We're not THAT divided - one Texan's viewpoint

(Written by my friend Steppy, who lives in Austin TX, and voted Kerry)

I have voted in 7 presidential elections now. Six times, the man I voted for has lost. Most of those times, I felt very strongly about my choice. I believed sincerely I was choosing the better man and in most cases, I dreaded the dire consequences of my candidate's defeat.

And in every case, things didn't turn out quite as badly as I feared. There are two things that have severely depressed me over the past 24 hours since waking up to discover George W. Bush had been re-elected. The first is the prospect of that man armed with an actual mandate and a more Republican congress, driving home an agenda authored by the extreme right-wing of his party. The second thing that has depressed me is the media-driven perception that everyone between the Nevada border and the Alleghenies is a foaming-at-the-mouth evangelical nut case hating gays, toting assault rifles, and voting for W. There is much talk about the "deep divide" in America today and for proof, one merely has to look at the electoral vote map -- blue in the west and northeast, red in the middle.

Once again, mass media creates an illusion that has the power, if it is twisted hard enough, to be self-realizing. Alienate the Midwest enough and there really WILL be a divide between the people of the Mideast and the population centers of the northeast and far west. So I guess this morning, I want to try very hard to establish a few realities by addressing some of the myths.

1.) The country is deeply divided. Ideologically, this may be true. Geographically, it is not nearly as divided as the networks and their election maps want you to believe. I live in Texas and the county in which I lived turned in a majority for Kerry. Overall, over one-third of Texas' voters supported Senator Kerry and that was true in almost every single one of the "red states." Several prominent blue states had over 40% of their voters supporting Bush. The so-called geographic model of division in this country is not nearly as pronounced as that electoral map makes it look. If they shaded those maps somewhere between red and blue indicating percentages of popular vote, fully 90% of the country would be some shade of purple. We're not red, we're not blue. We may be lavender, puce, violet, or magenta, but the closest thing to a solidly partisan electorate in this country was the District of Columbia whose voters were 90% for Kerry.

2.) Urban areas are solidly against Bush. The nation's second largest urban center, Houston, was solidly pro-Bush. So was Dallas-Ft.Worth. As a general rule, urban areas were bluer than they were red; that much is a fact. But one needs to realize Bush improved his percentages among all minority groups and among women between 2000 and 2004. There is much being made of how Bush won on the strength of the radical right, but the harsh reality Democrats have to face today is that Bush improved his numbers between 2000 and 2004 in almost every demographic category that is measured! Most Democratic strategists who are willing to go on camera are admitting the same thing -- they got beat. It wasn't some freakish aberration of voting irregularity. The democrats just got beaten across the board in almost every single category. Both democrats and republicans managed to drum up the same percentage of voters - 37% - in this election. But more democrats switched party for their presidential vote than republicans did -- 10% of registered democrats voted for Bush and only 7% of registered republicans voted for Kerry. Some people, including myself, may think Karl Rove is the embodiment of evil in politics today, but the fact is, in this election, he kicked the Democrats' asses.

3.) Bush won on the strength of the Evangelical Christian vote. There is one statistic -- just one -- that fuels this. Some poll somewhere determined that 40% of Americans are Evangelical Christians. But no one ever bothers to explain exactly what "Evangelical Christian" means. The dictionary definition basically is that if you are a Christian and you support the notion of spreading Christianity through missionary work, religious tours like the Billy Graham Crusade, or other such media presentations of your faith, you are "evangelical." The problem is, the media equates "evangelical Christians" with the religious right wing of the Republican party. This is grossly inaccurate. There are a great many Democrats in this country who are Christians who support mission work and fought pretty hard against the election of Bush. They are lumped in as "evangelicals" by the media and the polls and they are then homogenized into the religious right and the world of Bush supporters by the media. Before CNN convinces you 40% of the country are arch-conservative religious fanatics, make an effort to understand how this figure was arrived at and what it specifically means. There's a semantic war being waged here and a lot of lies are being propagated as a result.

