MAGA politicians will never abandon Trump. For some of them, it's fear and cowardice. For others, opportunism. But it's the true believers that scare me.

I have thought about this every time he mentions other countries sending people from their asylums to the US.

If Trump is chomping at the bit to start Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo, can you even imagine what’s in the Epstein files?

Honestly, if I had to choose between the dishwasher at my local Mexican restaurant who may not be here legally and a bunch of masked thugs with automatic weapons and a thirst for liberal blood... I'd let the dishwasher stay here.

I feel very strongly that I won Minnesota the last three presidential elections. And it's really incredible, you know, because I'm a drinks writer from New York and I wasn't on the ballot. I won it all three times in my opinion. I did so well in that state. The people were crying every time after.

Could blue states form escrow accounts and people/employers send federal tax payments to the escrow accounts instead of the IRS? Just thinking out loud here.

Turns out Republicans didn't want smaller government after all. They just wanted fewer IRS agents catching tax cheats and more masked thugs shooting women in the face.

Like many a jazz fan, I’ve looked down my nose a bit at Glenn Miller’s music. But these two 2 CD sets of previously unreleased radio broadcasts, recorded 1940-42, have converted me. My gosh, this stuff swings, and the sound is phenomenal. Only available from www.glennmiller.org!

An homage to New Year's Eve, traditions, and Chinese food — my latest for @forbes.com (via my website). Have a read while getting ready to give 2025 the boot!

As Trump proved on Christmas — and every time a normal person is supposed to behave with grace & dignity — he’s the most miserable, angry, aggrieved SOB on the planet. And he’s earned every shred of his misery. May he never know a minute of happiness or peace in this life or the next.

In 1993 I opened a record store — a CD store really. It was the '90s, you know. 20 years ago tonight we closed up for good. And I'll tell you, you couldn't pay me enough to do it again... although if I'd gotten paid in the first place, I might look back on the experience a little more fondly.

MTV could air music videos again. Or it could lean into its original GenX demographic and become an '80s nostalgia channel. Instead, every time I've turned it on for the last 5 years, it's been airing a show called Ridiculousness, featuring a woman named Chanel West Coast cackling at home videos.

There were a lot of great whiskeys released this year, and I neglected to write about many of them — probably because I was too busy, um, "researching" them. So here's my mad year-end scramble to mention as many as possible! Only at @forbes.com (via my website)!

A year that’s been so awful in so many ways delivers what I hope is the coup de grâce and not the precursor to even more awfulness. RIP Rob Reiner.

Putting “THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES” in quotation marks is something I actually agree with in this statement.

Looks like Trump is going to have to make room on his mantle (and around his neck) for the first annual Netflix Peace Prize and the first annual 60 Minutes Peace Prize.

One of these days I'll get caught up with posting links to my writing on my website. Until then... here are two relatively recent Whiskeys Of The Week I wrote up for @forbes.com. Check 'em out, why don'tcha! It IS Repeal Day, after all.

Biden/Harris failed in part because they tried to trumpet positive data about the economy & inflation without addressing people’s apprehension & fears. R’s are doing the same thing now — minus the data.

My daughter went to school today wearing a Members Only jacket & my Jesus & Mary Chain "Psychocandy" shirt from my high school days. I told her nobody who wore a Jesus & Mary Chain shirt in the '80s would have been caught dead wearing Members Only, but I suppose the distinction no longer matters.

War for oil, huh? So MAGA basically voted for Bush, with worse hair and less dignity.

I turned my friend Cynthia on to Letters To Cleo in ‘94 or so - she loved them even more than I did. We never got around to seeing them in their heyday & kept missing the occasional reunion gigs. Cynthia died a few years ago, but she was right there with me at LTC’s Bowery Ballroom show last night.

WHO IS THIS SANE PERSON AND WHAT HAS SHE DONE WITH MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE

I've been writing plenty for @foodandwine.com, but have neglected posting links on my website. So here's a bunch of 'em, led by news of Islay's first-ever rye whisky — & one of very few in all of Scotland. Plenty of other news as well. Check it out!

