The experience of the last 20 years, watching a significant portion of the population descend into gibbering madness, would be funny if it were not grotesque. Picture the regression from Bob Dole to Ted Cruz and Scott Walker, for example. Worse, it is evident that this regression is driven by the base with the leadership scrambling to match the descent. Walker and Cruz are not idiots, they are ruthless cynics pandering to idiots.
I’ve mentioned before the various science fiction scenarios in which some large percentage of people suddenly become insane in one way or another. We are seeing it happen before our eyes.