The media is once again up in arms over Donald Trump.  This time it’s lewd comments he made about women 11 years ago.  To be honest, I’m actually glad the media, along with the political elite, are finally taking morality seriously.  America has been in moral decline since at least the 1960s; yet hardly anyone on either side of the aisle has sounded a voice of alarm.

Our moral philosophy has become “If it feels good, do it” and “You only have one life to live.”  Traditional morality, we are taught, is for repressed individuals.  What really matters is “being true to oneself” and “feeling right.”

In a 2011 interview, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks – a member of Great Britain’s House of Lords – argued that Western civilization will collapse if its moral fabric continues to unravel.  “Moral breakdown,” he said, “leads to social breakdown leads to lack of morale leads to lack of national strength, and that is a story that’s been repeated by every civilization in history.  It happened in Greece in the third century before the Christian era, and it happened in Rome in the first century.”

Until now, the media and political class, with rare exceptions, have ignored the threat of moral decay to our future.  Trump, however, has apparently inspired them to rediscover their moral compass.  I therefore fully expect them to now:

1. criticize Hollywood for lacing its movies with horrific vulgarities and for objectifying women as sex objects.
2. call for outlawing late-night talk shows where crudity and disrespect for women is so routine that hardly anyone bats an eyelash anymore.  Indeed, the reaction to vulgar jokes is generally uproarious laughter. (Was I the only one outraged at the crowd’s laughter at Comedy Central’s recent roast of Ann Coulter?)
3. call on the FCC to ban TV sitcoms on which women’s private parts are played for laughs and men’s predatory desire to spend the night with every pretty woman they meet is portrayed as a normal state of affairs.
4. critique advertising agencies which objectify women and promote sultry sexuality as the height of beauty.
5. call on newspapers and magazines to refuse to run such ads.
6. slam rap music where women are commonly referred to as “bitches” and “hos.”
7. call on family shows like America’s Got Talent not to hire people like Jerry Springer and Howard Stern – whose fame derives from their appalling vulgarity – as hosts.
8. critique the fashion industry, which promotes styles that accentuate – not women’s femininity – but their sexuality.
9. slam our sexual culture which allows men to “hook up” and use women for their own physical pleasure – sometimes for years – before dumping them and leaving them holding nothing but emotional scars.

Lastly, since the media and political class have now, thank God, rediscovered moral probity, I fully expect them to call on Hillary Clinton to drop out of the race.  After all, it would be unseemly to have a woman running for president who casually laughed about defending a child rapist and who once greeted a Secret Service agent who wished her good morning by responding, “F— off.”