[Old School Hound]

Just saw this topic. Don't know whether to laugh or cry. Mind-blowing... Facebook as a credible news source, conspiracy theories that are even less credible. crushing of democratic norms, Congressional enabling of a wannabe autocrat... We were close, REALLY close to losing what the Founding fathers launched some 244 years ago- the great American experiment that espoused freedom and democracy over tyranny an monarchy. A close call... we should never forget it or take our democracy for granted ever again. Maybe next time when a rogue leader gains power, he might actually be smart and not a TV con man with a eighth grade reading level. History tells us that democracies have finite lifetimes. Death of a democracy usually doesn't happen overnight but little by little, stripping away of democratic norms. That's what makes authoritarianism so insidious- it rapes us of our democracy piece by piece- separation of powers, political plurality, democratic voting , all die at the hands of iron-fisted central tyranny.

Take a deep breath...exhale. Think of what we might have lost if there had been four more years of stripping away of what men like John Adams, Samuel Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, John Marshall, George Mason, and George Washington set in motion almost a quarter of a millennium ago.

Drop the silly conspiracy theories that are perpetuated on social media and get behind this new President. Wish him to be successful in bringing this country back from the brink of becoming what we fought so hard against from 1775-1783. If want this country to be well again, if you want the divisions to heal , if you want to avoid another 1861-1865 or an American version of the Third Reich, then get behind the new leader and wish him and the country success.