America, the dumpster fire.

In 1913, citizens of the Western world had every reason to hope that the future would hold nothing but gradual but constant improvement in the quality of life. They had not the faintest idea how degraded and poisonous life would become in the "advanced" West.

Not long ago, few Americans of the thinking persuasion might have imagined that such a well-engineered republic, with its exquisite checks and balances, sturdy institutions, and time-tested traditions would end up as so much smoldering goop in a national dumpster fire, but such is the sad state-of-the-union moving into the fateful summer of 2019.^[1]

We are a feckless nation that is utterly ignorant of the jewel that we inherited from our ancestors. We have found 10,000 ways to foul our own nest and cannot manage to handle the most basic of societal and governmental functions. Complete scum undermine out most basic institutions. Government response? None.

Notes
^[1] "The Golem Strikes Back." By James Howard Kunstler, 5/24/19.