Or it could have been a protest that turned violent on a scale without recent precedent, leading to the deaths of multiple protesters and counter-protesters and maybe police or federal troops. But it was pretty clear that at some point we were likely to cross into terra incognita via especially salient violence, because the momentum in that direction has been tangible. And, since Trump’s inauguration in January, another thing has become increasingly clear: In the event that the threshold-crossing violence turned out to be blue-on-red rather than red-on-blue, Trump would likely use that as an excuse to push the authoritarian envelope further than he’s already pushed it.