Of the roughly 200 nations of the world today, about 70 were founded in 1965 or later. If they were people, these 70 would be Gen Xers, Millennials, or even younger. It’s sometimes hard to contextualize that the median country in the world hasn’t existed independently any longer than the Baby Boomer generation.
■ The world is dynamic like that. Big changes generally don’t happen overnight (with the exceptions of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the attacks of 9/11), but a lot more of them happen in a much more compressed span of history than our instincts would suggest. Nations like South Korea and Ireland have surged from lower-income to top-tier within the time some incumbent United States Senators have been in office.
■ Circumstances change so much that fidelity to principle is more than a nicety. It’s the only way for a big power like the United States to bid for some kind of order in the world. Individual leaders may come and go, power dynamics may shift, and local hegemonies may rise and fall. But if we appear to have a stable and credible commitment to principles, then others can act accordingly by taking us seriously.
■ Therein lies the problem with the decision not to impose sanctions on Russia for what it is doing to Ukraine. If we are not on the side of those unjustly besieged, then what good are we?