Let The Healing Begin

I remember what it felt like to lose an election. 

The shock.  The disbelief.  The sense that life had handed you an unfair break.

I even remember thinking thoughts similar to those I've heard expressed by many pundits (not to quite the same degree, and certainly not with the same irrational vehemence).

How could voters elect a man who had defrauded the University of Arkansas ROTC to get a draft deferment?  Who spat in their faces, saying "he could never have served, because he loathed the military"?  How could they expect my husband to serve under this man as Commander-in-Chief? Were they nuts? 

Why had the media buried the story?

How could voters buy Clinton's "It's the economy, stupid" slogan?  Didn't they know anything about economics?  All the leading indicators showed we were already in recovery - didn't they read the papers? Why had the media spun the news in his favor so relentlessly?

How could anyone vote for a man who cheated on his wife repeatedly?  Didn't they see that a leader needs self-discipline? Clinton had already shown he put his own pleasure ahead of his duty. If he would hurt and deceive the most important person in his life, didn't they see that lying and breaking promises came easily to him?  The signs were obvious - he would do it again and it would embarrass the entire nation.  And of course it did.

I felt angry.  And I thought all of these things:  to myself. But I didn't go around saying them.  I didn't make signs, or protest, or go out and write bitter, snarky little columns about how stupid my fellow voters were for electing Clinton.  Or how America was a nation of cretins.

But now that a Republican has been elected (not selected), the Democrats are having a hissy fit, and the Sour Grapes Brigade are out in full force.  The Deconstructionistas know why we voted for the BushReich, and they don't like it One Bit.  We're Anti-Gay, Anti-Woman, and Anti-Tolerance.  They know how "those people" think. It's a conspiracy!  Apparently every single person who voted for George Bush is a racist, sexist, homophobic, right-wing religious zealot who wants to turn Amerikka-Uber-Alles into a hegemonistic gulag and feed Kerry supporters (we have a list, you know) feet-first into the plastic shredders we saved from Saddam's little party rooms especially for this purpose.

I don't know that all this talk of mass beheadings in Times square I've been hearing around my local Republiscum stomping grounds isn't just a tad bit excessive.  I'll settle for Paul Krugman, Maureen Dowd, and Bob Herbert.  Throw in Ted Rall and we're talkin' tailgate: warm PBR and pretzels with mustard from the back of our Hemis at the NASCAR rally.  Life just don't get any better than this. 

Dang.... that's an even number, ain't it?  Better throw in The BarbEhrian and make it five.  After all, one hates to disappoint their expectations.

Out in my old stomping grounds (the Left Coast), some folks were so darned excited that we're going to have four more years of The Chimp that they threw an impromptu party for him.  I was so touched by this outpouring of love and support for our President that I thought I'd take a few of the more moving shots and intersperse them with commentary from our friends at the New York Times, who have been reaching out to start the healing process on their own:

Thomas Friedman, from the Party of Peace, Love, and Tolerance, works hard to promote the reconciliation and healing America so desperately needs after this hard-fought election:

This was not an election. This was station identification. I'd bet anything that if the election ballots hadn't had the names Bush and Kerry on them but simply asked instead, "Do you watch Fox TV or read The New York Times?" the Electoral College would have broken the exact same way.

...what troubled me yesterday was my feeling that this election was tipped because of an outpouring of support for George Bush by people who don't just favor different policies than I do - they favor a whole different kind of America. We don't just disagree on what America should be doing; we disagree on what America is.

Is it a country that does not intrude into people's sexual preferences and the marriage unions they want to make? Is it a country that allows a woman to have control over her body? Is it a country where the line between church and state bequeathed to us by our Founding Fathers should be inviolate? Is it a country where religion doesn't trump science? And, most important, is it a country whose president mobilizes its deep moral energies to unite us - instead of dividing us from one another and from the world?

No, Mr. Friedman, it is not. You don't have the least idea how most Republicans think, because I very much doubt you have ever taken the time to talk to any of them. It's so much easier to demonize those who think differently than yourself. 

Abortion involves two lives, not just one: an issue you conveniently ignore.  There are two bodies being controlled, two lives.  One of which comes to an abrupt end. And this is coming from someone who happens to be (reluctantly, for the moment) in the pro-choice camp. Yes, a Republican who is pro-choice.  There are lots of us. But I understand both sides of the debate.  And I consider abortion to be taking a human life. I recognize - and abhor - the human cost.  I don't hide from it by engaging in simplistic sloganeering.  Do you have the courage to face the truth? 

I doubt it.  And by the way, I think you're a smug, self-satisified hypocrite. But at least I will grant your right to disagree with me, which is more than you grant to others.

And in the UK, The Guardian reaches out the hand of friendship to red state voters with its customary eloquence and charm:

Mr Bush faces a clear choice at home. He can treat his mandate as a blank cheque to govern in the interests of the conservative (and for conservative read, in many cases, anti-black) voters who backed him in such numbers - shaping a conservative majority on the Supreme Court, waging war on legal abortion, amending the constitution to prevent gay marriage, unpicking affirmative action, limiting and marginalising dissent still further, flirting with the notion of declaring the USA an explicitly Christian, English-speaking nation, seeking in all things to construct the conservative Republican hegemony for which Karl Rove has long dreamed and schemed. Or he can recognise the greater wisdom and the greater long-term security that mutual respect and bipartisan reconciliation will provide to a United States, and to a wider world, in which the belief in America's manifest destiny is not shared with such fervour as it is among evangelical conservatives - or even shared at all.

