Being a woman in America is hard enough. The sense of impending doom that Trump and his administration have brought since becoming president has only made it harder. Waking up every morning fearing for my rights, as well as the rights of the people around me, is exhausting. Evil people everywhere seem to be thriving in Trump’s chaos.
Trump’s first six months in office have been an undeniable disaster that has had many consequences for the American people. The stress of watching Trump govern America is unbearable.
Every day, I wake up to new news about the state of American politics. Between DOGE, deaths due to negligence, the embarrassing propaganda posted on the white house social media and Trump’s damning history, there is no such thing as peace in Trump’s America.
DOGE negligence
Elon Musk spearheaded the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). DOGE cuts funding from government agencies to create government efficiency. Just after hurricane season, Trump stated that he planned to begin phasing out the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Trump suggested allowing the states to be in charge of disaster relief. This insinuates that states would receive less federal aid to respond to natural disasters.
Musk undoubtedly benefits from funding being cut from federal agencies such as FEMA. FEMA regulates rocket launches. Musk is infamous for being reckless with the environment and safety aspects of his SpaceX rocket launches, as he has defunded FEMA obstacles for his rocket launches.
The current primary system for alerting the public is the Integrated Public Alert & Warning System (IPAWS), which FEMA manages.
The recent floods in Texas have been nothing short of horrific. 135 people died in Texas due to flooding on July 4th. That death toll is suspected to rise in the coming weeks. This is a direct result of FEMA being defunded. Texas officials did not alert cellphones as flooding began.
Misuse of social media
Trump’s use of social media has been unprofessional. AI depictions of Trump as the pope, a king and Superman all convey an image that Trump is more than just a president. Trump depicting himself as a king in a democracy is illegitimate. The use of the official white house social media has become so undignified that it’s making a mockery of America.
Beyond this, Trump’s memes about mass deportation are making a joke about a pressing world issue. The administration is using dark memes to boost its immigration policy across social media.
While memes can be a valid form of communication or satire in many contexts, their use by official White House social media accounts significantly diminishes their appropriateness. This isn’t about disliking memes. It’s about recognizing that a government institution with global influence should uphold a tone that reflects its responsibilities.
Private prisons hit a gold mine with Trump’s win in 2024. Brian Evans, the CEO of Geo Group, the nation’s largest private prison company, estimated that his firm could generate up to $400 million annually by filling empty or underused beds in existing detention facilities to meet what he described as the “future needs for ICE and the federal government.”
Trump’s damning past
One of the most recent horrors of Trump’s presidency has been his lack of transparency with the Jeffrey Epstein files. Epstein, the multimillionaire financier, was a convicted sex offender who died in prison in 2019. Trump’s relationship with Epstein has been under scrutiny after the Trump administration withheld part of the Epstein files.
Trump has 16 standing sexual assault allegations. In 2016, an unnamed plaintiff who went by the pseudonym Katie Johnson claimed she was sexually assaulted by Trump. Johnson stated she was repeatedly raped by Trump and Epstein at Epstein’s New York City apartment in 1994, when she was 13 years old. It is not known why she withdrew the lawsuit. Johnson filed a lawsuit against Trump in 2016 and then dropped it in November 2016. She has not spoken publicly or withdrawn her rape allegation since then.
Attorney General Pam Bondi agreed to release certain materials, such as flight logs from Epstein’s private jets, but withheld others, including what officials identified as child sexual abuse material.
Trump had earlier directed Bondi to release only information deemed “credible,” expressing concern that disclosing the full files might unjustly damage the reputations of innocent individuals.
He has dismissed criticism of his handling of the case as a Democratic “hoax”.
Trump’s lack of transparency around the Epstein files is alarming, especially given his history of sexual assault allegations. If the files could implicate Trump, his refusal to release them fully raises serious concerns that shouldn’t be ignored.
