You joke about these things but I'm afraid that's where we're heading.
Trump will close off as much opposition as he can in the next two years. Then spend a year convincing people that term limits aren't required by the constitution. By then we'll have had so many scandals and constitutional crisis events that just get ignored that it will happen.
Am I being overdramatic? Because this feels different. It feels openly hostile.
I don't think you're being overdramatic. At this point, I'd give 50/50 odds that Trump will install himself as a Putin-style dictator (if we're not already there). "Elections" will happen, but the outcome will always be the same at the national level.
No. That isn't enough. The only way to avoid another Trump is to not elect one.
The solution liberals recoil against for some reason, is disassociation. We should have threatened our Trumper friends and family with permanent disassociation before the 2024 election.
Most would still persist, unpersuaded. They're likely lost for our lifetime. But perhaps enough would have taken the social cue of ridicule and ostracizing as serious enough to not vote for a psychopath. The farther back, the more effective it would have been.
Instead, we keep thinking they can be persuaded with reason, despite all evidence they've abandoned rationality.
We can't legislate the outcome you want. What you want comes from virtue. And America is out of virtue. People voted for a rapist, a felon, and vile insurrectionist.
America may not deserve Constitutional order, and therefore we are losing it.