Reading a profile of the last twenty-four hors in the Ohio headquarters of ACT prompts me to finally say something publicly about the election, if only to get things straight privately.
Kerry got four million more votes than did Gore. Against the same man. Bush was an equally undesireable candidate four years ago, and though millions of us huddled together in the nicer parts of cities would say he and those around him proved our worst fears, the election was eerily similar. But in four years time more people have decided to look out at the world as Republicans than as Democrats.
We live in a "centrist" country that is increasingly being described as right of center. Of course the center is relative depending on where you are. My center and a Canadian friend's might be different. Head, heart, belly-button, crotch. Foreign policy, faith, economics, and fate. It's a Mr. Potato Head of values and priorities. I put the eyes here, someone I don't know in Nebraska's putting them somewhere different (and in my worst moods I'm assuming that theirs lacks eyes and ears entirely, but is endowed with several mouths and clunky shoes).
I don't have answers. An attempt at drawing conclusions preaches to an audience I don't have, and doesn't leave me certain that I can follow my own advice. But I am moved by the following values that leave me hopeful we might move in more productive ways: The accomodation of difference. Equisite tolerance. Attempts at openness.
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