EDITORIAL & OPINION: Learning from a low point

The curtain has dropped on the impeachment trial, but a lesson remains to be learned. Pundits and polls may have told us throughout this sordid process that the nation didn't care what passed for politics in Washington. But the national sigh of relief and joy -- driven less by the nature of the verdict than its finality -- sprang from quite a different source. It is true that voting percentages have fallen to all-time lows; that Americans, particularly so-called twentysomethings, feel largely disconnected from the political process. But what is not true, somewhat counterintuitively, is that Americans don't care what happens inside the Beltway. Far from it. Did Americans applaud the partisan nature of the process? Certainly not. Did they feel that their opinions were reflected in the events transpiring in Washington? Again, a large majority did not. But Americans did react, viscerally and loudly, to our national soap opera. Time and again, they expressed disgust with Washington's dancing rhetoricians. And for the malady of disgust, we have a cure. Involvement. It is a simple word, and one that is tossed around with astonishing flippancy. To some, it means campaign work or political activism. And for some, that is fine. But at a minimum, involvement means something much simpler, something that we believe many already ask of themselves. We ask that you care. When the news from Washington inspires disgust or anger -- and these days it is difficult to find too many Washington figures to feel warm and fuzzy about -- realize that the problem is not in someone else's backyard. It is in yours. Consider what it means to be disgusted about a process in which we all hold a fundamental stake. Consider how little we accomplish by walling off Washington's distasteful antics, when the antics are those of our elected representatives. The conclusion is inevitable: our disgust reflects our inextricable involvement. Try as we might, we can't abandon the political process. But using our energies to impact the process is far from impossible. And that is the moral of this sorry, twisted tale.