The whole system works because we are not all nuts on the same day. — Unkown

My mood regarding the heath of our nation goes up and down depending on what kind of news I am hearing. I try not to torture myself with too much information but I also believe in the importance of knowing the truth about what is happening even as I realize that we often are not privy to everything. In the past year and a half of Donald Trump’s presidency it has been difficult to stay calm given the massive changes not just to physical structures but to virtually every single federal department and often to laws emanating from the red states. It feels as though there is a purposeful dismantling of so much that I believe is important in the United States. Given that we are supposed to be in a celebratory year marking the two hundred fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence my anxieties are especially prescient. 

I keep thinking of Benjamin Franklin’s remark that we have a republic “if we can keep it.” Sometimes it feels as though we are standing at the edge of a precipice beyond which our nation will be doomed and other times I believe with all of my heart that the American people will ultimately keep the republic intact. 

There are some tacky things happening that are a matter of taste and a question of who has the authority to make them happen. There really was no reason to tear down the East Wing of the White House without a deliberation and agreement over whether or not we need a ballroom when there are nearby venues would be easy enough to secure and use for formal gatherings. It’s not so much that the idea of building a ballroom is totally bad, but the fact that part of the people’s house was torn down without any kind of consultation. Even if a ballroom is never built a great deal of costly damage has already been done. 

Then there is the lavish party for Trump’s eightieth birthday. He certainly has the right to celebrate his time on this earth. I gave my mother a surprise party when she turned eighty and it was lots of fun but not particularly costly nor did I tear up my yard to build an arena for a wrestling match for the occasion. I think that such an event is a bit tacky but I also say “to each his own” except for the fact that it is costing the taxpayers money that is desperately needed elsewhere. 

Of course these complaints from me are somewhat minor compared to the really serious things like a war with Iran that need not ever have happened and has been incredibly costly in lives and money. Trump and his followers seem to be unwilling to admit that the damage being done was never necessary. We have not in fact taken out Iran’s nuclear capability and the Strait of Hormuz was not closed before we attacked. The people of Iran are even less likely to rise up and protest than they were before Trump attacked Iran. We have expended also so much of our own arsenal that we are in a dangerous situation if a real need were to arise. The whole episode needed the formal agreement of Congress that the Constitution requires. What makes me the most angry and anxious is that Trump just does whatever comes into his head and then finds ways to justify his actions as though there are no restraints on a president the way our founding fathers intended. 

I could go on and on and on but each day feels so much like living in a house with someone who is mentally ill or a person who is a brutal bully. We don’t know from one minute to the next or one day to the next what the man who should be protecting us and our country will single handedly decide to do. He seems to stay up all night in a frenzy of anger and self pity that makes life unbearable for the rest of us and yet nobody says the true part out loud. Donald Trump is unfit to be in charge. His mind is focused on a revenge tour and a struggle for power that is personal, not about our national good. 

In the past there would have been good men and women who would have had the courage to speak up and make certain that nobody be allowed to run roughshod over our laws. What drives me particularly nuts in this moment is that a mad man is being protected by the very people who should be able to stop him. They bow and scrape and tell him that he is the greatest leader of all time for reasons that I cannot understand. The idea of honor is totally lacking in the members of the cabinet and in most of the Republicans in Congress. Whatever Trump wants he gets like a spoiled little brat that the elders fear. 

The only thing that keeps me sane and hopeful is that there are indeed people shouting from the rooftops that our president is not just an empty suit but a demented man who has no clothes. I see and hear their courage and I am able to keep from losing my mind in a situation that makes no sense to me. 

I have reached a point of not wishing to argue with many of the people who are ardent supporters of the madness of our president because I have learned that they are unwilling to see the truth about what is happening. I fear that they are blind to the danger that he represents so they go along with however he tells them to think. I don’t know if they fear him or they are just unwilling to accept that he is day by day destroying the country that we love. 

So for some time now I have vacillated between feeling as though all hope is lost and girding my loins to do whatever it takes to keep the United States free for all who live here. I have to believe that one day this nightmare will be over just as we made it through the revolution of long ago, the Civil War that tore us apart, and the world wars that brought down tyrants. We have struggled before and I believe that we will overcome this craziness once again.