So the real question is whether US is more like Russia or more like Western Europe. The NO disaster suggests that it is more like Russia - in the sense that beyond the federal government - and perhaps tee-vee - there is very little that holds this whole country together. Take that away, and everything slips into jeder fuer sich und Gott gegen alles, everyone for himself and a war of all against all.
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What the NO disaster demonstrates, however, is that this government-maintained social peace and civility is not particularly stable and prone to disintegration.
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The US is not an organic unity like most Western European countries, but a social Frankenstein hastily put together by various social engineers. In that respect, it looks more like Russia, or Africa, than like Western Europe. While I strongly believe that some diversity is healthy, too much of it is poisonous, especially if that diversity is forced into the narrow confines of institutions that serve mainly elite interest.
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If somebody posed the question "Will the United States survive to the year, say, 2020?" the NO disaster seems to suggest a cautious "No" answer.
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While all of this is very interesting, I suspect the grim reports of widespread looting, rapes, gunfire and other sorts of mayhem we received via television are the source of your musings.
How true are these reports? How widespread was the violence that, we were told, "gripped the city"? To what extent was whatever violence that occurred the result of people being huddled together into poorly provisioned facilities such as sports stadiums -- buildings not designed to act as shelters -- left without clear guidance as to what the next move should be? Were some people traumatized into extreme acts by the extraordinary circumstances? These are all key questions.
This rush to dystopian conclusions is predictable (you do seem to reach for the button labeled "behold, darkness!" rather often) but no more blessed with prescience than a fixed smile refusal to face hard facts.
And there are more unanswered questions.
To what extent did people band together to help one another? How many lives were spared because of the efforts of ordinary people to assist each other to whatever extent they could? The answers to these questions may provide counter-indications. Later, we'll know more.
Are the instances of cooperation less noteworthy than the instances of disintegration?
Your post seems to suggest your answer would be 'yes'.
Of course, the US will depart from the global scene at some point, as all things do. Even the sun will die, engulfing the entire planet and all our works.
Will this (the US' end or dissolution as a single state) be brought about by what you call "poisonous" diversity (perhaps you should have selected a less flame broiled word, one not so likely to inspire the reader who's unfamiliar with your LBO oeuvre to conclude you're a more intellectual version of the anti-immigrant Minutemen,...unless of course...)? I suppose we, or our descendants, will find out.
I suspect however, that a waste of talent and potential and the stubborn refusal to cooperate for the collective good will have more to do with it (and this refusal does not stop at the borders of one's ethnic comfort zone so it cannot be squarely laid at diversity's door) than the fact that one group too many squeezed into this "frankenstein" country, tipping the scales in the direction of chaos.
.d.