For me, the essence of what is wrong with America is that the VAST majority of us have never been asked to consider, let alone understand, the following:

There are many battles being waged at this moment in an eruption of the still active volcano that is the American Civil War, at the core of which is an unending conflict between the Armies of Equality and Liberty. The most exacerbating and recent confrontation has been the months-long battle between anti-vaxxers (the Army of Liberty) and pro-vaxxers (the Army of Equality). Here is a Tweet that provides a wonderful insight regarding that conflict:

There have been numerous posts on this blog that elaborate upon the assertion I first encountered in Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, by Yuval Noah Harari, who noted that Liberty and Equality are diametrically opposed.
BLOGGER’S NOTES:
Related Posts:
We Have Never Been United States Except on Paper
The War Between Equality and Liberty
The Foundational Cause of our American Discontent
Is the Confederacy a year away from winning the Civil War?
The Rule of Law and Tinkerbell
Equality, Freedom, Education (3): Public Education and Eating the Rich–Part 1
Equality, Freedom, Education (4): Public Education and Eating the Rich–Part 2
Equality, Freedom, Education (8): The Harm That School Choice Brings
Universal Public Education Is the Canary in the American Coal Mine
Education and the Welfare State
There is no intention on the part of the blogger to monetize the use of the featured image, a copyright-free image from Pixabay.