In previous columns and even in the interview he did with me, Dennis Prager documents how the Left ruins just about everything it touches. In the past, he has talked about how it has ruined university education, the arts, race relations, and free speech. His latest column adds science to that list and gives four examples.

First, is the desire of science departments in universities throughout America that have declared their “intention to hire physicists, biologists and other scientists based on gender and race, not scientific expertise.” On my radio program I’ve talked about sometimes when university departments even decided not to hire any professor in an academic discipline because no one of the specified gender or race applied.

A second example he cites is the declaration by more than 1,000 doctors and other health care providers who ignored their previous warnings against public gatherings in order to give their approval to certain protests. They wrote: “As public health advocates, we do not condemn these gatherings (mass protests against racism) as risky for COVID-19 transmission. We support them as vital to the national public health.”

Another example has been the complete rejection of any medical benefit to hydroxychloroquine and zinc in treating COVID-19. A drug used to treat lupus and rheumatoid arthritis was labelled dangerous. One of the most prestigious medical journals (The Lancet) dismissed the effectiveness of the treatment, until the editors were forced to retract the journal article calling it a “fabrication” and “a monumental fraud.”

His last example comes from the American Psychological Association that argued that “traditional masculinity is psychologically harmful.” They also add that “socializing boys to suppress their emotions causes damage.”

These four examples are a sad commentary on the state of science today.

Some American cities may never recover. First, there was the coronavirus pandemic, then the lockdowns, and now the protests and riots. Joel Kotkin writes about “The Twilight of Great American Cities” and wonders if we can reverse this downward trend. James Altucher is more pessimistic and declares that “New York City is Dead Forever.”

The pandemic has exposed the danger of densely packed urban life. City dwellers find themselves in constant contact with people in crowded, unventilated places like subways, small apartments, elevators, and offices. According to the New York Times some “420,000 people left New York City between March 1 to May 1. This nearly equals the city’s total population increase from 1950 to 2019.”

More and more people are telecommuting and don’t anticipate returned to their pre-pandemic lives. A Stanford economist predicts that once the pandemic ends the online workforce will have increased from six percent to closer to 20 percent. A University of Chicago study suggest that could grow to as much as one-third of the workforce.

Rising disorder in the cities, along with a shocking rise in homicides (in Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York) are forcing many to reconsider where they live. The head of Site Selectors Guild reports that few companies want to locate in a big city and are choosing suburbs, smaller cities, or rural areas.

Politics is another reason cited for leaving cities. The “progressive rule” in cities like Seattle are why Amazon is moving to the suburbs and other locations. When cities want to significantly raise taxes and yet lessen police protection, companies and even small businesses will try to move.

In the next few years, many of these cities will be a shadow of their former selves.

Why do the rioters in the street have so much rage? Trying to find rational answers to irrational actions is often a worthless endeavor. But Ned Ryan has found some reasons for “The Misdirected Rage of Young Rioters.” His recent column parallels some of the insights from the book, The Coddling of the American Mind, that I have discussed in previous commentaries.

He notes that many of the rioters come from a “spoiled, enabled, and poorly educated generation or two. We shouldn’t be so surprised when we see them looting, rioting, and tearing down statutes.” Some of this, he believes, goes back to the “self-esteem movement of the 1990s, when children were always told they were the best—even if they really weren’t.” They grew up when everyone got “participation trophies”

Add to this the fact that they spent years at “indoctrination centers of higher learning where they are spoon-fed all the lies about how evil our country is, that this place is rotten to the core, and that it should just be burned to the ground.” But then they graduate from schools with worthless degrees and staggering debt. They can’t find jobs and so they rage against the system. They blame the free-market capitalist system.

Ned Ryan understands their anger but believes it is misplaced. They rage against a version of capitalism implemented by corporations. He says that what we have today is a “crony capitalist system, filled with vulture capitalists who manipulate markets and politics to their advantage.” They want to burn capitalism and the American society down, but they need to focus their targets and pay closer attention.

Their rage unfortunately stems from the miseducation they received in school coupled with their real concerns about crony capitalism that is misdirected at the free market.

Six months into this pandemic, Americans still misperceive their risk of death from COVID-19. That is one of the conclusions from an extensive survey done by Franklin Templeton in conjunction with Gallup. They also found that the misperception is greater for people who identify as Democrats and also for people who rely more on social media for their information.

Americans generally underestimate the impact of the coronavirus on a person aged 55 or older. They believe that people aged 55 and older account for just over half (57.5%) of total COVID-19 deaths; the actual figure is 92%..

For the other age cohorts, they tend to overestimate the likelihood of a person dying. They assume that people aged 44 and younger account for about 30 percent of the total deaths, while the actual figures is 2.7 percent. And they estimate the risk of death from COVID-19 for people aged 24 and younger to be about 8 percent when the actual figure is 0.2 percent.

The report also explains that this “misperception translates into a degree of fear for one’s health that for most people vastly exceeds the actual risk.” For example, more than a majority (59.1%) of young people (18-24) worry about the serious health effects from the coronavirus, yet their percentage of total deaths is only 0.1 percent.

Partisanship and social media also have an influence. “Those who identify as Democrats tend to mistakenly overstate the risk of death from COVID-19 for younger people much more than Republicans.” Also, the survey found that people “who get their information predominately from social media have the most erroneous and distorted perception of risk.”

This survey not only illustrates the mistaken ideas many Americans have about the coronavirus, but also highlights how the media and politicized statements by candidates skew our view of the pandemic.

