It appears that 63 percent of Americans, plus or minus, are deranged.

Per recent surveys, that is the percentage of fellow citizens who do not approve of President Donald Trump’s performance a year into his second term.

In Trump’s world, most any criticism of the president is ascribed to TDS, short for Trump Derangement Syndrome. No critique can be taken as legitimate or weighed on its merits. Nope, it is all indicative of a core derangement on the part of the critic.

The time has arrived to push back on this reflexive dismissal and to ask the question of just where any madness lies.

Trump declares himself a supreme and total leader constrained only by “my own morality” when it comes to military action. Is it irrational to point that out or is it the limitless conceit itself that is crazed?

He uses U.S. military might to remove a strongman dictator in Venezuela without any plan for what comes next, without any intention to replace Maduro with democratically-elected leaders and openly asserting our entitlement to Venezuelan oil.

Luxury, beachfront high-rises are on tap for Gaza. Invoking “the easy way or the hard way,” Trump threatens to invade land belonging to another NATO member while disparaging Danish sacrifice in Iraq and Afghanistan. Time and again, he insults our friends to the north and infers that we could annex Canada.

By asserting an absolute right for the U.S. to dictate terms in this hemisphere, he provides cover for Russia’s incursion in Ukraine and for China’s claim to Taiwan.

But it is those who question such moves who are bonkers?

The president imposes tariffs at will, making up numbers as if blindly throwing darts. Switzerland was assessed a 39 percent tariff because its leader “rubbed me the wrong way.”

Instead of reforming USAID, Trump effectively shuttered it, saving veritable pennies while inevitably costing uncounted millions of lives among the world’s neediest.

Wind energy projects are put on the blocks due to Trump’s pique about offshore turbines near his Scottish golf course. All the while, despite the hype around DOGE, the federal debt grew in the last year by a staggering $2.25 trillion as it approaches stratospheric levels.

Trump uses his office for personal enrichment on a scale never before seen in America. Reports show that he improperly profited to the tune of nearly $4 billion in just the last year. He remains fixated on awards (the FIFA Peace Prize?) and on making his name ubiquitous (Trump-class warships; the Trump Institute of Peace; the Trump-Kennedy Center; and so on.)

All of this is on top of his acceptance of a jetliner from the ever-so-benevolent Qatari royal family and his unilateral destruction of the East Wing to make room for a gaudy, oversized new structure. Let us not forget the renaming of the Gulf of Mexico, no matter the reluctance of most countrymen to adopt the new moniker.

The mistruths, call them lies, flow with such volume that it is almost impossible to straighten the record. Despite promises, the Epstein files are released glacially and with heavy redaction.

But I am unhinged for pointing out all of this?

American cities are under siege. Masked agents of what has become tantamount to a private paramilitary force use administrative warrants, as opposed to judicial ones, to enter private homes and take away people at will. Birthright citizenship is banished by executive order while Trump’s vice president promotes “heritage Americans” as being a cut above.

A man with legal status in the U.S. is wrongly deported to an El Salvadoran gulag and the administration can barely be bothered. In full costume, Trump’s Homeland Security head adopts a conqueror’s pose in front of hopeless, shackled deportees. But lest you think mercy is dead, Trump is prioritizing refugee status for white South Africans.

The cornerstone ethos of the Trump presidency dates back to the ancient Greeks: “The strong do what they can while the weak suffer what they must.”

A student is arrested for the viewpoint of an op-ed column; a reporter with the temerity to ask a tough question is vulgarly told to “quiet Piggy;” and the president calls for the broadcast licenses of television stations “against” him to be revoked.

Without exception, everyone convicted of doing Trump’s bidding in the Capitol invasion and attempted insurrection of January 6 is pardoned on day-one of this term. Staring at unfavorable poll numbers, that mass of “deranged” Americans again, Trump now calls for next November’s elections to be “nationalized” under his control.

Some might find this column at odds with my centrist bearing. Lord knows, Democrats have their share of bad policy and bad actors as well. But there is no partisan equivalence here and few parallels in American history.

Moderation is about responsible governance, a commitment to freedom and justice, and a respect for America’s traditions. Above all, it puts a premium on character, hardly this president’s strong suit.

Those crying TDS in response to every negative appraisal of our dear president might grab a mirror. I am afraid the derangement is to be found within.

Eric Sondermann is a Colorado-based independent political commentator. He writes regularly for ColoradoPolitics and the Gazette newspapers. Reach him at EWS@EricSondermann.com; follow him at @EricSondermann