Trump is defunding resources the American working class needs and making a mockery of America. Trump has shown he doesn’t care about America through his policies and words. In 2024, Trump stated, “I don’t care about you, I just want your vote.” Trump does not care about the American people. He doesn’t care about America’s well-being or anyone’s well-being other than his own. He will never hear, care or acknowledge his supporters’ blind loyalty to him and his policies that harm the American people.
This version of America feels foreign and cruel. The daily dread I feel and the anxiety that so many share are not normal. Trump’s America is filled with fear, instability and exhaustion.
Trump’s leadership has fueled instability, but he’s far from the only one responsible. The real danger lies in how many bad actors, just as destructive and self-serving, are hiding behind Trump’s spectacle — untouched, unnamed, and likely thrilled to keep it that way.
Bad guys are everywhere, but none of them have the blind and unwavering loyalty that Trump has from his followers.
John Hedberg | Aug 18, 2025 at 4:48 pm
I once thought that the news sources I listened to were altruistic, truthful, cared about human suffering, and cared about the consequences of their own actions if their own errors caused others needless suffering. I believed what I heard about parties and politicians and history as they reflected it in their cohesive journalistic narratives.
One day, I caught a major news editor lying about something which he knew was lie, and I asked myself why he felt the need to lie?
I started looking into other stories I assumed were factual, only to discover more lies, all pointing in the direction of maintaining and supporting a common one-sided political theme. I found evidence of counter-vailing stories they’d buried which exposed major flaws in the worldview they’d been pushing everyone to believe, which benefited only certain political allies, even when those allies turned out to be responsible for major errors and suffering on a grand scale.
I started seeing patterns to how stories were chosen and edited, or suppressed and even attacked if they didn’t support outcomes which benefited their political friends.
I started waking up.
Since then, I’ve done nothing but read and study issues, and life seems remarkably more cheerful now that I have a far larger picture of present figures and events, of past history, and of actual cause and effect, actual reality apart from the biased and knowingly fraudulent political narratives I was fed for the first part of my life.
The more you research, the more optimistic life will become.
I hope this proves to be the case for each of you, as you unwind the warped stories you believed were being told by absolute altruists, only to find they were often accusing others of their own crimes in order to silence any opposition or discussion which might stop their own corruption.
Abraham Lincoln had a maxim worth remembering, a man who grew up in poverty, ignorance, and oppression and spent a life learning, experimenting, applying, and growing in wisdom, courage, and unfailing faith. It’s simple:
“Most folks are as happy as they make up their minds to be”.
He spent a lifetime making his mind extraordinary. Any student can begin that process for themselves with a simple daily decision.
I pray that your decisions bring similar happiness & peace. 🙂💛
Natalie | Aug 12, 2025 at 3:54 pm
I feel exhausted myself. I grew up believing in honesty, decency, with a single father who let us use our voice. I”ve been through 2 abusive marriages , the last one ended when he became mentally ill ( I believe right wing media had a large part of that) he lost his job, which pushed him farther over the line. I was starting to fear for my safety for the first time in our 24 year marriage. On Oct 28th 2018, he made the gaits stand up on the back of my neck. Later he went outside with his gun. I went out there abd he put it the gun to his temple and said if I called 911 he would kill me. I panicked, I grabbed my phone, trues to reach my daughter and called 911. The police officers didn’t believe me thst he would kill himself. They had me leave, He shot himself right after I left and it took another several hours to get the police to do a welfare check on him( they didn’t believe me again) Since them my life has,been turned upside down and inside out. I rarely go anywhere out of fear. I worry about my multi racial family everyday, I worry about my grandchildren’s future abd how all this hate impacts them. My anxiety goes up everytime I hear things lije they wabt to take our right to vote away. I am 64, have health problems, and basically have no one close by who really cares about me. I don’t thunk I’ll live long enough to see a better future for my grandchildren. It’s hard hanging on everyday. Thank you for this, I know I’m not alone.