“Shoulding” on each other is the quickest way to lose friends!  The radio DJ, the anchor, the news columnist, all those people get paid to write opinions, to speak ‘their’ beliefs, and to report pure facts. They are not my friends, and they do not speak for me.  These days I must wisely just listen and hold my tongue lest I lose a friend. What makes listening to CNN so difficult for me is to listen while attempting to turn off the part of my brain that is knee-jerk critical, the part that wants to argue, to point out flaws, to score points. Peter Elbow defines ‘Methodological Believing’: It is when a person consciously chooses to believe by systematically disciplining the mind to believe everything no matter how unlikely or repellent it might seem—to find virtues or strengths we might otherwise miss.   Applying ‘methodological believing’ to only the Left does not explain the great divide in the USA.  We must acknowledge that the Right, who listen exclusively to Fox News, that they choose to blindly agree with every utterance of President Trump in order to justify their party, their stance, their view.  If we all, (which includes the Left, the Right, the Middle, the Top, and the Bottom of American voters) if we all stopped to THINK and ASK ourselves a set of WISE questions about every NEWS revelation, we might restore ourselves and our nation into:  “One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”  1) What does he (news anchor, the President) see that I don’t? 2) How could this argument possibly be right? 3) What can I agree with? 4) What’s good or helpful about the view? 5) What would I gain if I embraced this view?  6) If it could possibly be true, what then?  Applying wisdom, we are asked to be fair, to listen more, speak less, and to condemn not. Ask self silently, listen for that still small voice, be obedient, and hold your tongue before it offends God, the Left, the Right, or the Middle.  Listening to the news challenges the critical voice in us all.  Can we, as the people, not get our panties all in a bunch because “those people” are not saying or acting according to how I would run things!  We all need accountability!  In a letter from Thomas Jefferson to Peter Carr.  Mr. Jefferson ‘shoulded’ all over Peter. He should learn this about math, he should read these classics, and he should…..and when it got to religion, in the last part of the letter it said, “Above all things, when it comes to religion, fix reason firmly in her seat, and question with boldness even the very existence of God, for if there be a God, he must surely rather prefer honest questioning over blindfolded fear.”