6/3/2026
My Dear Friend & POTUS, DJT,
Do you trust anyone? Should anyone trust you?
Those questions occur to me because you don’t seem to realize that our nation depends on it. We even put the word on our money, although I wish our currency would not specify that we trust God. I’d prefer “we trust the people” or “we trust each other.” Whoever the entities in the proclamation may be, the verb is what counts & it is a prerequisite to the functioning of the USA.
You understand that, don’t you? 250 years ago the Revolutionaries put their lives at risk because they believed they’d be much better off if all of the landowners got to decide how their tax dollars were spent. They’d learned that one guy should not be the decision maker because he’d look after himself, his family & his buddies, rather than take care of everyone. They trusted their neighbors & joined together to resist the king.
Of course, you know this history, but I wonder if you’ve thought hard enough about how fragile trust is. According to Aa, “trust is built slowly & destroyed quickly.” Aa lists reliability & predictability as its foundations with benevolent intent as its cement.
Please ask yourself whether you & your people are being trustworthy. You might also avoid appointing convicted criminals to perform important duties. Folks like Elias Irizarry should not be appointed to jobs that requires security clearance.
I don’t think I need to tell you that your are totally UNpredictable, so you have lots of work to do in this department. While I am happy that you reversed course on the Anti-Weaponization Fund, that’s just the latest example of how erratic your behavior tends to be.
Aa explains benevolent intent as wanting good things for people & not just yourself. You exhibit this toward some people, but not people like me. So most of the people in my circles do not trust you at all.
Lack of trust has begun to permeate all aspects of our society & is causing distress. The latest example of American’s wariness is our response to AI. I assumed everyone in the world was suspicious of what robots might do to society, but, according to the Christian Science Monitor, “in Asian countries such as China, Indonesia, & Thailand, between 75% & 85% see AI’s benefits as outweighing its drawbacks.” Experts say this is because “other countries have approached AI with a more intentional vision & have sought to connect AI development with a problem their country needs to solve.” Please think about how you can assuage our fears & give us something to hope for regarding AI.
Finally, please reinvigorate to your desire to be a peacemaker by attending to the situations in places like Burma & Gaza where children are learning that they can’t trust any grown-ups to keep them safe. As Aung Marm Oo writes in the Irrawaddy, the constant bombings in Rahkine State have begun a silent transformation of childhood itself where children “grow up believing the sky is an enemy.”
I hope your meetings go well today.
BYBS,
