Adding A Single Sane Word

 THE CONSERVATIVE ESTIMATE is that twenty five percent of the American people suffer from mental illness of some sort or another. A more liberal guess is fifty, what with the stress of the pandemic and the craziness of American culture and all. Arguably, at one time or another everyone experiences mental illness, just as everyone experiences physical illness. Arguably, everyone has at least one form of chronic mental illness. the types of mental illness are so many that surely everyone is afflicted with at least one of them, if not more. Who among us can truly claim to be free of all health related maladies, mental or physical? Who among us isn't a bit smitten by a smidgeon of gout, hypertension, diabetes, hardening of the arteries, arthritis, eczema, psoriasis, or such? It is also arguable, indeed evident that currently rampant in the United States are pathological prevarication (lying), narcissism, and delusion, and . that entire portion of the national mental illness epidemic, which in fact constitutes a huge portion of the whole, can be remedied by a single word, which ought properly be chiseled into granite on every public building in freedom's land: "perhaps", or, as an alternative: "maybe". Take your pick.A national referendum could decide between the two. "Perhaps" has an intellectual flair, "maybe" better suits blue collar America. Consider this:" perhaps the election was stolen from Donald Trump". "Maybe there are extraterrestrials disguised as human beings controlling the Federal Reserve". Sound better? sound less arrogant, more open minded, more honest? Case closed.Problem solved. No matter how unlikely the accusation, how outrageous the claim, the need for evidence is mitigated, if not eliminated merely by making the matter speculative, rather than arrogantly certain. Merely by adding a qualifier. Our national epidemic of delusional dishonesty is thus ended and the only necessary vaccine is a simple, but all important single word."Perhaps the Covid 19 epidemic is a liberal media hoax". "Maybe right wind extremist Trump supporters claiming election fraud are a tad violent and unreasonable". As you can plainly see, the possibilities are endless, for ending strife and arrogant, inappropriate certainty, the kind which starts wars. When something is put like that, in uncertain terms the only thing lacking is the  investigation.