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Hippo: I feel I've maintained something of a feeling of equanimity in the face of all the Trumpism of the past JESUS CHRIST TEN YEARS. But today I realize: It's over. Hippo: Partial destruction of the White House, high seas murder in the Caribbean, ICE gearing up with serious military gear, the deployments in American cities, the shutdown, the closing of the House of Representatives. Turns out the most small-d democratic institution in the federal government is controlled by one small man and he just ended it. The Democrats are still fighting to seat one Representative like it matters. Hippo: There may be more elections. There will continue to be courts. But none of it will matter to the executive. Democracy in America is dead.

NEW COMIC TWO OR THREE TIMES A WEEK, OR WHEN THE MOOD STRIKES

I'm not really one for despair. I'm cranky and a complainer but ultimately I'm a hopeful person. But these days that hope is very difficult to hold onto. The shuttering of the House of Representatives isn't a procedural dodge, a speed bump on the way to things returning to normal. It's the whole thing. Without the House there's no oversight of the executive. The courts have been filled with kangaroos and the few judges still standing for the rule of law have been targeted by the Justice Department. There's nothing checking the exercise of executive power except the bravery of the men and women being given illegal orders. And you can see for yourself how that's playing out: People being blown to bits for the crime of being in the sights of the largest military the world has ever seen; wholesale destruction of government agnecies; and now the demolition of part of the White House. This last may not be the historical travesty it immediately appears to be -- the East Wing was built in the 1940s -- but the fact that this major project commenced without oversight, without input from the National Capital Planning Commission, that's the travesty. That might sound like pointless red tape but that Commission exists to make certain changes to government buildings are improvements for the people of the United States, not the whims of this President or that agency head.

It's over. After this there may be elections again. Democrats may even gain a majority here or there. It won't matter because there is no effective legislative body, no check on the executive. The Democrats are still trying to raise funds, talking about how Grijalva won the special election, nattering on about Maine oystermen with Totenkopf tattoos, filing lawsuits. And none of it matters AT ALL. The Republicans aren't even pretending to care about any of it because it's over.