The first steps for any nation in addressing any national crisis are to achieve a national consensus that one’s country really is entering a crisis (factor #1); to accept responsibility for one’s problems (factor #2), rather than blaming them on “others” (other countries or other groups within one’s own country); and to undertake an honest self-appraisal of what is and what isn’t working well (factor #7). The U.S. is still far from uniting around those first steps. While Americans are increasingly concerned about our country’s condition, we still have no national consensus about what’s wrong.
