Imagine yourself running for student council in your high school or for another analogous group of ineffectual morons who don’t really accomplish anything: say, for example, the UMass SGA. However, this year is different, you’re not just running for a simple senator seat in the “Ineffectual Moron” branch of your student government. This year, you’re going for the gold. You want it all. You want to be the President.

So you face your opponent in a blood bath of a campaign; you expose his drunk driving and heroin possession record. He exposes your kiddie porn collection. It’s a death match like no other. Not only are you and your opponent sparring, but also your respective constituents have jumped into the ring. Your supporters protest in the hundreds of thousands when your opponent shows up in town. He gets his friends who fought in a war 30 years ago along side you to say really crappy things about you; it’s a bloody, dirty war of words and ideas.

Now imagine that your opponent wins. His supporters rejoice in the streets, promising that their president’s supreme reign has just begun. Your opponent also rejoices and agrees with his constituents that his “mandate” has just been newly christened. The other side laughs in your face and in the faces of all who support you. Then suddenly, a deafening silence sweeps over the celebrating supporters of your opponent as he comes forward and says “We should really unite. We should be on the same side. We should put this terrible campaign behind us and unite under the blanket of our great school and its leader, me.”

Sound familiar? Well, the above scenario, although crafted under the metaphor of the SGA or your local high school student council actually describes the current climate of our nation. Remember the bloodbath that was the 2004 Presidential Campaign? Remember how close the election was? Remember how divided the nation is? You should remember and don’t ever forget it. Don’t let anyone, not George W. Bush, not Condoleezza Rice, not Bill O’Reilly or Joe Schmoe from one of the Red States alter your memory by spouting some crap about unity, healing, or “reaching across the aisle.”

None of the supporters of George W. Bush really have the idea of true unity in mind. What they want is for anyone who is fighting against their ideological agenda to abandon the fight, to give up and surrender to the idea of some kind of “mandate” held by one man. I’m sorry, but the idea of a “mandate” doesn’t really seem synonymous with democracy, or even a republic “by the people, for the people,” but I guess if a mini-dictatorship makes people in Georgia feel safer at home, who am I to argue?

Who am I? I’m an American citizen who loves his country, who refuses to forget the disgusting ideological warfare that has occurred during this important campaign. I don’t want the Republicans to forget what transpired in the past year either. Many dirty blows were dealt to Mr. Bush as well, and if I were aligned with the Republicans, I would not be pleased with his concessions to the democrats concerning “unity.” Why? Because it’s a band-aid over a deep gash, it does nothing. The cultural civil war has just begun. The bodies are still fresh on the ground on both sides. We cannot be united until some clear victories or defeats have occurred.

We don’t know who we are as a nation anymore. We are still fighting the battles about abortion, gay marriage, war, healthcare and civil rights. Forgetting the past, letting go of this past and of our respective fights will never solve anything. I am for reproductive rights; it would be easier to know where I stand in this nation if some clear choices are made. My friend Sarah is against gay marriage; I think she would know better how she wants to move on as an American citizen if there was a clear decision made about how her nation will treat the issue.

I haven’t given up anything. I am ready to be labeled as “crazy,” “liberal,” “anti-American,” “a hater” or any label that talk radio and Fox News can come up with. We live in a scary time with a frightening and harsh division between people and their ideals, and I think that’s a good thing. When I saw and heard the reporters describe the nation as “divided,” I thought to myself “Good, now something can get done. Now that the delineations between people and what they stand for is clear, our leaders will be forced to make decisions for the entire nation, whether they like it or not.”

I realize that the decisions made may be decisions that I don’t like. In fact, I’m counting on it. In the meantime, I’ll be watching the other side carefully, reading and educating myself, arming myself to try to defeat them and the outdated “values” they say they uphold. And while I’m doing that, I’ll be processing my passport.

Thomas Naughton is a Collegian columnist.