Amid Chaos, Character Trumps Policy
Decency, honor and resolve will defeat a madman
A recent meme on social media showed a selfie of three young men heading to the Conservative Political Action Conference. Someone on Facebook commented, "Grindr outage coming in 3...2..."
Aside from the pathetic prospect of gay men hanging out with people who hate them, an odd moment came at CPAC when Matt Schlapp of the American Conservative Union asked the crowd how many wanted to see impeachment hearings against Trump. The initial reaction was cheers.
Signs of dissent within MAGA ranks are encouraging, but will they matter? Trump is pressing on with his war against Iran despite its unpopularity across the political spectrum. He says Cuba is next. The potentially disastrous consequences are not his concern.
The massive turnout at over 3,300 "No Kings" rallies on March 28 was invigorating. Yet many on social media complain that no one is doing anything to stop Trump. Do all the lawsuits, protests and campaign organizing count for nothing? How do these Trump opponents think they help by erasing the resistance?
Impatience is only a virtue if it moves you to help instead of throwing up your hands.
Failing to do the right thing can make us complicit. When the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution declaring the slave trade "the gravest crime against humanity" by a decisive majority, the United States voted no.
Concerns by some people about the prospect of reparations might be more credible if Trump and his diehards were not so eager to refight the Civil War. It is not just that their ill-concealed bigotry illustrates the living legacy of past wrongs. They are actively and aggressively trying to erase everything from America's history that does not glorify our past.
This revisionism is in line with an executive order Trump issued a year ago deceitfully titled "Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History," requiring federal parks and museums to remove items that portray the struggle for equality. He has gone after the Smithsonian Institution in particular.
Nor is the fight only over words and images. People inconvenient to Trump's vision are being targeted. This is seen in the nationwide flood of anti-tr ans legislation and the labeling of trans activists as domestic terrorists.
This brings fresh urgency to observances like the Trans Day of Visibility on March 31. Attacks on a community's visibility are attacks on its existence.
A trans friend writes, "I can feel the walls beginning to close in. First it was the Kansas anti-trans driver's license nonsense. The next thing was ... the International Olympic Committee banning trans women athletes. What will be next?"
She observes that trans folk constitute less than 1 percent of the adult population. She notes the absurdity of reducing the argument to XX and XY chromosomes when "the relevant differences are far more subtle." She points to the World Professional Association for Transgender Health. "Why not inform our opinions with real scholarly and medical information rather than shooting off our mouths about something we know so little about?"
She says it is easy to target a tiny minority like hers because "we can't rise up to mount a defense against such overwhelming odds."
She is right. Cisgender liberals need to stand with her, knowing that we are next in the far right's crosshairs. After allegedly scary minorities are erased, all of America's problems will remain to be dealt with. We must summon our best selves to defeat the worst people who have hijacked this country.
White male supremacy is on the march. The New York Times reported on March 27 that Pete Hegseth's chief of staff, Ricky Buria, had scolded Army Secretary Daniel P. Driscoll about the proposed promotions of two black and two female officers. The Times wrote, "Mr. Buria told Mr. Driscoll that President Trump would not want to stand next to a Black female officer at military events." The poor dear!
My friend Robert Naylor, a longtime journalist and author of the new book "The Soul of a Leader," writes of Hegseth's action:
"This assault on 'wokeness' is a brazen attack by a mediocre, petty, insecure TV personality on people of color and women, and nothing more than dressed up white supremacy."
Yes. We need to combat the mob mentality and intolerance stoked by a reckless demagogue and restore a more mature, honest, and respectful public discourse for all our sakes. Amid rising chaos, character trumps policy.
If we normalize pathology and hold back while the fascists run roughshod over us, we will lose our country.
Richard Rosendall is a writer and activist who can be reached at [email protected].
Copyright © 2026 by Richard J. Rosendall. All rights reserved.