I don’t think a lot of Americans have any concept of exactly how much the rest of the world hates them right now but I promise you that you’re living in a very different world moving forward as is everyone else.
You can’t spend generations telling everyone to depend on you precisely because you are selling stability and predictability and then change your mind overnight. That is going to have large multi generational consequences.
My advice is to get on top of your oligarchy problem sooner rather than later and you had best figure out a way that the fate of the world and your country doesn’t rely on what a bunch of people from Iowa think about “wokeness” every 4 years. That’s not sustainable
It is worse. Many don't care. They believe in American exceptionalism.
I just watched a stadium full of Canadian hockey fans boo a black woman in a wheelchair singing the national anthem. I’d politely suggest that while that might look like a funny story on the surface is actually very dangerous.
Who thought Canadians booing the US anthem was funny? I saw anger from jingoistic Americans. Sorrow from others.
If the rest of the world doesn't send munitions on target stateside, Americans wont care. Just like they didn't care for the past 20+ years when DoD was tasked with bombing millions others in far away lands without explicit declaration by congress.
Perhaps those who build their relationships on negotiated reciprocity rather than blind trust will fair better in the coming era.
People are motivated to make sure you feel the pain of this situation moving forward.
Right now, its just a clown show in regards to that.
I genuinely don’t mean to imply this as any kind of threat whatsoever just as a friendly pointer but I don’t think yelling “what are you going to do about it?” In a public forum under an alias attached to your real name is a particularly sensible move at the moment.
Lots of things that might have not been a big deal a week ago I would feel a lot less sure about now personally.
People will have hard choices to be made, doubly so for those who have avoided making them. It's great that you seem to now be questioning things you have thought unquestionable; things unfolding now are no surprise to me, and i expect things to get worse, even beyond the current administration or the next until I see people make hard decisions globally.
"If you can't trust America, who can you trust?"
I'm hopeful that it will create a more robust governance systems on the local level in the long run, but not without more short term pain (after all, there were a lot of non-stateside mouths being fed who will have to figure out realistic alternatives and face once unpalatable choices that will need to be made out of necessity).