This is a dangerous OpED to write. But it is also a necessary one.
The USA now has a POTUS who is a convicted criminal (as determined by a 12-person jury and judge). This POTUS, additionally, is conducting the U.S. government as a criminal enterprise.
He has appointed a raft of unqualified department heads who spend most of their time simply obeying whatever foolish whim comes to them from the POTUS, including orders to disobey lawful court orders. Though the Trump administration has lost up to 74 recent court rulings, Mr. Trump has also routinely ignored the resulting legal orders, instead calling for the impeachment of judges who’ve ruled against him. (The POTUS has no authority over impeachment proceedings.)
Not only must that concern us all, it is clear that the ship he is commanding is headed straight for the rocks offshore with no anchor brakes activated, like the recent trade barge which crashed into and destroyed the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore.
Mr. Trump has ordered the arrest and deportation of several people who possess legal papers to live and work in the U.S., and has sent Justice Department lawyers into court to refuse court orders to produce real evidence against those who’ve been deported to maximum prisons in foreign lands, or to produce real evidence that such persons have actually committed any crimes. The officials representing the POTUS have summarily fired federal employees without following proper procedures, then dallied endlessly in rehiring most of these employees after the courts have declared the government’s actions illegal.
Because he was embarrassed and belittled by many in the artistic community during his first term of office, the POTUS has this time dismissed and chased away the board members of the famous Kennedy Center that produces the Kennedy Center Honors programs, so that he can control the selection of artists himself—though he has no expertise in doing that. Additionally, he has in the last few days demanded to be appointed the chair of the Harvard University Board of Directors or else he would take away over 2 billion dollars in federal funding already promised to the school. Harvard has refused to comply and he has threatened punishment for the school. Additionally, he has already threatened other elite universities in similar fashion, and Columia and others have wilted and obeyed.
Mr. Trump could never have qualified academically to attend Harvard, Yale or the other elite universities he has targeted, so he has decided to bully them instead, legally and illegally. He has also continued with his quixotic tariff wars, in spite of the grocery store miseries it is causing for American consumers. The legal authority he has claimed to do so does not exist for that purpose, but he has galloped on anyway.
Essentially ignoring court orders—including recent Supreme Court rulings—means he is rendering the legal establishment in this country toothless and meaningless, and behaving as a would-be dictator or courtless king. Congress, the only other branch of government that can put him into check, is controlled by Republicans who will not act to deter him.
The fate of the U.S.A. is now in the hands of a psychopathic person with delusions of grandeur who sees nothing to hold him to account. It is terrible to behold what foolish people have wrought.
The end of America as we know it can truly be at hand. It is certainly in the looking glass at present. Those who doubt it can simply keep tweedling their thumbs and whistling a happy tune as the storm clouds grow ever bigger and more menacing.
Professor David L. Horne is founder and executive director of PAPPEI, the Pan African Public Policy and Ethical Institute, which is a new 501(c)(3) pending community-based organization or non-governmental organization (NGO). It is the stepparent organization for the California Black Think Tank which still operates and which meets every fourth Friday.
