Lucy Steigerwald

How can you tell that Donald Trump is just another war president? Because in spite of the administrative chaos, the executive branch with its ever-shifting staff, and the half-conspiracies that surround him, the meat of the matter is the question, which near-war should the public pay attention to? The recent gas attack on civilians in … Continue reading “Yemen, Syria, the Press, and Trump the War President”

United States foreign policy involves miserable choices. Were George W. Bush’s two boots on the ground wars worse than Barack Obama’s dabbling in six different countries with war robots, and his precedent-setting assassinations of American citizens? Was FDR worse than Harry Truman for pure body-count, even though the latter is responsible for the only use(s) … Continue reading “Is Trump Another Obama on Foreign Policy?”

The enemy of my enemy is my friend is a Cold War-like mentality that the United States has operated under for decades and decades. Perhaps it’s natural, human, tribalism to do this. Or at the very least, it’s coldly pragmatic. If your enemy is the Godless Soviet Union, then your friend are the Muslim "freedom … Continue reading “Trump Is the Enemy of Neocons, But He’s Not Our Friend”

A February NBC news poll reveals some dramatic diversity within the minds of Donald Trump’s America. The topics covered are varied, and include Americans’ current feelings about Russia, and their worries over a future major war (56 percent are very or somewhat worried). One other question caught my eye, however, and that was a choice … Continue reading “Believing That War Has Consequences”

Maybe Donald Trump is a different kind of politician. Maybe he will keep his promises. Unfortunately, since January 20, Trump has pursued a nasty collection of priorities. Any hope that the political newbie would be dazed and timid in his first 100 days went out the window after his clunky, legally-dubious executive order stopping immigration … Continue reading “The Wretched Beginning of Donald Trump’s Presidency”

President Donald Trump has been busy during his first week. The speed of his executive orders, and the confidence with which he has signed plans to build a wall, and to replace ObamaCare with… something else has been shocking, considering how shellshocked he looked when he actually won. Trump also followed through on his campaign … Continue reading “Banning Refugees From Countries America Destroyed Is Wrong”

I was desperately hoping to be wrong last week. I was delighted and surprised that I was indeed mistaken about President Obama being unlikely to pardon army whistleblower Chelsea Manning. My cynicism in the previous column was a challenge to the president, almost an act of reverse psychology. Wonder of wonders, Manning will be free … Continue reading “What the Clemency of Chelsea Manning Means About Obama”

This column will soon be out of date. There are only a few days of Barack Obama’s presidential pardon powers left. He will either offer clemency to whistleblower Chelsea Manning, thereby ending her sentence three decades sooner than officially mandated, or he will not. And the chances of her gaining freedom under a Republican-dominated Washington … Continue reading “The Foolish Optimism of Hoping for Chelsea Manning’s Freedom”

It’s still impossible to know what president-elect Donald Trump will do. His statements over the past 18 months, and before, have often contradicted each other on issues as varied as foreign policy and transgender people using the bathroom of their choice. On one important issue, however, Trump has been depressingly consistent. From all appearances, he … Continue reading “There’s Little Reason To be Optimistic About Trump and Privacy”

At some point during Tuesday night, MSNBC pundit Chris Matthews, strangely enough, was a momentary voice of reason and calm when he sarcastically pointed out that Gitmo remains open in spite of President Obama’s campaign promise to shut it down. That it an easy way of pointing out that presidential candidates say a lot, and … Continue reading “To-Do List for a Trump Presidency”