I’m starting to feel like the frog in the slowly heating pot of water.

National Guard troops patrolling Los Angeles. A judge just ruled it’s a violation of the Posse Comitatus Act, but that ruling doesn’t change much.

The military take-over of the federal district. “Crime is out of control,” according to the White House, though the city’s administration says those figures are a lie. No matter who’s right, we’re becoming inured to seeing troops in the streets.

Talk of next sending the troops into Chicago or some other major city. We’ll survive that, won’t we? After all, New Yorkers have gotten used to heavily armed people in fatigues at major events and gatherings. Those troops may not have chosen to be here, but we still have to thank them for their service.

Pair that increasing military presence at home with the spate of national emergencies the president is in love with declaring: the national emergency over immigration that the administration is using to justify increasing number of deportations. And the national emergency over international trade that was the justification for illegally imposed tariffs. And now there’s talk of the president declaring a national emergency over housing, because people in their 20s and 30s can’t afford to buy houses, because not enough new houses are being built.

Add in the president’s continual whining about that elections aren’t “secure,” that we can’t trust the mail-in paper ballots, or the electronic voting machines, or any other facet of the system, and that the federal government is going to have to take over the machinery of elections, just to ensure that they’re fair.

Do you see where this is going? This is all in the first seven months of this presidential administration. We are being inculcated to the steady stream of major emergencies demanding extraordinary governmental intervention. We are being taught to distrust the institutions of free and open government that have served us so well for two centuries. And we are growing desensitized to the elements of control such as the Army patrolling our cities.

It isn’t very much of a leap of reasoning to imagine we’ll be told we have to respond to some emergency in the summer of 2028, while the government is trying to make our electoral system “safe,” which will require a delay in election day, perhaps “just a few months.”

I think we’re in trouble. I feel the temperature of this water rising, but will we be smart enough to turn off the gas before it starts boiling?