Rex Smith

As one of those Americans who hasn’t paid much attention to soccer, I was presented with some opportunities for growth during the recent 39 days of World Cup competition - like, for example, this sentence from an analysis of the final game: “Spain,” it said, “were the better team throughout.”

Most of us will never know the anxiety that surely arises when an FBI agentknocks on your door with a subpoena – that is, demanding that you appear before a grand jury investigating what you have done, fully lawfully, at work.

I have a theory about Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense – or secretary of war, as Donald Trump wants us to call him. I’ve become convinced that he’s simply a fraidy-cat. He’s scared. And I don’t say that lightly.

To start with a bit of personal history: I was the drum major of my high school marching band. To prepare to wear the big hat and carry the baton, I went to a summer drum major camp at a big university in the west; I was told that I had to “learn some struts.”

This ought to be a golden age for people who care about the news – that is, anybody who doesn’t choose to be helplessly hobbled by ignorance – because there’s a lot of news and a lot of ways to keep up with it.

In journalism, my line of work for about a half-century, you learn pretty quickly that while words matter, you have to watch what people do, not just what they say.

Who’re you gonna trust? That’s a tough question these days. For a lot of Americans, the answer seems to be, “nobody.” And that’s pretty sad. It’s something we need to think about.

What you buy these days seems increasingly to be a reflection of your politics. At least, that’s what we learn in a report from Columbia University Business School research, which cites the polarization that has followed Donald Trump’s first election.

We are living in a worldwide crisis of gloom. That, anyway, is what I took from a new international poll of 20,000 people across western democracies and Japan.

What would you say is the biggest problem facing our country? Now, if you said, “Donald Trump,” I wouldn’t necessarily disagree, but that’s not the kind of answer we’re looking for here. Hold that thought, though: you may be onto something.