I saw this T-shirt in a store in Old Orchard Beach, Maine. As tempting as it was, I didn’t buy it. But it did get me thinking.

Does it seem to you that the level of general intelligence has gone down in recent years? Have people allowed themselves to sink to the lowest common denominator?

Is it the herd instinct? Not wanting to rock the boat with the truth? An unwillingness to tell our emperors that they have no clothes?

Are messages like this part of the problem, as accurate a the feelings may be? Are we allowing our need to be “right” to overshadow our brains? Is common sense no longer common, or agreed upon?

Is the decline in civility in North America (and elsewhere) a sign that our culture is on the brink of collapse? Have we lost the ability to discern who would make a good leader? And perhaps more important, who would not?

On this Wednesday I am full of questions. Do you have any answers?