Dead Patriots Society

#1

Dear President Trump,

Your insatiable quest of power and glory cannot profit your soul. 

As scripture makes clear, “those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted” (Matthew, 23:12). And “God resists the proud, but shows favor to the humble” (James, 4:6).

If one would govern he must first learn to serve. If he has to obtain a following by force or cunning, by creating factions, he invariably arouses resistance. 

He must have some notion of a public interest apart from his personal ambitions. He must be able to adapt to the demands of the time.

I pity the parents trying to raise caring, responsible citizens with Donald Trump in the White House.

Sincerely,

____________

#2

Mr. Trump,

Are you trying to prove you are the world’s most insecure man?

If so, you are succeeding, most recently with your desperate threats to destroy civilian infrastructure in Iran.

We do not elect presidents to exact vengeance on their political opponents, or to pursue their own depraved visions of power and glory.

We elect presidents to govern, with some notion of a public interest, not to exploit and stoke political divisions. But the latter has been your game plan since 2015. In 2016, you told Bob Woodward that real power is the ability to instill fear. That is how you operate.

You are the kid who always had to change the rules of the game in order not to lose. That is what you tried to do in 2020, culminating in a violent attack on Congress.

Since 2015, you have trashed immigrants and invented all kinds of lies about them, so as to help build your political base. Now you are bent on deporting or imprisoning as many darker-skinned people as possible, no matter how many lives are destroyed and families traumatized.

You have made complete jokes of the DOJ and FBI, turning them into arms of your vengeance.

You decry political violence, even as you are the Instigator-in-Chief of such violence. You regularly issue threats against judges, election workers, journalists and others, fully aware that any one of your true believers out there might take your words as marching orders.

You are happy to call yourself a Christian if it furthers your pathological quest.

Your contempt for and reversal of environmental regulations and policies to move us away from dependence on oil, gas and coal may be the most revealing of all. Do you even care what sort of world your own children and grandchildren will live in when you are through?

Always looking for new ways to disrupt lives, you launched a needless war against Iran. In addition to the direct cost in human suffering, the opportunity costs of this war–notably the human needs we cannot fund as a result–are mind-boggling.

You need to stop this war. If you follow through with your latest threats, you will surely regret it. The human misery you cause by destroying civilian infrastructure will be tremendous. And it will not cow the leaders of Iran. You will only succeed at unifying Iranians against the United States and Israel. The world will remember you as a complete fool, and a war criminal.

Sincerely,

___________