Consider:
a) Our incompetent leader who may see reelection this Fall;
b) The politically-disguised mob rule sweeping our cities, imposing their narrow, violent anarchy on the rest of us;
c) The deepening, polarized hostilities between our two major political parties;
d) The deadly, escalating and uncontrolled ravages of the Corona virus:
e) The unrelenting escalation of our climate crisis, a challenge that we naively presume can be resolved with only non-threatening, comfy modifications to our cherished status quo;
f) Our historic misinterpretation of our great continent as little more than an endless supply of natural, economic, and social resources available for exploitation by all comers (foreign and domestic), with concerns for a society of truly enlightened, cohesive integrity relegated to secondary status.
This ought to be a sobering combination of issues. Our democracy is a certainly noble, yet fragile experiment in enlightened governance; it demands, for its basic sustainability, "eternal vigilance". Our drift into a growing complacency towards our deeper responsibilities, as citizens, may prove insufficient to prevent the familiar slide into unrest, civil war, martial law, and an essentially irreversible totalitarian regime.