Just before falling asleep on Tuesday night, my phone — resting peacefully on my night table — chirped. Then chirped again. Then again.

I have a rule about checking my phone before bed. The phone at that hour is a portal to doom-scrolling and existential questions like: Who in God’s name can still support Donald Trump and call himself a patriot? Questions that are imponderable and extremely REM-cycle adverse. And as someone who struggles to sleep well I take my rule more seriously than Pam Bondi takes the rule of law.

But this felt different. That many alerts that fast? Maybe — finally — the news many of us have quietly hoped for since The Great Sleazer took the oath of office again. Something restoring sanity, duty, maybe even the return of complete sentences.

I picked up my phone.

Needless to say it was not the news I was looking for. Instead, the FAA had closed airspace around El Paso International Airport for ten days citing “special security reasons.” One report said it was the first domestic closure for security since 9/11. Odd. Why El Paso? Why ten days?

I put the phone down, turned up the white noise machine, and fell asleep.

I did not sleep well. Sadly, but true to my nature, my subconscious would not let go. Experience has taught me the monarch of Mar-A-Lago’s regime follows a pattern: panic first, deny later — like a cat that misses a jump onto a windowsill and immediately pretends it meant to sit on the floor and groom itself… while filing a lawsuit against the windowsill.

The next morning proved me right. While Rosie determined which exact spot in the frozen tundra she would leave a message for her friends, I responded to yet another chirp on my phone.

Sure enough. The administration believed Mexican cartels were flying drug drones across the border. Their super-secret radar spotted an intruder. Jets were scrambled. Weapons deployed. National security saved.

And they brilliantly shot down the intruder — a single mylar party balloon.

I thought: thousands stranded. Millions spent. The Air Force engaged in aerial combat with a birthday decoration that probably said Feliz Quinceañera and came free with a pack of streamers.

The administration made no announcement. No correction. No apology. They simply did what this presidency does best: pretended nothing happened and licked the metaphorical fur clean while insisting the balloon attacked first.

I was thinking this would be amusing — cocktail-party absurdism — when the most disliked dog in our neighborhood made an appearance. It is a small orange Pomeranian whose bark sounds like a squeaky toy discovered espresso and decided the whole neighborhood needed a press conference. And it barks at everything. Nonstop. Other dogs. People. Amazon trucks. The wind rustling through trees. Possibly the concept of wind itself.

It had just begun barking at a snowbank which had apparently gotten in its way when it hit me.

Trump is an orange Pomeranian.

He struts about thinking he is far more important than he is and barks at everything whether it requires it or not — especially if it doesn’t.

Take elections.

The Pomeranian in Chief fervently believes that our election system has completely failed — that since he failed to win the 2020 election there must be something methodically wrong with our system rather than, say, voters. He believes this so much that he has threatened to nationalize elections (which is constitutionally prohibited) and has introduced the “Safeguard American Voter Act,” which would require documentary proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote and require showing ID when one votes.

But he is barking at nothing.

In the last election 158 million votes were cast and only a few dozen illegal votes confirmed. Because our election system works. Not only does every state require proof of citizenship to register but voting illegally is almost impossible as most states have paper backups in nearly every state — a system so redundant it would frustrate NASA.

In other words, Sir Barks-A-Lot was yapping at nothing. Worse, his cure would disenfranchise millions, especially married women whose legal names changed, and cost $10–20 billion.

A very expensive solution to a statistical rounding error and a personal grievance.

Then there is his yapping about Minneapolis. He barked that it was a city so ripe with dangerous undocumented murderers, rapists, and criminals it required Operation Metro Surge, with 3,000 ICE and Border Patrol agents descending on the city. He was going to clean up that city even though the crime rate was the lowest it had been in years and Minnesota doesn’t even crack the top 20 states with undocumented immigrants.

Operation Metro Surge: 3,000 federal agents deployed to confront a supposed wave of undocumented violent criminals in a state not even in the top 20 for undocumented population and experiencing declining crime.

It turns out it was like the snowbank our neighborhood annoyance encountered.

There was no there, there.

He spent $250,000,000 and netted 4,000 detainees with only 30 accused of violent crimes.

It was Sir Barks-Too-Much yapping — except this time he was farting tear gas and using the Constitution as a pee-pee pad while insisting the pad had started it.

Sadly, this one bad dog has taught his bad habits to other dogs.

Did you hear Pam Bondi testify before Congress? (I imagine her as a ShiTzu with a bow in her hair.) Instead of answering questions she just barked out insults and made a mess on the carpet someone else will have to clean up — then blamed the carpet.

Don’t get me started on his pit bull, Karoline Leavitt. A big bark, a nasty bite, protecting territory with absolutely no idea why she is doing what she is doing but clearly hoping for a Scooby snack and a Fox News booking.

Walking back to my apartment, I began to think of Trump and his cabinet in that famous painting of dogs playing poker. Here is what I came up with so far:

Stephen Miller — the shelter dog who spent too long alone and now guards empty food bowls as a matter of ideology.

JD Vance — Beagle. Looks approachable and friendly but is constantly tracking a scent and howls at the moon even on cloudy nights and economic data.

Marco Rubio — Golden Retriever. Polished, camera-ready, eager to perform in public spaces. Will do anything for a treat and favorite pastime is humping whichever leg polls highest.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — Border Collie. High energy and intense, so focused on its own interpretation of the world it ignores everyone else calling it — including veterinarians.

Thinking of the current administration as dogs was a wonderful de-stressing visualization. And if you have suggestions about other members of the administration please feel free to post them in the comments.

But it also made me realize democracies don’t usually collapse with a bang.

Sometimes they just lose sleep because something keeps barking at shadows — and everyone is too tired to notice when there is actually something worth barking about.