November 4th

A former colleague wrote in his Facebook post that he was preparing himself to be forgiving after the election. From what I know about him, he is not a fan of President Trump and is likely voting for Biden. But he senses the need to be prepared to forgive. It was then that I realized that I don’t have any people within my circle of close friends or family whom I will need to forgive after November 3rd. However, I know this isn’t true for everyone I’m associated with.

Over the past few months, I’ve listened to family members, colleagues, and friends struggling with their frustration with people in their lives who stubbornly support Trump. I sympathize with them. It can’t be easy to watch someone whom you know and care about be taken in by a con man who absolutely doesn’t have the nation or their best interest at heart. It’s even more disturbing to see Trump supporters you know taking part in voter intimidation on the highways, through threatening notes and emails, and unauthorized poll watching. It’s uncomfortable to see a side of people giving place to cruelty, bigotry, and nastiness for the sake of anti-abortion, anti-immigrant, racist, and anti-LGBTQ judges and a promised tax cut. It’s infuriating to watch people blindly believe a truckload of lies to boot.

One of the common arguments for supporting Trump is a visceral fear of socialism. Because Trump supporters are largely uneducated, they bought into the fear tactic that leftwing Democrats are promoting the kind of socialism found in Cuba or Venezuela and not that which is found in places like Canada, Norway, Sweden, Demark, Finland, Australia, Japan, and Great Britain, a democratic socialism. In part, I blame us Democrats for not doing a better job educating these folks. Perhaps we’ve been too impatient with their ignorance or too lazy to bother with them or too condescending to believe they could grasp the concept. In any case, we were short-sighted because we forgot that they too, get to cast a vote.

Whomever wins this election, it is evident that we as a nation have some serious work ahead of us. First of course is convincing folks to do what is needed to end this pandemic while also avoiding the threat of post-election violence that seems to be looming in the air. There will likely be another period of shut down because of both.

Second, among our collective work is to end all the ridiculous laws that allowed for voter suppression and enforcement of voter intimidation laws. Every state and county needs to pass local laws that make voting easier and safer. Politicians must be forced to make the case to the voters for why they deserve election instead of making it difficult for people to vote. Post-marks, not post office delivery times should determine if a vote counts. And then ensuring the integrity of our elections is the job of the federal government. Our tax payer dollars would be well spent to ensure that every municipality’s voting machines and databases are secure. In addition, there should be a federal law that makes election day a paid holiday and another law that mandates the number of polling places and/or drop boxes per capita so that people in poorer neighborhoods don’t have to wait in longer lines or travel greater distances to a drop box. This is job number two.

Our third job after this election is to hold whomever is president and the Congress accountable. We will need to make our voices loud and clear about the kind of government and leadership we demand. No more corruption. No more lies. No more fleecing the American people.

And finally, after this election, we must take responsibility for our own welfare and that of our country by doing what we know to be good and right as individuals, communities, and a nation. The right thing to do is to patiently and lovingly educate our fellow Americans about our nation’s history, it’s representative form of government, it’s economics, and the environment. We must teach science and history in a way that helps individuals understand and gain an appropriate level of respect for it.

The last four years have taught us that we cannot depend on political leaders to protect us, serve us, or to do what is in our collective best interest as a nation. This election has also taught us that we have done a poor job of educating our population about history, government, economic systems, and how to think critically, to be proper consumers of media, and to understand science. Forgiveness is good, but a proper education moving forward is even more critical.