Editor's Note: This article is from Woke Wars, an email-only newsletter from The Sentinel published six days per week to cover the cultural insurgency of wokeness.

El Salvador has greatly curbed violence in recent years.

The small country in Central America was terrorized by notorious gangs over the past few decades, rendering the nation one of the most dangerous places in the entire world.

But according to Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, the murder rate dropped to 1.9 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants last year, rendering the country “indisputably the safest country in the Western Hemisphere, after having been the most unsafe country in the world.”

Bukele ended the announcement with “Primero Dios,” which means “God First.”

Praise be to his name.

The sudden reduction in violence can indeed be attributed to the mercy of God.

There were 6,656 homicides recorded in El Salvador ten years ago. There were only 114 homicides recorded last year. But that turnaround by no means occurred by accident.

Bukele entered office against all odds and defeated the establishment to exert the will of the people against the violent gangs, exercising emergency authorities to arrest tens of thousands of gang members, and leveraging the armed forces against the syndicates.

El Salvador can indeed offer the United States a lesson in political will.

The people have to want this.

America has far less violence and corruption than the El Salvador of ten years ago, and yet criminality has been on the rise in our country for the past few years.

That is because our leaders do not enforce the law, and our voters do not expect our leaders to enforce the law, especially in major cities with broadly Democratic voter bases.

Such a situation ensures that the laws will indeed not be enforced, causing everyday people to suffer, until they muster the political will to elect leaders who will end the violence.

There are no shortcuts. That is the only way to reverse the mayhem.