Nicole Sanders

Deceived?

Trump isn’t being that deceitful. Actually, for the most part, we should take him at his word. Ignore the walking back. Never mind the equivocation. He and his lackeys are actually doing and are actually going to do exactly what he has said he is going to do; and the rest of us need to be prepared for it. He is not going to help Ukraine. It’s simply not in his nature. He has no use for NATO and will jettison it at the first opportunity. When it comes to foreign policy, it is better to believe Trump the first time. The Trump administration’s “mixed messages” consist of Trump telling his base he keeps his promises and then saying all he needs to say to keep world leaders from interfering. History will look back and judge us for being stunned.

Why was it that no one saw his decision to speak unilaterally with Putin coming? This is typical Trump. I feel for Zelensky. He wants to believe that Trump won’t really make a deal without him at the table. He’s wrong. Trump will go behind Zelensky’s back and it will prove very difficult to stop him. Will Trump involve Europe, or worry about future Russian aggression? Not on your life. His VP said as much. Listen to the tone of contempt in J.D. Vance’s voice as he scolded European countries for not giving free speech rights to their far-right factions. Since when did Trump think that the fate of NATO nations was his prerogative? What motivation does he have? Trump is motivated by one thing and one thing only–a transactional relationship in which America has something specific to gain. In this case it seems to be rare earth minerals.

And let us not kid ourselves about Gaza. Trump will push his plan and strong arm anyone who tries to stand in his way. The reason Isreal isn’t sending tents into Gaza is because Trump wants to expel the population. He will do everything in his power to shove his plan down the throats of any country, as he deems it necessary. And when the world community protests that international law cannot be violated, he will either ignore it or attempt plausible deniability and expect the world community to go along with it.

The world community needs to stop standing around and waiting to be told what they want to hear from Trump. When he does lie, it is only because people in positions of power are willing to listen to him imply that it is all empty threats and bluster. No, it isn’t. The sooner the world community wakes up to that fact the sooner people in power can step forward and start figuring out how to respond. The real work needs to begin–the work of understanding how the world is going to cope with Donald Trump as he truly is. If we fail to act it is on us. We cannot say Trump did not warn us.

Who Knows About Efficiency?

Government workers will be facing, especially over the long term, some of the worst consequences of the new Trump administration. For them, change means not only the end of a career, but also a feeling of helplessness as they watch years of hard work being dismantled right before their eyes. As they are forced to leave, and as the risk of the government unraveling grows ever greater, the voices of these workers will and can become crucial in combating the chaos that is bound to ensue in a second Trump presidency. These are the people who know all too well, and better than anyone else, just how much damage is really being done to the rule of law and the ability of the American government to meet the needs of the American people. It is they who most understand that you cannot treat the Federal bureaucracy like an entity whose sole goal is making money. Yes, reforms to the bureaucracy are needed, but not by corporate executives. Changes need to come from the people who are doing the day to day work of the government, who have the expertise to know best how to deal with waste, fraud, and abuse.

The realities of responsible cuts to government spending are extremely difficult. Rather than waste, fraud, and abuse; most programs are serving a purpose and doing so in a reasonably efficient manner. Cutting government spending will mean reevaluating priorities–a notoriously difficult process.

Simply shutting down entire departments with no regard for the functions those departments have, will not, in the long run, seek to balance the budget; it will only sow chaos. You can shut down a department, but you cannot shut down the need that those government departments and their employees help fulfill. Some other way of filling the void created by this absence will eventually emerge. The only thing “gained” by the wholesale abdication of the responsibility of a government to its citizens is a power vacuum. Trump can cut whatever he likes; but people will find a way to get the things they need from their government. Denying citizens access to critical functions of their government is a recipe for chaos and will accomplish nothing else.

Civil Servants are not perfect people and they are dealing with a system badly in need of reform. However, there is no other group of people who can better tell us how to streamline government: what is most critical, what we can afford to let go, and how we can inject fiscal discipline into an admittedly broken system. If Trump really wants to tackle inefficiency he should start by listening to federal workers, not declaring them to be the enemy. He is demonizing the very people who could most help him reach his stated aim.

“Efficiency” is a smoke screen. What Trump really wants is a government non-responsive to the needs of common American citizens. Hopefully, eventually, the people who voted for him will come to that realization.

What if You Get it Wrong?

One thing is utterly lost on DOGE. The federal government is not a corporation. He is unable to understand that a government agency does more than just spend appropriated money. Government agencies have very specific purposes–intangible purposes. USAID, for instance, its purpose is American soft power. The problem is that you can’t put a dollar value on that, and therefore in Musk’s mind it has no purpose. But government is about all the things in life that you can’t put a dollar value on.

