BOSTON (CBS) -- First, some perspective.

American politics has never been a tidy, polite business. It has often turned ugly, far more so than the nasty stretch we're living through now.

I wasn't around during the Civil War and I was too young in the mid-1960s to remember much of it, but I'm pretty sure those who suffered through those bitter, violent eras would consider 2016 to be a glorified pool party.

Having said that, this is pretty bad.

I've expressed my opinion here before about Donald Trump's misogyny, gratuitous incitement, and thinly-veiled racism. Bernie Sanders the candidate has been considerably more polite, but his class-warfare message and dystopian spin on who and what we are isn't pretty.

And ask any enemy of the Clintons how rough things can get when you cross them.

Yes, it's going to be a real roller derby of an election once the nominating process finally fizzles out. And I'm sure an army of partisans on both sides will lap it up.

But at least some of the rest of us will be looking for something else – a sense of hope, and a reason to feel good about our next president.

I'm not looking for some kind of John Kasich-style hug-fest. And after watching the hope-and-change presidency turn into a mostly hopeless descent into the mud, I'm not expecting miracles.

But like it or not, a president is a role model, someone we look to as a source of pride, a representative of what's best about us.

Why can't I avoid the feeling that we're about to see a race to the bottom of the barrel?

Listen to Jon's commentary here: