An election is coming and given the strangeness of the challenger and the age of the incumbent, the outcome is anybody's guess. But perhaps all is not lost. Civilizations rise and fall, that's how history works. The native American tribes did their best to accommodate and negotiate with the white settlers. It came to nothing. New diseases and aggressive colonial expansion undermined their strength and they went into decline. Roman civilization fell apart. The British Empire did the same. Now it's America's turn. The democratic systems which have held the country together for so long are splintering. One candidate offers a new vision of political power and many find the idea attractive. The old systems of mutual accommodation and reciprocity are fading. Red lines are being drawn. Intolerance and dogma are the order of the day. It seems as if matters must be decided by the spilling blood as they were during the Civil War and WW2. Combined with climate changes and we have the perfect storm. Out of this change may come a new order. As with the Black Death even when half the population of the planet died, life went on. Humans invariably show great resilience and forget disasters quickly.