The odor of death offends the spring air | Whale’s Tales

Published 1:30 am Friday, April 10, 2026

As student strolling on the grounds of the University of Washington in the 1980s, I relished the advent of spring, especially the big, beautiful cherry blossoms in the Quad.

We all did.

Nearly 40 years on, those big, beautiful blossoms continue to rain down on my head and the sweet scents of magnolia still intoxicate the senses here in South King County, as sure an intimation of heaven as we are likely to know this side of things.

But then …

But then my rapture is soon checked as the odor of death offends the spring air.

Because, with all the red-faced, bluster and dignity of a spoiled brat with a bulging diaper throwing a tantrum because he’s been told he can’t have what he wants, our president has threatened to wipe out the entire Iranian civilization if they don’t agree to open of the Strait of Hormuz.

On Monday evening, a 2-week long ceasefire was announced. Let’s see how that works out.

This administration likes to the use the word “negotiate.” But what this president is talking about is not negotiation, it’s extortion. And there’s no more sophisticated an instance of it than Luca Brasi in “The Godfather,” holding a gun to a band leader’s head under the orders of the Godfather Don Corleone, while the latter assures the hapless bandleader, with the utmost sincerity, that either his signature or his brains will be resting on the desired contract in 30 seconds.

That was a fictional bandleader. Here, we are talking about the lives of millions of innocent Iranians, real human beings whose sole crime in the president’s eyes is living in Iran under a bad regime.

Defenders of the administration have said online: the president is only threatening Iran’s big wigs. He has not threatened to obliterate an entire civilization.

As my late father would have said: “Horse de pucky.” Trump used the words “entire civilization.”

Look, this is no longer a matter of partisan politics American style. It’s the scorched-earth policy of a tyrant who is losing a war — then orders all the bridges and infrastructure destroyed so no one can live there ever again.

Let’s call this what it is: supreme, unadulterated arrogance.

Or, if you prefer, in the words of Algernon Charles Swinburne in his “Atalanta in Calydon” more than 140 years ago, “madness risen from hell.”

Here’s my point. It is long past time to invoke the 25th Amendment, which allows for the removal from office of an elected president when it’s obvious to cognizant people that he is out of his gourd. I think most of us would prefer not to see our beloved Planet Earth turned into a glowing, lifeless, nuclear brand under our feet.

Of course, if it comes to that, we won’t have feet to fret. So we’ll have that going for us.

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Robert Whale can be reached at robert.whale@soundpublishing.com.