by Declan Rooney ‘25

As a red-blooded, glue-eating, American Patriot, it is imperative that I stay dangerously uniformed and yet still vote for the candidate I determine to be more “chill” solely based on what I see on TikTok and the fragments of Fox News I catch when my dad falls asleep on the couch. This year I happened to help elect Donald J. Trump, and I gotta tell you I don’t know how to feel. On the one hand, I really dislike this whole “attempt-to-overthrow-democracy” thing, but on the other hand, gas prices went up that one time, so it’s really a mixed bag. I also heard the other guy running was apparently a woman, which really alienated me, and I’d like to see the Democrats try harder next time to earn the working person’s vote.

Regardless of that, here is a short compilation of things I’d like to see done on day one of the new administration. But before you say, “Really, another list article? Are ideas this hard to come by?” I’d just like to say that I have plenty of amazing ideas; lists just happen to be the best way of formatting them. Anyways, what were we doing? Oh right, the fate of the entire nation or something.

Triple the defense budget. It’s time this country takes its troops seriously. I mean c’mon guys, we really lost two wars since 1970 to a bunch of poorly trained rebels armed with off-brand AK-47s? This cannot suffice. This nation needs to “get its get back” by dumping gasoline on the metaphorical fire. I’m talking about throwing another couple trillion dollars into the black hole that is the military industrial complex. Only then can we re-invade both Afghanistan and Vietnam, restoring the glory once held so dearly by our military.

Something something Women’s bodily autonomy. From what I’ve heard there seems to be some jibber-jabber going on with women’s autonomy nowadays. To fix this I think we need to start sending women to summer camps where they are taught how to change oil, replace tires, and take care of any other automotive needs. That way we never have to hear about “women’s auto this, women’s auto that” ever again.

Create an offense budget. Obviously, a defense budget is not enough if we want to strike fear into every woman, child, and civilian living in a third world country. In addition to beefing up the defense of this country, an offense is needed too. That way we can finally start conquering the globe, the obvious goal of any good military.

Abolish the Department of Education. There is too much governmental bureaucratic nonsense in our government’s bureaucracy nowadays. Obviously, our kids’ education should be left up to whatever former Vine-star can yell into an iphone the loudest, which is actually the case nowadays because of the internet, so the Department of Education really just doesn’t serve a purpose anymore. However, I must mention that this is one of the more lofty goals I have for the administration. I really don’t think anybody would be bold enough to really do this, let alone campaign on it and still win. We can still dare to dream, though!

Wipe Kiribati clean off the map. There seem to be too many places nowadays. I look at the map and my head spins with all of these whachmacallit nations. In my opinion, there should only be 2 countries, America and the U S of freakin A. So I’d love to see my tax dollars go to use in the form of expending the whole of our nuclear arsenal on Kiribati. I don’t know where that is or anything about it, but I heard of it in a travel brochure and it just seems unnecessary.

I really do hope and pray that the very serious and well informed quarrels of the everyday working man are taken to heart by the new administration. Only then can this country begin to heal. God Bless America.