The Open Stages, Atlas, 20th Day of Hagwinter, 625 M.E.

I've been trying to avoid the 24-hour news channels and to even minimize my online news reading, but it's still unavoidable. The progressive left media are all asking what went wrong in the 2024 election, and each pundit has their own answer. It's Harris' fault for courting the moderates and Republicans too much, and in the process losing her Democratic base. It's Biden's fault for not dropping out of the race sooner, leaving too little time for an open convention or a meaningful campaign. It's the Democratic voters' fault for not showing up in sufficient numbers to affect the vote. It's the Republican voters' fault for their blind allegiance to Trump. It's the Russians' fault for spreading disinformation. It's the liberals' fault for their emphasis on pronouns and using terms like "Latinx." I've even heard it's Anthony Fauci's fault for the way he handled the covid crisis, because, sure, let's kick him around some more. 

None of these are true and all of these are true. There's no one single scapegoat, but it is possible to connect the dots back to each one of these so-called "causes."

It's been said that white, working-class voters felt disaffected by the Democratic Party. They felt they were being talked down to by elite party leaders, who they thought considered them simple and unsophisticated. There's some truth to that, and I got a first-hand demonstration Wednesday.

On my usual walk along my usual route at my usual time, I ran into another person who I frequently see doing the same as me. Sometimes we talk - local news, Beltline development plans, the health effects of our walking regimes. I suspected he was a Republican and to the right of my views but we didn't talk politics and frankly I didn't care - he was just some person I occasionally bumped into on the trail.

But Wednesday, he was fired up to talk about Tuesday night's election results. I told him talking about politics wasn't a good idea and warned him we were probably of opposite sides of the aisle on this one, but he was excited and blurted out his Fox News talking points anyway. "It was a landslide," "a clear mandate from the people if there ever was one," "this time he'll have the Senate and probably the House, too,"  and "he'll pick the right staff this time that won't try to hold him back like before." 

I told him I didn't disagree with the facts of his statements, but felt everything he was saying was bad news for America and probably the whole world. I told him I thought Trump was a miserable, loathsome, dishonest cheater, a fraud, and probably a traitor. He was not persuaded and said he felt the same way about my side. Hunter Biden's laptop came up for some reason.

I'll be honest - I didn't want to have that conversation. I was hurting, I was sad, and I was just trying to walk out my anxieties and sorrow. I didn't want and didn't need some MAGA zealot gloating in my face, but out of politeness and neighborly kindness, I tried to restrain myself.

"Well, the stock market's doing a lot better already than it did under Ka-MAL-la," he said, mispronouncing her name the same way Trump does, and probably Fox News since that's the way their messiah says it. 

"It's 'Comma-la'," I told him.

"Are you sure? I'm pretty sure it's 'Ka-MAL-la," he insisted.

"No, I've even heard her explain it as 'Comma' like the punctuation, followed by '-La'. Comma-La. Kamala."

And at that point, he lost it. He started walking away, yelling that I had no right telling him how to say her name. "I'll teach you to come to the South and tell people here how to talk," he shouted. 

I had a hard time believing he was serious. "Dude, don't walk away mad," I said, but he was already 20 yards away, visibly angry, and putting his ear pods back in. "Okay," I thought. There's nothing I could do, and no reason to try to appeal to his better judgement. Nothing lost, life goes on, and we walked our separate ways.

Two lessons learned (maybe three): 

1. He didn't get upset when I revealed myself to be a Dem, and he didn't get upset by my arguments. He only got angry when I corrected him. That goes to the theories about condescension and that the Right is very sensitive about being talked down to. 


2. The fact that his first reaction was to lash out at me for not being native to the South shows he has a tribal mentality and saw me as an "other." I'm an American citizen living in America, paying my property taxes and maintaining my home just like he probably does. I'm not his guest here in the South who needs to mind his manners and behavior, although he apparently feels that way. One can imagine how he thinks minorities and women should behave.


3. I was right - talking about politics wasn't a good idea.