Prometheus 6

I've been thinking about America's psychological condition too. Dr. C Eric Lincoln described our collective mental state brilliantly: 

The toll of racialism is devastating for Blackamericans, but in the long run its costs may be even higher for white America. Beyond the extraordinary cost in dollars, the inconvenience and the inherent danger of trying to suppress a whole race of people, white America has lost its self-repect and its moral authority. A scarcely camouflaged sense of guilt pervades the church and society-at-large, and the abuse of power, sex, drugs, and people is the prevailing alternative to responsible interaction. The frantic pursuit of momentary escape from the nagging realization that there is a dilemma, an open chasm between what we claim to be and what we are, dominates our private agendas, colors our national character, and subjects us to international blackmail and ridicule.

. . .A system of values without consistency and without constraint cannot be trusted with the ordering of any society worthy of the name. And if our commitment is merely to be narcotized rather than to earn the tranquillity to which we hold ourselves entitled, then we must be prepared for the delirium and the agony that come when the fix has lost its magic and the morning after has arrived.

He's right.