”built to be tried in a courtroom, not in the media.” But here he was, facing questions from legislators not in a courtroom but on Capitol Hill — which, for all intents and purposes, means “in the media.”

There wasn’t much use to the hearing. There’s no actual question to adjudicate. No serious and unbiased observer questions Smith’s objectivity or credibility and no serious observer questions that Trump tried to overturn the 2020 election, triggering the riot that overwhelmed the building on Jan. 6, 2021. In effect, then, the existence of the hearing necessarily served to reinforce the falsehood that there was a debate in the first place.

Smith summarized the importance of recognizing reality in his opening remarks.

“The rule of law is not self-executing,” he said. That is, the bounds of the law are real only to the extent that they are respected. Smith, better than most, understands what it looks like when that respect evaporates.

The product of the hearing wasn’t a studious consideration of the validity of his work since, as stipulated above, there was nothing serious to mull over. Instead, the primary output of the hearing was probably a tidy stream of social-media-friendly video snippets. Members of the House (nearly all of whom will soon face primaries or reelection) saw an opportunity to make news and most of them tried.

What this means, in effect, is that the hearing not only didn’t resolve any tension between reality and surreality, it simply dug each side in a little deeper.

This wasn’t Smith’s fault. He very carefully responded to Republicans’ questions/attacks, offering a cautious deliberateness that will undoubtedly be read as hedging by the Republican media universe. But the decisions he and his team made about who to charge and when and with what were, again, centered on obtaining a conviction, not on muting Sean Hannity. He couldn’t help but leave plenty of space for Republicans to use cheap little rhetorical tactics aimed at collapsing trust in him and, by extension, his very-obviously-valid investigation.

Not to sound like the middle-aged man I am, but at one point in time the effort to convey reality would have been aided by the presence of an intermediary layer between the legislators and the public. Congress would hold a hearing and reporters would observe it and then they would tell the world what happened. They did so imperfectly, absolutely, and not without introducing some small measure of bias. But these, too, were largely accounted for and corrected through the systems in which they worked: being unfair or dishonest was a good way to find yourself looking for work.

What the public would have heard about the hearing wasn’t, say, Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan’s (R-Ohio) hyperactive dishonesties about Smith and the aftermath of the 2020 election. It would (ideally at least) be a summary of the hearing and his actions leavened with an anchor of truth. That Smith’s findings are credible, as is he, and that Republican politicians are biased in a way that Smith clearly isn’t.

These days, Americans are generally unencumbered by any such anchor. If they want to just get the “JORDAN HUMILIATED BY DEMOCRATS!” take, it’s there on YouTube. If they only want to hear “DERANGED SMITH COMMITS PERJURY,” they can subscribe to any random Republican legislator’s social media feed. Or, for that matter, the president’s. There is no filtering layer between the event and the public; there’s no net to trap the lies. More accurately: There are plenty of ways to drink the raw sewage without waiting for the water treatment plant to do its work.

It’s important to recognize that the presentation of falsehoods from legislators (particularly Republican ones today) is not solely a function of dishonesty. There are some, like Jordan, who think it’s clever to shade the truth to get what they want. There are also a lot who simply haven’t done the homework and trust the Jordans of the world to tell them how it is or what to say. Republican Rep. Michael Baumgartner of Washington admitted during the hearing that he really didn’t know anything about Smith’s work, but then ended his time at the mic by equating the special counsel to a soldier in Vietnam who endorsed the massacre of a village. If we can’t even get members of Congress to take five seconds and figure out the difference between true and false, what luck are we going to have with the public? And that’s considering those who actually perform their duties in good faith.

While Smith was testifying, we learned that the White House had shared a manipulated photo of someone arrested by the Justice Department to show her crying, a new line crossed by an administration fully committed to prioritizing the scoring Online Points Against Their Enemies over dutifully informing the public even if they seek to persuade them. It’s just another form of lying, one for which a large segment of the media will make excuses — or offer cheers.

Consider Smith’s line in light of that: he was aiming to meet the careful standard of a courtroom, not the non-existent standard of rhetorical disputes in the mass media. These two things used to be in relative alignment, even if they differed in rigor and methodology. But they no longer are, because one is a traditional system of rules and self-respect while media has shattered into a ruthless marketplace dominated by snake-oil salesmen. And elected leaders consistently see more value in becoming snake-oil franchisees than in telling anyone what they don’t want to hear.

