A few months ago, while listening to or reading news feeds, I started keeping track of positive ideas that I hoped would be expressed by candidates running for office in the next few years. For inspiration, I imagined standing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, overlooking Washington, D.C., taking in the history of our union, not just the current discord. This was before the Reflecting Pool debacle. Now, it even more clearly exemplifies what I am looking for.
First, candidates need to look ahead, not back. Agreed, too much has been changed, damaged and spoiled in the last 10 years. From today on though, we have to move forward. If the view we see ahead needs work, let’s roll up our sleeves and dive into the healing that can start now. Candidates should invite us to see a way toward a future of hope and progress for all.
Reports of overspending and idle federal employees have been around since the ink on the Constitution was still wet. So, when a gazillionaire with a chainsaw started hacking away with his distorted view of what needed trimming, many thought tightening the belt wasn’t the worst idea.
However, the blind, arbitrary annihilation of programs and people has left us with a gutted landscape, including holes in vital services, aid to other countries and responsiveness to the needs of our own citizens. These have been truly destructive, thoughtless actions whose repercussions we will likely live with for a long time. Agreed. But this also gives us a chance to rebuild, to improve, to de-politicize new ideas, complete with guardrails that prevent any future would-be monarchist’s ability to destroy them. The chainsaw is not an instrument of construction but destruction. It’s time to rethink and reshape what tools we need to replace the ruins left behind.
When we see the stars and stripes, remember this is our flag. Everyone’s. Every color, race, creed, gender, orientation, neighborhood and fetish. All of us. Jingoism aside, we need to have something to be proud of and to want to share it. Our reputation as the gold standard has been diminished but not shattered. We have the ability to rebuild our image into a more stable, generous and sustainable beacon of welcoming opportunities that help create a sense of inclusion for everyone.
Reconnect us to our neighbors and the world. For instance: bring back USAID. (Maybe in an even better, revised, not just restored version.) Let’s offer help not for what aid can do for our standing in a foreign land, but what it can do for the other humans who share with us this rock we call earth.
Campaigns need to outline specific steps. Details of programs rather than platitudes reiterated to fit the evening news sound bites. Have a vision. Help us see your vision. Tell us how we get there together. Show us how you would bring back funding for, among other things, public education, public broadcasting and publically-funded research. Instead of funding campaigns through donations of super PACs or billionaires, let’s just try funding political campaigns with only public funds.
Where we find disagreements, let’s work to find the overlap in a Venn diagram that describes each side’s opinions. The overlap is where we can agree. Do not replace the harsh tones of adversaries with the same harsh tone. Reasonable articulation, spoken with hope, energy and kindness covers more ground.
Try not to prejudge a person’s political motives when you see a lawn sign, hat or tee shirt that reads, “God Bless America.” Don’t question who their God is or what their motives are. Assume the best and find within your own heart the ability to feel blessed with what we have been given and strong enough to build a better tomorrow, for everyone.
This is not just pie-in-the-sky, wishful thinking. This is the tomorrow we want to leave for our children and grandchildren. Enough finite and exclusionary thinking about, “How do I get more for me?” Instead, consider what we can do for each other to make this a better place for all by restoring progress and a positive purpose for everyone.
That is the challenge. Candidates, please heed these words.
Rebecca Schaefer is a retired School Counselor and lives in Weare.
