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You do realize that this is where things are going, right? Have you not heard of the arrests and recent deportations of student protestors?

I don’t understand why we keep forgetting that authoritarianism is a slippery slope.




You have a point with democratic backsliding - but then your rights hinge on the impartiality of the judicial system (as a whole, and eventually, not necessarily individual decisions evidently). It’s pretty obvious that the legal systems even in flawed democracies is still vastly better than in those autocracies.


A tale as old as time: watch from the sidelines while things are relatively “good” before suddenly finding yourself on the naughty list.


Checks and balances are a crucial feature of American democracy.

It's almost as though the framers of the Constitution foresaw the possibility of the two elected branches of government (executive and legislative) being monopolized by the same group, at some point.

And that the very flexibility of regular, open, direct elections also required a check to protect the fundamental rights of all people in the country.


They may have foresaw it but they did little if anything to prevent it. They lamented that political parties would probably be the downfall, and here we are...


> little if anything to prevent it

The prevention is literally in the Constitution! Do you think other branches of government would be deferring to the Supreme Court if it weren't spelled out that they must?


> You do realize that this is where things are going, right?

This has been going on for decades.

> Have you not heard of the arrests and recent deportations of student protestors?

The legality of which will be decided (hopefully) by the courts. If this turns out to be legal, the fault doesn't lie at the hands of Trump and his cronies, but at a broken system we've had - for decades. Getting rid of him won't solve this. Having checks and balances will.

Much of his and Elon's actions are within the power that has been legally granted to them. And that is the problem. Congress is not limiting those powers. Voters are another part of checks and balances, and they happily wanted to give him those powers.

The problem isn't Trump. It's the country. Been broken for a while, but it took time for someone to clearly demonstrate how broken it is.


Agreed. And nowhere did I say that the problem is Trump. I was simply using current events as proof that we are already in a bad state.




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