I rarely comment on here any more Elle, but your article caught my eye. What troubles me is that the extreme Left and the extreme Right are so far gone that they own the narrative in ways that offended the vast numbers of largely centrist folks, of which I am one. That said, apparently a great number of folks never read, never attend to the political news, and pulled the R lever just because, without understanding anything about the man, the issues and the impact. Perhaps what got me most, however, was that for the third time White women voted overwhelmingly against their own best interests.

You write about this in such a sane way when it is utterly insane. Bernie Sanders wrote a scathing comment about how the Dems had left the working man behind (they did) and Trump successfully appealed to them by also blaming us awful women for the state of things today. I won't go there; I'm too angry at the moment for the betrayal by women of women.

I've read plenty of post-election comments and now I am sick of them. This was thoughtful as usual, Elle, but what for me is most telling is that we as a country had two opportunities to elect THE MOST QUALIFIED candidate, BUT it was a woman. The second time, a Black woman. In so many ways, far too many of us clutched our pearls and couldn't deal with having a Black woman be so utterly superior to that other choice that we punished her and her sisters for being so. damned. good. That's another story but right now I am in recovery.

When your granddaughter bleeds to death in her car because she can't get abortion care, don't come crying to me. When you can't get strawberries and lettuce and all the other products that immigrants pick, and your elderly parents can't their asses wiped at the long term care facility, don't come crying to me. When mass deportation rips millions of people out of the economy doing jobs you won't tolerate your little White babies to do, don't come crying to me.

And when the cost of living leaps yet again because of tariffs, please look in the mirror. To your point, Elle, we pulled a lever to get those "dirty, rapist immigrants" out of the country, without understanding a single thing about how essential those essential workers are. Because when the hurricanes hit and they will, when the ice storms slam us, when the floods take our houses away, who is there to do the cleanup?

Immigrants.

I'll stop there. And to all the haters who are likely to comment on this comment, wait your turn. Because we will all suffer from this choice. All of us. As well as the rest of the world, especially in those countries which had the courage to elect GREAT female leaders when we. can't. even.

Rant over. I'm going back to work. Thanks for the thoughtful piece, Elle.