I usually follow politics pretty closely especially in a presidential election year. Whenever I watch TV during those times, I usually find it hard to tear myself away from the cable news stations. But it has been different this year because almost every time that I turn my television on they are talking about something that Donald Trump said. It usually isn’t anything that is worth hearing because when he speaks it regularly involves the letter ‘I’ or the words ‘my’ or ‘me’.

Too often many of the things that Mr. Trump says have little regard for the truth, seem to be purposely meant to obfuscate, have already been walked back, walked over and walked forward again and many times are rife with flat out lies. Despite this, he continues to shamelessly move forward and always attract large crowds. Perhaps that is why the media feels obligated to cover him even as he refers to them as the ‘lowest form of life’. As a result, he dominates media coverage, whether it is positive or negative, and that seems to make him happy.

Although I have watched cable news less often lately because this media constantly covers Mr. Trump and he regularly repeats the same shallow and meaningless rhetoric, I have also watched it less often because I have too often found myself feeling depressed and angry during and after listening to him. It is like there is so much negative information about everyone involved in any way with politics except Donald Trump that it seems to eat away at any faith that I still retain in our political system and that someday, someway and somehow we will make progress toward improving it. I also began to feel that his methods were akin to brainwashing and he was slowly sinking his hooks into me.

All the while that all of this is going on, because of his divisive approach in his efforts to win the election by means of divide and conquer – pitting groups against one another based on their darkest fears; based on his rhetoric I got a strong feeling that he couldn’t care less about anyone who looks like me. Even if that wasn’t the case, I felt that instead of including people who look like me in his ‘make America great again’ rhetoric he was suggesting that we go back to the times when people who look like me ‘knew our place’.

Consequently, I began to feel even more disheartened because I started to question how so many white people could be in support of Donald Trump. Is it because they feel the same way that he does? Certainly they know that he is not qualified to hold the position of President of The United States even if based only on the way that he comports himself; and his lack of qualifications go far beyond that.

In light of all of this and with all of the Washington Republicans and elite Republicans who are supporting Donald Trump it is not hard to become angry and discouraged and for various groups to want to coalesce with those who look like them in order to protect their interests. After all, even Rience Priebus – the chairman of the RNC – recently stood on the podium with Mr. Trump and urged Republicans to help put him in the White House.

Under the circumstances and given that there has never been a ‘welcome’ mat at the door of the Republican Party for minorities, that is a significant enough signal to many groups that it is time to circle the wagons. As for me, Mr. Trump’s behavior – along with the support of him by the previously mentioned Republicans, has become enough for me to reflect on the hatred and divisiveness that he has been spouting and consider what if any impact that it has already had and possibly continues to have on me.

While some of the depression and anger that caused me to back away from my regular diet of cable news for awhile was still simmering just beneath the surface of my calm outer facade, I came across and watched a documentary on KRMA channel 6, a PBS station, entitled “A Ripple of Hope.” The part that really commanded my attention was Senator Robert F. Kennedy’s speech in Indianapolis on the day that Dr. Martin Luther King was shot and killed.

His speech took place during the evening and it was extemporaneous. The crowd was a mixed crowd that contained large numbers of black and white people. Some of those in the crowd were aware that Dr. King had been assassinated and others were not. One black woman who commented in the documentary said that there were many people in this crowd that were armed and who had expressed a desire for and intention to extract revenge on white people.

There were a lot of people traveling with Senator Kennedy as well as others who were not traveling with him who told him that he should cancel his prepared speech and not go to the rally. Among those who felt that he should go was one of the ‘Big Six’ civil rights leaders, John Lewis. John Lewis not only felt that Senator Kennedy should go to the rally but said that he must go. Representative Lewis felt that it was incumbent upon Senator Kennedy to speak to this crowd because he believed that it would have a calming effect upon them.

The same black woman who said that many in the crowd were armed and wanted to extract revenge on white people said that she was terrified. Then, she said – and I paraphrase, this small white man got on the stage and spoke. When he calmed the crowd and told them that Dr. King had been shot and killed, it got real quiet; you could hear him, she said in a tone that expressed amazement at how eerily quiet it actually was. She went on to say how courageous this small white man was.

In his short speech he did not condemn those in the crowd who were black and/or tell them how wrong they were for feeling the way that they did; instead, he told them that, and again I paraphrase, I can understand why you are angry and want revenge; because it was a white man who killed Martin Luther King. I feel your pain because my brother [President John F. Kennedy] was also killed. And it was a white man that killed him. But this is not the America that I know. You can choose to be angry and filled with hate and a desire for revenge or you can chose to work together with white people to make America great. After he finished his speech, everyone went home without any violence.

All of those Republicans who are supporting Donald Trump while armed with the knowledge that he is unqualified for the office that he is running for and that he would likely do great harm to our nation if he is elected are enablers who are knowingly enabling him. They are doing this for political reasons involving loyalty to their party and for personal political ambitions. And they should be embarrassed and ashamed of their behavior.

But as regards those American citizens who are Republicans who support Mr. Trump, as strongly as I feel about him and his divisive tactics and how he must feel about people who look like me; and how it should be all but impossible for them to not see the hatred that he constantly spouts and uses for purposes of his self-aggrandizement, I am compelled to think about that ‘small white man’.

I am compelled to think about the courage that he displayed and the speech that he made to that potentially hostile crowd on the day that Dr. Martin Luther King was shot and killed. I know that all white people do not feel the way that Donald Trump’s rhetoric says that he feels about people of color and those of various religious and ethnic groups. I also know that it is incumbent upon me to exercise the same kind of courage that that ‘small white man’ exercised when he opted to attend the previously mentioned rally. And that means that I must respect those white peoples’ feelings and empathize with them while at the same time encouraging them to get beyond those feelings and work together with all people of color, religious and ethnic groups to make America even greater than it already is.

If Donald J. Trump and that ‘small white man’, Robert Kennedy were placed side-by-side, the principles and values that each man espouses were displayed alongside them and as an American citizen one was tasked to choose which of these two men that they would prefer to be their leader it seems that the choice would be an easy one. But when all of the different perspectives and nuances are interjected into the mix and those driving forces are constantly emphasized and skewed toward our insecurities and darkest fears, maybe the obviousness of this choice is not so glaring after all.

That is why that as voters we must always stay informed on the issues and select the best candidate based on our knowledge of those issues and not based on sound bites. So whether you are a Democrat, Republican or Independent stay informed and always vote. Why? Because your vote is the most important one of all…unless you don’t use it!

Eulus Dennis – author, Operation Rubik’s Cube and Living Between The Line