For four years under President Trump, America enjoyed peace, security, and unparalleled prosperity.  Trump's presidency was a historic era of good times in which we began to regain faith in the American Dream.  Now we have the nightmare and the death and destruction that go with it.

Yes, the Trump Era was prosperous, with historically low unemployment rates, low inflation, energy independence, and rising wages.  But aside from that, the most important thing about Trump's presidency was the fact that Americans were secure, as they had not been under Obama and certainly are not under Biden.  Under Trump, America was in so many senses vibrant and "alive" with pride in our country and hope for its future.

Now we have regular mass shootings in which citizens disarmed by the State have no way to defend themselves.  Overseas, we have a war in Ukraine, the threat of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, and Iran developing nuclear weapons with the encouragement of the Biden administration.  The common thread is death and the fear that goes with it.  And this does not even include Biden's aggressive defense of abortion on demand. 

Under President Trump, I lived without fear.  I knew that Trump supported my right to defend my home and that he supported the police who defended me as well.  Just having the president and his administration on my side made me breathe easier.  America was moving in the right direction, as was confirmed by every opinion poll during Trump's time in office before COVID was unleashed.

Long-term death rates are more a matter of demographics than policy, and they have been rising ever since Obama took office in 2008.  But murder rates, deaths in war and civil unrest, drug overdose deaths, and accidental deaths are attributable to policy, and they have been rising under Biden, even during his short time in office.  Under Biden, the U.S. murder rate, which had been declining under President Trump, is the highest in 25 years.  According to former N.Y. police commissioner Howard Safir, the spike in violence is partly attributable to a lack of support for police and soft-on-crime prosecutors.  And it is Biden, with his anti-police rhetoric and refusal to prosecute (as in the case of those picketing Justice Kavanaugh's home), who is responsible for this climate of anarchy.

Now I plan my trips carefully, avoid eye contact with strangers, and carry only a driver's license and credit card.  I drive inconspicuously as well, given the explosion of road rage incidents.

The most galling thing is that Biden never says a word about the victims of crime unless he can twist the incident into an anti-gun lecture, and he takes no action to protect anyone, especially law-abiding citizens in middle-class neighborhoods like my own.  In this and so many other ways, he seems on the side of those who wish to destroy us.  It's no accident that murder rates are spiraling at home and war is breaking out overseas.  Both are a response to Biden's weakness, and death is the consequence.

I fear there will be more death ahead.  I expect an invasion in Taiwan, Moldova, or Finland, and new outbreaks of violence in the Middle East involving either Iran or its surrogates.  The incomprehensible Iran deal, which Biden is pushing, would "make Biden 'the biggest funder of terrorism in the world,'" according to Rep. Jim Banks.  "Terrorism" is not just a derogatory word; it is the act of murdering innocent human beings, including women and children.  Hasn't that fact entered into Biden's Iran deal calculations?

Biden's weakness has emboldened our enemies, and their actions pose a threat to our security.  This is the way major wars begin.  They can be prevented only by the projection of force of the kind we saw under President Trump, and Biden projects about as much force as a lady's fan.  His weakness will get us into another war, and our young men and women will die in that war.  There is death hanging over us, and Biden seems oblivious, fumbling with his note cards to find some kind of answer.  

There is a new national mood in America unlike anything I've seen since the 1960s: a sense of foreboding and caution based on the very real threat of violence and collapse.  There are more threats to our country, including the wealth destruction of inflation, to which Biden simply rolls his eyes, chuckles, and whispers some idiotic riposte.  There are more criminal gangs, and Biden just welcomes more in.  There is more road rage, more random shootings, and more felons out on no bond/low bond.  And there is a callous and brutal disregard for the lives of the unborn.

In response to the mounting violence, Biden seems remote, fuddling with his microphone like a man slipping into dementia, and those around him seem inept, if not callous, including his new press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, who is said to have "frequently stumbled" during her first weeks.  A president who is weak and advisers who are incompetent and anti-American to boot — that is a recipe for disaster, and disaster will end, as it always does, in poverty, destruction, and death.

There are bullies in the world who watched as Biden stumbled out of Afghanistan, and bullies don't have much respect for doddering fools who just want to survive a four-year term and leave a mess for someone else to clean up.

As a citizen, it is difficult to watch my country besieged by violence.  Biden's presidency has been deadly in every respect: turning off economic growth and imposing environmental restrictions, proposing inflation-adjusted cuts in national defense while paying off student loans, and putting citizens at risk with his anti-police rhetoric.

There is little chance of a second Biden term, but just another two and a half years is painful to imagine.  How many thousands will lose their lives because of one incompetent and wrong-headed leader?  How far will America go into danger and destruction?  And how much more difficult will it be for our next president, Trump or a Trump lookalike, to repair the damage and Make America Safe Again?

Jeffrey Folks is the author of many books and articles on American culture including Heartland of the Imagination (2011).

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.