With five days until Election Day, each and every one of us will need to take a step back after the votes are cast and the races are decided and ask ourselves one very difficult question:
“Now what?”
For well over a year and a half, the political machine has been in full force. This has easily been one of the most contentious elections in modern history, with no punches being pulled. But to my friends and family who find themselves on either the Trump or Clinton side of the aisle, I ask you to please, in all sincerity, join me in moving forward from this election together.
While I have taken a firm #NeverTrump/#NeverHillary position from the onset, I will not be naive in the reality that either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump will, in all likelihood (barring some unforeseen circumstance), be our next president.
The key in that last sentence is that Trump or Clinton will be our president.
Barack Obama is our president. George W. Bush was our president. Ronald Reagan was our president.
I have had many well documented issues with our current president and presidents past. However, despite these issues, the reality remains that they represent much more than their respective parties, but our nation as a whole. I’ve made it quite clear that I believe both Clinton and Trump would be travesties for our nation. But my personal beliefs on their respective policies will not change the inevitable that one of them will soon hold the highest elected office in the land.
So going forward, what good will it do, as friends and family, to hold resentment towards each other based on our political positions over the past year and a half? I have watched too many close friends and family members become so resentful of each other because of who they are supporting, it truly breaks my heart.
Why harbor these negative emotions towards one another going forward? What good does any of that solve?
Glenn Beck often cites the feeling of “9/12,” the day after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, as the last real moment that we as Americans truly set down our differences and embraced one another as fellow citizens rather than divided ourselves based on what sets us apart.
I reference Beck’s “9/12” feeling simply because the divide between Americans feels unlike nothing we have witnessed this millennia. Though we have the technology to bring us closer together than ever before, we have seemingly never been farther apart.
So, in closing, I ask this to all my dedicated Trump and Clinton supporting friends and family:
After this election, when you find yourself on either the winning side or the losing side and you are asking, “Now what?” please let the next step be one of forgiveness and moving forward.
Yes, we will have our differences, but these differences pale in comparison to the commonalities that we share.
The next four years will be undoubtedly difficult, meaning we will need to be united now more than ever before.