Bob Sheak, April 17, 2026

Arlene Sheak edits

The news is filled with the harm Trump has generated over his second presidential term, and before. He is linked to Jeffrey Epstein’s pedophile networks. His association with Elon Musk led to the reduction of federal jobs and serivces. His “Big Beautiful Bill” reduced taxes on the rich and powerful permanently. He has deployed ICE agents in cities across the country to find, detain, and/or deport immigrants, most of whom have been law-abiding and employed residents and citizens. Millions of people have protested against Trump’s ICE policies. He seems egomaniacally to look for every opportunity to have his name put on government building, monuments, and even on a one-dollar bill.

His tariffs inflated costs in the economy and had a drastic impact on many Americans. He started an unnecessary war on Iran that has led to much higher gas prices, fertilizer prices, and even higher inflation. He ordered the war on Iran without authorization from Congress. It is a lawless and unnecessary war. The war has caused immense destruction and death in Iran, including children. Now Trump has proposed a budget for 2027 that would raise military spending to levels not seen since WWII, while calling for severe reductions in other parts of the federal budget. He has even implied that he could order the use of nuclear bombs on Iran.

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Trump’s 2027 budget proposal favors military spending

LISA MASCARO and KEVIN FREKING report in an article for AP News on April 3, 2026 that Trump’s 2027 budget seeks $1.5T in defense spending alongside cuts in domestic programs (https://apnews.com/article/trump-2027-annual-budget-congress-defense-f95715d838bc17afd9799208cd3181.e3). Here’s some of what they write.

“President Donald Trump has proposed boosting defense spending to $1.5 trillion in his 2027 budget released Friday, the largest such request in decades, reflecting his emphasis on U.S. military investments over domestic programs.

“The sizable increase for the Pentagon, some 44%, had been telegraphed by the Republican president even before the U.S.-led war against Iran. The president’s plan would also reduce spending on non-defense programs by 10%.”

“‘It’s not possible for us to take care of day care, Medicaid, Medicare — all these individual things,’ he said. ‘They can do it on a state basis. You can’t do it on a federal.’”

Debt, deficits and tough choices ahead

Mascaro and Freking continue. “With the nation running nearly $2 trillion annual deficits and the debt swelling past $39 trillion, the federal balance sheets have long been operating in the red.

“About two-thirds of the nation’s estimated $7 trillion in annual spending covers the Medicare and Medicaid health care programs, as well as Social Security income, which are essentially growing — along with an aging population — on autopilot.

“It’s the rest of the annual budget where much of the debate in Congress takes place, as Democrats over the years have insisted that changes in the level of spending for defense and non-defense need to be equitable.

Trump’s proposals “suggests $1.1 trillion for defense would come through the regular appropriations process, which typically requires support from both parties for approval, while $350 billion would go in the budget reconciliation process that Republicans can accomplish on their own, through party-line majority votes.”

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War crimes

Over 100 legal experts say Trump committed ‘war crimes’

In an article for Mick Hilden, Alternet on April 2, 2026, Mick Hilden reports that “over 100 legal experts say Trump committed ‘war crimes’

(https://www.alternet.org/trump-war-crimes-2676655530). He writes,

“When President Donald Trump launched war against Iran at the end of February, his conduct then and since may amount to ‘’war crimes,’ according to an open letter signed by over 100 international law experts. The experts assert that ‘the attack was a clear violation of the United Nations Charter’ as there was no evidence that Iran posed an imminent threat.

“The letter signatories include senior professors, leaders of prominent international law organizations, former government legal advisors and military law experts including former Judge Advocates General, who signed to “express profound concern about serious violations of international law and alarming rhetoric by the United States, Israel and Iran in the present armed conflict in the Middle East.”

This body of experts asserted that the war — ‘which is costing U.S. taxpayers between $1-2 billion each day’— raises four main concerns.

“First, there is the violation of international use-of-force laws, as ‘there is no evidence that Iran posed an imminent threat’ to justify Trump’s self-defense claims.

“Second, there appear to have been serious violations of international humanitarian law, with 67,414 civilian sites struck, 498 of which are schools and 236 of which are health facilities, killing at least 1,443 Iranian civilians, including 217 children.

“Third, the letter points out ‘concerns about rhetoric and threats from senior officials.’ These include threats of ‘no quarter’ from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who has said that ‘the U.S. does not fight with ‘stupid rules of engagement’ and may conduct strikes on Iran ‘just for fun.’ At the same time, Trump has been making threats to civilian infrastructure like power and water desalination plants, which if carried out, entail serious war crimes.

