The law is a blunt instrument, but sometimes, justice is done. The problem of Black Lives Matter runs so  deep that the guilty verdict serves as an admission and a statement — but not as a solution. Previous articles:

• Police Brutality, Derek Chauvin, and the Death of George Floyd Part 1
• Police Brutality, Derek Chauvin, George Floyd, Rousseau’s Social Contract Part 2
• U.S. protesters call to Defund the Police.

Police brutality and racial discrimination have ample precedent in U.S. history, though we thought we had banished the worst of the past. Why has the social climate in the U.S. has deteriorated so much since 9/11?

• Delayed effect of external pressure from terrorism?
• Modest expansions of liberality by the Obama presidency, or awakening of latent racism by a Black president?
• Decline of the standard of living, bringing illegal immigration to the fore?
• Or is it the Web, which has spawned millions of tiny hate channels?

How much has changed!, since JFK’s inaugural (YouTube):

(click for full text) And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.

The U.S. is not a failed state. It is a troubled state, with generosity and compassion under siege.