There is no one thing. Democrats have floundered for… decades. They did a thing during Obama but largely as a party they’ve done nothing for most of America except maintain.

Then there’s MAGA which is kind of a new thing. It goes beyond ideology. I’d argue there is no ideology, beyond maybe a few wedge issues that are just used to build ranks. To me it kind of looks like useful idiots being wrangled by those that control information. But the idiots are at the top and the bottom of the chain so it’s confusing.

People also got soft, complacent, and poorer. Lots of people just completely checked out of their civic duties. Either because they can’t be bothered, or because they’ve got more important things to worry about.

There’s probably also lots of other topics leading into the current political climate that I haven’t even touched on. Trying to explain it away as one thing doesn’t really work.