I almost always enjoy The New York Times' columns that feature a dialogue or discussion between Frank Bruni (a Times' columnist who is sort of "liberal") and Bret Stephens (a Times' columnist who is, I think, correctly identified as a "conservative" by Wikipedia). I particularly enjoyed the column that appeared in The Times on Friday, September 26, 2025. That column was titled, "Trump Will Not Retreat."
In that column, linked above for those whose subscription status will allow them to avoid The Times' probable paywall (or for those who have a library card from the Santa Cruz County Public Library System, and have signed up for free access to The Times) it was the "conservative" columnist (Stephens) who compared living through the Trump Administration to a "strange trip" on psychedelics.
The "best line," though, I give to Bruni (the "liberal"), who said that the Trump Administration has taken the United States "from Manifest Destiny to Manifest Vanity." That does just about sum it all up, don't you think? Stephens (the "conservative") certainly thought so, calling Bruni's remark a "line of genius," and then going on to say this:
Trump is doing all kinds of damage to America’s global standing, not least by threatening some of our staunchest allies — Denmark, Canada, Panama and so on. But I think it’s a mistake that many of us who loathe Trump often make: Because he routinely attacks status-quo institutions, whether it’s the United Nations or the mainstream media or elite academia or various agencies of government, we become knee-jerk defenders of that status quo. We need to find a way to acknowledge that many of those institutions are broken even as we try to repair, not destroy, them.
Stephens' point is well-taken. With respect to the remarks typically made by our current president, on almost any occasion, and particularly when his remarks are manifestly inappropriate (a number of remarks in his recent speech to the United Nations come immediately to mind), Mr. Trump's "vanity" may be primary, but that is not the only thing on display. While his "vanity" predominates, always, when our current president speaks, his criticisms are not always off target. Sometimes, our current president does point a finger to issues that the nation needs to address. Stephens (again, he is the "conservative") is quoted, to this effect, as follows:
This is a globally consequential time we’re living through, similar in my mind to the 1930s. Russia’s appetite for destruction shows no sign of abating. Europe is at its weakest point in nearly a century. China is putting on displays of military might reminiscent of the Soviet Union. I wouldn’t want to own beachfront in Taiwan. And America, the last best hope of the earth, is being led by a jackass.The opportunity for Democrats right now is to get serious. Make the stakes clear to the American people. Become, once again, the party of F.D.R. and Harry Truman and Jack Kennedy, defending the free world while exemplifying what it means to stand for the values of a free society. I can think of at least some Democrats, like Rahm Emanuel and Seth Moulton and Ritchie Torres, who get this. But too many Democrats just seem small for the moment.
It is nice that it is the "conservative" who is calling our current president a "jackass," so that such an observation is not discounted as a partisan attack, but let me go further than Stephens does. It is all of us, "Democrats" and "Republicans" alike, who need to start standing up for the values of a free society. Elected members of Congress, in particular ("Republicans" are currently in the majority), need to use their political power to stop letting vanity and jackassedry steer our ship of state right onto the rocks.
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