Psychological Constitutional #1

Thoughts on the day after the historic and massive No Kings! protest

It’s been a eventful, tumultuous, and tragic few days in the history of our world. Democratic state representative and state House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark were assassinated in their homes by a man still on the loose, a man who had a list of scores of other targets. Another Democratic state senator John A. Hoffman and his wife Yvette were shot and wounded. The NYT’s headline is ominous: “Like School Shootings, Political Violence Is Becoming Almost Routine.” Meanwhile, Israel is escalating its attacks on Iran. Everything becomes justifiable when you feel threatened. The Washington Post has highlighted the escalating risk of nuclear war.

We didn’t sign up for this, y’all. Some folks are tapping into a deeply cruel, sadistic algorithm, and we’ve got to assert a better code, and fast.

Senator Chuck Schumer, the minority leader, warned against merely denouncing the shootings and moving on. “Condemning violence while ignoring what fuels it is not enough,” he said. “We must do more to protect one another, our democracy and the values that bind us as Americans.”

…Mr. Trump has had a hand in that. Since his 2016 candidacy, he has signaled at least his tacit approval of violence against his political opponents. He encouraged attendees at his rallies to “knock the hell” out of protesters, praised a lawmaker who body-slammed a reporter and defended the rioters on Jan. 6, 2021, who clamored to “hang Mike Pence.” One of his first acts in his second term as president was to pardon those rioters.

Finally, NYT. Many of us were ringing the alarm bells back in 2016.

Chandra R. Donald Trump Should Be Charged With a Crime! Psychology Today, February 24, 2016

All this weighed on my mind this morning, and I wrote this.

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Psychological Constitutional #1

Donald Trump and his MAGA GOP movement are a clear threat to mental health, physical health, mutual safety, and social well-being. At best, their horrific example challenges us to do much better than we have done to date. At worst, their pathetic, provocative, and aggravating so-called leadership will drive the nation and world to catastrophic failure, and even total destruction. We have no choice but to oppose them, and in opposing them, construct our own views of self-governance and interdependent union.

We are the descendants of history – events, ideas, and people. We gather ourselves in this moment, as we seek a way forward. Much has been accomplished, at great cost, labor, and sacrifice. Much has been violated, lost, and destroyed. We must reckon with assertions, ambitions, drives, and anguish, and attempt deeper connection, even as the former threaten to drive us apart.

250 years ago, Enlightenment values birthed a nation, albeit an imperfect union. The founders recognized unalienable human rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and declared it vital to question and challenge authority, and even overthrow tyranny. Yet they allowed tyrannies against Blacks, American Indians, and women. The struggles of these groups and others to affirm their previously unrecognized yet unalienable rights have proven that American democracy has enormous potential for human uplift, through the clarification of values and advancements in understanding. It is our position that we have only scratched the surface of the potential for liberation from tyranny and the alleviation of suffering.

At 250 years of age, we have only just begun. Every moment can be a new beginning. Every day, a new dawn.

On June 14, 2025, Americans participated in what are being called the largest protests in US history. While it is not unusual for many Americans to be dissatisfied with government in general, or this or that administration, it is clear that the leadership of Donald Trump is particularly abhorrent to a vast number of Americans.

Mr. Trump toys with tyranny, and propagates cruelty, seemingly with the aim of numbing and overwhelming our human and American capacities for reason, care, and courage in the face of adversity and change. Instead of elevating the American spirit, he seems willing to crush it to prove his infantile prowess. Instead of promoting the general welfare and the growth of consciousness, he seems consciously or unconsciously aimed at their destruction.

He is corrupt, financially and ethically. There is reason to suspect his cognitive capacity. He appears devoid of empathy and incapable of remorse. He lacks consideration of the impact of his words, deeds, and policies on other Americans, yet takes great affront to those who would challenge him. He is thin-skinned, without capacity to consider critique. His stubborn refusal to listen is in itself a damning indictment of his executive capacity. He considers himself above the law. He vainly, incomprehensibly, and grandiosely asserts that he is more knowledgeable and capable than experts who have given their lives to understand areas from military matters to science.

In all these ways, he is undemocratic, indecent, and therefore unacceptable as a leader. He promotes no acceptable means to navigate the dissatisfactions, ambitions, drives, and anguish of the American people. He attacks connection across diversity and difference, and promotes complicity, subordination, and obedience to his own authority, which is simple-minded, petty, and callous.

The American people have elected a dangerous buffoon whose ignorance imperils us all.

Government of the people, by the people, and for the people must not perish from the Earth. Donald Trump’s tyrannical and corrupt governance must be ended, and we must overturn the mechanisms that have promoted his charade of power.

We must exercise non-violent, democratic agency.

We must forge a more perfect union.

Warmly,

Ravi