Voting Democrat Is Bad for Mental Health
Surveys indicate that people are anxious and fearful because the stakes are so high.
Anxiety. Stress. Fear. That’s what more than six in 10 American adults claim this presidential election has brought them. One in five adults said the contentiousness has strained or even severed relationships. Younger Americans are the most likely to say their mental health or relationships have been negatively impacted by election politics.
That’s all according to a Forbes Health survey of 2,000 adults.
Veteran political analyst Mark Halperin says we ain’t seen nothin’ yet. He predicts that a victory by Donald Trump and JD Vance will trigger “the greatest mental health crisis in the history of the country.” He continued, “I think tens of millions of people will question their connection to the nation, their connection to other human beings, their connection to their vision of what their future — for them and their children — could be like. And I think that it will require an enormous amount of access to mental health professionals. I think it’ll lead to trauma in the workplace.” He also thinks “there’ll be alcoholism, there’ll be broken marriages,” and so on.
Moreover, “I don’t think it will be kind of a passing thing that by the inauguration will be fine. I think it will be sustained and unprecedented and hideous.”
As another hysterical (in both senses of that word) prediction once put it 40 years ago: “A disaster of biblical proportions. … Real wrath of God type stuff! Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies! Rivers and seas boiling! Forty years of darkness! Earthquakes, volcanos! The dead rising from the grave! Human sacrifice! Dogs and cats living together! Mass hysteria!”
Ok, back to seriousness and reality. What the heck is going on here if so many Americans invest so much of their own well-being into who the president is? More specifically, what in the world is wrong with leftists if they will be so fundamentally broken by a second Trump term?
Well, I don’t have time or space to fully answer those questions, but here are a few brief thoughts.
We’re told every single election cycle that “this is the most important election of our lifetimes.” Frankly, I’m tired of that hyperbole. Elections are important, but it’s simply a matter of fact that not every election can be the most important. I suppose you could argue that we’re on a critical trajectory, making the stakes higher each time, but I’d argue that’s mostly a form of what’s been called the tyranny of the urgent.
No Americans alive today can remember the elections of 1860 or 1789, which are just two that come to mind as pretty stinking important.
That said, if this mental health crisis is real, my own counterargument is that it’s the consequence of making virtually every decision a federal one — and not even made by our elected members of Congress, but by the president and his army of deep state bureaucrats who are accountable to no one.
What toilet would you like in your home? What light bulbs do you prefer? Should you get a vaccine? Can you buy a gas-powered car? Do you need to pay off your own student loan that you voluntarily agreed to? Will your kids be exposed to sexually deviant pornography in third grade?
All of these questions used to be decided among individuals. Now, they’re decided by the guy sitting behind the Resolute Desk or by his minions who have way too much power over your life.
And if the other guy (or gal) wins, it’s the end of the world for all those things you think are critically important. I don’t say that entirely in jest — these issues are important. We often say around here that the future of American Liberty is on the ballot, and we don’t mean that as hyperbole.
Yet our Founders deliberately designed a decentralized system of checks and balances to prevent precisely this kind of high-stakes, mental health-destroying existential contest. Americans long ago abandoned that in favor of bread and circuses. Now, we’re reaping the consequences.
The other big factor here is that the party and people who put the most trust in government — Democrats and leftists — cannot handle the thought of the Bad Orange Man being in charge again. He did a pretty great job last time — and it terrifies them. As Halperin says, “They think he’s the worst person possible to be president.”
We and others have long dubbed this practically clinical disorder Trump Derangement Syndrome. Free Press journalist Joe Nocera admits he has it and he’s proud of it. In fact, he says, “I wish all Americans had it. We would be far better off.”
The irony of all of this is that Kamala Harris is running on a theme of “Joy!” You can say a lot of things about Democrats’ emotional state, but exuding joy is not one of them.
Nevertheless, New York Times columnist Charles Blow argues that “joy” is “working for Harris,” and he hopes she can “close the deal” by emphasizing it. Fox News columnist David Marcus counters that “‘joy’ is quietly turning to panic for Democrats.”
Marcus has the better of the argument. Yelling “joy!” through gritted teeth while issuing dire warnings about the authoritarian Nazi, threat-to-democracy villain Trump just doesn’t resonate.
In her disastrous Fox News interview last night, Harris lied about Trump to stoke anxiety and fear. “You and I both know that he has talked about turning the American military on the American people,” she said with a shaking and irrational voice. “He has talked about going after people who are engaged in peaceful protest. He has talked about locking people up because they disagree with him.” No, Joe Biden is the one threatening Americans with the military, and the Biden-Harris administration is the only side locking up people who disagree with their policies — including Trump.
Meanwhile, research over several decades indicates that conservatives are happier than leftists, while leftists also report emotional trouble more frequently. That suggests that most of the anxiety, stress, fear, and broken relationships in this election cycle exist on the left side of the political spectrum.
I’m not a doctor, and I didn’t even stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but in my humble opinion, leftists would greatly improve their mental health if they quit trying to control everything the rest of us are doing while vilifying and censoring anyone who disagrees.
