RANDALL WHITE, FERNWOOD PARK, TORONTO. SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 2025. When the now daily tragedy of contemporary American history next door just gets too much to digest I walk to the foot of my street and sit on a bench at the edge of the boardwalk.

From the bench I am about 15 yards from the northwest shore of the smallest North American Great Lake. (In surface area at least. Cold Lake Ontario is much deeper than adjacent Lake Erie and even Lake Huron.)

For years now I have found that the lake and its infinitely changing beach, birds, boats, breezes, clouds, skies, sunshine, temperatures, and related human and animal activity quietly lifts my spirits, regardless of all current troubles of politics, economics, culture (religion), and sports — public life at large.

And these troubles seem increasingly worrisome in late September 2025 — south of the border at any rate. (Meanwhile PM Carney has been traveling abroad, drumming up new business for Canada as best he can. Who could ask for anything more in our adjacent vast geography with not-that- many people, up in the wilderness of “northern North America”?)

(1) Robert Reich on awakening the slumbering giant of Democracy in America

There are a number of increasingly troubling issues in the air at the moment — starting with the USA but then moving to various European (and Asian) old colonial mother countries.

There is arguably at least the beginnings of a silver lining to all the Trumpian troubles in the USA. As Robert Reich’s Sunday thought from Berkeley, CA explains : “It was an extraordinary week. The slumbering giant of America is awakening.”

The details Mr Reich offers are, as usual, illuminating : “Americans forced Disney to put Jimmy Kimmel back on the air … assailing Trump’s attempt to censor him.

“Trump’s dictatorial narcissism revealed itself nearly as dramatically in the criminal indictment of former FBI director James Comey, coming immediately after Trump fired the U.S. attorney who refused to indict him.

“As did Trump’s demand that prosecutors go after philanthropist George Soros, Senator Adam Schiff, New York Attorney General Letitia James, and other perceived enemies …

“As did Trump’s order yesterday, directing the ‘Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth’ to use ‘full force, if necessary’ to ‘protect War ravaged Portland’ Oregon and any ‘ICE Facilities under siege’ … [This is of course nothing like the real-world semi-lotus-land of Portland this weekend.]

“There was also his bonkers speech to the United Nations telling delegates that their nations are ‘going to hell.’ His attribution of autism to Tylenol … His unilateral imposition of tariffs as high as 100 percent on imports of pharmaceuticals and kitchen cabinets.”

(2) Can’t tell “when the tipping point will occur — but we’re getting closer”

Add all this up and it’s not unreasonable to conclude that the slumbering giant of Democracy in America is starting to awaken to just how far Trump’s America is straying from the historic boundaries (even in their always progressively evolving state).

Robert Reich’s own conclusion on the crucial fate of President Trump himself (as one might expect from Bill Clinton’s secretary of labor) is cautious and moderate but optimistic at the end of September 2025 :

“Friends, I can’t tell you exactly when the tipping point will occur — when elected Republicans will rebel against him, or when his dementia becomes so apparent he’s forced to resign, or when so much of the nation rises up against his dictatorship that he’s impeached and convicted of high crimes — but we’re getting closer.”

(I also recall seeing something similar from an excellent contributor to Twitter X this past week who I seem to have temporarily lost track of. The gist was “Can America take 3+ more years of all this? The answer is no.”)

(3) But Alyssa Farah Griffin thinks Trump would still win election … and “U.S. border officer speeds toward a Canadian tourist, yelling, ‘Never come to the U.S. again!’”

Especially in the USA today, of course, there is always another side to the story. And I have been somewhat struck by two recent messages on the electronic highway in this respect.

The first is :“’The View’ co-host says Trump would win by ‘same, if not a bigger margin’ if election held today.” (The co-host in question is a former Trump staffer who has allegedly since seen the light, Alyssa Farah Griffin. And no doubt she is right about many of the people she still talks with. But …)

The second is a TwitterX post from September 26, 2025 : “U.S. border officer speeds toward a Canadian tourist, yelling, ‘Never come to the U.S. again!‘” The post includes a video of the incident taken by the tourist, about two miles from the Canada-US border at Lewiston, NY — next door to Canada’s most populous province of Ontario, where I live myself.

What I take from the somewhat crazed US border officer shown clearly enough in the video is that many Americans today are quite angry or mad with no doubt many good reasons, but in altogether irrational ways. (More friendly voices from NY state, eg, are keen to welcome money-laden Canadian tourists, whose numbers have lately been somewhat dramatically declining.) And many angry Americans still seem to identify with the equally angry President Donald Trump, who peers at voters from TV sets across the nation virtually every day.

(4) Beyond North America : Unidentified drones over Europe and Russian bribery of Reform UK

At the same time again, it may finally be worth noting as well that Donald Trump is far from the only or even main source of all the troubles of the global village today.

I now have only a few remaining sentences to note various disturbing recent developments beyond North America. Two quick exaples must suffice.

First, synthesizing some AI reports : Unidentified drones were reported over Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, and Romania in late September 2025, disrupting flights and prompting investigations into potential ‘hybrid attacks’ by Russia, which denies involvement. Or as NBC News puts it : “Mysterious drone sightings raise tensions in Europe.” (Meanwhile, Sweden has moved military forces to join Finnish forces, along Finland’s border with Russia.)

Second, as recently explained by the BBC : “Reform UK’s former leader in Wales has admitted taking bribes to make statements in favour of Russia while being a Member of the European Parliament … Nathan Gill, 52, from Llangefni, Anglesey, pleaded guilty to eight counts of bribery between 6 December 2018 and 18 July 2019.”

The leader of the hard-right Reform UK (not too unlike the old Reform party in Canada) is Nigel Farage — and according to some polls he could actually be a future UK prime minister.

Farage is an old Trump friend. More recently, however : “Speculation has grown the relationship might have soured after Farage did not witness Trump’s swearing in person last January.”

Nonetheless, as of this past April, “GBN Britain’s News Channel” was reporting : “Nigel Farage ‘could pick up phone to Donald Trump if he wants to but he is focusing on building Reform.’”

Like Trump, Farage is also a fan of Vladimir Putin in Russia. And (unlike Trump most recently thanks to King Charles??) a year or so ago now the BBC was reporting :“Rivals attack Farage for saying West provoked Ukraine war.”