November 8 is decision day. Americans will choose who will be the next president of the United States: Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. There has never been an election cycle like this one. More than half of Americans dislike both candidates. The lies, insults, scandals and childish behavior of both candidates have been suffocating.

Trump promises to “Make America Great Again!” Clinton promises to unify America with her slogan, “Stronger Together.” Yet both sides claim that if their candidate doesn’t win, it will spell disaster for America. Some label Trump as a fascist; some label Clinton as a criminal. Yet one of these two individuals will become the next president of the world superpower. Tensions are high, and disaster seems to be building on the horizon.

Democracy seems to be broken. The many processes that have elected capable leaders in the past seem to have failed us. The future of America hangs in the balance.

There is an untold story of Election Day 2016. While America and the world focus on what America will be after the election, they are ignoring what America is now. President Barack Obama has changed this nation. America has been under attack for eight years. Whoever inherits the White House will preside over a radically transformed United States.

To understand what the future portends for America, we must grasp the damage inflicted by the Obama administration over the past eight years.

Promised Change

When President Obama was elected in 2008, a wave of euphoria swept the country: The first African-American had been elected president. Many believed he was a symbol of hope that America’s future was bright. It was a historic moment and a turning point for the nation. During President Obama’s victory speech in Chicago, tears flowed as people listened to the promise of change:

It’s been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America. … The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America—I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you—we as a people will get there.

America has changed under President Obama’s leadership, but not in the direction many hoped. There has been a drastic turn to the radical left in governance. The current administration has deliberately sought to transform the country. President Obama has a radical-left political philosophy and has been implementing policies to undermine the pillars of American society.

This may seem stranger than fiction. However, there is overwhelming evidence to prove that the president has been used to attack America.

The Age of Antiochus

God inspired the Prophet Daniel to foretell what would happen in “the time of the end.” One such prophecy was about Antiochus Epiphanes in Daniel 8 and 11.

Anciently, Antiochus Epiphanes was ruler of the Seleucid Greeks from 175 to 164 b.c. The Seleucid Empire was one of the four divisions of Alexander the Great’s empire when it fractured after his death. Seleucid Greeks ruled over Asia Minor, Syria and the Northern Levant, with the capital in Antioch. During one of Antiochus’s campaigns into Egypt, he was rebuffed by the Romans and descended into a fury. He directed that wrath at the Jews.

Judea was under his control, and the Seleucid Army had to pass through that region to return home in 168 b.c. Due to a mixture of internal politics, anti-Semitism and satanic influence, Antiochus unleashed a torrent of barbarism against the Jews. He slaughtered many, destroyed as many copies of the law as could be found, and set up a statue of Zeus in the temple.

Daniel 8:9 prophesies of a “little horn,” which refers to Antiochus Epiphanes (for more information, read Daniel Unsealed at Last). A satanic force overtook this man and caused him to commit brutal crimes against the Jews. The greatest was the “transgression of desolation” found in verse 13. Antiochus had a statue of Zeus placed in the holy of holies, the very place that symbolized God’s throne room.

Verse 14 reveals that the daily sacrifice would be stopped for 3 1/2 years. This oppression caused the Maccabean rebellion, where a small number of Jews fought back and eventually regained their freedom after a desperate struggle.

The Bible and secular history records Antiochus as a vile person with a deep hatred for the Jews. Daniel reveals that Antiochus was used by Satan to attack the Jews and to destroy the law. While this first Antiochus figure that Daniel prophesied about has come and gone, his prophecy also has an application for our time today! There were to be end-time types of Antiochus, who would attack God’s people.

An end-time spiritual Antiochus has already come and dismantled God’s true Church. Satan used this man to attack the leadership of the Church and then destroy the rest. For more on this fascinating history, request Malachi’s Message.

There is also a physical type of this end-time Antiochus who would attack America. Just as Satan attacked the Church’s leadership first with an Antiochus, so would Satan attack America in the same way. The reason for this attack is because America is one of the modern nations of Israel (to prove this for yourself, please read our free book The United States and Britain in Prophecy).

