AN INFLATABLE frog has been pepper-sprayed, spawning (sorry) an army of affinity frogs and other creatures real and fictional, protesting at the often violent arrests of immigrants. A clarinettist in a brass band has been assaulted and arrested, abbreviations have been outlawed and naked bicycle riders are swarming our streets.

If it looks like the United States has gone mad, that’s because it probably has.

All of this happened in just one US city — Portland, Oregon — the hotbed of antifa, according to the Trump administration, which is trying to proscribe the “group” even though these days “antifa,” an abbreviation of “anti-fascist,” pretty much defines anyone who opposes Trump, and was never an actual organisation.

Also this week, the US Secretary of Defence, who, in the interests of achieving peace says he has renamed his purview the Department of War although no-one actually calls it that, announced this week that the United States had given the Qataris their own air force base in Idaho.

DoD Secretary Pete Hegseth’s bizarre declaration was quickly retracted after President Trump’s own “America First” base reacted with shock that a foreign power was being gifted its own military base on American soil. What Hegseth apparently meant, or what he now says he meant it to mean, is that the US will be hosting the Qatari military on a US base for training purposes, a not uncommon practice.

In another ominous move by the DoD, this time to shut down free speech, the department has ordered media outlets that cover the Pentagon to sign onto a new press policy that forbids defence reporters from soliciting, obtaining or using any information not already authorised by the DoD. All but one have refused to do so.

Meanwhile, as the Gaza ceasefire agreement was finally announced, Jared Kushner, the reprehensible son-in-law of the even more repulsive US president, floating in some parallel universe and with visions of beachfront real estate still dancing in his head, publicly pronounced Israel “exceptional” for refusing to replicate “the barbarism of the enemy.”

Kushner seems not only to have missed the two-year genocide in Gaza but also Israel’s cruel and inhumane treatment of Palestinians for the many decades prior.

He is not alone, of course. The US mainstream media has been awash in happy reunion stories of the returned Israeli hostages, which would be entirely understandable if they did not at the same time largely ignore the grimmer realties surrounding the simultaneous release of the Palestinian hostages (for such they are, not “prisoners,” since most have never committed a crime).

Some of the Palestinians just released were never reunited with their families at all but were instead immediately deported to Egypt. Others were left in the West Bank where the hostile and violent takeover of Palestinian lands and homes by illegal Israeli “settlers” continues.

Even those who could joyously reunite with their loved ones, in some cases after decades of separation, were not allowed to savour that moment without the spectre of the Israeli menace still literally hanging over their heads.

Instead of bombs falling from the skies, the Israelis rained down threats in the form of paper messages warning Palestinians that “We are watching you everywhere. If you show any support for a terrorist group, you will expose yourself to arrest and punishment.”

No-one should believe that this ceasefire signals any intent whatsoever by Israel to relinquish its control over the lives of Palestinians.

The obvious response to all this? Give Trump the Nobel Peace Prize! The past weeks have seen a non-stop sycophantic advocacy campaign by legions of leaders and political commentators who advocated for Trump with almost unprecedented zeal. That was before last Friday’s announcement of the decidedly problematic choice of Venezuelan opposition leader and “iron lady” Maria Corina Machado instead.

That is the paradigm we are now in: the belief that the Nobel Peace Prize should be awarded to those who enabled, funded, armed and participated in a genocide, once they themselves decided to halt their own war crimes.

Trump could have ended Israel’s genocide in Gaza on day one of his presidency with a single phone call to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He chose not to. Like us, he watched the killings, bombings, and forced starvation along with the targeted assassinations of 1,700 doctors and more than 200 journalists, live-streamed on our screens for two years. We’ve been horrified. He did nothing. Worse still, at times he egged on Netanyahu to “finish the job.”

Back home, Trump continues with his quiet coup. Denied for now the possibility of sending troops into major US cities, he will continue testing this, with an eye to deploying them during the 2026 midterm elections that could see both the US House and Senate swing to the Democrats.

Federal agencies are being purged of dissenters and stacked with “yes men.” The Elon Chainsaw Massacre may be over now that billionaire Elon Musk, who ordered the early rounds of dismissals through the entity he invented — the Department of Government Efficiency — has fled the scene. But the maiming continues, as critical workers are fired, public institutions defunded and non-profits viewed as progressive or “woke” are blacklisted.

The barbarity of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activities has prompted citizen protests and sometimes even interventions in cities across the US. Portland has become the epicentre of street theatre protest.

The resistance began, as it often does, with a single individual, a man in an inflatable frog costume who goes by the name of Apollo Toad, staring down ICE (Immigration & Customs Enforcement) agents. Pretty soon, others rallied to his side, dressed as a variety of animals and cartoon characters, at once mocking the proceedings, but at the same time driving home the absurdity of Trump’s attempt to label them terrorists.

The Portland clarinettist, Oriana Korol, had been playing music with the Unpresidented Brass Band before she was knocked down according to eyewitnesses, then grabbed and taken to a jail in the neighbouring state of Washington to face charges of assaulting a federal agent, accusations her bandmates say are trump(et)ed up.

In Florida, far-right Governor and Trump acolyte Ron DeSantis is trying to get a Bill passed in his state’s legislature, HB 119, also known as the “No Sharia Act,” a fear-mongering attempt to “stigmatise Muslims by pretending that US courts could be ‘overruled’ by foreign or religious law,” the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a grassroots civil rights and advocacy group, said in a statement.

“In reality, American courts are already bound by the US Constitution’s Supremacy Clause, making HB 119 completely unnecessary and clearly unconstitutional,” the group said.

Black Hawk helicopters have descended on Chicago, frightening children out of their beds in the middle of the night, dragged naked and handcuffed with their families Gestapo-style out onto the street before being driven away in unmarked cars.

Ironically, one of the most banned books in America right now is A Clockwork Orange that features a dystopian, violence-filled future. It’s a black comedy, but the censors miss that. In the meantime, there were 44,000 gun deaths in the US in 2024, equivalent to wiping out an entire British town the size of Salisbury or Ashton-under-Lyne.

The Trump administration has banned or cautioned against using at least 350 words or phrases, including “climate change” (with and without a hyphen), “evidence-based,” “chest-feed + person” (don’t ask), “wind power” and yes, even “women.”

On the international front, Trump is bombing boats out of Venezuelan waters without a care as to who might be on them, leading to concerns of a war against Venezuela. He has announced he may send long-range Tomahawk cruise missiles to Ukraine, a clear provocation to Russia.

At home, renewable energy projects have been all but killed off. Trump has threatened 100 per cent tariffs against China. The price of eggs has become the least of our problems.

There are still 190 active lawsuits challenging Trump administration actions, down from more than 300 since Trump took office in January which already seems like a lifetime ago.

We are still clinging to the hope that our legal system will save us from autocracy and a descent into fascism, even though the US Supreme Court is stacked in Trump’s favour. Three of the nine justices were placed there by him alongside three other arch-conservatives. It was that court that declared last year that the president has widespread immunity from prosecution while in office.

The government is still shut down. Trump says he won’t go to heaven (in case anyone cares), for achieving the Gaza ceasefire. But he is determined to plunge the country he is supposed to be leading into a living hell.

Linda Pentz Gunter is a writer based in Takoma Park, Maryland.