“A Republic, if you can keep it” is how Benjamin Franklin described the type of country they had created after the Constitutional Convention. There has not been a period in my lifetime when this country has been more threatened from within than it is today.

• The Democrats embrace antifa as much as the Republicans embrace the Ku Klux Klan and white nationalists. Some do; most probably do not. As for Black Lives Matter, that’s a more complex pairing. Some Democrats may proudly consider themselves comrades, others allies, others indifferent. — Karen Chellquist