Many years ago I had an idea for a short story (which, sadly, I never wrote).

My main character, a mid-level government bureaucrat in Nazi Germany, accidentally hit his head on a bookshelf and suffered a very strange side effect: an incredibly acute sense of smell. As a result, he was assaulted by every odor around him, people, food, flowers, newly cut grass, and even the air itself. As his sense of smell continued to sharpen with each passing day, his misery increased. 

Eventually, he reached the point where he could smell emotions, and he realized that he was surrounded with fear, hatred, and duplicity that he was hitherto unaware existed. He was finally pushed over the edge when passing railroad cars packed with terrified Jewish children on their way to a concentration camp compelled him to throw himself under the wheels of their train to escape the stench threatening to destroy his very soul. While he was dying passers-by all around proceeded obliviously on their ways without the least doubt that their leader, Adolf Hitler, was the finest man the world has ever produced—and their ideals the finest their nation had ever known.

There is, I believe, a distinct and disturbing smell about America today that we can detect even without a sharp smack on the head, and it begins with our upcoming elections.

Regardless of how you feel about the candidacy of Kamala Harris for President, her bizarre ascension to the nomination without earning a single primary vote—coming on the heels of a broad and equally bizarre conspiracy to conceal the advanced dementia of Joe Biden for likely his entire term of office—is being celebrated by Democrats and their corporate media handmaidens with an salivating ardor that is more than a bit creepy to behold. 

The concurrent effort to erase (or ignore) inconvenient policy positions of the Democrats’ anointed candidate—on defunding the police, on decriminalizing illegal immigration, on supporting rioters, on restricting freedom of speech, on banning gun ownership, on eliminating private health insurance, and on a variety of other excessively Woke and worrisome positions—has required the eager compliance of Big Tech and major news organizations that indicates a complete disregard for any concept of objective and provable truth. Which seems to bother very few leading Democrats.

Other examples of malodorous and concerning official silence abound. The studied amnesia about the mind-boggling damage caused the  recent years of Covid-19 lockdowns and shutdowns. The incredible personal wealth public officials are magically accruing while in office. The peculiar inattention to security that nearly led to the assassination of former President Trump. The lack of curiosity about who is enabling the ongoing march of illegal immigrants to our national borders, where they are thence welcomed and set loose in America with remarkably little oversight by our government. The erosion of bank balance sheets as the value of commercial real estate loans continues to implode across America—and its implications for the solvency of our country’s financial system. The continued expenditure of taxpayer money on public schools that barely educate students. The miasma of censorship and shaming that functions as a national mute button on a wide variety of discussions that we desperately need to have. The list goes on and on and on.

Thankfully, a “silenced majority” of Americans are wise to the games being played, and this has translated into an open disdain directed toward our country’s major institutions by these ignored citizens. The regime media derides those who withhold their support for the official lies that now dominate our discourse, labeling them “low information voters”, but the reality is that Americans have a keen nose for nonsense. Poll after poll has shown that a tidal wave of mistrust has washed over our country, and the so-called conspiracy theories of the past few years on matters raging from the true origins of Covid-19 to the unproven Russiagate scandal to the veracity of Hunter Biden’s laptop have proven that the mainstream media and Deep State actors are the actual conspirators—and their falsehoods have only added to the stench now choking so many patriotic Americans.

No sensible citizen complains about being led, but few enjoy being misled by those who have been voted into positions of our highest trust. We see these suspicions manifested in citizens fleeing Democrat-run states and cities, growing recruitment problems for our Armed Forces, record purchases of arms and ammunition for personal protection, and a sullen resolve to resist the normalization of the abnormal by fed-up citizens who refuse to any longer be ignored and denigrated. This growing resistance angers the Marxist acolytes and insiders whose ideals tend toward a totalitarianism that believes forced obedience is a worthy goal of government, but they understand as little of our history and values as they do of honor and loyalty, which explains a lot of the stink now pervading America.

The next six months are going to tell us a great deal about both our own character and the future of our nation. Not everyone is going to require a good knock on the noggin to notice the odor of mendacity now pervading our politics and culture—many are already fully awakened—but it is a sad fact that the truth is often obfuscated or hidden by those extremists who are today trying to remake America in accordance with their warped and unworkable values. 

We will all need to follow both our noses—and our hearts—as we navigate the difficult and dangerous days that are dead ahead.