As far as I'm concerned, we're already a failed state. The government works exclusively for the people who don't have to pay taxes on any legitimate scale. We pay for everything so they can get what they want.

Residents of my city can approve a ballot measure by an 80-20 margin, and the state will introduce a law making whatever four out of five voters approved illegal. In the most recent case, we got a bit of a reprieve only because GOP lawmakers were too lazy to squeeze a vote in the House in on the final day of the session.

Just because your city isn't facing this doesn't mean you're remotely living in a functioning representative republic.

W's 2004 win is the only election since 1988 where the GOP nominee won the popular vote, and 2004 is an outlier because of the post-9/11 rally-'round-the-flag environment the election took place in (Remember when people utterly ignorant of the cut-and-paste Soviet experience thought invading Afghanistan was actually a good idea?), and said reelection was of someone who lost the popular vote the first time.

If you think one billionaire funding dirty politics is worthy of so much as an eyebrow raise, you haven't been paying attention.

It’s easier to win once you’ve rigged the rules and bought most of the referees.