As an American I feel like we fell quite some time ago (I date it to 9/11 but history tells me to look further back). What’s happening now is not the decline or collapse it’s the decomposition of the corpse.

Oh I agree with that statement. But it's now actually happening. For the longest time, I've seen America degrade with every year I visited. My country (🇳🇱 The Netherlands), is warning people to not go to the USA too. Things can get out of hand fast. But yes, the decline started a while back.