(CNN) Here's the situation. The nation's leader has behaved in ways that experts have denounced as unconstitutional. His opposition is livid and calling for his removal, while many in the leader's party slavishly attempt to justify his conduct. The media cannot stop talking about it. The general public hasn't entirely made up its mind, but seem much less up in arms. Overall, in all likelihood, the leader's potential breach of the law will yield no immediate consequences for him.

Laura Beers

Now here's the thing that's truly mind-boggling. This week, that brief, damning summary describes the political reality of two of the world's leading nations, both the United Kingdom and the United States. As an American born and raised in Washington DC and a historian of modern Britain now rearing a blended US-UK family in both countries, I can only marvel and strive to make sense of what's happening as both countries seem to sink ever deeper into a political abyss of their own making.

The conclusions are hardly encouraging. While both prime minister Boris Johnson and President Donald Trump were elected under the banner of one of their country's major political parties, both stake their claim to legitimacy not on their having won out in the traditional game of party politics, but on their ability to cut through "politics as usual" and act on behalf of the popular will.

In the US, this populism manifests itself most clearly in Trump's promise to "drain the swamp" in Washington, or side-step the party hacks, including those members of his own party, who see their only job as maintaining the status quo.

To review: In Britain, the high court declared on Wednesday that Johnson's actions advising the queen to prorogue, or suspend, Parliament for five weeks in the run up to the October 31 Brexit deadline was unlawful, as there appeared to be no justification for the suspension. Their ruling compelled Johnson to leave the UN climate change summit in New York and fly back to London where he met MPs with defiance, declaring the court's decision wrong and reiterating his determination to "get Brexit done."

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