The United States is a country that could not keep a demagogue from the White House; could not stop an insurrectionist mob from storming the Capitol; could not win (or at least avoid losing) a war against a morally and technologically retrograde enemy; cannot conquer a disease for which there are safe and effective vaccines; and cannot bring itself to trust the government, the news media, the scientific establishment, the police or any other institution meant to operate for the common good.

A civilisation “is born stoic and dies epicurean”, wrote historian Will Durant about the Babylonians. Our civilisation was born optimistic and enlightened, at least by the standards of the day. Now it feels as if it’s fading into paranoid senility.