President Trump is an autocrat. He doesn't care a wit about democracy. He doesn't care a wit about America. This is a given. It also isn't really the story. Congress is the story.
It can act as the ultimate check on not just Trump, but any president. The founders saw the co-equal branches of government as the ultimate blocks on over-reaching for power. They new despots would rise, but figured the system would act as a block. Mostly, it has worked.
The problem today is that this is not how our government is aligning. It isn't the executive versus Congress. It is the party of the president in Congress aligning with the executive. And when that party hold the reigns of power in both as the GOP does today, the check on power the framers invented doesn't exist.
Thus, it is Congress that is the real danger to our way of life. The GOP politicians fear their base and primaries more than the general electorate. None care a wit about the country.
It is up to us to make sure that they pay for that in 2018. I just hope that we still have a country to save. That isn't just melodrama. I wish that it was.
If you read only one thing today, make it this article by Ezra Klein on vox.com, How to Stop an Autocracy (The danger isn't that Trump will build an autocracy. It's that congressional Republicans will let him.)
And then roll up your sleeves and work even harder. Your country needs you.
7 February 2017
