Where we stand as the year ends

For some of us, New Year's Eve is a time to reflect on where we are as a nation--to try to make sense of the events the year that's ending, and try to map out a strategy for the next one.

As a nation and society, we've been blessed beyond belief: thanks to American innovation, hard work and our relatively free economy, we've had astonishing abundance.  

Former WW2 opponents Germany, Japan and Italy joined the allies as strong, prosperous, free nations (although Germany has recently become more totalitarian)..  Free nations fought the communists to a draw in the Korean War.

Even during the Cold War with the nuclear-armed Soviet Union, Americans lived with the confidence that the Russians wouldn't risk starting a war with our prepared military.
 
Despite the Democrat congress abandoning Vietnam to the communists, America was still a strong, successful nation, and a generous leader of the free world.

It's human nature to believe this would continue for the rest of our lives.

But the hard truth is that all great civilizations fall--usually because they collapse from within.  Most Americans would never believe that could happen here, because our Constitution seemed to be so well thought out, with its elaborately crafted system of checks and balances against a tyrannical central government, and the Bill of Rights.  Yet here we are, with the federal government jailing citizens without charge or trial for a year.  Some tyrannical state governors--all Democrats--have jailed coffee-shop owners for 90 days for the novel crime of daring to stay open.

And more loss of freedom is coming, as sure as the sun will rise tomorrow:  The government will soon force every American--down to 5-year-old children--to take a "non-sterilizing" jab, originally described as a "vaccine."  Now they're requiring a third shot.  The tyrants in power are determined to control everything, even at gunpoint.

I do believe our Constitution, and the form of government the Founders and Framers laid out in 1789 was divinely inspired. The Founders knew human nature, and that evil men have an implacable lust for power.  They crafted our government--as specified in the Constitution--to try to make it hard for evil men to gain control.

Unfortunately the Founders couldn't have anticipated the power of television propaganda, or the cunning of politicians to give "free" stuff (paid by taxes and borrowing) to bribe voters.  And the few who saw what was happening were ignored.

Now we are ruled by a man who has taken bribes from our enemies.  Congress is a den of corrupt thieves.  Fauci will soon retire on a government pension of $370,000 per year.

John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and many others did their best to prevent evil from gaining power, but ultimately the success of their efforts would depend on whether their heirs would defend the Founders' blueprint.

Obviously that didn't happen.  Far too many of those born later were either corrupt or lazy.  They sent the courageous and dedicated into battle while the corrupt and lazy stayed home.  And eventually that doing the right thing became something sneered at.  Drug dealers--who would have been found mysteriously dead in earlier times--became role models for tens of thousands of young thugs because it was a shortcut to riches.

State legislatures that had never allowed gambling fell for the tale of the lottery grifters that allowing those grifters to run state lotteries, and the revenue would be used to fund...education!  The laws were duly passed, the lotteries have been running for years now.  And how much revenue to schools?  Don't ask.

Despite the Founders doing everything humanly possible to keep the bad guys from taking power, here we are--due to corruption and weakness by the uncorrupt.  

I predict humans will eventually discover that it's simply not possible for *any* system of government--no matter how carefully thought out--to survive more than 250 or 300 years before cunning schemers figure out a weakness they can exploit.  But with as fabulous a blueprint as our Founders laid out, I thought we'd at least make it to the high-end of the bracket.  

Right now we're at 245-plus years from the Revolutionary War, and just 232 years from the signing of the Constitution.  Kind of sad.

Yet in those few years, hopefully the promise of freedom and individual rights laid out in our Constitution--and made real in our nation and society--will have inspired other people to carry on the promise.  

I don't think America is done quite yet, but there's no doubt that we're at an inflection point.  Clearly our nation is in dire trouble, and may not survive in any recognizable form for much longer.  When you understand the awful damage those in power have already done and are doing to us daily, it's takes a lot of effort to keep from being depressed.

But Americans are big fans of lost causes and fourth-quarter comebacks.  The bad guys are not infallible.  Once in a great while the good guys win against overwhelming odds.  While things look bleak now, I think there may still be a chance to recover.

But just wishing for Freedom to win won't make it so.  It's going to be a hard fight.