We Just Didn't Know

Much has been said over the past year and a half about Democrats still being in shock that Hillary Clinton did not win the 2016 election – and we are. Members of either party can be surprised by their candidate’s loss. It is part and parcel of being a political participant. Someone who puts their time, their effort, and their money into a campaign, and then backs it up with a vote at the ballot box, is invariably disappointed when their candidate-of-choice becomes an also-ran rather than POTUS.

But we are not as shocked by Hillary’s loss so much as we are shocked at Trump’s win. And that shock is the result of the fact that we just didn’t know as much as we thought we did about our fellow citizens.

We just didn’t know how many of our countrymen would be ill-informed enough to elect a well-known con-man to the highest office in the nation – and more to the point, the most powerful position on the planet.

We just didn’t know that people who believe themselves to be decent human beings would vote for someone who publicly mocked a disabled reporter, and openly laughed at his disability.

We just didn’t know that so-called Christians would turn their backs on the God they allegedly adore, in order to worship a man whose entire life’s history is fraught with behaviour that is the antithesis of Christian values.

We just didn’t know that seemingly intelligent Americans would embrace such obvious stupidity, that even the most poorly-educated among us lacked the basic common sense necessary to recognize the flim-flam of an experienced huckster.

We just didn’t know that the bigots and racists who lurk among us were so anxious to be recognized for what they are – and would actually take pride in doing so.

We just didn’t know that those who tout themselves as “people of religious faith” would abandon the tenets of their religion in order to install a liar, a cheat, and self-declared “pussy-grabber” in the Oval Office.

We just didn’t know that people who call themselves America-loving patriots would vote for the destruction of their own country, and the demise of every value it stands for.

The fact is we underestimated you. We underestimated your self-imposed ignorance and your abject stupidity. We underestimated your ability to recognize an arrogant, self-serving idiot when you saw one – one who demonstrated his selfish idiocy long before a ballot was cast. We underestimated your skill at knowing the truth when it was apparent, and your willingness to accept the oh-so-obvious lies instead.

We underestimated your unfettered desire to see your fellow citizens die for lack of affordable healthcare, to watch our environment destroyed, to sit in silence as our nation’s institutions are demeaned, to stand on the sidelines while decent people are called terrorists, rapists, drug-dealers and criminals based solely on their ethnicity, their race, their religion, or their country of origin. Above all, we underestimated the power of your seething hatred.

It was our mistake. We gave you the benefit of the doubt. We told ourselves that there were those “on the other side of the aisle” who were too smart, too decent, too patriotic to put Donald J. Trump in the White House. We convinced ourselves that despite our political differences, you were the decent people you have now proven yourselves incapable of ever being.

But not to worry – it is a mistake we will never make again.