We have, once again, arrived at the intersection of the rational and insanity. Some call it the election season.

And like the four seasons in nature, election season offers an eternal, hopeful spring, a time for renewal, adoption of reasonable political platforms, signs of new growth, ushering in a new crop of elected representatives, and movement towards a greater balance of power between the legislature and executive branches.

What an ideal outcome.

Putting nature metaphors aside, this upcoming election offers a smorgasbord of opportunity for distinction, as well as disaster.

Of course, every election offers both possibilities. Pundits opine about the various directions that each campaign can take. Alarmists of gloom and doom are having a field day, while hope-peddlers appear to be struggling to find their voices.

So, what’s at stake in the 2024 presidential election?

Democracy, as we know it, is threatened says one side.

The country, as we knew it, is being stolen says the other side.

Let’s examine the two arguments.

Democracy, as practiced in the USA, continues to evolve. In its most idealistic form, every eligible person would have a direct vote on all matters. As it is, the sheer size of this country has mandated an elected representative form of government to be more efficient and effective. When it works, the majority rule is honored, and election cycles matter.

Then we have those pesky states’ rights built into the Constitution, causing unbalanced votes on universal issues, e.g., women’s reproductive rights. The vast differences across the nation and how people vote on such matters causes fractures in the definition of a democratic ideal within the United States.

What issues are we all united around anyway? As a resident of the “eastern shore," it is difficult for me to feel the pain of my fellow citizens along the Texas border. On the shore, migrant labor is valued. Yet, at times it has been easier to identify with the plight of the Palestinians, over there, than with the Black farmers here at home.

What causes this dissonance?

I think that identity as an “American first” has colored our responses to all issues.

After all, Americans are the best, richest, most powerful, and fill-in-the-blank superlative, that any notion of us missing the mark, of falling below that artificial and inflated narrative, is antithetical to our selfidentity. We stand apart, above "them."

I think this mindset may have been adopted by Black Americans more than any other group. We are quick to remind ourselves that we built this country, and therefore we not only own it, but that we may be the only true Americans, aside from the native groups. I’m waiting for a time when a coalition of indigenous people and descendants of the African slave trade take their rightful places as the moral leaders of the new democratic ideal.

Wishful thinking?

On the other hand, taking the country back to some nostalgic time when the nation was smaller, ruled by a few white men whose women knew their place, and when there was still a vast frontier to conquer, with guns, is simply a pipe dream.

Yet, the passions churned up in support of this yearning to return again, has fueled how many voters align with or manufacture issues in search of candidates. These believers are true Americans, too, and their self-identities are equally invested in this false narrative.

What’s left?

The Third World, i.e., any other place not the USA, may dictate how the upcoming election is determined. Every day, bad news from around the world delivers foreboding warnings about how unstable most areas have become; many of these places are racially and ethnically homogenous and they harbor a common hatred of the USA-its democratic ideals, its wealth, etc.

Proxy wars are being waged throughout the middle east, in Africa, in Southeast Asia, and the USA role in each is growing. There are many dirty hands in this bloody business.

It is not so farfetched to think that a November decision may come sooner than the calendared event; that there might be an attack from outside our borders by any one of the other entities, and we will all be forced to vote, in one accord, to save ourselves.

At that time, will you be a flag bearer for the USA, or will you stand on the sidelines? Will you aid and abet the enemy from outside, or will you join with your enemy from inside in defense of our democracy?

Sparing any war before November, the time is now to decide who will represent your democratic ideals, for equal access to all the promises of America, from “sea to shining sea.” Vote, vote, vote! Toniwg1@gmail.com