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I began practicing psychotherapy during the Reagan administration. Thirty years went by before distress about politics became a clinical issue for any of my clients.

I remember the moment it first happened: There was a long voicemail from a distraught woman requesting therapy for anxiety and depression in reaction to the 2016 presidential election of Donald Trump. I listened twice to make sure I hadn’t missed something. I hadn’t. There were no other issues. This woman wanted therapy for political distress.

That was a new one for me and every therapist I knew. But now I see no sign of this clinical challenge abating.

Political polarization in the U.S. is at the highest level ever measured. Growing majorities of both Republicans and Democrats say they consider members of the other party to be unintelligent, dishonest and immoral.

What I’m calling political distress is a bipartisan mental health problem. It is based on a belief that, because the country is in the hands of bad leaders, awful things might happen. Many people experience intense fear about what the other side might do. Both Republicans and Democrats have experienced this anguish, but it peaks at different times for the two parties, depending on who won the last election.

We psychotherapists like to base our interventions on research-based strategies that have been vetted in clinical trials or, if not that, at least strategies grounded in the clinical expertise of master therapists who wrote classic books. There’s none of that for how to deal with political distress.

But therapists cannot tell a client in distress that future research is needed before we can help. Instead, we pull from what is known about how best to handle related issues. Here’s the advice I’m sharing with my clients who are upset about the way the world is going.

Taking a longer view

Information about American history is relevant to political distress because, psychologically, people evaluate their situations by comparing them with anchors or norms. You compare current dangers and threats with what you’ve faced and survived in the past.

A Democrat comparing today’s United States with the country a decade ago may feel gloomy. But broader comparisons can produce a more grounded, calming perspective.

The Great Depression in the 1930s came with massive unemployment; here, thousands of people in New York line up in hopes of a job. UPI/Bettmann Archive via Getty Images

The U.S. has faced major trials and tribulations over the course of its history. The country has proven itself to be a resilient democracy. Basic information about the Civil War, the Great Depression and World War II yields a sense that the present political moment is not the only perilous time our republic has ever faced.

Wisdom of the Serenity Prayer

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

Change what you can, recognize what you can’t. Jerry 'Woody'/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA

The Serenity Prayer is an effective summary of research on coping. As I discuss in my book “Finding Goldilocks,” the well-known invocation identifies two basic strategies and tells you when to use which one. People need the strength to change what can be changed and the serenity to accept what cannot. Political distress, like many stressors, calls for a combination of both tactics.

Doing what you can means funneling political anxiety into political actions, including voting, volunteering, donating money and serving as a poll worker. Can one person’s actions make a difference? They can make one person’s worth of difference. You can’t do everything, but you can do something.

In addition, taking action about a problem, even if it does not produce a solution, often reduces distress, especially if it brings you together with like-minded people.

Once you’ve done what you can, it’s important to acknowledge how much is beyond your control: The whole world doesn’t rest on your shoulders alone. Then you can in good conscience turn your attention to the good things in your own personal life.

It helps to limit your consumption of political news; past a certain point, you’re not learning anything new and just fueling your agitation.

Imagining the worst can be a first step toward moving past anxiety. rob dobi/Moment via Getty Images

The best things in life aren’t political

One basic tool of cognitive therapy for anxiety is asking the question, “What is the worst thing that could plausibly happen?” The purpose of this question is not to get anxious people thinking about worst-case scenarios – they’re doing that already – but to move their thought process forward to a picture of how they could survive their worst fear. This is a strangely effective form of reassurance.

Democrats believe Donald Trump’s second administration will hurt people. But with important exceptions – such as undocumented immigrants who could be deported – when many people try to picture exactly how their lives will be damaged in specific, concrete, serious ways, they usually do not come up with much.

This does not mean nothing bad will happen. It does mean you likely can cope with whatever does. While Trump’s policies might be unfortunate and even infuriating for those on the other side of the aisle, they are unlikely to be disastrous on an immediate, day-to-day level for large groups of people.

