I voted for Hillary Clinton. Truth be told, I would have
voted for just about anyone other than Trump. I didn't think that a man who
spent years disrespecting the current president should win, but I wasn't
surprised when he did. After all, this is America.
There are those of us who look beyond ourselves and those of
us who don't. I don't say that in a judgmental way, because I believe that
everyone is entitled to live their life however they choose, as long as it's
legal. I say that as an acknowledgement that not everyone thinks the way I do.
That doesn't make them wrong or me right. It just makes us different.
The truth is that I will likely benefit from Trump's
proposed tax cuts. My pockets will probably thank him for years to come;
however, I didn't vote for the person who was better for my pockets. I voted
for the person who shared my vision of America.
All of Trump's supporters are not racist. That is a
statement of fact. I know some of his supporters and besides their choice of
candidate, we really don't have any issues. The unfortunate part is that there
is a faction of his supporters that are extremely racist and that faction views
his victory as carte blanche to spit their vitriol in public. This faction is
one of the many reasons why I voted against Trump. I didn't want the racists
and/or anti-Semitic groups to think that
they were winning in America.
I don't know if Trump is racist (and before you say it,
having black friends or hiring black people or once having dated a black woman
does not mean that you can't be racist. There are some black people who are racist
against other black people). Truthfully, I don't care if he is or he isn't. I
care about what his words have done to people. Whether he actually builds the
wall, bans Muslims, sends illegal immigrants back, ends DACA, installs judges who vote
against Roe v. Wade and marriage equality is a moot discussion. The danger of
his presidency is that these "policies" won over enough people for
him to win the electoral vote. It doesn't matter that he lost the popular vote.
In years to come, Clinton's popular vote win will be nothing more than a
footnote in history. Just ask Gore.
How will Trump's presidency effect me? Well, not much. I
have healthcare through my job. I'm not planning to get married. I won't be
having an abortion. I'm not here illegally and neither are my parents. I'm not
Muslim. I live in a mostly democratic area, so I likely will not be called the
n-word to my face (because they do that in private), and if Trump defaults on
our debt and the value of the dollar plunges, I still have at least 20 to 25
years to recover before I retire. I know that I will likely not suffer any of
the potentially negative consequences of a Trump presidency, and yet, I voted
against him.
Now let's get to Hillary. I've followed her ever since she
emerged on the national scene and the media and America bullied her to change
her name from Hillary Rodham to Hillary Rodham Clinton, because, well, Heaven
forbid a married woman keep her maiden name. Hillary has been harassed on the
national scene ever since. She was demonized for standing by her husband and attacking
the women who accused her husband of wrongdoing. She was blamed for Benghazi,
even though it was a group clusterf**k. Congress didn't approve funding for
better protection and Hillary and the state department reacted too late to the
situation. It's sad that Americans lost their lives, but the blame doesn't
belong to one person. Her next scandal, the now infamous emails, shouldn't have
been a scandal at all. Anyone who has looked in to emails during that time and
before, will find that Hillary's email use was not an anomaly. They didn't have
the rules back then, that they have now. I firmly believe that Hillary wasn't
prosecuted because so many members of congress and other top level officials
(the president included) sent and received emails from Hillary's personal email
address. You shouldn't take her down without taking all of them, too. Although,
I don't say any of this to make excuses for Hillary. She lost the electoral college. Period. Hillary
didn't lose because of the Republicans smear campaigns, Wikileaks, the Russians,
the FBI or bitter Berners. Hillary lost because she didn't convince enough
people that she was the right candidate. I know that some ardent Hillary
supporters will argue that she was the best qualified candidate and I can't
argue against them, but I can remind them that in America, women and minorities
should all know quite well that being the best qualified doesn't make you the
automatic winner.
I know a few black people who voted for Trump because they
wanted "change." The irony is that change is indeed what they will
receive. Obama was a president who at least pretended to care about all
Americans, Trump will not bother to pretend.
Going forward, I am interested to see if the Republicans
approve Trump's infrastructure plan. Obama and the Democrats have been begging for an
infrastructure plan and Republicans have denied them each time. To approve one
now would mean that Republicans were fine with sacrificing American jobs as
long as it made the Democrats and Obama look bad. I look forward to seeing what
the Republicans actually do now that they have complete control of Congress and
can no longer use the Democrats or Obama as scapegoats.
I hope that the Democrats will not become the party of
"no" simply because it worked for the Republicans. I hope that the
Democrats will work with Trump when they can and fight against him when they
must. I don't want Trump to be treated the same way as Obama, where even his
good ideas are shot down simply because they came from him.
I'm not sure what the next 4 years will bring, but I'm not
worried about it either. I did my part. Now I'm going to sit back and find a
way to enjoy the ride.
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