Steve Bannon is about to report to prison. His “crime” is that he refused to bow to the edicts of a Congressional committee abusing its authority for political purposes and persecuting the opponents of this lawless regime. Bannon has the mad idea that the laws and institutions of the republic are worth fighting for and that we are far down the road to tyranny.

Only days ago America watched in horror as Joe Biden babbled and stumbled his way through a debate against Donald Trump. For many of us what we saw was only confirmation of what we already knew. Joe was physically and mentally incapable of discharging the duties of President. For those who still listen to the pundits and trust the White House press spokesperson however the performance was a revelation.

In the wake of the debate, we must now as a nation confront its implications. It is not simply that Biden cannot be allowed to win a second term. The real, immediate takeaway is that Biden is not running the country now and he quite likely has not been for a very long time. Who then is running the country and under what authority?

Seymour Hersh put it quite succinctly in his recent article.

“Whatever happens, we have a president—now fully unveiled—who just may not be responsible for what he does in the coming campaign, not to mention his actions in the Middle East and Ukraine.

Whatever happened to the 25th Amendment that authorizes the vice president and a majority of the Cabinet to declare the president incompetent? What is going on in the Biden White House?”

Our nation is not being run by the man who sits in the Oval Office. It is being run by unidentified individuals around him or perhaps behind him in the shadows. None of these persons are elected officials who have the constitutional authority to act as Commander-in-Chief. None of them are subject to the checks and balances built into the republic. They have in effect usurped the President’s power and seized control over the most powerful nation on Earth.

This is precisely what Bannon is talking about when he references the death of the republic. It is not a theoretical possibility to be faced by our grandchildren. It is happening right now and those who stand in the way of this coup by the Deep State are, like Steve Bannon, silenced and shuffled off to confinement.

This did not just happen, and, ultimately, it is not really about Biden. We have been on this road for a very long time. Washington has grown ever bigger and ever more powerful. Our “public servants” have long since stopped thinking they were actually accountable to us. We the people are no longer the source of power. We are to be ruled, and those in power consider it beneath them to answer to us or explain themselves.

Recently, the Supreme Court overturned what was known as the Chevron ruling that mandated that the courts defer to the judgment of administrative agencies unless their regulations were clearly “unreasonable.” It is worth noting that the case in which the Supreme Court just ruled concerned regulations on commercial fishermen that were winked into existence by the federal bureaucracy without any action by Congress. According to these regulations commercial fishermen would not only have to comply with a stack of rules made up by federal bureaucrats, they would have to carry inspectors on board to guarantee their compliance. And, the fishermen would have to pay the cost associated with these contract “observers” – $700 a day.

Somehow the federal government abrogated to itself the authority to order struggling fishermen barely keeping their heads above water to hire an employee, at the fishermens’ expense, whose job it was to watch them work and then report on them to the authorities.

That’s a small example of the arrogance on display every day by federal authorities. Not all are so narrow in application.

Homeland Security Secretary Mayorkas recently announced that he has the authority to admit even more illegals if he chooses to do so. Specifically, individuals who have been caught and removed from the country can simply apply for readmission using the “CBP One” app and Mayorkas can then decide if he so chooses to let them back in. No need to worry about borders or laws or what the American people want. Mayorkas decides. All others must obey.

Mayorkas also recently advised that he has the legal authority to raise the inflow of parole migrants via CBP One, regardless of immigration numbers set by Congress in 1965 and 1990.

Mayorkas has made no secret of the reasons for his actions. He disagrees with the existing immigration laws. He finds them inequitable. He believes our policies should be different and that we owe some sort of obligation to the world to allow anyone who wants to into our nation.

What he does not believe is that he should have to consult the American people about any of that. What he does not believe in is a republic in which the peoples’ representatives make the laws. He will decide, and all others will simply obey.

Some will. Some like Steve Bannon will find the moral courage to stand up, do what is right, and put the fate of the republic before their own personal well-being. The question that hangs in the balance is how many will join him.

Get off the couch. Put down your tablet. As Teddy Roosevelt would sav, get in the “arena.” Speak up. Organize. Refuse to comply.

Bannon is willing to go to prison to save his country…what will you do?