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The national and international strategies – from the effort to overturn the election five years ago to current incursions and threats – undermine not only domestic and international legal frameworks. But that’s not all.

They jeopardize the core idea of a civilized world.

A ethical foundation of a functioning society is to forestall the stronger from harming and taking advantage of the less powerful. Otherwise, we risk being permanently immersed in a conflict of all against all where might makes right could survive.

This ideal lies at the center of the nation's founding texts. This is also the core of the postwar international order supported by the US, built on international cooperation, democracy, individual liberties, and the rule of law.

Yet, it is a vulnerable ideal, frequently ignored by those who choose to misuse their power. Maintaining it necessitates that the those in charge have enough integrity to refrain from seeking temporary advantages, and that society demand responsibility should they falter.

Absolute power does not make right. It results in turmoil, disruption, and hostilities.

Each instance individuals, companies, or nations that are richer and more powerful prey upon those that are less so, the fabric of society frays. If these actions are not contained, the structure collapses. Without intervention, the world can plunge into chaos and war. It has happened before.

Our current reality is a international landscape marked by extreme inequality. Influence and wealth are held by fewer hands than in recent memory. This encourages the elite to exploit the weaker because they act with a sense of omnipotent.

The resources of certain ultra-wealthy individuals is staggering. The influence of big tech, big oil, and large defense contractors extends over a vast portion of the world. Advanced technology is poised to further concentrate economic and political clout even more. The offensive capability of the major powers is without parallel in recorded history.

Supported by a compliant faction and a pliant judicial body, the executive office has been made into the supreme and answerable-to-none entity of government in history.

Consider this confluence and you see the danger.

An unbroken thread connects previous transgressions to ongoing threats. Both were premised on the hubris of invincibility.

You see parallel dynamics in the actions of other powers: in military conflicts, in expansive ambitions, and in the global depredation by massive conglomerates.

However, raw power does not create right. It fosters fragility, upheaval, and war.

History shows that frameworks designed to constrain the influential also shield them. Without such constraints, their endless appetite for increased control and resources in time lead to their downfall – taking down their enterprises, countries, or domains. And threaten global conflict.

Such disregard for rules will plague international stability – and indeed civilization – for the foreseeable future.