“I HEREBY DEMAND”

“I hereby demand…”

With those three words the President of the United States formerly proclaimed his intent to subvert the rule of law.  A conscious effort by the president to interfere in an ongoing investigation by ordering the DOJ to investigate the investigators who are investigating him.  A flagrant attempt to use the institutions of government to further the president’s personal interests.  An unmistakable abuse of power not seen in our government since the days of the Nixon administration.

As the Mueller investigation draws closer and closer to the president and his family, the president has become more erratic and more dangerous.  His effort to end the investigation by firing James Comey, failed.  His attempts to impugn the character and professionalism of Mueller’s investigative team have also failed.  So he resorts to unhinged titter rants of: “No collusion, no collusion”; sounding more like a babbling parrot on meth than the leader of the free world.

And now this…a conscious effort by the president to undermine the investigation by revealing classified information and human intelligence sources.  An egregious violation of institutional norms orchestrated by complicit sycophants in congress.  A Republican led House Investigative Committee that conveniently found no collusion after ending its inquiry without issuing a single subpoena.  A committee chairman more interested in carrying the president’s water then finding the truth.  An unethical, unscrupulous unprincipled effort to undermine the rule of law sanctioned by a weak-kneed Republican Speaker and his cowardly muted leadership.

In spite of the president’s “No collision” pronouncements we know that the entire United States intelligence community believes with “high confidence” that the Russians meddled in our 2016 election and that the Russian operation was ordered by Vladimir  Putin. This assessment is corroborated by the intelligence services in Britain, France and Germany.  We also know that at least seven members of the Trump campaign’s inner circle had contacts with the Russians affiliated with the Russian government and discussed helping Donald Trump win the election.   These are proven facts which are beyond dispute.  Yet in spite of all the evidence we see the President of the United States taking active measures to disrupt the ongoing investigation for the sole purpose of protecting his self interests.

The Founders anticipated a would be king like Trump.  But never could they have imagined that a congress charged with oversight would be so complicit in supporting the monarchy at the expense of the republic.

These are not the actions of Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln.  What we are witnessing is right out of the playbook of Hitler, Stalin and Putin.

The talking heads fret about the constitutional crisis looming just over the horizon.  Fret no more.

As Pulitzer Prize winning Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson writes in today’s column: “Stop waiting for the constitutional crisis that President Trump is sure to provoke.  It’s here.”