America is in dire straits. The U.S. economy is mired in 9 percent unemployment, and economists fear that the country may experience a double-dip recession.

The debt crisis is careening to Greek levels, with the legacy of Weimar Germany in sight. Politicians cannot agree on a solution, but when they do, it will either lead to massive tax increases, huge cuts in benefits to those who have depended on them for so long or near hyperinflation.

Regardless, the results won’t be good for Americans.

Even beyond economic concerns, the country’s consensus is coming apart. E pluribus unum we are no more.

The country no longer agrees on the fundamentals that describe a nation. The country’s shared morality is coming apart. Whether it’s faith, culture, history or political issues, the American consensus has ceased to exist.

This is the thesis of “Suicide of a Superpower,” political analyst and adviser to three presidential administrations Patrick J. Buchanan’s newest bestselling book.

“America is disintegrating,” Buchanan writes. “The centrifugal forces pulling us apart are growing inexorably. What once united us is dissolving.”

Our grandfathers quarreled over big picture issues: how to wage the Cold War and what rate the income tax should be at dominated dinner-table conversations. But all shared in the same culture: they listened to the same music, watched the same movies and worshiped the same God.

These basics of our civilization are now what we quarrel over.

“Will America survive to 2025?” Buchanan asks in the subtitle to his book. From the looks of it, he argues, the answer is no, at least not the America we now know.

To look at experience, it’s hard to argue with Buchanan’s argument. There is even evidence of this on Fresno State’s campus with the immigration issue.

Last year, The Collegian broke the story that Pedro Ramirez, last year’s Associated Students, Inc. president, was an illegal immigrant. This polarized the campus. Students split into pro-Pedro and anti-Pedro camps, with virulent rhetoric dominating the discussion. Hispanics on the side of Ramirez and whites on the side against Ramirez accused each other of racism. One would be hard-pressed to find a good deal of unity at Fresno State last year.

With such a deep divide between Americans, what can possibly be the answer? In politics, the answers are relatively easy. All it would take to solve the debt crisis would be to raise taxes or cut spending. To increase employment, either embark on a massive public works project or remove government controls from the economy. If terrorism poses a big enough threat to the country, go after the terrorists. If it doesn’t, then stay home.

In our culture, however, the answers are not so easy. Politicians can compromise. Indeed, that’s partly how the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street movements began: these groups believe both parties are too prone to compromise.

But on our cultural issues, we cannot compromise. It is all or nothing. On what ground is there to compromise between someone who believes that abortion is murder and someone who believes that it is an expression of the fundamental right to privacy? How will one who sees gay marriage as immoral and one who sees it as the natural progression of human ethics ever agree?

There is no convincing one who believes that illegal immigration is leading America to ruin to agree with one who believes America should be open to all at all times.

If there can be no compromise on these issues, what, then, can happen? Either one or the other side wins or America as we know it ends.

“The differences between us are wide, deep, and enduring,” Buchanan writes. “Less and less often do we take the trouble to find common ground with people unlike us in views and values.”

It’s easy to share Buchanan’s pessimism. If America continues down this path — an “inexorable” one, according to the author — not much could save it.

It is not too late. The American people have proven to be very resilient in the past, and they may find common ground once more.

But this resiliency better kick in soon.

Listen to an excerpt from the audiobook of “Suicide of a Superpower.”