Listen To This Story

This week, we were going to write about how Civil War II has already begun, but that too few people have noticed because this one isn’t fought on battlefields by rival armies wearing uniforms that make them easy to distinguish. Instead, it is waged by the entire federal government against anybody who opposes Donald Trump.

Then something happened that has probably happened to most people who care about America. And we’re not talking about the MAGA “patriots” with flags in their social media bios who only seem to believe in the Constitution when they feel that their rights are being violated.

Donald Trump (almost) wore us down.

If you have followed this column, then you know that, for the past decade, we have warned about the terrible human being he is and the unique threat he poses.

In most cases, we have been proven right… sometimes eerily so.

In all that time, we never lost hope that the United States would be able to rally somehow, that Trump would be held to account for his actual crimes, as well as his flagrant violations of the Constitution and the ideals upon which the country was founded, and that Americans would ultimately reject his brand of right-wing nationalism.  

This week, we almost despaired.

Why, you ask?

It wasn’t the military strike on Venezuela law enforcement operation involving 150 fighter jets and other aircraft that resulted in the capture of Nicolás Maduro.

It wasn’t that Trump just keeps blurting out the real reason for the attack, which is that he wants to extort Venezuela and steal its oil so that he can book an affordability win at home (and because he is a mobster at heart, and this is what mobsters do).

It wasn’t listening to “Secretary of War” Pete Hegseth raving about “one of the most historic military missions the world has ever seen” (he must not have gotten the memo that it was a law enforcement operation) and realizing once again that this country is being led by imbeciles whose only relevant “characteristic” is loyalty to a loon.

It wasn’t watching the embarrassing display of Fox News host Sean Hannity trying to play kingmaker by goading María Corina Machado into giving up her Nobel Peace Prize to Trump, which isn’t even possible (a Nobel Peace Prize recipient can no more transfer their award to someone else than Tiger Woods can gift one of his Masters victories to us).

It wasn’t knowing with absolute certainty that, if Machado were to debase herself in that way, Trump would forevermore (falsely) claim that he is a Nobel Peace Prize recipient.

It wasn’t hearing him and other administration officials rattle off a list of countries that they want to attack and plunder next.

It wasn’t the president’s insistence that Greenland would be his, one way or another, which would end the most effective diplomatic and military alliance in world history.

It wasn’t realizing that the United States is now a villain on the global stage.

It wasn’t witnessing the spineless Republicans in Congress ceding yet more power to Trump.

It wasn’t watching a masked federal goon gun down an American citizen in broad daylight only to have the dead victim be blamed for being engaged in “domestic terrorism.”

It wasn’t the endless lies from the president and everybody else in his administration.

It wasn’t realizing once again that truth and reality no longer matter to half the population.

It wasn’t seeing another “the emperor has no clothes” event at the White House where everybody had to pucker up and kiss the president’s ass.

It wasn’t him making it abundantly clear in word and deed that he is severely mentally ill.

And it wasn’t listening to Trump explain that he is only constrained by his own “morality,” which is a terrifying thought.

No, while all of those things happened in just one week, they weren’t what caused us to (almost) lose hope.

What did, however, was realizing that nobody with any kind of power is willing to stand up to Trump.

Whether it’s heads of state, members of his administration, congressional Republicans, the media, or corporate executives, all of them are either afraid, greedy, power hungry, or on board with turning the US into a right-wing autocracy.

In other words, anybody who could stop what’s happening, or at least make it more difficult, isn’t doing so, either because of self-interest or self-preservation.

So, why aren’t we completely discouraged?

Because we still believe in the American people. Yes, we have discovered that a huge chunk of the population consists of bigots yearning for a strongman.

But we also see in poll after poll that most Americans are not OK with what is going on in the United States, and we see every day that these true patriots are still willing to get up and fight.

And, together, they are stronger than all the forces marshalled against them.

Maybe democracy is a bit like marriage — every now and then, you have to renew your vows to make sure that spark is still there.

What better time to do that than on the 250th anniversary of the nation standing up to tyranny?

So why have we not given up hope?

Because of you… and we aren’t going to abandon you now.