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Tag: President Donald Trump

Letter to the Editor: Donald Trump’s Grand Agenda

letter to the editor

Letter sent to the editor of the Defiance Crescent-News.

Dear Editor:

Our republic was saved from Donald Trump’s worst tendencies during his first administration by Republicans who understood what unchecked power could do in the hands of megalomaniac. Over the course of four years, they were replaced by feckless true-blue believers willing to bow to Trump’s delusional demands.

Today, the three branches of government are dominated by devotees to Trump and Project 2025. Loyal to the man, instead of the people, these servants tirelessly work to advance the whims of their leader. No regard is given to the U.S. Constitution or the rule of law. All that matters is obeisance to their savior Donald Trump. He alone, they say, can deliver us from communism, socialism, atheism, liberalism, and anything that paints White American Christians in a bad light.

In their minds, the United States is a Christian nation governed by the teachings of the Protestant Bible. Well, some teachings anyway. Trump-loving Christians ignore the verses that talk about how they should treat strangers and enemies; they ignore verses that explicitly condemn the Trump administration’s immoral treatment of undocumented workers and LGBTQ people. They worship what I call a Jesus of convenience; a Jesus that is used to advance political and social agendas instead of saving souls and transforming society.

It remains to be seen if our country will survive Donald Trump. Democrats fiddle while Rome burns, offering muted responses to Trump, if any at all, waiting until the time is “right.” If they can’t see the flames erupting through the roof, they aren’t paying attention. Protests and letters to the editor have their place — I’ve been writing letters for almost 50 years — but they alone cannot bring political and social change. The solution remains what it has always been: voting. As long as we are a democratic republic, voting remains the only means to effect change. If most Americans don’t vote, we can’t expect lasting change.

Trump plans to roll back progress to the Gilded Age of robber barons. The rich now control the reins of government more than ever before. One of their own now sits at the head of the table, acting like he’s a mob boss. All that matters to Trump is power and money; things Jesus expressly condemned. And if you stand in Trump’s way or dare to challenge his actions, he will bring the full force of the government down upon your head.

Bruce Gerencser
Ney, Ohio

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Who is Really Running the Federal Government?

trump im not a racist

Not Donald Trump, that’s for sure.

Trump has issued a record number of executive orders since becoming president. But, there’s a dirty little secret behind Trump’s orders; he doesn’t write them. It’s clear, at least to me, that he doesn’t even know what the orders say. That’s why he has a staff member read and explain the executive orders to reporters. Trump couldn’t explain these orders if he had to. Trump is being “managed” behind the scenes by people determined to put as much of Project 2025 into effect as possible.

Does anyone seriously think that Trump has the intellectual capacity to write his executive orders? This is a man who doesn’t know the difference between Alaska and Russia; a man who, in any other setting, would be considered mentally unfit to be president. If Joe Biden showed early signs of cognitive decline, what shall we say about Trump spouting all sorts of craziness and nonsense every time he has a press conference or delivers a speech?

Trump is a pawn in a war against the American people, one being waged by oligarchs, billionaires, libertarians, right-wing preachers, and ideologues who see Trump as a means to an end. Privately, they know he is a stupid man, a buffoon who can be manipulated to advance their respective agendas. These workers of darkness and evil use Trump’s pettiness, vindictiveness, and jealousy to tear down our democracy and replace it with a Christian theocracy.

It’s shocking how quickly they have gained their objective, and unless Congress and the Supreme Court stop these enemies of democracy, political and social collapse is sure to follow. November 2026 will be our first opportunity to neuter Trump. Whether we succeed depends on whether voters finally see Trump and MAGA as an existential threat to our republic, and vote accordingly. If Republicans hold on to their control of Congress, it is doubtful our country will survive. Cynical? Pessimistic? You bet. I have no time for people who can’t see Trump for who and what he is. It’s been ten years since Trump came down the escalator. We may not have known who and what he was back then, but we sure as Hell do now. No excuses. You can’t hide behind your ignorance. You have had ten years to size up Trump. And what troubles me the most is that millions of Americans would STILL vote for the man if he were running for office today.

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Bruce’s Ten Hot Takes for August 12, 2025

hot takes

Donald Trump thinks Alaska is Russia. Either that, or Trump plans to trade Alaska for a golden shower (pee) tape.