Take something as seemingly economic as farm subsidies. Being from a rural state I have seen Washington politicians convince themselves that things like crop insurance are solely economic matters. Anybody who lives here will tell you differently. The politics of farm subsidies is about what kind of farming we will have–the life and death of the family farm. What seems to be a matter of mere money is in actuality an existential fight about what it means to be a farmer. Money is not the point.

All of government works this way. Things that seem to be about dollars and cents are really about the things that cannot be bought and sold. By ensuring the government meets the needs of vulnerable populations, Social Security protects our democracy. The Education Department provides oversight, ensuring kids have the resources they need to learn. Expertise is a resource that cannot be bought.

The biggest problem with Mr. Musk is recklessness. When SpaceX fails a rocket blows up. When the government fails, a generation of children are not able to function as workers and citizens. A “move fast and break things” approach may work in the corporate world where the worst thing that could happen is for your venture to go bankrupt. But if the government goes bankrupt there is a lot more at stake than man never making it to Mars. Millions of people will have their lives impacted in really serious ways. I am all for reform. Washington does need to be shaken up. But no one has the right to just put a stop to the business of government. If Twitter shuts down while Musk remakes the company people can’t Tweet. If Musk shuts down USAID for a while millions of people who rely on emergency food aid will be in danger of dying of hunger.

What we have never heard from anyone in the Trump team is an acknowledgement of the terrible responsibility that rests on their shoulders. These people may be the smartest people in the room in Silicon Valley, but that doesn’t mean they are psychologically equipped to deal with a situation in which mistakes cannot be made, and where you have to get it right the first time. We can live without Twitter. Millions of people here and all over the world cannot live without the American government. With power comes responsibility. Have Trump and Musk ever, in their hubris, ever stopped to consider the consequences if they get this wrong?

More Than Just Four Years

I would say that we are in for a long four years, but it is going to be a whole lot harder than that. Whatever happens in the next election cycle, irreparable damage is being done to American democracy as we speak. Taking a look at the people Trump has gathered around him, it is sobering. For one thing, impeachment will not be enough. Even if we find a way to oust Trump we will still be stuck with his nominees, not to mention that now the world’s richest man has better access to sensitive Treasury payment systems than career employees. Now that Trump has a group of powerful acolytes who are in the business of remaking government, it is going to be really hard to put a stop to the damage being done.

This is not a moment to hunker down and wait. It is a moment for action. The Democratic Party is floundering after being unable to block a raft of dangerous nominees to the most important offices in the land. That isn’t to say that people aren’t trying. Time and again members of the committees demanded yes or no answers to yes or no questions. Time and again they received none. A good example–Pam Bondi hedging, unwilling to say that Biden won the 2020 election, constantly attempting to interrupt and talk about her “experiences” in Pennsylvania.

Clearly, there are a lot of Americans who are not fooled. This was a close election. The margins in the Senate are small and razor thin in the House. But enough people have been taken in to give Trump enough power to form an administration. The question is if, over time, voters will see that the people Trump is putting in power are not who they say they are.

For one thing, we can hope that voters will realize they did not elect Elon Musk. Hopefully, those who voted for Trump will see that he is abdicating his power to unelected oligarchs. Trump and Musk are taking a huge risk. Trump’s promises to wrest America from the deep state may yet blow up in his face. If their “reforms” cause something to go seriously wrong with the government on Trump’s watch, Trump will have trouble blaming someone else for the mess. But this is the hard way. If America goes down this road there will be a lot of destruction left in the wake of Trump’s administration. The greatest hope we have is that Trump’s administration will crash and burn without taking the entire American government down with it.

Musk is right–this is indeed a fork in the road for America. It will come down to the values of each individual acting collectively. It will be a test of American values. The people will have to decide whether or not they want their democracy, or if they are going to abdicate their role as citizens because of the false promises of a man and a movement attempting to destroy American democracy.

“Great Again” When?

Whatever has been is what will be, and whatever has been done is what will be done. There is nothing new beneath the sun!

Ecclesiastes 9:1 Stone Edition Tanach

Trump’s promise to “Make America Great Again” has one glaring flaw. When exactly was “Great?” Rather than restoring America to a former glory, he is refusing to learn from history. For instance, his hostility toward USAID. We take USAID for granted now, but it only became important as America struggled to win the Cold War. In the beginning, America believed in fighting the Cold War solely through military might. Then we learned the importance of soft power and the war of ideas–that the world viewing America as committed to human rights was as important as being a superpower.

