Hell No!
The Hill (01/23/2025) Headline: Tennessee Republican proposes amendment to allow Trump to serve third term
Representative from Tennessee, Andy Ogles’ proposed amendment is a dangerous slide into tyranny. This is exactly what the founders feared.
No, they did not input term limits, but George Washington understood the ominous precedent it would have created if he lingered. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was an astounding president, but term limits established by the 22nd amendment remain pertinent.
Lutheran Pastor Martin Niemöller, a supporter and ultimate critic of Adolf Hitler, reckoned with his complicity. The rise of a monster. A man many generations learn and despise — yet, that knowledge — like a ball of yarn, is slowly whittling away. That social depression. The feeling of being duped. A sweltering hate boiling and bubbling from poisonous rhetoric.
“First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a socialist.
“Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a trade unionist.
“Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
“Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”
Then we have Cicero echoing the fall of a republic… “The budget should be balanced, the treasury should be refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered, and assistance to foreign lands curtailed, lest Rome become bankrupt.”
Julius Caesar, the pragmatist and — albeit not the first — dictator said, “If you must break the law, do it to seize power: in all other cases observe it.” Though not the first… he would be declared one for “life” — dictator perpetuo.
This cynical pragmatism encircles our U.S. institutions like sharks eying drops of blood clouding in salty water. The tides culled them in, and the oceans rose their depths to the surface.
Henry Kissinger bellowed American power by saying it “has no permanent friends or enemies, only interests.” He must have known this was true both foreign and domestically. Presidential power was tested during his tenure. “When the president does it, that means it is not illegal,” Richard Nixon said. This fissure never glued.
Hitherto, the strong oligarchs will “do what they can, and the weak” will “suffer what they must.”
Thucydides, following the Peloponnesian War, observed mannerisms attached to modern day democrats: “It is the habit of mankind to entrust to careless hope what they long for, but to use sovereign reason to thrust aside what they do not fancy.”
The negation of hard truths. The reality that sat before them. The economy was in shambles. Biden could not communicate anything coherent to roar over our fears… we were left to sulk and fear tyranny void a viable alternative. A deep frustration fracturing beneath our feet. We will go on our daily lives. But if we flirt with tyranny, we won’t for long. Listen to the echoes of the past, they’re reaching further into our future.
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