So Much for Love Trumping Hate (original) (raw)

Yes, the United States has decided to elect as its leader someone with no experience, no platform, no compassion, no self-control, and no sense of decency. Also he brags about sexual molestation. A lot of people are terrified, and I don’t blame them. My first thought is that this is basically the nation giving up, that we’re just going to free Loki and get on with Ragnarok already. But no, I think a good number of people actually LIKE the guy, or at least don’t hate him as much as he deserves. It’s terrifying how many racists and misogynists there are out there, but is it actually surprising? Yes, Barack Obama won two terms, but not by a landslide either time, and people made racist comments about (and even to) him throughout his administration. What does kind of surprise me is that Americans would vote for someone so uncharismatic. Obama stirred up excitement, and even George W. Bush had a certain gee-shucks kind of charm. Trump just doesn’t strike me as likeable in any way. He’s not attractive, he’s not friendly, and he’s not a remotely skilled orator. For as many jokes as I’ve come across about holding your nose and voting for the lesser of two evils, I’m not sure people really do. We saw it in 2004, when Bush was very unpopular, but nobody seems to have been excited about John Kerry. So people don’t bother voting, or they vote for someone who couldn’t possibly win. At least that’s what I have to suspect. I don’t know exactly how much impact third-party candidates had on this election. People say votes for Jill Stein ruined Hillary Clinton’s chances, but that’s assuming the Stein voters would ever have voted for Hillary. What I wonder is why so many people who weren’t down with Trump also hated Hillary. I’m not talking about the people who think she planned Benghazi, because I don’t know that any of them would be Green voters either. I’m talking about people who seem fairly intelligent otherwise. I’m not even necessarily blaming them for President Trump, just curious about why they’re so against her. If you wanted Bernie Sanders as Democratic nominee, hey, I liked him better too, but you’re probably underestimating the amount of antisemitism in the country. I guess that also applies to Stein, not like she had a chance anyway.

So how is a Trump presidency going to affect the nation? Well, I’m a straight white man, so I doubt it will impact me that much. Then again, I have been on Obamacare and might need to be in the future as well. But really, Trump has flat-out admitted that he’s basically a wild card. He might not do much of anything. He might declare nuclear war on Rosie O’Donnell. He might even actually try to help people other than his base, although that’s a long shot. It’s a long shot that he’ll even try to help his base, for that matter. But a lot of xenophobic racists feel empowered by Trump, and he has an incredibly homophobic dude backing him up. He also has the possibility of appointing more than one Supreme Court justice, AND a Republican majority in Congress. I hope all the prominent Republicans who insisted Trump didn’t represent their party remember that when he proposes legislation, but I tend to doubt it. And no, I don’t think the country will learn from this. Some people will, but not the nation as a whole. As a group, we’re incredibly forgetful and gullible.

One thing I was recently thinking about and likely would have addressed even if Trump had lost was how he was always saying the media were unfair to him. My thought is that they were way too nice to him. Sure, they reported his gaffes and scandals, but they did the same for Hillary even though it meant never shutting up about the stupid e-mails, and were generally very polite to him. There were exceptions, but I get the impression most media outlets treated him as just another candidate in just another election, and acted accordingly. But this was a guy who routinely threatened people in public speeches and debates, outright insulted a significant portion of the population, and is quite likely a rapist. I don’t know if these things are unprecedented, but they do seem to be as far as major presidential candidates within my memory. That’s not to say the media, Hillary, or anyone else should have stooped to his level. I was annoyed at Joe Biden when he jokingly said he wished he could take Trump out behind the gym, because I felt that violent rhetoric was just buying into Trump’s way of thinking. Vandalizing Republican offices also fit into that category, although for all we know that was the work of Trump supporters. I just don’t feel there was that much shock and outrage over the Donald essentially being a monster. Actually, there was a lot of it, but not so much from the media or his opponents; it was just used as ammunition against him in the election, presumably never to be brought up again if he lost. I do have to wonder what will happen if he’s found guilty in the upcoming rape trial. Can you be impeached for something that didn’t happen when you were in office? The weird thing is, if he hadn’t run for office, the general public probably wouldn’t have been aware of how horrible he was.