Just Another Monday in a Dying Republic

Bomb Threats, Democratic Backsliding, and the Creeping Merger of State and Corporate Power

Image: Shutterstock.com

I write this from a hotel room in Washington D.C., my head throbbing with what feels like a hangover. But it's not alcohol that's left me in this state—it's the weight of conversations, the gravity of realizations, and the crushing disappointment in those who should know better.

I came to the capital for a conference, but it quickly devolved into a series of hushed meetings and furtive conversations about the precarious state of our democracy. Corridors and coffee shops became impromptu war rooms, where concerned citizens and political operators alike grappled with the unfolding crisis. I should probably mention there was also a bomb threat aimed at intimidating anti-Trump conservatives. An event yours truly was present for.

But here's the truly terrifying part: I'm more afraid of the response to what's happening than I am of the events themselves. The threats to our democratic institutions are clear and present, visible to anyone willing to look. What chills me to the bone is the tepid reaction, the moral cowardice, and the intellectual gymnastics performed by those who should be on the front lines of resistance.

Hakeem Jeffries, faced with this existential threat, asks “what can we do?”—a question that reveals both their recognition of the crisis and their paralyzing uncertainty about how to confront it. It's a response that, while well-intentioned, betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of the moment we're in. The machinery of democratic governance is being dismantled before our eyes, and they're still operating as if we're engaged in a policy debate rather than a fight for the very survival of our constitutional order. Their hesitation, their search for “leverage” within a system that's being rewritten in real-time, is not just ineffective—it's dangerous. While they ponder the proper procedural response, the foundations of our republic are being jackhammered away

Meanwhile, across the country, signs emerge that some Americans are waking up to the perversion that is the arrangement of Musk and DOGE, and the outright distortion of law and ethics it represents. It is, as I've been warning, a slow-motion coup unfolding before our eyes. The audacity is breathtaking: Musk runs his private empire while simultaneously demanding government employees send him weekly reports. Two plus two equals four, and this equation doesn't add up to anything resembling democratic governance.

This awakening, however limited, offers a glimmer of hope. But it's a race against time. While some citizens are just beginning to grasp the magnitude of the threat, the machinery of state is being rewired to serve private interests. The fusion of corporate power and government authority that the Founders feared and fought against is no longer a cautionary tale—it's our lived reality.

The arrangement between Musk and the administration isn't just a violation of ethics or a breach of protocol. It's a fundamental rewiring of how power operates in our society. When a private citizen, accountable to no one but himself, can demand oversight of government functions while simultaneously running companies that benefit from government contracts and policy decisions, we've moved beyond mere corruption. We're witnessing the birth of a new form of governance, one that blurs the lines between public and private power in ways that our system of checks and balances was never designed to handle.

And yet, even as this realization dawns on some, the response from our institutions remains woefully inadequate. The urgency of the moment demands more than just recognition—it requires immediate, decisive action. But where is the outcry from Congress? Where are the emergency hearings, the subpoenas, the demands for accountability?

Which brings me to Ukraine…

I don't even know where to begin. The sheer scope of moral and historical tragedy playing out before our eyes, as the United States openly sides with Moscow, openly lies about Europe's funding arrangements with Ukraine, and when corrected by Emmanuel Macron in real-time, Trump more or less suggests Macron is delusional about his knowledge about his own government's commitments.

This isn't just a policy disagreement or a diplomatic faux pas. It's a wholesale abandonment of truth, of allies, and of the very principles that have underpinned global stability for decades. Two plus two equals four, but in Trump's America, it seems that basic arithmetic is now subject to negotiation.

Consider the surreal spectacle of Macron, the President of France, gently correcting the President of the United States on basic facts about European support for Ukraine. This isn't just embarrassing; it's dangerous. When the leader of the free world can't—or won't—acknowledge reality, the entire framework of international cooperation begins to crumble.

But it gets worse. The U.S. has now aligned itself with Russia, North Korea, and Iran in voting against a UN resolution condemning Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine. Let that sink in. We've gone from being the bulwark of democracy to keeping company with the world's most notorious autocracies. This isn't just a shift in policy; it's a repudiation of everything America has stood for on the world stage since World War II.

And as if this weren't alarming enough, we're witnessing an unprecedented and dangerous alignment of private and public power in this arena. Elon Musk's Starlink, a critical communication infrastructure for Ukraine's defense, is now being wielded as a tool of extortion. The same Musk who runs DOGE, who demands weekly reports from government employees, who blurs the line between state and corporate power at home, is now playing kingmaker in an active war zone.

