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Sunday, November 13, 2016

Why Trump Won

Last week, three old friends – people I’ve known for years – each requested to be “unfriended” by anyone who planned on voting for Trump. Honestly, that was disheartening. Who tosses away a friendship over an election? Are my friends turning into those mind-numbingly arrogant celebrities who threaten to move to another country if their candidate doesn’t win? Are my friends now convinced that people they’ve known for years who happen to disagree with them politically are not merely mistaken – but evil, and no longer worthy of their friendship? 
For what it’s worth, Carol, I don’t think Donald Trump won by tapping into America’s “racist underbelly,” and I don’t think Hillary lost because she’s a woman. I think a majority of people who voted in this election did so in spite of their many misgivings about the character of both candidates. That’s why it’s very dangerous to argue that Clinton supporters condone lying under oath and obstructing justice. Just as it’s equally dangerous to suggest a Trump supporter condones gross generalizations about foreigners and women. 
These two candidates were the choices we gave ourselves, and each came with a heaping helping of vulgarity and impropriety. Yeah, it was dirty job for sure, but the winner was NOT decided by a racist and craven nation – it was decided by millions of disgusted Americans desperate for real change. The people did not want a politician. The people wanted to be seen. Donald Trump convinced those people that he could see them. Hillary Clinton did not.
And President Trump should take Mike Rowe up on his offer of expanding still trade education. 

1 comment:

  1. Mike Rowe also noted that he doesn't want to be President. Someone asked me how our country could end up with Hillary and Trump. This after telling me how awful it was Trump said things about women (and I noted those things were said in private). Why would anyone with better things to do want to submit themselves to running for a political office?

    At a recent college reunion, I learned that a friend's wife ran for her local school board. During the race, her opponent accused her of having an affair. No evidence (because there was none) was ever provided. The notion was just put out there; and people that claimed to know her actually asked her if it was true. When she denied, they seriously asked, well why would her opposition make the claim? This was just for a school board position. She won, but she lost a lot of people she used to think of friends, because they thought she was unfaithful and she realized they were real idiots.

    We got Trump and Hillary, because it takes a certain ego to run for President. The sort of ego that thinks doing what you want, regardless of what others think, is acceptable. Doing what you think needs to be done, regardless of what others think, is essential. People with that type of ego don't always do what you think they should, act how you would want them to act, or get done what needs to be done. That leaves a simple equation; which one is likely to do more to help me get done what I want or need done. Rowe is right; I want and need real change in DC, and Trump is most likely to make that happen.

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