Jakarta
Exactly four years ago this month in his inaugural address right after being sworn in by chief justice John Roberts, United States President Donald Trump talked about what he described as “American carnage,” referring to crumbling US cities plagued by unemployment, crime and drug problems. Many certainly doubted whether that statement was a true representation of what the US looked like under the administration his predecessor president Barack Obama. But that phrase is certainly apt to describe what went down in Washington, DC, on Wednesday, especially what happened within and around the Capitol building, one of the defining symbols of American democracy. It was a scene reminiscent of a banana republic. Indeed, the media reports of the events could have been written by journalists describing an attempted coup in Central Africa or Latin America. “Hundreds of suppor...