In the week since Donald Trump won a commanding electoral mandate and resounding popular vote victory, his supporters have been elated with relief that our terribly listing ship of state can be righted, and we will chart a new course to make America great again. On the other hand, Kamala Harris’s supporters have descended into deep despair and are panicked the new orange captain will make them walk the plank.

The euphoria of Trump supporters is only eclipsed by the hysteria of Harris supporters. Certainly, the disappointment can be profound when your candidate loses and as the Biden administration has shown their really bad policies can make life miserable, but our Constitutional Republic continues to survive despite taking more than a few broadsides. There may well be anger and frustration, but it’s still no reason for drastic measures like exiling yourself or shaving your head.

Somewhat shocking and sometimes comical, the left’s post-election frenzy can be understood in the light of the media’s gross manipulations and patently false political paradigm that has prevailed for about the past half century. The incessant often absurd fear mongering by the Democrat Media Complex has misled and frightened too many Americans and our misplaced fixation on the false left versus right political spectrum has obscured the true middle ground. While the left’s irrational over-emotional response is annoying and seems silly, we should take this as an opportunity to come together to heal and seek truth.

First and foremost, everyone can take a deep breath. Trump nor any American politician is “Hitler!” Hitler was a mass murdering megalomaniac, so repeatedly maligning Trump as Hitler is highly irresponsible demagoguery. Voters that believed such tripe are naturally spooked, but rather than scorn them, we should point out that the accusers are no longer worried about Trump being a Hitler and now saying it will be alright. So, they were obviously lying to get your vote. Don’t let them take your sanity too.

While there will always be disagreements about policies, we need a reset to debate actual policy positions. A favorite leftist tactic is to misrepresent the opposition’s position. For instance, anyone that opposes illegal immigration and supports border security is immediately cast has xenophobic and hating all immigrants. Completely false, this polarizes the debate. Instead of debating how to curb illegal immigration and improve legal immigration, the media dismisses the entire debate as hateful, voters are further divided, and nothing gets fixed.

Harris voters can rest assured they will not be rounded up, deprived of their rights, or forced to wear pregnancy monitors, and Trump will not be a dictator. In fact, Republicans should not misunderstand the election results and Democrats can take solace; Trump is not an ideological conservative or hardcore Republican.

Trump may embrace conservative policies, but above all, he is a pragmatist – he wants to implement solutions and improve the American condition. His victory was based in Americans simply endorsing Common Sense! Americans support legal immigration and want a secure border, so they want illegal immigration especially criminals stopped. Americans are still relatively LGBTQ+ tolerant but leave the children alone, and boys just don’t belong in girls’ sports. They want a clean environment but are not willing to mortgage our children’s future on unproven theories. Overall, Americans are basically moderate and shun extremes. That’s why each side particularly leftists want to smear the opposition as radical.

The root of our political polarization is the erroneous left versus right, liberal versus conservative, or Democrat versus Republican narrative. This model is just wrong. The true political spectrum has tyranny at one extreme and anarchy at the other, or more precisely tyranny is any totalitarian regime which is based on everything is regulated by government and anarchy has no government, laws, or regulations. All government versus no government.

This is the political paradigm embraced by our Founding Fathers. They recognized both laws and liberty are essential to a functioning free society, but there must be a balance of both. We need some laws to maintain order and protect the vulnerable, but we also need liberty to allow freedom to flourish. Therefore, they adopted a Constitutional Republic to balance laws and liberty and thereby avoid tyranny or anarchy.

On the tyranny end is communism, dictatorship, fascism, monarchy, and socialism. Only libertarianism is on the anarchy end of this spectrum. Both parties like to claim the middle, but Democrats are clearly somewhere between socialism and communism. Republicans like to fiddle in the middle, but too often also embrace big government, so both our major parties tend to tyranny.

The electorate has been deceived into believing there are left-wing and right-wing extremists, but the extremists are totalitarians and anarchists. And sadly, as stated Democrats and too many Republicans tend to big government, so we have few politicians in the middle. However, the American people generally still want a Constitutional Republic that balances law and liberty.

Americans rejected Democrats, but they didn’t necessarily vote for Republicans. They voted for the middle and Common Sense; that’s what they saw in Trump. Democrats should learn that Americans don’t want oppressive laws and Republicans should learn being a Constitutionalist is not right-wing extremism, but rather a moderate position. The American people know this and endorsed it with their votes. It’s time both parties listen to the people and try to govern them as a free people. It’s just Common Sense and Constitutional.

“Appoint judges and officials for each of your tribes in every town the LORD your God is giving you, and they shall judge the people fairly” (Deuteronomy 16:18).

Pete Riehm is a Navy Veteran, conservative activist, and columnist in south Alabama. Email him at peteriehm@bellsouth.net or read all his columns at http://www.renewamerica.com/.