The last decade has made it abundantly clear how weak America actually is.

Growing up I just assumed we would stomp this kind of shit out real fast. Instead we're bending over and letting an almost dead felon rapist pedophile fuck our country and our futures up. We're allowing a clearly treasonous party to abdicate all their responsibilities to a fat creep that falls asleep and shits his pants during official duties.

It's truly pathetic.

Don't think I'll be able to muster up much patriotism for this shithole for the remainder of my life.

There is a brutal man with a gun, controlling and threatening a group of good citizens with consciences. He's going to do terrible things to them, and make them do terrible things themselves.

They have him outnumbered, but he has the gun. If they rush him, they can easily defeat him. But, the first one or two or three or four people to move forward will be shot and probably die painfully. Going first is going to cost a terrible price and you don't know for sure that anyone else will follow you, that your sacrifice will be for anything at all.

You feel a little paralyzed and at the same time ashamed you are just standing there.

What happens next?

There is a combination of factors that is turning America, a country founded on evicting a King from our government, into a country with a de-facto one.

First, one of the foundational principles of the country was the separation of powers. Specific powers were given to specific branches of government. The founders anticipated that ambitious people would fill those branches, and they would not give up that power so easily. They did not anticipate a Congress that would abdicate it's power over directing the Executive branch when their guy is there. And a Supreme Court picked expressly to choose sides.

Second, the founders realized that there needed to be someone in charge of the Federal executive that had some real power. Recall that we had already formed one government , under the "Articles of Confederation", with a weak central government that was not working. But, they did not trust the general electorate to pick it. That is the original purpose of the Electoral College: State Legislatures would name delegates, and those delegates would pick the President. We retain the Electoral College not because it still works in the modern era, but because it is too hard to change. (The fact that Congress hasn't changed in size for 100 years also contributes to the inequity of the Electoral College, since each state's votes are tied to their representation. In fact, I think the EC might still be workable if each district were smaller....).

Third, we had built up a strong tradition of non-partianship in the executive branch, with career civil servants doing their jobs across administrations, providing continuity. We even thought that protection was entrenched in law. But then this guy comes along, and decides that none of those laws matter. Once that merit-based expertise leaves, it is very hard to get back. And he can violate laws with impunity because of Point #1.

So, while we don't call Trump a King officially, his office is being turned into a monarchy, where his opinion rules all and the rule of law is subject to it.

There are a couple of factors that play into the "lack of resistance."

• Healthcare and employment are intertwined in the US. Also, healthcare is more expensive in the US than just about anywhere else in the world.
• Employment in most states is "at will," meaning employees can be fired without cause. For most employees, there is also no employment contract. Unions in the US are very weak for the most part.
• Most people in the US live paycheck to paycheck, and don't own their primary residence.

These are the ingredients of a captive population. They can hate something all they want, but objecting to it is a risk of losing everything they have. And that's not hyperbole. There have already been reports of people being fired for social media posts, and ICE collecting info on "anti-ICE" social media content. Unfortunately, this is going to have to get to a point where enough people are willing to die to oppose this. When the economy starts hurting the upper-middle class, things might change, but I don't know.

There is and has been resistance, and it's resulted in American deaths. There just hasn't been the craziness of, e.g., Jan 6 (irony intended)!

It is without resistance. The citizens offer protest while the Democratic Party looks out for their retirement checks. The protest has been ineffective other than getting press and bringing out trump’s goon squad.

Tyrants always have the advantage in a "civil society"...

(Almost) Everything he does is legal so people treat it as fair game even if we don't like it, and aside from ICE murdering people, there isn't any direct violence to fight against so the "civil society" has to wait until it's wayyyyyyyy too late, to the point that we're all being sent to the gas chambers, until it decides it's morally correct to use violence.

Until that point we're left hoping our "representatives" will "fight" for us (hahahahahahahahahahahahaha...... Ughh....)

:(

The American constitution means there was a way of stopping America from becoming a tyrannical fascist state.

Turns out it is just for show.

The Weimar Republic also fell to the Nazis with almost no resistance.

One reason is that the US is just too big and too different to fight back effectively.

I think the most practical resistance is the west coast trying to split off.

It’s a lot easier to rally an entire state than an entire country.

The 2001 Patriot Act is the cornerstone and the MAGA fucknuts pushed ahead with their insane Project 2025 BS!

We have been sufficiently divided to prevent collective action until it is too late. Those who should be allied with us are too distracted by gender arguments and religious propaganda to notice the boot coming down for us all.

Just reading his Wikipedia page is scary as hell for an American president. Unreal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_presidency_of_Donald_Trump

But also, fuck neocon Robert Kagan

I don't want to sound like a Bible beater because religion is very much not a part of my life. But I know the Bible. If the warnings in Daniel, Theologians, revelation about an antichrist is true, everything that describes an antichrist, Trump fits to a a T, and this board of peace. I dunno it's starting to be more than a coincidence to me.

I suspect most people feel that if things get too bad (too late) things will be taken care of for them, someone else will do it, etc. Despite all the rhetoric there is still a lot of faith in the system, at least from the older folks. I have to say it is quite eerie and weird though and not in a good way.

It is hilarious to me and also annoying that they say there is no resistance. Millions are flooding the streets. Record protests. Hundreds of thousands have made networks of information systems. But yeah sure no resistance. A toy company took the administration to Supreme Court and won but okay yeah no resistance . Women gassed and burned ice warehouses but okkkkk no resistance. Kids punching nazis. No resistance. Ridiculous.

Americans are too obsessed with themselves to give a shit. And when ICE starts busting the heads of white people, they'll happily report their neighbors and coworkers for disloyalty.