We might be in a lot more trouble that we think.

It might just be the negative effects of social media. It might not be as bad as it can sometimes seem. But it might be that our democracy is being dismantled right in front of us.

Let’s start with America. It’ll be hard to catch you up if you’re new to this, but, to summarise, it seems with the recent indictment of 12 Russians for interfering in the election of Drumpf that the investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller has uncovered some pretty damning evidence that Putin was heavily involved in installing the orange cockwomble in the Whitehouse. Cambridge Analytica appears to have been involved, stealing the data of many, many Facebook users. Hundreds of thousands of fake social media accounts were set up in Russia to spread untruth and cloud the issues. Twitter has, only recently, starting to delete these profiles – thousands of them at a time. That’s a good thing, but it’s also a bit late, and I expect they’ll be replaced before long.

Republicans have been warping democracy for some time however, and the most damaging of these arsemaggots has been Mitch McConnell. Mitch is, to put it mildly, a huge fucking arsehole. A hateful shit of a man so far in the pocket of the corporate and ideological interests he serves in place of actual people that if there is such as thing as a soul, his is no longer anything more than a wank stain on Bernard Manning’s bed sheets. The Supreme Court of the United States, when it needs to appoint a judge, has that judge selected by the sitting President. Obama’s choice was denied a place because McConnell had control of the Senate and delayed the hearing until after the election, which Drumpf won. The spot Obama was not allowed to fill has therefore now been filled by a Republican nominee, needless to say of a hard-right persuasion. I’ve heard a number of times that this is not legal. But I don’t get it – if it is illegal, why has it been allowed to go on, and why was nobody arrested. Is it illegal or not?

The Republican’ts’ (see what I did there?) dodgy tactics has meant some wins for them at the Supreme Court, not the least significant is the Court’s decision to allow them to continue gerrymandering. This means using your knowledge of what people are most likely to vote for in a geographic area and using that knowledge to draw constituency boundaries to give one party an unfair advantage. In many places, because of gerrymandering, constituency boundaries look utterly bonkers, Democrats require a great deal more votes to get elected, and the newly Republican-favouring Supreme Court shut down a motion to prevent it. Even better, one of the more moderate judges is now retiring, meaning it’s possible McConnell could get another hard right judge on the court, potentially paving the way to overturn the historic Roe vs Wade, making abortion illegal again. In 2018. Even better, the latest nominee doesn’t believe a sitting President should be investigated or impeached, and should basically sit there like some kind of emperor, immune to law and judgement. So Mueller’s investigation could be halted at any time, leaving the whole corrupt lot of them free from criminal prosecution. I keep reading people dramatically tweeting that the Republicunts (see what I did there?) will be remembered on the wrong side of history, as if at the end of all this America won’t just be an annex of Russia, with democracy and actual freedom and independence a thing of the past. They still assume they’ll win, but from what I can see, that is somewhat up in the air.

But why should anyone in the UK care? First of all, because that attitude of not caring about anyone except ourselves is what’s got us in the current mess we’re in. Secondly, like it or not, America does have a large impact on world events, and the current clusterfuck in the White House will have far-reaching effects for everybody, not just Americans and their brown-skinned neighbours.

But mostly, because there is some evidence that Russia also had a significant impact on the vote to shoot ourselves in the foot leave the EU. The same Russians that have been involved with the U.S. election, were involved with Farage and the Vote Leave campaign. Cambridge Analytica were involved, as was Facebook, who has recently been fined the maximum amount possible for violating the Data Protection Act during the time of the election. And then trying to cover it up. The only place this appears to be being investigated is at the Guardian, by award-winning journalist Carol Cadwalladr. It’s being picked up by American newsgroups but nobody else in the UK is covering it. I’d expect that of the Fail and the Scum, but not even Channel 4 is really covering it. It does appear that the Leave camp broke electoral law, but it still doesn’t seem to matter. So many people are so disengaged that either they don’t know or don’t care.

Or is it something else? Have I actually got nothing to worry about? Is it nothing more than a conspiracy theory that has snagged me and some of the people I follow on social media? Am I worrying that democracy in the U.S. and, by extension, here too, is being dismantled by a hostile foreign power and some collaborators in country unnecessarily? I kind of hope so. And you can tell it’s a truly messed up state of affairs if I hope my mental state is a bit off rather than what I’m seeing and reading being true.

But if it is true, and Rees-Mogg, Farage and BoJo force us to leave the EU without a proper deal (leaving them free to inflict all manner of right-wing ideology on us – has this been the plan all along?), and the band of reprobates over the water continue to push America to a lesser, more insular and racist version of itself, then hopefully enough people won’t roll over and let them do it, and will continue to resist.