Weichlein is the CEO of FMC: The Former Members of Congress Association.
Rep. Rodney Davis joined a number of his fellow Republicans on June 14, 2017, for an early morning baseball practice on a field in Alexandria, a Virginia suburb of Washington, D.C. They were getting ready for an annual charity game that Republicans and Democrats have played for over 100 years, and the recurring time and place of their practice was not something anyone thought needed to be kept secret.
The first gunshots rang out about 30 minutes into practice, and if it had not been for two Capitol Police officers who happened to be at the field, there’s a good chance that Davis and most, if not all, of his colleagues would have been massacred that morning. The shooter, who does not deserve to have his name in print, had approached one of the members of Congress before practice began to make sure that those were indeed Republicans on the field that morning. In other words, had they been Democrats, he would have not pulled the trigger.
Davis has continued to represent Illinois in Congress despite that morning’s attempt on his life, and we are better off for it because he is a thoughtful legislator with integrity and commitment to making this country better. While performing this public service, he continues to routinely receive death threats, sometimes for being a Republican and other times for not being Republican enough. The other side of the political aisle is not exempt from the very real possibility of violence against them or their families. Sen. Mark Kelly, a Democrat from Arizona, said that threats are expected and come with the job. He should know, since his wife, former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, was shot in the head and nearly died in 2011 while holding a campaign event in her district.
The number of death threats against members of Congress actively investigated by police reached an astounding 3,939 in 2017. By 2020, that number had more than doubled. The next year it almost tripled to nearly 10,000. That means that on average a member of Congress receives a message that the police classify as “disconcerting or a direct threat” every three weeks. And when I say “a member of Congress receives,” what I should say instead is “the staff of a member of Congress receives” because the person picking up the phone and being harassed, screamed at with vicious and profanity-laden language, and told in no uncertain terms that the world would be better off without them, is usually an intern or the most junior staff member.
Public service comes in many different forms, and the health of our communities depends on citizens stepping up to the plate, either by volunteering or by foregoing more lucrative private-sector opportunities. They pay a price, which is why it is called public service. However, in our age of riling each other up via social media and call-to-arms cable news, the sacrifice we are asking of our public servants is much too steep a cost. School board members across the country dread town hall meetings because they know they will be shouted at for hours.
Many need security to make it out the door to their cars, and quite a few are reminded that “we know where you live.” Police officers, who have to assess the danger of a situation in a split second in order to keep themselves and the public safe, are as a group lumped in with every bad apple who ever put on the uniform. And teachers have been fully thrust into the middle of the mask mandate debate, having to deal with angry parents on both sides of the dispute.
The great “I’ve done my part, but now I’m done with this crap” tsunami is headed our way, and we have no one to blame but ourselves. We are losing members of Congress with years and years of experience and a track record of actually legislating. Congressional staffers at all levels are analyzing their quality of life and monthly paychecks and then updating their resumes as a result. Classroom sizes next year and for years to come will only get bigger because we’ll have fewer teachers for more students. Police officers are working more and longer shifts because there are fewer bodies to help keep our communities safe. And on school boards across the country, there are now countless opportunities for extremists from either side of the political spectrum to pick up vacated seats and transform what and how our children are learning.
It is crucial that we as a society figure out how to tone down our disagreements. We each have the responsibility to take the spotlight away from those whose business model is anger and division. It is time to come to our senses and stop empowering those who peddle tribalism and belligerence for personal gain, be they on the airwaves, internet or Capitol Hill. They are the ones who are actively stoking the flames of anger and threats, and they are the ones preventing Americans from living up to the best versions of ourselves.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.