(2023-10-05) To The World Mccarthys Exit Is Just Another Example Of Us Disarray

To the World, Kevin McCarthy’s Exit Is Just Another Example of U.S. Disarray. There was a time, not that long ago, when the United States presumed to teach the world how it was done. When it held itself up as a model of a stable, predictable democracy.

it has become an example of disarray and discord, one that rewards extremism, challenges norms and threatens to divide a polarized country even further.

The Republican uprising that led to the ouster of a House speaker for the first time in American history would be enough of a disruption. But the upheaval on Capitol Hill comes as a former president sits in a New York courtroom

The former president has long chosen provocation over peacemaking. But in recent weeks, he has escalated the violence of his rhetoric.

America has gone through other periods of deep divisions, as during the eras of McCarthyism, civil rights, Vietnam and Watergate, to say nothing of the Civil War.

What is different now, according to some scholars, is that Republicans under Mr. Donald Trump have directly attacked the foundation of the democratic system by refusing to accept an election that they lost and by tolerating if not encouraging political violence, most notably the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol.

The American public has been sour on the country for a remarkably long stretch. The last time a majority of Americans reported being satisfied “with the way things are going in the United States” in Gallup surveys was January 2004, nearly two decades ago. That has taken a toll on American institutions.

Among those presumably watching the tumult of recent days with some satisfaction is President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.