Things To Keep In Mind As The New Year Approaches - 2 of 20

2. Defend an institution. 

Follow the courts or the media, or a court or a newspaper. 

Do not speak of "our institutions" unless you are making them yours by acting on their behalf. 

Institutions don't protect themselves. 

They go down like dominoes unless each is defended from the beginning.

Yale historian and Holocaust expert Timothy Snyder wrote: "Americans are no wiser than the Europeans who saw democracy yield to fascism, Nazism, or communism. Our one advantage is that we might learn from their experience. Now is a good time to do so." 
Snyder's a member of the Council on Foreign Relations (which includes former Secretaries of State), and consults on political situations around the globe. He says: 

Above, #2 of twenty lessons from the twentieth century, adapted to the circumstances of today.