There is a stealth civil war taking place within the American Jewish community. Don’t worry. Most American Jews don’t know about it and have no intention taking sides or firing a shot. Hearts and minds aren’t involved either. It’s more like a cold war of complacency.

REMEMBER those saner, less divisive and demonizing days when the word “bi-partisan” didn’t suggest something sexual? You probably can’t. If you’re a Democrat, and favor the party’s far left “Occupy Wall Street” fringe, with its ideological fixations on sexual identity and gender fluidity—where all the world’s problems disappear if we simply did a better job mastering pronoun usage and embracing a more expansive definition of reproductive freedom (not only abortion rights, but the liberation of the male womb)—you would be forgiven for mistakenly assuming that bi-partisan has something to do with political accommodation and compromise.

The poker table of American politics now officially has no limits. Anything goes. Bet whatever you wish. It won’t matter: The house never loses, unless it’s the White House. We’re having yet another crisis in American confidence. The dashboard of our democracy always seems to be flashing red. Do our institutions actually work? We’re long out of warranty, so some reassurance would be nice. Don’t bet on it.