This is a bizarre time in U.S. presidential politics. American voters are faced with an unsavory choice between two presidential candidates, neither of whom would be viable if the other party offered a credible alternative.

I feel badly for my white male compatriots who feel so hurt these days because they are not being paid attention to. They whine that politics and society have left them behind. They grump about their lost opportunities, the ones their fathers had in such abundance fifty years ago, mostly in manufacturing.

In 2009, while in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, a video crew and I interviewed vets who had just returned from a deployment to Iraq. We asked several of them and their families what America stood for and what values they felt they fought for.