“Finally, the signatories are worried about the reduction of institutional safeguards against further violations, asserting that Trump and his officials have ‘deliberately and systematically weakened the protections meant to ensure compliance with international humanitarian law.’ They have achieved this by removing senior military lawyers without cause, replacing military advocates general, and abolishing ‘civilian environment teams’ and other mechanisms specifically designed to limit harm to civilians during operations.”

“The letter concludes by urging ‘U.S. government officials to uphold the UN Charter, international humanitarian law and human rights law at all times, and to publicly make clear U.S. commitment to and respect for norms of international law.’

“But their pleas may fall on deaf ears as on Wednesday night, Trump delivered a national address in which he gave little sign of changing course, instead declaring that he would bomb Iran ‘back to the Stone Age.’

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Mentally unstable

Amidst all this harm and chaos, Trump is now being characterized as mentally unstable, that is, MORE mentally unstable than in the past.

Peter Baker has a lenthy article in The New York Times on Trump’s condition

(https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/13/us/politics/trump-mental-fitness-25th-amendment.html). Baker writes, “President Trump’s erratic behavior and extreme comments in recent days and weeks have turbocharged the crazy-like-a-fox-or-just-plain-crazy debate that has followed him on the national political stage for a decade.” Baker seems to favor the latter, just plain-crazy option. “A series of disjointed, hard-to-follow and sometimes-profane statements capped by his ‘threat to wipe Iran off the map last week and his head-spinning attack on the pope on Sunday night’ have left many with the impression of a deranged autocrat mad with power.”

Jamelle Bouie writes in the NYT on how Trump is “not a man in control of himself” (https://www.nytimes.com.2026/04/15/opinion/trump-iran-power-unitary-executive.html). “The president is struggling with the consequences of his actions, raging in protest of the fact that for all its firepower, the United States cannot bomb Iran into submission.” Trump looks for others to blame. “Over the last few days, Trump has denounced ‘the Fake News Media’ as ‘CRAZY, or just plain CORRUPT!’ for its reporting on the war. He attacked Pope Leo XIV in a bizarre rant, calling him ‘WEAK on Crime’ and ‘terrible for Foreign Policy.’ And he posted an A.I. image of himself as Jesus, surrounded by devotees, healing an unnamed man.”

Some top psychiatrists, have also written to Congressional majority and minority leaders in the US Senate and US House about Trump’s mental instability. The psychiatrists include James Gilligan, Prudence L. Gourgueshon, James R. Merekanges, and Jeffrey D. Sachs. The letter is reproduced on The Alternet website, April 15, 2026 (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/top-psychiatrists-issue-urgent-letter-to-congress-about-trump-s-mental-instability-opinion/ar-AA20WQwAl).

“Dear Senate Majority Leader Thune, Senate Minority Leader Schumer, Speaker Johnson, and House Minority Leader Jeffries:

“We write to you today with a sense of urgency that we do not use lightly. The behavior and rhetoric of President Donald Trump have crossed a threshold that demands the immediate and bipartisan attention of Congress. This is not a partisan assessment. It is a judgment grounded in observable fact, consistent professional assessment, and the constitutional responsibilities that your offices carry.

President Trump exhibits what forensic mental health experts have, across dozens of independent assessments, identified as the ‘Dark Triad’ of personality traits: narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy. Rather than constituting a clinical diagnosis, this trait-based assessment is grounded in behavioral observation and is particularly useful for assessing the level of danger an individual poses in a political leadership position. We do not offer this as a clinical verdict. We offer it as the considered judgment of a substantial body of professional opinion, based on well-researched evidence that is consistent, accumulating, and impossible to dismiss.”

“What makes this more than an academic matter is what predictably happens when this personality structure collides with immovable obstacles. The clinical literature is clear: individuals with Dark Triad profiles, when confronted with situations they cannot control or escape, do not recalibrate. They escalate. The psychological imperative to relieve narcissistic collapse overrides strategic calculation, concern for consequences, and ordinary self-restraint. Rage surges to domination. Impulsivity overrides caution. The urgent need to extinguish psychological pain eclipses every other consideration.”

The most urgent of their recommendations is that “Congress must immediately retake its constitutional authority over war. The bombing of Iran and the initiation of a naval blockade — acts of war under both US and international law — cannot be authorized by presidential fiat. Article I of the Constitution vests in Congress the sole power to declare war and to regulate commerce with foreign nations. The Framers intended Congress to deliberate upon and be accountable for precisely such consequential actions. Congress must assume its constitutional authority now, before further escalation renders the question moot.”

