Terrified of being seen as a loser, Donald Trump is nonsensically lashing out – even against our old friend Canada

I’m still grieving Dolly Parton. I never met her and always wanted to. She was almost exactly my age and my height and had values I deeply admired. Her death leaves a hole in the firmament.

Which brings me to the person whose values are as far from Dolly Parton’s as any human could possibly be and still claim to be human. I’m referring, of course, to the current occupant of the Oval Office.

The president senses a crisis in his cult of personality. He believes the path to victory is through unwavering devotion

Donald Trump has framed his theme for the midterm elections. It has come to him as naturally and inevitably as staring into the mirror, beyond any logic or argument, his definitive answer to no specific issue, providing no understanding of any particular problem, but transcending all of them. His political theme is more primal than programmatic, more instinctive than analytical, a heartfelt expression to protect his greatest romantic attachment, his obsessive fixation, his idealized object: himself.

Trump’s campaign theme is unrequited love. Unlike the pollsters, media consultants and pundits, he alone has grasped the magnitude and the source of the existential crisis threatening his politics. He has identified the problem for the Republicans as the faltering measure of complete devotion to him. His demand has nothing to do with mutual affection. It is a ploy to reassert his slipping control, a manipulative test to prove loyalty to him, or else. There can be no absolute rule without an absolute ruler; no absolute ruler without absolute submission; no absolute submission without the expression of absolute love. His sadness at its fading gives way to anger, paranoia and greater acts of retribution. He equates the fear he instills as a form of love. Trump accepts subservience, from whatever motive, as affection or its closest equivalent. He cares nothing about sincerity, so it’s all in the show. The less love displayed, the more fear required. Yet there is no rebound, but only deeper rejection.

President denies visit was to gain support for Iran sanctions or due to fears that Putin plans to ‘test Nato resolve’

Donald Trump has downplayed a visit to Moscow by the CIA director, John Ratcliffe, as “semi-routine” after he turned up in the Russian capital unannounced, triggering a wave of speculation about the reasons for his trip.

Ratcliffe was reported to have flown to Moscow on a government transport plane on Tuesday in a rare visit after taking off from the Andrews air force base in Maryland.

This story appeared in The Logoff, a daily newsletter that helps you stay informed about the Trump administration without letting political news take over your life. Subscribe here.

Welcome to The Logoff: Donald Trump says he’s renaming Lake Ontario. Let’s talk about it. 

Can he really do that? Probably, though it doesn’t mean anyone will listen. 

Strictly speaking, Trump’s executive order, signed Thursday in the Oval Office, directs the Interior Department to update the lake’s name to “Lake America” in the US’s Geographic Names Information System. It remains to be seen whether products like Apple and Google maps will follow suit, but New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, whose state contains the US portion of the lake, says she won’t. 

Why is he doing that? The immediate answer is that Trump launched a trade war with Canada over the weekend, and he’s mad that Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney won’t give him what he wants; this is a petty way to lash out. 

That doesn’t explain the trade war itself, though. Unfortunately, when my colleague, noted Canadian resident Zack Beauchamp, went looking earlier this week, he couldn’t find an explanation either. As he writes, there’s absolutely no constituency for this fight — other than Trump’s own imperial desires as he keeps joking-but-maybe-not-joking about making Canada the 51st state. 

Isn’t this just a stupid stunt? It’s a stupid stunt — but not just that. As my colleague Caitlin Dewey wrote earlier this week and Zack can attest, Canadians are royally pissed at the US. The trade war might feel like one more Trump fit of pique to Americans, but for Canadians, it’s a serious threat. 

Thursday’s executive order further ratchets up those tensions, and it specifically plays into the (very credible) school of thought that Trump isn’t really in this to redress US-Canada trade imbalances; as with many things Trump, it’s about dominance and the desire to claim a “win” at any cost.

Lastly, it’s worth dwelling for a second on the stunt itself. One, Lake Ontario isn’t Canada’s name for it; it predates either country. And two, ad hoc renaming of bodies of water — this isn’t even the first time this Trump term — puts Trump in some fairly uncomfortable company.

And with that, it’s time to log off…

My colleague Sara Herschander just debuted her new newsletter, Nice Things, which feels like a great fit for this section. It’s all about dreaming big to build a better America, one with widespread high-speed rail, affordable housing, and infrastructure that works. You can subscribe here and read a story from the first edition here.

Thanks for reading, have a great evening, and we’ll see you back here tomorrow!