Global Diplomacy and US recent events: What Trump and His Mob Taught the World About America - Anne Applebaum

And yet by far the most important weapon that the United States of America has ever wielded—in defense of democracy, in defense of political liberty, in defense of universal rights, in defense of the rule of law—was the power of example. In the end, it wasn’t our words, our songs, our diplomacy, or even our money or our military power that mattered. It was rather the things we had achieved: the two and a half centuries of peaceful transitions of power, the slow but massive expansion of the franchise, and the long, seemingly solid traditions of civilized debate.

read more at: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/01/what-trump-and-his-mob-taught-world-about-america/617579/