FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 6 , 2019. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE A21
T
his doesn’t qualify as earth-
shattering news at this point,
but President Trump showed
us again this week how spec-
tacularly ignorant, vainglorious and
obsessive he can be. This time, he did
it with a clumsily doctored map.
Yes, I’m talking about the out-
of-date National Hurricane Center
map of Hurricane Dorian’s projected
path that Trump displayed Wednes-
day — a map that someone who clear-
ly knows nothing about weather fore-
casting or rudimentary logic had
crudely altered with a black Sharpie
(Trump’s preferred writing imple-
ment) to protect the president’s mas-
sive yet eggshell-fragile ego.
Gee, who might that have been?
The heartbreaking story about
Dorian is the catastrophic damage
the storm inflicted on the northern-
most islands of the Bahamas, where
entire communities were destroyed
and there still is no full accounting of
how many lives were lost. The on-
going story is the threat of flooding in
the Carolinas as the storm plows its
way northward. The contextual story
is the growing scientific consensus
that climate change has made such
tropical cyclones fiercer, wetter, slow-
er-moving and thus more punishing
than in the past.
But leave it to Trump to make
himself the subject of a bizarre and
disgraceful footnote. I pity the sati-
rists and comedians who try to make
fun of him, because he does such a
good job of it himself.
To review: On Sunday, Trump
tweeted a warning to residents of
states that could be “hit (much) hard-
er than anticipated” by Dorian —
Florida, South Carolina, North Caro-
lina, Georgia “and Alabama.” An ad-
mirable gesture, but the National
Hurricane Center was predicting
that the storm would parallel the
southeastern coast, remaining over
the Atlantic Ocean — far from Ala-
bama. Indeed, that same day, Trump
retweeted an up-to-date hurricane
center map showing the projected
offshore path. National Weather
Service officials in Alabama quickly
issued a tweet making clear that
residents of that state were in no
danger.
When reporters pointed out the
discrepancy, Trump went ballistic.
On Monday evening, the president
tweeted that it “WAS true... under
certain original scenarios” that Ala-
bama could have been hit. It is the
case that in the middle of last week,
when Dorian was still over the Carib-
bean Sea hundreds of miles from theBahamas, some forecasting models
predicted it might plow across the
Florida peninsula and possibly enter
the Gulf of Mexico, where it possibly
could affect Alabama. But by Sunday,
according to forecasters, it was clear
this would not happen.
Okay, fine, end of story. Trump
made a mistake. We all make mis-
takes. Except that we have a president
who seems incapable of admitting
even the slightest error, especially if
he is called on it by the journalists he
slanders as “enemies of the people.”
So on Wednesday, in delivering an
update on the hurricane, Trump
displayed a week-old hurricane cen-
ter map showing how forecasters ini-
tially thought the storm might make a
Florida landfall and head northwest.
The widening “cone of uncertainty” —
showing where it was believed, a week
ago, that the hurricane might conceiv-
ably go — was outlined in white. The
cone did not, however, quite reach the
great state of Alabama. But someone
had used a black Sharpie to add a little
bump indicating that Alabama had
been imperiled.
As smooth moves go, it was lamer
than trying to forge a $100 bill by
taking a Monopoly $1 bill and writing
a couple of extra zeros on it.
Leave aside that it was an outdated
forecast. As I don’t have to tell you —
but, sadly, have to explain to the
president — the cone of uncertainty
on a hurricane map always widens
and never narrows. That’s because it’s
easier to forecast where a storm will
be later today than where it will be
tomorrow, easier to forecast its posi-
tion tomorrow than the day after and
so on.
We’re left with two disturbing pos-
sibilities. One is that Trump altered
the map himself. In that case, we have
a president too insecure to admit the
slightest misstep and too incapable of
logical thinking to do a plausible job
of forgery. We also have a president
who broke the law, since altering a
National Weather Service forecast is a
crime.
The other possibility is that some-
one on Trump’s staff used a Sharpie to
fulfill the mission of “proving” Trump
right even when he was wrong. That’s
basically all the White House com-
munications shop does these days,
anyway.