Trump’s shocking and utterly unworkable idea to remove Palestinians has been tried before as well, several times. Ironically, one effort was made by USAID. They moved Palestinians to Jordan, hoping they would see themselves as Jordanian. It didn’t work. It became clear that the Palestinians were a people with a homeland and were not going to go willingly. They were displaced once and were not going to be displaced again. The world moved forward and came to understand that a two state solution was needed–except Trump, who insists on repeating history and telling the world it is something new.

Stocking a federal bureaucracy on the basis of loyalty isn’t a new idea either. It was called the “spoils system.” But the rest of us don’t want to return to the 1880’s, before the Pendleton Act established a merit based process for hiring civil servants. It would take a long time for the merit based system to take hold. But as it did people understood it as a step forward. Ironically, the main reason the merit based system was instituted was to increase efficiency.

Furthermore, it is not as if transgender people have never encountered laws that force them into the closet. Not so long ago people went to jail for dressing in “drag”. Cross-dressing was kept secret and if discovered lives would be ruined. It was accepted that gender dysphoria was a mental illness. Then we had the Stonewall Uprising, and the movement it sparked. Transgender people became recognized members of society.

The last two generations have brought negative changes as America has transformed socioeconomically. But this isn’t the first time America has faced such changes. During the Gilded Age, America transitioned from an agrarian economy to an industrial one. There were real problems, like child labor and tainted food. But America did not return to an agrarian economy. We passed child labor laws. Harvey Wiley and his Poison Squad laid the foundation for the FDA. America had to adapt to seismic changes; it could not return to the past.

We should be careful when we use the word “unprecedented” to describe Trump. There are precedents to his backward and dangerous ideas. They exist far back in the annals of the history he is repeating. Trump isn’t making America great again. He is rolling back hundreds of years of human progress, not returning America to a storied past.

A Way of Making America Poor Again

A good name is better than much fine oil.

Ethics of the Fathers Chapter 6 Mishna 7

Donald Trump is promising to make America rich again by using the power of the purse to intimidate our allies. In Trump’s over-simplified universe, all we have to do is intimidate people to get what we want. Since America is an economic and military power-house, it ought to be able to get everything it wants.

But there is another kind of capital that Trump is burning through with record speed–political capital–the good graces of our allies and the respect of our adversaries. For instance, we stand to lose a lot if we alienate Canada. Taking the attitude that Canada is a less rich country and therefore we will simply ignore Canada’s wants and needs, and disregard its interests, is foolhardy. Someday we will need the Canadians; or we will find that we would have been a hell of a lot better off for having their trust and cooperation on some matter of mutual importance. Why tear down this relationship? Trudeau may mollify Trump, but even now the Canadian people have begun to sour on America.

This reckless attitude toward the goodwill of our friends and allies is no different than someone who believes that they have an endless supply of money. Eventually, they end up bankrupt. Trump will burn through American political capital only to find we need something we cannot get simply by throwing our weight around.

Take Columbia–yes, we can throw our economic might in this small, poor country’s face, deciding that we should be able to have all we want simply because we are bigger and might makes right. But why? Why throw away a perfectly good relationship? It is ironic that Trump claims that the flow of drugs into the US is one of his top priorities and then deliberately alienates one of America’s most important allies in stopping the flow of illegal drugs. Sure we are bigger than Columbia, but that doesn’t mean they have nothing to offer us. The diplomatic relationship is still worth a lot. And Columbia knows that. A time will come when we need something from the Columbians that we cannot cajole them into providing. A moment will arise when the political capital we have invested in for years will prove invaluable to the interests of America, and will have a real-world impact on our everyday lives.

It’s almost impossible to make some other country share intelligence. The benefits of a stable economy in a troubled region are something that cannot be obtained by coercion. Aid and democracy efforts keep people from becoming migrants in the first place. Our interests extend beyond our borders.

There are things America needs and wants that bullying cannot afford us. There are more things for which bullying is the really hard way. I’m not asking anybody to be a bleeding heart liberal. Political capital is necessary. It’s about being pragmatic. Just as no one person has an endless supply of money, no one nation can address all of its interests by projecting intimidation.

