Elections are coming, the Geese are . . . well, no.

All my friends, and many of my acquaintances are contemplating the forthcoming elections with distaste and bafflement.  Except for a few, everyone wants major changes, but they're not clear about what those changes should be, exactly.

In the past, there have always been pundits who suggested what each sort of person should do, but in the past three years we have learned one thing for sure: the pundits are going to get it wrong; they have thoroughly discredited themselves.  I too got it wrong, and I ... well, let's forget about that.

I want to remind my readers of things they might forget, and things they should consider carefully, but I have no prescriptions, except for the obvious ones.

Many astute observers, including the conservative commentator David Brooks, says that he sees polarization dominating the psychology of the voting population on both sides.  In other words, it appears that people are voting against whom they hate, rather than for whom they want elected.  In yet other words, people are getting emotional (and facebook and twitter are amplifying these feelings, and maybe Putin is not entirely to blame; we're sitting ducks when it comes to mob psychology), which is not good.

Why?  Because the issues are even more complicated this time, and nobody does well with complicated matters when they're mad.

I know for a fact that many conservatives---regardless of whether they voted with the GOP or whether they were Libertarians---are not going to vote Democrat, simply because the Democrats, mostly young Democrats, are so furious that they have been manufacturing memes blaming the entire spectrum of conservatives for the spectacular missteps of the president.  So these frustrated conservatives may well stay home, or vote for, say, Green Party candidates, or what have you.

Of course, that's their right.  But it is quite possible that they may add their vote to those moderate Democrats who are coming forward to run for office, if they did not feel so shunned by the sharp-mouthed liberals, and my readers probably know a few of those.

There are young liberals pouring out ridicule and humiliation on conservatives, blaming everyone for electing Trump, when the fault lies in the readiness with which Democrats were incited to believe the negative stories about Hilary Clinton.  Sure, there was a lot of help from Russian propagandists, but we liberals swallowed the propaganda wholesale.  There is a point where we can't point the finger anywhere except at ourselves.

Wage propaganda war, if you think that's going to help.  But we're never going to win any votes except the few that the more energetic among us will bestir ourselves to cast, if we make any potential crossovers feel stupid.

I say: make nice for the next few weeks, and if crossover conservatives help us remove the Trump fans in Congress and the Senate, we will have to graciously grant that conservatives helped to ease Trump out of the White House, and point him towards the Big House, because things are looking very, very bad.  (Not good, to be perfectly clear.)  Trump has no clue about what the consequences of his actions are.  He pretends not to care, but in fact he is simply surprised at the fallout of everything he does and tweets.  We have been taught to be gentle with mentally deficient people, but let's make an exception in this one case.

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