I'd just like to remind Americans that France is currently on its Fifth Republic since 1789 (with three Empires—with monarchs—interleaved until 1870).
The USA appears to be in the dying days of its Second Republic (time out in 1860-65) but something better will emerge eventually, if we avoid planetary ecosystem collapse in the meantime.
This, too, shall pass.
@cstross we didn't even rewrite our constitution when we started the second one.
Fun fact: Marx and Engels wrote to Lincoln encouraging him to use the Union Army as a force to enforce a completely new constitution focused around worker soverignty and racial/gender equality. Lincoln apparently said he'd consider it, but his assassination cut short their correspondence
"Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.”
https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/first-annual-message-9
Charlie Stross
Odo Tournesol
Peter Butler