Breathe Deep

We all need to chill. We need to think about what we are doing and why we are doing it. Like the MacCarthy era, or Salem 1692, this has all the classic characteristics of a witch hunt. We are allowing ourselves to be caught up in mass hysteria. There is a problem at the Southern border. It doesn’t mean immigrants are responsible for all our problems. No, we can’t just ignore illegal immigration. That too is a band-aid. It means we need to strike a balance between recognizing immigrants have much to offer and, yes, no country can function without a border. Yes, a small minority of people who cross the border illegally are truly criminals. Yes, the undocumented have committed a crime by crossing. Most are desperate.

Think about it; how much money would I have to pay you to walk through the Darien Gap? It is 60 miles and can take 10 days. The mud can literally swallow you whole. If you don’t dehydrate in the densest jungles on earth or die from exhaustion walking up steep mountains, you could get eaten by jaguars. It can cost as much as $500.

Despite this, there is a $30 million a year industry guiding the 400,000 people who crossed in 2024. One of the reasons the number is so high is efforts to stop illegal immigration. Mexico tightened its borders so Venezuelans could no longer get in by plane. 40,000 chose the Darien Gap instead. The Trump administration believes migrants living in fear of ICE will deter illegal immigration. If they weren’t afraid of the jaguars…

Are the cartels pedaling fentanyl terrorist organizations? I lost a friend to the opioid epidemic; no one can claim I am soft on drug dealers. But there is no invasion. Everybody has drug dealers; everybody struggles with illegal drugs crossing their border. A lot of the people in this “invasion” are unaccompanied minors–children. Most are families. Many of those children are escaping gangs. They want what we want, what all people want: a safe place to live, a way to make a living. They want the things people want because they are human.

It is appropriate to deport non-citizens who have committed serious crimes. But America has the world’s most sophisticated law enforcement; we can separate the sheep from the goats. We have too many native born citizens committing violent crimes to waste resources tracking down tax-payers whose only crime is being desperate enough to walk through a jungle in search of a better life.

Why exactly did undocumented workers rise to the forefront of the threats to America? Trump hypocritically pardons the Proud Boys and then says our undocumented co-workers and neighbors pose a threat. The most destructive aspect of Trump’s effort will be how it convinces federal agencies to take their eye off the ball of real threats to the nation–like the domestic terrorists he pardoned.

America had immigration problems before Trump. Now, it has all those problems and xenophobia.

Toxic to Democracy

There has been a lot of Democratic soul searching since Trump was reelected. But there is one thing that contributed to Trump’s reelection that Democrats logically could do nothing about–something that both women and many men have grown increasingly alarmed about for decades–toxic masculinity. For a long time now, people all over the world have watched as a destructive definition of manhood has overtaken American political culture. From Mark Zucherburg’s new lock to Dana White’s critical endorsement of Trump to Hulk Hogan’s shirt ripping and proclamations about “real Americans” at the Republican National Convention; Trump won the White House by convincing other men he was a “real man.” Toxic masculinity has become a threat to our democracy.

I am not surprised. Democracies aren’t built just on politics. They are built on a set of shared values. Values that are non-existent in the “manosphere.” People whose values revolve around the Ultimate Fighting Championship aren’t going to know anything about the most basic democratic principle of them all: solving conflict without using violence. This is the point of a democracy, and what makes a democracy a democracy.

There was a time, in my lifetime, when boys looked up to people like Joe Biden, when his achievements would inspire admiration. But increasingly young men look with disdain on men who show a willingness to solve conflicts through any other means but violence. A democratic society cannot maintain this forever. In order for a republic to function, its people must aspire to cooperate and find ways of resolving disputes other than through intimidation. Terry Gene Bollea (Hulk Hogan’s given name) may be a nice guy, but the kind of values his occupation espouses have no place in a diverse democracy that can function only when people agree to work in a cooperative manner with those with which they disagree. WWE may be good entertainment and a release for men; but kickboxing, pinning, submitting, and a general attitude of doing anything and everything to intimidate your opponent have no place in the White House. Hogan said it best himself at the Republican National Convention when he called the Trump-Vance ticket, “The best tag team ever.” referring to a WWE match in which teams compete.

Like the wrestlers that support him, Trump is a bully, constantly attempting to gain power through threat of force. The “tough guy” attitude that makes Trump so popular is also what makes him dangerous. And he now has the world’s greatest military power behind him.

But this problem is bigger than Trump’s presidency. As long as toxic masculinity endures, it will poison American democracy. Part of defeating Trumpism over the long haul will mean finding healthy role models for young men–men who don’t solve problems through violence. American democracy will not be truly safe until being a “real man” means wisdom, integrity, hard work, determination, and a belief in the power of the pen and the spoken word. This, not Hulk Hogan, is what it means to be a “real American.”

