Admittedly, it is hard to get one’s head around the total package of what the Trump administration represents and is unleashing against the American constitutional republic and its people. This is a whole new level of assault and if it is not stopped and remedied quickly, its results may become irreversible.

On the one hand, there is the willful collusion between the Trump campaign and the most thuggish and deceitful elements of Russian oligarchical deception and dirty trick operations, far more sinister and ghoulish than most naïve Americans can even fathom or have the heartless will to execute.

It is total Mafia. You can’t even get a beginner’s permit in this “club” unless you’ve demonstrated a willingness to nail your grandmother’s cat to a garage door and set its tail on fire.

These are the people who have wickedly compromised our so-called president and many of the people around him. This is why no one should be surprised to learn that not only Trump but a lot more of his high-level appointees are part of the auxiliary “club” of deeply compromised and blackmailed officials.

No matter how important someone can make themselves look on Capitol Hill with their fancy black suits, shiny black shoes, $200 haircuts and gruff macho personas, they all look the same with their clothes off, squealing in unsavory bedroom positions with a video camera whirring.

This isn’t just a matter of foibles, it is a matter of dead serious coercion and a veritable lifetime of fear-based, degraded slavery.

But this is just about the enforcement arm of this operation.

On the other hand, paying the bills for all this are the sociopathic leaders of the global military-industrial complex and its worldwide financial entanglements who know no end to the misery they are willing to inflict on the “little people” who in this country rely on simple things like Medicare, Social Security and food stamps.

This is the same age-old universe of evil, the sworn enemy of democracy as we know it, that runs the Russian Mafia, a good chunk of the U.S. government by now, and the draconian budget cuts that are now being channeled through the U.S. Congress.

They do what they do in the name of whatever works for them, including false prophets, so-called “evangelical” religion and mean-spirited cults. There are no boundaries for this, no meaningful divisions among political operations, social structures or varied tastes in religion and earthly delights.

Their tools are the age-old ones, the notorious acronym of “MICE” (money, ideology, compromise and ego), to bend people to a will that is much stronger than ordinary people can even imagine.

This needs to be rooted out, or it’s curtains for our country and a rule of law based on inalienable human rights.

Fighting back against it requires courage and tenacity from the many desk chairs of influence we have in America.

If Trump can be cornered like a rat and forced out, this evil is not going away. Even with the most concerted efforts of millions, it will not die. But it can be disabled.

There is a dark side to human nature, just as there are dark holes in the universe that are destroying the matter that the rest of it needs to generate life, intelligence and evolution through love. It is really a cosmic fight and we have guidelines on this planet for choosing and engaging the fight for good over evil.

“God hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.” The proclamation from an Old Testament prophet (Micah) sums up what is the common cornerstone of the Judaic, Islamic and Christian traditions derived from it, and of all the world’s great faiths in fact.

The enemies of this sentiment strive to suppress it by driving wedges between its advocates. Reforging a solidarity of spirit among them all is the pathway to the future, although not without a real fight.

I am an optimist based on no evidence other than the inherent power in this conviction.

Nicholas Benton may be emailed at nfbenton@fcnp.com.