An old pal of my in England recently emailed me, saying that it’s almost impossible to find someone to say something pleasant about Trump on this side of the Atlantic, especially after the way he treated Zelensky in their White House meeting (Feb, 28, 2025). He also mentioned that his daughters can’t understand how a convicted felon, racist, someone who falsifies his tax and incited an attack on the Capital is even allowed to be elected, let alone President, adding that Prime Minister Boris Johnson was kicked out for way less. Paul concluded his note to me with, “What’s going on in America?” He is too perceptive a thinker for me to fall back on the lazy way of clichés, sound bites, or memes. We have had many long serious conversions over the decades. Here is my reply, sent on March 13, 2025.

Hi Paul,

Always good to hear from you. I can well understand why you and your daughters ask, “What’s going on in America?” I have often said that I write to know what I think. Your question has “forced” me to put into writing a task I’ve put off: to see what I myself think about what’s going on. Here’s some summary thoughts that came to mind. I have always appreciated the fact that you try to understand the behavior of others, even those you find offensive. I hope the following thoughts, although briefly stated, provide you and your daughters with some understanding.

I see several significant social and political shifts that have contributed to what’s going on in America today: the rise of the imperial presidency; government run increasingly as a business; the steadily escalating division between the conservative-minded and the liberal/progressive minded; Trump’s working principles; Trump’s pivot to Putin.

1) The rise of the imperial presidency. Trump is the current Oval Office heir to what’s been called “the rise of the imperial presidency.” In the modern era this was given a boost when the U. S. Congress, which alone has the sole constitutional power to declare war, did not declare war on Vietnam but instead authorized Presidents Kennedy and then Johnson to use “military force.” After Johnson, President Nixon held a vast view of executive power, which, in my view, grew considerably as a result of what he saw he could get away with (e.g., illegal wire taps, withholding information from Congress, circumventing judicial processes) until he got busted through what became know as the Watergate scandal, which broke in the news (1972-1973). Eventually, with his near-impeachment at hand, Nixon resigned the presidency (Aug., 1974). Afterward, some attempts were made by the U. S. Congress to try to curtail presidential power to shore up constitutional restraints. Yet neither the political liberals nor conservatives gave up wanting a president to be the guy who dreams big dreams for the nation and promises to make them a reality (one hears this bs implied or directly stated all the time in presidential campaign speeches).

Then came a tipping point: 9/11 and U.S. responses. Besides Congressional authorization of George W. Bush to conduct military actions (but called wars) against Al-Queda, the Taliban, and Iraq, Congressional acquiescence played an important role in allowing Bush, and President Obama after him, but especially Bush, to exercise presidential power domestically that was virtually unchecked by meaningful legal limits (e.g., Guantanamo Bay, spying on US citizens, Obama’s military strikes against Libya and ISIS exceeded constitutional limits).

It seems to me that constitutional brake pads meant to stop the movement of increasingly abusive executive authority have worn thin over the decades. Apparently Congress has not been able or is willing to slow down, never mind stop, what has become the ever-evolving executive authority a president gets away by using presidentially appointed teams of clever constitutional lawyers. It doesn’t matter which political party sits being the so-called Resolute desk in the Oval Office. Each president, in his own way, has a field day (for 4 or 8 years) bypassing constitutional restraints on presidential power, each in their own (partisan) ways, getting much of what it and his party wants, while Congress does little or nothing about it, or even endorses it, as the majority party in Congress will usually do – currently the Republicans. Large segments of the population of the party in follow in step.

The raft of Executive Orders adds to the problem. EOs are created and signed by presidents because EOs do not need Congressional approval. They can at times be good for the country, but they can also be vehicles whereby a president gets around federal laws. EOs are often reversed or cancelled by the next president if that person is from the other party. Congress and federal courts can strike down bad or unnecessary EOs, but that takes time, and all the while the limits of executive authority continue to be tested if not crossed. Although we are currently only weeks into Trump’s second term, many of the EOs that his administration are carrying out are having the effect of a guillotine upon agencies and institutions rather than being actual reforms (no one disagrees that actual reforms of various agencies and institutions are necessary).

The imperial presidency (the cult of the presidency, as some now call it) seems to be reaching what the Old Testament person would call idolatrous proportions in more recent years. All sorts of social and political unrest here has emerged and contributed to this, including a number of Supreme Court rulings that have reified the social and political divisions of an already split country. Into the volatile mix, add Trump’s first term, the rise of MAGA, his absolute refusal to admit he lost the 2020 election, the January 6, 2021 violent riot at the Capital, the Biden administration (4yrs), and now Trump’s second term, which seems to be taking of monarchial dimensions, fueled by strong support from Republicans in Congress and some strange brew of MAGA people and many Evangelicals. Trump is having his own field day. The imperial presidency seems to have been unleashed. My question to myself has been: is it unlikely that Trump will try, with Congressional support or not, to make an end-run around the constitution and go for a third term, or worse?

