We can't all get along -- in the current context, there are many who do not want to get along with their opposition. And that is their decision to make. But this does not take away from those who do recognize the ultimate damage -- yet to come -- that will take place if the divisions between people continues at the current pace. Many of us have family members, neighbors, co-workers, old friends and others we used to be able to talk to that we no longer do.

Are people screaming and yelling and assaulting each other in your local grocery store? In your workplace? At your local hardware store?

This "divided Americans" crap is a media creation

Your assertion that there isn't a divided America has no basis in reality. Polarization isn't about people screaming at each other in a hardware store. It's about the vast chasm that has developed ideologically between the right and the left over the past 40 years, culminating in half of the voting public voting for a conman and Trump supporters storming the Capitol. Did you miss January 6th?

If you really think we're all one big happy America, you might consider doing some research. Here are some places to start:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/04/08/house-polarization-partisanship/

https://www.brown.edu/news/2020-01-21/polarization

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_polarization_in_the_United_States

If you're saying 1/4 or less of the eligible voting population elects politicians, that would be correct. (Far, far fewer in midterm elections)

No one knows what half the country even thinks

...correctly, but I thought I once heard that some 60% of the insurrectionists busted on Jan 6 didn't bother to vote in the very election that they were trying to overturn.

Trump fashioned himself as some kind of anti-establishment leader "shaking up the system" or whatever crap he said

While most of the J6ers came across as libertarian to me, they were just a tiny handful of Americans and not representative of much

There were incidences of respect and civility between North and South even during and after battles during the Civil War. That doesn't change the fact they were still trying to kill each other.

and so does everyone else, it seems--- at least, in my neighborhood...

wonderful idea. He and I do just that we'll talk about it and granted we rarely agree but we are able to talk about things and we even make jokes. There was no way you were pushing right wing talking points but if you are accused and 'found guilty' that's a wrap, but I remember the post and I'm with you on this !!

Including 14% of Democrats...

And no, I don't have the solution.