Today...

from the Minneapolis Star Tribune

I write when I’m happy or moved. I write from my experience of life. And today, I write from a place of horror, sadness, and strong resolve. 

I never thought I would see gangs of thugs, incited by the President of the United States, break into the U.S. Capitol to ransack and destroy the very building and institution established to represent our increasingly fragile democracy. And yet that’s what is happening right now.  

Yes, the British tried to destroy the Capitol building in 1814 – yet here we sit in our homes across the country in the 21st Century, in the midst of a pandemic, with easy access to instant visuals of lawlessness by our own citizens reacting to a call to action – from the President of the United States. 

Pause a minute here.

I’ve written before about my staunch standing in the moderate middle. And I have friends from across the range of political partisanship…all people I care about deeply.  

But today? Today we’ve seen what can happen when we truly cease to think for ourselves.

There are those who may not like the outcome, but Joe Biden won the Presidential election. The 2020 election had more oversight, more reviews, more recounts, more legal challenges, more safeguards in place to ensure people could exercise their constitutional right than we’ve seen or experienced before.

I was a poll observer on election day, and I watched people show their IDs, register on site (as is legally permissible in Minnesota), and swear a legally binding oath before exercising that right. All legal challenges have been knocked down – by both Republican appointed and Democrat appointed judges. All Secretaries of State – both Republican and Democrat – have certified their state’s results.

And only one man – who has worked to promote absurd lies – has refused to agree with the outcome. Unfortunately, this man has promoted those lies as well as promoting violence – and today we witnessed the result.

Let’s pause again here. Take a deep breath, and realize this is not who we are. Not who we are as a people. Shirtless white men in head gear rampaging through the halls of Congress? To what end?

Today is a stark reminder of the privilege white Americans still enjoy. Imagine for a minute the different militarized response if the hordes moving onto the Capitol grounds had been black or brown.

Today is also a day to hug your family, and prepare for the hard work we all have ahead in rebuilding the fragile democracy of our fractured nation.