Photo: Capitol police officers embrace on Thursday, August 5, 2021, in the Rose Garden of the White House. (Flickr/White House/Adam Schultz)

Donald Trump has started a new members-only club that demands a high entry fee. But instead of being situated in southern Florida or the rolling hills of New Jersey, this one is virtual. And instead of adopting a gaudily romantic name, this one is just called “the Board of Peace.”

The president rolled out this new initiative in an event held during the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland. He’d already offered some public details — member countries were asked for $1 billion in contributions; its focus would be on rebuilding war-ravaged Gaza — but the Davos event was the official launch party. Representatives of several of the countries that had already signed up to participate were there, including United Arab Emirates, Hungary and Pakistan.

You will notice that those countries are not traditional allies of the United States. That’s telling, given that some are concerned that the Board of Peace might be intended to be a center of power that exists in opposition to the United Nations.

In fact, nearly all of the countries that agreed to work with Trump’s Board of Peace are ones that are rated relatively poorly on an important metric: adoption of democracy.

The Economist Intelligence Unit’s annual Democracy Index assesses the strength of each nation’s commitment to democracy (or lack thereof). In 2024, the average score across the world — on a zero-to-10, least-democratic-to-most scale — was 5.2. The score among the identified founding members of Trump’s Board? 4.5 points. That includes the U.S.; removing our country drops that average to 4.3.

The EIU’s analysis slots countries into one of four categories, ranging from authoritarian to full democracies. Nine of the countries that signed up for Trump’s Board fall into the “authoritarian” group. None — including the U.S. — are considered full democracies.

Given that the focus is ostensibly on Gaza, you might assume that the imbalance above is a function of regional partners, non-democratic Middle Eastern countries wanting to invest. But it isn’t. It’s a panoply of weak democracies and autocracies that span the globe.

Why does this matter? In part because the U.S. has traditionally sought to participate primarily with international actors that share our political values. Trump appears to be building a pay-for-play alliance that gives bad actors access to American power, perhaps with an eye toward aggregating power to contravene the existing convening international body, the United Nations.

Put another way, this matters because these are not historically the sorts of partners that America has sought out. But, then, Trump is not historically the type of president we elect.

Below, the trend in the EIU’s index by country over time.

Photo: Donald Trump at an event in December. (Flickr/The White House)

At the outset of his second term in office, Americans were willing to give Donald Trump the benefit of the doubt. Every incoming president has something of a honeymoon period after inauguration, a few weeks or months when people (generally meaning independents and the opposing party) haven’t yet decided that he is terrible.

Trump wasn’t really a new president, as such, so there was no guarantee that he’d experience the same lift. But he did. In his second month, despite his furious effort to immediately reshape the government and the country, Trump generally enjoyed net-positive approval on key policy issues.

No longer. By the end of last summer he was underwater across the board. Even on immigration, an issue that was perceived to be a particular strength of Trump’s, significantly more Americans now see him doing poorly rather than well.

(I’m not going to spend time here getting into the debate over whether Democrats ought to have focused on the economy or on immigration when attacking Trump because it’s pretty clearly been settled. Attacking strengths is more valuable than highlighting weaknesses because you have the potential of eliminating that strength. It’s really not that complicated.)

The categories used above are necessarily broad, since it’s tricky to repeatedly ask poll respondents their view on dozens of specific policies. But YouGov has been asking people about a subset of Trump’s immigration policy: deportation. Over the past year, he’s gone from being plus-18 on it to minus-8. That’s largely because of a surge in opposition from non-Republicans — but also a small drop among Republicans.

One of the most remarkable recent poll findings came from CNN. Respondents were asked if they saw Trump’s presidency as a success or as a failure. Most said “failure.”

In fact, Americans were more likely to describe Trump’s second term as a failure than they were to use that word to describe his first term in the immediate aftermath of Jan. 6, 2021. Back then, only half of independents said Trump’s first four years in office were a failure. Now, two-thirds of them say his second term has been.

But note those numbers among Republicans. Nine in 10 approve of his deportation policies, even now. He’s well above water on approval on the various policy issues and overall. And while 1 in 9 see his presidency as a failure — which seems like a lot! — 8 in 9 don’t.

Maybe opposition to what ICE is doing will prompt him to reconsider his approach. Maybe concerns about how Republicans might fare in the midterms will do it. But he himself is not running for reelection (however much he likes to daydream about doing so) and has demonstrated an indifference to opposition that borders on the pathological.

When Renee Good was shot and killed by an ICE agent earlier this month, Trump and his team were quick to portray her as a “terrorist” who tried to run the agent over, neither of which was true. But then Trump learned from a CBS News interview that Good’s father was a Trump supporter.

