Which America?

This year’s elections will be the most pivotal in our nation’s history. They will be as consequential as the elections of 1864 when Lincoln was re-elected. 

Perhaps you believe this to be more than slightly overstated but, consider this.

In 1864 the nation was still at war with itself. The election results would literally determine what type of nation the young United States would become.  On Election Day, November 8, 1964, the New York Times editorial read: To elect Lincoln was to choose “war, tremendous and terrible, yet ushering in at the end every national security and glory.” And, to elect his opponent, McClellan, was to choose “the mocking shadow of a peace…sure to rob us of our birthright and to entail upon our children a dissevered Union and ceaseless strife.”

This year the nation is faced with just as stark a choice. We can reelect our first African American president who came into office when the global economy was staring into the yawning abyss of a financial collapse that would lead to social chaos - a president who moved boldly to avert catastrophe and chart a better course for our nation and future – even when some of those policies were strongly opposed by many. 

Our other choice? To return to the party whose policies turned our national surplus into the largest budget deficit in our nation’s history and launched wars on 2 fronts without bothering to pay for them. A party that offers up candidates who demonstrate a lack of vision and show themselves incompetent to move the nation forward because they each long for things that have been left behind us.

Oh yes, this election is most consequential. We have the choice of moving confidently into an uncertain yet hopeful future or, engaging in a disastrous attempt to return to the failed policies of the past. Fortunately, for now, we still have the ability to choose the America we would prefer.

By Jackie Lambert

LTAI Word of the Week:

Proclivity – an inclination or predisposition toward something; especially a strong inherent inclination toward something objectionable.

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