As opposed to the 2008 election, which had many frustrated and emotionally charged voters dreaming up a new America with a historic presidential candidate leading the charge, the 2010 midterms had people doing the exact opposite. In 2010, a majority of Americans stopped dreaming and started to face reality. America was accelerating toward an irreversible and all-encompassing decline. The path envisioned by the president and his supporters for a radically changed United States was starting to look like a dead end. America was breaking down. The year 2010 was also when essayist Walter Russell Mead began to ascribe many aspects...