Grunts Won. What Now?

Grunts Won. What Now?

Keith Nightingale

Last night the Grunts won.  The Grunts of our Nation that do all the heavy lifting.  The silent, obedient, functioning, productive portion of our country.

These soldiers of our story-the people that cleared the forests, farmed the land, poured the iron and worked the mines that make us what we are today.  These soldiers of our Nation that silently pick up their tools, shut their mouth, lower their heads and do what they can with what they have. These soldiers that make us a better place. At last they spoke.

And the Nation had no choice but to listen.

Like the uniformed Grunts of before, now and tomorrow, they labored in obscurity, focused on their work, took their lumps, accepted ignoral and consistently provided the glue to their families and friends as soldiers do to their squads. Loyalty is local and all else must be endured. Nothing else matters.

Last night their endurance was awarded.

For much of their existence, their leadership went in directions they did not like and did not understand.  But still, they labored, obeyed and persevered in their small world to make life at least better for the people they could effect-or at least thought they could.

Last night they took the hill.

It was a hard, long and painful slog.  Their story was the Hamburger Hill of National elections.  It was not about race, religion, ethnicity or parochial values.  It was about the squads of the Nation, bound by the deep visceral glue that only prolonged combat can create, rucking up and moving out with a sense of deep determination to achieve the previously unobtainable.

The complexities, subtleties and nuances were lost to a steely resolve that something had to be done.  No more casualties.  We must act.

As in combat, the price for success is to act in common cause.  

Last night, the Grunts landed on our electoral Omaha Beach and carried the cliffs.

Now that the Grunts have carried the Hill, what do we do with it?

Can the leaders be worthy of the led?