Democracy under siege as Trump's reign of terror begins

It is worse than many of us imagined.

Not because we didn't know it would be bad, but because I reckon we practiced self-care by not fixating on it every hour of every terrible day since the horrid election in November.

So we licked our wounds, bucked each other up, and prepared for whatever hell was coming.

On Monday, it arrived.

On the first day of his reign of terror, the sick, vengeful king released 1,500 dangerous thugs, who beat the life out of cops and tried to set fire to our country, by violently stopping the certification of our election.

The people he said that he “loved” now have safe harbor, but only as long as they vow to work for him, because, you see, he has proven he is both capable of getting them in and out of their terrible messes.

Such power.

I have long ago lost confidence that our pathetic, horse-race media would report this at all properly when the gruesome day arrived, so let this old print guy break it to you cold this way:

WE ARE IN THE MIDDLE OF A NATIONAL EMERGENCY

We simply cannot survive this obscene level of anti-Democratic lawlessness from the fascist White House, and that makes it incredibly important how this moment in history is framed for the public.

Every day of the next 100 will be key, because hell is rolling downhill fast right now.

-Does our mainstream media finally do its job and sound the alarms?
-Do they relentlessly call (demand) power to account for their actions?
-Do they tell us just what in the hell is really going on here, by giving the incineration of our democracy and our law and order the bandwidth and context they deserve?
-Do they break into their horses--- regular broadcasting to let America know it is under attack?
-Do they report on what Americans should be doing to mitigate and stay safe from this onslaught?

I know what you are thinking ...

We are but weeks away from all this being normalized. In a matter of days Trump, with the backing of fawning oligarchs and a corrupt political enterprise, will have amassed an enormous amount of centralized power. Before you know it he will have made it all but impossible to drill into the core, to get at its terrible source.

He is in a breathtaking race right now to shield himself from anything that might be coming so that he can rain hell down on the rest of us from the safety of the Capitol he attacked but four short years ago and finally captured on Monday.

Once he’s insulated, it’s over.

No surprise. He has flooded the zone on social media today saying the military will be his No. 1 priority as he gets at America’s true enemies. He means us, of course.

This is predictable as hell, and back in November I warned you of this:

NOTHING Trump does with our military will be to protect the citizens of the United States of America.
EVERYTHING Trump does with our military will be to protect himself from the citizens of the United States of America.

We will be here shortly unless something jars us from our deep sleep.

America has not seen anything like this since our Civil War. That one didn’t end us, but its echoes are pounding in our ears like never before. The white heat is turned up to 10.

History shows us 1935 Germany can also be terrifyingly instructive. The accumulation of unchecked power can happen insanely fast. Hitler himself was actually surprised how easy things were, and expected a helluva lot more pushback than he got on his way to complete power.

Now 90 years later, all the dogs are once again lying down. While we nap, evil has crept up to our doors.

Human beings will be rounded up and shipped out.

Comply, or else.

This is a five-alarm fire, good people. It is far beyond what any reasonable person who has been around for a while feared in their lifetimes. Our Democracy is burning out of control, and the response from our Democratic representatives on the frontlines in Washington has been appalling.

They literally have no answers for us right now, as they scramble to find their asses with both hands. It is as if they have been living someplace else, while the rest of us have yelled for them to do something — ANYTHING.

This is why people like us were screaming bloody murder when Merrick Garland did nothing. Not ONE lawmaker was tried or jailed for the January 6th attack -- including of course the dangerous, orange ringleader who means to finish us off.

I genuinely need to know what the f--- just happened the past four years, that left us so completely unarmed for this.

I have no answers for you, my friends, but those need to be demanded. I will put on my activist hat before finishing up here, and suggest if you haven’t already that you call your representatives and demand an accounting of what they are planning to do to defend us from the end.

Winning some election that may or may not happen two years from now is NOT an acceptable answer.

Here’s the number, if it isn’t already burned into your fried brain: 202-224-3121. I’d also suggest you contact what passes for your local news sources and ask them what they have planned in their coverage of this attack on our freedom. Write a letter to the editor today. Some of you other rough-and-readies will have suggestions, and the comments are open.

UNDERSTAND THIS: We must stay together right now. We must check on each other, and report out what we are seeing and hearing. Information is power.

America is under attack.

This is not a drill.

D. Earl Stephens is the author of “Toxic Tales: A Caustic Collection of Donald J. Trump’s Very Important Letters” and finished up a 30-year career in journalism as the Managing Editor of Stars and Stripes. You can find all his work here, and follow him on Bluesky here.