Look back over the past eight years. Compare America 2016 to America 2008. Great change has occurred in this country, and it all follows the guidelines of a radical-left agenda. This transformation goes against the foundation of American law, culture and identity. It is all meant to destroy America’s history with God and break the faith of the nation. Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry explains all this in his booklet America Under Attack.

Attack on Law

In The Bible as History, Werner Keller wrote that Antiochus sought to “crush and destroy the faith of Israel.” The chief method he employed was the systematic destruction of copies of the Torah. Seleucid troops marched through the Judean countryside, destroying any copy of the Torah they found. It was an assault on God’s law and the chief source of the Jews’ faith.

The ancient Antiochus hated the rule of law, and this is also true of the end-time Antiochus ruling America. There has never been an attack on law in America as there has been by this administration. The Constitution is the supreme law of the land, the lifeblood of American identity, and the guarantor of our freedoms. This has been the chief target of this administration’s far-left agenda.

Before a president assumes responsibility of the office, he must take the oath of office: “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of president of the United States and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

President Obama, a Harvard-trained lawyer who has taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago, has done the opposite. In America Under Attack, Mr. Flurry writes, “[T]he Obama administration is taking actions just about every week that raise constitutional questions and that threaten to undermine America’s foundational document.” The president has sought to dissolve the separation of powers by circumventing Congress and acting as chief executive and chief legislature. No other president in U.S. history has expanded the powers of executive so quickly and effectively. The radical-left ideology endorses big government, and that is exactly what President Obama has been delivering.

In his most recent booklet, Great Again, Mr. Flurry writes, “When he became president, Barack Obama promised his supporters a radical transformation of the U.S. …

“Mr. Obama is an outspoken critic of the Constitution and has long desired to cast off its restraints.” This is the process we have witnessed over the past eight years! Where is this all leading? Mr. Flurry continues:

Do you realize how deadly dangerous this trend of lawlessness is? Very few people do. But it gives insight into the real nature of the threat facing America.This is quickly moving America toward a race war and rule by dictatorship or tyranny.

That is where this is leading. President Obama and the radical left have been successfully weakening the checks and balances of American government to the point where a dictator could take power. It may seem to be a cruel fantasy that the land of the free would cease to be a democracy, but that has been the goal of Antiochus from the start.

We do not yet know the outcome of Election Day 2016 and the future leader of America, but whoever wins the White House will inherit expanded powers and dangerous precedents that could further endanger the republic. That is the supreme danger: It doesn’t matter who wins the election or leads America, the damage to the Constitution and the rule of law has already been done.

Global Retreat

One of the defining legacies of President Obama will be his attempt to transform foreign policy. Mr. Obama sought to distance himself from the apparent militarism of his predecessor George W. Bush. Over the past eight years, however, there has been a far more radical change in ideology.

President Obama advocated a lead-from-behind policy. The U.S. has since fallen far behind. In every global theater American rivals and enemies have seized the initiative. Russia has seized Crimea and parts of Eastern Ukraine; it also dominates the conflict in Syria. Iran’s hegemony in the Middle East grows daily. China effectively controls the South China Sea and acts aggressively with impunity. The Islamic State and terrorism have ravaged the world with vengeance. The global world order is falling apart, and it has done so under President Obama’s watch.

One incident above all others characterizes the president’s failure in foreign policy. In August 2012, President Obama created a “red line” for Syrian President Bashar Assad: If Assad used chemical weapons, the United States would intervene. A year later, Assad used sarin gas to slaughter almost 1,500 of his own people. More than 400 were children. Yet President Obama chose not to enforce the red line. In fact, we know from Jeffrey Goldberg’s Atlantic piece “The Obama Doctrine” that the president considers his inaction on the Syrian red line one of his greatest foreign-policy achievements. Besides destroying American credibility, it did nothing to stop the suffering of innocent Syrians. When President Obama had the opportunity to intervene in 2013, 5,000 Syrians had been killed. Today, the death toll of the Syrian civil war is around 500,000.

