Taken Hostage - an edited version of this post is scheduled to appear in Letters to the Editor in the New York Times

("White House Denies Violating Judge's Order in deporting Venezuelans")

Yet another nail in democracy's coffin, as the administration blatantly defies an unequivocal court order.

As the will of Republicans in Congress to constrain the President from doing his worst has been completely neutered, it has been left to the judicial branch to give any remaining meaning to checks and balances. And when a minion of Mr. Trump announces without hesitation that the directive imposed upon the President's action was literally not worth the paper it was printed on, there is virtually nothing left standing between him and dictatorship.

It has all happened with such speed, not nearly two months into the second, and increasingly likely not last term of this President.

This was not merely a plane carrying a group of immigrants to El Salvador. Also on board was our very way of government, taken hostage and in grave danger of disappearing forever.