The following is a guest post by my good friend Jett Atwood. You may know her as Sarjex, the creator of the awesome cartoons attached to many of my posts. Like many she has some thoughts about this election and its aftermath. Here they are, presented without comment or modification:
First, I was not thrilled at the thought of a President Hillary Clinton. I was equally not thrilled with the thought of President Donald Trump. This election was like being forced into a dumpster fire and told I had to eat either a poop sandwich or a vomit salad...and by the way, I was still going to be trapped in the dumpster.
With that said, this country against all odds mounted and survived a revolution against the world's only superpower winning our freedom to enact the world’s greatest civic experiment: Can people govern themselves?
To the utter astonishment of Europe and the absolute credit to the founders, our nation displayed unprecedented peaceable exchanges of power...twice when Washington stepped down...once as General of the Revolutionary Army and again when he voluntarily stepped down as President.
The precedent was set when after an angry bitter election John Adams stepped down to his hated rival Thomas Jefferson after only 1 term.
Pretty much until the Civil War and then after, this country has taken great pride in peaceful elections and an orderly exchange of power. To protest the results of a *free and fair election* is probably one of the most un-American things one can do.
This nation has survived the Civil War where we tore ourselves in bloody half, and we survived the painful restitching back together over the notion that we really do all have, under God, unalienable rights.
We have survived The Great War where we voluntarily went and fought for other nations' liberty. We did it again 20 years later and we managed to survive that second World War though we left thousands of our own dead on far away shores during those bloody engagements.
We have survived the rise and fall of the Soviet Union despite some feckless leadership at home and a maniacal Kremlin that pounded its shoe at the UN and promised to *bury us.*
As a nation we have survived multiple presidential assassinations and not a small number of presidential fools.
We have endured and then thrived under the creatively destructive inventions of the cotton gin, the automobile, the atomic bomb, and the microchip.
We have survived the Halls of Montezuma and shores of Tripoli. We survived Wounded Knee, Waco, and Ruby Ridge. We have survived the influenza epidemic of 1918 that got over 25% of us sick and almost 700,000 dead. We have survived Polio and the Great Depression.
We have survived Reconstruction and battles for civil rights. We have survived the moon landing, Vietnam, the Bay of Pigs, 9-11, the Teapot Dome Scandal, the Bull Moose Party, Watergate, Manifest Destiny, the Intercontinental Railroad, Monica's blue dress, the 19th amendment, and may God have mercy on us, even the *16th.*
We have survived all of this and more and despite it all, for over 200 years, we meet and passionately argue who should lead the next 4. The arguments are vicious, bombastic, often outright demagoguery and lies… but once the votes are cast and counted, we pride ourselves on the proud tradition of a peaceful exchange of power.
We have survived bobs and miniskirts. We have survived the foreign invaders of the Beatles and Justin Bieber. We have survived wardrobe malfunctions and over 20 years of The Simpsons. We survived zoot suits, skinny jeans, and twerking. We have even survived bell bottoms and jelly shoes.
We are *Americans* and we will get through a President Donald J Trump just fine.
First, I was not thrilled at the thought of a President Hillary Clinton. I was equally not thrilled with the thought of President Donald Trump. This election was like being forced into a dumpster fire and told I had to eat either a poop sandwich or a vomit salad...and by the way, I was still going to be trapped in the dumpster.
With that said, this country against all odds mounted and survived a revolution against the world's only superpower winning our freedom to enact the world’s greatest civic experiment: Can people govern themselves?
To the utter astonishment of Europe and the absolute credit to the founders, our nation displayed unprecedented peaceable exchanges of power...twice when Washington stepped down...once as General of the Revolutionary Army and again when he voluntarily stepped down as President.
The precedent was set when after an angry bitter election John Adams stepped down to his hated rival Thomas Jefferson after only 1 term.
Pretty much until the Civil War and then after, this country has taken great pride in peaceful elections and an orderly exchange of power. To protest the results of a *free and fair election* is probably one of the most un-American things one can do.
This nation has survived the Civil War where we tore ourselves in bloody half, and we survived the painful restitching back together over the notion that we really do all have, under God, unalienable rights.
We have survived The Great War where we voluntarily went and fought for other nations' liberty. We did it again 20 years later and we managed to survive that second World War though we left thousands of our own dead on far away shores during those bloody engagements.
We have survived the rise and fall of the Soviet Union despite some feckless leadership at home and a maniacal Kremlin that pounded its shoe at the UN and promised to *bury us.*
As a nation we have survived multiple presidential assassinations and not a small number of presidential fools.
We have endured and then thrived under the creatively destructive inventions of the cotton gin, the automobile, the atomic bomb, and the microchip.
We have survived the Halls of Montezuma and shores of Tripoli. We survived Wounded Knee, Waco, and Ruby Ridge. We have survived the influenza epidemic of 1918 that got over 25% of us sick and almost 700,000 dead. We have survived Polio and the Great Depression.
We have survived Reconstruction and battles for civil rights. We have survived the moon landing, Vietnam, the Bay of Pigs, 9-11, the Teapot Dome Scandal, the Bull Moose Party, Watergate, Manifest Destiny, the Intercontinental Railroad, Monica's blue dress, the 19th amendment, and may God have mercy on us, even the *16th.*
We have survived all of this and more and despite it all, for over 200 years, we meet and passionately argue who should lead the next 4. The arguments are vicious, bombastic, often outright demagoguery and lies… but once the votes are cast and counted, we pride ourselves on the proud tradition of a peaceful exchange of power.
We have survived bobs and miniskirts. We have survived the foreign invaders of the Beatles and Justin Bieber. We have survived wardrobe malfunctions and over 20 years of The Simpsons. We survived zoot suits, skinny jeans, and twerking. We have even survived bell bottoms and jelly shoes.
We are *Americans* and we will get through a President Donald J Trump just fine.
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