Joy Reid is filled with despair today (ME TOO!)

[calimary]

40. Well, all your post has made me think of is empires - and their rise and INEVITABLE fall.

And I seriously do wonder if our country is on that same track (like ALL the rest of 'em) throughout history, whether it's recorded in writing, oral tradition, or even the fossil record built over the eons.

Even the most ferocious dominators or dominating groups eventually lose their dominant position. Whether it's Nazi Germany or the British Empire or the Spanish Empire or the Roman (Holy or otherwise) Empire or the Phoenicians or Greeks or Hittites or Egyptians or Babylonians or Huns or Genghis Khan - or even in the creature kingdom - Tyrannosaurus Rex and raptors and other predators at the top of the food chain, and so forth. That universal cliche seems to apply across the board - "what goes up must come down."

With the way our country's psyche, its whole collective being, seems to be on a deteriorating spiral, manifesting a downward trend that only seems to be accelerating, I have to concede that I can't help but think that's US now. That WE are that. Could it be that it's simply now OUR turn on that inevitable slide, having had our turn on the top rung of the civilization ladder? And if so, in that regard at least, we're frankly nothing special. We're simply taking our place, and our turn, in the cycle of rise-and-fall. Seems as though every dominant entity is on that common path. Pushing upward toward dominance, with the inevitable downward slide off the top of the ziggurat, that follows. And I cannot help but wonder if we're just the latest example.