Let me not quote him once in this piece. We’ve already heard all too much from him, don’t you think? And president of the United States though he may be, he doesn’t deserve to be quoted, not given what he has to say.

It’s true that, in my lifetime, we’ve had all sorts of strange, sometimes deeply disturbing presidents. Believe me, Richard Nixon was no fun. And neither was Ronald Reagan or even, in our very own relatively recent moment, the aging Joe Biden. But nothing like him was ever even conceivable... not until, of course, he happened.

I hardly need to say it, but he—and unfortunately on this planet of ours right now, I really can’t help mentioning him again and again and again, can I?—should be considered the summary of what decline has long meant for great powers, personified in a fashion that may be historically unique for a nation that, not so very long ago, was arguably unique in its global reach and power. Phew, that sentence exhausted me!

Indeed, historically speaking, it’s certainly been rare beyond words (though I swear that won’t stop me from writing this!) to experience such an imperial decline—especially of the greatest power on Earth, possibly ever—both summoned up by and summed up in a lone individual, a single leader, a uniquely mad (and, mind you, not simply as in angry) man.

Consider it beyond remarkable that, in 2024, almost 50% of the American voting public (49.8% of them to be exact) opted to put YKEW back in the White House to do his—and it couldn’t be a more appropriate word, given our world—damnedest to turn this planet into a hothouse of the first order.

If a single poll sums him up in this singular moment of ours, perhaps it’s the latest AP-NORC one. It indicates that about 72% of Americans think this country is indeed heading in “the wrong direction,” while only 26% (and what in the—yes!—world can possibly be going through their brains at this moment?) think it’s heading in the right direction (wherever on this ever stranger planet of ours—or do I mean theirs?—that might be).

And talking about the wrong direction in which the president of the country that, not so long ago, was certainly the greatest power ever is sending us, hook, line, and sinker—whoops, I meant not to mention him again and yet there I went! It seems that I just can’t help myself, nor can I evidently finish this sentence—and honestly, can you blame me on this planet of ours?

Okay, I give up. How can I help myself (or anyone else) when it comes to HIM?

After all, what world can any of us imagine living in anymore, other than his? And given that world, maybe what I actually meant should have been a little more emphatically stated than what I wrote above. After all, to put it mildly (or do I mean wildly?), he’s taking us in the wrong direction, hook, line, and—no, not sinker but stinker (though he is indeed sinking us and this planet, too, in a big-time fashion). And yes, the president who told the world at the United Nations last year that climate change was nothing short of a “con job” and a “scam” seems to be distinctly in the process of preparing to burn down this very world of ours (or do I mean his?).

It’s Getting Hot, Hotter, Hottest

Oh, and only recently, to change the subject for a moment from You Know Exactly Who (or YKEW), a French tourist died after his vehicle became stuck in the mud in the all too aptly named Death Valley National Park in southern California, where the temperature was—and catch a breath before you read this!—116°F! (And mind you, that valley has been setting its own heat records in recent years.)

Now, given the location, you might think that was a one-of-a-kind situation in a deeply desertified stretch of this planet, but if so, think again. As it happens (to flip lands for a moment), on that tourist’s home continent, Europe, according........

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