The danger of the Donald Trump presidency lies in how he can make the morally and ethically repugnant seem routine. The outrages pile up – the shredding of environmental regulations, the enabling of white supremacists – and Americans, used to a new normal, shrug and go about their day.

Outrage can be a finite resource. And in the annals of Trump’s wreckage of what was already a frail democracy, his vice-president staying in a Trump-branded hotel in Ireland this week won’t rate even a mention in a US history class 20 years from now. Mike Pence, loyal to the end, eschewed a Dublin hotel near the president of Ireland, whom he had traveled across the ocean to meet, for Trump International Golf Links & Hotel in Doonbeg, more than 140 miles away.

Mike Pence accused of humiliating hosts in Ireland: 'He shat on the carpet' Read more

Marc Short, Pence’s chief of staff, said Trump suggested the vice-president stay there. Why not? It was new business for a president who claims to be a billionaire – his true finances are not known – and cash he probably needs, given the financial struggles of his branded properties. Republicans have spent at least $20m at Trump-family hotels since 2015, according to a Center for Responsive Politics study, a brazen ethical breach that puts Trump in league with any craven, tinpot dictator straining to enrich family and friends at the expense of everyone else.

Had a Democratic president attempted even the mildest version of this corruption, Republicans would be in a blind rage. An Obama-branded hotel would be picketed, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham would talk of nothing else for the rest of the year and GOP lawmakers would be drawing up impeachment papers. In the meantime, with Democrats actually in charge of the House, the judiciary committee is preparing investigations into how Trump drives business to his family operations.

Amid the maelstrom of the last two years, it’s an almost forgotten fact that the president has probably violated the emoluments clause of the constitution many times. Trump is not the first president to ignore constitutional laws and democratic norms to get his way – any Trump hater has to be careful not to pine for the interventionist lust of a George W Bush – but he is remarkably uninterested in even attempting to comply with the law.

Presidents are prohibited from accepting any payment from the federal or state government, beyond their salary. To date, most of the focus on the emoluments clause has been on Trump accepting unconstitutional gifts from foreign governments. Like Republican operatives, officials from overseas have sought to curry favor with Trump by booking stays at his hotels.

The quid pro quo is standard operating procedure under Trump. A hack businessman of the first order and a former donor who used to try to curry favor with politicians himself, Trump knows of no other way to live his life.

What’s to stop Trump from continually violating the emoluments clause or any other law in our constitution? Virtually nothing

What Trump has exposed is at least one fatal flaw in American democracy that the next president, Democrat or Republican, must seek to correct. The deranged, despotic and corrupted commander-in-chief is not well contained by the system we have, designed more than 200 years ago in a very different world. A president is beyond the conventional reaches of law, unable to be indicted or seriously challenged on any ethical issue.

What’s to stop Trump from continually violating the emoluments clause or any other law in our constitution? Virtually nothing. Impeachment is an inadequate response because it’s purely a political convention, subject to whoever controls the House and Senate. Progressives will sleep better at night when Democrats vote to impeach Trump, feeling they’ve secured their place in history by standing up for justice and decency. But a Republican Senate will never convict Trump – not over emoluments, obstruction of justice or anything else. Self-satisfaction wilts against this reality.

New guardrails must be built and new laws enacted to restrain the imperial presidency. Both parties like it when they are in power. Bush was able to wage endless wars and erect a mass surveillance state that Obama happily safeguarded. Democrats never cared to figure out ways to prevent a president from wantonly flouting the constitution because they never imagined, feeling so smug and safe, that such a man as Trump could seize power.

But here we are. A for-sale sign hangs over the Trump White House. The taxpayers will undoubtedly foot the bill for more hotel stays and that cash will inevitably end up in the shrinking well of the Trump family business. We must keep our outrage. It’s all we have.