Sight Unseen

A blind expat's musings on life, death, and the Trump era

119 posts and counting

My name is Christopher Winner. I am an American citizen who has lived in Europe, predominantly Rome, for nearly half a century, and I founded The American | In Italia in 2004. I also began a column titled “Area 51,” which exists to this day. But, in 2015, I was diagnosed with glaucoma and have gradually lost my sight. The thoughts and comments you read below are snippets of my thinking in these challenging times and are dictated to co-managing editor Leigh Smith. See also my personal website.

Christopher P. Winner • April 16, 2026 at 12:52 pm

Dirty words: In the year 2000, when I was living in Prague, a woman I came to know introduced me to her grandfather, a pie-faced man well into his 80s who told me that during the Nazi occupation he had reluctantly served in the city’s law courts. This experience had marred his life, and he was now glad, he said, to be in the presence of a “good” American, as it was our efforts that slayed Nazism and later helped eliminate Communist rule. In flawless English, he recollected his law clerk days in 1941. Daily, dozens of citizens, mostly Jews, were summarily tried and convicted. Sometimes the offenses were absurd, perhaps walking down a certain street that was barred to Jews or trying to rescue a pet cat that had jumped on the fender of a military truck. Most all were given immediate death sentences and hanged in gallows located in the building’s courtyard. Others were guillotined in an abandoned tannery nearby. He remembered repeatedly having to pen the words “exterminated,” “eliminated,” and “extinguished” in his legal ledger. Those days left him so vacant in spirit that he spent many postwar years ambling through the local countryside and collecting grasshoppers whose delicate frames he preserved in cataloged jars. Now, nearly a century after those bleak Occupation days, it is the Jews of Israel and the “good” Americans who speak of extermination, since the hard-line leaders of Iran are portrayed as ugly specimens who very literally should not exist. Astonishingly enough, since both men were brought up in the immediate post-war, neither the American president nor his Israeli counterpart seem cognizant of the Nazi-era diction they apply almost daily. The Nazis rationalized their Prague law courts by saying they sought to re-order a contaminated city. Unwittingly, perhaps, America and Israel are providing similar rationalizations. As my friend’s grandfather said, “May God have mercy on me for those times.” That same God is now being asked to extend His mercy. There is no telling if He will.

Christopher P. Winner • April 14, 2026 at 9:51 pm

Orbán’s end: For sixteen years, Hungary’s Viktor Orbán was the European Union’s most accomplished chameleon. His expedient shifts from right to center and back to right — his true home — caused havoc in the EU. He vetoed budgets and forged a friendship with Vladimir Putin when no other states would touch him. He then morphed into an apologist for the Ukraine war. Until recently, his constituency admired him as a shrewd nationalist. All that has now ended with a landslide election defeat in which his party effectively lost control of the country to a younger, center-right candidate named Péter Magyar. Orbán’s mystique had been fading, true, but few expected this slaughter. The why is simple enough. The far right that used to serve Orbán so well suddenly became home to a troubling, Big-Stick American president as well as the dwelling place of the Israeli prime minister, a man Orbán severed ties with the International Criminal Court to host. Putin was one thing, but Orbán was now in league with a new and surprising duo of devils, neither one a political admirer of the EU, and this is to put it mildly. Hungary was also grappling with its own economic problems as well as allegations of widespread corruption. Enough was enough, and Orbán was gone in a day, American endorsements made useless since this United States more resembles the old Kremlin than anything traditionally American. What next? Probably closer ties with Brussels and a distancing from both the us and Israeli leadership. Orbán, a masterful Sisyphus, was a marvel at pushing even the most improbable rocks up steep inclines, only to step aside when they began to roll back toward him. Finally, he was not able to get out of the way.

