EPA says it will eliminate its scientific research arm

It's really depressing how the US system seems to have existed "on belief". Once somebody set out to damage or destroy it, away it went. Pretty much without a whimper.

As I recall, the system was set up with 3 branches of government in tension. Obviously, that was naive.

All societies are consensus realities wholly dependent upon participation.

The system was fine but no one has yet constructed a system that can withstand weaponized mass stupidity. Even the ones created to combat corruption fail to account for this danger.

So.

Germany has learned this lesson the hard way, with a 'defensive' constitution post-1945. You don't have 100% free speech in Germany, and it is possible to make parties illegal. It's not without its issues (currently, the far-right AfD might be banned using these laws but the whole system has been dragging its feet) but it is a lesson the US should have learned after the first Trump term.

Democracies by default assumed that all players in the system are supportive of the system itself, kind of like all early Internet protocols assumed that there are no malicious users.