Last Tuesday night was one of the more interesting evenings in my brief lifetime. America elected a new president while I drowned myself in garlic sprinkled french fries and Johnny Walker Black.
Sitting amongst new friends on the patio of a restaurant, there was a party happening next door. Democrats were in a celebratory mood because many of their own were either elected to office for the first time or earned re-election. It seemed like a never ending stream of people packed inside of a building that the fire marshal should have shut down.
President-elect Donald J. Trump
Everyone was ready to explode as soon as the race for president was called for Hillary Clinton. But that excitement soon morphed into an uneasiness that turned into fear.
As the night melted away, it became clear that Hillary Clinton would lose and Donald Trump would become president.
Our conversation on the patio quickly turned from celebration to dealing with the news of the night: how did Donald Trump become president?
As a self-described cynical progressive, I didn’t think that Trump would win but I wasn’t shocked or surprised that he did. For all of his negative rhetoric and un-attuned positions, I thought that this country wasn’t so far right that Trump would get to live in the White House.
While I was wrong in my election day prediction, I was right in my belief that Trump tapped into American despair that Democrats ignored as ignorance and bigotry.
Trump’s main message was that he hears those who feel as if they’ve been forgotten and will do everything in his power to ensure that their voices are heard.
A message steeped in simplicity but one that struck a chord with millions of people. For every charge of racism and misogyny, Trump fired back by carving a niche for himself as the candidate who speaks for the underclass.
It is, for better or for worse, a position worth studying in American politics. Prior to his election as president, Barack Obama was the candidate of hope and the one who would turn the American economy around. Jobs would be saved, the stock market would rebound, millions of homes would be pulled back from foreclosure, and everyone would see the benefits.
Some of that happened but not enough of it. Obama had a chance to save millions of homes through a program called HAMP and a key provision called cramdown. HAMP was started but cramdown was left out and the program wasn’t as impactful and it should have been.
The poverty rate has declined slightly under Obama but some of that is due to how poverty is now measured. Job growth has been steady yet a lot of jobs created have been in the service industry and represent part-time work.
Millions of Americans are still struggling, and maybe more than anything, last Tuesday’s election is a swift and strong repudiation of Obama’s presidency.
Of course Obama’s time in the Oval Office deserve a more careful and thorough analysis, but if people are struggling economically, Congress isn’t usually blamed. It is the president who gets that honor.
While Democrats and Obama deserve some of the blame for Trump being elected, let’s not forget how much a train-wreck a Trump presidency is likely to be. Campaigning on promises to overhaul Washington D.C. and as an outsider who hears the cry of the little guy, Trump purports himself to be a billionaire and wants to fly home each weekend to sleep in his own bed at Trump Towers after he takes office.
He failed to recognize the gravity of the job he just won and reports state that Obama will have to do a lot of hand holding with Trump.
This shows how far we’ve fallen in American politics and how desperate Americans feel that many turned to a man with gold toilets and compensation issues for president. Oh, and the racism and sexism shouldn’t be forgotten or massaged away like a cramp or stress in tense shoulders.
For all of Trump’s faults, and man are there many, his election may be the last domino to fall before America dives fully into the abyss.
-JH
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