Today something’s happening that’s not like anything that’s happened in my lifetime. Today we try to get a would-be strongman out of office, knowing he’ll do anything to stay there. He’ll invalidate every ballot, he’ll lie and cheat and this time, instead of a Brooks Brothers Rioter, he’s got a different kind of angry white man, in body armor and an AR-15 instead of a polo shirt*. He’s turned the White House into a bunker. Will he come out shooting or will things end the way they did for a different man in a different bunker? And what will happen to what actually matters–the rest of us, out here?
Today we’re waiting to see what’s going to happen. Today we’re waiting to hear the answer to the eternal question How Low Can They Go. Today we’re listening to Jimmy Cliff, waiting for the tide to flow. We’re not waiting to get into heaven, though following the Latin, we are at the border of something. We’re not ducking under a lowering bar, but we will need to be limber, following the root of that limbo, flexible enough to take what’s coming without breaking. And following the root of limber–a cart that attached to artillery for towing– we may need to be ready for a fight.
Whatever happens today, and in the next few days, eventually we’re going to need to be flexible enough to not keep fighting, to recognize that we’ve been driven apart by people who don’t care about the wreckage they left behind. We’ve got some time to search our souls. Let’s not give them the satisfaction of being the wreckage.
Samuel Cohen 