It is no understatement to say that the United States is experiencing its greatest political and constitutional crisis since the Civil War, "with a reasonable chance over the next three to four years of incidents of mass violence, a breakdown of federal authority, and the division of the country into warring red and blue enclaves," as Robert Kagan wrote last year in the Washington Post. Or, to paraphrase Donald Trump's 2016 tactician Steve Bannon, the U.S. is undergoing a "deconstruction of the state."
Bannon is in federal court this week charged with contempt of Congress after he failed to comply with a subpoena from the House select committee. He declined to sit for a deposition and to provide documents related to the events of Jan. 6, 2021. His defense has shifted from a claim of executive privilege (nonexistent in his case) to the allegation that he misunderstood the deadline set by the committee.
