From Jon Meacham last night on MSNBC’s All In, when Chris Hayes asked for the historical context of possible criminal charges against former president Donald Trump:
What are we going to do when a huge chunk of one of the two major political parties … would still walk through fire for this guy? That’s a central problem that no legal action can take care of.
(For) those of us who think … Trumpism is a virus … (we must say) that … the Constitution matters, the rule of law matters, the Declaration of Independence matters.
If we don’t … we’re going to be locked into this endless reality show, and the problem … is that it’s not a show. We’ve seen that on January 6th (2021). … I believe firmly that this generation will be judged by our success or failure at standing up to a totalitarian impulse in the United States.
Meacham quoted Thomas Paine’s January 1776 Common Sense statement that in some countries the king is law, but in this soon-to-be-birthed country, the law is king.

From “Thomas Paine,” by Norman Provizer, The First Amendment Encyclopedia, Middle Tennessee State University