This week I’ve talked a lot about nation-states and political parties in collapse. These are bad things even when they are likely to ultimately result in good. But as they happen, people get hurt. Lives are altered, destroyed and even lost. It hurts to see the organization you worked so hard for or really believed in crash and burn. At a bare minimum will be economic losses and disruptions. Anyone happy about any of that isn’t thinking too straight.

Lately, I’ve come down pretty hard on leftists. A number of people will read that as liberals but only some are the same thing. Many liberals define themselves as classical liberals – they mean centrist but classical has a better ring to it. Regardless, they are left of center, not actually leftist. These folks primarily identify as Democrat or Independent. Either way, they are going to be heartbroken if I’m right and the Democrat party collapses. I think I’m right or I wouldn’t be predicting that collapse but I do feel bad for those who have the hearts tied up in being Democrat because this will hurt.

The Democrats will get off lightly compared to the Chinese and the Russians. Authoritarian nation-states don’t deal well with chaos and they tend to be nastier for it. We might get lucky and have two Soviet Union style collapses but that’s unlikely. The Chinese people don’t distinguish the CCP from China so even a peaceful collapse is going to hurt – and given the condition China is in, it will hurt in more ways than just the one. The Russian people take pride in the strength of their nation and you can already guess how current events are making them feel. The gentlest collapse possible will still be pretty awful for them.

But there’s tomorrow.

The Democrats will form a new party out of the ashes and it will likely be a much better one, once it stabilizes. China will have a chance to rebuild and those nations it has dominated will have a chance to break away. Nothing remotely easy about it, but there will be a new day and very likely, a better one. Russia will get the chance to join Europe on equal footing as a nation governed by its people. This, too, is a long, painful process, but Ukraine and Poland have already demonstrated that something better can be built on the other side.

Yes, I hope all three collapses will take place as painlessly as possible. But I’m under no delusions that it will be painless and it saddens me that so many will suffer. I would wish differently if I weren’t firmly convinced that there will be far more suffering if the Democrats, China and Russia all remain as they are.

There is a lot of work to be done one way or the other. As things crumble, it will be up to us to help those who are losing the world they have come to know. It won’t be easy for them or us. We will make mistakes. It will get messy. There will be a LOT of yelling and hair pulling and just plain screeching. That’s just how people are when big things go very wrong.

But there will be a tomorrow.

They will figure things out. We’ll figure out better ways to help. We’ll figure out when to step back and when to step in. They will work out their new parties and governments. Things will change.

I truly believe things will also get better. IF we all work hard to make things better.

Time will pass. Things will settle down. And we will still yell and holler at each other sometimes. Politics is messy that way.

There’s no pleasure for the decent person in the pain of another. But there is hope in the midst of all these storms. This isn’t the end.

It’s just the beginning!