
Photograph Source: Tyler Merbler – CC BY 2.0
What will happen on January 21 after the inauguration of Donald John Trump as the 47th president of the United States? There are lots of predictions of doom and gloom. But there may be another way to look at what will happen. After all, DJT has made so many promises – extending American power to Greenland, the Panama Canal and Canada, ending the Russia/Ukraine War, deporting millions of undocumented immigrants as well as his outrageous nominations – that it will be impossible for him to succeed with all he has boasted he will do.
And more down to earth, the fires now burning around Los Angeles and their consequences will still be on the January 21st presidential agenda. Trump’s fantastic predictions about what he will accomplish will face material reality as soon as he is sworn in. Homeless Californians will demand presidential action at the same time a triumphant Trump will try to celebrate with his toadies in Washington and at Mar-a-Lago. The fires represent a potential gravitational pull back to Earth for Trump and his delusional MAGA followers.
Up until now, in terms of dominating the news, Trump has set the bar very high. There is no question that between November 5, 2024, and January 20, 2025, Donald Trump was the world’s pre-eminent figure. “Trump’s determination to project peerless authority is playing out on multiple fronts,” CNN headlined. He was more than just Time magazine’s Man of the Year. His personality was globally omnipresent.
Along with Trump’s omnipresence, there are also ominous warnings about his threats to democracy and autocratic rule with no guiderails. His omnipresence implies omnipotence Trump’s political domination may have given him a unique pre-eminent status, but it has mostly been outside traditional democratic values. There have been repeated references to the upcoming Trump imperial presidency as a return to the U.S. tradition of imperialism at the end of the 19th century with the purchase of Alaska, the invasion of Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines and the completion of the Panama Canal. But 2025 is not 1823, 1867, 1898 or 1914. The world is not the same as when the Monroe Doctrine was declared and implemented, nor when Teddy Roosevelt used his “Big stick” for foreign adventures.
And if there are so many warnings about an impending imperial presidency, shouldn’t there also be revelations that the emperor has no clothes? There are certain similarities between Hans Christen Andersen’s tale “The Emperor’s New Clothes” and Trump’s braggadocio.
A tradition comes to mind to answer the question about the naked emperor and fairytales. For the last several decades, the most valuable player (MVP) in the U.S. football Super Bowl declares; “I’m going to Disneyland/Disney World,” when asked what he is going to do after the win. Last year’s MVP, Patrick Mahomes of the Kansas City Chiefs, celebrated his team’s victory with a parade at Disneyland in Anaheim, California.
Going to Disneyland/World is in many ways a continuation of the football game. Sporting events and a parade with Mickey and Minnie are part of fantasy realities. Watching the Super Bowl on television, as 123 million people did last year, is part of an escape from daily routines and frustrations. Going to Disneyland/World is the vacation equivalent. But opposed to those fantasies, the fires now burning around Los Angeles are real. For the people caught up in the horrors, there is no escape. The L.A. fires are non-virtual reality. From the fires to Disneyland is only 30 miles, but the two exist in very different worlds.
The Super Bowl/Disney and horrendous fires represent two separate realities. While Americans may be holding the two at the same time, a form of cognitive dissonance, the fires show the limits of the virtual and a disintegrating separation of fiction from fact. The legendary American journalist Pete Hamill was once assigned to cover a Super Bowl game in Miami. Instead of attending the game, he roamed the streets of Miami’s ghettos. “Better to deal with real people than pumped-up entertainment,” the Brooklyn born street reporter explained to me.
After January 20, will the American people recognize the limits of Trump’s fantasy world? The fires should be a wakeup call. They should exert a gravitational pull on Trump and his followers to return to the world of climate disasters, opioid epidemics, increasing economic inequality as well as the declining domination of the United States in global politics. Games and virtual reality have their limits. No matter what Musk and Bezos do in outer space, Earth’s gravitational pull cannot be avoided. The Super Bowl/Disney/Trump and MAGA are distractions; the fires are real.
Donald Trump and his MAGA followers have been watching and playing games for years. After January 20, a different kind of reality will set in. Trump’s legacy may best be remembered for his unique pre presidential importance between November 5 and January 20 based on unrealistic promises. But his election victory and the period from November 5 until January 20 were based on fictions, on mythical American dreams, on a porous border between the imagined and a very different actuality. Gravity cannot be avoided on planet Earth. Non-insured California homeowners’ cognitive dissonance is going up in flames. The California Dream is going up in smoke. Will the fires bring the MAGA/Disney believers back to Earth? On January 21, will Trump’s omnipresence and proclaimed omnipotence turn out to be fantasies like the emperor with no clothes? The tragedy of the horrific Los Angeles fires may have some positive, unintended consequences only if they force Trump and his delusional MAGA followers back to Earth. Or will we all see that the emperor/president truly has no clothes?