This week in the saga

Wednesday afternoon two National Guardsmen are shot blocks from the White House. He calls the shooter an animal, says he will pay a very steep price, and blesses the guard. At five past nine that evening he announces he will speak on it at nine fifteen, sharp. Thanksgiving night he posts a policy instead of a greeting: migration from every third-world country permanently paused, and only reverse migration can cure it. Friday afternoon the machine that signs documents is turned into an eraser — ninety-two per cent of the last administration's papers terminated in one paragraph. Saturday morning the airspace above and around a South American country is closed in its entirety, addressed to airlines, pilots, drug dealers and human traffickers alike. And at a quarter to one on Monday morning he posts the section number of the sedition statute and tells the reader to do what has to be done.