We are suffering as a people from the ongoing never-ending pandemic, and the attendant media hype that accompanies it. In our current state, America is in a funk. Media lies and biased reporting⏤designed to paint a picture of imminent collapse and doom. They are asking us to reject our national history; reject our founding; reject the constitution and accept our guilt. We can only hope to avoid public flogging or worse, unless we do the following: reject Trump, vote for Biden, give back the tax cuts, and accept socialism as our future.
The media hype and political naysayers want you to believe that the sins of our past are not forgivable. They would have you believe that we were founded on hatred⏤that our forefathers were all evil men who created a system that never really worked. If you don’t agree with this narrative, you’re a hater. Case closed; no argument accepted.
Yes, this can cause distress, particularly for the people who know in their hearts they are not racists, or evil or haters. For them it is especially difficult to accept the guilt if they have helped people in need, prayed for the oppressed, or cried at the death of an innocent child killed by a stray bullet from a street gang gun fight. And then to see their own family and friends belittled, mocked, assaulted and their religion attacked at every opportunity. 
There is most assuredly more to come as we get closer to the fall and our chance to redeem ourselves by voting out prosperity and welcoming the crushing hand of tyranny, if we would just wake up and see the damage we have caused to everyone else⏤we may prove worthy. We are all supposed to be in abject panic that death is right around the corner unless we succumb to the plan: the plan to vote for Biden, wear a mask everywhere you go, let the economy crash, stay home from school and work, and get rid of Trump so everything can be right in the world.
This might seem like a dire representation of our current plight, and it is. 

America has the highest living standard in the world, the best economy, the greatest military that saved the planet from evil many times over, the freest place on Earth and the place where everyone has the chance to rise to the potential of their dreams.

How did we arrive at this place, at this time? What dragged us down the spinning vortex of self-loathing and hatred for our fellow citizens? How could we have been so blind for so long so as to arrive at the precipice of national destruction?
We did not get here in one short jump, we have been sliding this way for years⏤decades even⏤down the slippery slope of American Politics. Greased with a slop of misinformation, political gamesmanship, loss of patriotism, terrible education, political correctness, self-aggrandizement and a population with a lot of free time on its hands.
Some of you may be thinking⏤how can a population with too much time on its hands have contributed to our current sad state of national affairs? Good question, I will attempt to make a case to explain.
In years gone by, Americans have had a much more difficult life than most people have today. They had to work hard everyday just to eat. Vacations were almost unheard of; education was a luxury that came second after working to help your family survive. Struggle was your partner⏤your constant companion. This daily battle to survive and feed your family was overwhelming, along with a World War here and there and a Great Depression thrown in for good measure.
What sustained Americans was having their faith, their belief in God, their desire to please something greater than themselves, and a sense of gratitude for everything and everyone that came before them. Specifically, their families, friends and the men and women who hammered out our nation with their bare-hands and their blood to create a place where they could work hard everyday and struggle, but they could also survive.  

Just a few generations back, people understood the value of selflessness and service to others, they understood honor and decency, integrity and faithfulness. These are the things that gave them hope and allowed them to appreciate the opportunity America offered them and their families.

They didn’t sneer at the idea of capitalism, where their hard work could get them a house, or a car, or better food, they didn’t see socialism as the “Great Equalizer”, the hand of big government to make everything fair. They made their own way, took the responsibility of their actions, sacrificed for the common-good and had pride in being a part of something greater. 
They did not have time to find fault with everything they had, real or imagined. They did not have the luxury to pick apart the weaknesses of the past and the people that occupied it. They learned from the mistakes and tried to make things better. 
We are in distress today because for most of us, the struggles of yesterday are a thing of the past, replaced with the largess of those who came before us and made a place that was better than they had. Yes, for sure there are people who still suffer from need and want, there always will be, but on a larger scale the majority of us want for nothing.
We have cell phones, cars, housing, food, clothing, internet, education, jobs and a myriad of programs to help cover shortages. Even the poorest among us have the opportunity to improve our lives. For the poor we should strive to make a greater world of opportunity and feed the internal desire to take care of ones family so they can bask in the pride of accomplishment.
It is this abundance we enjoy at every level of our society that allows people to look away from gratitude and see disdain, to revile the past instead of understanding its place and the lessons it teaches us and shows us how far we have come and where we have to go. Our prosperity offers us time to indulge the self at the expense of the other, to find fault in everyone except ourselves, to develop a sense of pride and arrogance not borne of the blessings of doing right by our fellow man, but through the false demand of “respect” without the accompanying acts of decency, hard work and sacrifice.
These are the principles that cause downfall in a man or a nation. The source of this fall, this distress comes from the lowering of standards in the name of progress. The belief that by allowing our instincts to have equal time and value to our higher calling⏤we will be better. This has never been true and never will be. 
We find ourselves on the slippery slope of decline in American politics. Lowering our standards, accepting less than our best, making excuses for evil and indulging our boredom with self-serving pursuits is the beginning of the end for any civilization. These lessons are clear for anyone who wants to see them and how they have played out over history; and most certainly will again if we do not change our course. We can all think of examples of how we allow the slippery slope and the ride down the gulley lowers our values and moves us away from the place that I believe God calls all of us to. This is the cause of our distress and will be the cause of our failure. 
America is the one place where this fate can be avoided. The hearts of patriots, from every walk of life and every community must awake and see through the fog of this distress and push it away and come together as one if we are to overcome our pain and begin anew⏤the next part of the journey. 
The road will not be easy, it is filled with pitfalls and distractions, slick operators and conmen who see their chance to rise and lead us all into mediocrity and down the slippery slope to a place we will never recover from.