I’ve been back in the United States from overseas for three weeks. (More on why I am here now on another post). And it has been three weeks of hell.
I arrived in NYC during the second week of the Olympics and decided to substitute the news and commentary that usually swallow my time here with sports coverage. My first attempt to shield myself from the news fell flat by February 22 as the creature in the White House was filmed congratulating the men’s hockey team, which won gold for the first tine in 46 years, and joking that he will now have to, in addition to inviting the men to the State of the Union, do the same for the women, who also won gold—ending a losing streak of only two years.
In true bro’ culture, the hockey men and the White House dweller laughed uproariously, the Olympic gold medal winning women’s team, which routinely sells out stadiums, the source of their mutual derision.
By February 25, the bros were united at the State of the Union address, which seemed to mimic a testosterone-rich high school assembly at an all-boys school. To avoid the topic of the Epstein investigation, Donald turned to the number-one hit on his top 40: hatred of Black people, this time Somalis again, leaving people like me from immigrant backgrounds to wonder when he will turn the attention of his empty headed, bigoted followers to the country of my origin. Will there come a time when I cannot leave my home in the U.S. like the Somali Americans who live principally in Minnesota?
By February 26, yet another student from one of my alma maters, Ellie Aghayeva of Columbia, was kidnapped by ICE goons allegedly using misinformation to gain access to her off-campus housing. Two students had been kidnapped from my undergraduate institution, Tufts, as well as Columbia last year. Because I have been out of the country and largely unplugged I should just say those are the kidnappings of which I am aware.
By February 28, the creature in the White House, traipsing behind the Israeli leader, began engaging in a military campaign against Iran. Donald, not known to read or digest history, understand military strategy, or have respect for non-whites, has distinguished himself as being the only American president too dumb and too vain to allow himself to fight the embattled Israeli prime minister’s war for him. There are no clear goals or exit plans for the U.S. in this latest military adventure. The effort, called Operation Epic Fury, is run by the two of the most epically unqualified and unprincipled people: Donald Trump and drunken womanizer Pete Hegseth, immortalized on Saturday Night Live by the comedian Colin Jost.
While Americans by a slim margin disapprove of the war, there is little reporting here on the more than 2,000 individuals who have died across the Middle East because of the two criminal leaders’ actions. I suspect that in true form Americans will wake up as gas prices here become even higher than they have become since the war, the economy continues to crater, and lone wolf and organized terrorism come to our shores—again.
By March 2 I was mean-Tweeting Donald’s followers during Zoom church, a practice I had given up when I left the country in July and began seeking peace of mind. And it was communion Sunday. I guess the blood and body of Jesus can’t help me now.
Having digested Fox-masquerading-as-a-news-outlet’s talking points, much of MAGA nation is singing the praises of the war, and finger wagging people like me that the U.S. is saving Iranian women from dictatorship. Shouldn’t we be happy? I got whiplash as aren’t these the same individuals who hate people of color, Muslims and women, of which the majority of the Iranian women are all three?
By March 6 toxic Barbie DHS Secretary Krisi Noem had been “reassigned” to the new position of Special Envoy for The Shield of the Americas, something akin to Order of the Pink Pom-Pom, or Order of You’re Put Out to Pasture. Noem, who has taken a wrecking ball to DEI programs under her aegis, is a graduate of an online university. At the end of the day, she was released for displaying all the financial corruption, incompetence, narcissism, lack of principles, empathy and basic decency of the bros in the administration. But she’s not one of the bros, big distinction.
Toxic Barbie will be replaced by Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin, who stood up and challenged the head of the Teamsters to a fight in the middle of a congressional hearing in 2023. “You are a United States senator. Sit down,” Bernie Sanders scolded the would-be pugilist, taking on the role of Congressional papa. Sounds like we’re in great hands. (Oh, by the way, this is the 2020s, so rather than giving Mullin his own pair of concrete shoes, the Teamster leader endorsed the senator years after their altercation, showing that MAGAs make strange bedfellows when there are so many others to vanquish.)
If I wrote all this in a script it would be thrown out, wouldn’t it? Welcome back to hell.