Adapt or Die?

We know the devastation of the Los Angeles wildfires. Some blame government agencies for insufficiently resourcing fire departments. They are approaching the problem from the wrong perspective. Yes, more money should have gone to fire departments because of climate change. But how much money does any one municipality have to spend on “adaptation” or “mitigation” efforts? LA has some of the best fire-fighting apparatuses in the world–with helicopters comparable to military aircraft and pilots with experience in night time combat flying. The Santa Ana winds downed these elite helicopters, and even the most experienced pilots. Without aircraft, firefighters tried to contain fires moving with hurricane force winds by hand. The Santa Ana winds would have overrun the best resourced fire department. When it came to the fires, there was no way to adapt to climate change. People died.

The risks of wildfire are well known to the people of the affected communities. While many people have lost everything through no fault of their own, the environmental movement has been raising alarm bells about building in fire prone areas for decades. Not all, but some of these homes, many of the very rich, should never have been built in the first place. If the municipal fire departments resources are insufficient, they need to not spend them trying to save the homes of people who logically made poor choices–who knew the risk of building in a fire prone area in an era of climate change. Although I feel for the people who have lost everything, this is a man-made, not “natural” disaster. For years, we have known that climate change was coming, we knew it would bring wildfires, and we knew what places would be prone to wildfires. People built anyways.

Rather than being able to adapt, communities like Altedena, and the people who live in them, may die. The winter rains failing and the Santa Ana winds being stronger may become the new normal. Exactly how often can this fire-prone area experience this kind of devastation? Especially when we consider not only the homes lost and the incredible emotional and psychological toll taken, but the disruption of the economy: price gouging, looting, an exacerbation of a housing crisis, the many, mostly immigrant, businesses who relied on these communities as a market for services from house cleaning to lawn care.

And there is the most obvious long term disruption–the insurance market. There seems to be no good way to stabilize the housing insurance market. One way or another, whether through direct payments to their policyholders or an assessment from Cal-fire, insurance companies in California are facing huge financial losses, and are withdrawing from California.

Today, President Trump pulled America out of the Paris Climate Accords. He says it will save $1 trillion dollars. Also today, the National Weather Service again issued its highest alert for fire danger. In the end, we will not be able to adapt to climate change. We will have to live with its destruction. And people will die.

The Limits of Martyrdom

Trump seems to have gotten away with it. However, over time and with careful pressure there is hope yet that Trump’s legal troubles–and some kind of accountability–will follow him into his next term. There is hope that the accumulation of legal problems will undercut Trump’s real or perceived mandate to govern. Eventually, something will stick. Trump has vulnerabilities or he wouldn’t be fighting every attempt to have the truth come out.

Trump displayed his weakness when he felt he had to go after a legacy news agency for misstating the difference between “sexual abuse” and “rape” in reference to E. Jean Carroll’s lawsuit. His need to parse words, and to defame Carrol, shows that he is not as invulnerable as he wants us to believe. His moral troubles may prove more resilient than his purely legal ones. E Jean Carrol is still bravely moving forward with her suit. Her’s is perhaps the most important because it calls Trump out for what he is–morally bankrupt and concerned only with escaping accountability.

Trump has famously claimed that he could shoot someone in broad daylight and get away with it. But that doesn’t mean he can do whatever he wants for any length of time. Eventually, what he does will catch up with him. Granted, there may be a group of people surrounding him that are so fanatically dedicated to him that nothing will cause them to change their minds. But the people who got him into the white house were not that fanatically devoted to him. They gave into his lies about how he could and would improve their lives. Trump’s claim, for instance, that he would lower the price of groceries. This is actually an economic impossibility. Deflation is the worst thing that can happen to an economy. What needs to happen is for real wages to rise enough for incomes to catch up to prices. This will occur on its own–Trump or no Trump.

So, there is a group of people with whom Trump is very vulnerable. The question is how to reach them–or maybe what to reach them with. It is a matter of finding what matters to the right people at the right time. And that takes really understanding why people voted for Trump in the first place. It takes getting your head around why all of this man’s immorality did not disqualify him in the minds of average American voters.

One thing is for sure, an unconditional discharge isn’t going to help; it is a major setback. It puts to rest something that should have followed Trump into the White House. But even with an unconditional discharge, Trump is still a felon. And we do have a report by the special council saying that he would have been convicted. That is not nothing. And it is telling what lengths Trump has gone to to suppress it. It shows us that there are limits to his ability to cast himself as a martyr oppressed by the deep state.