This isn't just a businessman making tough decisions. It's a private citizen, accountable to no one, leveraging control over crucial military infrastructure to influence geopolitics. The implications are staggering. We've moved beyond the realm of corporate influence into a new frontier where tech oligarchs can effectively hold sovereign nations hostage.

The fusion of Musk's private interests with U.S. foreign policy represents a perversion of democratic norms on a global scale. It's as if we've decided to outsource our diplomatic and military strategy to the whims of a billionaire. This isn't just a violation of the separation of powers; it's a wholesale abdication of the state's responsibility to its citizens and allies.

Two plus two equals four, and here's another simple equation: When private companies can dictate terms to nations at war, when they can shut off critical services at will, we're no longer operating in a world of democratic nation-states. We're sliding into a new form of techno-feudalism, where the lines between government, corporation, and warlord blur beyond recognition.

Trump's proposal to essentially ransack Ukraine's natural resources as payment for past support is not diplomacy; it's extortion on a global scale. It's the language of mobsters, not statesmen. And it sends a chilling message to every democracy under threat: America's support is now conditional on your ability to pay, not on the righteousness of your cause.

Meanwhile, Macron performs verbal acrobatics, trying to speak a more palatable reality into existence. His efforts to keep the peace process alive, while admirable, highlight the desperation of our allies in the face of America's moral collapse. When the French President has to articulate America's security commitments because the American President won't, we've entered truly uncharted waters.

The implications of this shift are staggering. We've undermined our own negotiating position and strengthened Russia's hand, not just in Ukraine but across Europe. We're not just abandoning Ukraine; we're signaling to Putin and autocrats everywhere that aggression pays, that borders are negotiable, and that America's word is worth less than the paper it's printed on.

This is what the erosion of democratic norms at home looks like when projected onto the world stage. It's a betrayal not just of our allies, but of our own history and values. We're watching in real-time as the edifice of global security, painstakingly built over generations, is dismantled by the very nation that was its chief architect.

The moral bankruptcy is complete. The historical tragedy is unfolding before our eyes. And unless we find the courage to stand up, to speak truth to power, to reassert the values that made America a beacon of hope and stability, we may soon find ourselves in a world where such courage is no longer possible.

This is the cost of our collective failure to defend democracy at home. This is what happens when we allow lies to go unchallenged, when we normalize the abnormal, when we choose comfort over confrontation. And make no mistake: the clock is ticking. Every moment we spend in denial, every instance where we choose expedience over principle, brings us closer to a point of no return.

Speaking of at home, the Trump Administration continues to run roughshod over civil service protections enshrined in law. While the courts have blocked many of these attempts, the administration is sharpening its blades for arguments before the Supreme Court, when certiorari is eventually granted on these cases.

Their weapon of choice? The Unitary Executive Theory—a constitutional interpretation so extreme it might be better termed the Elected Monarch Theory. Under this insane reading of the Vesting Clause, they argue that civil service protections, dating back to the Pendleton Act of the late 19th century, were never constitutional to begin with.

Let's be clear about what this means: They're not just trying to change policy or reorganize government. They're attempting to undo over a century of protections against corruption and political manipulation of the federal workforce. This isn't reform; it's a wholesale attack on the very concept of an impartial, professional civil service.

The implications are staggering. If successful, this argument would effectively transform every federal employee into a political appointee, serving at the pleasure of the president. It would turn the entire machinery of government into a personal fiefdom of whoever occupies the Oval Office.

Two plus two equals four, and here's another simple truth: A government where every official from the highest cabinet member to the lowliest clerk serves solely at the president's discretion is not a democracy. It's not even a republic. It's an elected autocracy, with a thin veneer of democratic legitimacy.

This isn't just a technical legal argument. It's an attempt to fundamentally rewrite the relationship between the government and the governed. It would eliminate the safeguards that prevent presidents from using the power of the state to punish enemies, reward friends, and entrench their own power.

The Founders, who had just fought a revolution against the arbitrary power of a monarch, would be appalled. They designed a system of checks and balances precisely to prevent this kind of concentration of power. Now, under the guise of “original intent,” the administration seeks to create exactly the kind of unaccountable executive power the Constitution was designed to prevent.

