“Who are we”?
In recent weeks, I’ve watched the conflict in the Middle East escalate in ways that feel dangerous, destabilizing, and morally unbearable. What troubles me most is not only the scale of civilian suffering, but the sense that decisions of enormous consequence are being made with little transparency, debate, or visible restraint.
Presidents have broad authority in national security, but what we are seeing now feels different. Military actions are escalating rapidly, with devastating human consequences, yet without the public oversight or congressional involvement that a healthy democracy demands. It creates the unsettling impression that the presidency has become an office of nearly unlimited power.
What frightens me is not just the violence itself, but the erosion of the guardrails we rely on — legal, institutional, and moral. When conflicts expand day after day, civilian deaths mount, and the public is left on the sidelines, it’s hard not to feel that the systems designed to prevent unilateral escalation are failing in real time.
I do not claim to know the right policy choices in a region as complex as the Middle East. But I know this: a functioning democracy cannot allow decisions of war and peace to rest in the hands of a single person. The American people deserve a voice, and our institutions must reassert their role before this conflict widens further.
At a moment when the world feels increasingly unstable, we need more accountability, not less. More transparency, not secrecy. Leaders must wield the power to wage war with the responsibility to protect human life and uphold democratic principles.
If we don’t respect the lives of others, then who are we? If we allow unchecked power to determine life and death, we risk losing the very values that define us. The time to act is now — to demand oversight, to insist on humanity, and to remind those in power that every life matters.