I know it’s a minor episode, but I
hope that doctored map makes its
way into the Smithsonian someday.
Like Washington’s uniform or Jeffer-
son’s desk, Trump’s bogus map em-
bodies the man.
[email protected]EUGENE ROBINSONThe map makes
the man
Y
ou’ve heard of the Wars on Drugs,
Terror, Poverty, even Women.
Well, welcome to the War on
Children.
It’s being waged by the Trump adminis-
tration and other right-wing public offi-
cials, regardless of any claimed “family
values.”
For evidence, look no further than the
report released Wednesday by the Depart-
ment of Health and Human Services’s own
inspector general. It details the trauma
suffered by immigrant children separated
from their parents under the Trump ad-
ministration’s evil “zero tolerance” policy.
Thousands of children were placed in
overcrowded centers ill-equipped to
provide care for them physically or psy-
chologically. Visits to 45 centers around
the country resulted in accounts of chil-
dren who cried inconsolably; who were
drugged; who were promised family
reunifications that never came; whose
severe emotional distress manifested in
phantom chest pains, with complaints
that “every heartbeat hurts”; who thought
their parents had abandoned them or had
been murdered.
Such state-sanctioned child abuse was
designed to serve as a “deterrent” for
asylum-seeking families, as then-Chief of
Staff John F. Kelly and other administra-
tion officials made clear.
Of course, they failed to recognize just
how horrific are the conditions these
asylum-seeking children are fleeing —
conditions that further decreased HHS’s
ability to adequately care for them.
“Staff in multiple facilities reported
cases of children who had been kidnapped
or raped” back in their home countries,
the IG report states. Other children wit-
nessed family members raped or
murdered.
But hey, Trump believes these kiddos
must be punished further for the crime of
seeking refuge — a.k.a., the “invasion” of
America.
Despite this and other abundant evi-
dence that government facilities are not
able to care for children for extended
periods, last month, the administration
also announced a new policy that would
allow it to keep children (along with their
families) in jail-like conditions for longer
periods of time.
This is hardly the only way the adminis-
tration has knowingly enacted policies
that harm children.
In August, it finalized a rule that would
make it more difficult for immigrants to
receive green cards if they have used
certain safety-net services they’re legally
entitled to — or if government officials
suspect they might ever use such services.
Confusion and fear about the policy and
whom it affects abound. This has already
created a “chilling effect” for usage of
social services, with immigrant parents
disenrolling even their U.S.-citizen chil-
dren just to be safe.
Last fall, for instance, I interviewed a
green-card-holding mother who decided
not to enroll her underweight newborn in
a program that would have provided free
formula (even though the program in
question was not mentioned in the rule,
and the baby is a U.S. citizen). Huge recent
declines in children’s Medicaid and Chil-
dren’s Health Insurance Program enroll-
ment are also believed to be at least partly
a result of fears about this policy change.
And lest you think only immigrant or
brown children are being targeted in this
war: U.S. servicemembers’ children, of all
sorts of backgrounds, are being hurt, too.
The Trump administration is siphon-
ing billions from various defense projects
to fund border wall construction, despite
promises that Mexico would pay for it.
This might sound unlikely to affect kids,
but somehow the Trump administration
found a way. Among the projects losing
funds are schools for the children of
U.S. servicemembers based in Kentucky,
Germany and Japan, and a child-care
center at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland.
Trump’s proposed federal budgets have
likewise axed funding for other programs
that serve children, such as subsidized
school meals and Medicaid. Indeed, both
federal and state GOP officials more
broadly are still working to kill the Medi-
caid expansion, as well as other Affordable
Care Act provisions that benefit kids.
The GOP has likewise ignored the pleas
of children who want their lives protected
from gun violence, or who want their
futures protected from a warming planet.
A year ago, I offered a suggestion: that
Democrats make children the theme of
their midterm campaign. They mostly
ignored me and still did okay. Nonethe-
less, I’m re-upping it.
