I’ve been thinking about something that’s uncomfortable as hell.
Americans love a celebration.
We celebrate everything.
Your team wins the Super Bowl? You’re downtown hugging complete strangers.
World Series? Champagne everywhere.
NBA championship? They shut down the streets.
Hell, your college beats its rival and suddenly perfectly reasonable adults are setting furniture on fire.
Americans know how to throw a fucking party.
So here’s the uncomfortable question:
What happens when Donald Trump dies?
I’m not wishing for it. I’m not advocating for it. Everybody dies. Trump will die. I’ll die. You’ll die. That guy setting the couch on fire after the basketball game will eventually die.
The question isn’t whether.
The question is: How will America react?
Because I suspect we could see something extraordinary.
There will obviously be millions of Americans who mourn him.
People will cry.
There will be flowers, flags, memorials, television specials and endless discussions about his presidency and his legacy.
But there may also be Americans who feel something completely different.
Relief.
And some may celebrate.
Maybe people gather in bars.
Maybe somebody starts playing music.
Maybe strangers hug each other.
Maybe somebody pops champagne.
And suddenly you’ve got two Americas watching the exact same event and experiencing completely opposite emotions.
And that is the part that interests me.
Because forget Donald Trump for a second.
What the hell happened to us?
How does a country get to the point where one human being can represent salvation to one neighbor and catastrophe to the guy living across the street?
Think about that.
Same neighborhood.
Same grocery store.
Same roads.
Their kids might go to the same schools.
They probably bitch about the same electric bill.
And one of them might be crying while the other one feels relieved.
That’s not really a Trump story.
That’s an American story.
We’ve turned politics into professional sports.
Red team.
Blue team.
My guy.
Your guy.
We don’t discuss ideas anymore. We wear jerseys.
And every morning we check the political scoreboard.
WHO WON TODAY?
Trump said this!
Democrats did that!
Republicans are furious!
Democrats are outraged!
BREAKING NEWS!
Everybody get pissed off!
It’s fucking exhausting.
Meanwhile, I’ve been talking to ordinary people face-to-face.
And something strange happens when you actually talk to people instead of watching them argue on television.
They start sounding remarkably similar.
People want a decent job.
They want to afford their house.
They want healthcare.
They want their kids to get a good education.
They want safe streets.
They want decent infrastructure.
They want some money left after paying the goddamn grocery bill.
And they want to believe their children might have a better life than they did.
That’s pretty much it.
Nobody has ever told me:
“John, what I really need is three more hours of political outrage every evening.”
Nobody wants this shit.
Yet somehow we’ve built an enormous political and media machine that depends on keeping us angry at one another.
Because angry people watch.
Angry people click.
Angry people donate.
Angry people vote.
Angry people stay angry.
And here’s the danger.
Eventually you stop disagreeing with somebody.
You start hating them.
Then you stop hating their ideas.
You start hating them personally.
And eventually you reach the darkest possible destination:
You start imagining that America would be better if certain Americans simply weren’t here anymore.
That’s when we’ve lost the plot.
So maybe the real question isn’t:
What happens when Donald Trump dies?
Maybe the question is:
Why would anybody celebrate the death of an American president in the first place?
And why would millions of other Americans be devastated by the exact same event?
That’s the conversation I want to have.
Because Donald Trump isn’t going to be president forever.
Neither will the president after him.
Politicians come and go.
But we’re still going to be standing here afterward.
Neighbors.
Americans.
Citizens.
And sooner or later we’re going to have to figure out how to live together again.
Maybe that’s the revolution we actually need.
Not defeating the other side.
Not humiliating them.
Not waiting for somebody to die.
Just remembering something unbelievably simple:
We’re all in the same fucking country.
And when the game is finally over, maybe we shouldn’t be looking for somebody to beat.
Maybe we should finally figure out how to be on the same team.
Join the Conversation