Various Republicans have been flirting with treason for years now, even decades.

In the late 1980s, the Reagan administration sold arms to Iran at high prices to finance the Reagan-favored “contras” fighting the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. It violated all canons of democracy: arms sales to Iran were prohibited; the U.S. government had forbidden ransom of any kind for hostages; funding the contras violated Congressional law.

The 2003 attack of Iraq by the Bush administration involved even more deceit and lying than LBJ’s war in Viet Nam in the 1960’s. In the 1970s there was Nixon’s abuse of power & obstruction of justice regarding Watergate and now Republicans in Congress solidly put partisan politics above the American people.

The most recent events seem to be a natural extension of the tribal front against all things Obama, many instances of Republican policies and actions actually operating against the welfare and interests of our democratic republic. Republicans openly thwarted Obama’s treaty efforts with Russia to restrict possession of nuclear weapons and set up a coalition of Republicans against Obama’s plan to halt Iran’s development of nuclear weapons, which both shoved Obama’s foreign policy thrusts aside and invited the Israeli prime minister to conspire against Obama.

Republican actions during the Obama terms of office always put Republican partisan interests above those of the American people, trying to vindictively scuttle health care for millions rather than make it better, and shutting down the government and not raising the debt limit, regardless of the consequences, usually for naked partisan reasons. That and worse is continuing under the Trump administration.

Now with that same tribalism formed and cemented, Republican actions have more than crossed the boundary of treason in that enemies of the United States are given comfort and even license to interfere with American elections, this by the whole Republican apparatus, Trump and Congress.

Many in the party, including the so-called Freedom Caucus in the House of Representatives, and even mainstream Republicans like Lindsay Graham, are so driven by the din of emboldened right-wing Fox-and-Breitbart-like sources, that like Pavlov’s dog, they are chasing false shadows cast by such propagandists, who include the president of the US. All are snarling at the shadows rather than real enemies of our republic like Vladimir Putin, proven to have staged cyber attacks against our democracy. And Putin is still doing it, seemingly unabated by Trump and Republicans in Congress.

No facts have to be in evidence when it comes to news sources like Fox News. Many on Fox News are competing for the ear of Donald Trump, who specifically consumes Fox and Friends and Sean Hannity every day, his brain willfully numbed like other Fox minions. The Fox-Trump team includes Republicans in Congress, with a Trump campaign team member, House Intelligence Committee Chairman, Devin Nunes, actively working to squash the investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible Trump administration collusion, an effort that is getting closer to Trump.

Recently, Devin Nunes released a fabricated memo with uncleared-classified information regarding FISA investigations of Carter Page, whom FBI evidence showed consorted with Russians. After Page’s meetings with Russia, he became a Trump foreign advisor.  Reacting to the deeply-flawed Nunes memo, Hannity, like a third-world propagandist for a sitting dictator, loudly called for Mueller’s removal. It was clearly intended to give Donald Trump an excuse for firing Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to clear a path to fire special counsel Mueller.

All Republican members of the House Intelligence Committee supported the Nunes memo effort and thus are defending a President’s efforts to obstruct Mueller’s investigation, a president who acts like an enemy of the people, and who is a closer friend of dictators like Putin than Americans he has pledged to serve in his oath of office.

For almost a year Republicans have suffered an ignorant fool who is not fit to be president. It is not just that he is unfit but he is also a danger to the welfare of our planet and our people.

But Republicans have been choosing party over country for at least two generations. The party has supported crony capitalism from the beginning of corporate efforts to control the political and economic engines of our nation, to the extent of putting corporate priorities above all else, including the health and welfare of our democracy and its people.

So, the Republican party’s dereliction of duty regarding its pledge to follow the precepts of our Constitution, a pledge embedded in their oaths of office is longstanding in year after year of choosing a narrow corporate agenda over the needs of most Americans.

Recently their actions have breached their Constitutional pledges into a category that resembles treason, amounting to a reckless endangerment of our country and our democracy.  Many members of the party are openly thwarting an effort by Robert Mueller that could prove collusion of Donald Trump and his associates with a foreign power, Russia.

The anti-Mueller fury ramped up after the prosecutor indicted former national security advisor Michael Flynn this month for lying to the FBI, though Mueller has the pick of several charges that seemingly amount to treason, were it not for Flynn’s cooperation with the investigation.

The Mueller investigation already seems to point to a number of charges against Trump, many constituting treason, but a tribally partisan Congress will not consider impeachment, though peril for our nation looms over us.

Evidence points to a role in Russian money laundering, a conspiracy with Russia to rig the election of 2016, obstruction of justice, violation of the Constitution’s Emolument’s clause, and perhaps even a role in plotting to remove Russian sanctions, thought to be quid pro quo, even before he was inaugurated.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump continues policies that have long-term consequences of destroying planet Earth and short–term consequences of bodily damage and even death from dangerous chemicals being released into our environment. He is on a path toward nuclear war with North Korea. And to satisfy a small minority of political followers, including billionaire donors like Sheldon Addellson and evangelical followers, he is committing us to relocating an embassy to Jerusalem that is already causing unrest and even death.

On another media front, most likely, gutting net neutrality is another imminent threat the Trump administration can use against those who resist pro-Trump media fronts, many of which are still aided by Russian bots and cyber-attacks.

Though Trump has chosen to ignore new congressional sanctions against Russian and Putin, Republicans in Congress likewise are choosing to ignore Trump’s breach of this legislative mandate due to his allegiance to Vladimir Putin.

This dangerous disruption of democratic processes by tribal Republicans, right wing media allies, and the Trump administration – all threaten our very republic’s existence, one of the world’s oldest democracies.

The actions of all constitute aiding and abetting a proven enemy, Russia, even while its leader continues to threaten our democracy through duplicitous cyber attacks, this while a weakened Trump-led foreign policy adds to Russian strength and alienates our proven allies.