Karoline Leavitt is a liar. Every day, she stands before the American people and paints turds with faux gold paint. I’ve yet to hear her give a press conference without lying. But, she loves Jesus, right?

Congress can put an end to Donald Trump’s use of emergency orders to advance his fascist agenda, but they won’t. Congress fears what Trump might do to them if they oppose his policies, so they silently sit by while he burns our democracy to the ground.

Trump has no idea what his executive orders say. He’s has an “explainer” who explains to reporters what his executive orders mean. He’s cannot do this himself. A man of letters, he is not.

U.S. citizens and legal immigrants are being arrested without warrants by masked agents of the federal government. This is patently illegal and unconstitutional. Congress has the power to end these arrests, but they won’t.

Dean “Superman” Cain is now an ICE agent. Border problems solved, right?

Sherrod Brown plans to run for the Senate again. This is a perfect example of what we don’t need in Ohio. Brown, along with fellow Democrat Marcy Kaptur, ran centrist campaigns in 2024, alienating liberal and progressive voters. I found their Republican-lite political ads infuriating. I will vote for neither of them the next time around.

Marci Kaptur will be eighty and Sherrod Brown seventy-six when they are on the ballot again. Term/age limits, anyone?

We will never be able to trust labor statistics from the government again.

Am I the only one who wonders who is really running the government? Trump’s not. He seems clueless most days. I suspect the white Christian nationalists of the Heritage Foundation (Project 2025) are in charge of the federal government.

Bonus: Pete Hegseth’s favorite preacher is megachurch pastor Doug Wilson — a racist Christian nationalist. This should scare the shit out of all of us.

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Quote of the Day: Representative Jasmine Crockett Shows Why Trump is a Racist

trump project 2025

President Trump recently said:

I mean, when you have low IQ people like Crockett, I wonder if she’s any relationship to the late, great Davy Crockett, who was a great, great, a great gentleman. But you have this woman, Crockett. Very low IQ person. Somebody said the other day she’s one of the leaders of the party. I said, you’ve got to be kidding.

Representative Crockett replied:

He just knows how to throw that insult. But it’s a common insult when it comes to people of color. He just threw the same insult at Charlamagne tha God, and so I want people to see him and understand who he is. This is a person that has a problem with people of color, period. I don’t care how many Black MAGA are out there with their hats.

When we look at who it is that he’s kicking out of this country, it is people of color. When we look at who he always disrespects and says are low IQ, even though, when you look at his cabinet, this has to be the most incompetent cabinet we have ever had in the history of this country.

We’re talking about people that literally have the ability to drop bombs or order that bombs be dropped, or make recommendations that bombs be dropped, and they literally don’t know how to get the Signal chat. Right? So we’re talking about low IQ individuals, but so long as they say that this guy is their guy, and usually if they work for a certain news network, that’s the only qualification that’s necessary.

As reported by Vibe

By the way, Crockett has more education than Trump. She is a lawyer.

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Trump Dump: Dirty Old Man Says Sydney Sweeney is Hot, and Taylor Swift is Not

donald trump dump truck

Sydney Sweeney, a registered Republican, has the “HOTTEST” ad out there. It’s for American Eagle, and the jeans are “flying off the shelves.” Go get ’em Sydney! On the other side of the ledger, Jaguar did a stupid, and seriously WOKE advertisement, THAT IS A TOTAL DISASTER! The CEO just resigned in disgrace, and the company is in absolute turmoil. Who wants to buy a Jaguar after looking at that disgraceful ad. Shouldn’t they have learned a lesson from Bud Lite, which went Woke and essentially destroyed, in a short campaign, the Company. The market cap destruction has been unprecedented, with BILLIONS OF DOLLARS SO FOOLISHLY LOST. Or just look at Woke singer Taylor Swift. Ever since I alerted the world as to what she was by saying on TRUTH that I can’t stand her (HATE!). She was booed out of the Super Bowl and became, NO LONGER HOT. The tide has seriously turned – Being WOKE is for losers, being Republican is what you want to be. Thank you for your attention to this matter!

— Donald Trump, as reported by The Mirror

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Trump Dump: Trump Claims Latest Job Numbers are Rigged

donald trump dump truck

Last week’s Job’s Report was RIGGED, just like the numbers prior to the Presidential Election were Rigged. That’s why, in both cases, there was massive, record setting revisions, in favor of the Radical Left Democrats.