And where are the self-proclaimed defenders of limited government in all this? Silent, or worse, cheering from the sidelines. They've become so fixated on shrinking the state that they're willing to hand over unprecedented power to a single individual, as long as he promises to use that power to dismantle the institutions they dislike.

Now, think about what this insane theory of executive power really means in practice. It's not just an abstract legal argument—it's a fundamental reshaping of every interaction you have with your government.

Imagine a world where the person behind the desk at the passport office owes their job not to their competence or experience, but to their loyalty to the president. Where the IRS auditor examining your taxes is there not because of their expertise in tax law, but because they donated to the right campaign. Where every perfunctory bureaucratic process you come into contact with—from applying for Social Security to getting a small business loan—is staffed based on political allegiance rather than professional qualifications.

Is this really what Americans want? Do we truly believe this will reduce corruption? Are you fucking kidding me?

This isn't just about inefficiency—though make no mistake, a government staffed by sycophants rather than professionals would be catastrophically inefficient. It's about the very nature of citizenship in a democracy. It's about whether you can trust that you'll be treated fairly by your government, regardless of your political beliefs.

Under this system, every government interaction becomes a potential loyalty test. Disagree with the president? Maybe your passport application gets “lost.” Donate to the wrong candidate? Perhaps your tax return faces extra scrutiny. Speak out against administration policies? Watch as your business loan application languishes at the bottom of the pile.

Two plus two equals four, and here's another simple truth: A government where every official serves at the pleasure of a single individual is not a government of laws, but of men. It's not a democracy, it's not even a republic—it's a patronage system writ large, a return to the spoils system that we thought we'd left behind in the 19th century.

The proponents of this theory will tell you it's about accountability, about making government more responsive. Don't believe it for a second. This isn't accountability—it's the weaponization of government against its own citizens. It's the transformation of public service into a partisan battleground.

And let's be clear—this isn't a partisan issue. It doesn't matter whether you're a Republican, a Democrat, or an independent. The idea that any president, of any party, should have this kind of unchecked power over the entire federal workforce should terrify every American who values their freedom and their rights.

This is how democracies die—not with a bang, but with a thousand small cuts to the institutions that protect us from tyranny. It's death by a thousand bureaucratic decisions, each one made not in the public interest, but in service to a single individual's whims and desires.

As we stand at this crossroads of history, the convergence of these threats—the erosion of civil service protections, the fusion of private and public power, the abandonment of allies, and the perversion of executive authority—paints a chilling picture of a democracy in free fall. We are witnessing nothing less than a fundamental rewiring of the American experiment, a shift from a government of laws to a government of men, from a republic to an elected autocracy.

The tragedy unfolding before us is not just political; it's moral and historical. We are betraying not only our allies and our values but the very foundations of the democratic order that generations before us fought and died to establish and preserve. From the Founders who crafted our Constitution to the civil servants who built our institutions, from the soldiers who defended democracy abroad to the activists who expanded its promise at home—we are squandering their legacy with breathtaking speed and recklessness.

Two plus two still equals four. The truth remains the truth, no matter how many lies are told to obscure it. And here's another immutable truth: Democracy, once lost, is hellishly difficult to regain. The window for action is closing, and it's closing fast.

So what are we to do in the face of this existential threat? First, we must shake off the complacency that has allowed this crisis to metastasize. We must recognize that this is not politics as usual, not a pendulum swing that will naturally correct itself. This is a deliberate, coordinated assault on the very foundations of our republic.

Second, we must resist—not just in words, but in actions. This means supporting and strengthening the institutions that preserve our democracy. It means demanding accountability from our elected officials, regardless of party. It means standing up for the rule of law, even when—especially when—it's inconvenient for those in power.

Third, we must educate. We must ensure that every American understands what's at stake, that they see through the fog of disinformation and recognize the clear and present danger to our way of life. We must make it impossible for anyone to claim they didn't see this coming.

Finally, we must have the courage to imagine and fight for a better future. In the face of those who would drag us backward into autocracy, we must articulate a vision of democracy renewed, of institutions strengthened, of a nation recommitted to its highest ideals.

The task before us is monumental, the odds daunting. But the alternative—surrender to autocracy, the death of the American experiment—is unthinkable. We stand now at the precipice, with the fate of our republic hanging in the balance. The choice is ours: Will we be the generation that lost democracy, or the one that saved it?

Two plus two equals four. Democracy is worth fighting for. And the time to fight is now.

“The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.” — James Madison, Federalist No. 47.