Contrary to what you may have been told, the sky is not falling.

The Earth is not spinning wildly out of control.

President Barack Obama is not the anti-Christ.

Just to set the record straight, I’m not a huge fan of the President. I didn’t vote for him and he has done many things with which I did not agree.

It’s just that I’m tired of reading how he is going to ruin the country and how the United States of America can’t survive with him in the Oval Office. It’s ludicrous.

We’ve survived drunks, crooks and idiots in the White House. Some of the most revered men who have ever held the office of President were not quality human beings. That’s the way things go sometimes when you vote.

I get a chuckle out of some of the jokes that are forwarded to be by email about the President or Vice President Joe Biden or Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. They are sometimes quite amusing.

I thought those same jokes were funny a few years ago when the authors were attacking then President George Bush, another president that I didn’t agree with very often.

What I can’t stand is the messages I receive through email, Facebook or text message that is trying to convince me the world is coming to an end because a black man from Illinois was elected President of the United States.

It’s irritating because the country was formed to survive presidents both good and bad, both conservative and liberal. The founding fathers of this country were smart enough to know how to leave a mechanism of change – our Constitution.

As long as the United States Constitution exists, I don’t worry too much about who the president is or isn’t because his control is limited. Sure I go out and vote and express my opinion, but I don’t live and die by their results.

Now that I have the support of all of my liberal readers, let me take my shot at them.

Everyone who disagrees with the President is not a racist. There are true, real divides in what we believe as a nation. Some of us deeply believe in things that make the next person’s skin crawl.

We have sharply different views of the world and the government and they have absolutely nothing to do with black or white. They are about liberal, conservative and moderate.

That’s part of the American institute of government.

While some may choose not to support the President because of the color of his skin, there are many millions of Americans who are opposed to him and his policies because they have different beliefs.

In the fight about who is right and who isn’t, we have lost the idea of being the land of the free. Both sides have decided that anyone who disagrees with them is the enemy.

That shouldn’t be the way it is. We are one nation who has a myriad of beliefs and thoughts. It is what has made us great. We shouldn’t let it be what makes us anything less.

Thadd White is Staff Writer and Sports Editor of the Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald and Gates County Index. He can be reached via email at thadd.white@r-cnews.com or by telephone at 332-7211.