As an American living in Australia, I’ve unwittingly become the unofficial translator of U.S. political madness. Nearly every day since January, someone has asked me the dreaded question, “So, what do you think about what’s happening in the U.S.?” And each time, I find myself stumbling through a response, trying to make sense of the chaos, and struggling to condense the tumultuous flood of news into something that is both coherent and—dare I say—eloquent. Writing about it feels like my best shot at making sense of the ever-growing dumpster fire that is American politics.
Let me be upfront and say that I’m no expert, historian, or political scientist. I’m just an American in Australia with an internet connection and a functioning brainstem. I consume news from both “mainstream” media sources and independent outlets while remaining acutely aware of the biases baked into every headline. As a result, I’ve developed a habit of cross-checking sources, researching historical context, and doing my best to form my own conclusions. But let’s be honest—fact-checking has become a partisan battlefield in its own right. The irony is rich: trust one source and you’re labeled a sheep, doubt it, and you’re suddenly a conspiracy theorist. So, let’s be clear—this blog is nothing more than my personal opinion, shaped by my experiences and observations as an expat watching my home country spiral into oblivion from 7,000 miles away.
I’ve never been a “Trump supporter” nor a “Trump hater.” In 2016 and 2020, I begrudgingly cast my vote for him, viewing him as an opportunistic populist who thrived on media attention and political spectacle. For a while, I thought his extreme rhetoric was just that—rhetoric, a loud-mouthed politician who said outrageous things to get attention. Surely, I thought, America’s institutional safeguards would keep things from devolving too much. But then January 6, 2021, happened. The Capitol riot made one thing painfully clear: Trump wasn’t just a showman who thrived on chaos, he was a dangerous demagogue. His baseless claims of election fraud had already spun out of control, and yet, he did nothing to stop his supporters from storming the Capitol in an attempt to subvert the election result. The violent scenes we saw that day were a slap in the face to the notion that his supporters were truly “law and order” advocates.
Trump’s defenders love to say, “He didn’t tell them to riot.” Maybe not explicitly, but when you refuse to condemn the violence, when you go as far as to call the rioters “patriots,” the message is clear as day. And that was the turning point for me—the moment I realized Trump wasn’t just a media-obsessed reality TV star; he was a man who had learned how to manipulate people, weaponizing their fears and frustrations to his own advantage. His words and actions were no longer just annoying; they were actively undermining the foundations of American democracy.
It was around this time that I began reflecting on my own experiences. I’d worked as a police officer during the 2020-21 election cycle, and one coworker, in particular, left a lasting impression on me. He was smart, charismatic, and deeply committed to his job—but his worldview had been completely warped by conspiracy theories. He was convinced that COVID-19 was manufactured to stop Trump’s re-election and that the vaccine was a left-wing mind-control tool designed to turn people against him. And to make matters worse, he genuinely believed that Trump was “anointed by God.” This wasn’t the result of some off-hand remark; he said it to my face, with complete sincerity.
What stunned me even more was that he sourced all of this “information” from Alex Jones, a man who once claimed that the government was turning frogs gay. When I asked him if he ever questioned Jones or disagreed with even 1% of his views, he said no. That’s when I realized: hope was lost for him.
Eventually, our department implemented a vaccine mandate, and my coworker refused to comply. He ultimately lost a job he truly loved and excelled at— and no, it wasn’t just about personal freedom, it was more due to blind loyalty to a man who wouldn’t recognize him if they passed on the street. His story, combined with the events of January 6, cemented my belief that unchecked demagoguery is one of the greatest threats to democracy. I still don’t know what’s more terrifying: the fact that such a person could hold such a position of influence or the fact that there are millions of others who follow him.
Trump thrives on fear. He weaponizes misinformation, playing on the anxieties and frustrations of his base to rally them to his cause. If you’re American, there’s a good chance you know someone who went down the Trump rabbit hole during the COVID pandemic and never resurfaced. The cult-like devotion, the unquestioning belief in his every word, and the way his followers flocked to Washington D.C. on January 6, 2021, like it was the second coming—it’s beyond surreal. It’s terrifying.
And this is why I started this blog.
I hesitated at first. The internet is forever, and I have no desire to become some viral cautionary tale. But as I approach 40, it’s becoming clear that I won’t be running for office or securing a high-profile job that could come back to haunt me. Living so far away from the U.S. provides a nice buffer from the madness of the MAGA cult. Plus, I’ve been told that writing about my frustrations might actually be good for my mental health—so here we are.
The reality is that American political news moves at an absurdly rapid pace. It’s almost impossible to keep up. Every day, there’s some new scandal or controversy, and it’s difficult to discern what’s real, what’s exaggerated, and what’s just straight-up fabricated. But I’m going to try. My goal is to focus on the issues that keep me up at night—the ones that make me question where the U.S. is headed—and maybe, just maybe, encourage others to think critically about the state of American politics.
I’m also hoping that, over time, I’ll be able to offer some perspective to those who ask me the now-familiar question: “Hey mate, what’s going on in the U.S.?” Maybe, just maybe, one day I’ll be able to give a coherent answer—a response that isn’t a jumbled mess of confusion and frustration.
Until then, I’ll keep writing, because in the face of all this political chaos, writing is the one thing I can do to make sense of it all.