Just another day in the Land of the Free, where the absurd is not just expected, it’s celebrated.

They’ve been fed a steady diet of grievance and paranoia, spoon-fed the notion that all the wrongs in their lives can be traced back to the “Others” — the immigrants, the educated elites, the outsiders, the women who haunt their nightmares.

The Trump era has shattered the consensus that allowed for civil discourse; it has unleashed a wave of tribalism that turns neighbors into enemies and discourse into shouting matches.

From the outset, Trump’s ascent was heralded by a cacophony of false promises and incendiary rhetoric. The campaign was a potent cocktail of fear and bravado, with a staggering number of voters throwing caution — and critical thinking — to the wind.

Throughout history, great orators and demagogues have understood the power of chaos. Mussolini, Hitler, and McCarthy — all leveraged the art of blithering to galvanize their followers and demonize their opponents.