Finding the Calm Center in All This Worry about Biden
Or, why we really don't have to live in a dark Republican fantasy
NOTE: I wrote this post on July 13, 2024, hours before news broke about the shooting at the Trump rally in Pennsylvania. I didn’t publish it because it was a time for silence. How were we, each one, to regain our balance?
This post is as relevant today as it was before Saturday evening. Our need to protect democracy in America has not changed.
THE POST:
Today I heard from a friend in a nearby county. We’ve been in touch because, during the latest national news turmoil, locally there was some confusion over an event date. My friend wrote,
My daughter is a true political animal, very active in local politics. She assures me that confusion is part of the process and we just have to move on.
Then she told me,
I'm so distressed about the presidential election that it interferes with my sleep.
At the same time she was writing this, I was writing a Postcards post called “Housekeeping”. It began,
With all the harsh words in the air about taking down the American government, my instinct is to come indoors, clean house, and cook something wonderful to share.
So my friend and I both feel the disorder all around us. We are both looking for ways to restore balance to our daily lives. The task is bigger than we’ve ever experienced and we’re making it up as we go, every day.
How can we possibly sort it all out and move on?
We have reason to feel this way. Every day it’s harder to ignore the attack on our identity as free Americans. In their manifesto called Project 2025, Republicans outline not only a planned takeover of the government, but also the takeover of our culture and our personal rights.
Among their plans is a “Secretary of Retribution” who will direct loyal bureaucrats to act on a “Deep State target list”. This list already includes 350 names of people to be “arrested and punished for ‘treason’ if Trump is reelected”.
To me, the title for this evil Secretary of Retribution seems to have come from a video game. Are gamers finally taking us all into their virtual world? No wonder we’re frantically trying to protect what some of us still call reality.
So someone else’s fantasy is at our door. I’m not alone in my unease. President Biden said this week that, because of the “gravity of the situation”, he’s running again regardless of his age.
Also, he wants to finish the job. At his NATO Summit news conference on Thursday, he listed the ways his administration has worked to strengthen democracy around the world and here in the United States.
His positive words opened the door for me, not to a grim Republican fantasy but to the very real possibility that, given the chance, four more years of Democratic leadership will bring more humanity and civility back to our daily lives and to the planet itself.
We still need healing.
Any strong organization has a visionary at the top, whose job it is to inspire the many other people who work together to make their shared vision real. This year it’s clear that, no matter who is at the top of the ticket in either major party, basic American values are on the ballot.
Personally, I know that our North Carolina state and local Democratic Party leaders and candidates not only have hope for a healthy, free society - they’re ready to make it happen. And I know they need my support.
So how do you turn a sleepless night into a center of calm?
You can remember the calm, stabile core of democratic values at the heart of the Democratic Party. This can be empowering. It can motivate you to jump in and join them in protecting our nation’s long experiment in universal human rights.
You can talk to people you know. Tell them how Republicans’ Project 2025 will affect Americans’ daily lives, and how you’re working with the Democratic Party to block it.
Talk about voting in November for Democratic candidates from the top of the ballot to the bottom - because even the most extreme Republican gerrymandering can be defeated by an equally extreme, pro-democracy, Democratic vote majority.
Thank you! I needed your wise and soothing words to start my day!
Vote Blue, Vote for Democrats UP & Down the Ballot!