Donald Trump and the Road To Nuclear War

It was one of the worst and most depressing sights I have ever seen. Donald Trump and his ghastly family standing there in the shadow of the great Lincoln, who appears to be looking down on them in disbelief.

While a military band played, a military choir sang the Battle Hymn of the Republic, and a massive power fireworks show spelled out the letters U-S-A in the sky.

But of course the real horror show begins today.

When Trump is sworn in as President, and delivers a speech he claims to have written himself.



And what with that strange look in his eyes, and that eagle which seems to follow him around wherever he goes...



Even when he parties with the convicted felon Joey No Socks Cinque.

One shudders to think what Trump might say, or where that deranged demagogue might lead his country and the rest of the world.

And so crazy and unpredictable is the situation, one really has to wonder whether we will survive him.

Or wonder as Charles Blow does, why more Americans aren't alarmed. 

I continue to be astonished that not enough Americans are sufficiently alarmed and abashed by the dangerous idiocies that continue to usher forth from the mouth of the man who will on Friday be inaugurated as president of the United States. 

Toss ideology out of the window. This is about democracy and fascism, war and peace, life and death.

When it should be clear by now that Trump's government of uber right-wing billionaires and flaky generals is a prescription for disaster... 



In a series of interviews and testimonies Donald Trump and his cronies have granted in the last several days, they have demonstrated repeatedly how destabilizing, unpredictable and indeed unhinged the incoming administration may be. Their comments underscore the degree to which this administration may not simply alter our democracy beyond recognition, but also potentially push us into armed conflict.

And could even lead to a war with China over some artificial islands that country has been building and fortifying in the South China Sea... 



Last week, Trump’s secretary of state nominee, Rex Tillerson, said during his confirmation hearing that the United States had to “send China a clear signal that, first, the island-building stops, and second, your access to those islands also is not going to be allowed.”

The only way to do this is with some sort of naval blockade, which China would undoubtedly interpret as an act of war. 

If the United States put “a cordon of ships around one or all of the islands, and the Chinese flew in aircraft to one of their new islands, what are we going to do? Shoot it down?” Glaser asked. “We’d certainly end up in a shooting war with China.”

Now I think Charles Blow is wrong when he says not enough Americans are alarmed. I think they're just keeping their fear to themselves.

As are so many others all over the world....



But he's right about China. Now would not be a good time to provoke it or its supreme leader.

It all comes at the worst possible time for Chinese President Xi Jinping, who is looking ahead to a politically tricky Party Congress in late 2017, when key policies will be debated and a large number of top decision-making posts will turn over. The last thing he wants is to be distracted by a White House that intends to challenge nearly every aspect of the Sino-U.S. relationship—or to appear weak in its face. 

Not when he can't afford to show any weakness, and the country is in the grip of a nationalist revival.

Already, leading Chinese hawks are spewing nationalistic rhetoric, putting pressure on Xi and raising the odds of a dangerous clash with an unpredictable American president China barely understands.

So it's easy to see how a shooting war could start in the South China Sea. 

Or how a trade war could lead to the same result. Especially since the man who will be advising Trump on trade with China is a crackpot named Peter Navarro.

Who a few years ago produced a documentary called Death by China...



And when I see that dagger and that blood flowing out of a wounded America... 



I think anything could happen. Even the unthinkable.

Maybe people think this possibility is unthinkable. Maybe people are just hoping and praying that cooler heads will prevail. Maybe they think that Trump’s advisers will smarten him up and talk him down. 

But where is your precedent for that? When has this man been cautious or considerate? This man with loose lips and tweeting thumbs may very well push us into another war, and not with a country like Afghanistan, but with a nuclear-armed country with something to prove.

Are you not alarmed?

All should be alarmed, and only mass resistance can save us now.

For we are in the hands of a madman.

In an even more belligerent America.

And the nightmare is just beginning...