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“But he hasn’t got anything on!” said a little child. “The emperor has no clothes!”
In Hans Christian Andersen’s 1837 fairy tale, “The Emperor’s New Clothes” it takes an innocent child to declare what all those surrounding the emperor will not. That is the “magical” garments,” which only the brilliant and astute purportedly can see, do not exist. They are mere fabrications. But for fear of crossing the mighty ruler and being thought inept or stupid, the courtiers proclaim the beauty of the emperor’s non-existent clothing.
If we take the emperor’s “clothes” to mean the dignity and true power of the office of the Presidency, then indeed, Donald Trump is wearing no clothes. And his chief tailor, Elon Musk, has never sewn a stitch of diplomacy or practiced relational tactics in his life.
In the United States, we do not have an emperor, and despite the publication from the White House declaring otherwise, we do not have a king. We have a president, the head of the Executive branch, whose job is to execute the law. We have two other equally powerful branches: the Legislative and the Judicial, whose jobs are, respectively, to make the laws and to judge the laws. Our forefathers intended for each branch to provide checks on the others, which is critical for the balance of power within the government.
Now, all three branches are peppered heavily with Republicans. In the true sense of Lincoln’s Republican Party, this would not be a problem. But this is no longer the Republican party. A perfect example is how the Republican members of Congress, the party that enthusiastically voted for military aid and support to Ukraine, have changed their tune almost unanimously now in support of Trump's clash with Ukraine president VolodymyrZelensky on the 28th of February.
However, it is the job of all members of Congress, regardless of which party, to speak up when legal or moral rules are violated.
Our country is a tangible collection of many ideas and ideologies, yet all are subject to its laws, and all citizens within the realm possess guaranteed rights. Even those who argue we need a thorough cleansing of the federal bureaucracy are not advocates of “throwing the baby out with the bathwater.” Sure, we have very real problems: unchecked immigration, out-of-control national debt, etc. We do, of course, need to solve these problems.
However, the answers cannot be found in alienating half of our country’s citizens and many allies worldwide. President Trump’s meeting with President Zelensky at the White House was a national embarrassment, playing out on an international stage.
How can any of us remain nonplussed when viewing the chaos of the last several weeks? Or have Donald Trump’s litany of executive orders been so stunning that we are stunned and senseless?
Apparently so. Although some are rising in protest, and some judges and districts are bringing lawsuits, most Americans are acting as if all they need to do is change the channel on their smart TV, and this all-too-real reality show will go away.
But many don’t want to change the channel and believe our 47th President exhibits the “strong leadership” our nation needs. Of course, we do want strong leadership, but it must be tempered with respect and compassion, remembering that as president, our leader speaks for all his constituents, and he is the voice the world hears.
Our 26th President, Teddy Roosevelt, said it plainly, “Speak softly and carry a big stick, and you will go far.” Roosevelt’s approach emphasized the importance of maintaining a strong military as a deterrent while prioritizing diplomacy. One example of many was Roosevelt sending a fleet of U.S. Navy ships on a world tour to demonstrate American naval power, a peaceful yet powerful display of strength, aligning with his philosophy of speaking softly while carrying a big stick.
Perhaps many Americans who don’t support Trump's actions remain silent because they believe that, ultimately, the pendulum will swing, as it has in the past, and that we’ll restore sense and balance. But might it not be too late for us and the world if we do not take action now?
Presently, there are 96 legal challenges to the various Executive orders issued by the Trump Administration. Following the rule of law is one way to act with legal challenges and is likely to overturn many of Trump's executive orders. But there is more you can do. Protests against the DOGE cuts are happening across the country at an ever-increasing rate. A “50501 Movement’ standing for “50 states, 50 protests, one day” has emerged in which dozens of demonstrations across the U.S. were recently held.
The overriding message is “No Kings,” where protesters are criticizing some of President Donald Trump’s actions as illegal and beyond the scope of his presidential powers. Additionally, more and more protestors are taking aim at billionaire Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency-led efforts to cut spending and fire employees across the federal government without due process.
