A Country Lost in Hate

America stands at a crossroads where violence threatens to replace ballots, where leadership fails, and where our children may inherit a nation defined by hate, not hope.

Guest article by Michael Cohen. Follow him on Substack for more by clicking here.

The message of Charlie Kirk is being wasted. And before you roll your eyes, let me explain what I mean. When a young man is gunned down in broad daylight, when his life is snuffed out in an act of political violence, the tragedy transcends partisanship. It should. His assassination should have been a wake-up call to every American—Democrat, Republican, Independent—that we are teetering on the edge of a precipice. Either you have democracy or you have political violence. You cannot have both.

Yet, yesterday, inside the Kennedy Center, what unfolded was not a solemn reckoning with this truth. It was not a coming together of leaders across the political spectrum to mourn a life lost and reflect on how to prevent the next one. No. It was an orgy of blame, finger-pointing, and partisan chest-thumping. Instead of grappling with the danger of a society where guns and hate intermingle, speakers weaponized the tragedy itself. They turned death into a talking point. They turned grief into ammunition.

Is this the country we want to leave to our children? A country where every act of violence is immediately assigned to “the other side”? Where the blood on the ground is not mourned but manipulated? Where our leaders use a funeral as a campaign stop instead of a sacred moment of reflection? I say NO!

The President had a chance—perhaps the most important chance of his second term—to speak to the entire nation with clarity, compassion, and humility. He could have acknowledged the darkness of the moment while calling us back to light. He could have extended a hand across the aisle, telling the wife and children who just buried their husband and father that their pain mattered more than politics. But he didn’t. Instead, he went small. He went mean. He blamed the “radical left,” labeling them “flag-burning, scumbag lunatics.”

What a missed opportunity.

Political violence isn’t a left or right issue. It’s an American issue. Once we normalize killing each other over ideology, once we let assassination become part of the political process, democracy itself collapses. If you need a cautionary tale, look no further than history. Every failed republic began not with some grand war, but with a culture that made violence acceptable.

Martin Luther King Jr. once warned us: “Let no man pull you so low as to hate him.” Think about that. Let no man—no politician, no demagogue, no cable news host—drag you into the pit. Because once you are in it, once you start hating as reflex, you stop seeing the humanity in others. You stop seeing America as a shared home. You stop believing that democracy requires compromise, forgiveness, and sometimes even love.

Nelson Mandela said something equally profound: “No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love; for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.”

We are at that crossroads right now. Every speech matters. Every headline matters. Every reckless comment from a president, a senator, or a media personality doesn’t just dissipate into the air; it becomes a seed. Seeds of love, seeds of hate. What are we planting?

At the Kennedy Center yesterday, I saw the worst of us: the opportunists who will never waste a good crisis, the politicians who feast on division. But I also saw glimpses of something better. I saw families holding each other in the pews. I saw young people crying, not because they cared about party labels, but because they were grieving the senselessness of it all. That’s where hope still lives—in the ordinary people who refuse to surrender to hate.

The truth is, the message of Charlie Kirk—the human being, not the pundit who I disagreed with on almost everything—should have been unity. The tragedy of his death should have reminded us that our nation is fragile, that our experiment in democracy depends on restraint and compassion. Instead, his death is being twisted into another weapon in the endless culture war of division.

But we still have a choice. We can let this assassination be just another headline, another excuse to sharpen the knives. Or we can let it be the line in the sand—the moment we finally all say enough.

I am haunted by the thought of what we’re passing down to our children. They’re watching us. They’re listening. They’re learning whether hate is the language of America or whether love still stands a chance.

The Kennedy Center should have been a cathedral of reflection. Instead, it was a stage for blame. But the story isn’t over yet. We can still choose a different ending.

And so I’ll leave you with this: democracy dies not when one man pulls the trigger, but when the rest of us decide to stop caring.

---

PLEASE DON’T IGNORE THIS… JOIN THE FIGHT!

SUBSCRIBE. READ. SHARE. RESTACK.

Yeah, I know—you’re tired. This shit is exhausting.
Guess what? Me too.

But I’ve spent the last 8 years throwing punches in the dark so truth could get a little daylight. And now I’m asking you to step into the ring with me.

Because if you’re still reading this, you already get it:
This isn’t just a newsletter. It’s a rally cry. A war drum. A line in the sand.

We are not passive observers of the downfall. We are the resistance. We call out the liars. We drag corruption by the collar into the sunlight. We say the quiet parts out loud—and we don’t flinch.

But here’s the truth: I can’t do this solo. Not anymore.

The storm is already here. We are standing in it. And it’s wearing stars and stripes like camouflage, preaching “freedom” while it sells fascism at retail.

So let me ask you:
Are. You. In?

Because this is not a scroll-and-forget read. This is a living, breathing, fire-breathing movement—and movements don’t move unless you do.

We need to be louder than spin, tougher than propaganda, and impossible to gaslight. That takes more than clicks. More than likes. It takes skin in the game.

So if you believe truth matters, if you're sick of the bullshit, if you’re ready to stop screaming into the algorithm and start pushing back with purpose, this is your next step.

HERE’S HOW YOU PUT YOUR FOOT ON THE GAS:

• Become a paid subscriber. Fund fearless, unfiltered journalism that hits back.

• Share this with the loudest people you know—the ones who never sit down and shut up.

• Build the community. Amplify the message. Be the damn megaphone.

And yeah, Founding Members? The first 240 of you will get a signed, numbered, limited-edition Substack version of Revenge. That’s not just a collector’s item. That’s receipts. Proof you didn’t sit this one out.

But let’s be clear:
This isn’t about a book.
It’s about backbone.
It’s about calling out the gaslighters and refusing to be played.
It’s about locking arms and saying, "Not. On. Our. Watch."

You want to make a difference?
Then make it—right now.

Because if we don’t fight for truth, no one will.
But if we fight together?
They can’t drown us out.

Let’s be so loud, they wish we were just angry tweets.
Let’s be unshakable.
Unignorable.
Un-fucking-breakable.

Let’s go!