Will Future Generations Blame Us All?

Or will they recognize that most of us were mad as hell and refused to take it?

The allure of a hateful demagogue. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch via Getty Images)

We are living in historic times. Decades from now, scholars and interested citizens will be studying this period to try and understand how and why so many Americans were willing to toss away the democratic experiment—the promise of 250 years contained within the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution—to serve a deranged, malignant and corrupt man.

Our time will be a case study for them to assess the nature of the human condition and how a broken American political system and society made such a rupture possible. They will be reading and watching with the same fascination that many of us explore the horrors of Nazi Germany and that nation’s willingness to follow another deeply deranged and malignant man.

How could the Germans have let it happen? Well, we know now how demagogues can appeal to people’s worst impulses and the rich and powerful will selfishly abandon their morals in order to curry favor, no matter how mad. I’m looking at you, Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, aa you have already changed the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America on your maps.

Really? Is your position that fragile? Will you next agree to call the Atlantic Ocean the Trump Ocean if he demands it?

Oh, there are so many examples of sycophancy, cowardice and desperation that I could list here. But what I’m struck by now is not the enormous well of fear and failure that has overtaken the worst of us, no matter how much it loads up our public discourse and drives doubt about our ability to escape this tragic chapter.

Rather, allow me to dwell on the enormous waste of time and energy that could be spent on real problems to improve our world. Every day—if you look—you will see stories that reflect the consequences of not dealing with the climate crisis. Every day we will see the results of a nation that has failed to address the epidemic of gun violence, the absence of affordable healthcare for all, income and wealth inequality on a never-before-seen scale, the intensifying struggle for ordinary Americans to get by, deteriorating public education and the continuing stranglehold of racism. Perhaps you will have other issues to add to this list.

But of all the tragic consequences of reelecting a narcissistic criminal obsessed with wealth and power, one strikes me as the most corrosive: The nation’s inability to focus on the real and profound problems that beset our world.

It’s not new that Americans are seen by others as an unserious people. But the willingness to twice elect a man so buffoonish, depraved and hateful to the highest office in the land legitimately provokes the belief that Americans have not just lost the plot of their democratic project, they cannot be trusted any longer to do the right thing. It will be a long time, if ever again, that the rest of the world can view us seriously as a people to be trusted with the fate of the world.

Trump and Killer Pete Hegseth have exposed America’s true weakness. Despite all the evidence to the contrary, they believe “might makes right” and continue to break the U.S. military, warping it into a tool for their poisonous and backward fantasy of a sexist, white supremacist, hyper-masculine country. While that dangerously empowers adversaries devoted to America’s destruction, it also has forced long-time allies to accept that they have to strengthen their own defenses and deepen and expand partnerships in a world without America as a reliable ally.

American leaders who could enter a room with the expectation of being seated at the head of the table will in the coming decades have to earn back the necessary respect to even be seated at the table. We will long be viewed with skepticism, and rightly so. That may be sad for us, but I can tell you that it’s also sad for many leaders and ordinary citizens around the world that used to see us as a source of security and stability—and even a model of leadership.

As we approach the midterms in just 63 days, we will hear plenty of skepticism toward the positions of the most progressive candidates—from Republicans and moderate Democrats alike. But we should not doubt that the emergence of candidates identifying themselves as Democratic Socialists or who support many of their policies represents an angry electorate that recognizes the system is broken and is demanding real change.

“Working families are tired of status quo politics and the same old, same old establishment policies that have failed them for years,” Sen. Bernie Sanders wrote in a recent column for The Guardian. His explanation of why many voters are supporting progressive candidates is not a new message for him, but it particularly resonates now when the failure to deal with real issues has come at such a painfully high price. As he put it:

In the richest country in the history of the world, Americans do not want to have to struggle every single day just to pay the bills. Working-class people do not want to die years younger than they should because of illnesses caused by the never-ending stress they experience just to survive. And, like past generations, they do not want their kids to have a lower standard of living than they do.

Are progressives who call for getting money out of politics, expanding the Supreme Court, passing Medicare for All, taxing billionaires their fair share, confronting the climate crisis, regulating artificial intelligence, abolishing ICE and cutting defense spending really so far from today’s mainstream? Will the sloppy cries about the horrors of socialism and the ridiculous lies that progressive Democrats are communists really succeed at scaring voters to side with the Trump Republicans this time around? I don’t think so.

Our public square has rarely been noisier or more jammed with lies. Our White House has never been occupied with people more bent on destroying our democracy and ignoring the needs of people in its corrupt pursuit of self-enrichment. Our political system has never been more obviously broken nor has our Oval Office been more focused on denying constitutional rights.

Decades from now, students of history will be asking how was it possible that Americans could let this all happen. But those students will have the benefit of hindsight. Just maybe, they will look at the results of the 2026 midterms and conclude that Americans were not monolithic—that the depth of opposition represented a significant majority, that Americans grasped their ugly reality and embraced a more progressive future.

That outcome is in our collective power. Achieving it could begin to make clear that we are done with the corruption and crime, the narcissism and the sociopathy, and we demand leaders who are committed to making lives better and who are capable of pursuing real change, not more of the same. And it would allow us to tell future generations that we understood that Trump and his regime were wasting our time, that—as actor Peter Finch said in the film Network exactly 50 years ago—“I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore.”

As the midterms approach, it’s more important than ever to support the survival of democracy and the expansion of independent media. I pledge to raise my voice as vividly and fiercely as I can. While most of my posts are free, paid subscribers get full access to our thoughtful comments sections, exclusive online chats, video recordings and more.