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His national and international initiatives – from the effort to overturn the election five years ago to latest moves and warnings – weaken not only national and global law. But that’s not all.

These actions jeopardize the fundamental meaning of what we mean by.

The ethical foundation of a functioning society is to stop the more powerful from attacking and exploiting the vulnerable. Otherwise, we could find ourselves locked in a state of nature where survival of the strongest wins.

This principle is embedded of America’s founding documents. It’s also the foundation of the postwar international order advocated by the US, built on collective action, democratic governance, fundamental freedoms, and the legal authority.

However, it is a fragile construct, often broken by those who choose to misuse their power. Upholding it necessitates that the powerful have the moral fortitude to avoid seeking immediate gains, and that the public ensure they answer for their actions when they fail.

Absolute power is not right. It leads to turmoil, upheaval, and conflict.

Whenever individuals, companies, or nations that are advantaged prey upon those that are weaker, the framework of civilization frays. If these actions are allowed to continue, the structure collapses. Allowing it to persist, the world can descend into instability and violence. History provides ample precedent.

Our current reality is a society and world with deepening divides. Authority and resources are more concentrated than in recent memory. This encourages the powerful to exploit the disadvantaged because they act with a sense of untouchable.

The fortunes of a handful of ultra-wealthy individuals is difficult to fathom. The influence of big tech, big oil, and large defense contractors spans numerous countries. Artificial intelligence is could consolidate economic and political clout to a greater degree. The military might of the major powers is without parallel in recorded history.

Supported by complicit legislators and a pliant supreme court, the presidency has been transformed into the supreme and answerable-to-none agent of state power in recent memory.

Combine these factors and you perceive the threat.

A direct line links previous breaches of norms to present-day menaces. Each were premised on the hubris of omnipotence.

There is much the same in other global contexts: in wars of aggression, in strategic threats, and in the global depredation by powerful corporate entities.

However, raw power does not establish right. It produces instability, upheaval, and war.

The lessons of the past reveal that rules and conventions to check the influential also safeguard them. Absent these limits, their endless appetite for increased control and resources eventually lead to their downfall – taking down their corporations, nations, or empires. And risk international catastrophe.

This kind of lawlessness will cast a long shadow over the nation and the world – and indeed civilized conduct – for the foreseeable future.