Thoughts and prayers, for real
Donald Trump sounds like he is going nuclear.
I should preface what I’m about to say by noting I grew up during the Cold War, when “Christian” (more precisely, Protestant[1]) capitalism was pitted against a “godless communist” (more accurately, authoritarian socialist) monolith in Moscow (somehow conflating China with the Soviet Union), when all-out nuclear war was an ever-present possibility, and indeed, when mutually assured destruction was unironically understood by its acronym MAD. It was “good” versus “evil,” every bit as stupidly hierarchically invidiously monistic as it sounds.
I’m hearing that word “armageddon” again,[2] in reference to Donald Trump’s vulgar threats against Iranian bridges and power plants[3] and that “a ‘whole civilisation will die tonight.’”[4] And I’ve seen a concern that Trump may indeed go nuclear,[5] though the White House now denies this.[6] (I distrust anything emanating from this administration.)
It is certainly something to contemplate when a war started first, because Binyamin Netanyahu wanted it; second, because Donald Trump needed a distraction from the Jeffrey Epstein files; and third, because war is Pete Hegseth’s idea of a hard-on, may result in the first use of nuclear weapons since the U.S. dropped atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II.
I’m not religious but my thoughts and prayers are for the Iranian people—and for anybody downwind.
[1] Richard Tarnas, Passion of the Western Mind (New York: Harmony, 1991).
[2] Andrew McDonald, “TACO Tuesday?” Politico, April 7, 2026, https://www.politico.eu/newsletter/london-playbook/taco-tuesday/; Nicholas Vinocur, “Trump’s Iran threats set EU on edge,” Politico, April 7, 2026, https://www.politico.eu/newsletter/brussels-playbook/trumps-iran-threats-set-eu-on-edge/
[3] Dan Rather, “Trump Unhinged,” Steady, April 6, 2026, https://steady.substack.com/p/trump-unhinged
[4] Al Jazeera, “US denies nuclear plan as deadline on threat to Iran ‘civilisation’ looms,” April 7, 2026, https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/4/7/us-denies-nuclear-plan-as-deadline-on-threat-to-iran-civilisation-looms
[5] Al Jazeera, “US denies nuclear plan as deadline on threat to Iran ‘civilisation’ looms,” April 7, 2026, https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/4/7/us-denies-nuclear-plan-as-deadline-on-threat-to-iran-civilisation-looms; Patrick Wintour, “A war of regression: how Trump bombed the US into a worse position with Iran,” Guardian, March 27, 2026, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/mar/27/how-trump-bombed-us-into-worse-position-iran-strategic-failure
[6] Al Jazeera, “US denies nuclear plan as deadline on threat to Iran ‘civilisation’ looms,” April 7, 2026, https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/4/7/us-denies-nuclear-plan-as-deadline-on-threat-to-iran-civilisation-looms