John Avlon: “The U.S. Constitution was designed to protect the rights of the people against the rise of a would-be tyrant. The founders understood they were embarking on a rebellious project that had never succeeded before. As John Adams scowled, ‘There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.’ Their aim was to build a structure that could withstand the forces that destroyed democracies in the past.”“That’s why the founders explicitly warned about the dangers of a demagogue, the poison of hyperpartisanship, the corrosive effects of corruption and foreign influence, the politicization of religion, and the erosion of the separation of powers.”“Yes, by those basic standards, we’re living through the founders’ nightmare. But the right response is not civic despair but a defiant resolve to reclaim American patriotism and fix what’s been broken so that we can strengthen our democracy to survive the next 250 years.”