the definite article 35
Trump good and bad, Dylan, Lynch, and Auschwitz as a theme park.
Greetings Substackers! We have two TDAs this week. This one is a collection of Trump-centered articles – both positive and negative – followed by some articles on music, movies, and writing. Enjoy.
Yuan Yi Zhu, writing for Unherd, noted that President Trump put a Mars mission high on the agenda for America. While realizing that this will likely not be accomplished during the Trump presidency, he also notes that the aspiration is not risible, as it would be if made by, for instance the Prime Minister of Canada or Great Britain. Or Russia. America can has aspirations like this that no one laughs at, because America could actually do it. And that says a lot about America.
https://unherd.com/newsroom/trumps-mars-ambition-is-why-america-rules-the-world/
An exuberant article in Compact about the infectious exuberance of America.
https://www.compactmag.com/article/the-return-of-american-exuberance/
Trump’s pardon of those arrested and imprisoned for crimes committed Jan. 6 made sense to Vance and Bondi for those who protested in a non-violent way. Both were clear that those convicted of violent crimes should serve their time. Trump simply issued a blanket pardon. Nothing that Biden did justifies this.
Another mistake.
A last-minute presidential face-plant. Reprehensible, and nothing Trump did justifies this.
https://www.newsweek.com/sorry-bidens-pardons-are-much-worse-trumps-opinion-2018843
This is the first episode of Eli Lake’s new podcast that tries to read history into modern events. This one compared the populism of Trump to the populism of Andrew Jackson. It pretty interesting.
David Samuels, one of my favorite writers out there, reviews both Bob Dylan and the movie about Bob Dylan in this very well done piece.
https://unherd.com/2025/01/bob-dylan-fought-the-proto-woke/
A very interesting review of the work of David Lynch, who passed away last week.
https://quillette.com/2025/01/21/american-surrealist-david-lynch/
This is a review of a book. That’s about all I can say about it. I only started the article and it seemed interesting enough to bring it to your attention.
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/romance-of-belonging-nowhere
https://jewishreviewofbooks.com/holocaust/17939/the-big-schlep/
A review of the movie A Real Pain, which I have not seen. But it sounds interesting. The plot, such as it is, is a story about two cousins going on a trip to Auschwitz. They experience what no one doing such a trip should experience, such as bored guides at Auschwitz and all the stereotypical business of the Shoah (there’s no business like Shoah business, they say). Having guided many times at Auschwitz and befriended several guides from there, I can say that part of the coldness or disinterest attributed to Polish guides at these places has to do first of all by the less-than-puppydog-friendliness that reflects American culture. And think if your job was to guide at Auschwitz 4 days a week. That would probably require distancing yourself somewhat from the horror of the place just so you could walk in the front gate every morning. But I would still watch the movie.
Ha! An interesting side note. My grandmother’s brothers would never carry $20 bills because of the picture of Andrew Jackson, who displaced their Cherokee family back in the day.
"There's no business like Shoah business"? REALLY, Reuven?!! 🤦♂️