To understand the election, Distinguished Professor Emeritus Jeffrey Stonecash says, we should be asking "about what values and ideas are driving polarization and which groups embrace some ideas rather than others."  At the moment, he argues, Americans seems intensely divided by the question: "What defines America: is it a set of people (white, Christian) or is it a set of ideals that anyone can come and achieve. To the former immigrants are an alien threat and dangerous (as it has always been in American history). What value should prevail: individual rights and anti-government beliefs or is there a collective interest that sometimes requires some constraints on individuals?" Read more in the New York Times article, "Biden Is Not Out of the Woods." 10/21/20