Let today be the day the nation returns to sanity

The campaign, which started with promises to stick to the issues, eventually devolved into a slugfest that hurled both candidates down a slippery slope made slick by a slush pile of misconceptions, media hype, religious and racial stereotypes that were patently offensive, and the old bugaboo of class warfare.

How frightening that we have lost our civility. What has happened to the Americans who understood unity, compromise and common sense? The Greatest Generation fought the good fight; in the realm of today’s national politics, the only fight that seems to matter is who can demonize their opponent while riding on a shockwave of rhetoric and slogans that would make any Madison Avenue huckster swell with misplaced pride.

Don’t be surprised in the wake of the election by those cries you hear. They are not cheers of victory but shouts of foul, allegations of cheating, tales of voter fraud and other crimes, most of them imagined or blown out of proportion. 

Both sides will scream the wrong candidate is on his way to the White House. 

When Bill Clinton won a three-way race in 1992 with 43 percent of the vote, his opponents denounced him, saying he did not win the popular vote. He was relegated to the role of a trailer-hopping, womanizing buffoon led by the nose by his wife.

Then came the scandal-plagued race of 2000, with all the lamentations of hanging chads, gnashing of teeth over questionable Florida recounts and the wailing over a final decision by a conservative-leaning Supreme Court that put a second Bush in the White House.

And though the race of 2004 seemed more clear-cut, voter disenfranchisement had set in, carried on a tide of cynicism that has yet to recede.

And so we come to 2008. Pundits, prognosticators and not a few politicos will create a virtual thunder clap as they rush to fill the void left by real citizens concerned only with moving the nation ahead as they walked away from the polls, the former cabal screaming their candidate was wronged, their candidate was maligned, their candidate was cheated.

Let us hope this is not so. Let us hope the rift in the fabric of American life created by this three-year campaign for the Oval Office can be forgotten and forgiven, so America can concentrate on the true ills besetting this land — a deep recession, a two-front war, an epidemic of obesity and cancer and so many other problems that require our unity to solve.

Some will say a storm has swept over us. Others will say the storm has only begun. Well, here’s one thing to remember: the president might symbolize the executive branch of government, but he is not THE government. We cast off the monarchy more than 200 years ago. Congress makes the laws.

In the old days, Americans right after a presidential election may have grumbled a bit if their candidate lost, they may have been a bit disappointed, but in the end they picked up their heads, looked down the road, resolved to do their bit for God and country, and forged ahead. They knew they’d have another shot in four years.

Let today be the day where we regain our sanity and come back together as a nation, united by the principles we all share, the principles that no single person can ever take from us.