The Trump Administration Is Decadent and Depraved

A Savage Journey through the Heart of the American Dream

By Michael Kelman Portney (with regards to Dr. Gonzo)

Welcome to the Capital

I got off the Acela around 9 AM and nobody spoke as I crossed the platform to the terminal. The air was cold and sharp, like a meat locker in the dead of winter. Inside, people were gathering in clusters, checking their phones obsessively... nervous grins and a whoop here and there: "By God! This is it! This is really it! We're gonna stop the steal!"

In the coffee shop near Union Station I met a man from Ohio who said his name was something or other — "but just call me Patriot Roger" — and he was here to Save America. "I'm ready for anything, by God! Anything at all. Yeah, what are you drinkin?" I ordered a regular coffee, but he wouldn't hear of it: "Naw, naw... this is history, brother. You need to be alert. Get some of that cold brew shit... we got a long day ahead."

I shrugged and changed my order. Patriot Roger nodded his approval.

"Look." He tapped me on the arm to make sure I was listening. "I know this crowd, I been following Q since the beginning, and let me tell you one thing I've learned — this is no town to be giving people the impression you're some kind of liberal. Not today, anyway. Shit, they'll turn on you in a minute, especially when things heat up."

I thanked him and pulled out my phone. "Say," he said, "you look like you might be press... am I right?"

"Freelance," I said. "Independent media."

"Oh yeah?" He eyed my bag with new interest. "Who you work for?"

"Small operation," I said. "Truth-telling outfit. You wouldn't know it."

He laughed. "Well goddam! You gonna tell the real story? Not like those CNN traitors?"

I shook my head and said nothing; just stared at him for a moment, trying to look serious. "There's going to be trouble," I said. "My editor thinks this could turn into a riot."

"What riot?"

I hesitated, sipping my coffee. "At the Capitol. When they certify. The President's people." I stared at him again. "Don't you read the chans?"

The grin on his face widened. "Hell yes there's gonna be trouble! That's why we're here! They're stealing our country!"

"Well... maybe I shouldn't be saying this..." I shrugged. "But hell, everybody seems to know. They're bringing in National Guard. Extra Capitol Police. They warned us — all the press — to keep our distance. We were told to expect... confrontation."

"Good!" he shouted; his fist came down on the small table, rattling the cups. "Those sons of bitches! God Almighty! They think we're just gonna sit back and let them install a puppet?" He was shaking his head, eyes getting misty. "This is America, brother. We don't go down without a fight."

I shrugged again. "It's not just the proud boys. FBI's been tracking busloads of militia coming in from all over the country — mixing with the crowd, some of them armed. Coordinating. They'll be dressed like everybody else. You know — MAGA hats and flags and all that. But when Trump gives the signal..." I picked up my bag. "Thanks for the talk... and good luck."

He grabbed my arm, urging me to stay, but I said I had to get positioned before the rally started and hustled off to find the scene.

At a newsstand I picked up a Post and scanned the headlines: "Trump Continues Election Claims" ... "Georgia Call Transcript Released" ... "Proud Boys Leader Arrested, Released"... At the bottom was a photo of the Capitol, serene and white in winter sunlight.

The rest of the paper was filled with arguments about certification procedures and quotes from Republican officials refusing to commit to accepting the results. There was no mention of what would actually happen in just a few hours when these goddamn animals would descend on the Capitol.

Waiting for the Spectacle

By 10 AM I still had no clear plan and — according to every official I'd contacted — no hope at all of getting anywhere near the actual certification. Worse, I had no photographer, no backup, no real credentials. All I had was a quarter bag of grass, case of beer, one pint of brandy, and a multitude of different sour fruity candies, including the multicolored confection known as Skittles

Would the thing actually pop off? Would Trump really tell them to march on the Capitol? There was no way of knowing. Hopefully, sanity would prevail and this would just be another grievance rally. Maybe a few hours of angry speeches at the Ellipse, some flag-waving, then everyone goes home to their hotels and complains about Dominion voting machines on Facebook.

My plan was vague: get to the Ellipse early, watch the rally, then position myself somewhere between there and the Capitol to see what happened when the mob — and it would be a mob — started moving.

The cold had kept some people away, but by 11 AM the crowd was already thick around the monument grounds. Thousands of people bundled in winter gear, Trump flags everywhere, vendors selling merch, a carnival atmosphere with an undercurrent of genuine rage. These people really believed it. You could see it in their eyes.

View from the Ellipse

Later that morning, standing in the crowd near the back, I tried to take in the whole scene. This was the first time I'd been to one of these rallies in person, and the energy was different from what came through on television. More desperate. More end-times.

"That whole area," I thought, gesturing mentally toward the Capitol maybe a mile away, "will be jammed with these people in a few hours. If he tells them to go, they'll go. And then what? Does Pence actually have the balls to certify? Will the cops hold the line?"

