The Way Forward

In less than a month, we’ll have ourselves a new president, and America’s five-year-long national nightmare will be over. All of the chaos, stupidity, and corruption is leaving the White House, replaced, hopefully with competence, empathy, and the rule of law.

When my good friend, blog partner, and co-founder Greg called me a few days after the horrific Marjorie Stoneman Douglas high school mass shooting in 2018, he’d had enough. He wanted to do something. No, not the usual anger and throwing up of the hands after all the other mass shootings. This time, he and I wanted to put our anger into doing something positive. Thus became On The Fence Voters.

We’ve spent the last nearly three years documenting the lawlessness of not only Donald Trump and his despicable administration, but also the continued radical downward spiral of the once-proud Republican Party. To use a football analogy, we spent most of our time on offense.

And now, things are going to change a bit. The man we advocated and campaigned for will be the 46^th president of the United States. In a sense, using that same football analogy, we’ll now have to go on defense. After all, the policies that Joe Biden will promote and implement are nearly the same we’ve so often written about in this space. These are the policies we think are what’s best for America. So if we believe that, we must defend those policies to the best of our ability.

But before I go any further, I need to do some housekeeping.

Thank You, Jerry!

As most of you know, Jerry Gramckow began contributing to On The Fence Voters in February of this past year. He’s Grumpy1180, by the way. Jerry came to us with a unique perspective; he is a lifelong member of the evangelical community who had become frustrated at how his fellow friends and church-going members were in the tank for Donald Trump.

What followed were some of the most personal and intelligent posts we could have ever wanted. Jerry’s penchant for rooting out his community’s hypocrisy, based on facts, not conspiracy theories and lies, is what set him apart and gave our blog a much broader and compelling component.

As we move forward in 2021, though, Jerry has decided to resurrect his blog. It’s called Grumpy’s Grumblings, and you can find the link here. I highly encourage you to head over there and give him a follow. As you may remember, Jerry is in the process of writing a book, and he’s featuring excerpts of it on his blog – not to mention many more of the same types of posts he provided for us here.

You never know what 2021 may bring, but you may see a few of Jerry’s posts over here from time to time as well. We shall see. Regardless, though, please give him a shout at his new gig. He will greatly appreciate it, and we wish him nothing but the best of luck. We’ll miss him.

Moving Forward

As I said above, I suspect we’ll be on the defensive quite a bit in the coming months and years. And that’s ok. The other side of the aisle will be in full-scale obstructionist mode and will more than likely try and derail the new administration at every turn. I promise we will continue to call them out for that. After all, the Republican Party cares about one thing and one thing only: power. They’ll do whatever they can to keep it, obtain it, and whack Democrats over the head with it.

But if Joe Biden tries to: fix our health care system, mitigate the growing climate crisis, help and improve the lives of every day Americans, provide for free or highly affordable college, implement comprehensive immigration reform, and fight for a higher minimum wage, you’re damn right I’m going to defend his attempts to do so. I’ll be glad to debate our right-wing friends any time they’d like.

We know they cannot and will not govern. First and foremost, Congressional Republicans seek to destroy, not come together for the common good. The one percent crowd remains their most ardent backers and benefactors, and we shall continue to call them out. Over the working-class and poor, their surrender to the rich and powerful threatens to damage our democracy even further than the current president has.

But I also want to promise you something else. If Joe Biden screws up, we must also hold him to account. It would be intellectually dishonest if we didn’t, and we owe you an honest and thorough take on how the incoming administration conducts itself.

While I remain confident in Biden’s ability to bring our country together, the challenges he will face are immense. We know there will be hiccups. After all, we’re talking about human beings here, not robots. But what separates this group from the one going out is that they believe that the government can and should do good things for the American people, not enrich themselves in any corrupt way imaginable.

Let’s Hear From You

And now, a request. What would you like to see from us in the coming months? Is there something that concerns you that maybe we haven’t covered in our previous posts? If so, I’d be honored to hear from you. All comments and suggestions are welcome.

After all, those who take the time to read us are the backbone of this blog. I want to thank you for your comments and engagement. It means more to us than you’ll ever know.

One More Thing

I wanted to share one more piece of information with you. A few days ago, I had a long conversation with my blog partner Greg. He wanted me to let you know that for him, 2021 is going to be a year where you’re going to hear from him on a more regular basis. After an over 30 year career in the blue-collar world, he’s ready to call it a day. That’s right, retirement is coming next year for Greg, and with that comes a newfound sense of urgency and commitment to writing for our blog.

As the old saying goes, “Shit happens,” and it certainly did to Greg over the past nearly three years. So much happened; so little time to devote to what he’d hoped would be an opportunity to express his thoughts on a wide variety of subjects.

Here’s hoping that it’s all going to change starting sometime in the next year. I’ve always said to him that we’ll be a better blog when we’re both contributing. I’m optimistic that we can finally start to see that come to fruition.

With that, please have a safe and wonderful holiday season. We have a lot to do next year. Getting out from under a cloud of the Trump crime family makes me optimistic about our future. But it’s not going to be easy. Let’s hang in there and fight for what we deserve: a government by the people, for the people, and of the people. I hope you’ll all continue on this crazy journey with us. Stay tuned and stay woke!