2) Government run as a business. About 20 yrs ago I began collecting occasional pieces of analysis which argued that a subtle and at-times not so subtle shift was occurring in which our federal government was being steadily transformed into a business enterprise. I don’t have access at this time to my notes on this development, but the thesis seems to have been prescient. Our “government” has slowly been moving outside of functioning within the laws, norms, and principles respective of a constitutional republic to be increasingly run, “governed,” as a business enterprise. Jim Skillen has done extensive research into this. He recently summed it up this way: “the federal constitutional order of the United States republic is increasingly being governed – as well as interpreted by the Supreme Court – as a marketplace.” Trump moved this shift along during his first term (2016-2020), with various political moves that directed more government benefits and power to big corporations and the wealthy. He is strengthening, if not solidifying, the shift of the U.S. to become increasingly identified as marketplace. As Skillen muses, “the outcome might look more like a privately owned company whose chief investors and directors constitute a corporate oligarchy under his autocratic authority. In either case,” he concludes, “Congress and the Supreme Court my find themselves shrunken to toddlers tagging along for the ride.”

Trump is a businessman and, as you say in your email, he seems to think international politics is like real estate deals, which seems to be dragging us into a dangerous and darker future. He seems to know no other way that being a businessman. That’s how he’s running the presidency. As he’s found of saying: “I’m a deal maker. I do deals.” Interestingly, he never adds, “and I’ve been bankrupt many times.” I mention that little omission since he’s now running a country, and it makes me wonder what he is running it into.

3) The slow revolt of the conservative-minded against the liberal/progressive-minded. Or, to put it this way: the steady movement of social liberals/progressives away from religious conservatives. This movement now seems to have spanned into unbridgeable gap, playing itself out politically in the near-absolute division today between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party. Its social-political roots can be traced to the rise of the moral majority (late 1970s). The movement gained a lot of traction during Reagan’s 8-year tenure (1980s), with the division at times becoming more defined during the 16-year period that gave us the Bill Clinton and George W Bush presidencies, respectively(1992-2008).

After presenting himself as a kind of left-of-center Democratic candidate, when elected President Obama (2008-2016) slowly influenced the Democratic Party leftward, particularly when he publicly came out in support of gay marriage, which seems to have been a subtle factor in setting in motion enough social momentum across the country for the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in 2015 to legalize gay marriages. Further contributing to the liberal/conservative division in our country was the Court’s decision in 2022 to end the 49-year old law that guaranteed a constitutional right to an abortion. The decision was seen as a huge victory for conservatives (it put the ball back with the states, and it so far has not slowed down the rate of abortions, and it has resulted in previously unheard of complicated lawsuits). Since then all sorts of trans-related issues are making the (so-called) left-right division here even more absolute. Further, Trump’s first, and now his second term, are solidifying the country’s social, political, and religious divisions.

4) Trump’s working principles. In brief: deny, deny, deny; obfuscate, obfuscate, obfuscate; sue, sue, sue. To understand these, one needs to look into the life of Roy Cohn, the lawyer who was key in Trump’s rise to power in real estate; the two men had a close business relationship. I researched this around 2016-17. That research explained a lot about Trump, which is in evidence even more consistently to this today. Cohn (d. 1986) was known as the person who mentored Trump in many and varied ways to exploit power and instill fear; Cohn’s formula: attack, counterattack, never apologize. Cohn was also expert at media manipulation. Apparently the 2024 biographical film, “The Apprentice,” (I’ve not seen it) is partly about this relationship.

5) Trump’s pivot to Putin. There’s no need for me to say anything about this because it’s been so much on Trump’s own lips and in some of his actions, beginning in his first term, but now quite often; it’s become self-evident. In my opinion, Trump is edging his way into ruling the U. S. like Putin and Xi Jinping rule their nations.

It’s over to you now, mon ami. These significant five shifts in American life (there would be others) seem pretty clearly implicated as motivating social and political factors. Thanks for the opportunity to know what I think! Which, as always, seeks further understanding. I hope these five begin to help us build up a comprehensive picture re what’s going on here today. I look forward to your further thoughts on this.

Continued grace, strength, and wisdom.
Charles