Watching the TV coverage of the slow-rolling horror in Pittsburgh, I thought: I’m glad my mother is not alive to see this. My mother was 92 when she died, a year ago. She was 15 when the Nazis marched into Paris. Her brother was turned in by a neighbor and died in Auschwitz and she…

The week before the vote, I said good morning to my neighbor, who answered, “He’s not going to be confirmed is he? I said, “Yes, he is.” She looked horrified. I was equally horrified, but I didn’t doubt the outcome. The old bulls (as Dan Rather called the old white men who defend power and…