That Trump probably cannot achieve his stated aims here remains spectacularly beside the point. During the closing days of the 2020 election, I wrote repeatedly about the seriousness of Joe Biden’s refusal to reject his party’s growing demand to “pack” — i.e. destroy — the United States Supreme Court. Not once did I receive an email from a Trump voter telling me that my alarm was misplaced on the grounds that, in all likelihood, Biden would not have the votes to do it. Back then — and rightly so — the mere fact that Biden was entertaining the idea was deemed instructive: “When people tell you what they want to do with power,” my correspondents invariably opined, “you should believe them. Joe Biden cannot be trusted with power.”

Well, so it is with Donald Trump once again. When Trump declared his 2024 candidacy last month, he implicitly asked us to judge him and his plans for the country, and, eventually, to compare those plans to those that are on offer from other hopefuls. And so we must — including when he talks about the election of 2020. I have never believed that it was a good idea simply to ignore Trump’s ramblings as if he were just some washed-up radio host. But now? After Saturday’s post? Now, that is simply not an option. If Donald Trump gets his way, he will be president of the United States again, and, quite obviously, we cannot have a president of the United States who has called for throwing out a certified election, who has demanded his installation as a dictator, or who has proposed the “termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.” Ahead of time, Trump is informing us that he aspires to be a tyrant. Sic semper tyrannis.