Reading the tea leaves

Like most writers, I have countless novels in various states of completion on my laptop. The one that I probably worked on the most, and never satisfactorily finished, was a presidential election story that I started in the fall of 2011. At that point, seemingly every week another Republican candidate would be presented to the American people. It was pretty obvious that the voters didn’t want Romney, who was seen as the establishment pick. Yet that was who they got stuck with.

I think back on that time a lot, wishing Democrats would have read the tea leaves to see how strong the anti-establishment/anti-elite sentiment was growing. Yesterday, not wanting to trudge through snow and the still super cold temperatures, I stayed home and re-watched this documentary. I had originally watched it when it came out and had thought the film had placed too much blame at Obama’s feet merely for his existence. Re-watching it I still felt that way, and that Republicans couldn’t see how their own intransigence played into the growing polarization. I do think if Obama would have ignored his financial advisors and held the banks and wall street accountable for the 2008 crash, the tea party might have lost some momentum.

What grabbed me the most was just after Romney lost in 2012. He had endorsed Romney, and afterward tweeted very interesting things. I hadn’t paid much attention to him at that time, not even watching his reality show, so I don’t remember hearing about these tweets.

There’s no point wasting time over what could have been. I just hope the politicians who believe in democracy, if we get through this regime, find a way to actually learn from this moment, so we don’t have to repeat it.