Heading into any business meetings today? We hope you’ll have someone on hand to gas you up as effusively as Attorney General Pam Bondi did for Donald Trump in yesterday’s cabinet meeting. “President,” she said, eyes locked on her boss, “your first 100 days has far exceeded that of any other presidency in this country. Ever. Ever. Never seen anything like it.” Bondi went on to claim that Trump’s efforts to crack down on fentanyl had already saved—“are you ready for this, media? 258 million lives.”

There are roughly 340 million people in America. I mean, we could have been really screwed! Happy Thursday.

The All-Powerful God-Baby

by Andrew Egger

Donald Trump, the great man of history, stands astride America like a colossus. Pencil-pushers scuttle for cover as he stretches out his hand to sweep away the detritus of the moribund old bureaucratic ways; other nations tremble with fear as he burns the former global order to the ground to build something gleaming among the ashes. America’s golden age has begun, spoken into existence by the new god-king.

Except when markets crash and people get mad. Then Trump is just a workaday guy trying to clean up a mess, and would you all please have a little patience, for crying out loud? These things take time!

“This is Biden’s stock market, not Trump’s,” the president complained yesterday amid yet another flurry of economic bad news. “Our Country will boom, but we have to get rid of the Biden ‘Overhang.’ This will take a while, has NOTHING TO DO WITH TARIFFS, only that he left us with bad numbers, but when the boom begins, it will be like no other. BE PATIENT!!!”

There’s always been a sweetly childlike quality to Trump’s relationship with the stock market. It doesn’t matter what’s going on in the economy or the world—it doesn’t even matter who happens to actually be president. If markets are rising, Trump takes credit. If they’re falling, someone else is to blame.¹

But it isn’t just markets. This crown-on, crown-off posture has become a regular thing for Trump. One moment, he’s the master of the universe, demanding total prostration from world leaders and government officials and taking credit for all blessings that may rain on the lives of the people. The next moment, he’s a very smol bean working with limited knowledge and a limited toolset, and why are you bullying him by asking him whether the law requires him to give hearings to deportees?

Yesterday, the master-of-the-universe routine was on display at Trump’s Politburo-esque cabinet meeting, where Secretary of State Marco Rubio, seated at Trump’s right hand, proudly proclaimed that questions about what the White House was doing to facilitate the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia were off limits to both the public and the courts. “I’ll never tell you that, and you know who else I’ll never tell?” Rubio sneered. “A judge. Because the conduct of our foreign policy belongs to the president of the United States.”

But just one day earlier, in his interview with ABC News, Trump was proclaiming no such powers. In fact, he was handing them off to his subordinates. Did Trump acknowledge that the law requires hearings before people can be deported? “I’ll have to ask the lawyers about that.” Shouldn’t migrants get due process? “They get whatever my lawyers say.”

Trump’s interactions with Nayib Bukele of El Salvador have long had the same flavor. Sometimes Trump is the magisterial presence and Bukele is the eager subordinate: “We’re a small country, but we can help,” Bukele beamed in last month’s Oval Office meeting as Trump instructed him to build more detention centers to potentially hold deported Americans. Other times, Trump can’t believe you’d presume he can tell Bukele what to do: Don’t you know he’s the leader of his own “proud and sovereign nation”?

The schtick is thin, and people aren’t buying it. On the matter of the economy, for instance: A CBS News poll last month asked whether Joe Biden’s policies or Trump’s were “more responsible for the state of the U.S. economy today.” Fifty-four percent said Trump, more than double the 21 percent who suggested we were still living the dream of Bidenomics.

That’s the trouble with going around proclaiming yourself god-king. The god-kings of old had it pretty good in fat times—enjoying the credit for keeping things square with the (other) gods, ensuring good weather and bountiful harvests. When things went sour, though—when the rains dried up, the cows didn’t calve, a plague broke out—it didn’t do the king much good to try to tell the people he really had very little to do with any of that. He was probably ending up a ritual sacrifice either way.

An (Imaginary) Trump Voter Rethinks

by William Kristol

Well, I voted for Trump because I knew he’d get the economy roaring again.

So I was kind of worried to hear yesterday that the U.S. economy had shrunk -0.3 percent in the first quarter of 2025, down from a 2.4 percent growth rate in the quarter prior—you know, the last one under Joe Biden. I’d already noticed that since Trump became president, my stocks were off about 8 percent. I’d also read that, because of the tariffs, shipping volume at our ports is way down. And I’d seen a guy who runs an export trade group for farmers saying on CNBC that they’re in a “full-blown crisis,” with the prospect of “massive” financial losses.

But President Trump said it’s going to be fine. And I believe President Trump. You saw what he posted on that sort-of-wacky website he likes yesterday:

“Tariffs will soon start kicking in, and companies are starting to move into the USA in record numbers. Our Country will boom, but we have to get rid of the Biden “Overhang.” This will take a while, has NOTHING TO DO WITH TARIFFS, only that he left us with bad numbers, but when the boom begins, it will be like no other. BE PATIENT!!!”

Yep. You gotta be patient. I told this to my highfalutin’ neighbor with Trump Derangement Syndrome. He responded by quoting some obscure old Brit: “Patience is the virtue of an ass that trots beneath his burden, and is quiet.” Was he implying that I’m an ass? That attitude is one reason I voted for Trump!

We just have to wait for Trump’s tariffs to kick in. After all, “Liberation Day” was April 2, less than a month ago. It’ll be fine by the end of the year.

Speaking of the end of year, another thing I liked about Mr. Trump: He was against the Left’s War on Christmas.

But now my annoying neighbor, who of course subscribes to the New York Times, says that