It’s
a miraculous feeling knowing you were there when things changed. Maybe not
forever, maybe not dramatically, and maybe not even for a generation. But
knowing you were there and involved when something truly important happened is
an untouchable and incorruptible moment. If the election proved anything, it’s
that we are a divided nation. But it also showed that we didn’t give up when
the moment was hardest, that we stuck to our guns and decided the devil we all
know is better than the devil we don’t.
I’m
from Maine. For most of my conscious life my state has always had two
Republican U.S. senators who could best be described as moderates. And when
Olympia Snowe stepped down, the GOP was left scrambling with one less vote. But
instead of going the chosen course of red and blue, Maine went with Angus King,
an Independent who may prove to be the key vote for the next few years. And on
that line, Maine became the first state to ever ratify same-sex marriage by
popular vote. Though we are a small state, the people of Maine proved something
on Election Day. That even in the most divisive moments in contemporary
history, we can still agree that some things are inalienable and that the
overall system demands to be fixed (and that we deserve no less).
In
terms of the national election, it was surprising just how substantial a
victory Obama won. It was close early on, but by 11:30 the race was over. The
incumbent had won, no doubt about it. Even with Florida notwithstanding, the
president had over 300 Electoral College votes, and his challenger conceded. I
truly believe in my heart that Mitt Romney is not a bad person. On the
contrary, I believe he is a good man who loves his family and his country. It’s
a remarkable shame that the most honest emotion Mitt Romney ever showed was in
his concession speech on November 7, 2012 at one o’clock in the morning, only
after he lost his second race for the White House. It was not a concession speech from
a movement leader like Reagan, but from a man who had tried and failed, from a
cowboy finally ready to ride off into the sunset once and forever.
At
the same time I don’t believe President Obama is a bad man either. I believe he
is just a man who underestimated how divided a country we really were, who
didn’t anticipate the drive for partisan goals would ultimately outweigh the
moral obligations to the American people. But we stand at a crossroads now. The
GOP has lost. Mitch McConnell has lost. John Boehner has lost. Mitt Romney has
lost. The goal of these Republicans and so many more for the past four years
had been to make President Obama a one-term president. The goal wasn’t to fix
the economy, or to create jobs, or to bring soldiers home, or to change policy,
or recreate the power of the president, or even to pass basic legislation. It
was to defeat somebody in the opposite party. That has to be the most startling thing
about our broken system: that our politicians haven’t even been running to win,
but instead just to make sure somebody else loses.
Maybe
now we can actually get something, anything,
done. Obama has a second term. Neither party really has anything to lose. The
Tea Party appears to be on its last leg, if you believe what the 2012 election
has said so far. We’re a nation far removed from perfection. We’ve admitted
that ideology doesn’t always pay off, that putting all our eggs in one basket
might just make us hungry later. But we’ve also admitted that we’re ready to
see something through, that despite what recent history might say, we’re
accepting of new norms.
Sure,
our economy needs work. And admittedly, we’re still more divided than ever. But
if there is one silver lining to the years 2008-2012, it’s the notion that
we’re ready to continue to move forward. That we admit social issues like
equality are still worth fighting for. That we’re not just names on a list,
numbers in a book somewhere. That we’re not just a nation of 300 million lost
souls who only want what’s best for ourselves, no matter what the cost to
everyone else might end up being, and who just want to be left alone. Maybe we’ve finally come to terms with the
fact that change doesn’t happen over night.
Maybe
I’m being overly optimistic. We have a lot of work to do here at home in terms
of nation building. But it’s that idea of the silver lining that drives so many
Americans to keep going. Politicians don’t change things. Presidents don’t
change things. The Electoral College doesn’t change things. Money doesn’t
change things. Necessity changes things. The idea that we are better than the
rhetoric dictates changes everything.
John
Fitzpatrick Kennedy said it best just a few months before he was gunned down in
Dallas. A man may die, nations may rise and fall, but an idea lives on. Ideas
have endurance without death.