World Holds It’s Breath To See What Future Brings

GARYTALK.COM (11/14/2016) – I have made it a tradition to vote on election day, not before, not by absentee ballot, so I waited for election day to mark my ballot in person this year, too. After I walked several blocks to the building to which I was assigned to vote, I was prepared for a long line of people snaking their way up to the tables to pick up a ballot. I expected to stand in another line waiting for an opening at one of the voting booths after I was given a ballot to mark. That was the scenario for both of the last two presidential elections in which Barack Obama was elected, then re-elected to another term.

I thought my experience would be very similar for this election, because of what seemed like a lot of voter interest on television news reports, polling and surveys, leading up to election day, Tuesday, November 8th, 2016. However, such was not the case at all this time. The whole thing, from start to finish, took less than five minutes and I was done, out the door, and on the sidewalk for my walk back home on a nice, cool, sunny Autumn day.

I was puzzled the line, if you could even call it a real, line, moved so swiftly. Surely, I must have arrived when there was a lull in the day. Then, I remembered, Early Voting and Absentee Ballots, which have seemingly become increasingly more important as methods of voting, were gaining a lot of coverage throughout the country on national, regional and local news programs. So, I convinced myself, that must be why the voting process on election day was short and the voting was so swift, compared to other presidential elections in recent memory.

This was an unusual campaign between two major party candidates. One with no practical experience and a lot of boastful language, from the Republican side of the aisle, and the other, a former First Lady, then U.S. Senator from New York, followed by being Secretary of State under President Obama. The Republican candidate’s only claim to fame was having his name on buildings and starring on a Reality TV Show called The Apprentice. The choice would certainly be easy to see for most, intelligent, thinking voters, I thought.

One had political, government and diplomatic experience, the other did not. One, spoke knowledgeably, with detail. The other spoke in generalities, misdirection, innuendos, untruths, fantasies and wishful thinking. Little did I know, the right votes from the latter candidate’s supporters, would be cast in large enough numbers in the states that would enable the latter candidate to be declared the winner of the presidential election, 2016, by gaining at least 270 Electoral Votes, even though, he lost the Popular Vote.

So, here we are. As of this writing, about 60,467,601 American Voters placed their mark next to Hillary Clinton’s name, while Republican candidate Donald Trump gamed support from 60,072,551 Popular Votes, a difference of approximately 400,000 votes. (The number in Clinton’s popular vote win keeps growing as the ballots in some areas continue to be counted.) So, even though, it was far from a record turnout of voters, compared to past presidential elections, the winner, lost, and the loser, won, because the Electoral Total shows Donald Trump winning more of the states that counted the most (had the largest number of Electoral Votes attached to them), than Hillary Clinton did.

According to the rules, Donald Trump is President-Elect, because, the magic number is 270 out of 538 Electoral Votes to win. Trump received 290. Hillary Clinton gained only 228 Electoral Votes. That’s how it stands, if the Electoral College follows through in December. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, current President Barack Obama, and President-Elect Trump, are operating under the assumption that the Electoral College will reflect the results of the Electoral Vote that has been reported, even though there are some Clinton supporters who are hoping that will not be the case.

The campaign rhetoric of the Republican candidate has caused a huge fear to spread among people who did not ever want to see a President-Elect Trump, because, he had painted a dismal future. What they feared has happened. He is President-Elect and is expected to be sworn in on January 20th as the 45th president of the United States, and the fear and mistrust has grown.

It will now be up to Donald Trump and his advisers to proceed with caution in setting up the Trump Administration and following through with actions that prove he is going to indeed be “the president for everyone” as he has boasted since the election. Everyone, Democrats, Independents and traditional Republicans, as well as supporters who chose him on their ballots, and the rest of the world, are collectively holding their breath to see what the future will bring.