(Credit: Author)
Every election is the most important election ever.
We hear it every election, that it is the most important election in history. It’s true. Every election is the most important election in history because it is an election we can vote in. It is our opportunity to make our voices heard, even one as supposedly inconsequential as the midterms.
The importance of voting cannot be overstated. The ability to participate in our democracy is a gift we take for granted too often. It’s a miraculous thing that every two years, we get to overthrow the government with a pen and a sheet of paper, without a spot of blood in sight. This is a tradition which has continued for the last 250 years, unabated, undeterred, uninterrupted.
It is a tradition which is under serious threat. Because there is an old guard of politicians who cannot imagine a world which is different than the one which has made them fat, comfortable, and rich. A world in which their milquetoast lip service to improving the lives of American citizens with no tangible improvement is no longer accepted. A world in which this government holds itself to account for its massive amounts of failures and allocates its resources to truly allowing this nation to succeed.
That is the world we deserve to wake up in on Wednesday, November 4th. A world where our leaders are taken to task for the gross misuse of their power, selling out the nation they are charged with serving, and harming its citizens from atop ivory towers. A world where the government of the most powerful nation on earth, which is filled with honest, earnest, hardworking, well-meaning functionaries is no longer held hostage by reality television stars and woefully unqualified lunatics to appease the ego of a wannabe tinpot dictator and instead can turn its full might towards doing the best it can to support all Americans at home and support liberty and justice for everyone across the world.
We have a system of government that allows us the freedom from oppression when we stand up and disagree with our leaders as loudly as we can. The freedom to choose who we want to lead us without reprisals if our horse loses the race. The freedom to express different beliefs from each other and debate those differences to build the best nation we can. But that society only comes when we debate in good faith, when we are willing to compromise on the way forward, and we recognize when a true threat is doing everything they can to tear this great nation apart at its seams.
Donald Trump is the representation of that threat to America. He is a man who lies that he is doing the best for all Americans, but only seeks to enrich himself. He has no moral conscience or reverence for the significance of his office. He acts like a petulant king, reshaping every piece of the nation’s capital to glorify himself and fulfill his whims. His supporters have thrown out due process for every aspect of governmental operations from criminal prosecutions to architectural reviews.
The President started a war with Iran which has made our lives more expensive at the pump. He has upended trade deals out of ego and his own opinions of other nation states based on their willingness to pay fealty to him personally which cost us more at the grocery store.
He has dismantled entire sections of the federal government which disrupt vital operations like being able to get our tax returns, or for Medicare patients to have their benefit information accessible by their healthcare professionals. He has offered no solution to the lack of health insurance and rising healthcare costs across the nation. He has continued to allow
He has killed a million people by destroying USAID, depriving those in need of vital resources to help weather a thousand kinds of crises. He has killed Ukrainians by backing off support for the victim of a war against an imperialist neighbor because the self-styled tsar of Russia is the kind of man he wants to emulate. He has killed American servicemembers by engaging in an ill-conceived, ineptly-executed war of aggression and placed them in harm’s way with no tangible benefit to anyone. He has had heavy-handed immigration enforcement murder American citizens with no just cause in the streets, not to mention the harassment of hardworking legal immigrants, and the inhumane treatment of undocumented immigrants who have been deported to nations which they do not belong to where they are left to fend for themselves, or are just thrown into one of the most infamous prisons in the world for its cruelty.
Even if you are not liberal, it should be impossible not to see how damaging this man is to the nation as a whole, to global stability, and to the ideas of freedom, justice, and prosperity which he claims to stand for.
The time has come for his enablers in Congress to lose their jobs.
America deserves better than this, and we have the power to say so tomorrow in definitive fashion. America can always be better. The unfinished pyramid on the back of the one dollar bill is the idea that this democracy is unfinished, and it is up to us to continue building it. Every election is the most important because democracy, and the legacy of this nation is constantly being built.
Tomorrow is our day to send politicians to Washington who not only believe in that very concept, but make decisions to put it into action. We deserve leaders who’ll start working on building the bridge to the bright, beautiful future we deserve, and not the ones playing politics with wedge issues to win cushy jobs full of black tie galas and multi-million dollar ‘considerations.’
With that optimism comes some measure of bitter reality, in that change happens unfortunately slowly. We want a perfect society, but that can’t happen overnight. So much is at stake during this election for Americans of all races, colors, and creeds. Our very democracy continues to be at stake. Harm reduction is not an invalid concept. Right now we have to vote for the candidate in any given election who will do the best, even if we disagree with them. Even if we don’t think they will do enough. Sometimes you have to play the game in order to make it fairer. Politicians are not meant to be perfectly aligned with what we believe; they are meant to be representative of the closest we can get.
All it means is that we can vote for someone who is a step closer to the America we seek, and when they seek reelection, we can support the person who gets even closer. Progress is difficult, and it takes time. But it starts tomorrow in the voting booth, and it continues with the actions we take to hold our new leaders accountable every day afterwards.
There is a contingent running for office who paint America as some dystopian hellscape. A nation shattered by undesirables smashing against the gates, destroying us from within, and they alone can save us. Who pay lip service to our armed forces while voting with nothing but contempt for them. The kind who insult anyone who disagree with them, and hold court with liars, hypocrites, and crooks.
These people hold no loyalty towards Americans. Their primary concern is advancing their own position and power. They need to cheat so horrendously because if the game was fair, they’d never win another election again. Tomorrow is our chance to show up and do just that, from the United Senators all the way down to members of the School Board. We have the chance to vote for candidates who represent we the people, and will execute the duties of their office with the respect, consideration, and reverence they deserve. Candidates who dedicate their lives fighting for the average citizen while playing the delicate balancing act of American politics as best as they possibly can. Candidates who show us solid plans when they talk about their ideas, and they always make sure that the experts have their say in making policy. Candidates who openly express the desire to invite everyone to the table and surround themselves with people who will do their best for every American.
There is so much more at stake than the percentage of red and blue on seating charts in the US Capitol. Tomorrow is the chance to voice our concerns and outrage at the direction we’ve been going as a nation, and the chance to empower individuals who seek to start tuning the wheel of this great ship so that we all travel in a new direction.
There are people asking for our vote tomorrow who do not believe in democracy. Who offer no proposals for how to fix the problems plaguing us, but just try to point us toward someone to blame. They can’t detail why they think they can build a better America, only why others will destroy it.
The Godfather opened with one of the best lines in all of cinema, “I believe in America.”
That is a hard thing to do in today’s America. But it is not only possible but mandatory to bring this country back from the brink. In times of crisis, we see the community formed to protect and care for each other. That is the America to believe in. That is the America we need to empower tomorrow at the polls.
America is an imperfect nation. It will always be an imperfect nation. But we have the opportunity tomorrow to send lawmakers to Washington DC who will do their absolute best to work for all Americans, and uphold the laws which the current administration and his enablers both in and out of the government are breaking with such flagrant disregard for the citizens of this country.
Together, we can create a society for our children better than the one our parents left for us. I can think of no loftier goal to strive for. It starts with us exercising our freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution to choose our leaders and make our voices known. To ensure that America is a place for everyone, and retake its rightful place as the guardians of liberty throughout the world, through tangible action and the swift and decisive delivery of justice which has so long been denied.
Tomorrow is the day to make our voices heard, so get out and vote.
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