by Robert Reich
It’s been a few weeks, but it feels like an eternity.
It feels like an eternity because of the immensity of the loss — not just the loss of the election but the seeming loss of America. Not just America, but the apparent loss of the world as we knew it.
In reality, we lost by a relatively small number of votes, but in our winner-take-all system of government, that doesn’t much matter. We lost.
A few weeks in, and the magnitude of the loss may be hitting you differently than it did on the night of Nov. 5.
It has been coming to me in the early morning, just as dawn is breaking and I’m starting to awaken. It has been coming to me in the form of dread.
What exactly do I dread? Trump, and all the anger he has exploited. Trump, and all the people he has manipulated. Trump, and all the power he will have to do atrocious things. Trump, and all the dreadful people he is surrounding himself with or is seeking to appoint. Trump, and his use of the military on hardworking people in my community.
Some of you probably awaken as I do.
Alternatively, some of you are using coping mechanisms — not reading the paper or listening to the news, or giving up on politics, or relying on music or poetry or the beauty of nature to blot out what is occurring.
I get it.
However you might be coping with the loss and the shock, it’s very important that you know what they’re trying to do.
What they want most is to take away our hope.
If they can make us hopeless, they win everything. If they can abscond with our hope, we will stop fighting for a more just society, stop defending those who are most vulnerable to them, stop protecting what’s left of our democracy.
If they can destroy our hope, we won’t join together to try to stop them. They will win everything. They will get it all.
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