It was at 11:48 a.m. Eastern Standard Time Wednesday, January 20, 2021, a “palendrome” date (“12021” being the same forward and backwards), that the biggest climate change event in U.S. history happened. It was defined by a great collective exhale. For millions of us, we’ve been holding our breath, figuratively at least, from the time that a two-bit con man, grifter and sociopath moved into the White House four years ago. The physical reaction was more than called for, as the man proved to the world in his final days, when he incited a riot with the intent of executing a coup against the constitutionally-grounded government of the U.S.

This was a matter of no mean significance, as it came from the highest authority in the land, the president himself. For everyone with grave concerns about this man, their misgivings were proven correct in spades by the coup attempt and its motive, coming from Trump himself. We will learn in the coming months much more about the machinations that went into that coup attempt. It was intended to involve far more horrific outcomes than materialized, including loss of life of elected officials and a disruption of the confirmation the election of Joe Biden that could have led to chaos and the kind of dissembling that may have resulted in Trump’s continued rule under severe police state conditions.

Some of us feared and warned this foul administration would represent a coup against democracy, that Trump was determined from Day One to be dictator for life. On his very first day, he ordered his press secretary, no less, to force a bald-faced lie about the attendance numbers at his inauguration down the throats of the free press. It was a prelude for what was to come, including the relentless attacks on the press as “fake news.” This is the first goal of a dictator, to suppress the free press. Documents show that had the coup somehow succeeded on Jan. 6, the first order of business was to be the shutting down of all media. Trump bypassed that media throughout his four years by use of Twitter, for which it took all but the last two weeks of his regrettable reign to be cut off to him.

As we’ve editorialized in the past, the major media can be soundly criticized for its shortcomings to allow for Trump. But on the other hand, the U.S. media played a heroic role in exposing his crimes with solid exposes that eroded his power. The Washington Post, the New York Times and others played huge roles in weakening Trump’s fascist intentions. This newspaper was 100 percent in moral alignment with this effort from day one.

Inauguration Day 2017 signaled that a new would-be fascist regime was grounded in an outrageous repudiation of truth. It was the relentless demand that truth be asserted and affirmed that brought that most foul effort down.