If only there was good news to write about, but these days it is very difficult. Yes, there are small personal bits of good news, but on the larger stage of the West it seems like a downhill descent from democracy, freedom and equality under the law. The West reached its peak in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, starting its decline in the 1990s and, like the proverbial downhill fall, gaining speed in the 2020s. The United States continues to be divided along political lines. Whatever the merits of each case, the different treatment of Democratic Senators who have done the wrong thing and Republican ones cannot be seen in any light other than politics intruding into the judicial system. In the United States, Great Britain, Canada and Australia, the draconian response to COVID-19, which is now coming out as based not facts but on politics and hysteria, saw the suspension of human rights. Australia is undergoing a most divisive referendum. Israel has been torn apart by judicial reforms, with the United States interfering in what should be Israel’s domestic affair. France is undergoing ethnic violence. These events do not augur well for the West at a time when its enemies are attacking or preparing to attack what was once the bastion of democracy. Those enemies are watching very closely and calculating their moves. The leaders of Western countries would do well to stop stoking the division and once more unite their populations or risk the consequences of continuing along the path that they have chosen. [Image: Library of Congress]