The president has also attempted to completely reorient American loyalties. He embarked on a diplomatic crusade to create a nuclear deal with Iran. The circumstances of the agreement were fraudulent, and it remains one of the worst diplomatic decisions in U.S. history. The Iranian regime made no concessions, and its anti-Western, anti-Semitic, apocalyptic threats are more credible than ever. Even after Iran humiliated 10 U.S. sailors, the American government did nothing to stop the sanctions relief. Instead, Iran has received billions of dollars.

The second disaster was the lifting of economic embargo on Cuba. Ever since the 1959 Cuban Revolution, Cuba had been a national security threat to the United States. This was dangerously illustrated by the Cuban Missile Crisis. What is most amazing is that the Cuban government made no changes to its anti-American ideologies or to its pattern of human rights abuse. Now, the United States has relaxed trade and travel restrictions on a hostile Communist island; no repentance required.

What has been most obvious is the administration’s anti-Israel sentiments. President Obama has repeatedly embarrassed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and disdained the opinions of the Jewish state. The current administration also has referred to Israel as an occupying force. Above all, it is this anti-Israel sentiment that reflects the character of Antiochus. As the Jewish state faces existential threats from Iran and other Middle Eastern neighbors, Mr. Obama diplomatically bows to the Jews’ enemies.

These foreign-policy changes and the sudden estrangement of old allies have left America in a state of unprecedented weakness. In fact, this is merely a brief survey of the vast foreign-policy disasters suffered over the past eight years. This international collapse leaves the next president at a massive disadvantage. The foreign-policy platforms of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton offer little hope of recovering from eight years of retreat.

By Reason of Transgression

For the past eight years, America has lived in the age of Antiochus. On November 8, Americans will choose who will lead them in their uncertain future. Trump and Clinton both have a history of corruption. Lies and accusations are the only campaign headlines. How did America get to the point where the only choice is between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton?

The reality is that it is the fault of the American people. The only way moral corruption can triumph in government is when the people are morally corrupt.

Daniel 8:12 says that God allowed Antiochus to commit evils against the Jew, and desecrate the temple “by reason of transgression.” It was the sins of the people that brought forth this punishment. By the second century b.c. the people in Judea had already begun to adopt the culture of the Greeks and were Hellenizing themselves. Historian Edwyn Bevan wrote:

It is a cardinal fact to be grasped in estimating the policy of Antiochus Epiphanes that the initiative in the Hellenizing of Jerusalem was not on the side of the king, but of the Jews themselves.

Even before Antiochus stopped the daily in the temple and destroyed copies of the law, the Jews were drifting away from the law and true religion, moving toward the ways of the world. Only a few loved the law and truth enough to fight for it.

The same is true today. The only reason a political Antiochus could systematically undermine the Constitution and America itself is because of the sins of the American people. There was already a lawless spirit in American society, especially in the intellectual class. President Obama simply exploited it to his own ends. We have no one to blame but ourselves.

Great Again

Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are a mirror for every American. They are a reflection of what American national character has become. President Obama has been able to act lawlessly because of the lawlessness of our people, and that is also why two corrupt presidential candidates are the nation’s only choice.

This is the untold story of Election Day 2016. America has been under attack for eight years. Whoever wins the election faces a domestically and internationally dismantled America. Whoever wins will also inherit powers that far exceed what the Constitution permits. No matter what policy is taken, the damage has been done and no human leader can offer solutions. As Antiochus exits the stage, a new actor will lead the tragedy.

Donald Trump’s rallying cry of “Make America Great Again” has tapped into the anger and frustration of many Americans who have an inkling of what has happened to this country. Yet Trump is incapable of making America great again. So is Hillary Clinton. Times will only get worse for America in the days ahead. No matter who wins, America will lose—it will experience the worst suffering in human history.

Yet there is a bright ending. America will be great again, but only after it repents, yields to God’s rule and the marvelous future that awaits mankind.