As 2022 draws to a close, The Fulcrum has invited leaders of democracy reform organizations to share their hopes and plans for the coming year. This is the eighth in the series.
Vines is the executive producer of the 2021 documentary “Dialogue Lab: America” and president/CEO of Ideos Institute. Molineaux is co-publisher of The Fulcrum and president/CEO of the Bridge Alliance Education Fund.
This time of darkness in the Northern Hemisphere is a time when many of us go inward. We reflect on the past and plan the future. We gather with friends and family or feel isolated and lonely. Or both. This time of year is a time of struggle for many among us. It’s also an opportunity for renewal.
The world is changing. Our nation is evolving. The changing nature of life itself doesn’t require permission, understanding or approval. It simply is. What we have control to change is our perception and our response. One way to feel empowered is to observe, decide, and then act.
Observe: What do you think about? Have you ever examined the thoughts you think and wondered where they came from? Are they really yours? Much of what goes on in our thinking are ideas and beliefs that are external to us. They are the ideas or biases of our family, our faith, the media, advertisers and our friends. Without examination, we may mistakenly believe these thoughts are our own. Many of them are not.
Without the ability to think critically about why we believe what we believe, and examine where holes in our beliefs might lie, we live captive to the ideas and biases of others. When an entire population or group fails to engage this sort of reflective examination, groupthink is often the end result. In the worst of cases, groupthink can lead to dangerous social behaviors like anti-democracy activities or even violence against other groups.
Decide: Do you believe every thought you think? One benefit of examining what’s in our stream of consciousness is the ability to discard what’s not working. We outgrow beliefs like children outgrow the tooth fairy and Santa Claus. This aspect of self-reflection allows us to change our mind and adopt new beliefs that better serve our needs. A common example is when people believe they don’t deserve love. This unhealthy belief causes suffering and leads to a spiral of despair. Once discarded, a new belief can grow to improve our life. It is simple to do. It also requires practice.
As these practices take root, the process of constantly and intentionally discarding unhelpful ideas and biases become second nature. This, then, allows us as individuals, and eventually as social groups, to become more effective and critical thinkers who can offer love and compassion to others without feeling threatened in the process.
Self-reflection helps us have compassion for ourselves. While judging harshly may be our first impulse, discarding the judgment as an unhelpful belief is essential. When we know better, we must do better, as Maya Angelou noted. Can you imagine what our society would be like if everyone practiced self-compassion in service of offering that same compassion to others?
Act: While these skills are vital to a functioning and healthy self and society, they also require practice. One easy way to practice is by spending time in dialogue with others on a similar journey. The great news is that you can begin this practice anytime.
In fact, we think that engaging in dialogue should be one of your New Year’s resolutions. And to start, why not join the National Day of Dialogue happening on Jan. 5. There you will gain from like-minded organizations ready to help you take your dialogue practice to the next level, including offering tools and guides so you can gain the confidence necessary to begin. You may want to invite a friend or colleague to join you. You might even find new friends to partner with. The important thing is to start.
As more Americans practice self-reflection in community with others, we begin to co-create a future we’d like to live into. By empowering ourselves, we in turn empower others to be better citizens, friends and family members.
Every journey starts with a single step. And yes, practice makes progress. Together we are stronger and should we find our way back to showing love and compassion to those with whom we disagree, our nation will be stronger, too.
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.