Thread by @asymmetricinfo

Filed a column on why appliances break so much more these days, pegged to the death of my fridge. By afternoon, it was clear Manafort/Cohen was coming, but I was already in edit--& dreading the questions about how I chose to write about *a fridge*

Then a funny thing happened.

I mean, so yes, a lot of people who are apparently not familiar with my writing about Trump & his campaign accused me of trying to deflect from the crimes by focusing on my fridge.

But a lot of readers shouted "No! I want to talk about refrigerators!"

I just got the loveliest voicemail from a 70 year old woman who called to say nice things about the column, and complain about the durability of modern appliances, having just replaced the very 1979 Kenmore I wrote about in the column here: washingtonpost.com/opinions/to-a-…

She expressed the hope that the fridge would last 20 years (implying she & spouse don't expect to last longer than that) and gave me advice on brands to look at.

And you know what? We do care about the mundane details of our lives. Indeed, the aim of politics is to enable people to spend more time worrying about mundane details, and less time worrying about impending tragedy.

I've got a column in edit on Manafort/Cohen. Obviously, I wanted to write about that, because it's very important. But our daily lives are important too, and I'm not sorry I wrote about something that matters enough to make nice strangers call me to talk.

washingtonpost.com/opinions/to-a-…