YOU.ARE.NOT.SAFE.

ESSAY: America is not becoming LESS SAFE. It has become UNSAFE. You are not safe. Your family is not safe. We are not safe. I am not safe.

Early in my career as a news producer I heard some simple but sage wisdom from a veteran newsman named Avril Westin. Av said that when people turned on the news they wanted to be first reassured of three things:

1. “Am I safe?” 2. “Is my family safe?” 3. “Is my world safe?”

I am here to report that right here, right now, you are not safe, your family is not safe and your world is not safe. This is not a warning. We are past warnings. These are now dangerous facts.

So, keeping with a news tradition, I’ll start with something close and personal that everyone can relate to - the weather.

Meteorologist John Morales has been reporting the weather in central and south Florida for decades. And he told his local audience on June 3rd, 2025, that they could no longer be assured of the accuracy of his forecasts. The reason: cuts to the National Weather Service (NWS) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). And, more broadly, attacks on science.

So, before you read any further, please watch this remarkable storm of reality from an experienced truth-teller. All of it.

NWS & NOAA are agencies inside the Department of Commerce. Trump’s current Secretary of Commerce is Howard Lutnick. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) falls under the Department of Homeland Security. That cabinet secretary is Kristi Noem. Both Secretaries Lutnick and Noem have been busy ‘downsizing,’ nay, decimating, NWS, NOAA & FEMA.

Right now, all the agencies they oversee have been weakened, altered. Hampered storm surveillance, hurricane forecasting, weather tracking, disaster response, environmental cleanup & emergency assistance make you UNSAFE from the WEATHER. That’s just where we start.

(In this report, I am not going to platform the intentional falsehoods being used to justify or rationalize the indefensible Trump governmental dismantlements. Suffice it to say that Trump and his MAGA cabal are obfuscating the truth and hiding the intentions of their draconian cuts. That intent is to destroy agencies, programs, policies, regulations, oversights, protections, enforcements, guidelines, standards, norms, rulings and rules. They are seizing power and control. Your safety is NOT their concern.)

So, are you safe? Let’s move to the air we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat.

The Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) is Robert F. Kennedy, Jr..

Kennedy, as HHS head, oversees 13 agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), to name but a few.

Your food. Your medicine. Your health. Your parents. Your children.

President Donald Trump, Kennedy & the former head of the ill-conceived & ill-named Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Elon Musk, have replaced the experienced experts at those 13 agencies with a mind-boggling roster of incompetent political loyalists. It would be exhausting to try and list all the damage they have already done and will still do to our health and safety with their anti-science quackery and unhinged theories.

So, I implore you, dear readers, to look up the health and/or safety issues most near and dear to your hearts to see what protections and preventions you are losing. Because, what is happening at those agencies can cause you pain and suffering, right now. You are UNSAFE.

So, who are the ones being fired in the bogus name of ‘waste, fraud & abuse?’ Scientists. Researchers. Lab technicians. Doctors. Drug analysts. Vaccine developers. Inspectors. Nurses. Treatment providers. Regulators. Watchdogs.

You now have to worry if you will get sick or die from your water, or your food, or your air, or your drugs, or your treatments, or from an unnecessary & preventable disease. This isn’t political. This isn’t economic. It is criminal. It is immoral. But, it is real. This is happening. Not later. Not someday, maybe. NOW. You are UNSAFE.

Staying personal, are you even safe from the very air you breathe? Not if another pandemic takes hold. Why? Because there aren’t enough researchers studying how pathogens mutate, or how species transfer those pathogens, or what medicines, treatments or vaccines might save us from deadly communicable diseases.

This regime is firing them or defunding them. So, yeah, measles and covid and the bird flu and god knows what else is out there waiting to kill us all. Trump’s maniacal minions are ending or hamstringing that life-saving research.

Meanwhile the Trump agency heads are tasked with decimating their agencies, not making them stronger and more effective. Instead they are busy demonizing and delegitimizing science, academia and expertise. As Trump said in his first presidential campaign, “I like the uneducated.” The result: They are not protecting you from death by pathogen. You are NOT SAFE from your unregulated air, polluted water or un-inspected food.

