The unruly child has become a bore

If Donald Trump wins a second term this November, I would not be shocked: most of that shock value evaporated eight years ago when he rode a two-million-vote deficit into the White House. Whatever remaining Trumpian bombshells after that one evaporated during the January 6 uprising when he urged his disaffected and traitorous disciples to overthrow the government.

At this point, nothing Trump does or says surprises us much. However, I find myself rolling my eyes more and fuming less. Don't misinterpret that: he remains a dangerous figure, one whose viewpoints and goals contravene the core values of the great majority of Americans—even the ones sipping the Kool-Aid, waving his flags, and wearing his hats. But in 2020, the Republican party presented no cogent platform, perhaps an early pre-January 6 indication that they were a political party in name only. Now we have that platform—Project 2025—which is quite simply an authoritarian blueprint—one that renounces reform in favor of replacement: why work to improve the government when you can simply have a new one? Or an old one that didn't work?

Project 2025 comprises 900 pages of Heritage Foundation dogma centering on licensing and pardoning lawbreakers; investigating, retaliating against, and replacing critics and rivals; and using the Insurrection Act to terminate any protests or attempts at contradicting Trump policies. It's a roadmap of Germany in the 1930s with a dollop of McCarthyism thrown in for modernity.—a systematic dismantling of individual freedom and an assault on human integrity.

Trump himself has tried to distance himself from Project 2025, but every time he opens his mouth, he falls in line with its principles. He's not smart enough to avoid it. And adding J. D. Vance to his little coterie has made his denials even hollower because Trump—never one to avoid saying the quiet things out loud—has added an acolyte who screams them.

That's why, at least at times, I feel we are coming to the end of MAGA. It will, like all authoritarian philosophies, rot from within. And Vance and Trump working together—with a boost from Elon Musk and the republican House zanies—may accelerate the decline. I'd like to claim it will end this November, but that may be a bit optimistic. Trump won't go away unless we make him go away.

However, Project 2025 has proven that you can utter all sorts of harebrained ideas in front of a crowd of zealots, but putting them on paper and defending them are entirely different. It has already deteriorated into a joke—many jokes—and if Kamala Harris and the rest of her party can work to expose them and maintain a sense of balance—and yes, a sense of humor—the Republican party may very well be recognized as the sham it has become. Even some of its own members are backing away from it.

But Donald Trump remains dangerous, especially now that he credits the God he doesn't believe in with sparing his life, and many on the fringes of the religious right are goose-stepping along. But he has also become more laughable and doesn't like that. Trump has never learned that self-effacement and self-deprecation can sometimes help individuals connect with others on a human level. Instead, he prefers connecting through confrontational bullying and name-calling.

It's a tried and true tactic that most children grow out of. Most, but not all.