Smerconish in philadelphia, the final day of voting is four weeks from tuesday. And even without my showing you the latest polling, you already know the State Of Play while Vice President Kamala Harris has a slight edge over former President Trump at a popular vote the seven widely recognized Battleground States are within the margin of error this after a long strange trip in which nothing has moved the nation from an intractable divide when it began, there was a lot of talk about a third Party Factor but they couldnt find a ticket to meet the moment. And the fresher face from florida never got the traction that some had anticipated so trump cruised to the nomination without ever having to debate his opponents and was actually bolstered by four indictments and suffered know setback among republicans, even after being convicted. The general election field, then took shape. Age was immediately a factor. The only thing these candidates could agree on was to debate at the start of summer a
Our society had trouble with in recent years. That makes us wonder how strong our institutions will prove to be, how we will rise to a challenge like this. You cant help but see it as a time of crisis but because it is the time of testing it is also time to think about what americas strengths are, what we are good at and how we can build on that to address the enormous problems we confront. Host how did we get here . Guest that is an awfully complicated question. Our country has always tried to strike a balance between the dignity and the quality of the individual on the one hand and some form of strength of community on the other. Every free Society Faces that. Our society has in the past century emphasized the individual, emphasize liberty, emphasize freedom and diversity and that has brought some enormous advantages and benefits but there is another side to that coin and the other side look Like Division and fragmentation and isolation, it can look like alienation and loneliness and