The ancient proverb states; the fish rots from the head down. In reality, however, it is the guts of a fish that stink first, then the head. Regardless, there’s a stench associated with rotting fish, much as there’s a foul odor in our society that’s coming from somewhere. If we only knew the origin, we could get things to a point where maybe we could at least tolerate each other.

It’s unclear how many more body blows society can withstand this year. 2020 has bought us a horrific pandemic along with the economic disaster to follow. We’ve suffered back-breaking conflicts related to race relations which, quite honestly, have been simmering for decades. In these trying times, we take for granted the concept of leadership until which time we have little or none of it, then we experience how bad things can be.

If there has been a more divided time in our country’s history, I don’t believe anyone alive right now has experienced it. Not since the 1860’s has our society been at such odds. Why? Is it the lack of leadership and poor example setting? Or are our leaders simply mirroring the bad behavior of society? I believe most people are followers by nature and it’s apparent to me that our leaders are letting us down. From the national on down to the local level, the seeds of division are being sown. The concept of servant leadership appears to be lost upon those who are “in charge”. So many elected officials seem to think they are our bosses instead of our employees. How often do we hear politicians make references to “my city” or “my district” or say things like “I spent” money on various programs? Hello? This is OUR city / district and you’re charged with spending OUR money. Their part in the play is but a temporary role, or at least it should be. Shouldn’t our leaders represent all of us and not just those who voted for them?

While the current candidates are in a frenzy to rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic in order to get elected, the rest of the country is suffering. As a result, we certainly don’t seem to like each other very much. We’re not even pretending to like each other anymore, which could be a pre-curser to something much worse if things don’t change.

With the news of President Trump’s COVID-19 diagnosis this morning, for a moment I thought that maybe people would put the daggers down for a minute or two. Then I started reading things about how the Karma bus paid an overnight visit and so on and so on. So much for that.