A Jan. 25, 1899 issue of Puck magazine published a political cartoon that shows Uncle Sam lecturing four children, which represent different island countries across the globe that America colonized: Philippines, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Cuba. Image: Wikimedia Commons.

When Minnetonka mayoral candidate Jonathan Kent asked the rhetorical question, “I would love to hear the ways in which the United States and Israel are each held accountable for their actions in ways that don’t involve self-policing, regulating, and reporting,” he already knew the answer. And we know it too. The answer is: they aren’t. And they can’t be — not in the ways weaker nations are.

When smaller nations commit atrocities, the world has a standard playbook. Sanctions are imposed. Embargoes are enforced. Tribunals are convened. Leaders are marched before the International Court of Justice or the International Criminal Court. These are the rituals of accountability. Yet when the empire is accused, the playbook dissolves.

The United States has built structural immunity. Its veto at the UN Security Council shields itself and its allies from punishment. The General Assembly can do no more than issue symbolic resolutions. The International Court of Justice is ignored. The International Criminal Court is not only rejected but threatened; U.S. law authorizes military action if the ICC dares prosecute an American. And because the global economy runs on U.S. dollars, other nations cannot risk sanctions without crippling their own markets. Israel, too, benefits from this shield. When its conduct is questioned, American vetoes and aid silence calls for accountability.

So when accountability does happen, it is only the accountability the empire grants itself. In Vietnam, after the My Lai massacre where hundreds of civilians were slaughtered, only one officer was punished, and even he was eventually pardoned. In Iraq, after the horrors of Abu Ghraib prison were exposed, a handful of low-ranking soldiers were scapegoated, while no generals or leaders faced consequences. During the Iran-Contra scandal, the government was caught red-handed running an illegal operation to fund rebels in Nicaragua. Convictions followed, but presidential pardons swept them away. Again and again, accountability is staged, managed, and neutered — a theater designed to preserve the empire’s image without touching its core power.

And here is where Jonathan Kent’s question turns back on us. If empire exempts itself from accountability abroad, what happens at home? We are watching the answer unfold. The Second Trump Administration treats the Constitution as a nuisance, a suggestion, a speed bump on the road to unchecked power. The rule of law is trivialized when courts are threatened, when journalists are silenced, when political enemies are prosecuted, when entire groups of citizens — immigrants, LGBTQ people, professors, and the poor — are marked as targets of state power. If empire claims immunity abroad, presidents who see themselves as emperors will claim the same immunity at home. The veto becomes executive orders. The refusal to join the ICC becomes refusal to honor subpoenas. The shielding of allies abroad becomes pardons for loyalists at home.

This is not just a foreign policy issue. It is a survival issue for American democracy. Because if the presidency is not held in check, if Americans do not insist on real accountability at home, then the same impunity we project abroad will corrode us from within. Rome exempted its rulers from accountability, and the Republic collapsed into dictatorship. Britain exempted its monarchy and parliament from restraint, and its empire rotted under rebellion. Japan exempted its emperor from law, and its empire ended in ruin. Unchecked power is always the prelude to collapse.

That is why it matters — in this exact moment — to hold the presidency accountable, especially when it treats the Constitution as trivial. A president who shrugs at the First Amendment, who mocks checks and balances, who demands loyalty over law, is not leading a democracy. He is leading an empire. And empire has always been the enemy of accountability.

So when Jonathan Kent asks his question, the true answer is this: the only accountability that exists for the United States and Israel must come from within, from citizens who refuse to accept imperial immunity as the norm. Because if we do not insist on accountability at home, no one abroad will ever impose it.

Empires believe themselves untouchable. They believe law is for others, not for them. But empires always fall. Rome fell. Britain fell. Japan fell. And America will too, if we confuse immunity with strength. Which means the task falls to us — to demand accountability where empire denies it, to defend the Constitution when presidents endanger it, to insist that the rule of law applies not only to the weak, but also to the powerful. Because without accountability, democracy is nothing but empire draped in stars and stripes.

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