NY grand jury indicts former President Trump
The international mindset has changed a good ninety degrees from the time of my early youth when things like honesty, duty, the sacred obligation of bringing a child into the world, providing for one's family and a basic belief in an Almighty, just and omnipotent God were the basics of life in the Western World.
The family unit took precedence, the stay at home mom was the norm, the flag, anthem and other symbols of a united nation were respected, indeed revered, and patriotism was passed from generation to generation and was a place of common ground for Americans from all ethnic and racial origins.
When World War II ended, America was about to swing into the most affluent, progressive and prosperous period of our history, and the pie was big enough for everybody to have a piece.
But our nation had a cancer rapidly metastasizing on its underbelly.
Some of the same soldiers who fought against the Germans on D-Day, Guadalcanal and the Battle of Berlin came home to find that risking their lives fighting America's battles did not elevate them above the second-rate citizenship they left behind when they went off to war.
They were expected to take off the uniform and go back to the ghetto, to accept menial jobs, send their children to inferior schools and not even be allowed to sit at the same dime store lunch counter as their white counterparts they had shared foxholes with.
And they were expected to take it all in stride, to accept their "place" in the natural order of things and to like it.
Looking back and remembering those days quite well from my earlier youth, it all seems so silly, it seems such a waste, the implacable psyche that perpetuated this evil, tacitly denying a whole race of people the equal rights they were guaranteed in every federal paper our constitutional founders ever issued.
This situation was a powder keg, just waiting for a spark big enough to ignite it.
When a man sees the hypocrisy of a country that went to war to achieve freedom for a foreign nation, the same type of freedom it denies a minority of its own citizens, something has got to give, and it did.
The murder of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was the catalyst that lit the fuse, and America exploded.
And although the rift has narrowed in the 50 years since, there is still much to be accomplished, and hopefully cooler and more compassionate heads will prevail on both sides of the equation.
This is an ever-present problem that elicits heated feelings and is simply one of the complications America should have dealt with a long time ago.
There is a myriad of others that, due to the habit of Americans and especially American politicians of kicking thorny issues down the road, will have to be dealt with in the near future. America and other western nations are aborting their native populations out of existence. (And for the reticent and doubtful among you, please look it up for yourself.)
I am not alone in believing that there will be a future court where all decisions are final and not appealable, where we will all stand in final judgment and that the taking of unborn life will be viewed as murder.
The halls of power--state, local and most especially federal--are full of greedy, for sale to the highest bidder, or donor as it were, burned out retreads whose profligate spending and careless handling of taxpayers' money have resulted in putting the next foreseeable generations of Americans into hock, born with a tragic debt hanging over their heads.
The nuclear family unit has been desecrated, belittled and devalued by a people in a secular world that have developed their own morals, ignoring the eternal Author of morality.
Massive pharmaceutical companies with deep donor pockets, armies of lobbyists, a fleet of Ivy League lawyers greedily peddle their highly addictive wares to unscrupulous middlemen who put them into the hands of street dealers where they pass into the possession of those who can least afford the addiction.
If somebody stood up at a board meeting and accused these hyper compensated executives of being dope pushers, I'm sure they would be highly offended, but the truth of the matter is that though they may wear Armani suits and Ferragamo shoes, they are no better than the guy in the hoodie on the street corner selling their product.
Honesty is a subjective term to many in media and politics, and integrity only defines how much can be gotten away with.
Rascals and scoundrels are lauded while good men and women are defamed and destroyed.
The most affluent nation in the world still has hunger among us and veterans who fought our wars walk the street in rags, drug addicted and suicide-prone. Meanwhile, politicians would rather care for the needs of illegals who aren't even supposed to be here, to create a bigger voter base.
We have almost single-handedly turned China into a superpower, and Russia has gotten used to thumbing its nose at America. And now Russia is entrenched in the Middle East where there will eventually be an influence struggle. Check that, it's already going on.
China and Russia, during the military malaise of the Obama days, have apparently been developing some pretty scary weapons: stealth nuclear missiles and space-age fighter jets. They have left us in the unenviable position of playing catch up.
We revitalized Iran, assuring the world that they will develop a nuclear device in the foreseeable future, another issue that has been sidestepped by Republican and Democratic administrations for decades, and those chickens will soon head for the roost.
And in a time when we need to be more united than ever, every facet of government and much of our population are divided along real and imaginary lines.
Our children are in danger of never returning home from school on any given day, and instead of implementing basic protections now, before there's another school shooting, our elected representatives use the tragic issue posturing for political gain.
And no, I don't have all the answers. I have a lot of ideas, but I don't know if they would lead to solutions. But one thing I do know, we need action now, before more children are wantonly murdered, before the lunatic in North Korea does something horrible and irreversible, before the racial divides in this nation become any wider, before the Mullahs in Iran decide to hasten the arrival of the Mahdi by starting the third world war, before the Russians and Chinese get an even bigger head start on modern weaponry, before the interest on the national debt consumes 100 percent of our GNP and before another veteran becomes a static on the suicide roles.
Can we handle this?
Only with God's help.
What do you think?
Pray for our troops, our police and the peace of Jerusalem.
God Bless America
— Charlie Daniels
Charlie Daniels is a legendary American singer, song writer, guitarist, and fiddler famous for his contributions to country and southern rock music. Daniels has been active as a singer since the early 1950s. He was inducted into the Grand Ole Opry on January 24, 2008.