Short perspective. The beginning of the demise of America as founded was April 8, 1913, when the 17th Amendment was ratified denying the states representation in Congress and turning us into a democracy, rather than a proper republic. The process was accelerated by the courts with Wickard v. Filburn in 1942, which turned the Commerce Clause into a justification for Federal law intruding into every facet of economic activity (and some non-economic spheres) on the plea that they "affect interstate commerce", and Reyolds v. Sims that destroyed the republican constitutions of most states by forbidding them from following the wisdom Founders showed in establishing the Senate, and requiring all state legislative chambers be apportioned on the basis of population, rather than having an upper house elected by, say, county.
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A respectful demurral.
We, as well as the rest of the world, have abandoned the wisdom of the
Ancients who understood that Mankind's Anchor were his spiritual sensibilities.
These had absolutely nothing to do w/any religious impulse. NOTHING!
The radicals of the French Enlightenment asserted that Man's higher calling
was his material betterment, driven by the birth of Capitalism; a sea change
in attitude and temperament that has fundamentally altered the world.
Mankind is hardly better off for this change of focus!!!