King Donald I

 As we "celebrate" this Fourth of July, it's worth looking at the Declaration that was published this date in 1776. The stirring preamble said more than Jefferson perhaps knew, when it created the concept of universal rights. Later generations, including Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, pointed at the Declaration - not the Constitution - as the basis for their calls to end slavery. The right of self-government is also a critical part of that preamble. 

The rest of the document is largely lawyers Jefferson and perhaps Adams listing the crimes of King George III against the people of the American colonies, now states. Some are worth repeating in 2025.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

Yeah, he's a criminal and his administration routinely breaks laws with the acquiescence of the Supreme Court.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

Trump is making every effort to subsume local government and civil society to the whims of his will. While many states are resisting him, the assault is real.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

The siege of Los Angeles falls into this category.

As Richarson has been noting (I think she wrote a book on this), the Declaration's radical principles were not universally accepted by Americans, much less the rest of the world. The contest of the 1840s and '50s was fundamentally about whether America would actually live by the principles it established at its founding.

Today we are faced with a similar crisis. The tyrant sits in elective office. The horrific bill passed yesterday is not - for all its cruelty - undemocratic. As long as we are able to wrest at least one branch of government back in 2026, we can begin to unravel the cruelty. 

No, it's the rot in the Executive Branch - spurred on by enablers on the highest court in the land - that represents the true threat to our democracy.

Democratic self-rule won in our first revolution. It won in our second revolution against an oligarchic slave holding elite bent on its destruction. A softer revolution won over the plutocrats of the Gilded Age and the early 20th century. It won against the tyranny of Jim Crow.

I believe we will win against this challenge. I can't say I'm certain of it, because too many of our people have become in thrall to lies, But I remain hopeful in a time of great turmoil and darkness.

I'm an American, what other choice do I have?