Remember that Americans are already at each other's throats. Half the country is literally terrified about what will happen tomorrow. The other half of the country is ecstatic. For at least some of them, they are looking forward to doing exactly what the other half fears. The rest are relieved that they will not have to undergo the terrors and tribulations of the last four years.

The country is constantly on a knife edge. It takes only a tiny shift to cause a radical change in the power structure, and good reason to think that power structure will be used against you.

It is indeed remarkable that the country has achieved anything at all when it spends so much time cowering. Nor is that new, but modern media seem to give it more immediacy.