As a citizen of both the US and Israel, I've often said the same thing. About both the US and Israel. Remember 2016 right after Trump won? All the lefties collectively bemoaned and emphatically insisted, "This is not who we are!" Well, apparently it was and still is. As we creep inexorably towards the cliff of November, I've been asking myself, what does it say about us (I mean the US, us) that a Trump candidacy is anything but absurdist satire or dystopian science fiction/horror? Or if Biden dropped out of the race, as he should, voters who supported him in 2020 would not vote for Kamala Harris because she's - whatever, it doesn't even matter. Seriously, America, do you really have to overthink an alternate pick considering what we're up against? And this is besides the fact that these are our choices. In some ways, I think Israel is a window into our not-too-distant future.

Israel has a parliamentary system of government, so it has even less excuse for claiming that the government does not represent its citizens. Last year, thousands of Israelis took to the streets and brought the country to a standstill over proposed legislation to kneecap its Supreme Court. That would have removed the last obstacle to making Israel an imperialist theocracy. For decades, the Palestinians were out of sight and out of mind. It was only when Israelis realized what they would stand to lose that they protested.