Editor, 

Trump’s reliance on the soon to be outdated “Golden Dome” defence system is another indication that he lives in the past. His decision-making is informed by outdated and historically tainted ideas, making his presidency a catastrophe for human kind. The march forward for people has been sidetracked by a president who wants to turn the clock back. How the American people could vote for such a dangerous and utterly uninformed ideologue is beyond amazing. Instead of looking for solutions and ways of making things better for people—not just for Americans—but all people, he clearly rejects that notion as he grifts the American people for personal profit.

Trump has denied the imminent threat of climate change; he sees the world as a cash grab he can plunder; he wants to destroy Cuba and bring it into the American sphere as a pre revolutionary vassal state beholden to American investors; the deployment of carpet bombing tactics against Iran is meant to support the freedom loving Iranians but is instead killing them and putting them into oblivion; ground-breaking research on health issues has been retracted; the fossil fuel industry is mythologized as an industry; free speech, monuments that indicate the vile fact of slavery in American history, and the well being of non-documented Americans, are on his eradication list. The Epstein scandal hangs as a tumour on his legacy.

The “brains” behind Trump’s actions are clearly right wing zealots fostered by the super wealthy. They want the world to stay as they see it, ripe for the pickings. It is said that American democracy will survive. But the existence of American democracy has never been threatened as it is now. American democracy needs a monumental re-doing to correct all the damage this president has done – a monumental effort by the American people to redress the impasse and bring a new vitality to it. Unable to deliver his affordability campaign promise, Trump is running amok, and we are all paying the price for it.

Carl Hager, Gatineau