>I get it I feel it myself, but history doesn’t repeat itself and groups of humans (especially civilizations) have so much more nuance to them it’s a disservice to both Rome and American history.
I agree, it's imprudent to try and draw direct parallels between the US and any other historical empire, including Rome.
That said, we can learn much from history. And in the US and Europe, we can learn even more from the history of the "West."
As Eugen Weber[0] put it[1]:
...But where should we start? Perhaps the first
thing to ask is what the scope of a series on the
history of Western Civilization should be?
And the best way to think of it is that we are going
back to the old country. We're going back to where
many of our ancestors came from. To see where their
stories came from, and their memories and their
habits and the way they are, which has made us the
way we are.
This is what history is about. Where we come from.
What lies behind the way we live and act and think.
How our institutions, our religions, our laws were
made.
As the old saw goes, "history doesn't repeat, but it often rhymes."
Understanding the thoughts, fears, triumphs and failures of our forbears is an important window on our human nature and the things that have driven us since time immemorial, and continues to drive us to this day.
Whether it's the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and the many civilizations of the Levant/Fertile Crescent as well as Rome, the Abrahamic[2] religions and the thinkers/ideas of the ensuing millenia, they all have something important to teach us about the world we live in now. They did, after all, birth many of our core beliefs, ideas and institutions.
While it's generally not productive to point at specific issues and exclaim "This is just like Rome!" or something similar, understanding the culture and practices of our ancestors can give us insight into our current world.
But that's not enough. While human nature is human nature which hasn't really changed in a couple hundred thousand years, times do change.
And when they do, we need to, as Lincoln pointed out[3]:
The dogmas of the quiet past, are inadequate to the
stormy present. The occasion is piled high with
difficulty, and we must rise -- with the occasion.
As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act
anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we
shall save our country.
tl;dr: While it's dumb to see history as a blueprint for the future, it is a wonderful trove of knowledge and information about the human condition and its response to a vast array of stresses.
As we are keenly reminded by Paul M.M. Cooper and his Fall of Civilizations[4] podcast.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugen_Weber
[1] https://archive.org/details/western-tradition-01-the-dawn-of... (timecode: 06:35)
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abrahamic_religions
[3] http://www.abrahamlincolnonline.org/lincoln/speeches/congres...
[4] https://fallofcivilizationspodcast.com/
Edit: Fixed formatting/transcription issues.