Trump is a fascist. And that's not a term I use loosely or often. But he's earned it. - Max Boot

Catering to populist anger with proposals that are certain to fail is not a viable strategy for political success.

Journalists are naturally skeptical of the U.S. intelligence, given the U.S. government's history making claims that did not pan out—most notoriously about the presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, which was used to justify the U.S. invasion in 2003. But there is indeed a long history of Russia using so-called false-flag operations to justify aggression.

There is no evidence that Republican leaders have been demonstrably dumber than their Democratic counterparts. During the Reagan years, the G.O.P. briefly became known as the "party of ideas," because it harvested so effectively the intellectual labor of conservative think tanks. ... In recent years, however, the Republicans' relationship to the realm of ideas has become more and more attenuated as talk-radio hosts and television personalities have taken over the role of defining the conservative movement that once belonged to thinkers.