The United States is on the eve of completing a process that had its beginnings years and years ago.\u00a0 No, I am not referring to the election of its first female President.\u00a0 I am talking about the process of separating a melting-pot culture with a patchy purplish hue into its stark and clashing colors of red and blue.<\/p>\n
In the world of physics, this would be characterized as an entropy-reducing process.\u00a0 The usual analogy for such a process is arranging the balls that are scattered over a pool table so that the striped balls are lined up on one side and the solid balls on the opposite side.\u00a0 That is pretty close to what has taken place in our nation over recent decades.<\/p>\n
Such a process just doesn’t happen by itself.\u00a0 That would be breaking the Second Law of Thermodynamics.\u00a0 The Second Law says that it takes energy to decrease the entropy of a system.\u00a0 Your refrigerator gets cold inside because of the energy that runs its compressor.\u00a0 Likewise, the process of separating us into camps of red and blue over the years has taken energy, lots of it.\u00a0 The energy comes from demagogue radio talk show hosts who profit by maintaining and appeasing devoted hard-core audiences.\u00a0 It comes from politicians whose main goal is to stay in power — and who better to enlist for that goal than rabid followers?\u00a0 And it comes from corporations and other rich donors who fuel the process with money, without which none of the above takes place.<\/p>\n
So, it’s not Clinton vs. Trump tomorrow, not really.\u00a0 It is those who would solve problems vs. those who would gain from conflict and division.\u00a0 Regardless of the election outcome, the forces that separate us today will continue to do so tomorrow.\u00a0 This is because of the many who have something to gain from our polarization, people with money and energy to pump into our system, to make us cold and hostile to each other.\u00a0 Those people know their way around the Second Law.<\/p>\n
The answer, at least my answer, is to remain civil and rational.\u00a0 Try not to pick fights with friends, family or Facebookers.\u00a0 Save your most passionate words for the occasions when you are “speaking to your choir.”\u00a0 Be as critical of the leaders and positions of your own political persuasion as you are of others.\u00a0 Don’t just argue about or advocate for specific candidates, as candidates come and go (mostly go).\u00a0 Instead, voice your expectations of how the political process should work and how the business of running the nation should be conducted.\u00a0 Voice it to your friends.\u00a0 Voice it to your representatives.<\/p>\n
Unless we think of ourselves as a purple people again, not red or blue, we can’t expect our politicians to treat us differently.\u00a0 We have work to do tomorrow and many days after to bridge the divide that powerful interests invested so much energy in creating.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The United States is on the eve of completing a process that had its beginnings years and years ago.\u00a0 No, I am not referring to the election of its first female President.\u00a0 I am talking about the process of separating … Continue reading