It's unsettling when politicians like Kari Lake and Wendy Rogers exhort us to "Strap on a Glock," or that "we need to build more gallows." But even these exhortations come nowhere near the dire predictions of doom and societal chaos described by some leaders of the Republican Party. I assume the idea is to frighten the bejabers out us and persuade us to vote for them. When watching and listening to the new Democratic leaders, one a genial, good looking woman and the other a friendly teddy bear of a man, it's hard to believe Democrats are bringing us to the edge of some dreadful precipice before the country descends into anarchy. The doom and gloom message favored by Republicans fits into their narrative of financial incompetence under Biden, universities and government agencies as hotbeds of "wokism" and socialist ideology and teachers favoring Karl Marx over Ayn Rand and Little House on the Prairie. How on earth are we to choose between these two sides? To make matters worse, owning a cat now has political implications. God forbid owning a certain breed of dog indicates weird societal imperfections? This scary Republican drumbeat of pending disaster is wearing. I prefer to look on the bright side.