(Oct. 18) Consider this a plea for forbearance toward your fellow voters.

All over the internet, one sees people not just touting the causes of their own presidential candidates, or criticizing the other candidates, but also besmirching all those, both public figures and private, who dare to reach different voting conclusions. And tales are legion in private lives of families and friendships riven by what should be respectful disagreements about this election.

[kpolls]

Enough already.

If one cannot even put oneself in another person’s shoes, one isn’t a kind or reasonable person or, for that matter, not even a moderately well-adjusted adult.

In this presidential election, especially, there is absolutely objective reason for people to see each candidate as a sort of extreme. Making a prudential judgment about which one to vote for (or against, which may be the bigger motivator), or whether to cast a write-in ballot or leave the spot blank, can be a tough task.

It is a simple fact that former President Donald Trump tried to sic a foreign government on his political opponent, a fact that he tried to overturn election results duly certified by all constitutional processes, a fact that he knowingly withheld classified documents and lied about it, a fact that he repeatedly has listed political opponents he wants to throw in prison, a fact that he has called for domestic use of U.S. military forces, and a fact that he regularly praises authoritarians and totalitarians specifically for their exercises of power. If one of his fans can’t even credit the sincerity of those who think this is all so worrisome that it necessitates a vote for someone ordinarily of the opposite ideology, the fan has a serious problem with perspective. The anti-Trump person’s conclusion may or may not be wise, but it’s not as if the concerns aren’t based in hard reality.

Likewise, it is incontrovertible that by objective standards, Vice President Kamala Harris is one of the most left-wing major-party presidential candidates in U.S. history…. [The full column is at this link.]