I believe that the more valuable lesson to be learned, and long remembered, is the apparent impotence of better men to stop the incompetent ignorant footnote in history.
And that impotence, as you correctly call it, is what I call the fatal flaw of our system of government. There aren’t systems without flaws, but in some of those systems a military intervention is possible when such usurpation of power takes place. Not an ideal solution, but a solution nonetheless.
Reading through the Federal Papers dealing with the advice and consent issues, I took note of their belief in high minded and moral people of character and substance who would do the right thing in government. Now then, today I don’t think many in the country would look at our government officials being people of good character and morally straight. In fact, it is almost the opposite.
IMO, it is time for a redo.