"The barbarians are at the gates."

There's an old metaphor to denote a life-threatening emergency: "The barbarians are at the gates."

In the U.S. in 2026 the barbarians aren't just AT the gates, they are inside the gates.

• They have lifetime jobs in universities.
• Lifetime appointments as federal judges at every level.
• They control the Mainstream Media--virtually every television network, cable-TV channels and all newspapers.
• They control what's amusingly known as "the entertainment industry:"  movies, television and the music industry.
• They've used congress to wangle hundreds of billions in government (taxpayer-funded) grants, with no effective oversight as to how they spend the money.  Example: billions spent in California on "the homeless" with nothing to show for it except wealthy pols and directors of NGOs.
• Without exception, all the above organizations support the Democrat Partei and socialism.
• They control elections--registration and vote counting--in virtually every big city, even if the governor and legislature are conservative, because virtually all big cities are Democrat-run.
• They control what's known as the "permanent bureaucracy" of the federal government--the Deep State--civil service employees who essentially can't be fired, and who cunningly sabotage any efforts at reform, as with Fauci and his lackeys.
• They block all efforts to prosecute massive fraud in government programs like Medicare and Medicaid, because grifters kick back millions to Democrat officials.
• They've even gotten their people elected as "nominal" Republicans--RINOs--who routinely vote with the Democrats to block all but the most trivial reform.

If you've ever been puzzled by how clearly-guilty people like Fauci or Eric Swalwell or Nancy Pelosi or the Somali grift machine in Minnesotastan are never tried and imprisoned for their corruption, everything you just read explains it.

The same things explain why policies favored by a huge majority of Americans--like photo-ID to vote--never pass, even when nominal Republicans have a majority in both chambers of congress: fake Republicans (RINOs) vote with Dems to defeat the reforms.

Are you starting to understand yet?

(H/T Thomas Sowell)