@Mame,
There is an implicit recognition from george above that a crisis (or crises, more accurately) of order with attending threats to democratic systems of governance are presently unfolding in America and more broadly in the world. In this, he's correct.
These are complex and multi-faceted matters but overall trends are undeniable. The Pentagon itself, for several years now, has recognized the threats to security arising from climate change with attending consequences of increasing migration patterns is just one, if central, elements in this picture.
Another is how our modern communication systems facilitate broad and effective campaigns of misinformation/disinformation, originating both internally and externally, which are straining or breaking prior social agreements and national/international arrangements. But it's worse than that. Also under strain or breaking are peoples' notions or what is true and false and who is to be trusted to accurately or honestly describe reality.
Only 21% of Republicans in America now believe that Biden won the last election. There is always some degree of such epistemological turmoil but the periods where it becomes acute marks the really dangerous points in any culture's history.
It seems to me that the current situation of America is important quite beyond the country itself. America, despite inevitable failings of any nation/culture, was a bold, courageous, enlightened and positive experiment in governance. The real possibility that democracy (in any meaningful sense of the term) will fail there is going to have negative, perhaps very negative, consequences for the world. Temptations towards severe authoritarianism elsewhere will be validated and justified, a trend already evident. And such authoritarian regimes will follow prior patterns of isolated power and retribution against those who oppose or who are not on board. The "common good" will be defined in terms of a severe consensus about the right of the few in power to remain in power and how everyone else must behave and what they must believe. Militaries and para-militaries will enforce the demands from those few holding power.
The presumption - the mythical story - that none of this could happen in America will not survive. Except, that is, in the propaganda outpourings of those few who now hold power and continue to use the myth for their own purposes.
How the US has now come to such a state is also a complex and multi-faceted matter. There are threads that go back to the founding and other threads that go back further to the cultural inheritances that immigrant groups brought to the colonies. There are economic factors including slavery and geopolitical factors, etc.
But there are other, more recent, factors and events which have led to this dire situation. These are the subject of the piece below. Take the time and read it.
What seems to me of critical importance right now is that we don't merely think of what's going on as sort of a mechanical process which relieves us of moral duty because, "In history, **** happens."
The insurrection is only the tip of the iceberg
Behind the insurrection of 6 January was a coup plot that was months in the making, and which involved a dastardly cast of characters