Trumped!
The President of No Return on a Hothouse Planet
I grew up with a vision of a possible instant apocalypse, inspired (if, under the circumstances, such a word can even be used) by the nuclear obliteration of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end World War II. It could happen at any moment, even if you were "ducking and covering" under your school desk, as I did in those years. And I was hardly alone. That was a genuine generational nightmare of the 1950s and early 1960s -- the possibility of a nuclear war between my country and the Soviet Union that might devastate my city, New York (or your city, FILL IN THE BLANK), and our world. But in those years what I never could have imagined was that, even without an atomic blast, I might already be living through the extremely slow-motion equivalent of just such an apocalypse, which should, of course, be the definition of climate change.
And with that in mind, let me start this piece with a distinctly slow-motion apocalyptic moment some seven decades later, one I'm living through not as a young kid under that desk at school but as an old man under the presidency of Donald J. Trump. Recently, in a White House ceremony, the president was crowned the "undisputed champion of beautiful clean coal" by the Washington Coal Club, an event attended by Environmental Protection Agency (or do I mean Environmental Destruction Agency?) administrator Lee Zeldin, as well as Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, both, as the Guardian reported, "staunch coal advocates." The ceremony was in honor of the "signing of an executive order directing the defense department to secure long-term power purchase agreements with coal plants for military installations and other 'mission-critical facilities.'"
And honestly, you don't need to know much more to grasp that this world -- as the Guardian also reported recently -- is heading for a potential "point of no return" on the way to becoming an all too literal (if still reasonably slow-motion) hell on Earth, a genuine "hothouse planet." Imagine that! And imagine that, in the future, the Trump administration is working so energetically to make far hotter, far faster, there will be no desks to duck under. And imagine as well that the man "we" chose to elect to a second term in office in November 2024 is now working all too feverishly to ensure that he'll be remembered as the president of no return and that, before he's done, it won't just be the East Wing of the White House that he will have turned into rubble.
In that context, let me tell you just whom I feel bad for: the reporters on the beat in Washington, D.C., covering" yes, that genuine nightmare, President Donald J. Trump, the second time around. I often dream about trying to tell my parents (who died in 1977 and 1983) about this world of ours and You Know Who. But there would honestly be no way to do so. If they were to appear now, I'd be at a complete loss and, in any case, they would never believe me. Whatever I told them would, from the perspective of their ancient American world, seem like the most ludicrous form of fiction imaginable, not even a good (or bad) joke. A president like Donald J. Trump? Dream on. (Or more pointedly, of course, nightmare on.)
And yet here we indeed are. No question about it. And imagine this: the American people, or at least 49.7% of us, elected for a second time a man whose most essential goal remains the literal fossil-fuelization of planet Earth. Though all too few of us say so, Donald J. Trump as president of the United States should distinctly be considered the nightmare of our age, or possibly of any age. Once upon a time, you couldn't have made such a thing up and yet, unbelievably enough, he wasn't just elected president once (after all, anyone can make a mistake, even a truly grim one) but -- yes! -- twice! How could that have been possible, especially for a candidate so intent on taking our world down with him? Indeed, in November 2024, the American public reelected a former president who seemed to be itching to turn the United States into his personal property, while working all too literally to incinerate this planet. Just try to imagine that!
Can Donald Trump Flip American Democracy on Its Butt?
And that should indeed be considered a nightmare and a half. In this piece, then, let me offer both my pity and compassion to the reporters who have to cover Donald J. Trump for at least the next three years. Yes, hard as it might be to believe, barring a health disaster, always possible for someone who is going to turn 80 in July, we indeed do have (almost) three more years of him -- and I should undoubtedly add "at least" to that. After all, he's already clearly thinking about how to flip the more than two-century-old American political system on its head (or do I mean its butt?) and turn it into something else entirely -- transform it, in fact, into his personal property. (Exactly what he and his associates have recently been trying to do with this country's elections, which the president would now like to "nationalize.") And to hell with the Constitution or anything or anyone else who might try to stop him! (As he wrote at one point on Truth Social, "RECORD NUMBERS ALL OVER THE PLACE! SHOULD I TRY FOR A FOURTH TERM?") And don't forget that the Trump Organization is already selling "Trump 2028" hats for a mere $55.
So, make that possibly five, six, seven, or more flaming years of him working to shut down (or at least endlessly stall) wind and solar projects in this country while continuing to fossil-fuelize the United States (and, naturally, the planet) in a striking fashion.
Of course, I'm perfectly aware that all of that might indeed not happen. Despite this ever eerier present we're now living through, it might only be my grim fantasy of our future. Even Donald J. Trump might not be able to literally flip the American system on its ass. But given what we've gone through so far, don't count on it not happening either.
And, of course, we're not just talking about the man who wants to flip the system on its butt, we're talking about the guy who seems all too intent on doing the same thing to planet Earth. Someday, Donald Trump may be known as the end-times president, since he and his Republican confederates (and I use that word advisedly) seem remarkably intent on ensuring that this planet will indeed become a hellhole for our children and grandchildren. At some level, it should be considered beyond remarkable that even 49.7% of Americans voted for a presidential candidate intent, perhaps above all else, on burning this planet to the ground.
Giving Imperial Decline a New Name
I mean, just imagine that, in Donald Trump's world (as well as Vladimir Putin's and Benjamin Netanyahu's, since there's nothing like a good war to drive staggering amounts of planet-heating fossil-fuel gasses into the atmosphere), this planet is his birthday cake and he's intent on lighting the candles (most recently, of course, with his war in Iran).
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