By now, it's no secret that Americans have largely divided along political lines and really don't like the people in the opposing tribe. What's a work in progress, though, is the growing willingness to do something very dramatic about that mutual loathing so that a temporarily dominant faction can't be obstructed by its enemies. Increasingly, our countrymen contemplate a balkanized future in which newly formed statelets are led by woke or MAGA Caesars. It's a future worth averting through some solution that lets people run their own lives independent of their opponents, if that's at all possible.

"Significant numbers of both Trump and Biden voters show a willingness to consider violating democratic tendencies and norms if needed to serve their priorities," the University of Virginia's Center for Politics reported last week of its latest poll. "Roughly 2 in 10 Trump and Biden voters strongly agree it would be better if a 'President could take needed actions without being constrained by Congress or courts,' [more than 40 percent of both groups at least somewhat agree] and roughly 4 in 10 (41%) of Biden and half (52%) of Trump voters at least somewhat agree that it's time to split the country, favoring blue/red states seceding from the union."