In the cold light of day, it seems to me the Dems did the right thing. I mean, part of why we're Democrats is that we don't want tens of millions of people to go hungry, and eight of them just voted to prevent that from happening.

I am well aware that if I was on SNAP I’d likely feel quite different about the shutdown ending.

Mind blown.

Trump is appealing the court's decision because he apparently really, really wants millions of people to go hungry while he fights to jack up their health insurance premiums. And on Thanksgiving my in-laws are going to complain about... Mamdani. I'm pissed off already.

I wrote about Dr. Bill Lumsden (of Glenmorangie & Ardbeg fame) and someone he worked with whose name escapes me presently. It's a fun read! Check it out at @forbes.com via my website.

At some point during Game 7 of the World Series I stopped rooting for a team and started rooting for the game to never end.

Does anyone else read about China’s leader and think “President Eleven?”

New nerdy music purchase! 6 CDs box set of Bob Crosby (Bing’s brother), recorded 1936-42. He led one of the great jazz bands of the era — they played a hybrid of old-school Dixieland and modern (for the time) big band swing, and they COOKED. Get your copy at mosaicrecords.com !

So Trump is holding food stamps hostage until the Dems cave and let him... jack up health insurance premiums. And yet tens of millions of people truly believe he cares about their well-being, or anything other than humiliating Democrats. I don't get it.

Read about the longest-aged single malt Scotch in whisky history (85 years!) via the link at my website, where you can also read my gloating about how I got to taste it twice (or three times, depending on how you look at it).

It seems to me that, best case scenario, we're headed for an "illiberal democracy" for the foreseeable future. Worst case — and it seems like Trump wants this — is a full-on dictatorship. Do we have reason to believe otherwise? I would love to be convinced if so.

ACECO, the company tasked with tearing down the East Wing of the White House, is not only acting illegally, it's acting stupidly. Going by its client's past history, there's a very good chance it won't get paid for its work.

I'm rooting for the Blue Jays. America doesn't deserve a World Series championship this year.

The time to be shocked or outraged by anything Republicans do is over. This is the new normal. And rather than hoping we can turn it around with lawsuits that crooked judges will make sure fail, or elections that will likely be rigged going forward, we need to figure out a new way to fight.

Since Trump is cutting funding — illegally, I assume — for projects in blue states which taxpayers have paid for, do taxpayers in blue states have any recourse? Do we know if governors of any blue states have some sort of plan in place?

Taylor Swift’s new album sold 2.7 million copies the day of release. To be fair, that could just mean that one fan bought all 2.7 million variations.

It may be small consolation when the armed forces and ICE come to occupy my city, but I’m still rooting for the one Canadian team in MLB to stomp the life out of the MAGA-friendly New York Yankees.

I wonder if the MAGA #Yankees celebrated their win over Boston by mistakenly deporting some US citizens because they looked like they could possibly be Mexican.

Chatting with Willem Dafoe about whisky at 7 AM on a Sunday wasn't on my bingo card for 2025, or ever, really. But it happened, he was very nice, and of course it was for an article for @foodandwine.com, so here it is (via my website).

It’s funny to realize that MAGAs were actually fine with all the excesses of the woke left and cancel culture — they just wanted to be the ones in charge of it.

I threw out my back, and between muscle relaxers and general agony I haven't been able to do much. But in between shuffling around the block, stretching & hot showers, I updated my website with links to stuff I've written recently for @foodandwine.com. Have a read! Ouch!

Watching my first Mets game as a former Yankees fan. Gary, Keith and Ron... I think I can get used to this.

Further proof that the Yankees are the most MAGA of baseball franchises. Which is not surprising because George Steinbrenner was the OG Trump. I’m embarrassed to be a fan.

Thoughts and prayers.

It will change approximately zero MAGA minds, but at least it’ll be fun watching the mental acrobatics required to rationalize it.

I was too busy enjoying summer to update my website much, so it's time to catch up with the backlog. Starting with this writeup for @forbes.com of one of the more interesting/noteworthy things I've tasted in the last few months. Get the link and click away!