Trump turns 80 in two weeks. Actuarial tables suggest he could remain alive and politically active for another seven or eight years — meaning Americans shouldn’t assume his influence simply expires with his current term.

The comforting thought is that the American Constitution bars a third elected term. The less comforting thought is that constitutions are only as strong as the willingness to enforce them. Traditional checks on U.S. presidential power are now weak or inoperative. Republicans have little willingness to challenge any misconduct by Trump.

A politicized Supreme Court has already granted him broader immunity and seems likely to back whatever he demands. Trump’s cronies have systematically replaced senior military leaders with people chosen for their personal devotion to him.

So the real question becomes: if Trump were to declare himself President for Life, would judges, legislators, generals, civil servants, and ordinary citizens actually resist?

I worry that too few would.

Democracies rarely collapse in a single dramatic moment. More often they erode slowly—norms abandoned one by one, institutions gradually captured, each new breach of convention absorbed as the new normal.

Americans who find these concerns far-fetched might reflect on how much that is already happening today would have been considered unthinkable just a decade ago.

If democracy is lost below the 49th parallel, British Columbia may seek a formal alliance with Cascadia, or at least the portions that include Washington, Oregon and Northern California.

Another possibility is for Canada to recognize that it has more in common with other countries. It would then seek stronger ties with Eastern and Southern Asia and northern nations that are part of the EU.