Tanks, Tweets, and Treason

So here we are, folks. The part in the dystopian movie where the strongman in a red tie decides the Constitution is more of a suggestion than a binding document. This week, Donald Trump took a flaming blowtorch to that quaint little concept called “civilian control of the military” by once again floating the idea of using the National Guard—and even the U.S. military itself—against American citizens. Specifically, in Los Angeles. You know, the city of angels, movie studios, and people who still believe in democracy.

Because nothing screams “I love America” like threatening to deploy troops on your own people for the crime of… protesting you.

This isn’t Trump’s first authoritarian rodeo. He’s been itching to use the military domestically ever since he got his tiny fingers on the nuclear football. In fact, during the George Floyd protests in 2020, he ordered National Guard troops to violently clear peaceful demonstrators from Lafayette Square so he could hold a Bible upside down in front of a church he doesn't attend. And now, in 2025, he’s taking it up a notch. He’s not just using the National Guard like his personal goon squad—he’s doing it illegally.

Legal scholars from across the spectrum, including those who probably dry-clean their flag lapel pins, have sounded the alarm. This isn't just inappropriate. It's unconstitutional. You cannot—legally—use the military to silence dissent in America. But this administration doesn’t read laws; they read polls. And the only poll that matters to Trump is the one that shows him winning. By force, if necessary.

This is what authoritarianism looks like. Not with jackboots on your doorstep (yet), but with carefully manufactured chaos. Trump isn’t deploying troops because the streets of L.A. are burning. He’s deploying them because he wants the image of chaos. He wants to use fear for Control and Power. That’s what every tinpot dictator has ever wanted. Mussolini had trains. Trump has Truth Social and tanks.

And behind the scenes? Russel Vought is quietly dismantling the last shreds of democratic governance with Project 2025, a master plan to consolidate power in the hands of a president who calls coups “beautiful.” This isn’t just bad policy. This is strategic authoritarianism—calculated, patient, and cloaked in a thousand flags and Fox News segments.

Meanwhile, Congress is asleep at the wheel, too busy rubber-stamping billionaire tax cuts and pretending that threatening to use the military on American soil is just “tough on crime.” Republicans are more loyal to Trump than to the Constitution, and Democrats are playing by rules written for a gentler era—one that ended the moment Trump refused to concede in 2020.

And what are we, the people, doing? Hoping this all blows over? Waiting for the courts to save us? Here's the hard truth: The courts can’t save us. Not alone. Democracy doesn’t die in one dramatic moment. It dies slowly, while people refresh their news feeds and say, “Surely someone will stop this.”

Spoiler alert: That someone is us.

We are now in a moment where a sitting president is not only threatening to use military force against citizens, but is also surrounding himself with loyalists—grifters, felons, and fascist cosplayers—who will carry out that order without blinking. The legal lines have already been crossed. The only thing stopping this from becoming full-blown dictatorship is resistance.

And yes, it may already be too late to stop what’s coming. But that doesn't mean we don't fight.

Because if we don't, the next protest might not be met with tear gas and rubber bullets. It might be tanks and live rounds. And the president won’t just be threatening democracy.

He’ll be burying it.

Art by R. McKee