Since President Trump fired FBI Director James Comey on Tuesday, the media have been in an uproar with conspiratorial claims that the Russia investigation was the cause. On CNN Sunday morning, serial plagiarist Fareed Zakaria kicked off his show by declaring that there was only one group that could defend America from Trump: The Media. “Donald Trump in much of his rhetoric and many of his actions poses a danger to American democracy,” he announced. “Our task is, quite simply, to keep alive the spirit of American democracy.”

He started off his opening monologue by claiming that “As regular viewers know, I have tried to evaluate Donald Trump's presidency fairly.” He complemented Trump on selected some capable people for “high office,” but followed that up with a dire warning. “But there has always been another aspect to this presidency lurking beneath the surface, sometimes erupting into full view as it did this week,” he added. “Donald Trump in much of his rhetoric and many of his actions poses a danger to American democracy.”

There typically would only one way to keep Trump in check according to Zakaria, and that would be through impeachment. The CNN host wrote off that avenue and cut down Congressional Republicans for not standing up to the man he seemed to be equating to a dictator:

Since Trump's own party controls both chambers of Congress there has been little resistance to him there. So far it appears the Republican Party is losing any resemblance to a traditional western political party. Instead simply turning into something commonly found in the developing world -- a platform to support the ego, appetites, and interests of one man and his family.

“There are only two forces left that can place some constraints on Donald Trump, the courts, and the media. And he has relentlessly attacked both,” Zakaria argued as he rattled off instances where Trump has criticized courts and judges. “That leaves the media. Trump has gone at them, at us, like no president before. Smearing news organizations, attacking individual journalists and threatening to strip legal protections guaranteed to a free press. We will survive, but we must recognize the stakes.”

Zakaria seems to be asserting that Trump’s tweets were so powerful that they could render the entire U.S. judicial system useless in keeping his danger at bay, but the media were the ones who could persevere and protect America. He omitted how the Obama administration targeted Fox News by trying to get them excluded from the White House press pool and labeled James Rosen as a co-conspirator for not revealing the source of a leak.

The media’s mission, according to Zakaria was to:

Never let the public forget that many of the attitudes and actions of this president are gross violations of the customs and practices of the modern American system; that they are aberrations and they cannot become the new norms. That way, after Trump, the country will not start the next presidency with tattered standards and sunken expectations. Our task is, quite simply, to keep alive the spirit of American democracy.

He also claimed that the media needed to cover the Trump administration fairly, but that quick point went right out the window with his own rant. His hyperbolic smears took his political analysis to a dangerous new low. It’s rather ridiculous for Zakaria to frame the media as the country’s saviors since they have a lower approval rating than the President himself.

Transcript below: