I watch all this unfold
from the center lane—
not because I’m quiet,
not because I can’t choose a side,
but because the noise on both edges
drowns out the truth
I want my daughter to grow up believing in.
They’ve opened the files now,
dumping names into the world
like seeds scattered in a storm—
some rotten,
some clean,
some never meant
to be torn from sealed soil.
And I keep thinking of my little girl,
the way she sees the world
as something basically fair,
basically fixable.
I want to protect that hope,
but how do I explain
that when politicians get hungry
for a headline,
even innocent people
can be ground into dust?
Some of the names will survive it—
privilege makes a soft landing.
But some won’t.
Some who did nothing
but bump shoulders with the wrong man
in the wrong year
will wake up ruined
because the mob wanted a sacrifice
and Congress handed them a list.
And I know—
believe me, I know—
most folks staring at those files
are really searching for one thing:
proof that Trump
is finally guilty of something
so definitive
even his most loyal devotees
can’t Houdini their way around it.
I get the longing.
But wanting a villain
doesn’t make him appear in the paperwork.
I’m a mom.
I know the difference
between suspicion
and certainty,
between rumor
and evidence.
I know what monsters look like—
real ones,
like Epstein—
and I want every last accomplice
dragged into daylight
if they exist.
But daylight isn’t a weapon.
It’s supposed to be truth.
And these files—
they’re not truth.
They’re a mix of facts,
theories,
lies,
half-memories,
wishful thinking,
and the kind of accusations
that fall apart
the second they hit a courtroom.
We shouldn’t be teaching our children
that justice is just
public humiliation
with better lighting.
We shouldn’t tell them
privacy is meaningless
once the crowd starts howling.
And God help us
if we teach them
that innocence
can be optional
when politics
is involved.
I want my daughter to inherit
a nation where the guilty are punished—
with evidence,
not vibes.
Where the innocent are shielded—
not sacrificed
for someone else’s narrative arc.
But standing here,
a married lesbian mom
with a wife I adore
and a kid I’d walk through fire for,
I’m afraid of the precedent
we just set:
When you teach the public
that anyone’s private life
is fair game
as long as you shout
“transparency,”
it won’t stop
with the powerful.
Eventually,
the fire spreads.
And the blaze
doesn’t care
whose name
it burns next.
© Susie Stiles-Wolf