Photograph by Nathaniel St. Clair
On November 2, 1800, John Adams wrote a letter to his wife, Abigail, on the first night he moved into the White House. He was its first resident and the second President of the United States. In concluding his letter, President Adams prayed: “May none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof.”[i]
Given his ending prayer, President Adams would be absolutely dumbstruck were he to observe the Presidency of Donald J. Trump.
Rather than the “honest and wise” man, President Adams prayed for, Donald Trump is the polar opposite.
He is a serial liar, whose personal and professional life reeks of corruption, cheating and scandal.
He has sullied the federal courts with his appointment of unqualified political hacks and his “good old boy” relationships with certain of the Supreme Court Justices.
He fomented a coup on January 6 2021, to take over the government and nullify the presidential election he lost. In his present term he is pardoning and trying to set aside the convictions and sentences of the thugs and terrorists who participated in executing his insurrection.
His moral code is no better than that of common back-alley pimp; he has sexually assaulted women, and he frequented Jeffrey Epstein’s island where teen age girls were forced to be the sexual playthings of the rich and famous.
He has, and is, grifting the government and Americans to increase his personal wealth. He made promises to Americans that has never kept and will never keep. He promised to raise up the common man and woman, but has, instead, trampled them down.
He has decimated federal regulatory agencies and the civil service.
He has insulted our friends and allies to the point that our Country, once the shining light of democracy and a world leader, is distrusted and disrespected. He has tariffed the trade of other countries to absurd lengths, and the costs of these have been passed on the Americans.
He unleashed his Brown Shirts (ICE) on those people seeking nothing but a better life—and willing to work for it—and he’s imprisoned them inhuman facilities before separating parents from children and, ultimately, deporting tens of thousands. His ICE agents have committed homicides on American citizens attempting to monitor their activities; they have harassed citizens attempting to exercise their Constitutional rights of free speech and assembly.
He has dragged our Country into a foreign war without Congressional authorization. That war has increased inflation, the cost of food, gasoline and travel for Americans, and it has upset the economies of the world. In that war, Trump has threatened to commit war crimes against Iranian civilians; he has threatened to wipe out an entire civilization.
While sanctimoniously supporting Christian values, he chastised Pope Leo, calling him a weak loser, because the Pope spoke against Trump’s war with Iran and argued the need for peace and dialogue. Worse, Trump portrayed himself as Jesus Christ, the healer, in a web-post.
He tore down the east wing of the White House and is in the process of building heroic monuments which are little more than gaudy shrines to his lack of taste. He seeks to have his name plastered on buildings and public facilities.
He has sought to take control of Canada, Greenland, Cuba, and Puerto Rico. He invaded Venezuela and kidnapped its sitting President and First Lady.
He punishes all who slighted him in any way or whom he considers to be his enemies. He is a venal and vengeful bully.
Donald Trump is delusional. Four considerations underpin his every decision: 1. Will it make me look good? 2. Will I make money doing it? 3. Will it make me more powerful? And 4. Can I punish my enemies doing it.? Indeed, Donald Trump is a malignant narcissist whose only concern is for himself.
Donald Trump is an old, corrupt, incompetent tyrant who gets up–and off–every morning in his own self-created and self-fulling reality—a reality that is bereft of the actual problems and needs of modern-day America, once the leader of the free world.
So, what is the solution?
Surely, Donald Trump should understand insurrection, since he fomented one on January 6, 2021.[ii]
But that’s not how we change our country’s administrations and depose corrupt leaders who would be despots and monarchs of the sort we overthrew in the Revolutionary War.
There are peaceful means at our disposal.
Our elected representatives in Congress could exercise their Constitutional Powers of impeachment and conviction under Article 1, Sections 2-4, or removal under the 25th Amendment to rid us of the narcissistic, delusional fraud who presently occupies the White House.
But sadly, Congress has demonstrated neither the will nor intestinal fortitude to exercise its Constitutional powers and duties. Rather, like beaten dogs, all but a few of those in Congress cower and snivel before Donald Trump’s throne, kissing his ring, and turning a blind eye to his corruption, deceit, incompetence and the chaos he has loosed upon America, on our those who were our allies, and on the world. So, leave Congress to its cowardice
But what does it say about us, that we suffer a person like Donald Trump to remain in office and our elected representatives’ dereliction in failing to remove him to the dustbin of history? What does it say about us that we would defeat President Adams’ prayer by suffering a dishonest and stupid man to rule under the White House roof.
We the people must act. We still have the power of the vote—even though Donald Trump and his lickspittles are trying to suppress and subvert that, as well.
We must vote all of these elected officials out of office, and we must replace them with officers who will support, protect and defend the Constitution in accordance with their oaths of office.[iii] We must elect officials who will govern for the good of America and for the common man and woman; who will restore our Country as the shining light of democracy in the world; and who will reclaim the respect and trust for our Country that Donald Trump, his sycophants and cronies have trashed.
This is our time, and, in the challenge of President Adams, we must together save our Republic from those who would destroy it.
Notes.
[i] https://www.masshist.org/database/1998
[ii] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/January_6_United_States_Capitol_attack
[iii] See, Federal Constitution Article II, Section 1 and Article VI.
