Madness
Finding the appropriate interpretation
Last year, if you can remember it, was a long time ago. It began with a period of 100 days when I had to hold my breath until I was out of oxygen and the US President was out of ink from signing 143 Executive Orders. Holding my breath for so long caused me to lose my usual mental acuity and it wasn’t until early June that enough blood reached my brain again to allow me to take in what was happening in the world.
What was missing, however, was comprehension. Surely, I thought, if things go on like this we won’t survive. So, instead of trying to make sense of it all, I opened a desktop folder which I titled “World War 3 Begins”. It filled up pretty quickly, what with Russia bombing Ukraine, Ukraine bombing Russia, Israel bombing Iran, Iran bombing Israel, America bombing Iran and Tariff Wars waging on all fronts. By mid-September it was overflowing and World War 3 still hadn’t begun.
So I opened a new folder. This one I called “Suicide: the death of the West”. Pretty soon my iCloud storage memory costs began to rise so steeply that I had to take drastic action or go bust. I began by making a list of trigger words which sent stories straight to my Bin if I attempted to save them: Immigration, Transactivist, NHS (or anything with Health in its name), DEI, LGBTQAI+ (or diminutives of same), Protest, Nazi, Fascist and Paedophile.
It helped, but my Apple iCloud monthly charges were still burdensome, until I had the brainwave to include real names in my list for exclusion: Starmer, Macron, Rachel Reeves, AOC, Kamala, Mamdani, Taylor Swift. Gradually I got the costs under some sort of control.
I know what you’re thinking. Why didn’t I add Trump to the list?
Well, excuse me for stating the obvious, but if I’d done that there wouldn’t have been any story anywhere in the world that wouldn’t have gone straight to my Bin, for there isn’t any story anywhere in the world that journalists can compile without including his name. Even people who religiously abstain from watching or reading news cannot let a day pass without mentioning his name.
Obviously I can’t open a folder titled “Trump”. Not even OpenAI and xAI combined have built enough data storage to house that lot. But what portion can I retain for reference if I’m to do my job of commenting on the world — bearing in mind that we journalists and opinion writers source most of our inspiration from what has been written by other journalists and opinion writers? By the end of 2025 I realised that I needed a new criterion for saving files and a new title for a desktop folder.
The end of the year arrived and a new year began. Julius Caesar created this tradition in 46BC by establishing the calendar which starts each year on January 1st. He’d just spent 12 months cruising the Nile with Cleopatra and was obviously in desperate need of a rest and a new beginning, which is how we all feel come Christmas Day and New Year’s Eve. Nowhere more so than in New Zealand where people stop working for at least 20 days, me included. 46BC was known as “the last year of confusion”, because it cleared up the issue of how many days there should be in a year, but I gave that title to 2025 and was determined not to have another year like it.
Out of care for my fellow human beings I’d made sure that cautionary tales of Jacinda Ardern were not consigned to my Bin (in fact I’ve retained one for you for next week), and other names leapt to front of mind in early January which I was equally glad not to have expurgated; US names like Candace Owen, Tim Waltz, Minneapolis, Tucker Carlson, Somalia, Greenland; Yookay names like BBC, Grooming gang, West Midlands Police, David Lammy; New Zealand names like Chloe Swarbrick, John Tamihere and Simon Wilson. Put them together with Donald Trump and I began to see a pattern emerging. Perhaps this was the direction that 2026 would point me towards. But what title could I give to the new desktop folder?
A comment made by the Telegraph’s Sam Ashworth-Hayes made me pause for thought: ‘The principle problem of the sensitive middle aged right winger,’ he wrote, ‘is that reality is so absurd and the actions of the state so malign that you sound like a conspiratorial lunatic when you set out a straightforward factual description of events.’
Who could argue with that? Perhaps “Conspiratorial Lunatics” could be the title of my new folder.
Then I read a headline that asked, ‘Is there method in Trump’s madness?’ It might have been in the New York Times, The Guardian, or CNN. I’m a bit of a stickler for language and like to spot the Marxist trick of inverting meanings, so I paused for a moment and questioned whether this common phrase was being used correctly. Sometimes his demands are absurd: ‘Give me Greenland or else.’ ‘Canada should be the 51st state’ etc. It does rather suggest in those cases that madness is a device that Trump uses to try and obtain an outcome.
That is certainly possible, but it also suggests a level of cunning on his part that requires extraordinary concentration. In 1971 Richard Nixon told Henry Kissinger to persuade the Chinese that he (Nixon) was so mad as to be dangerous and unpredictable. It worked so well that Nixon was the first US President to be invited to China and be gifted a panda bear. There’s no doubt that Trump could use the same method to destabilise an opponent, but his concentration is appalling and I’m not convinced that he can keep it up with everyone in the world as he seems to want to do now. His follow through is erratic, to say the least. Besides, it only worked for Nixon that one time. After a while people are on to you.
Richard Nixon told Henry Kissinger to persuade the Chinese that he (Nixon) was so mad as to be dangerous and unpredictable.
So, perhaps, rather than asking ‘Is there method in Trump’s madness?’ it would be more accurate to ask, ‘Is Trump’s madness methodical?’ The difference in meaning is considerable. But when I look at my watchlist for 2026, I do know that all the people on it have one thing in common: “Madness”.
The new folder is already filling fast.
A.I. Fabler
January 20, 2026
It is so energy conservative to hear a person like Donald Trump speak his mind wihout suffocating barriers to push through. A good example is "give me Greenland". Straightaway you know he wants Greenland but you know he won't tell you the reason until the deal is reasonably secured. If that makes doing business more straithforward then it should also make politics more straightforward.
Another person that I think conducts politics the same way (direct and straightforward) is British MP, Rupert Lowe. One is so typically English while the other is so 'loudly' American. Both, I admire and am grateful.
My only disappoitment so far is that the US and Israeli Forces have not yet hit the IRGC and save the lives of the protesting anti-Islamic Iranians. I say, "Where the bloody hell is the US Cavalry?".
Madness. Good title. But are you sure it won't fill up before, say, April or May? You may have to make several subfolders. And for goodness sake, do make all the folders digital or you won't be able to find your desk.