I can explain it to you, but I cannot understand it for you. When I first saw that sentence on a tee-shirt worn by a man in California, I laughed out loud. After the fact and on reflection, though, I realized the statement was most profound. Why? Because there are so many topics and issues in our national discourse that are misunderstood or misinterpreted.

Six issues come readily to mind. They are the differences between the free market system and socialism, centralized government versus decentralized government, the Second Amendment and responsible gun legislation, a common-sense immigration policy, the usefulness of the U.S. Constitution, and the value of the Electoral College. I could suggest a dozen others, but these will illustrate my point.

Most Americans do not comprehend these issues in sufficient detail to discuss them with a reasonable degree of understanding. I sense we are bombarded each day on television and the Internet with so-called memes and tropes meant to shape our thinking. Such propagandizing is shocking to me but it is a reality.

We must counter this biased information by doing our homework and learning to debate these issues critically. Such an informed debate is a core responsibility of being an American citizen.

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