How came they to be this way? Therein lies the root of the larger problem. Personally, I blame Franklin Roosevelt. (for appointing so many kook judges who undermined what was normal public behavior.)
Thanks for the reply and I think you ask a good question. In my opinion, which is not shared by many at FR, focusing on politics rather than the things that we as Christians are supposed to focus on has been a real disaster.
As for how this evil came about, well, I guess you could trace it to satan being cast out if you want to go back that far.
In our country I think a lot of this from a political perspective comes from the aftermath of the civil war when the idea of states rights and autonomy was essentially chucked out the window. It got immeasurably worse under Wilson and FDR, but I think the roots of it lie with the idea that one national government holding the vast majority of the power is better than 40 or 50 states holding most of the power and effectively competing with one another to be freer (or more horrible) as the case may be.
At this point I view it as mostly academic. We are where we are and I’m more concerned about how we get to a better end place. And again my opinion is not widely shared at FR, but I don’t see politics as offering much in the way of a solution. You don’t fix spiritual and cultural problems through elections.