So said Donald J. Trump in early October 2025 as he began to publicly and prematurely congratulate himself as the architect of an historic and unprecedented peace plan, the first steps toward a ‘Strong, Durable, and Everlasting Peace’ in the middle east.

Won’t it be wonderful if that prediction comes true!

Meanwhile, back home, a man named Donald J. Trump was concurrently orchestrating a domestic Civil War in the United States.

The domestic Mr. Trump is no stranger to the concept of a federal government shutdown having presided over a 35-day shutdown of the U.S. federal government from December 22, 2018, until January 25, 2019 — the longest such shutdown in U.S. history and the second federal government shutdown involving furloughs during his first term as U.S. President.

By some estimates, the shutdown which ended on January 25, 2019 cost the U.S. economy $11 Billion in direct loss of spending.

What is not measured is the negative impact to U.S. reputation on the world stage. A self-induced government shutdown immediately raises concerns that U.S. political dysfunction poses a major threat to national security and creates questions about American predictability and reliability. It sends a cautionary message to allies that the U.S. may be an undependable partner. To adversaries — or would-be adversaries — that there are obvious chinks in the armor.

According to domestic Mr. Trump, the cause of the current federal government shutdown [which began on October 1, 2025] is entirely because of Chuck Schumer and the Democrats. “They started this thing,” Trump said, calling the impending federal job cuts “Democrat-oriented.”

No mention from domestic Mr. Trump of the myriad negative impacts of policy decisions directly under his own control, a few of which include:

1. Abrupt, unplanned and irrational tariff policies, which change on a whim;
2. Draconian cuts in health care funding [both tax credit subsidies to assist low- and moderate-income households with access to health care insurance; and the massive destruction of Medicare] resulting from the passage of the “One Big Beautiful Bill” Act (July 2025);
3. Quiet expansion and militarization of masked ICE troops to terrorize and divide U.S. cities;
4. Federalization of State Militia units to invade U.S. cities against both common sense and state rights as established in the U.S. Constitution;
5. And – just now – the indictment of James Comey and Tish James by an inexperienced and unknown U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia on unsubstantiated charges.

[I do hope most will agree that Mr. Trump emerged as a U.S. household name beginning around 2004 in his role as host of The Apprentice. That popular reality television show also helped define and assure his image as a successful businessman. Beginning around 2010, Trump enhanced his popularity and reach into an often ignored conservative segment of American society through his almost relentless adaptation of the “birther” theory which claimed that Barack Obama was not a natural-born U.S. citizen and was therefore ineligible to be president. As reports surfaced in 2011 that Trump was considering running for president in the 2012 election, he began a series of media appearances to shine a bright light on the probability that Barack Obama must have things to hide, possibly related to his religion. Then, he did muster a presidential campaign in June 2015 focused on illegal immigrants; horrible trade deals; and We Will Build a Wall, and Mexico Will Pay for it!]

Back to 2025…

Observing Donald J. Trump over the past decade, or so, has led me to conclude that he may have inadvertently become caught in the grip of Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) [a.k.a. Split Personality Disorder].

Research consistently shows that DID is not a fabrication but a genuine, complex and serious condition, widely accepted as a complex and valid mental health condition characterized by the presence of two or more distinct personality states within a single individual, although it remains a challenging diagnosis to make.

Each personality may have its own way of interacting with the world, and the condition often arises as a coping mechanism in response to trauma. And, the preponderance of academic and clinical studies point toward development in individuals in response to severe and prolonged childhood trauma, of which Donald J. Trump has a well-document history.

n.b. If there really are 2 distinct people named Donald J. Trump – likely identical twins, based on photographic evidence – then my observation of a clear and irrefutable case of Dissociative Identity Disorder (‘DID’) [a.k.a. Split Personality Disorder] may need further investigation and research. Otherwise, I think it’s time for the Congress and the Supreme Court to take immediate action to protect the future of the United States of America from what seems to be an inevitable trajectory toward destruction under the leadership of Donald J. Trump.