I’m from the United States of deception.

Where the president brags about bringing back mental institutions, what used to be called insane asylums, while calling it compassion.

Where homelessness, addiction, and mental health illnesses aren’t treated as issues to be solved, but as threats to be locked away. Where the executive order didn’t even try to hide what it was: a weaponization of care, a PR-friendly purge.

Where news networks must accept government overseers to approve their coverage. Where CBS News is forced to accept an ombudsman to monitor coverage for anything critical of the president. Where dissent is being reframed as unfairness, and truth as bias. Where the First Amendment is treated like a nuisance.

Where science is being erased with the stroke of a pen. Where RFK Jr. is about to fire every single member of the cancer screening task force because they believe in equity, in evidence, in science. Where terms like "pregnant person" are treated as more dangerous than stage 4 disease.

Where your Obamacare premium might jump 75% next year if Congress doesn’t act. Because they want you to give up. Because they are counting on your despair to fund their chaos.

Where Marines were flown into LA for six weeks, deployed with full gear, housing, hazard pay, and did nothing. Costing us $134 million. That’s $3.5 million per week. For what? Photo ops. That’s $191,000 per Marine to stand around. To send a message. To pretend like there was something to fear.

While that was happening, they cut $50 million from children’s cancer research.

Let's put that in perspective. That $134 million could have funded 2,680 teachers for an entire year. Or provided 26,800 school lunches every single day. Or added full-time mental health counselors to 134 public schools.

That kind of money could have put boots on the ground in the places where kids actually need help. Instead, it bought us theater. Expensive, meaningless theater. A photo op for a problem that didn’t exist. A flex for a base hungry for force and control. And while they do that, they’re cutting education budgets, slashing food assistance, and pretending there’s no money left. There is. They just don’t want to spend it on you.

Where a Tennessee school district just told parents that their doctor’s note doesn’t matter. That only a school nurse can excuse your child’s illness. Where medical degrees mean less than political obedience. Parents with sick children now face truancy officers instead of sympathy. Pediatricians are calling this “the end of medical authority.” One mother is concerned that if her daughter has strep throat, she could be marked truant if the school nurse disagrees with the diagnosis.

Where ICE storms a medical clinic to detain a man. Where the staff who tried to protect him now face federal charges. Where medical compassion is criminalized and immigration raids are normalized.

Where cruelty is always justified. Where calling it out makes you the problem.

Where the dark triad isn’t a psychological diagnosis anymore, it’s a political base. A 2023 study of 15,000 voters found that self-identified MAGA supporters scored 40% higher on validated scales measuring manipulation, 30% higher on narcissism, and 25% higher on subclinical psychopathy.

They also showed dramatically lower scores on empathy and higher support for authoritarian leaders. This explains why they cheer when children are separated from their parents. Why they laugh when protesters are beaten. Why they say, “Good,” when someone they disagree with gets sick or dies. It’s not a side effect. It’s the appeal.

The same study found they’re more likely to support violence against protesters. More likely to dehumanize immigrants. More likely to see politics as a zero-sum war, not a shared system of governance. This isn’t speculation. It’s measurable psychological data. And it’s showing us exactly who they are.

Where public health isn’t a right, but a battleground. Where RFK Jr. erased vaccine experts from advisory boards and replaced them with ideologues. Where he canceled entire meetings meant to protect children, the immunocompromised, and people already ignored by the system.

Where medical disinformation is treated as freedom. And life-saving facts are treated like a threat.

Where families now wonder whether their child’s fever will result in truancy charges. Where cancer screenings, once routine, are now a culture war. Where being poor and sick is no longer a crisis—it’s a conviction.

I’ve watched this all unfold with grief, with rage, and with clarity. Because I remember what politics used to be. Disagreements about taxes. Fights about where the money should go. Now it’s about who gets to live with dignity. And who gets locked up, priced out, shut down, or pushed aside.

This isn’t just corruption. It’s systemic dehumanization. And it follows a script we’ve seen before. Blame the poor. Blame the disabled. Blame the immigrants.

Frame them as chaos. Then fund the response.

You think it can’t happen here? Ask the ACLU. Ask the historians. Ask anyone who’s studied the first stages of authoritarianism. It starts with labeling people as burdens. Then as criminals. Then as threats.

And then comes the silence.

But here’s what else I’ve seen. People fighting back. Doctors risking their careers to speak out. Parents organizing to defend their rights. Local journalists refusing to soften the truth.

You want to know what you can do? Call your representatives. Tell them to keep ACA subsidies. Demand they protect the independence of health panels. Support candidates who call this what it is. Share this information. Loudly.

Start local. Vote in every school board election. Run for a seat if you can. Back the people who know this is a moral fight. Not a budget fight. Not a branding fight. A fight for who gets to belong.

Because it doesn’t get better if we ignore it. It gets better because we drag it into the light. And shame it. And vote it out.

And while all of this feels like too much, I want to remind you of something: Joy is still allowed. In fact, it’s necessary.

They want us exhausted. They want us hopeless. They want us numb.

But joy is a protest. Joy is proof of life. Joy is our refusal to give them everything.

So yes, feel the pain. Feel the anger. And then laugh with your kids. Go outside. Bake something delicious and share it with a neighbor. Watch a movie that makes you cry with someone who won’t judge you. Paint your protest sign in rainbow glitter. Play loud music and dance while you plan your next act of resistance. Because we’re going to need that strength.

I still have hope for America, and you should, too.
I’ll see you tomorrow, Heather

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