The House Republicans just -- stunningly and amazingly -- actually did something. I know! You could've knocked me over with a feather....

I start with such snark because it seems entirely appropriate. But this is rather big news, as what it truly means is that the Republican House cats have now (for once) been successfully herded. This really is a big deal, since it hasn't happened much at all in the past decade or so.

The way things usually go in the GOP House is that they attempt to pass a bill (usually a budget, since that's about all they're capable of paying attention to) but their slim majority in the chamber means that their speaker cannot convince enough of them to vote for it, and so it dies. This usually leads to negotiations with Democrats and kicking the can down the road once again (it can also lead to a new Republican speaker, as we've seen before).

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Republicans in Congress are running out of time. The federal government's budget turns into a pumpkin in mid-March, so if a new budget bill isn't passed by then, the government will shut down. And while President Elon Musk's chainsaw approach to slashing spending and personnel is getting most of the attention, what Congress does is likely to have a much deeper impact. This budget battle will also provide an opportunity for Democrats to make the case that Republican "populism" was never more than a mirage (or a lie) to begin with.

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I start today with a bit of mineralogical history. The Washington Monument on the National Mall was built both before and after the Civil War, and was finally finished in 1884. At the top of America's obelisk sits a pyramid, with observation windows visitors can look out of. The very tippy-top of this stone pyramid (roughly 555 feet above ground -- at the time, the tallest building in the world) was capped with a small pyramid made out of metal (which doubles as the contact point for the monument's lightning rod). The metal used was one of the rarest available at the time -- so rare that it was as expensive as silver. This small pyramid weighs 100 ounces, and at the time was the largest cast piece of this metal in the world. So what was this extremely rare metal?

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The first month of the second presidency of Donald Trump is now over. Only forty-seven more to go!

That, of course, is a daunting prospect, but we can at least open with some good news this week: Trump is already wearing out his welcome with the public. The presidential "honeymoon" period is apparently over (almost before it began). Trump started off his second term with historically dismal ratings, although they did best one previous president -- himself, in his first term. His job approval numbers were actually at 50 percent or just above when he was sworn in this time around (which, as mentioned, every other modern president has beaten), so he could at least claim a majority of the public was behind him. Not any more.

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Donald Trump is now officially one month into his second term as president. And already, his "honeymoon" period seems to be ending. Most incoming presidents get at least a few months where the public essentially gives them the benefit of the doubt and approves of the job they're doing. But then at some point, this wears off and their job approval polling noticeably falls back. And some of the polls released recently show that this may already be happening with Trump.

Trump started his second term with one of the weakest honeymoon showings of the modern political era. Even so, it was better than his first term, where he never did get above 50 percent (he briefly touched this milestone in his first month, but then fell back, never to fully recover). This time around, he barely got his polling average above 50 percent, but at least mostly he was "above water" in the polling. His job approval was higher than his job disapproval, in other words. This is no longer the case in some polling.

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So far, most Republicans have sat back and watched President Elon Musk's bull-in-a-china-shop efforts to fire people and slash budgets with glee. The whole tech-bro "move fast and break things" ideology is just fine with them, as long as the targets are parts of the federal government they have long hated -- like foreign aid or the Department of Education. But now things are about to get a little more personal for them, since the next department on the chopping block is going to be the military. The Washington Post broke the story today of what exactly this is going to mean:

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There are some jobs where, if the job is done perfectly, the public is never even aware there is a person doing that job. The only time people notice them is when a screw-up happens. The job of projectionist at a movie theater is a good example. If he or she runs the projector perfectly and there are no problems, then no one in the audience gives them a second thought (or even a first thought). They are invisible -- but the movie wouldn't run without them. The sound mixer at a live concert is another good example. If the sound is mixed well and all the equipment functions perfectly, then nobody even notices them. But if something's wrong, then everyone turns around and starts yelling at them.

There are a lot of governmental jobs that fall into this category as well. Which has left me wondering what is going to happen when a whole bunch of them get fired (or quit in disgust) and then a screw-up happens?

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Since today is a federal holiday, I decided to take the day off. While looking for a column to re-run, I came across this one from 2017. It was written on the first Presidents' Day of Donald Trump's first term as president, after a rather rocky beginning.

Trump's second term has also had a somewhat rocky beginning, but in a different way. The first time around it was mostly his unfamiliarity with Washington and government which led to some major stumbles. This time around has been notable for Trump's eager embrace of executive power as well as his abdication of a lot of that power to someone nobody saw coming -- the world's richest man. The whole thing reads like a James Bond storyline, in a lot of ways.

Nevertheless, as I did eight years ago, I'm not going to dwell on Trump's start to his second term today, but rather provide a historical overview of how a number of other presidents have had to face some very rocky problems very early on. I resisted the urge to update this with a paragraph or two about the mess Joe Biden inherited (January 6th, COVID crisis, economic devastation, etc.), but it really should be included in the list now. In any case, here was the view from eight years ago....

Originally published February 20, 2017

Since it is Presidents' Day (or whatever else you call today, apostrophized or not), I thought I'd take it easy on our current president, and take a break from the regular ridicule I've been heaping upon him since he was sworn in. Today's supposed to be a noble holiday, after all, so I thought I'd make an extra effort at evenhandedness, and take a look back through history at some of the rocky starts various American presidents have had on the job.

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It's hard, as each new week goes by, not to get distracted by all of the chaos emanating from Washington. This week, we're going to begin by connecting a few dots that really need connecting, and (so far) haven't gotten enough attention (in our humble opinion).

Before Donald Trump became president again, both he and his MAGA choir spent a lot of time decrying "censorship" and wailing about their "free speech" being somehow suppressed. This was largely due to social media sites policing their allowable content, and occasionally removing objectionable or flat-out false posts and even kicking people off their platforms.

This is not "censorship," as both we and many others pointed out, at the time. A social media company is a private entity, and what they allow or don't allow on their sites is their own business, plain and simple. Twitter was not "the public square," period. No First Amendment rights were being trampled upon by any of it.

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Robert F. Kennedy Junior is now going to be in charge of overseeing the nation's health systems. This seems to be a prime example of the ironic question: "What could possibly go wrong with that?" since Kennedy is so obviously not even remotely qualified for the position, and he holds so many bizarre and conspiratorial viewpoints on health care and medicine that HuffPost ran the story with a main-page "screamer" headline: "Quack Confirmed!" If anything, calling R.F.K. Jr. a "quack" is an understatement of the reality.

But today I am in a rather good mood for no particular reason, so I won't be pointing out what every other sane journalist who respects actual science is now busily pointing out, since as mentioned it is so patently obvious that R.F.K. Jr. should have been summarily dismissed by the Senate rather than confirmed into a position of power. Instead, I am (for once) going to follow that motherly advice most of us got at one point or another in our lives: "If you can't say something nice about somebody, don't say anything at all." This maxim is normally almost impossible to follow while commenting on politics, which is why in my many years of political blogging it may be the first time I've ever quoted it (I'd have to check).

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