Not sure how finished this election season is nationally, but it's done and dusted where I live. How much will change as a result of how we've voted? Hard to say less than twenty-four hours after the polls closed, but I guess we'll find out together, not that we've been together too often in recent years at any level of our government.
When I was in the Air Force, we had an expression: 'If you're so smart, why aren't you rich?' I've used that a lot in recent years when looking at people seeking my vote for office. I applaud their generosity and admire their energy, but telling me that 'I love my city/county/state' isn't really a qualification for elected office in my book. And assuring me you have the answers when I'm still struggling with the questions gets you a shoulder shrug.
I tease acquaintances that I never allow my lack of knowledge on a subject to keep me from having an opinion on it. If you didn't recognize that sentence as attempted tongue-in-cheek humor, please do us both a favor and find something else to read right now. As Daniel Patrick Moynihan suggested many years ago, "everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but NOT to his own facts."
As I've aged, I've grown more short-tempered and quite frankly less kind in my daily interactions with others. And I'm not alone. As part of the Baby Boom Generation who blamed our parents for everything we disliked, I'm not happy that my children blame me. Gets sort of awkward, to be honest.
I fear we're running out of grace for one another, and I suspect yesterday's election results will do little to improve that unless we resolve, each of us, to be a better person. I think many of us still want to change the world but have trouble getting started by changing ourselves. Baby steps.
-bill kenny
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