Peggy Noonan seems quite depressed:

I think there is an unspoken subtext in our national political culture right now. In fact I think it’s a subtext to our society. I think that a lot of people are carrying around in their heads, unarticulated and even in some cases unnoticed, a sense that the wheels are coming off the trolley and the trolley off the tracks. That in some deep and fundamental way things have broken down and can’t be fixed, or won’t be fixed any time soon.

And that is one of the cheerier parts of the piece.

The thing is, I am not sure what she is talking about–i.e., what is going to go wrong and why does she feel that will be the case?

If you’re feeling depressed, please avoid this column.

And this is perhaps one of the gloomier things I have read in a while (if you really stop and think about the implications):

A few weeks ago I was chatting with friends about the sheer number of things parents now buy for teenage girls–bags and earrings and shoes. When I was young we didn’t wear earrings, but if we had, everyone would have had a pair or two. I know a 12-year-old with dozens of pairs. They’re thrown all over her desk and bureau. She’s not rich, and they’re inexpensive, but her parents buy her more when she wants them. Someone said, “It’s affluence,” and someone else nodded, but I said, “Yeah, but it’s also the fear parents have that we’re at the end of something, and they want their kids to have good memories. They’re buying them good memories, in this case the joy a kid feels right down to her stomach when the earrings are taken out of the case.”

Wow.