“When I learned her — her parents, and her father in particular is — I hope he still is, but, I don’t know, was a tremendous Trump fan, he was all for Trump, loved Trump,” Trump said. “And, you know, it’s terrible. I was told that by a lot of people. They said, oh, he loves you. He was a — I hope he still feels that way. I don’t know. It’s a hard situation. But her father was a tremendous — and parents were tremendous Trump fans.”

That’s what he took away from Renee Good’s killing: It was primarily bad because her father was a Trump supporter.

That is what he takes away from all other criticism, too. Unless you are or were a supporter, he doesn’t care.

Photo: Trump “dancing.” (Flickr/White House)

I’m a bit tired of regurgitating all of the times that private citizen Donald Trump disparaged then-President Barack Obama’s golf habit from 2009 to 2017. You can search for yourself and see; on the campaign trail in 2015 and 2016 it was a regular part of his patter. When Obamacare kicked in, Obama would probably be off golfing!!! Obama talks about climate change — but flies a jet to Hawaii to play golf!!!!! “You can’t be playing golf when Japan is burning and crashing”!!!! And so on.

At one point — as I have also pointed out repeatedly — Trump told 2016 voters that he would be too busy as president to play golf, a pledge that got thrown out the window almost as soon as he actually took office.

Today marks the end of Trump’s fifth (non-consecutive) year as president. Over that period, he has likely played golf 20 more times than did Obama, 6 percent more golf.

I say “likely” because (as I have also noted before) Trump almost exclusively plays at private clubs owned by his family’s private company and prevents the media from knowing what he’s up to. I’ve tracked his daily calendar for both terms in office, though, and I am confident that my total (excluding days when it’s raining, for example, or when he wasn’t at a club long enough for a round) is accurate. (As for Obama’s total, that comes from the late CBS reporter Mark Knoller.)

Trump’s total is driven by his playing golf more often during his second term. In his first term, he averaged a round of golf every 5.6 days. This time around, he’s averaging a round every 3.9 days.

You can track Trump’s golfing and visits to Trump properties at pbump.net/outofoffice.

That increase in frequency has his cumulative total nearing twice as often as Obama. Obama played an average of 42 days per year, about 1 in every 9 days. Trump’s averaging 71 days per year — essentially a round every five days.

If Trump continues at his second-term pace, he’ll end up having played on 375 days from Jan. 20, 2025 to Jan. 20, 2029 — meaning that he will have likely played golf on the equivalent of a full year of his term in office. He’ll also have exceeded Obama’s eight-year total in only four years.

Trump doesn’t always achieve the things he desires. I’m confident, though, that he’s got the level of commitment necessary to make this one come to fruition.

Photo: Trump on a Trump Organization golf course last year. (Flickr/White House)

 

Over the weekend, ICE agents repeatedly used the killing of Renee Good to threaten Minnesotans recording their activities. "Did you not learn from what just happened?" They thought it was a "lesson" and now they'd be left alone. Didn't work.

— David Bier (@davidjbier.bsky.social) 2026-01-12T14:53:10.422Z

   

UNARMED WOMAN: “Shame on you.”ICE GOON: “Have you not learned from the past few days?”UNARMED WOMAN: “Learned what? What’s our lesson?”ICE GOON: *VIOLENTLY SNATCHES HER PHONE*(H/T @Mollyploofkins)

— The Tennessee Holler (@thetnholler.bsky.social) 2026-01-10T17:35:43.714Z

   

"You guys need to stop obstructing us, that's why that lesbian b*tch is dead!..They literally said, have you not learned? This is why we killed that lesbian bitch!"-2 ICE protesters arrested for legally following ICE tell our @jtcestkowski.bsky.social ICE slandered Renee Nicole Good. MORE⬇️

— Status Coup News (@statuscoupnews.bsky.social) 2026-01-12T22:26:52.492Z

   

“The driver, the ICE agent that had pepper-sprayed into the vents of my car, said, ‘You guys gotta stop obstructing us. That’s what that lesbian bitch is dead.”

   

REMINDER. “To all ICE officers: You have federal immunity in the conduct of your duties. Anybody who lays a hand on you or tries to stop you or tries to obstruct you is committing a felony. You have immunity to perform your duties, and no one—no city official, no state official,… pic.twitter.com/xoWDjOctLe

— Homeland Security (@DHSgov) January 13, 2026

 

Photo: Trump speaking on Jan. 6, 2026. (Flickr/White House)