Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published The worst is notSo long as we can say ‘This is the worst.’- Shakespeare

You can’t take it anymore. Things can’t get worse! But they’re going to – because they must. You eye the exits. But there is no escape. For it is your home being besieged, you they’re coming after. So what you voted for the guy. He lied – or was different then – or, come to think of it, maybe you didn’t vote for him. Whatever. Now is now. You’re up to your ass in alligators. Do or die. Sink or swim.

Daily, more Americans are freaking. Recent elections suggest that something like a quarter of 2024’s voters are experiencing acute buyers’ remorse. No, they didn’t see this coming! Should they have? Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda don’t put out fires.

I’m eager for the crisis – inevitable since we reelected the Nameless One. It had to come to this – because the creep we elected didn’t want to lead America but steal it. He said so. And we laughed. He’s just joshing, funny old Uncle Don.

Now he won’t stop because he can’t. Half gaga he may be but the half that isn’t can read the tealeaves. If he loses, he’s toast. “They’ll impeach me!” he whines. Worse than that, much worse, we’ll crucify him for the damage he’s wrought on all he’s touched. The White House’s East Wing is a metaphor – for ICE, Nato, Greenland, the environment, Kennedy Center, truth, Canada, Cuba, Ukraine, tariffs, Harvard, Melania the movie, the Washington Post, pardon auctions, Epstein, crypto, each day another doozy. Three more years of this and there’ll be nothing left to break. Only he can’t count on the courts to shield him from the people’s wrath. “The Supreme Court follows the election returns,” quipped Mr. Dooley more than a century ago. Treason, sedition, perfidy, and larceny are not exempt from prosecution.

Either the Nameless One completes his conquest of America – or he skips town – to join Syria’s al-Assad in Moscow’s luxury retirement community for skedaddled dictators. And his name gets ripped off the golf courses and high-rises which haven’t done so already. And his assets get freezed – easy come, easy go. So he’ll do what he must to keep power – and if that means calling out the troops and dropping bombs on Minneapolis, well, you can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs – or a tyranny without breaking heads.

He won’t get away with it – that’s my bet. Not because of the courage of our alleged leaders, but because of the disgust of ordinary Americans. We’ve had it. We can smell a rat. And our boys and girls in uniform won’t slaughter us (we hope).

What will spark the denouement none can predict – but that it must come increasingly we accept. No peaceful resolution, no negotiations, even his MAGA maniacs will forsake him, for nobody likes a loser. Then Reconstruction will commence, long, arduous, and harsh. The wreckage of a moment may take years to repair.

The night before the battle we may pace with dread. But the morning of the battle we buckle our armor and quit fussing, for we’ve got work to do. This will be the fight of my life – and I’m 74. And it’s a fight worth winning no matter the cost. To lose is to give up on civilization, which depends on freedom, and on our grandkids, who depend on us.

Words help – a little. “History says, Don’t hope,” wrote Seamus Heaney,

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedOn this side of the grave,But then, once in a lifetime,The longed-for tidal waveOf justice can rise up,And hope and history rhyme.