Trump's Rose Garden remarks last night chilled me to the bone. I saw a man who fantasizes about ruling America with a "firm hand" relishing an opportunity to act out those fantasies, to become the kind of "strong man" he admires.
This is a man who, 30 years ago, criticized Gorbachev as "weak" for losing control of the USSR and praised the Chinese Communist Party for showing us "the power of strength" in Tienanmen Square.
This is a president of the United States who openly sympathized with heavily armed gunmen threatening Michigan's legislators and saw "good people" among the white supremacists in Charlottesville but sees antifa as a vicious terrorist group and black protesters as "thugs."
This is a president who admires Kim Jong Un while deriding Angela Merkel. This is a president who keeps claiming he has unlimited power and responds to challenges to those claims by verbally abusing and then firing people or siccing his armed and adoring followers on them.
These aren't whiffs of fascism; they are neon signs, blaring sirens.
Thanks to disproportional representation and a feckless GOP, the main constitutional mechanism meant to check this slide, congressional oversight, has failed. Republican senators have made clear that there is no transgression they can't stomach.
Still, I'm trying to stay hopeful that a few other barriers will hold. State and local authorities can ignore infringements on their powers. Police and military can refuse to obey unlawful or unjust orders. And, of course, citizens can keep mobilizing to protest and impede.
Maybe I am being too alarmist. I hope so. At this point, though, I'd rather err on the side of overreaction than under-reaction. The stakes are way, way too high.