This brings me out to the environment, writ large. The Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency is Lee Zeldin. The Secretary of Agriculture is Brooke Rollins. The Secretary of Energy is Chris Wright. The Secretary of the Interior is Doug Burgum.

All of these Trump loyalists and industry toadies are tasked with opening American lands and waters to resource exploitation. They intend to open wildernesses for oil drilling. They intend to open public lands to mining and lumbering. And they intend to dot the landscape with power plants to run energy-guzzling data centers supporting the burgeoning artificial intelligence needs of corporate America.

To do those things, they are going to decimate environmental protections, eliminate regulatory oversight and dis-empower government watchdogs and regulators. Damn global warming. Damn green energy. Damn sustainability & safety. Damn clean air and water. Let it be UNSAFE.

How about the land and the sea? Are your parks and recreation areas free and safe for visitors? Are your wildernesses safe from destruction? Are your grasslands, wetlands, forests, tundras, rivers and streams safe for wildlife? Is the great outdoors safe from irreparable depletion and monetization? No. The American Frontier is NOT SAFE.

While we are looking up and around, how about our skies? Are they safe for travel?

Sean Duffy is the Secretary of Transportation (DOT). Organizations within the DOT include the Federal Highway Administration (FHA), the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTS), the Federal Transit Administration (FTA), the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) and the Maritime Administration (MA).

Noticed any more plane crashes and near misses lately? Heard any news reports from air traffic controllers saying they are woefully understaffed and have frequent technology failures? Yes you have.

The solution from Trump and Musk? Severe cuts of those bad, worthless, slacker, fraudster civil servants who are called upon when there are deadly disasters in the air, on our highways and in our waterways.

My daughter was booked to visit me last month when the airlines servicing Newark airport started cancelling their flights for safety concerns. As a result, my daughter was afraid (for the first time) to fly. Remember when I said to think about what hits closest home? I agreed with her decision not to come. She WASN’T SAFE.

(Trump now has two old Air Force One jets. Another to be refurbished from Oman. Two more being built my Boeing. And, of course, Trump Force One. Think he feels safe flying?)

So, right now, you are NOT SAFE from the uncaring & cynical government officials failing to provide clean water, fresh air, work-place safety, effective medicines, safe vaccines, life-saving research, life-enriching education and other life-affirming protections and preventions.

It gets worse. For some of us, many of us, we are UNSAFE in our own homes, streets, workplaces, businesses, schools and houses of worship.

Are you an immigrant? Are you an undocumented worker? Are you a migrant? Are you a refugee? Are you seeking asylum? Where you born here to an undocumented resident? Are you on a student visa? Are you a ‘dreamer?’ Are you an unregistered alien? Are you a naturalized citizen? Are you on a work visa? Do you have citizenship by descent, acquisition, conferment or investment? Are you from any of the banned or restricted countries with majority black or brown population?

Do I need to say more about what we are seeing happen to our friends, family, co-workers, students and neighbors, right before our eyes? The appalling and willful lack of due process? The apprehensions? The deportations? The detentions? The incarcerations? The ignoring of court orders & injunctions? The skirting of the rule of law?

Are you next? Are you a citizen with oppositional views to the current President of the United States? Have you expressed them? Can you? Will you?

Do you FEEL SAFE?

I do not trust Pam Bondi at the Justice Department, Kash Patel at the FBI, Tom Homan at Immigration or Kristi Noem at Homeland Security to obey, defend and protect the Constitution or to honor and protect the rights and freedoms of any citizen, or any person (especially if they aren’t white). We’ve seen what they are doing. What they are doing is clearly giving law and justice the middle finger.

We are NOT SAFE.

(I truly hope you are not as exhausted or discouraged reading this as I am writing it? There is more to note, so I am going to persist.)

That partly dispenses with the first two concerns, “Am I safe and is my family safe?”

But, is my world safe?

I am 76 years old and I’m not sure I have ever felt less safe about national politics and global tensions. Even after living through the Cuban Missile Crisis as a child, the Vietnam War as a young man, the Cold War and the assassinations of good and moral leaders, here and abroad. Right now, I do not feel safe.

