DEEP BREATH.
There were plenty of ups and downs last night. I'm sure we all felt alternatingly thrilled and devastated as we stayed glued to our phones and televisions into the night. And, if you're like me, you've noticed those feelings carrying over into the hours - and now days - after. You could certainly start tabulating the positives and negatives, and come up with a lengthy list for each...but then you'd probably start feeling discouraged that, for every one of our gains, we've given something back, or fallen short of achieving a given objective.
But there's one thing that's giving me a healthy dose of hope.
Every election cycle or two, the balance of power in at least one chamber of Congress swings the other direction, as our country has inevitably stalled or at least not fulfilled all of the wildest dreams and desires of the electorate, and the people decide that all they want is change, whatever form that may take. It dawns on us that our representatives have sold out, or are corrupt, or inept, or all of the above. We just want them out.
Which is why I think this year's midterms are so significantly different, and why we're going to see the repercussions of it for decades to come.
For the longest time, it's been the old guard. Largely white, male, and elderly. Nearly every member of Congress has been at least two out of the three. And for them (a warning: I will be doing some generalizing in this post), it is very much about holding and exercising power, building personal wealth by succumbing to lobby pressure, sacrificing the will of their constituents in a hurry if another choice benefits their personal agenda. Much more so on the right, but members of both party are guilty of it. They got into politics because they loved the game. They were lured by the power. They talked a big game, and they probably even felt strongly about certain issues, but it rarely translated into real action. Very little laying it all on the line for what they claimed to believe in. And every six-to-twelve years, the citizenry catches wise, and gives them the boot in favor of some new puppet.
But this new wave of Representatives-elect - they are different. I believe that - hopefully not naively so. They did not form their campaigns because they grew up watching C-SPAN just before bedtime. They're not hungry for power, or recognition. They're hungry for change. They are women who have been mistreated and overlooked. They are minorities who have been harassed, or who have watched their loved ones be imprisoned or murdered unjustly. They are scientists who are ready to fight back against this administration's promotion of anti-intellectualism. Their interest is massively personal. These are people with integrity - an integrity that can't be bought, and won't wane. It is an unfamiliar quality in Congress, but holy shit is it a welcome one.
My hope - and my belief - is that, even in spite of the certain gridlock that is to take place over the next number of years, voters will begin to see that these new Representatives cannot be moved to relinquish their principles. Not for the promise of riches, not at the threat of losing their jobs. And when we see that these people are actually fighting - that they are doing what we elected them to do, and that we can trust them - they will gain a foothold in the House. A foothold that the wildly corrupt and often criminal Republicans who previously held control were unable to manage.
And when it comes time to once again drop names into ballots, there will be no semblance of a red wave. I'm not so deluded to think change will happen dramatically or all at once - I don't foresee a 400-35 split by 2030, for example - but I do believe that we have reached the tipping point, and Americans will no longer settle for politicians who are consumed by self-interest. Not when we see the fight that this new batch is about to put up. Not when we catch a whiff of true integrity.
It's what we've been longing for.
It's here.
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