Having watched the movie Snowden it appears to me that all of Congress knows that at any time regardless of party an individual can be destroyed directly or indirectly by the info gathered by the NSA
Obama took Hillarys FBI file threat to the next level, and everyone lives in fear of
their turn coming...
I don’t believe that. It’s not fear that drives them. It’s greed. Getting as rich as possible and setting up their kids to do the same.
Look, anyone with any sense of history knows the USA wasn't going to last forever. Aging is a result of imperfect cell replication; so too populations, where each successive generation experiences mutations. At present, we are so far removed from the original governing & organizing principles that it's really just a monster at this point.
Since there are no longer any political corrective measures that can applied, we've reached the stage where every civilization has gone before. What comes next is a battle for control, where the loser is barred from the public sphere. Patriots know exactly what progs intend, but how many nationalists are willing to apply the same measures? Trump had his chance, but in the final analysis, it's clear he really didn't want to be "that guy". Too bad, because deferring the situation is only going to make it worse.
However, what's really going to make things 'interesting' are larger scale issues that normal political conversations don't address. I'm speaking about resource constraints, such as peak oil, overpopulation and environmental degradation. The conflicts already occurring on the margins - in the least developed nations - is what's driving the migratory herds to first world countries.
Add to this mix a whole host of scientific and technical advances in genetic engineering, atomic level computing (sensory devices + computational abilities), etc and it's going to be a wide open fight for control. I for one have pretty much conceded any short-term concern - it's really just a waste of time. Of far more interest is puzzling out the medium term game and being financially positioned.