Protests have broken out across the country after a maniacal authoritarian masquerading as the president of a democracy trampled on the rights we had long taken for granted. When did this start? How did it happen? By that I don’t mean to blame only Donald J. Trump who I view as merely the symptom of the actual disease. That disease has become our new pandemic with similar devastating results.
The disease in question is apathy among our elected leaders
compounded by a disillusioned public. That apathy has nurtured a leadership disconnect with the priorities of the electorate. As a result, we now see a sociopathic television entertainer has been able to convince just over half of the nation that even he, with all his personal baggage, would be better at running things. It was easy for a larger-than-life personality to get elected. We had become a nation enamored by celebrity and influencers, the new gods of a listless society. Once in charge, his attempts to keep some of his wild promises would involve an attack on the fundamental rights and freedoms that we hold dear.
His actions had nothing to do with solving problems, they had to do with a consolidation of power that could then be wielded for financial gain. His transactional nature sees all “deals” need to benefit him in some way. He gets money, power, adoration, or something else he craves in exchange for anything he gives. Whomever else may benefit as a result is circumstantial. The universe revolves around him. Where he sees a collection of star systems others with better vision see a black hole.
We have for too long been complacent and tolerant of a gradual erosion of our rights and freedoms as a cadre of stealthy and nefarious individuals sought personal gain through a corruption of “the system”. If there is a common denominator in all this, I would have to say that it is money. In that, I equate money and power as two sides of the same coin. Perhaps I should say two sides of the same bitcoin as nobody uses regular coins anymore.
The Trump Regime, as virtually all political criminal empires had done before, used familiar tactics. They corrupted the legal system and delegitimized elections. They then attacked free speech, education, racial minorities, sexual minorities, religious minorities, and bullied any group weak enough to not be able to fight back. They did these things in a way that would provide their rank and file with an identity. That group found it easy to become members of a large organization that gave their lives meaning. They now had a sense of belonging.
Once they were part of the regime, it was like a religion. In fact, those who already had deeply held religious beliefs were a known quantity who would be susceptible to groupthink. They were used to parroting the scripture that they had been taught to never question. That same scripture could be interpreted and reinterpreted in as many ways as necessary to explain past actions or future direction. These political evangelicals became true believers in “the cause”.
Some of the ideology was easy to accept because the words used to describe the various concepts would be hard to dispute. Who doesn’t want lower taxes, lower prices, better paying jobs, etc.? Everyone wants these things but, during political campaigns, nobody ever discusses the cost. The loss of personal freedom was never part of the discussion.
We now see that rhetoric was used to disguise the more hidden objectives. A power grab that would take away your right to vote for or against things you liked or didn’t like. You could have some education but only if that education taught a specific lesson. Books and other forms of messaging could now be banned along with free speech if any of the messages included were not approved by some higher authority.
One of our freedoms has no specific name, that is the freedom to exist as a free person. You could now be imprisoned without trial at the whim of someone more powerful than you. This basic personal freedom would first be lost by a minority group, namely anyone in this country without documentation. That group would then be expanded to include those here legally but who had in some way made some utterance with which someone in authority disagreed. Suggestions have already been made to further expand this to all citizens who don’t provide the new regime with the respect they demand.
This would then become a police state where the old government of “we the people,” becomes “I the ruler.” We are truly headed for such a dark place. It is time to challenge the loss of our freedoms. No drop in egg or gasoline prices will be worth the loss of everything outlined in our Bill of Rights and guaranteed in our Constitution. Apathy has no place here. We can no longer afford to be complacent. We need to let our voices be heard loud and clear. Let no politician feel that they don’t work for us.
People like Elon Musk have used their cash megaphones to buy political power but, as even he has seen, there is a price to pay. His Tesla brand has seen a loss of $873 billion in first 3 months of 2025. Where possible, others need to feel that pain. When politicians start losing their cushy jobs and the wealthy see their lifestyles threatened, perhaps things will change for the better.
Trump’s continuing series of whoops and do-overs showcase his ineptitude. His never-ending executive orders have cost this country trillions of dollars and ruined thousands of lives. Many of those orders were “issued by mistake,” and then when the reality of what he had just done was realized, there was no apology. There was just another order. Our future was as clear as pea soup. Any planned future investment was halted as too risky amidst the chaos. A stable economy does not fare well in times of uncertainty.
Trump has been his own worst enemy and, with luck, he will self-destruct. His approval ratings are in freefall. His first hundred days have shown that he is no better at running a country than he was running a casino.
