Blue

This is my 1100th blog post. It won't change anyone's mind. It will not affect anyone's vote. It's election day. I'm frustrated, and I'm scared out of mind.

America is broken. Its fractures are deep, widespread, and I truly fear they are irreparable. I'd like to at least pay lip service to the illusion of hope, but honestly? I think we're screwed.

Maybe I'm just being pessimistic. But in 2016, I was secure in the certainty that voters would never in a million years award the Presidency to a loathsome, blustering charlatan like Donald Trump. I've learned to never again hold any faith--any faith--that people will do the right thing, no matter how simple, no matter how obvious. The fact that Trump still has any supporters, or even apologists, snuffs out the once-glowing spark of my optimism.

I'm not giving up, even as everything I say screams surrender. Maybe there is still a way to make America great again, like it was in those halcyon days before Trump became our Buffoon-In-Chief. This country was great, and not so long ago. Now? Now, we are the laughing stock of the world. The crazy Americans. The crazy Americans that will doom us all.

I wish I could bring myself to tell this story more effectively, to be more subtle, more evocative. But I'm frustrated. I'm scared. I look back on what I wrote two years ago, just before the Electoral College disaster of 2016:

I confess this sin: I do believe that our current dismal political stagnation and stalemate is more the fault of right-wing zealots than left-wing zealots. I'm not going to indulge in the ritual charade of false equivalence. But screw the zealots anyway--the hell with all of 'em, from Matt Drudge to Susan Sarandon. We don't need them. We need each other.

I never liked President Reagan. Maybe you never liked President Obama. But both men did love this country, and both deserved our respect. We can disagree without being assholes about it. We should disagree, and debate, and improve. That's what's great about America.

In the words of a great man named King: I have a dream.

In the words of a not-great man named King, whose circumstances compelled him to reach higher: Can't we all just get along?

And in the words of a great man called King: Thank you. Thank you very much.

The naysayers? They are rabble. They are noise. And they are not built to last. When they go low, we go high.

Two years later, the fractures are winning, and winning handily. The toxic nature of the Trump presidency has magnified our divisions.

That has to change. We can't reclaim greatness with the inept sleight-of-hand of a reprehensible reality TV show star pandering to the gutter, fertilizing and gardening fear as his reliable cash crop. We can be better. It starts today. It starts with a vote. Even if the Party of Trump retains its control of the Senate (as seems likely), even if (God help us) the House remains blood-red, we can still begin the long, arduous process of putting this broken land back together. We begin with a vote. That vote's color is blue.

And I just cast mine.