I spent part of Election Day in my community college classroom with introductory literature students. We watched videos of Richard Blanco’s and Amanda Gorman’s 2013 and 2021 inaugural poems. The students loved Blanco’s powerful imagery depicting the bonds we share as citizens hard at work on the American Dream. They gasped at Gorman’s youthful authority, musical phrasing, and call for healing and unity.

As class ended, I encouraged them all to vote. Some shrugged. Some said they already did that morning. One young woman was giddy about being able to cast her first vote. Another student said he looked forward to hearing a new inaugural poem in January 2025.

My students are good people. I’ve learned so much from them over four decades of teaching. I used to think that most people in this country were basically good. Sure, we all fall short of being who we aspire to be at various times. We all make mistakes. But I was convinced that, at our core, most of us wanted what was best for each other.

Then the election of 2016 happened, and I realized that many people weren’t well-intentioned. A good person wouldn’t vote for such a terrible candidate.

But the good people rallied, figuratively and literally. We resisted the four years of an unqualified jerk temporarily disgracing the White House. We voted him out and kept his army of insurrectionists from completing a coup. The good people held firm, passed some unspectacular but helpful laws, and dug out from a global pandemic. We resisted and then persisted.

Meanwhile, the jerk in the rumpled suit and red hate-hat somehow got even worse. Even as he was dealt a fraction of the justice he deserved (fraud and sexual abuse verdicts, indictments for trying to overthrow an election and stealing classified documents, and criminal convictions for election interference), he wouldn’t go away.

His cult devoured the Republican Party from within. Many who condemned him for the insurrection bowed before him in supplication. And millions of voters I once thought were basically good people cast their ballots for the man who has no plans except revenge, authoritarianism, avoiding jail, vowing to be big-daddy protector of women whether they want that or not, celebrating the fall of Roe, more tax cuts for the rich, tariffs that will reignite inflation, and mass deportations that will be cruel, devastating, and pointless.

Bret Baier of Fox News recently asked Kamala Harris (love her!) if she thought the cult leader’s supporters were stupid. Clearly, Baier and his employers think those supporters are stupid because Fox is a cult-friendly, lie-delivery machine that led directly to this election outcome. Lying is such a waste of our freedom of speech and of the press. And believing such obvious lies is a complete waste of the human brain’s ability to think.

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Do good people vote for a proven racist and misogynist over a vastly more qualified woman of color? Or does their vote show that racists and misogynists recognized one of their own? The cult leader has a long history of slutty behavior, including five kids by three different partners and pretending to fellate a microphone at a recent rally. He also needs to smile more and wear less makeup, so, obviously, he would make a terrible woman president. If he had a cat, his fake hillbilly veep’s head might explode.

Anyway … I’m done writing this column each month. After this election, I can’t do it any longer. I’ve obsessed over it for 12 years to provide comfort and support for like-minded readers, and I’ve tried to reach people who disagree by using facts, reason, personal anecdotes, and humor. Thanks to the Gazette for the opportunity. To those who’ve enjoyed these columns, I’m deeply grateful for your readership. To those who disagree, I haven’t been able to reach you through the fog of your cult. To the trolls who send me hate mail, it goes straight to the dumpster with the other garbage.

I’ll spend the countless hours I used to obsess over this column with my wonderful wife, my stepkids who have grown into kind and thoughtful adults, and my delightful grandchildren. I’ll join our aging, cancer-stricken dog, Libby, tossing balls in the backyard for as long as she can chase them. I’ll exercise and read for pleasure more. I’ll write more fiction because fiction feels closer to reality than nonfiction these days. I’ll keep helping my students with critical thinking, creativity, and research so they can recognize liars and avoid cults. I’ll find other ways to resist and encourage better people than myself who have more energy than I do to fight against the cult.

I wrote this column in one sitting and won’t do my usual endless rounds of revising and editing. Libby’s ready for another trip outside, and that’s more important. She’s a better person than the millions of cultists out there who don’t bother to read anyway.

I doubt there will be an inaugural poem in January 2025. Poets seldom coddle fascists. But I’ll keep sharing the Blanco and Gorman poems with students. We should all rewatch them to rekindle our depleted optimism for a more perfect union after this senseless, cult-inflicted wound. What a shameful waste of the right to vote.

John Sheirer, of Florence, has written approximately 130,000 words of columns for the Daily Hampshire Gazette. Please visit JohnSheirer.com for many more words.