A very broad perspective will remind you that democracy is a rarity in world history. For most of civilization, people have lived in monarchies or tyrannies of some sort, and most of them managed to be OK.

I’m not suggesting that people disengage from the political world. I believe it’s important to stand up for what you believe is right. My advice is not to put on your rose-colored glasses and withdraw into your own safe space, the rest of the world be damned.

But the main sources of human well-being are family, friends, meaningful work, hobbies, the arts, nature, spirituality and acts of kindness. None of these depend on political systems. We can cope with political distress by falling back on the best things in life.

Jeremy P. Shapiro, Adjunct Assistant Professor of Psychological Sciences, Case Western Reserve University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

President Donald Trump's administration has removed Admiral Linda Fagan -- the first woman to lead a U.S. military service -- as the head of the Coast Guard.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees the Coast Guard, did not immediately respond to a request on Tuesday for comment on Fagan's dismissal.

Fox News cited a senior official saying reasons included her failure to address border security threats, excessive focus on diversity, equity and inclusion, and an "erosion of trust" over the Coast Guard's investigation into sexual assault cases.

Trump and other Republicans have long railed against government programs aimed at fostering diversity, and border security is a key priority for the president, who declared a national emergency at the US frontier with Mexico on Monday, the first day of his new term.

"She served a long and illustrious career, and I thank her for her service to our nation," acting DHS secretary Benjamine Huffman said in a message to the Coast Guard, which is one of the five US military branches.

Fagan had led the Coast Guard since 2022, and previously held posts including vice commandant of the service.

She "served on all seven continents, from the snows of Ross Island, Antarctica to the heart of Africa, from Tokyo to Geneva, and in many ports along the way," according to an archived version of her biography, which is no longer available on the Coast Guard website.

© Agence France-Presse

The co-hosts of "The View" were furious with new President Donald Trump handing pardons and clemency to some of the most violent Jan. 6 attackers.

In his speech issuing pardons to approximately 1500 people, co-host Sara Haines was offended that Trump used the word "hostages" to refer to those imprisoned since there are actual hostages still in the Middle East.

"They were terrorized by Hamas and have not all come back, so that's a hostage. You can't use that term loosely," she said. "These people committed crimes."

ALSO READ: The terrifying implications of pardoning insurrectionists who killed and maimed

"When we talk about guardrails — you said no one is there to check him," she continued. "His own vice president said if you committed violence on that day, January 6th, obviously you shouldn't be pardoned. His attorney general last week said I condemn any violence on a law enforcement officer in this country. Sixty percent of Americans don't agree with pardoning them. This was the biggest middle finger he could give the entire country. Out of all of his options."

The panel debated President Joe Biden issuing preemptive pardons to people like Dr. Fauci, Gen. Mark Milley, and his own family. The pardons came after years of Trump threatening retribution against them.

Alyssa Farah Griffin said that Biden should operate on a moral high ground and shouldn't have issued pardons for his family without also stepping in to save those who spoke out against Trump, who will likely be targeted in the coming years.

Alexander Vindman's wife, Rachel, complained on Threads that her husband wasn't offered a pardon. Vindman came forward about Trump attempting to bribe the president of Ukraine to announce an investigation into Biden before he'd send the military aide given by Congress.

Others like Griffin herself and aides like Cassidy Hutchinson came forward to testify before the Jan. 6 committee. There is a fear that they will also become targets but weren't protected the way the officials and their staff were.

"I think Biden holds himself on this certain moral high ground and sets a very dangerous precedent," said Griffin.

Sunny Hostin disagreed, saying that Trump is a "very dangerous man," and she understands Biden's fear for his family.

"Yes," Griffin agreed, saying that Trump is dangerous. However, "that's going to allow that man to basically give blanket pardons to anyone he chooses."

Hostin argued that Trump would do that regardless of Biden's actions and had campaigned on it.

See the discussion below or at the link here.

