READ: He *will* arrest his enemies. (Updated)

"Lock her up" was never just a slogan. Trump is preparing to round up his rivals — and will obliterate the rule of law.

The President of the United States was asked this weekend whether he’d be comfortable seeing former FBI Director James Comey and former CIA Director John Brennan arrested live on television by his administration.

“Would not bother me at all,” he said.

I was never in that category of person who thought Donald Trump’s revenge musings were just a joke. I took him at his word. In fact, I was concerned enough to write a book about it, with the subtitle A Warning to Save Democracy from Trump’s Revenge. The president and his allies dismissed my warnings about his plans as “fake news,” “phony,” and “malicious and preposterous,” while deriding me as “a lying sack of shit.”

Now they’ve carried out the majority of my predictions. So much for calling it fake news.

But Trump hasn’t locked up any of his enemies yet. A change of heart, you say? Certainly not. Since the first administration, I can tell you that Trump’s desire to defy the Constitution has only grown more determined, especially to charge his detractors with crimes.

He will do it. I’d like to be wrong, but I won’t be.

The delay stems from the so-called banality of evil — the fact that it takes a little time and a bit of bureaucracy to carry out government-sponsored acts of retribution. You see, in order to put on show trials, you must build the sets and sew the costumes and write the scripts. Otherwise, the audience won’t believe what they’re seeing. And with three-plus years left in office, Trump and his cast of second-rate political understudies have plenty of time to produce a spectacle. Believe me, they want you to see them handcuff his enemies, jail them, and put them on trial.

I talked about this on MSNBC’s Sunday show yesterday:

As I write this, administration officials are hunting for infractions committed by Trump’s targets and gussying up the facts to distract from the president’s motives. Look at the allegations dredged up against Federal Reserve official Lisa Cook. Isn’t it odd that the president mused about taking over the Federal Reserve a few weeks ago … flirted with firing its head Jerome Powell … and then one of Powell’s deputies is accused of filling out mortgage forms wrong, years ago? Suddenly Trump has a “reason” to fire her. What remarkable timing!

When Donald Trump says it “would not bother” him to watch people like Comey and Brennan arrested, he’s actually giving a directive to his lieutenants: It would please me very much, in fact. Proceed accordingly.

And they are. The president’s henchmen are moving forward with official acts of retaliation. Sometime soon, the charges will follow. Just take a look at Trump’s growing enemies list. Of course, Vice President J.D. Vance says the president does not have an enemies list. I suppose, in the VP’s view, it’s entirely coincidental that so many of Trump’s critics have found themselves under federal investigation. Just routine investigations. Nothing to see here, folks.

But soon enough people will surely be arrested and charged. Notwithstanding the hand-waving and smoke bombs thrown by J.D. Vance, we need to be ready — not just emotionally, but intellectually — to see through the façade.

Trump’s team will try to distract the American people by spotlighting whatever “facts” they manage to dredge up. John Bolton? Not a revenge investigation, they’ll say. He emailed sensitive information! Lisa Cook? Not a revenge investigation, they’ll say. She misfiled her mortgage papers! James Comey? Not a revenge investigation, they’ll say. He posted the number “8647” to threaten the president! And so on.

The investigative details are not the point. The point is that the government is being aimed like a weapon at Trump’s perceived enemies. The story is the fishing expedition itself — the deliberate abuse of power to go find something, anything, to punish dissent. With enough time, they’ll succeed; you’re bound to see someone jaywalk if you follow them and watch them long enough. As the old Soviet saying goes: “Show me the man, and I’ll show you the crime.”

It may happen to me, too, sooner or later. Trump has accused me of the nation’s highest crime: treason. In a comical inversion of the justice process, he first declared me guilty of that crime and then directed his enforcers to find the proof. I don’t know what they’ll seize on. Neither do they. But when they do, they’re counting on this: that people will focus on the allegation, not the abuse of power that led them there.

So when Donald Trump says it wouldn’t bother him to see his enemies arrested, I believe him. But let’s make damn sure it bothers the American people. If it doesn’t, then we don’t deserve a democracy.

Watch my conversation with Norman Eisen, Joyce Vance, and company here.