The first tyranny was the warlord king. For most of human history, power came from violence. Kings ruled because their ancestors slaughtered their neighbors, seized land, and enforced obedience at sword point. They claimed God had chosen them, demanded loyalty, and crushed dissent. By 1776, monarchy was so normalized that the idea of overthrowing a king was considered radical, dangerous, and insane. But that was exactly what the American Revolution set out to do. King George III ruled as all kings did. He taxed, punished, and occupied at will. He treated the colonies as property. Jefferson spelled it out in the Declaration, describing a ruler who had become a tyrant, "unfit to govern a free people." The Founders rejected that model completely. No kings. No thrones. No divine rights. Would you want to live under an all-powerful king?

We now have a president who openly admires strongmen and autocrats. He talks about ruling, not governing. He issues decrees like a monarch and demands personal loyalty and a constant stream of gifts and flattery. He surrounds himself with suck-ups, fellow billionaires, and yes men. He's reimagined the White House not as the people's house but as a palace, complete with plans for a massive ballroom modeled after the gilded throne room of the Winter Palace in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Do you think that President Trump exhibits some of the same behaviors that modern autocratic strongmen (warlord kings) do/did when they were in power?

The second tyranny the Founders feared was the morbidly rich. Thomas Jefferson and John Adams wrote again and again about how wealth corrupts democracy, never mincing words. Jean-Jacques Rousseau warned that the central duty of a republic was to protect the poor from the tyranny of the rich. Jefferson agreed, writing that the rich prey on the poor like animals "devouring their own kind." Adams warned that once wealth and power become hereditary, elections would collapse into corruption. Do you agree with Thomas Jefferson and John Adams?

Trump is an oligarch who's stocked his administration with oligarchs. Billionaires write this administration's policy. Billionaires get tax cuts. Billionaires dismantle regulations that protect workers, consumers, and the planet. The morbidly rich now sit openly in the halls of power, not behind the curtain but right at the table, shaping an economy designed to funnel wealth upwards and lock it there. This system Trump is reinventing is not capitalism. It's aristocracy with better branding. Do you agree with Thom Hartmann's conclusion?