Those big adjustments were made to cover up, and level out, the FAKE political numbers that were CONCOCTED in order to make a great Republican Success look less stellar!!! I will pick an exceptional replacement. Thank you for your attention to this matter. MAGA!

— Donald Trump, as reported by The New Republic

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Quote of the Day: Trump’s Illegal Use of Fraudulent Emergency Declarations

quote of the day

By Michael Brock, Notes from the Circus

As the Jeffrey Epstein scandal continues apace, and MAGA grapples with the gaslit reality they live in, the Trumpr Administration continues to negotiate so-called trade deals, which are negotiated and implemented using pure executive fiat, under emergency powers, under an emergency declaration which has no rational basis, while everyone pretends this isn’t an example of a constitutional coup. It’s actually an exercise in sedition, if one were to avoid putting a finer point on it.

The mechanism is breathtakingly brazen: declare a fake national emergency, invoke emergency trade powers designed for genuine crises, bypass Congress entirely, and conduct billions of dollars in international agreements through personal presidential decree. When Japan agrees to invest $550 billion based on Trump’s “Strategic Trade Agreement,” they’re being asked to legitimize constitutional fraud that exists only through Trump’s personal authority rather than constitutional process.

Our allies aren’t stupid. They understand perfectly that what Trump is doing is illegal. The Constitution explicitly grants Congress the power “to regulate Commerce with foreign Nations”—not the president. Foreign governments have constitutional lawyers who can read Article I, Section 8 as clearly as anyone. They know there is no emergency, no “unusual and extraordinary threat” that justifies bypassing Congress to negotiate trade policy through executive decree. They must be horrified by how few Americans seem to care that their government operates through systematic constitutional violation.

….

Congress could terminate these fraudulent emergencies at any time under the National Emergencies Act. Instead, Republican leaders have chosen to become active accomplices in constitutional destruction. They literally suspended the flow of time itself—declaring that calendar days would not constitute calendar days—to avoid voting on Trump’s fake emergency tariffs. When that proved insufficient, Speaker Mike Johnson simply shut down the People’s House entirely to prevent oversight votes. Senator Markwayne Mullin confessed the conspiracy on the House floor: “What we’re simply trying to do here is give President Trump cover.”

This demonstrates what a fundamentally unserious country we’ve become, with a political economy increasingly designed toward the maintenance of Trump’s personal power rather than constitutional governance. These vulgar arsonists in Congress have voluntarily transformed from co-equal branch into presidential protection service, abandoning their constitutional duties to serve one man’s authority. Every avoided vote, every suspended timeline, every shutdown of democratic process serves the same seditious purpose: eliminating constitutional constraints on executive power.

….

Every trade deal negotiated through fake emergency powers establishes irreversible precedent that the presidency can operate beyond constitutional constraint by simply declaring emergencies. Trump has converted emergency powers designed to protect the republic into tools for dismantling republican government itself, while Congress provides the accelerant and courts provide the legal cover.

This is sedition: the systematic subversion of constitutional government by those sworn to preserve it. The American republic is being destroyed by constitutional arsonists who have discovered that the most effective way to eliminate democratic constraints is to declare them emergencies that require bypassing democracy itself. Our allies watch in horror as we demonstrate the complete transformation of American governance from constitutional republic to personal rule.

You can read the entire article here

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Should We Put President Donald Trump’s Face on Mount Rushmore?

trump-rushmore

If there’s one thing most Americans can agree on, it is this: President Donald Trump is a pathological liar. There’s not a day that goes by without Trump uttering multiple lies. MAGA supporters dismiss his lying, saying, “Oh, that’s just Trump being Trump.” Maybe, but his lies can and do cause material harm to the United States and its people. I am at a loss to understand why millions of Americans still support Pinocchio. He’s lied so many times that his nose extends into outer space. Sure, all politicians lie, but Trump is in a class all his own. On this, Donald, you are, indeed, #1.