Christopher P. Winner • April 12, 2026 at 10:26 pm

Israel 2.0: It is an unfortunate accident of history that the United States and Israel, inseparable allies, would at the same time be led by governments of the extreme right, each inclined toward 1930s militarism. The campaign against Iran was only in part motivated by fears that Islamic nation was close to developing a nuclear weapon. The second component, just as vital, was to sever the umbilical cord between Tehran and its major terrorist proxies, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. This Israeli leadership is unlike its more open-minded predecessors. It seeks not only full control of Gaza, but also as much of Lebanon as it can secure, both stepping stones toward a vibrant Greater Israel, no Palestinian state in the mix. Nor are civilian casualties of any special concern. Here is Israel’s version of Manifest Destiny, a concept to which the American president can relate. An expanded and unimpeded Jewish state dealing freely with its rich Arab neighbors (Saudi Arabia, the Emirates, and Kuwait, among others) would represent an unrivaled commercial and political juggernaut. For this reason it has no intention of curbing its military moves in Lebanon, which makes enduring peace with Iran hard to imagine. These times have the flavor of a Judeo-Christian jihad, though both Israel and the U.S. would find such a parallel profoundly objectionable. Yet it is, without doubt, one extremism pitted against another, with the biblical nation-builders holding the upper hand.

Christopher P. Winner • April 09, 2026 at 7:32 pm

The talented Mr. Vance: A certain Mr. J.D. Vance can at times surpass his master in the rhetoric of unpleasantness. Last year, he so infuriated European leaders that they made it clear they would no longer deal with him. He has lately been replaced at summits by Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State. But now the young ruffian is back, this time, to meddle in Hungarian affairs, throwing his and his boss’ support behind Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who is trailing in opinion polls ahead of Sunday elections. Orbán is pals with a man named Putin and, like young Vance, takes pleasure in tossing verbal grenades at the European Union. Vance has also weighed in on the Iranian ceasefire deal, naturally insisting America won a beloved and unquestioned victory. Bear in mind, please, that this is the man who may run for president in 2028, assuming this incumbent chooses to step aside. Vance is an all-too-lucid reactionary who revels in supporting the unsupportable, including Israel’s self-aggrandizing operations in Lebanon, which are gradually rivaling Gaza’s in scope. He is frightening because he exudes a lethal mix of confidence, arrogance, and ignorance, much like his president. Worst of all, given America’s partisan divisions, he may represent the American future. All of this to say, trouble lurks even outside the dis-Ovaled White House.

Christopher P. Winner • April 08, 2026 at 9:47 pm

Stockholm in Iran: Ceasefire aside, when the leader of a nation such as the United States threatens to eradicate an ancient civilization, those sentiments, once they make the public rounds, cut deeply into the way citizens are inclined to view would-be liberators. So deeply, in fact, that opponents of an oppressive regime can suddenly place national pride ahead of domestic discontent, a kind of in-house Stockholm syndrome brought into being by a loose-lipped and at times lunatic president. Those Iranians who at first welcomed a possible change in government may come to see those who bombed them for more than a month not as saviors but as raiders alone. The U.S. and Israel may claim to have won this war, or won a ceasefire, but they have no notion of the disillusionment they have inflicted on the people they sought to redeem. If the Iranian masses now behave more gingerly toward those who would “rescue” them, this will be the cause. A pummeled regime that was not supposed to have survived has apparently done just that, and in so doing perhaps retrieved a Stockholm syndrome–like reprieve from a restive population.

Christopher P. Winner • April 08, 2026 at 1:28 am

Shame: Whatever transpires in Iran in the coming days, the American president’s obscene warnings about ending a civilization have diminished if not obliterated a once universally respected office and perhaps shattered beyond repair a vision of a country long admired for its dedication to an ideal of decency. Some may excuse this as back-alley bluster or boardroom vulgarity. But previous presidents knew to check their rantings at the door out of deference to basic public decorum. This man and his cohorts, American jihadists of a sort, eschew such restraint and composure, leaving these United States of America in a gutter no washing will later rob of its stink. I am for the first time in more than 50 adult years ashamed to call myself American, a feeling made all the worse knowing a fair number of my compatriots admire this stench because, in their view, truth is by nature vulgar and better brutal bluntness than what they consider political double-talk. Shame on them, shame on America, shame on any sense of First-ness, shame on electing a convicted felon to the White House, a place his arrogance may keep him from leaving in two years’ time so that the only civilization at risk is our own.

