I argued that politicians had been eating away at our core principles like termites chewing on hidden beams. While they distracted us with temporal issues—capital punishment, for example, which in actuality is never going to affect any of us, unless we have a friend on death row—they had been steadily weakening our constitutional foundations.

One night several months earlier we had gone to hear Pulitzer Prize–winning historian David Malinsky lecturing at Georgetown about his new book, Complexities Made Simple. What I remember most about that is the great imitation he did of George Carlin’s explaining the demise of the American Indian. “Just back up a little, please,” he said. “Just a little, little more. One more step. A little bit more, don’t worry about it, just a tiny step, a little more, and more … Next thing you know you’re in North Dakota.”

That was what we were doing to our constitutional safeguards. The irony of it is, of course, that the biggest steps have always been taken in response to an event. To keep the nation together during the Civil War, Lincoln had to ignore the constitutional protections that the North was fighting to make the South respect. In 1941 we went to war to fight dictators—and to do so, it became necessary to give FDR dictatorial powers. To deal with the pandemic, first the Trumpers, then the Democrats treated the Constitution as an inconvenience to be acknowledged and respected, but ignored like an irritating older relative.

Essentially, every time there’s been a crisis, we’ve disregarded the Constitution. And lost just a little more freedom. Just a little more, one more step, a little farther. Vietnam. Wow. Congress voluntarily gave Johnson war powers granted to them in the Constitution. So much for that. 9/11, boom! Next thing you know we’re standing in long lines at airports, smiling into surveillance cameras, and giving away our privacy.

What I wondered was how Wrightman was going to use these attacks to consolidate all the small steps he had already taken. I smelled the stink of fascism.

Jenny asked me to pause here and tell you she thinks I am overreacting. She would tell you herself, but she’s … uh, she’s busy right now.

This slow erosion might have continued apace for several more decades if the internet hadn’t burst into our lives and changed everything. The internet allowed people to find their tribes, to locate people who believed as they did—no matter how sensible or wacko. It allowed small, highly motivated groups to organize and take power away from much larger but complaisant or distracted groups. The result of that was Trump.

Voltaire wrote: “To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize.” But this was exactly the type of warning Wrightman would have erased if it had been possible. Several weeks after Wrightman’s inauguration a group of students at Vermont’s John Rogers University occupied the administration building to protest an announced tuition increase. In response, the chancellor said that while he admired their spunk, he abhorred their tactics, and to “crush dissent” he sent in the cops. The kids were carried out and charged with disturbing the peace.