When politics becomes scorched earth, it is the nation itself that burns. I was raised to believe that democracy came with duties as well as rights. You voted. You accepted the outcome. You argued your case, made your peace with defeat when it came, and waited for the next election. Politics was competitive, sometimes bruising, but it was not meant to be an existential threat. The opposition’s role was to hold the government to account, not to weaken the country for political gain. That older civic instinct now feels rather quaint. In theory, the idea of the “loyal opposition” remains...