Constitutional crisis, daytime TV hit: Ratings for political TV are up across the board, but one particular program has captured the country like never before: Sean Spicer’s press briefings. President Trump’s assault on the free press has rendered this once dull routine an alternately horrifying and fascinating spectacle, in which the First Amendment is pitted against the Trump administration on a daily basis. Who’s winning? The press, Seth Stevenson argues—slowly but surely.
Not-so-silent majority: As President Trump inches closer to the 100-day mark, it’s safe to say that the resistance is stronger than ever. Yascha Mounk lays out the pros and cons of actions taken to thwart the new administration so far and reaches a mildly optimistic conclusion: Democracy is doing its job. But we’ve a long way to go yet.
United in inefficiency: Chances are you’ve seen that disturbing video of a passenger being literally yanked off of a United Airlines flight by now. But while it’s easy—and correct—to blame United, Daniel Gross points out the broader problem: the severely outdated booking system used by all major airlines.
Savage grief: Ariel Levy’s tough, uncompromising new memoir tackles miscarriage and middle age in an unsettling way, Michelle Goldberg writes. Female readers may find it terrifying—and its publication in this time of feminist disillusionment feels all too appropriate.
Off the bench: Neil Gorsuch was sworn in by Justice Anthony Kennedy on Monday as the newest justice of the United States Supreme Court. Above all, Mark Joseph Stern writes, the ceremony was a ploy to coax Kennedy—the relative moderate—into retirement, paving the way for a historically right-leaning era of the Supreme Court.
For fun: Maxine Waters is giddy about her internet fame.
Happy Passover,
David
