I am not nearly is sure that the United States of 2015 has one tenth of the resilience of the United States of 1940.
Kids then grew up saying the pledge of allegiance, and hearing what a wonderful country the United States are.
Now, kids grow up, many of hem never hearing the pledge of allegiance, and in school hearing how the United States was so awful to ___ (fill in your oppressed minority group here). It seems that way more Americans have their hands out, and have forgotten JFK's admonition. So many Americans are "owed" something. "I've got ADHD, give me a check!" "I'm a broke-butt, give me a check!" I just do not think kids are taught to love their country any more. They are more likely to have been taught to gripe about what a terrible place it is. Urkel, the anti-cheerleader-in-chief (
whose wife was never "really proud of her country" until her babies' daddy won a primary election, she said) is part of the problem, but he is a symptom, not the disease himself.
We have couch potatoes that can kill zombies at an amazing clip in a video game, but would simply soil themselves if somebody shot at them in real life.
I just am not sure we would have the resilience we had in 1941. I believe if the Japanese had destroyed the entire Pacific Fleet on 7 December, the US still would have won. The US produced 120 aircraft carriers, for Pete's sake. There was almost no way the Japanese could have damaged the US enough to knock the US out of the war.
Nowadays, however, as
One Second After, I fear, realistically depicted, Americans faced with a serious blow (one much more easily delivered than Pearl Harbor which required six aircraft carriers and a huge support fleet), Americans are pretty vulnerable and would likely fold pretty quickly.
Dostoevsky forecast this well: "In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us."
I believe we have sown the wind and I am afraid we are going to reap the whirlwind.
I could be wrong. I hope I never find out.