Because even without Trump’s baby
jails and proposed Medicaid cuts, our
country’s emphasis on children’s well-
being is seriously deficient.
Last year, for the first time on record,
we spent a greater share of the federal
budget servicing the national debt than
we did on children, according to an analy-
sis out next week from First Focus on
Children. Spending on children as a share
of the federal budget is also expected to
shrink over the coming decade, crowded
out by both debt service and spending on
the elderly.
This is despite the fact that spending
on children (especially low-income chil-
dren) has among the highest returns on
investment of any form of government
spending.
Whatever the opposite of Trump’s War
on Children is, that’s what Democrats
should be running on.
[email protected]CATHERINE RAMPELLWelcome to
Trump’s War
on Children
A
s we move into the fall, there’s
one overriding foreign policy
priority for the United States:
Find a strategy to deal with a
rising China that protects U.S. interests
but doesn’t subvert the global economy.
China is the challenge of our time, and
the risks of getting it wrong are enor-
mous. Huawei, the Shenzen-based com-
munications powerhouse, argues in a
slick new YouTube video that its critics
want to create a new Berlin Wall. That’s
not true — Huawei and other Chinese
tech companies have allegedly been
stealing intellectual property for years
and are finally being held accountable —
but there’s a real danger that the United
States will talk itself into a digital cold
war that lasts for decades.
We are at a crossroads: At a conference
on U.S.-China relations last month at the
University of California at San Diego, a
Chinese participant offered a blunt pre-
diction about the future: “We think we
are heading toward a partial decoupling
of our relationship.” Trump administra-
tion officials argue that China has been
decoupling itself — denying access to
Western firms, even as the United States
and its allies provided technology, train-
ing and market access.
But what comes next? Trump adminis-
tration officials hope that progress
toward a trade deal might happen at last,
now that a meeting with a senior Chinese
official has been set for October. But
Myron Brilliant, who runs the U.S. Cham-
ber of Commerce’s international pro-
grams, cautions, “There’s a trust deficit
between Washington and Beijing that
needs to be restored before there’s
progress.”
President Trump reiterated on
Wednesday that the administration
plans to deny Huawei access to U.S. tech-
nology. “It’s a national security concern,”
Trump told reporters at the White House.
“Huawei is a big concern of our military,
of our intelligence agencies, and we are
not doing business with Huawei.” That
leaves a little wiggle room, but not much.
White House officials tell me the
Chinese are mistaken if they think the
administration is seeking to cripple Chi-
na technologically. Officials say their
goal isn’t a rerun of the anti-Soviet
strategy of containment but something
more flexible. One administration offi-
cial says his colleagues sometimes refer
to this still-unnamed strategy simply as
“the noun.”
The Trump administration’s problem
is that it has gutted the national security
process that could devise a systematic
plan for dealing with China. Instead,
policy is highly personalized and shapedby Trump’s erratic decision-making style.
“President Trump is our desk officer on
China,” says Michael Pillsbury, an infor-
mal White House adviser on Asia policy.
Strange as it sounds, that’s probably
accurate.
This administration’s sharp policy de-
bates on China strategy are exacerbated
because there’s no decision-making proc-
ess to resolve them. On one side are
China hawks such as White House trade
adviser Peter Navarro; on the other are
would-be dealmakers such as Treasury
Secretary Steven Mnuchin. In the middle
is Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who
seems to have an instinct for where
Trump will eventually land.
“On no issue is the lack of a policy
process more visible or dramatic than
China,” says Kurt Campbell, who oversaw
Asia policy during the Obama adminis-
tration. He contrasts how the presidents
of the world’s two superpowers spent the
last weeks of summer. Chinese President
Xi Jinping met with top party officials at
a beach resort and emerged with a new
honorific, the “People’s Leader.” Trump
spent those weeks in very public and
sometimes self-destructive Twitter bar-
rages, at home and abroad.
Trump has a simple four-word sum-
mary of his China baseline, notes one
administration official: “Xi is my friend.”
Personal diplomacy has its uses, but it’s
no substitute for clear policy.