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There are other deeply serious indications of Trump’s mental instability and the reckless policies that stem from it. Tom Nichols offers some glimpses into Trump’s behavior in an article titled “Trump’s Latest Meltdown” for The Atlantic Magazine, published on April 14, 2026

(https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/04/trump-pope-post-truth-social/686802).

Here are excerpts.

“On many recent nights, Donald Trump has been posting obsessively on his Truth Social site into the wee hours. The president, of course, has never been one for a solid night’s sleep—or restrained and temperate commentary on social media—but his emotional state seems to be fraying: This weekend, he attacked Pope Leo XIV, presented himself as Jesus Christ, and then jabbed at his phone until dawn.

“Judging from those posts, the commander in chief is in distress. No one can say for sure what is causing the president’s bizarre behavior. Perhaps Trump’s narcissistic insistence that he is always successful in everything he undertakes is feeling the sting and strain of multiple public failures, including the collapse of his campaign to dislodge the Iranian regime, plummeting approval ratings, the decline of the U.S. economy, and, on Sunday, the crushing defeat of one of his favorite fellow authoritarians, Hungary’s Viktor Orbán.”

Nichols describes Trump’s posts on Truth Social on Sunday night, April 12.

“So a few minutes after nine on Sunday night, Trump posted a salvo of more than 300 words on Truth Social. According to the White House’s official schedule, he had just landed at Joint Base Andrews after his trip to Miami and was likely posting from the plane.

“His post was, in every way, bonkers. The president accused the pope of being ‘Weak on Crime’ and ‘Weak on Nuclear Weapons.’ He said that Leo ‘wasn’t on any list to be Pope’ and that he likes Leo’s brother Louis much better because ‘Louis is all MAGA.’”

“He had recommendations for the pontiff about how to be a better Vicar of Christ, saying he ‘should get his act together as Pope, use Common Sense, stop catering to the Radical Left, and focus on being a Great Pope, not a Politician.’”

“This one screed against the leader of a billion and a half Catholics was worrisome enough, but for Trump, it was just the beginning of a long night. Only 45 minutes after flaming the pope, Trump posted an AI-generated image of himself as (apparently) Jesus Christ, healing a sick man while soldiers and nurses and other worshipful white people gaze in awe and military jets fly overhead. You have to see the image to really grasp its weirdness, and to take in how offensive, even heretical, it might be to Christians of any mainstream denomination. (Trump has since taken that post down, claiming that he thought it depicted him as wearing a doctor’s outfit—a denial that is not only laughable, but is also hardly reassuring about his cognitive health.”

Nichols then provides a timeline for Trump’s behavior from 10:10 p.m. until 4:10 a.m. 

“Five minutes after this sacrilegious nonsense, Trump posted a mock-up of a Trump Tower on the moon. (Sure, why not.)

“Twenty minutes after that, at 10:10 p.m., Trump shared a silly meme about how Bernie Sanders, Chuck Schumer, and Joe Biden all look old after so many years in office, unlike himself. Twelve minutes later, he posted a clip from Newsmax’s Rob Carson Show. Twenty minutes later, he posted yet another Newsmax clip from the same show.

“Relative calm then overtook Trump’s phone until 12:43 a.m., when he announced that the U.S. Navy would be blockading Iranian ports in the morning—as if it were just another stray factoid to share in his news feed.

“Then, a bit more than two hours later—at 2:35 a.m.—he posted a link to a right-wing news site that approved of his Iran actions. At almost the same time, he posted another news story from the site about the Biden family and Ukraine. Two minutes later, he posted an article about Eric Swalwell leaving the California governor’s race. A few minutes later, he posted the same Biden story, again.

“Within another minute, Trump posted a link about an appeals court ruling that he could keep building his beloved ballroom until April 17. Finally, after a brief pause, he wrapped things up by posting a laudatory article from the New York Post—at 4:10 a.m., not long before dawn.”

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Concluding thoughts

Our president is an unstable, self-serving, and vindictive person. He has done great damage to the society, not the least of which is take the men and women of our military to an unnecessary war in Iran. This war has done great harm to the Iranians and has been costly to the U.S. in money, the use of expensive weapons, and the loss or wounding of American soldiers. Despite massive protests against his policies, he does what he wants, knowing that Republicans who control both houses of Congress will bend their knees to him. Despite all this, there is opposition outside of his Republican base to his policies and support in recent elections for dozens of Democratic candidates, pointing toward victories in November.