After a very long day, I decided to engage in some mindless entertainment and turned on a 3-hour season premiere of Law & Order.

Of course, I just can’t get a break. The episode is set in Bucha. I understand that it’s fashionable, and it’s even good because it keeps people plugged in, but I feel like I’ve been knifed in the gut.

Does nobody watch TV anymore? Why didn’t anybody warn me?

The post-nation state loves the symbols, the institutions, the legitimacy, and the prestige of the nation-state. It tries to steal them but can’t fill them with meaning.

Thus, the message of the post-nation state is invariably, “You must vote but it only counts if you vote in this particular way.” This message is always delivered through coercion because the post-nation state doesn’t know how to evoke love. It’s a cold financial proposition that speaks to lonely self-interest. It can’t speak to “we the people” because it’s terrified of a real “we.”

The post-nation state breaks up the “we the people ” into vanishingly tiny “we” of aggrieved identities. In lieu of love and brotherhood, it offers suspicion, resentment, and a dog-eat-dog fight for scant resources.