Part 1:

Part 2:

"Border czar" Tom Homan vowed to snatch undocumented immigrants from schools if he deemed them a threat to national security.

During a Tuesday interview on Fox Business, host Stuart Varney noted that the Department of Homeland Security "issued a memo to repeal limits on ICE agents."

"Am I right in saying that this frees up ICE agents to go into schools, hospitals, and other institutions to arrest illegals?" Varney asked Homan.

"Well, again, the officers have a great deal of discretion depending on the location," Homan confirmed. "There's not a blanket, you know, saying we can't go in these locations at all, but there's going to be a process put in place where there is discretion used."

"If and when ICE went into a school to arrest someone, that would be highly contentious, wouldn't it?" Varney pressed.

ALSO READ: Inside the parade of right-wing world leaders flocking to D.C. for Trump's inauguration

"Well, absolutely," Homan agreed. "But then again, you know, what's our national security worth?"

"I mean, if we have a national security vulnerability that we know is a national security risk, and we've got to walk on a college campus to get them, that's something we have to do."

Watch the video below or at this link.

Rep. Wesley Hunt (R-TX) called for "naming everything American" after President Donald Trump ordered the Gulf of Mexico to be renamed to the "Gulf of America."

In an executive order this week, Trump gave the secretary of the Interior 30 days to "take all appropriate actions to rename as the 'Gulf of America' the U.S. Continental Shelf area bounded on the northeast, north, and northwest by the States of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida and extending to the seaward boundary with Mexico and Cuba in the area formerly named as the Gulf of Mexico."

He also said Danali would be named "Mount McKinley" and called for "taking back" the Panama Canal.

"I don't know what happened in the past, but President Trump is right for that, renaming the Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf of America," Hunt told Fox News on Tuesday. "You know, I'm a patriot. I'm a combat veteran."

ALSO READ: Inside the parade of right-wing world leaders flocking to D.C. for Trump's inauguration

"I love the idea of naming everything American, if you ask me," he added. "But these are the kind of issues, the culture issues that people want to see, putting our country first. That's exactly what he is signaling by some of these decisions."

Fox News host Steve Doocy joked: "He owns a bunch of golf courses. Maybe he was saying Golf of America, not Gulf."

Watch the video below or at this link.

A Catholic priest told CNN that he takes issue with President Donald Trump's claim that God saved him from an assassin's bullet so he could help "make America great again."

Father Edward Beck, chaplain at Manhattan University and CNN contributor on religious and spiritual matters, told host Kate Bolduan on Tuesday that Trump's inaugural comments on a day that happened to coincide with Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday, amounted to "hubris."

Bolduan played a clip of Trump saying Monday, "Just a few months ago, in a beautiful Pennsylvania field, an assassin's bullet ripped through my ear. But I felt then, and believe even more so now, that my life was saved for a reason. I was saved by God to make America great again."

ALSO READ: Inside the parade of right-wing world leaders flocking to D.C. for Trump's inauguration

Beck began, "Well, I think the theology is problematic. So, did God not save MLK Jr.? I mean, a prophet, who is speaking about a vision for the country that we still revere to this day? Why was he killed and why was this president saved? So, does God have favorites? Is God partisan? What makes you think that that was God's intervention, other than hubris, which is condemned in the scripture and it lacks humility, and so it's not my theology. It's not the theology of the Judeo-Christian tradition that we have a kind of God who picks and chooses who he will save."

Evangelical Christians have long supported Trump's presidential aspirations, with many believing he is, in fact, "anointed by God" to save America. They justify Trump's past as an adulterer and convicted felon by claiming that God has used "imperfect individuals" for great things throughout history, such as King David and King Solomon.

Trump received widespread criticism for failing to place his left hand on the Bible while taking the oath of office Monday, as first lady Melania Trump stood by holding two Bibles for the purpose.

The president is expected to spend Tuesday morning at Washington National Cathedral for the national prayer service.

Watch the clip below or at this link.