The long shadow of Donald Trump looms large in this election. After two weeks of watching the Republican and Democratic conventions, the snapshots of these two parties reveal what Trump’s unsettling effect has been. A Republican Party led by a Trump candidacy has seemingly forgotten Ronald Reagan’s "Morning in America." Their optics portray the United States as a fading power with enemies lurking from within and outside its borders. Instead of celebrating Reagan’s optimism, Republicans and a significant portion of the population in this country now respond to Trump's candidacy with a crowd mentality. Mob chants and a 19th-century mindset of open-carry firearms are celebrated with the maturity of a juvenile on an ill-fated joy ride. In a gesture to be “their voice,” Trump accepted their nomination in a speech that iterates racial division: “We are going to build that wall.”
The GOP hierarchy winces but falls into line, reminiscent of times when men’s backbone against injustice melted, like so many victims in the fires of Dachau. Moreover, a national media’s news department defaults to its more lucrative entertainment side, a split personality with unintended consequences of a Trump win in November. The media prepare their offerings to the ratings god with little regard to the ramifications. For them it is "Evening in America."
The Democrats have traded places with Republicans; they have a positive vision for the future: America’s best days are ahead us. And while Bernie Sanders' supporters continued to show visceral dissatisfaction with the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton, a turning point came the first night with the speech of First Lady Michelle Obama. We remember with clarity our first real glimpse of her in 2008. In a rare and breathtakingly honest comment after Barack Obama won the Iowa primary, she said, “This is the first time I am proud of my country.” Now, eight years later, Mrs. Obama again responds from the inspirational moral high ground, relating what she and the president tell their two daughters about the racist innuendo and intrinsic meanness they hear: “We explain that when someone is cruel, or acts like a bully, you don’t stoop to their level -– no, our motto is, when they go low, we go high.”