My honest feeling is that it’s too late for American government.
Nah, humanity and America has been through much worse than this clusterfuck. We’ll get through it. And, who knows? In the long run, these kinds of gross displays of government ineptitude might work in our favor. It’s uniting many Americans from different walks of life in realizing it’s time to send these bums in Congress, etc. packing. I certainly wish it didn’t have to get this shitty and destructive first, but I guess that’s what it takes for some people to finally get motivated.
For about three months after Obama was elected it felt like things could be changed
I wasn’t so sure. The American public failed at strategy very badly. Without removing the Republican fillibuster from the equation, it allowed the Democrats to continue to blame Republicans for obstructionism instead of taking all of the responsibility for inaction (and/or failure) themselves. It’s worked out very nicely for the corporatists and I’m sure they’re hoping and praying all this leads to further false equivalency mistakes and the continued, destructive ping-pong effect that the American public has been stupidly locked into for decades.
My hope is the American public finally learns from this and finally (FINALLY!) votes out enough Republicans to thwart their obstructionism. That way we can finally put the Democrats’ feet to the fire and put all blame (or credit) squarely on their shoulders. This will either result in them working for average Americans for fear of a permanent loss of power or blowing it and ushering in a third party from an angry populace. Obama and the other Democrats are blowing it, but they can still blame the Republicans. We need to remove that part of the equation in the next elections. The American public needs to finally put the same emphasis on mid-term elections as they do on presidential elections.
If that doesn’t work, then we’re fucked. 
