Sharp as Teeth and Stars

Trump has effectively burdened Americans with a $6 trillion regressive tax hike, veiled under the guise of a tariff policy that many don't seem to understand. These tariffs, now soaring to levels unseen since the disastrous Smoot-Hawley Act of the 1930s, threaten to throttle economic growth just as they did then, prolonging hardship rather than alleviating it.

This reckless economic warfare will drive the country toward recession, at which point the true beneficiaries (read: billionaires and predatory private equity firms) will swoop in like vultures, scavenging distressed assets for pennies on the dollar. It is a cynical, calculated redistribution of wealth, siphoning from the working and middle classes to further entrench our emboldened oligarchy.

All of this has been carried out unilaterally by executive order with no input from Congress, no debate, and no regard for democratic oversight.

A society stripped of its humanistic institutions does not produce free thinkers; it manufactures a docile, myopic workforce, incapable of challenging power.

An intellectually brittle society, deprived of historical consciousness and critical inquiry, is one that will not recognize, nor resist, its descent into authoritarian rule.

Social media has warped my perception so thoroughly that a post getting 5 likes feels like a public disgrace, whereas in real life, if five people praised my work, I’d be halfway to drafting an acceptance speech.

Another round of historical gaslighting from Donald Trump. This executive order is just another ideological bludgeon aimed at historians who refuse to whitewash the past.

History isn’t a patriotic fairy tale; it’s complex, messy, and (when done well) real.

And here is where everything truly falls apart.

Bodhisattva Head, Gandhara

Mary Harrsch, Photographed at The Art Institute of Chicago