In recent years, “One out of many” has become nothing more than a slogan on a bumper sticker. Even so, the motto underlies our most basic beliefs and commitments to our descendants.

Ours is a nation that depends on PLURALISM, the celebration and encouragement of a multitude of viewpoints, a philosophy that dominates almost every sector of American political and economic life.

Our economy is based on a market system that thrives on pluralism. Buyers and sellers of everything from financial instruments to grapefruits make for relatively honest and realistic markets that help buyers and sellers alike.

Our human enterprise, energy, and innovation are grounded in the pluralistic blending of human talents drawn for every nook and cranny in the world.

Our artistic and athletic talents have enormously benefitted from the mixing of many cultures and genealogy.

Until quite recently, our political lives have surely benefitted from great pluralism, drawing from such a rich and diverse source of human talent and encouraging healthy debate and compromise.

Today, however, pluralism seems to be under attack by efforts to polarize and a refusal to acknowledge or appreciate the views of others. As a nation, we seem to be forgetting that debates are not games to be won, but a tool—the means to fumble and find our way towards the principles that will best govern our country.

Given the indisputable importance of pluralism in our history and lives, why are we even tempted to tamper with the basic elements of how pluralism works for us?

Hopefully, when the American people vote, it will be clear that WE really are not so tempted!

We must now spend the next several months listening to the raving of a man so sick that he must have no real idea of what he is saying.

If we survive that, we will hopefully have come to better understand and appreciate what is so precious in our E PLURIBUS UNUM.