Donald Trump was re-elected as President of the United States to serve, not to reign, and he should return to these core principles.
Amy Lockard is an Iowa resident who regularly contributes to regional newspapers and periodicals. She is working on the second of a four-book fictional series based on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice."
image of U.S. President Donald Trump is displayed on a digital billboard in Times Square in New York on April 8, 2026.
Trump is stuck between two realities. Neither serves the American people
Normally, I worry that events may overtake a column. But not so with the Iran war.
I don’t worry about running afoul of a headline or Truth Social post from the president because what is said about the situation is no longer very relevant to the reality.
On April 8, Nick Catoggio, my Dispatch colleague, dubbed an earlier stoppage with Iran “Schrödinger’s ceasefire.” This was a reference to the famous thought experiment by the physicist Erwin Schrödinger, who was trying to explain the weirdness of “superpositionality” in quantum physics. A cat in a box is both dead and alive at the same time until you open the box. Schrödinger meant to illustrate the absurdity of the idea that particles aren’t any one thing, but a “cloud of probabilities.”
The Trump administration is stuck in a word cloud of probabilities of his own making. The war is over. The war is on. The war isn’t a war. We have a deal, but we don’t have a deal, but we’re about to have a deal. We destroyed Iran’s military. No, we left it intact. We want regime change. No we don’t. We already accomplished it. We “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program a year ago. We had to go to war in February to prevent nuclear war. The Strait of Hormuz is open, closed, or something in-between. No deal without “unconditional surrender.” Let’s make a deal!
This everything-all-at-once vibe can be disorienting, particularly since most Americans didn’t have a war with Iran on their bingo cards until the shooting had already started. President Trump didn’t prepare the country or consult with Congress beforehand because he thought it would all be a smashing success in a matter of weeks.
The miscalculation that started it all: killing Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and much of Iran’s senior leadership, on the first day of the war. To “the great proud people of Iran, I say tonight that the hour of your freedom is at hand,” Trump announced on Feb. 28. “When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance for generations.”
I support regime change in Iran and shed no tears for Khamenei or his goons. But when you start a war by killing the regime’s top leaders, it’s not unreasonable for the remaining ones to conclude that you really intend regime change.
Khamenei was a murderous fanatic, but he was a fairly cautious one. He liked to threaten closing the Strait of Hormuz or attacking our regional allies, but he was reluctant to actually do it, fearing it would invite a regime change war. The mullahs and IRGC goons believed, not unreasonably, that if they lost their grip on power, they’d be lynched by the Iranian people they’ve brutalized for decades.
By starting with a regime change war, Trump removed any reason for the regime not to go for broke. When you have nothing to lose — particularly when you are a millenarian religious fanatic — a Persian Alamo strategy makes a lot of sense.
So Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz and attacked its neighbors.
But it turns out this wasn’t the Alamo. In the contest of wills, Trump blinked. The Iranian regime’s tolerance for punishment proved — so far — to be greater than Trump’s and that of our gulf allies. Militarily we could finish the job, but that would require ground troops and much greater economic turmoil. In a conflict Trump launched unilaterally without the prior support of Congress, NATO or the American people, Trump doesn’t have the political capital for that.
But that’s only half the problem. Trump wants the war over, but he doesn’t want to pay — militarily, economically, politically — what that would cost. So he wants to make a deal that ends it. But there is no deal available that wouldn’t come at an equally undesirable cost. Any deal that looks like what President Obama struck with the Iranians would be too embarrassing to bear. But the Iranians are convinced that they can get just such a deal, and they’re willing to drag things out as long as it takes.
The result: Trump’s in a box of his own making. He thinks he can talk his way out by simply asserting a reality that doesn’t exist. When the financial markets get nervous, he announces a breakthrough that is, at best, a possibility. When the Iranians agree to a deal that looks similar to one Obama might negotiate, Trump goes back to his threats.
It can’t go on forever. But I’m sure it’ll last until long after this column is forgotten.
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.