Framing a real China strategy should
be Job No. 1 for Trump (and his successor
in 2021, if Trump is defeated). Pillsbury
described the scope of the challenge in
the title of his 2016 book, “The Hundred-
Year Marathon.” He told me this week:
“We need to change the trajectory that
we’re on now. That means running faster
and slowing them down.” That’s a good
formulation, but both goals require disci-
plined U.S. policy — something in short
supply.
Making good decisions about China
(and, implicitly, about the future of
global technology) requires a sound
U.S. policymaking structure. The best
idea I’ve heard is a bipartisan bill intro-
duced this year by Sens. Marco Rubio
(R-Fla.) and Mark R. Warner (D-Va.),
which would create a new “Office of
Critical Technologies and Security” to
oversee decisions about China and other
key countries.
Trump was right to take the China
trade and technology problem more
seriously than his predecessors. But the
time for Twitter diplomacy and deals
with “my friend” Xi is over. U.S. moves on
this chessboard should be guided by
clear planning, not whim.
Twitter: @IgnatiusPostDAVID IGNATIUSThe time for Twitter
diplomacy is over
T
here are alarming consequences
for the survival of human beings
and the success of the society they
inhabit when the brain suffers
without treatment. And it has become
frighteningly common for Americans to
find their way into despair and
self-murder.
About 7 percent of American adults
had at least one major depressive episode
in 2017. Nearly 13 percent of the U.S. pop-
ulation likely took antidepressant medi-
cation during the past month, yet suicide
rates have risen to the highest since
World War II. The odds of dying from
suicide or an opioid overdose — the
“diseases of despair” — are now higher
than that of dying from a motor-vehicle
accident.
These problems are tragically concen-
trated among the young. More than
3 million people ages 12 to 17 had at least
one major depressive episode in 2017 —
most accompanied by some form of se-
vere impairment. The highest prevalence
of major depressive disorder is among
people ages 18 to 25. Some claim these
numbers have risen mainly because of
increased reporting. But that can’t be true
of suicides. The suicide rate for people
ages 18 and 19 increased 56 percent
between 2008 and 2017. The rate of sui-
cide attempts among people ages 22 and
23 doubled in the same period. The num-
ber of emergency room treatments for
self-harm has increased, as well as hospi-
tal admissions for suicidal thoughts.
America’s mental-health crisis is very
real. Yet explanations for this rising tide
of despair feel insufficient. The trend
doesn’t seem tied to broad economic
indicators — though the death of the
blue-collar economy in some places
might play a role. Some have tried to
blame the anxieties produced by a “gig
economy” — but indicting Uber for hu-
man hopelessness seems a stretch.
Ready access to highly addictive opi-
oids certainly is a source of numbed
despair in many communities. Ready
access to firearms plays a role in many
suicides. Digital addiction and social me-
dia have transformed — and distorted —
the social lives of most young people.
Digital connection can deliver the poison
of cyberbullying intravenously, in a
steady drip. The withdrawal from direct,
human contact with friends is associated
with a variety of mental-health issues.
A few things we know. Many Ameri-
cans have tragically limited access to
mental-health services. Some health-insurance plans don’t provide adequate
coverage. Some people are forced to drive
long distances or wait on long lists. Some
are discouraged from seeking help by
continuing stigma. (About 20 percent of
Americans have lied to cover up their
pursuit of mental-health services.) As a
result of all these factors, more than
one-third of adults with major depressive
disorder don’t get treated. About 60 per-
cent of adolescents who have major de-
pressive episodes don’t receive care.
We know that jails and prisons are not
the best places to provide mental-health
care — though likely more than 350,000
people with mental illness are currently
behind bars. We should not trust many of
these cases to the tender mercies of the
penal system.
And we know that the deepest human
needs can’t be described in purely materi-
al or political terms. Though friendship,
belonging and shared purpose are intan-
gible, they are as essential to humans as
air and bread. Yet nearly half of Ameri-
cans say they are often lonely. About
20 percent of millennials report they have
no friends at all. Many of us have lost faith
in the institutions that once gathered
individuals into common effort and iden-
tity. Many of us have grown rusty in the
task of social connection.