What, exactly, has Trump done for the working class and poor people? Not much. He has, in every way, made their lives harder. Trump says gas prices are down to $1.99, yet most of us are paying at least $3 a gallon. Supposedly, groceries cost less thanks to Trump, yet most of us are paying substantially more to put food on the table. My partner and I recently ate dinner at a local Mexican restaurant. Entrée prices are up $2 each. Everywhere I look, I see increasing costs. I put the blame for increased prices solely on President Trump and his enablers in Congress.

Worse, Trump is neck deep in the Jeffrey Epstein scandal. Trump denies ever being on Epstein’s island. Does anyone believe him? I know I don’t. Trump’s behavior suggests he has a “thing” for young, perhaps underage, women. He and Epstein were best buds at one time. Trump says that he broke with Epstein because he was poaching his employees — mainly young, attractive women. This is Trump’s red line, and not the fact that Epstein was a pedophile, a sexual predator.

Recently, MAGA politicians have suggested that Trump’s visage be carved on Mount Rushmore. He is — just ask the humble man — the best president in the history. This, of course, is another lie. Historians years from now will likely conclude that Trump was a lot more like Herbert Hoover than Abraham Lincoln or George Washington. He is one of the worst presidents to ever sit in the Oval Office. I can’t think of anything Trump has done to merit him being added to Mount Rushmore. The same goes for naming buildings, roads, waterways, and airports after Trump or giving him the Nobel Peace Prize. I thought Trump thinks the United States should be a meritocracy. If so, what has he done to merit having his face forever chiseled into stone on Mount Rushmore?

The only place I want to see Trump’s face is on urinal cakes. Take aim, men, and let’s show Trump what we really think of him.

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Trump Dump: Evidently, Trump Failed Elementary Math

donald trump dump truck

We will have reduced drug prices by 1000%, by 1,100%, 1,200%, 1,300%, 1,400%, 700%, 600%.  Not 30% or 40% or 50%. But numbers likes of which you’ve never even dreamed of. 

We’re gonna get the drug prices down. Not 30% or 40%, which would be great. Not 50% or 60%. No, we’re gonna get them down 1,000%, 600%, 500%, 1,500%. Numbers that are not even thought to be achievable.

— President Donald Trump, as reported by Salon

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Letter to the Editor: Will Americans Ever See Beyond Trump’s Lies?

letter to the editor

Letter to the editor of the Defiance Crescent-News submitted on July 23, 2025

Dear Editor,

President Donald Trump is a psychopath who has no empathy for anyone but himself. Trump does no wrong. He even said he hasn’t done anything worthy of asking forgiveness from God. In his eyes, he sees himself as one of the greatest American presidents, ever, worthy of his spray-tanned face being chiseled into Mount Rushmore. Trump’s visions of grandeur know no bounds. He delusionally thinks he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize. A liar and a braggart, he spins lies into stories about everything from his prowess with women to being the greatest negotiator who ever lived.

Whatever Trump might think about himself, in the real world we continue to judge politicians by their works. The Bible tells us to judge people by the fruit they produce. What, if anything, has Trump done for everyday Americans? Not much. So far, all he has done is foment chaos and fear. Financial markets are having a hard time figuring out what the “stable genius” is doing. Trump’s handlers tell us to trust him, saying he is a master businessman and financier, all the while ignoring that he has gone bankrupt numerous times. A reckoning is coming for Trump. Not today, but once he is out of office and lacks the power of the state, business leaders will be free to ignore his insanity. Of course, until that glorious day, we have to live with Trump’s ignorance about how the world really works, hoping he doesn’t drag us into another war or burn our world to the ground. This should come as no surprise since Trump doesn’t read. He even avoids reading security briefings, preferring pictures or summaries. He is the most illiterate man to ever be president. Regrettably, millions of Americans are fine with Trump’s apathy towards learning new things, especially things that challenge his racist, fascist, misogynistic beliefs.

Trump now faces questions about his relationship with sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein. Extant evidence suggests that the men were best buds who had a sickening obsession with underage girls. Trump, of course, denies everything. Instead, he blames Barack “Hussein” Obama, “Sleepy” Joe Biden, and arch nemesis, Hilary Clinton. Take his whopper of a lie about his uncle, John Trump, teaching Ted Kaczynski at MIT. From stem to stern, this was a lie. Are we so numb to his lies that we ignore them? I hope not. The future of our republic is at stake.

Bruce Gerencser
Ney, Ohio

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.