The election is over, and not a moment too soon.

After nearly two years of speculation, campaigns, analysis, debates, commercials, rallies, accusations, attacks, partisanship and far too much information about a certain plumber, we now have a new direction in the country chosen by the people. Only time will tell if that direction is better or worse for the U.S.

But that's exactly what we have: time.

We need to use that time between now and the start of the 44th presidency to heal and unite as a nation. Then, we have four years to evaluate whether the country made the right choice before we make another choice, and so on :

That's the beauty of the United States and Colorado: We have built-in ways of changing things that we do not like or that are not working at national and local levels - elections.

And we in Moffat County took full advantage of that option, voting in record numbers in this election - which is extremely commendable. We all should be very proud of ourselves for the local turnout at the polls.

However, the majority of us voted the opposite direction of many of the national results. Because of this, we also need to be part of the healing of our country's political, partisan rift.

Results of our local races showed more unity, but we had a few contests that turned mean-spirited at times. That needs to change.

In the meantime, there also are things we can do to make sure that things are different in the next election.

The negative, attack campaign commercials turned our stomachs and made us want to get less involved in the statewide and national races. That we didn't stop caring and, in fact, embraced this election is remarkable.

The candidates went negative hard and fast in many races, especially for U.S. House races. We urge future candidates to consider being more concerned with getting out a candidate's message than with revealing everything wrong with the other guy or gal.

The loophole for so-called "527" groups (named after their tax code provision) needs to be closed. We should not allow seemingly anonymous groups to spend money just to attack a candidate or issue, without revealing exactly who is behind it, not just some random nonprofit group name chosen for the purpose of running the ads.

Also, we're concerned about so-called Robo-Calls, where a machine dials phone numbers and plays a pre-recorded message. There currently is no way to opt out of getting these calls, despite no-call lists. Congress should look into ways to changing this.

But for now, we look forward to quieter evenings and TV commercials touting cars, shampoo and Christmas toys, instead of candidates and issues.