Remember that old detective TV show, “Dragnet”? There was a famous line by actor Jack Webb, “Just the facts, ma’am.” Naturally, the police search for the facts in order to solve a crime.

Juries are convened to decide between fact and fiction. They decide guilt or innocence accordingly. Judges conduct the trial, and upon hearing the jury’s verdict, pronounce sentence.

Permit me to apply this analogy to you and the upcoming national elections. You are the jury. Here are some facts.

Fact: Communism, once the greatest nanny state of all, failed as a political system because it couldn’t feed its own citizens. The entire Soviet Union went under, and China sunk into poverty, but both have made comebacks by turning to capitalism for salvation.

Of course, a few communist go-getters became millionaires in the process, which offends the communist ideology, but the ideal of achieving total equality became a dream of the past.

Fact: Europe moved in the direction of socialism by creating a network of nanny states. Deficit spending ballooned as social benefits increased. Today, many European countries are in a state of economic chaos, and have been forced to cut back on spending. As a result, street riots have broken out to protest the cutback in benefits.

Fact: The United States is over $15 trillion in debt. We have not begun to cut back on our deficit spending in any significant way. We haven’t even come close to balancing our budget.

Fact: A recent Gallup poll reported that 70 percent of those polled believe that America is moving in the wrong direction.

Fact: I have been a bleeding-heart liberal all my life. I believe that Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid must be saved. I marched in Selma, Ala., with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

However, recently I have begun to see that the American experiment is slowly dying. Our government will go bankrupt if we do not make deep cuts in our deficit spending. Even if the health care bill is deemed unconstitutional, we are still in trouble.

When Congress voted for universal health care, they increased our potential national debt beyond belief. I shuddered when I realized that the ship of state is slowly sinking. It has three holes in the hull (Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid). Water is pouring in by the ton.

If we are to stay afloat, we cannot punch any new holes in the hull. Either we reduce our deficit spending or we sink.

Fact: I am no longer a bleeding-heart liberal. I do not believe we can continue to go forward in the same direction. I would love to see our leaders change direction, but instead of reform, we seem to be expanding the nanny state further.

Think of yourself as a member of a national jury. You have the obligation to render your verdict in November. You must base it on the facts, not on unsubstantiated promises. When you decide what is fact and what is fiction, you must then vote your conscience.

I will respect your decision whatever it is. But let us agree to pray for the United States of America and its future.

For the next few months, politicians on both sides will be spending millions of dollars in TV ads, trying to distract voters from focusing on the essential question, which is this: Are we moving in the right direction or not?