1. United States
2. Maine
3. Letter

If the reports are true—and these days one must approach all reports with a lantern in one hand and a healthy skepticism in the other—then we find ourselves in a most curious chapter of American governance. It appears the President has taken up the occupation of national cobbler, personally selecting shoes for members of his staff and cabinet. A generous gesture, one might think, if not for the peculiar detail that he reportedly guesses their sizes. Now, guessing a man’s shoe size is a risky enterprise even among friends. But to miss the mark so thoroughly that the recipients must hobble about in ill-fitting footwear—yet dare not remove them—suggests something stranger than mere poor estimation. If a cabinet secretary must limp through the corridors of government in shoes that pinch like a tax collector’s handshake, not because they fit but because they came from the wrong man to contradict, then we are not merely discussing footwear. We are discussing fear. So I write with a simple request for clarity. Is this story true? Are the stewards of the republic really padding around Washington in shoes that do not fit, silently enduring the blisters? Because if the people serving our nation cannot safely admit their shoe size, one begins to wonder what else they cannot say. And that, unlike a tight shoe, is a problem that fits us all.