One striking difference between Europe and America has been the temptation of many European countries to fall into totalitarianism. Dennis Prager reminds us that after World War I, many of these countries embraced communism, fascism, or Nazism. There is a very good reason why.

The primary beliefs that gave rise to meaning in life were patriotism and the Judeo-Christian religion. The senseless slaughter during the Great War (as it was called) challenged both of those foundations. National identity was seen as the cause of the war. And religion was deemed unnecessary and perhaps a relic of the past. The void that was left was filled with communism in Russia, fascism in Italy, and Nazism in Germany.

In the US, there were communists and many other activists promoting other totalitarian temptations, but they never took root. Americans did not lose their faith in religion (especially in Christianity). Patriotism not only flourished, but Dennis Prager reminds us that the words “under God” were even inserted into the Pledge of Allegiance recited daily in American schools.

But the baby-boomers born after World War II began to challenge God and country. These students were indoctrinated in secularism and anti-Americanism. The generations that followed them grew up in a country that was less religious and more likely to criticize America’s government and history.

Today we have a void that is similar to the one found in Europe a century ago. Most likely, the totalitarian temptation today will be a Leftist totalitarianism that promotes Leftist political correctness and bans free speech and religion.

There are many reasons to pray for a spiritual revival, but one of the more important reasons is to prevent this country from falling for the totalitarian temptation.

A new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention documents what we already suspected. The coronavirus pandemic has adversely affected our country’s mental health. Correspondent Alexander Nazaryan summarizes the findings from a CDC survey of 5,412 Americans. More than four in ten (40.9%) respondents reported at least one adverse mental or behavioral health condition.

More than three in ten (31%) suffered from anxiety or depression. More than a quarter (26%) experienced symptoms of traumatic disorder. Many (13%) were using drugs or alcohol more heavily or even for the first time to cope with the epidemic.

Many news reports accurately reported that 11 percent of the respondents said they seriously considered suicide. But that doesn’t give the whole picture. If you look at the chart in the CDC report, you notice that more than a quarter (25.5%) of young people (18-24) considered suicide in the last 30 days.

All of these numbers and percentages represent higher levels of psychological distress compared to pre-pandemic levels. Anxiety symptoms, for example, tripled in their incidence compared to the same period last year. Even worse, the incidence of depression or post-traumatic stress disorder quadrupled.

Columnist Jennifer Senior wrote about a Kaiser Family Foundation tracking poll showing a majority of American adults (53%) believe the pandemic is taking a toll on their mental health. More than one third (36%) of Americans said it was interfering with their sleep. Also, a third (32%) say they are overeating or not eating enough. All of this she concludes is causing a “national slide into a sulfurous pit of distress.”

I believe the current circumstances provide an opportunity to provide our nation with true hope and encouragement found in the gospel and provided through individual Christian action and church outreach.

Andrew McDiarmid is a media specialist at the Discovery Institute and author of a blog that attempts to apply biblical principles to technology. He was on my radio program recently to talk about an article posted at the Breakpoint website.

The global pandemic has affected our lives in countless ways. One of the most concerning is the reality that our screen time has skyrocketed. We are now relying on technology companies more than ever. He concludes that the “pandemic has given many tech companies a golden opportunity to solve our daily pain points and get us hooked on their products and services.”

This leads to an interesting irony. We have more digital technology available to us than ever before, but we seem more unhappy than ever before. “As Christians, we want to be a witness for Christ and use the gifts God has given us to live purposeful lives and build his kingdom. But when our use of technology becomes automatic and unthinking, our health and well-being” are at risk.

He recommends that we take stock of the technology we already have in our lives, especially the digital technology of gadgets and screens. Are we using the technology tools merely to waste time? Do these new devices and services keep us from thinking for ourselves? Do they enable us to use our God-given abilities and spiritual gifts? Do these digital technologies help us to accomplish what God has called us to do?

These are good questions and require that we begin to set boundaries. He admits that “knowing where to draw the line between things you think through yourself and thinking you delegate to a computer can be difficult.” All of this requires thoughtful analysis of the tech tools you bring into your life and a careful evaluation of how you will be using them.

The last two months have shown us how easily the veneer of civilized American society can be shattered. We naively assumed that the moral foundations and social institutions would be strong enough to handle a global pandemic and scattered protests and riots. Now we see their weaknesses.

Victor Davis Hanson writes about this thin veneer of American civilization and begins by focusing on New York City that used to be thriving not so long ago. “The city is now something out of a postmodern apocalyptic movie, reeling from the effects of a neutron bomb. Ditto in varying degrees Minneapolis, Portland, Seattle, and San Francisco.”

On more than one occasion, I have mentioned in my commentaries that most of us lived in a world with a “live and let live” social philosophy. I do that in part of explain to a younger generation what life used to be like before university professors encouraged their students to hate America and to protest even “microagressions.” Nearly everything is under attack. It’s not just statues that are being pulled down. Movies and TV programs are being pulled from services on the Internet. Comedians are complaining that they can’t even make a joke without facing the cancel culture.

Meanwhile, out in the streets, it is getting dangerous. Hanson reminds us that, “Once upon a time, trying to torch a federal courthouse would earn years in prison. And simply taking over a large chunk of a downtown to re-create Lord of the Flies was unthinkable. Not now. Today you can go to jail for reopening a gym that requires masks, social distancing, and constant cleansing with antiseptics.”

In the book of Isaiah (5:20) that is a warning of a nation that “calls evil good, and good evil.” It sounds like American society today.