To the editor:
Yes, the Trump nightmare is over. The soul of a nation can now begin to heal.
A recent letter to The Democrat highlighted how dangerous people garner the hearts and minds of good, honest, hard-working people: lies, lies and more lies.
It’s easy to sound smart, learned and prosperous when your personal drive for success untethers you from any semblance of truth. People of conscience are always easy targets for fraudsters and con men because good people find it hard to believe others aren’t as honest and trustworthy as they themselves strive to be. For most of us, that we wouldn’t knowingly or willingly deceive people defines who we are.
We all make mistakes; we all give what turns out in retrospect to be bad information or advice, or keep our mouths shut believing that telling a loved one, friend or colleague the truth would hurt or do more harm than good. But, most of us are guided by a wisdom gained early on: mistakes are not lies — and lies are not mistakes.
Trump has lied his whole life. Of course you won’t hear that from the man himself. You have to listen to the people who trusted and were hurt by him — from family members, small contractors and business associates to now, a slew of political associates and constituents who lost everything because of their blind fealty to him. Their stories are not hard to find.
Kudos to Mike Pence for standing up to a mendacious, vindictive man. For understanding what his own role was in certifying the election, per the writ and intent of the American Constitution. For telling the truth that the election wasn’t stolen. Qualified election officials of both parties told him lawyers finding instances of improperly cast ballots wouldn’t find vast schemes to cheat he and Trump out of a win.
As an election official myself — many years as a municipal chief election officer — I can witness that the overwhelming majority of improperly cast ballots are mistakes by municipal employees and stressed election workers, or honestly cast ballots by folks who believed they were allowed to send in their recently-deceased parent’s absentee ballot, etc. One voter even argued that he should be able to vote in both communities where he owned homes because he paid taxes in both places! No, Pence accepted that Trump’s claims of vast election fraud in America’s large cities were just more Trump lies.
VP Pence let his soul guide him to do the right thing.
Now, a nation divided by real, honest policy differences about tough public policy choices can turn our attention to holding our representatives accountable for getting on with the business of advocating for our positions, making hard choices and compromises in good faith. And, in the end, moving us forward toward a More Perfect Union for all.
Darcy Gustavsson, Nashville
P.S. I recently moved here from Brookfield, Wisconsin, where I was a chief election officer.
