It was an “unsinkable ship,” crowed its hubristic builders.   But the Titanic wasn’t unsinkable, and there were far too few lifeboats to save everyone it carried, so many of its passengers perished in the ice cold waters of the northern Atlantic during the early morning hours of April 15, 1912.

The sinking of the Titanic was a horrible disaster, but was a small one compared to the impending disaster we are seeing unfold before us in America right now.

The “unsinkable ship” is sinking.

We in the U.S.  have become complacent, believing our leaders who told us that terrorism could never happen in America and we would always be a free nation, safe from dictatorial leaders.  And, at least since the end of WW2, this has been the case.

But now we are seeing where our complacency has taken us. The checks and balances we used to take for granted that would not allow a sociopath like Donald Trump to rise to power have been systematically gutted and now we are facing the unthinkable.

Why did we assume it could never happen to us?   Just because nothing like this has happened in its 241 year history, doesn’t mean it can’t now.   This country isn’t even half the age that the Roman Empire was when it fell.

We think we are special but we’re not.  We’re not the first nation something like this has happened to.   It’s happened in Russia, Germany, China, Eastern Europe, and many other nations.    The danger is that we are so big and powerful in comparison to, say, 1942 Germany, or even the Soviet Union before communism fell, that what has happened can and probably will have worldwide consequences.   The fallout may reach far beyond its borders.

We are not special and this isn’t the first time in history, or even in recent history, that something like this has happened.   We never learn from history though, not from its big lessons, like WW2 Germany, or its small ones, like the sinking of the Titanic.