How Tall; The Wall

Joe Cherner: “How did President Trump grow an inch this year? Does anyone in his 70s actually get taller? Or could it be that if he were still six two (as he was measured at his last physical), he would be considered obese (he’s only borderline at 6’3″)? Do you think he was trying to avoid being labeled obese?”

His head may have swelled?

In this photo, he appears to be the same height as President Obama — 6’1″.  But if you input his age (71) and his weight (239, unless they fudged that a little, too), and 6’2″ — or if you just look at him — you will see he is officially obese.

The more so if he is 6’1″.

I once wrote “How Tall Is Robert Redford Really?” for New York Magazine, so celebrity stature is a field with which I have some familiarity. 

Bob Sanderson: “There’s a narrative on the wall that almost everyone in Washington is missing.  WE ALREADY BUILT THE WALL!  The Secure Fence Act of 2006 launched the construction of hundreds of miles of walls, fencing, and vehicle barriers at the cost of many billions of dollars.  They referred to this as “barriers” or “fences”, but when I drive from Phoenix to San Diego, it sure looks  like a wall.  I believe we decided to refer to it as a “fence” so as to minimize offence to Mexico, a partner in border security and drug interdiction.  Almost every news story about the border, even coverage of Trump’s wall prototypes in San Diego, shows the existing wall in the background, but nobody ever points it out.  . . . As Trump’s wall has evolved, it is settling on a description that the current wall already matches.  They’re now calling for see-through construction, fences in some places, high-tech sensors instead of a physical barrier for some sections.  This is what we already bought and (maybe) paid for.  I don’t doubt that Border Patrol has some areas where they would like additional barriers, or stronger barriers where they’re frequently breached.  Previous Congresses ran out of enthusiasm for what was starting to look like a money pit.  I suspect that Trump knew none of this when he proposed his wall.  His concept of our border was likely formed by listening to Fox News and talk radio, which likes to refer to our “open border” when discussing border security. . . . Every discussion of Trump’s wall should say not that “Trump wants to build a wall”, but instead that “Trump wants to build another wall”.  And any proposal to spend more money on walls should first answer the question “what problem will Trump’s proposed wall solve that was not already solved by the billions we spent on our existing border barrier system?”