12/15/2025

My Dear Friend & POTUS, DJT, 

I have a heavy heart today after hearing about the shootings in Syria, Providence & Sydney. It’s troubling to see how many tortured souls in our world choose killing as their answer to their inner turmoil. I find it difficult to hold on to my enthusiasm for life amidst suffering. It is the existential paradox we all face, & today I find it draining. 

As always, we are faced with the challenge that George Fox put before Friends in 1656, while imprisoned in Launceston, Cornwall, to walk cheerfully over the world, to answer that of God in everyone, & to be a blessing to others.  In other words, we somehow need to radiate positive energy in a discouraging world. 

It seems that your latest strategy for sparking joy is free association (FA). I believe that’s what you were doing yesterday at your Christmas reception when talking about Dr. James Jones’ new book about how he survived being bitten by a viper in Peru. Your critics interpreted your rambling as another sign of dementia, but I’m inclined to think of it as a riff where you let loose & said whatever came into your head. Patients undergoing psychoanalysis have to be coaxed into doing FA to overcome blockages that cause self-destructive behaviors. You have such a free spirit that you do it all the time. Did you start doing it to deal with childhood trauma? 

Those of us who have not experienced all of the privileges that you have are much more inhibited. Keeping some things to yourself can be quite helpful at times. You might want to give it a try. 

Did you have fun in Baltimore on Saturday? It looks like the Army-Navy game was quite exciting. I can’t say the same for the UCD-ILSU blow out. UCD could not defend against the Redbirds passing game. It was so lopsided that we left at the end of the 3rd quarter. 

As usual, I ask that you call MAL & tell him that you will not recognize the results of the “election” that he plans for the end of the month. As Kyaw Zwa Moe points out in today’s Irrawaddy, “what the military is staging is not an election but a political scam.” I also ask that you reinstate the TPS for Burmese in the US given the Dec 10 bombing of the Mrauk-U hospital. Clearly, it is not safe for anyone to return to Burma, especially those from Rahkine State. 

BYBS, 

RCA