Don't try to get political at cocktail hour

I'm writing this at 4:15 on a Monday. A lovely, warm springy Monday. It's patio cocktail hour.

I've been reading a book about politics in the U.S. It was published in 2005, so was probably written 3 or 4 years ago. It talks about things that I already knew, and gives details about other things that I didn't know. But my analysis of what the author is saying so far is that there is some serious potential for things in the U.S. to really go to hell in the proverbial handbasket, if they haven't already.

My question is: are we working our way towards some really cataclysmic disaster (natural or caused by persons), or has the U.S. hit the apex of badness and are we now witnessing the denouement? Or will there just be years and years of watching policitians south of the border conduct and condone behaviour that goes against most moral laws, some international laws as well as old-fashioned common sense? Eep. I don't want to know the answer. Do I?

If I found out that we were at the start of a downward spiral where people worldwide become less safe, less secure, less fed, less sheltered, and less healthy (less so than right now, and things are pretty bad for the majority of the world's population right now), would I do anything? I don't want to know the answer to that either.

Anybody for a martini?