The Women’s Convention announced that Senator Sanders was speaking and Twitter went wild with rehashing, revisiting, relitigating and reviling the 2016 primary and election cycle.
They both had the undying devotion of their supporters. They both had their warts.
They both claim that but for the actions and/or inactions of the other they might be president.
But neither are and, for all our fractious fighting, we’ll truly never know.
What we do know is that the current administration is led by the most racist destructive, spiteful, cheating, lying, bloviating bully in the history of presidents.
What we do know is that this president is being enabled by his party leaders intent on delivering tax cuts and other “gifts” to their wealthy donors at the expense of Americans.
What we do know is that Americans have been pummeled, pounded, embarrassed, horrified, disgusted and dismayed for over 250 days and, barring a heroic maneuver by Mueller and a chickenshit GOP Congress, we’re stuck for at least another 365 until we can change anything.
So the in-fighting has to stop. The Purity Tests have to stop. Every single candidate running will have a wart or two. We won't agree 100% with every position they took in the past or have on their platform. 90% will work. So will 80%.
The stakes are too high in 2018 — Ginsburg and Kennedy aren’t gonna make it to 2020 (they’ve been talking retirement for 2 years or more) and a whacked out SCOTUS will last for decades.
So we have to unite. Seriously. Because if we remain divided, if we allow our butt-hurt over 2016 to do what it did in 2016. We can’t allow bots and trolls to stoke the fires. Over 100 million voters stayed home in 2016; others cast “protest” or “message” votes.
And we ended up with Trump. And Ryan. And McConnell. And Gorsuch, Price, Tillerson, Sessions, Mnunchin, DeVos, Chao, Zinke — the list goes on.
Voting rights are under fire — DAILY.
People of color, women, LGBTQ and non-Christians are under fire — DAILY.
Children, seniors, disabled and poor are under fire — DAILY.
Flipping the House and the Senate is critical. Critical for reasons that would fill a book.
The supporters and die-hard fans of both have to find the common ground — and that ground is throwing Republicans out of power. That ground is uniting with reasonable, sane, thoughtful folks of all parties to save America from war, environmental disasters, economic debilitation and the contempt of the world.
Can we make a deal? Can we — each of the factions — stop bashing the other? Can we stop insisting that “but for” — our chosen candidate would have won?
Can we decide to put our country and the future of ourselves, our children and our grandchildren before the need to “prove a point”? Doing otherwise is pointless. The temporary satisfaction of a “gotcha” won’t warm you during a nuclear winter.
Never — truly NEVER have the stakes been this high. We’ve already regressed beyond recognition.
Can we make a deal? Can we keep our eyes on the ball, swallow our need to lash out at detractors of our chosen PAST candidate and make a collective vow to #VoteBlueNoMatterWho? To get out there and get others out there?
Can we make a deal to do anything and everything in our power to stall the agenda of this horrible travesty of an administration until we — ALL of us — can shift the power in 2018?
I will. Will you?
We can’t change history. But we can change the future.