Trump's vicious response proves he's cornered — and dangerous

This was always going to be one of the most dangerous junctures of Donald Trump’s godawful second term, though I admit it arrived a bit earlier than expected.

How would the dangerous, ill-bred lout, who’s never seen a lie he didn’t like, handle it when the truth about him and his failed policies were dragged into the unfiltered light of hundreds of sunny days for all of us to see?

How would the man who stalked America’s countryside last year, the grotesque billionaire Elon Musk in tow, bombastically floating empty promises and plenty of hate during his profitable, one-after-another hate rallies, handle it when he was found out?

How would the man who promised to release the list of Jeffrey Epstein’s vulgar cohorts deal with the blowback from many in his racist cult, when it was clear all he was really prepared to give them was yet another song and dance, instead of a list of the repugnant headliners behind these horrible assaults on our children.

How would the man handle it when his vile name was used by Democrats all over the map to warn against more of the poison he was dealing, while sweeping to landslide victories in places like New Jersey and Virginia in the first significants elections since America chose so spectacularly wrong a year earlier ...

Well, we got our answer last Thursday, when the unfit Trump took to his caustic, state-run social media channel and threatened to hang politicians who he doesn’t like.

It should matter little what set off this nuclear-powered temper tantrum from our sick king, only that he is now on the record making it clear just how far he is willing to go to quiet the opposition, as well as the dark, vindictive voices that are eating away at what’s left of his decaying brain.

He should be removed from office just as soon as possible, of course, but won’t be because he still has the corrupt, cowardly Republican Party and its mealy-mouthed sinners like House Speaker Mike Johnson under his fat little thumb.

Trump will kill to keep power, and now Johnson and his worthless party can never pretend otherwise.

Trump’s second term has been a bonfire catalyzed by greed, fear and retribution. The terrible man is governing this country in his horrid image. Rather than building, he is breaking. Rather than unifying, he is splitting. Rather than rising up, he is tearing down. Rather than helping the most needy among us, he is going out of his way to hurt them …

He doing all these horrid, vindictive things because he just wants to be loved, you see, and if we are all too stupid to get that, then he will use the enormous power his office grants him to shake us all until it hurts.

We will bend the knee, or else ...

Can’t we understand that he is demolishing the White House for our own good? Can’t we see he is fixing our health-care system, government, and decades-long global alliances by taking a sledgehammer to them first? Can’t we see that prices are actually lower, even though we the buyers can plainly see they are going up?

Trump is failing everywhere and is doing so in spectacular fashion.

When six of my fellow veterans in Congress produced a 90-second video, Don’t Give Up The Ship, reminding our troops that they are obligated to refuse illegal orders, the unhinged Trump wasted no time illustrating why this video was so necessary.

“SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!” Trump wrote in one post. And just to make sure his bloodlust was crystal clear to everybody he shared a different post, written by another person, that said: “HANG THEM GEORGE WASHINGTON WOULD!!”

This madman doesn’t belong in our White House. He belongs in a straitjacket.

I knew this day was coming last November, the minute the election was called for Trump in the wee hours of one of America’s darkest nights.

I wrote Warning Shot just two weeks later, because I understood that at some point things were going to get so bad for Trump that he was going to do what every murderous fascist of note has done before him, and hide behind the military for protection.

I’m not sure I have written anything that got more readership.

From that piece:

Once you understand that Trump will use his presidency and whatever is left of his miserable life to settle scores and return the favors of the crooked dictators, and slobbery weaklings in his political party, who helped put him back in office, you can better prepare for the hell that’s most assuredly coming.

By words and by deed it is clear as day that Trump has absolutely no respect for the United States of America he violently assaulted, nor our men and women who wear the uniform, because like any authoritarian leader he sees them as servants to him, and not our country.

I went on to explain:

Remember: Trump, and his Supreme Court see his power as absolute. There is NOTHING that applies, or restricts him from doing whatever the hell it is he thinks needs doing in the interest of national security, which as of January 20, 2025, will mean his security.

So now we are counting on our military not to obey unlawful orders and defend a Constitution their Commander in Chief could care less about. That’s a mighty big ask.

I quoted an official in the Pentagon at the time, who chillingly said this:

“Troops are compelled by law to disobey unlawful orders. But the question is what happens then — do we see resignations from senior military leaders? Or would they view that as abandoning their people?”

I hope everybody now understands why Sen. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, a former C.I.A. analyst who served in Iraq, organized this important, timely video.

Slotkin was joined by Reps. Jason Crow (D-CO), Chris DeLuzio (D-PA), Maggie Goodlander (D-NH) and Chrissy Houlahan (D-PA), and Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ).

These patriots and public servants are staying true to their oaths, and their duty to warn. They have watched as Trump has bastardized our military this past year for his political gain. He has taken to our bases to sell his gross MAGA merchandise, and called out Democrats, including past presidents, by name. He has called on these troops to use our cities as their “training grounds.” He has belittled true heroes like John McCain, and disgraced Arlington National Cemetery more times than I can count.

He doesn’t know a single, damn thing about army values, navy values, or ANY values, because the only thing he truly values — the only thing he has EVER valued — is himself.

So now he has proven himself again to be dangerous as hell, as his regime fails on all fronts. He is now looking for others to pay for his mistakes, and there isn’t a single thing he won’t do, including kill opponents, to give himself the vindication he thinks he deserves.

He’s lost his mind, and it is never coming back.

I typed Warning Shot one year ago lat Wednesday. I ended it this way, and so I will again with this piece:

This is not a story of hope, my friends, but words of warning.

Like it or not, and as tired as we are, we must be vigilant and NEVER accept this as anything approaching normal in this country.

A repulsive coward who never had the guts to serve will do everything he can to get our armed forces to serve only him.

WE must be the resistance.

• (D. Earl Stephens is the author of “Toxic Tales: A Caustic Collection of Donald J. Trump’s Very Important Letters” and finished up a 30-year career in journalism as the Managing Editor of Stars and Stripes. You can find all his work here.)