The rally itself was a blur of grievance and conspiracy. Giuliani talking about "trial by combat." Trump Jr. fired up like he'd been awake for three days straight. Eric looking confused as always. Then the main event: Trump himself, working the crowd into a frenzy, telling them their country was being stolen, that they had to "fight like hell or you're not going to have a country anymore."

And then the key line: "We're going to walk down to the Capitol..."

The crowd roared. This was it. This was the moment they'd been waiting for. Permission. Validation. A mission.

I didn't follow immediately. I wanted to see if he'd actually do it himself — walk down Pennsylvania Avenue at the head of this mob like some grotesque parody of a civil rights march. But of course he didn't. Trump never does the actual work. He got in his motorcade and fucked off back to the White House to watch it on TV.

But the crowd didn't care. They were already moving.

A Huge Outdoor Asylum

I followed at a distance, trying to stay on the edges, watching the mass of humanity flow down the street toward the Capitol. It was one of the strangest things I'd ever seen — thousands of people, many of them middle-aged or older, convinced they were saving democracy by marching to disrupt the constitutional transfer of power.

The cognitive dissonance was staggering.

"Just pretend you're visiting a huge outdoor asylum," I told myself. "These people have been driven insane by Facebook algorithms and a con man from Queens. Don't engage. Just watch."

But it was hard not to engage. They were friendly, mostly. Offering water, helping older folks navigate the crowd, taking selfies with each other. It could have been a church picnic, except for the rage simmering underneath and the growing chants of "Hang Mike Pence."

By the time I got near the Capitol, the scene had already deteriorated. The barriers were coming down. People were pushing forward. Capitol Police looked overwhelmed, outmanned, confused about their orders. And then — shockingly fast — people were on the steps. Then at the doors. Then breaking windows.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Patriot Roger dart into the building. He had removed his T-shirt, proudly displaying a full backsized tattoo of Richard Nixon.

“Jumping Jesus on a pogo stick!” I thought to myself. “Just look at these goddamn animals! “

And then they were inside.

Unscrambling January 6th

Total chaos. No leadership, no plan... nobody really knew what they were supposed to do once they got inside. Wander the halls? Steal a podium? Take selfies in Pelosi's office?

I watched from outside, using binoculars I'd bought at a tourist shop, as the mob surged through the building. People in tactical gear moving with purpose mixed with suburban QAnon types who looked lost and terrified now that they'd actually breached the sanctum.

The TV crews were going insane, trying to process what was happening in real-time. Members of Congress being evacuated. Pence being rushed to safety. A woman shot in the hallway. Senators hiding under desks. The Confederate flag in the fucking Capitol rotunda.

And through it all, Trump — back at the White House — reportedly watching with satisfaction, refusing to call it off, reportedly saying "maybe they're right" about hanging Pence.

Later, watching the footage in my hotel room, I saw what happened when reality finally arrived. The tear gas. The flash bangs. The agonizingly slow police response. One rioter crying because she got maced: "This is a revolution!" Another one sobbing: "They're treating us like Black Lives Matter!"

The cognitive dissonance remained intact even in defeat.

The Face I Was Looking For

Somewhere in the footage — and there was so much footage, thousands of phones documenting their own crimes in real-time — I finally found it. The face I'd been trying to identify all day.

It wasn't one specific person. It was the composite. The mask of the MAGA faithful: a pretentious mix of conspiracy theories, failed expectations, and a terminal identity crisis. The inevitable result of too much Fox News in a closed and paranoid culture.

These were people who'd been promised they were special, that they were the "real Americans," that their grievances mattered more than anyone else's. And when reality refused to conform to that narrative, when Trump lost and the courts wouldn't help and the recounts confirmed it and even Republican officials admitted it... they couldn't accept it.

So they convinced themselves they were patriots. Freedom fighters. The last line of defense against tyranny.

And they walked right into federal charges, documented every step, and then seemed genuinely shocked when there were consequences.

Getting Out of Town

By evening the National Guard had finally arrived — too late, of course, but eventually present. The Capitol was cleared. Congress reconvened. And in the most American possible ending, they certified the election anyway, completing the process at 3:40 AM as if the whole thing had just been an inconvenient interruption.

I left DC the next morning on an early train, hungover and exhausted. The city felt stunned, processing what had happened. The monuments still stood. The buildings still functioned. But something had broken that couldn't be unbroken.

On the train I tried to organize my notes, but my hands were shaking and my vision kept blurring. Finally I just closed the notebook and stared out the window as we left the capital behind, as The Fear subsided.

We came down here to see this terrible scene: people all pissed out of their minds and attacking the Capitol and smearing shit on the walls... and now, you know what?

It's a land of bisexual Nazis and sadistic incels.

It's us. It's America. It always was.