4.) The next 4 years will be the end of the world as we know it. This country is more resilient than we think. The pendulum of the country has swung far right (and left) in the past and we've recovered. The architects of this governmental system, Jefferson, Adams, Jay, Franklin, Madison, et al, did a damned good job. Even when all three branches of the government are held by conservative forces, it is important to remember that this will ever be temporary. Furthermore, at the state and local level, much can still be done to counter what takes place on the national level. 55 Republicans in the Senate does not mean 55 Jerry Falwell clones are holding forth in the Senate chambers. Those 55 are a spectrum of political viewpoints that span quite a range of views. It is crucial to identify the more liberal of those republicans who are now in the congressional majorities and push them. Rely on them. Write them and make them your champions.

Here is the most important maxim I can offer for us to hang on to in the months ahead:

Polarization is a perception.

It goes from the national level all the way down to individuals. At the highest level, we look at our government and say it is a Republican government. But it isn't that simple. About 2/3 of the Supreme Court, for example, could be called moderate to liberal. About 45% of Congress is Democrat. The government is MOSTLY Republican and as Miracle Max pointed out in the Princess Bride, 'mostly' is a lot different from 'all the way.' Remember, 48% of the American people supported Kerry. FORTY EIGHT percent! That gigantic sea of red on the map contains a good 20-25 million Kerry supporters. And let's take this a step further. Many of the people who voted for Bush are NOT religious fanatics screaming to take away your rights and machine gun gays. In fact, I would guess that almost none of them are. The agenda Bush wants to push is NOT 100% approved by the 51% who voted for him. And this will have a profound impact on the months and years ahead.

The future:
If history teaches us anything, and if the Bush administration's strategists are at all intelligent they will know this, it is that second term presidents must be cautious or they will do irreparable harm to their party. If Bush assumes the Republican majority in government and his second term mandate give him the power to push an extremist agenda in his first two years, the Republicans will experience a massive backlash in 2006 and lose the Congress. If the Democratic party has any sense at all, they will take a good hard look at this year's election and learn some valuable lessons from it. The vast majority of Americans, I believe, are dissatisfied with the platforms of BOTH parties as they are written. But it seems that slightly more of them believe they can survive to the next election with the Republican platform than with the Democratic platform. The biggest mistake anyone can make right now is to believe that 58 million Americans gave a whole-hearted thumbs-up to the Republican platform. That is absolutely NOT what that vote meant and it would be disastrous for anyone to assume it does. If the political parties have any intention of holding on to the office of president in the future, they have to stop trying to match extremes with extremes. They have to stop telling the people of the country that it's either a bright future or a dismal disaster and you must choose one or the other. The parties, if they want to win by large margins, must realize that the candidate selection process is inherently flawed. Why, you ask? Because our current system of primaries and conventions and caucuses is guaranteed to cater to the most enthusiastic, most active, and most EXTREME elements of the party.

Consider: Independent polls found that John McCain would have been preferred to Bush as a candidate by almost 3-1 among people questioned - a poll that included Democrats, Independents, and Republicans who have not voted recently. But if you narrow down the demographic to active Republicans, the numbers shift heavily in favor of Bush. In other words: the people who are most active in the candidate selection process are the ones most likely to push for the extremis agenda.

Until parties recognize that it is necessary to choose a candidate that appeals to a broader spectrum of the country than just the most faithful, active members of their party, we will continue to have these vast divisions in public opinion and continue to see party politics as usual in Congress. But before they can come to that realization, we ALL have to stop believing the CNN Headline News version of condensed, pre-chewed, sound bite encapsulated information and do some real analysis of the facts. It's time for voters to stop believing everything they're told. Question EVERYTHING! Demand proof! Assume ulterior motives!

It's time to take back not just our country, but our information and our futures.

was perhaps as bad as any of the tripe that is debasing people, searching for their lowest motivation, filling them with hate and pride and setting them aloof or against each other.

It was avomitous piece of supercilious trash extracted from only the worst attitudes of interviewees who support the black elan of this rag.

In the former Yugoslavia people who refused to turn against their neighbor were the first shot. I won't die so naive.

Dallas was not "solidly pro-Bush"--it was an almost 50/50 split. And the voters elected the first woman to ever head the Sheriff's Department and three Democratic judges. And without the Republican gerrymandering, Martin Frost (who used to be my Congressman) would have been re-elected.

This map demonstrates how "purple" many of the so-called red states really are. That almost blue dot in North Texas is Dallas County: