A Divided America

 Clearly, this country is so divided that East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet. I am quite certain if politics were left out of the conversation, we could chat amicably about our lives and the things we love. My husband plays cards in an atomosphere where half of the people voted one way, and the other half another way. The night is just about the card game, nothing more, and they can kibbutz and have fun. However, this division sometimes comes into play-rarely, only when someone dares to bring up a wild conspiracy theory that the 2020 election was stolen and the response is, "No it was not." Then everything stops.

This is what I know about the other side. Some voted because they like disruption; they don't want conventional political leaders. It does not matter that he has selected cabinet officers with little to no experience; hence, they don't trust government, and some of this is true. They also say that prices have gone up--they have, not realizing in recent months not only have prices gone down, but the economy is doing way better in terms of jobs filled, gas prices lowered and a stock market boom. But they don't watch the same news that I do. They watch Fox, deemed, worldwide, entertainment, not news; plus, they have been sued millions for all the alternate facts they have created. Alternate facts don't bother the other side, so they tune into social media to get their news. Elon Musk invested millions to feed the Trump campaign and did so strategically; feeding the two sides of the Israeli conflict different information, so each side would feel placated. He fed into the image of a "Woke" other side, depite the fact that Kamala's campaign did not dwell on some of these issues. This created an empire who felt the fabric of their communities was being destroyed--the books their children read; gender idenity; immigrants who were all taking over their jobs, forgetting we are all immigrants. Women (53 per cent of White women) fell into the trap,"Women, I will protect you." It did not matter that his running mate was so clueless as to suggest all grandma(s) could care for their grandchildren; women without children were "childless cat ladies." It did not matter that Trump is an alleged serial sex offender. It did not matter that he insulted women based on their looks. It did not matter that he said Hatian immigrants were "eating the dogs and cats." Nothing mattered but the macho and bluster he presented, but people liked the performance. It worked. He won over people in this election. It became a them and us in their world view.

There was no them and us on the other side. We are all a nation of immigrants, human beings, and ones who want to work across the political divide. The other side read newspapers and followed stations such as CNN, which reported news, which meant mostly facts. This side created a campaign that we are all Americans and we need to curb our guns, we need to aim for truth, we need to believe in science, people who stormed the capital were not patriots, women need to have their reproductive rights, health and safety need to be safeguarded, children need CHIPS and school lunches to eat, and you can't do away with a DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION because if each state does what it wants, all that red in the middle will be using the bible as a text, won't use texts that have even an iota of FACTS in them, will ban books in the classroom, won't allow the very diverse voices of America, including religious freedom (no, we are not just White, Christian Americans), won't allow marriages of Gay people, nor will it allow them to adopt the surplus of babies now that abortion will mostly be illegal. Also, social security and medicare are not entitlements; I paid into them my whole life. "We are not going backwards," was the mantra of the campaign on this political side.

But indeed we are going backwards; pity the children and grandchildren of the next generation, one where the military is coming to take migrant children away from their parents, even those who have lived here their whole life. They voted in a man without morals, scruples or character, and if they are poor and suffering, if they are women,  if their health insurance is taken away, he has nothing on his agenda that will help them. This divide will grow and like Jesus said, "forgive them father, for they know not what they have done." If the humanity and decency gap grows larger, which it already has during this campaign, I am not so sure I will forgive them; it might be too hard. He consistently showed what he was about--a charlatan, at best--and more. And they voted for him anyway.