Photograph Source: Matt Johnson – CC BY 2.0

These days when I’m asked how I’m doing, I usually reply, “I’m fine until I start following the news.” It’s all so depressing. Donald Trump is everywhere. On front pages as well as in social media, DJT dominates. A day doesn’t go by without headlines mentioning something involving Trump. Tariffs? Attacks on the Federal Reserve or some other congressionally established institution? ICE? A recent court ruling for or against him? His Nobel Peace Prize quest? One could ask if his omnipresence is intentional. Does he set out to dominate the 24/7 news cycle or is his presence merely a reflection of his frenetic pace? “Attention, not cash, is the form of power that most interests him,” Ezra Klein wrote in the Times. Whether intentional or not, his media presence buries deeper stories. He diverts our attention from anything else.

Trump stories appear, then quickly disappear. Today’s headlines have their own limited time cycle. We are now focused on Trump’s firings at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the fate of Susan Monarez as well as pressure on Jerome Powell and Lisa Cook at the Federal Reserve. What will be next? Will the next Trump headline bury the CDC story or the one about the Federal Reserve? Already we have trouble finding information about what happened to the U.S. Institute of Peace where its president, George Moose, was escorted out by local police.

Like an avalanche, Trump news gathers speed and buries........

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