There's been a lot of nastiness during this election (and let's be honest, nearly all of it has been from the Trump camp). But you know what? I don't hate you guys. I understand.

Back when I was in college in 2007, I was a Ron Paul supporter. Just dabbling at first. I took my basic econ classes and decided that the Free Market^tm knows all. I was socially liberal, and had never paid taxes but was still deeply offended at how much I would hypothetically have to pay. So Ron Paul became my guy.

I joined the camp. That was my first mistake. I took a side, which made my evaluations of Obama and McCain biased from there on out. Even after Ron Paul lost the primary with 0% support, I contended that he'd be the best. That Obama would tax us all into oblivion and that McCain was a warhawk who would start WWIII.

And then it went deeper. Like a gateway drug, my Ron Paul support led me down a path into the underworld of 9/11 conspiracies and how quantitative easing was keeping us all enslaved to the Bilderberg group. In this echo chamber of ideas that I already agreed with, someone started shouting more and more extreme things and it all blended together. I got sucked in, and became that insufferable douche who refuses to listen to reason.

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Eventually I wised up and was rehabilitated, thank god. But I see the same thing happening with the Cult of Trump. You get lured in by a few reasonable principles you may agree with (an outsider being elected, renegotiating trade deals, etc.). And then it gets more and more extreme, going from "we've got to enforce immigration laws" to "build an absurdly expensive wall and start a campaign of mass deportations." You’re willing to overlook his personal flaws and rationalize those statements that you don’t agree with. You convince yourself that Trump didn’t really mean the things he said that you found abhorrent, and what he really meant to say was exactly what you think. And then someone starts shouting conspiracies into the echo chamber, and you start to believe those too. And it seems like the world is conspiring against you: the 'establishment,' the media, the voters... everyone is against you only because they don't see the truth, right?

I’m not here to try to convince you that you’re wrong. There’s nothing I can say that hasn’t already been said by a million different experts that you refuse to listen to. In my own experience, I find that you just need a little more time and life experience to bring you back to reality. For me, it was getting outside my comfort zone and getting to know people with different points of view. I know that someday all of you diehard Trump supporters will get there too and realize the error of your ways. You’ll look back on your history of posting God Emperor Pepes with the same cringe-inducing shame that I look back on my own “bring back the gold standard!” facebook posts.

When that happens, let me buy you a beer (You’ll be old enough to drink by then, and it’s awesome). We’ll chat like long-lost friends and talk about how silly those fringe political movements seem in hindsight.