SOME MIGHT dispute whether America remains the "indispensable nation", a phrase deployed in 1998 by Madeleine Albright, then the country's secretary of state. But it is certainly still the nation that cannot be ignored, the one that, in a sense, sets the political weather globally.
So when it goes through a trauma as it has since the killing by the police of George Floyd, the impact is felt worldwide. Mr Floyd's death has provoked popular protests in dozens of countries; it has also been an opportunity for gloating from the governments of America's foes and rivals, and has been an embarrassment for its friends and allies.