Mental health is different from many
other policy issues. It involves both a
public debate and personal responsibility
to friends and acquaintances — a duty of
active, empathic, invasive concern.
Isolation is the growth medium for
severe depression and suicidal thoughts.
Without hearing some other, kinder
voice, the echoes of self-condemnation
can grow louder and louder. Without
outside intervention, a downward spiral
can be rapid, uninterrupted and deadly.
People who struggle with depression
need others in their lives who are alert to
the signs of suffering and violate polite
boundaries. They need someone who is
willing to say: “You may not want to hear
this, but I care about you and I’m worried
about you. Please tell me how you are
hurting and allow me to help.”
This voice can come from a health-care
professional. It can come from family
members, or from friends and colleagues,
or from a support group in which the
confession of need is expected and wel-
comed. On mental-health issues, prog-
ress will be measured by increased focus
and resources — but also by the loving
welcome of our deepest selves.
[email protected]MICHAEL GERSONDepression, and
the duty of concern
CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES
President Trump with what appears to be an altered map of the forecast
storm track for Hurricane Dorian on Wednesday in the Oval Office.JENNIFER RUBINExcerpted from washingtonpost.com/people/jennifer-rubinPopulism as a weapon
Arthur Brooks wrote a compelling col-
umn for The Post identifying the preva-
lence of conspiracy thinking in our poli-
tics, in particular “the propagation of
conspiracy theories by elites themselves.”
Now, while populism exists on the right
and left, under President Trump, the
former has grown far more noxious and
more reliant on conspiracies to hold on
to its base. And that distinction, I would
argue, is essential.
Right-wing populism, or right-wing
nationalism, as it exists today is inher-
ently conspiratorial. The entire premise
is that immigrants, the “deep state,” elite
media, violent cities and anti-religious
left-wingers are out to destroy America
as white Christians imagine it to be. The
risk to the country is so great, these
pseudo-intellectuals claim, that it justi-
fies any tactic (including Trump’s elec-
tion) to prevent the apocalypse.
As we have seen from Trump’s tenure,
right-wing populism is not in service of a
particular ideological goal but rather
serves to keep the base in a constant state
of fear and anger so that its leader can
retain his grip on power. In fact, from an
ideological perspective, the movement is
incoherent (e.g., supply-side tax cuts and
tariffs, muscular foreign policy and
slavish subservience to dictators). Critics
of Trump have noted that “cruelty is the
point,” not a disagreeable consequence,
of his policies. Likewise, conspiracies are
the point of right-wing populism.
The most common tactic of self-styled“conservatives” who defend Trump is to
point to places in which Trump’s incoher-
ent policy spray intersects with their
ideological preferences. This is the “But
taxes... ” argument. It requires the
enabler to ignore or minimize all of the
things that undermine his ideological
preference (e.g., forget crony capitalism
and protectionism to focus on tax cuts;
ignore the attacks on the rule of law and
the appointment of blatantly unqualified
judges to focus on the “good” judicial
appointments).
Thus, Trump enablers can posit that
Trump is tougher on foreign policy
(because of defense spending, for in-
stance) than Hillary Clinton would be,
even though the latter would not have
coddled Russia, Saudi Arabia and North
Korea, weakened NATO or abandoned
human rights. It’s only by ignoring the
insane premises of right-wing populism,
the reign of chaos and the conservative
values Trump destroys that “conserva-
tives” can manage to defend a morally
abhorrent, incompetent and anti-demo-
cratic president.
Clarity is important in a media climate
too prone to fall into false moral equiva-
lences. That syndrome allows defenders
and apologists to normalize Trump and
to present once again the false choice:
Trump or civilizational destruction?
In fact, Trump’s right-wing populism
is the most destructive force we face, and
if unchecked, it will erode the American
creed, democratic institutions, anti-
totalitarian international alliances and
fact-based governance.