Who would have thought that the “American Experiment” was designed to allow the “peaceful” takeover of the Country by an unknown, politically agnostic, megalomaniac foreign dictator?  We all thought that the “founding fathers” had magically created a system of checks and balances, of fair and open elections, of free speech that would automatically bring any dangerous political deviations quickly back to center again.  As long as enough of us believed that – it was true.  However, as soon as enough of us stopped believing in the experiment – it is no longer true.

Rather than being full of checks and balances, protections, and a legal system that made violation of the American dream impossible (and hopefully illegal), we actually built a system without ANY checks and balances.  The founding fathers created, and we perpetuated, the potential for unlimited power and control to any person that had a desire and ability to claim it. 

We are now seeing a totally horrifying, and unexpected, shift of power and control to a narcissistic rich white guy from South Africa who is changing the global balance of power on a whim.  For example, Musk (with Trump’s blessing) just canceled the $40 billion dollar a year USAID program which prevents tens of thousands (perhaps hundreds of thousands of lives) of deaths by starvation – just because he could.  In a post on X Musk said that he had “spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper. Could gone to some great parties. Did that instead.”

Shutting down USAID in such a dramatic and immediate way will undoubtedly lead directly to the starvation deaths of thousands of people while opening up grand opportunities for China and Russia as they rush into the void to stop the resulting famine – transferring the mantle of being the global leader of humanitarianism in the eyes of the world from America to China and Russia.  Who knows, perhaps North Korea will also volunteer their assistance and get in on the shining new glory that used to belong to America. 

Not only will this abrupt change in global humanitarian assistance result in many horrible deaths, but it is likely to destroy much of America’s agricultural base that has been struggling for the past decades.  The vast majority of the food as well as manufactured and medical products provided in USAID’s  humanitarian assistance programs comes from USA based farmers and industry.  A $40 billion unexpected cut will undoubtedly bring many farmers to their knees.  These cuts will likely result in many bankruptcies leading to an increase in farmer suicide as they are forced out of business, losing their family farms and their feeling of self-respect.  However, foreign farmers and manufacturers can be expected to reap the benefit of the suddenly expanded market as China, Russia and others rush to fill the void.

The pair’s “feeding USAID into the wood chipper” is just the tip of the iceberg.  Musk and Trump are busily dismantling vast swaths of the Federal Government machinery that has traditionally protected us, including protecting us from madmen gaining control of the power and wealth of the County.  The first step was to eliminate the “checks and balances” aspect of the Supreme Court – which Trump accomplished in his first term.  Then all that was needed was to castrate the Legislative Branch of government by threatening them with unleashing the forces of civil war by his throng of fanatical cult followers – the MAGA group.  Legislators in the Southern States are terrified that a full blown American Civil war will rekindle if they go against the wishes of this crowd – as indeed seems likely.  Trump is a master of using extortion by the threat of unleashing his cult to control the leaders of what were secessionist States during the Civil War.     

So here we are, looking down the barrel of a cannon aimed at destroying our County led by an idiot and his dictatorial foreign madman – apparently without our having any way to divert or stop it.  The only force that could stop this would be through the force of unified opinions of Americans – unfortunately,  the expressed “majority” opinion at this time is that it is much more fun to watch the sparks fly with the hope that something “good” might eventually arise from the ashes of their actions.   

God help us all.