COMMANDER-IN-THIEF

Commander in Thief

Donald Trump is not leading the country. He’s looting it. Not in secret. Not behind closed doors. But openly, brazenly, and with the backing of nearly half the population who still believe he’s their champion. This is not leadership. It is theft in broad daylight. He is not the Commander in Chief. He is the Commander in Thief.

Trump has perfected a kind of reverse Robin Hood economics: robbing from the working class and handing the spoils to the ultra-rich, including himself. His so-called policies are scams wrapped in slogans. Beneath the “America First” bluster lies a very different agenda: Trump First, Always. From tax cuts that benefit billionaires to deregulation that lines the pockets of polluters to trade wars that hurt consumers and farmers alike, every move enriches his cronies and impoverishes the average American.

Even now, he is campaigning on the promise to finish what he started, which means gutting what remains of public service and turning over every agency, every contract, every national resource to the highest bidder or closest loyalist. His economic “plan” isn't a strategy; it’s a pipeline that pumps wealth upward while draining the rest of us dry.

And the most galling part? He’s doing it in front of everyone. It’s not hidden. It’s not subtle. He proposes tax breaks that would apply to himself. He flirts with foreign money and autocrats while pretending to be a populist. He takes millions at his properties, golf courses, hotels, and resorts while pretending to fight for the little guy. He claims to represent the forgotten man, even as he picks that man’s pocket and laughs all the way to the bank.

This is not complex. It’s not a matter of political ideology. It’s a matter of basic morality. No one,  right, left, or center,  wants to be stolen from. Yet here is a man who is stealing, day after day, not just from those who oppose him but from those who still support him, who rally for him, who chant his name. He is draining their wallets, their futures, their dignity, and they don’t even see it.

They think he’s their anger. Their outlet. Their middle finger to the elite. But he is the elite. Worse: he is the worst kind of elite,  unqualified, unethical, and utterly uninterested in anyone else’s welfare.

And when the bill comes due, and it will, it won’t be paid by the billionaires he’s helped. It will be paid by the very people who waved the flags, wore the hats, and believed the lie. It’s already happening: prices up, wages stagnant, healthcare slashed, education under siege, infrastructure crumbling. But there’s more to come. Much more.

History will not look kindly on this period,  not just because of the man who stole the presidency and then pillaged the country, but because of the millions who stood by and let him do it, and even worse, cheered him on while he did.

It’s time to stop pretending this is politics as usual. It’s not. It is kleptocracy in action,  and if we don’t call it what it is, we are complicit in our own decline.

Donald Trump is not your savior.
He is not your voice.
He is not your strength.

He is your thief.

William James Spriggs