Israel and Hamas are engaged in a heart-breaking war in Gaza. Ukraine and Russia are fighting a devastating war of attrition on their border. China is threatening Taiwan. Pakistan and India have exchanged deadly fire. Iran is supporting terrorist clans across the Middle East. Statista classifies 22 conflicts around the world as wars.

I watched an interview tonight by MSNBC’s Nicole Wallace with Rep. Jim Hines, Democrat of Connecticut. He is steeped in national defense knowledge. When asked how unsafe the United States should feel with Donald Trump as Commander-in-Chief, he reassured Americans that the U.S. was still the most powerful military force on Earth, and that that is a deterrent. And he noted that while Trump isn’t much of a peace-maker, he does seem to have an innate aversion to the U.S. engaging in any active military action.

But, it was noted, that our enemies might see this current regime, with its clown car of military and national security ‘disrupters,’ as a sign of weakness and an opportunity for assault. And that is why I do not feel safe.

The mindless installation of Pete Hegseth at Defense, Tulsi Gabbard at Intelligence and Kristi Noem at Homeland Security scares the living shit out of me. They are all inept at their jobs. Never have I witnessed a national security apparatus less qualified, less capable or less reassuring.

If we are to face military assault or cyber attack or a drone attack on our homeland, these are not smart, measured, thoughtful, deliberate, cautious, courageous and trustworthy leaders. Hegseth is play-acting a tough guy. Noem is cos-playing a bad-ass. Gabbard is missing in action.

None of them have the intelligence or the experience. None the understanding of world history, military readiness & strategy, global events or international affairs. Again, all you have to do is read up on the unhinged actions they have taken since taking control of their agencies to know that they are making us more UNSAFE each and every day. There are too many to recount in this already lengthy essay.

Not to mention that I have absolutely NO faith that Donald J. Trump could or would know how to handle a military or economic assault on the United States of America.

There are only two people in the Trump administration who hold any respect from me as being somewhat measured & reasonable - Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent. I don’t agree with their policies. But I don’t think they are reckless.

If a bad actor or a hostile nation decided to test our strength, we are in dire danger. What’s vulnerable? Our ports. Our energy infrastructure. Our banking systems. Our communications networks. Our satellites.

We don’t need a ‘Golden Dome’ to shield us from missile attack. We need engineers & scientists & algorithms & military strategists to protect us from cyber warfare or low-tech drone terrorism. We need the best and the brightest from around the world to go to our universities and become our citizens. We need an educated America of leaders. Not a dumbed-down cult of followers, easily conned, easily manipulated, easily enslaved.

We are NOT SAFE.

So, whew, I guess that’s about all for now. Though, there is so much more to say, really. But, we can not be complacent. Trump is buddies with autocrats - Putin of Russia, Xi of China, Kim of North Korea, Orban of Hungary, Bukele of El Salvador, Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia. They all know he is a blowhard and can be played. Especially Vlad.

Trump has no problem punching down. He is not as brave at punching up. If pushed by a real power, a real threat, a real adversary, he will fail us.

We are NOT SAFE.

Trump has pardoned insurrectionists & crooks & drug dealers & fraudsters. He and his crime family are making billions - self-dealing, manipulating crypto markets, striking foreign real estate deals, taking international investment money and selling influence. His White House is for sale. He has already shown that to be true. He is working for himself alone. He seeks to be King.

This democracy is NOT SAFE.

Trump’s ‘enforcers’ are ignoring laws and common decency and infringing on citizens’ right and freedoms.

Trump’s ‘disruptors’ are collecting & collating government data on citizens to use against them.

Trump’s ‘investigators’ are targeting anyone and everyone who speaks out against him in any manner.

Trump’s ‘complicit legislators’ are dismantling the Constitution, rupturing the system of checks and balances.

Trump’s ‘power-brokers’ are establishing and wielding the singular power of the unitary executive.

You are NOT SAFE.

We are NOT SAFE.

I am NOT SAFE.