Reader Zapollo:

Honestly, even though I’m on the right, I’m feeling a bit scared right now.

See, I know where liberals are at right now, because that’s basically where I was during nearly all of 2016 until very late on election night. I was in total despair.

I wasn’t talking or even thinking about violence or resistance, mind you. But I did hear rumblings online, and I could feel the seductive pull of those kinds of thoughts. I remained unmoved, but I can remember being deeply worried that other people on my side wouldn’t be able to restrain themselves. Now I worry about the same thing from the other side. The past couple of weeks have not given me encouragement.

In a weird way, I’m kind of angry on behalf of liberals, if that makes any sense, because it pisses me off that such fundamental questions can be decided by presidential elections or judicial nominations. Which goes back to why I’m a conservative: I don’t think many of these issues belong in the political realm in the first place, and when they do, I’d prefer they be dealt with at the lowest, most local level of government where it’s practical to do so.

In a country as large, diverse and populous as the United States, it is INSANE for one part of the country to dictate to another, vastly different part of the country how it shall conduct its affairs. I have absolutely no interest in telling people in San Francisco how to live their lives or govern themselves, but it feels like I have no choice because if I don’t, they’ll turn around and impose THEIR will on ME, and I have NO desire to live like San Franciscans. It’s crazy.

I should be feeling giddy now, but I’m not, because it feels dirty and cheap to win this way, and with this man, Donald Trump, in the lead. That doesn’t mean I’m not going to try to win — I just feel like I’m surrendering some part of my humanity in doing so. But I have 100 percent confidence that if the shoe were on the foot, the liberals wouldn’t hesitate to crush me.

That’s why I think the best-case scenario for the country is a peaceful national divorce of some kind. None of us, liberals or conservatives, should have to keep selling our souls on the installment plan just to stop faraway people we will never meet from bossing us around.