Hey, I don't know about you, but I'm certainly feeling the love there.  I think we have the beginnings of a respectful trans-Atlantic relationship, don't you?

I was pleased to see that MoDo is reaching out to the New York Times' conservative readership too:

W. ran a jihad in America so he can fight one in Iraq - drawing a devoted flock of evangelicals, or "values voters," as they call themselves, to the polls by opposing abortion, suffocating stem cell research and supporting a constitutional amendment against gay marriage.

So voters who support values are all to be lumped into the "evangelical" bin: code word for religious zealots who want to wipe out the separation between church and state and burn heretics like you at the stake. Uh-huh....  And of course there's the ubiquitous attempt to define the gay marriage issue as a uniquely Republican one, all evidence to the contrary.

Vice continued, "Now we move forward to serve and to guard the country we love." Only Dick Cheney can make "to serve and to guard" sound like "to rape and to pillage."

Our armed forces: rapers and pillagers.  Lovely image Ms. Dowd.  Thank you. I've alerted the Hyperbole Police. It's always so instructive to see what pops into your mind...

The World According to MoDo: "He's creating the sort of "democracy" he likes. One party controls all power in the country. One network serves as state TV. One nation dominates the world as a hyperpower. One firm controls contracts in Iraq."

No need for facts in MoWorld: the voters just elected the President and both houses of Congress.  But Ms. Dowd would apparently prefer to overturn the will of the people because it didn't turn out to her personal satisfaction.  After all, in the liberal uber-mantra, the end always justifies the means.

FoxNews (Ms. Dowd's "state network") competes with ABC, NBC, CNN, CBS, PBS, BBC America and a plethora of other stations.  It is the ONLY station that gives anything like a balanced view of the news.  Because of this, Democrats have actually introduced legislation to try to censor it. 

One station.  Competing in the marketplace with more than six other stations who were all there before it arrived.  Doing better than they are, because it provides better coverage.  Sounds to me like the American way: provide a better service and consumers will want more of what you can give them.  Of course, Democrats are now crying "foul" and trying to handicap it because their monopoly of the airwaves is in peril.

And while we're at it, let's remove the only nation capable of handling major military operations (the US), and the only firm capable of handling these large contracts (Halliburton) from the theater.  That will solve the problem.  The age-old liberal formula.  Whine about fairness but offer no solutions.

Bob Herbert lays more balm on the smarting wounds of this long election season, adding his legendary optimism and good cheer to the post-election party.  Who brought the s'mores?:

In other words, nothing has changed. Mr. Bush's victory on Tuesday was not based on his demonstrated competence in office or on a litany of perceived successes. For all the talk about values that we're hearing, the president ran a campaign that appealed above all to voters' fears and prejudices. He didn't say he'd made life better for the average American over the past four years. He didn't say he had transformed the schools, or made college more affordable, or brought jobs to the unemployed or health care to the sick and vulnerable.

He said, essentially, be very afraid. Be frightened of terrorism, and of those dangerous gay marriages, and of those in this pluralistic society who may have thoughts and beliefs and values that differ from your own.

As usual, he turned reality upside down. A quintessential American value is tolerance for ideas other than one's own. Tuesday's election was a dismaying sprint toward intolerance, sparked by a smiling president who is a master at appealing to the baser aspects of our natures.

Nice turn of phrase..."the baser aspects of our natures"... that's the way to start the healing process.

And you know, you make a good point there: I voted for George Bush because I hoped he would crush all those "different people" under his Doc Martens.  I'm getting sick and tired of all this pluralism - that's not the Amurrica we Smith & Wesson voters believe in, durnitall

Of course, there was really none of that crushing of dissent during his first four years, but I'm willing to give him a pass.  We all know payback is coming now that he has a real mandate.  That Ashcroft was really a terrible disappointment.  We really thought we had another Goebbels when the BushReich appointed him, but he was a complete washout.  He let you people call Our Fuehrer "Hitler" and "The Chimp" and a Nazi, fascist, murdering racist (and personally I was OK with that, but we like to keep that sort of thing limited to the Party faithful, you know).  And I certainly didn't see anyone suffer for doing that.  I'm waiting to see Ashcroft's head on a platter.

There was more hateful invective from the Left in the last four years than I've ever seen directed at a sitting President, but no retaliation.  None. No Patriot Act arrests.  No mass graves under Central Park or Hollywood and Vine. What was up with that, anyway?

All I can say is, you guys are off to a great start.  I'm sure the White House is listening to all of this reaching out very carefully. 

I'm sure they're vastly encouraged by all of your support - it will be a great inducement to adopt your agenda and govern from the center.  I'm sure it will have just about the same effect as when Julian Bond accused the President of dragging blacks behind trucks and writing racism into the Constitution, as though the President even had the power to change the Constitution.  But why let little things like facts interfere with your race-baiting?

And you know voters (and readers) like me, who voted for George Bush are really touched by your sentiments.  It's so nice to see the Party of Tolerance show its true colors: after all, it is in deeds that we see what one truly believes.  Talk of pluralism and diversity is so important in a heterogenous society, isn't it?  And seeing you all reach out like this - seeing you show respect and tolerance for those who disagree with you - is just ... well, it's just heartwarming.

Let the healing begin.

- Cassandra