America’s Culture War Lost:

When 30 FBI agents showed up at Mar-a-Lago to cart off boxes of documents, it was an authorized, legitimate and justified procedure to retrieve national security secrets being illegally kept there. It was also an unusual regime raid that took place at the Mar-a-Lago home and office. This allowed for the retrieval of national security secrets being illegally kept there.

And Jan. 6, 2021? It was a riot and a scandalous breach of Capitol. There were assaults on Capitol police officers that should have been punished. It was much more. It was much more. It was an “insurrection,” a “fascist coup,” an act of treason led by far-right extremists to abort the transfer of power from the winner of the election of 2020 to the loser. It ranks right up there with the 1814 burning of the Capitol by the British.

This is America’s divide, and it goes beyond the clashing views that we had at Jan. 6, or the Mar-a-Lago Raid.

Consider abortion. Before the 1960s, abortion was almost universally regarded as a shameful and criminal act. Doctors performing abortions were often disgraced, and even sent to jail. But after the Dobbs decision by the Supreme Court declared that Roe v. Wade in 1973 was wrongly decided, restoration of women’s right to an abortion is being championed by half the nation. Half of America believes that abortion is the murder of unborn children.

Part of America rejoices the Supreme Court decision to make marriage equality legal for gays. However, some traditionalists believe such a mandate would impose on America a secularist morality that is contrary to the Christian beliefs which were the foundation of our laws in the first two centuries of being a nation.

It is not just clashing morality which divides us. A broad consensus in belief, culture and custom is necessary for a democracy, nation or country to survive.

There is disagreement about the conduct and role of the police in relation to law and order. Without it, a republic can’t stand. During the George Floyd summer of 2020, “Defund the Police!” The clamor of left was “Defund the Police!” It was only abandoned by a dramatic political revolt.

Some things are essential to the survival of a country, particularly a powerful one like the United States. To preserve its currency and to protect its borders from illegal mass migrations or invasions, a democratic republic must also preserve law and order in all its major cities. Which of these requisites exist today when the nation suffers 8 percent inflation; 250,000 illegal aliens cross our southern border every month; and “mass shootings” occur daily in our cities during which at least four victims are gunned down, wounded or killed?

The preservation of democracy depends on the trust of its citizens in its institutions. Since Reagan’s era, Americans have lost half of their trust in major institutions. This is a significant drop from one-quarter to one-fourth. In 2022, confidence in the Supreme Court fell by a third to 25 percent. Only a fourth of the country retained high confidence in the presidency; and confidence in Congress plummeted to 7 percent, or one in every 14 Americans. Only 1 in 9 Americans said the same thing about TV news. One in six Americans felt great confidence in newspapers.

In summary, the country has a declining confidence in nearly all its institutions. This includes big businesses, churches, universities, and media. The American people trust only small businesses and the U.S. army.

The public approval of Biden’s performance at this stage in his term is the lowest ever for any president.

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True. We have survived and come back from difficult times. In the 1860s, 11 of the 33 states seceded and fought for four years to gain their independence of the Union. The 1960s were divisive, but the left, with Sen. George McGovern its political expression, captured less than 40 percent of the vote against Richard Nixon in 1972. Ronald Reagan ran up two landslides in the 1980s.

These days are gone. Today, the left dominates academia and culture in a much greater extent than ever before. It is also further from the heart and soul of Middle America.

When, and how will America unite again? And what unites us, other than an external attack on the country, like Pearl Harbor or 9/11? Is there a common ground? Is there any common ground, with the apparent irreconcilable differences in religion, ethnicity and race, or morality and ideology? Is the great experiment over?