It’s now become pretty clear that the appalling ugliness that was the last presidential election was caused by our long-time enemy, Russia. Our intelligence sources are convinced it is so, and even Putin admitted he wanted Trump to win. Whatever. Presidents come and go. The real damage that was done to America was done by us, ourselves.
Putin’s operatives used our own individual beliefs to turn us against each other. Take this example: Mona and David are deeply in love. Mona has a friend, Gwen, who is in fact, not a very good friend, but Mona doesn’t know that. Gwen wants David, so she sets out to break them up. She starts telling Mona that she’s seen David cheating on her. She tells David the same thing. She whispers and whispers and soon the lovers confront each other, furious with the other’s perceived infidelity. They start to hate each other and they end a loving relationship. Who won here? Not David, not Mona. Gwen won.
This is what Putin did to us: He made us hate each other. He knew, as President Lincoln knew, that a country divided against itself cannot stand. Putin wants us to fall.
He put enough lies out about both sides, Democrats and Republicans, and not just the candidates, but about how awful anyone on the other side was. Instead of Americans taking pride in the fact that our liberty meant we could hold different ideas without being enemies, we got the whispers that said the other side (whichever side) wanted us gone, eliminated, that only one side could be right, and the other side was not to be tolerated.
And we fell for it, pretty much all of us.
We are no longer capable of seeing each other as fellow Americans. Think back to the Civil War, which was really the last time Americans felt this much hatred for each other. Now, close to 160 years later, that hate still lingers, long after the men who were in office died, long after the nation was “reunited.” Which shows that genuine reunification won’t happen by itself.
Anyone who has ever written a letter vilifying others for their political beliefs is as guilty as Putin because you’re doing his work. Have you refused to go a dinner because members of the other party will be there? Then you’re guilty, too. And in fact, even if you’ve ranted to your friends about how stupid and mean your opponents are, you’re still guilty. We’re all guilty.
We have to see the hatred for the lie that it is and try to fix it in the only place we can: our own souls.
We don’t need to Make America Great Again.
We need to make America Whole again.
Tina Owens is a resident of Kailua-Kona.