November 9, 2016
This morning after pill is a bitter one.
Today one of my daughters called, trying to hold back those
21 year old tears…. “Hi Mom, I just want
to know, what can I do? How can I get
involved? This was a wake-up call. I want to do something.”
The first thought that sprang (sorry) to mind was, “Grow a
penis maybe, if you want to have a voice?”
But I didn’t say that.
I advised, “Talk to me, let it out… be with your friends. What’s happening on campus? Go to a protest. Join the DFA debrief call. Help somebody.
The pendulum will swing back again.
People who’ve been around longer than me assure me that the world will
not end.”
The friend I was with at the time talked to my daughter for
a while, when I was unable to choke out a few of the lines from Hillary’s
concession speech. My friend said a lot
of smart, good things to us both. She actually
saved me today. She made me get up and
out for a walk, treated me to breakfast, and kept it upbeat. When I went low, she went high. What a class act she is!
I guess this is how it’s going to go for a while. We will hold each other up as we try to choke
down this bitter pill of defeat.
I called and texted friends and family, and read news and
posts online for most of the day, allowing waves of grief to come and go.
Our consumption of media has been such a big part of the great divide, as well
as the disappointment I felt today. I
refused to watch tv, and tried to resist mainstream sites. I considered starting an “I hate Nate” campaign
(Nate Silver, pollster, of fivethirtyeight.com). I did not do that, ‘cause love trumps
hate, right? I blew my vegetariany diet and
fell off the weekday no alcohol wagon. I
went to a protest vigil at UC Irvine. In
the end, this was the creative thing I mustered to move forward:
The Pendulum Swings Manifesto
WE WILL
- Accept the results of the 2016 election.
WE WILL NOT
- Let the planet be pillaged.
- Let war be the answer.
- Roll back the clock.
- Go away.
WE WILL
- Keep believing that love trumps hate.
- Seek to understand those who made this decision.
- Find bridges on which we can all stand.
- Turn Congress blue in 2018.
ReplyDeleteMorning After To-Do List:
1. Take over the Democratic Party and return it to the people. They have failed us miserably.
2. Fire all pundits, predictors, pollsters and anyone else in the media who had a narrative they wouldn't let go of and refused to listen to or acknowledge what was really going on. Those same bloviators will now tell us we must "heal the divide" and "come together." They will pull more hooey like that out of their ass in the days to come. Turn them off.
3. Any Democratic member of Congress who didn't wake up this morning ready to fight, resist and obstruct in the way Republicans did against President Obama every day for eight full years must step out of the way and let those of us who know the score lead the way in stopping the meanness and the madness that's about to begin.
4. Everyone must stop saying they are "stunned" and "shocked". What you mean to say is that you were in a bubble and weren't paying attention to your fellow Americans and their despair. YEARS of being neglected by both parties, the anger and the need for revenge against the system only grew. Along came a TV star they liked whose plan was to destroy both parties and tell them all "You're fired!" Trump's victory is no surprise. He was never a joke. Treating him as one only strengthened him. He is both a creature and a creation of the media and the media will never own that.
5. You must say this sentence to everyone you meet today: "HILLARY CLINTON WON THE POPULAR VOTE!" The MAJORITY of our fellow Americans preferred Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump. Period. Fact. If you woke up this morning thinking you live in an effed-up country, you don't. The majority of your fellow Americans wanted Hillary, not Trump. The only reason he's president is because of an arcane, insane 18th-century idea called the Electoral College. Until we change that, we'll continue to have presidents we didn't elect and didn't want. You live in a country where a majority of its citizens have said they believe there's climate change, they believe women should be paid the same as men, they want a debt-free college education, they don't want us invading countries, they want a raise in the minimum wage and they want a single-payer true universal health care system. None of that has changed. We live in a country where the majority agree with the "liberal" position. We just lack the liberal leadership to make that happen (see: #1 above).
Let's try to get this all done by noon today.
-- Michael Moore
widja
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