Post-Election Reflection

Dear Republicans, I’m writing to you as an independent voter. And to be clear, I’m not writing to lecture you, or to tell you that you were wrong to vote for Mr. Trump, this time or last time. Believe it or not, now that we’ve had a few days to process the election, I even understand why more of you voted for him this time, in 2020, than last time, in 2016. I get why you’re proud of him, why you like him, why he’s your guy. But that’s not why I’m writing. I’m actually writing to you because I’m not sure who else I should address these thoughts. So bear with me.

Most of the time, this country feels like an anchored ship, all of us on board trying to lift the anchor and get it to go one way or the other, forwards or backwards or sideways, but we’re rarely content to stay still. And we all want someone we know, someone we like, someone we believe in to steer the ship our direction. But part of the reason we’ve made it this long, this far, this many years since the Founding, is because our common ship moves so slowly, because no one ever yanks the ship one way so harshly, so violently, so disregardingly, for too long without paying a price from those on the ship who need a steadier boat, those on the ship who can’t sleep a wink without fear of the next unpredictable turn.

I’ll give you an example. Forgive me if you already know this, but President Lyndon Johnson, a Democrat from Texas, ushered in a heavy-handed agenda between 1964 and 1965 called the Great Society. Tons of spending programs that included a massive overreach known as the War on Poverty, when states all over the union were quickly disregarded in favor of the federal agenda. Even the Voting Rights Act of that era hit some backlash in the streets, because it didn’t resolve the deeper issues of American racism. If you know your history, you know that Johnson had the chance to run for another term and didn’t. The country had ripped him to shreds for trying to do so much so quickly. Some of his legacy still lives on today and some of it is pretty solid. Medicare. Medicaid. Voting Rights. The legal end of segregation.

But I tell you this because heavy-handed, aggressive agendas, agendas that openly and brazenly disregard the passengers of the ship make the whole ship restless. A few years ago, my wife and I were traveling on a boat in the North Sea above Scotland, through heavy storms. Our drawers and cabinets opened and closed at every tip and tilt. Needless to say, we didn’t sleep well. But even then, we had a captain who kept in mind every passenger and offered calming words after every hard night.

Normally, in the United States, when we vote for presidents, we vote for moderates, we vote for cheerleaders and advisers, people who help us get through the turns and the storms. At the very least, even when we don’t vote for moderates, the presidency forces the ones we elected to restrain their worst impulses, to realize their reach is limited. And I don’t mean we collectively wish to stay still or steady forever, but rather, that most of us are just struggling to deal with our own stuff, let alone the veering, violent turns of the nation. So we hope, pray, plead, beg our leaders to do what they do carefully, kindly, graciously on our behalf while we do our own things, continuing on this difficult and complicated ride of being Americans.

On the other hand, we’re not passive citizens. We want the country to do a lot of big, drastic, sudden things. I certainly know that you want an end to Roe v Wade, an end to every serious regulation, and an end to Obamacare. Some of you talk about closing up borders and kicking out immigrants. And based on what we’ve seen in the last several years, it’s clear that most of you will support anyone in your party, regardless of any accusation against them, because you believe the other side is always worse. I don’t agree with you, on any of it, but I’d be hard-pressed to find someone who isn’t clear about what Republicans want, what you stand for. You do an excellent job of branding.

But here’s the problem. And I hope you’re still with me. When your party primary elects someone who isn’t a moderate, someone who gives you everything you wanted in spades, without explanation, without planning, without preparation, without prior warning for the rest of us, the nation ends up reeling and exhausted, barely able to breathe. That’s what the Presidency of Donald Trump has been like for the nation. Feverishly erratic and spitefully sudden, every single day, like being on a ship that we’re not even sure will stay afloat because it rocks so much, and because when it rocks, the captain never tells us what’s going on, or offers us a remedy, or offers to help us get through it, together. Worst of all, there were plenty of times when the captain was intentionally rocking the boat, for no reason in particular, just because he had the wheel.

As an independent, I know that the parties have aggressive ideas, that they have aggressive politicians who will usher in those ideas if given the chance. Sometimes those ideas are good and sometimes they’re awful. But they can’t all happen at once at the expense and disregard of everyone outside a single party. In fact, your party makes up about 25% of the voting population. Democrats have about 30%. And we, the independents, get most of the rest. Or to put that another way, 25% of the ship can’t rightly push and pull at the wheel without a few of the remaining 75% climbing into the seat of power and trying to control the reigns again. People didn’t vote against Donald Trump because he was a Republican. They voted against Donald Trump because he never stopped turning and pulling at that wheel, because they didn’t trust him to protect all the passengers anymore.

So I guess what I’m asking, hoping, begging, is that the next time you run a primary, the next time you put someone into the General Election, that you provide us with a steadier, moderate hand to choose. The nation may move forward or backward, but we also need peace, and you’ve offered it before. You can offer it again in the future.