Christopher P. Winner • April 07, 2026 at 1:49 am

Apollo 8: The first lunar orbital mission came nearly 60 years ago, in 1968, and briefly calmed a planet in chaos. I was 15 at the time, and there was no Internet, no mobile phones, and global news was broadcast only once daily. It was an election year. In a broken South, George Wallace emerged as an unrepentant segregationist candidate. In the space of three months, the leading Civil Rights activist, Martin Luther King Jr., and the most outspoken critic of the Vietnam War, Robert F. Kennedy, were shot dead. As north Vietnamese troops pressed on with a devastating offensive, President Lyndon Johnson announced he would not seek reelection. With hundreds of weekly deaths and despite the presence of half-a-million American troops, the United States was losing the war, or so said the respected CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite. In Paris, students joined workers in massive anti-government demonstrations that seemed on the verge of overturning the existing social and political order. Cold War tensions were also high. In August, the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia to quash a pro-democracy movement and warned the west against any interference.

The Democratic party’s political convention saw pitched battles between hardline police and radical protesters. Hundreds were arrested, and Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley as well as FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover spoke of sedition. In November, Richard Nixon was elected president, saying he spoke for the “silent majority” just as this president speaks for a malignant minority of one.

I mention these events to bring into sharper relief what the three NASA astronauts accomplished during their mission. In scratchy voices heard around the world —there were no video links at the time — they read passages from the Book of Genesis. It was near Christmas and, for the first time in that chilling year, the world felt a sense of peace, harmony, and hopeful humanity. It was as if these three men speaking from so far away had reached the suburbs of the universe, making the interstellar city beyond inevitable. Would that this new group of lunar astronauts could transmit something of the same sentiment, but that seems unlikely in a world fractured beyond even Genesis’ ability to heal.

Christopher P. Winner • April 06, 2026 at 1:38 am

Hellfire: American evangelicals have a crush on this president. Though often profane, he speaks in the simplistic way of born-again sermons and likes conjuring visions of hellfire. His is childlike language, suited to comic-book bubbles and picturebook readers, wherein he tells us who is good, who is bad, and who has been nice to him. Those who have not been nice are morons, idiots, or low-IQ individuals, whether members of the press corps or Supreme Court justices. His enemies face the wrath of God, since in his mind he is both God and avenger. TV and online preachers are in awe of his bluntness. If only they had his power. All this does not sit well in Europe, accustomed as it is to secular politicians, having long ago set aside popes and monarchs. French President Emmanuel Macron has, so far, been the only leading European to vex this Sun King–like figure, others fearing further trade repercussions. Fortunately, a few diplomats have raised their voices, and they deserve credit. Among them is Sven Kühn von Burgsdorff, a German national and the former European Union representative to the Palestinian territories, no doubt a low-IQ individual, but, as one myself, I choose to reproduce his incisive words below. Remarking on recent events in the Middle East, this is what he had to say: “How can it serve Europe to be seen as a sidekick of an erratic, unreliable, and apparently megalomaniac U.S. president, or of a warmongering, annexationist Israeli prime minister. That cannot be in Europe’s interest, because it comes at the expense of relations with other parts of the world.” As Emmanuel Macron has repeatedly said, it’s time for Europe to grow up.

Christopher P. Winner • April 04, 2026 at 2:32 am

Firestorm: Since the introduction of mass bombing campaigns in World War II, the line between the justifiable and the grotesque has grown twisted. Late in that war, Allied bombers razed Hamburg, Cologne, and Dresden, though none truly represented military targets. The aim, said the Allies, was to decimate Nazi morale, and Germany was merely reaping what it had sown. Similarly, the dead and contaminated of Hiroshima and Nagasaki — perceived by some as subhuman “Japs” — fell victim to an obstinate military that refused to capitulate. This concept of the subhuman also permeated napalm attacks on countless Vietnamese villages and hamlets, the earliest incarnation of “back-to-the-Stone-Age” military strategy. As the luminous German writer W.G. Sebald once remarked about the carpet-bombing of Germany, the idea was to “stifle any attitude to life” among the surviving population. Cometh Gaza and Iran, in which the Sebald logic is again very much at play. Two heads of state are bombing indiscriminately because, to them, the messy ends justify the messy means, but this is déjà vu all over again in which the virtuous have every right to vanquish the brutal unwashed, no nuance need apply. Gaza Arabs and Islamic Persians are expendable in that the contours of their lives, like those of the Japanese and Vietnamese, are literally inconceivable to the Western mind. Americans are flexing newfound muscles while Israelis look ahead to annexations. Thus, the ruins of Gaza and Iran may now be added to those of Germany, Japan, and Vietnam, the morality of aerial bombing no clearer now than it was 80 years ago. More’s the pity.

