Today (August 11) in The Washington Post is a front page story that hundreds of FBI agents are being deployed to fight crime—primarily street crime—in the District of Columbia and a similar article in The New York Times that in addition to the FBI, Trump is planning to send in hundreds of National Guard troops this week “to keep order” in the nation’s capital. All of this is happening at a time when the crime rate in the District of Columbia is close to historic lows. Several previous articles in various newspapers have said he is planning to abolish home rule, fire all DC elected officials, and appoint lackeys and sycophants to do his bidding—which includes his plans to expand the White House by constructing a gigantic ballroom. Such an action would normally take years for approval by regulatory agencies. Not if Trump’s henchmen are running the show. Trump was also quoted that within a matter of days there would be no signs of homeless people or encampments in DC. What does that mean? What does he plan to do with those people? And this is happening at a time when masked ICE officials with ambitious arrest quotas are now arresting people on the streets in poor DC neighborhoods and adjacent counties who look like they may be immigrants or speak with a dialect. And what about the massive prisons being constructed around the country to be run by private prison companies to house undocumented people in cages and to separate families? I tell myself that this is just a bad dream. But it is happening.

So how worried should we be?

According to the U.S. Constitution, checks and balances are in place to prevent autocratic rule in the United States. There are three branches of government—the executive, legislative and judicial branches—which share the responsibility for governing. But what if  both other branches are compliant with whatever the executive decides? Republicans control both the House and the Senate and have a majority on the Supreme Court. It appears that there is nothing Trump can do that will cause more than one or two Republican Senators or Congressmen to break rank. And the final guardrail—the Supreme Court—is shaky. Many lower courts have ruled against Trump’s agenda, especially those courts where a majority of judges have been appointed by a Democrat. Ultimately most of the controversial cases will end up in the Supreme Court where Trump seems to have four solid votes for whatever he wants and three justices appointed by a Democrat who will fight his moves, leaving the outcome to be decided by Chief Justice Roberts and Amy Coney Barrett, both Republican appointees. In times past the Supreme Court has been the final guardrail keeping our democracy from going off the cliff. Not so much today.

So how worried should we be?

It is too early to know what kind of pushback will happen regarding sending in the FBI and National Guard to take over law enforcement in DC and what the chances are that Trump will be able to pull this off. But what if he does? What does this say about our democracy and our way of life not only in the District of Columbia but in our country? If Trump can pull this off in DC, which cities might be next?

So what should those of us who are horrified by Trump’s actions do? I written checks to the ACLU and to CASA, nonprofit advocacy organizations which are championing the immigration cause, and attended last week a session about what we should do when we see ICE arrest someone (mainly document with our cellphone cameras), but that does not seem like very much. We can support Democrats running for the Congress and the Senate in 2026 but that seems like a long way off, and so much damage can be done between now and 2027 when Democrats would have a shot to having a majority in at least one of the legislative chambers. We can speak out and demonstrate when given the opportunity, join marches, and post blogs like I am doing now, but all that too seems futile.

And the fundamental question is this: why do good people turn a blind eye or sit on the sidelines when they know that what is happening is wrong? Most people, I believe, are fundamentally good and want to do the right thing. Hillary got into trouble when she said something like all the MAGAs are not evil people (implying that a lot are). I do not believe that all Trump supporters are bad people. What I do believe is that we Homo sapiens are fundamentally herd animals. We have the capacity both to love and to hate and fight back when we feel threatened. This is the nature of our species. We have evolved over many thousands of years from being the hunted to the hunter and for now due to our tribal organization we rule the roost on the planet Earth. Tribalism has enabled this to happen. But every tribe has a leader. That is why good leaders are so important and bad leaders are so dangerous.  I think you could make a good case that the critical factor which determines whether a country tilts toward good or to evil is the leader of the tribe. The Germans under Hitler were not all evil people. Nor were Italians under Mussolini, the Spanish under Franco, the Russians under Stalin or the Chinese under Mao. Yet many in those countries did terrible, evil things because of their tribal leaders. That is what we humans do.

And that is the situation we are experiencing today. The tribal leader of the United States is a narcissist wannabe dictator. The challenge for us today is how do get out of this mess. The main hope we have, I believe, is for strong new, younger leaders to speak out and to rally us herd animals to a vision of inclusiveness, fairness and kindness—all of which are part of our human nature, just as much as our capacity to do bad things to one another. Who will that be? When will that happen? How much time do we have?

That is why today I am announcing my candidacy to become the next President of the United States.

Send money.

(Ok, just kidding.)

But that does not answer the fundamental question of how worried we should be or what we should do about it. What do you think? What are you planning to do?

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