Christopher P. Winner • April 02, 2026 at 1:43 am

In a lifetime lived mostly in Europe, I have never heard veiled sarcasm mixed with disdain quite like this morning’s radio commentary regarding this president’s apparent decision to gradually back away from the Iran war in part, he says, because he failed to receive support from his NATO allies, whom he has spent more than a year berating and insulting and whom he did not openly consult before his Epic Fury. Now, after a month of bombing by both the United States and Israel, he appears ready to step away and let the non–“America First” world go fetch its own oil, a task that will be difficult indeed now that Iran will apparently again call the shots. All his bluster about creating the conditions for democracy in Iran are suddenly gone with the same wind that saw an about-face on Greenland. From Europe’s perspective, the American president is again turning nasty for two reasons. The first is that his war is causing unexpected commercial turmoil and enraging regional friends. The second is that his vaunted military has informed him that any effort to seize Iran would cost many American lives, a political price he will not pay, especially ahead of crucial November midterm elections. That in essence means the Islamic government will survive, even if stuck for now amid Stone Age rubble. It also means Tehran will still control the Strait of Hormuz and force American allies to fork over gobs of cash before fully reopening it. If some call this president irrational, erratic, and dangerously subject to whims, they cannot be blamed. Most say what all have come to know: His truth is the stuff of lies.

Christopher P. Winner • April 01, 2026 at 12:56 pm

Madame Moon: It’s official. The moon is a girl. Or so says the NASA of 2026. She’s calling us, and we’re ready, said a NASA spokeswoman ahead of the coming circumnavigation, a ten-day voyage now set to launch later today. This gender revelation puts the moon in league with sea vessels, forever female for luck and the women left behind. Throughout the moon missions of the sixties and seventies, the Earth’s running mate was a barren “it,” the most impersonal of pronouns. Why the change? Maybe the moon has recently taken to popping estrogen. It will now be up to a new set of astronauts to take her majesty’s wedding gown details and post them to Instagram.

Christopher P. Winner • March 31, 2026 at 3:04 am

Barometers: When it comes to barometric pressure, by which I mean public morale, it cannot be measured only in terms of cities bombed and enemy leaders assassinated. The Nazi war machine disintegrated when both the German military and the German public sensed beyond doubt that all was lost. The morale behind the Iraq mission came apart the instant it was discovered that Saddam Hussein, the great arch enemy, possessed no weapons of mass destruction. Though the Iran conflict remains young, morale is already aquiver in the United States, which started the war by pointing a finger at Tehran as the latest Evil Empire. Minor seeds of public dissatisfaction are evident, driven mostly by a rise in gas prices and a suspicion that winning the war outright may demand the involvement of U.S. combat troops. Israel, however, remains resolutely pro-war, but even there, the mood is jittery. It has been fighting nonstop since the Gaza attacks of 2023, and some are beginning to tire, another barometric dip. Many have already fled the economically vibrant Emirates, at least for the time being. But most affected, at least subliminally, is Europe, a continent made helpless by the new and belligerent world order, a continent in therapy and on heavy doses of antidepressants. Its young people, by now two generations removed from world war, can no longer imagine what the future holds. The virtuous America portrayed by Hollywood for decades has vanished, as if the Earth below had disappeared from view on a routine flight. Only Iran’s tyrannically rigorous Revolutionary Guard appears to be insulated from drops in morale. War is a mind game. War is a mood. War can make even those remote from the action grow anxious and fear for their sanity. If only boastful leaders cared to pay attention to the world’s plunging pressure, but, alas, they do not.

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