Election Leaves Need for Safe Spaces

 

This election of Donald Trump to be the next President of the United States has really stressed me out. I am reeling and in dire need of a series of safe spaces in near every place which I visit. I go get coffee at my usual place and there it is in my face, Donald Trump will be President come January 20, 2017. Dinner out, more Trump is pushed in my face. Where are my safe spaces like all those lucky college children have access to while their professors cancel exams and hold weep-ins instead of lectures. Even going to the grocery store and you pass the newsstand where you are reminded about President elect Trump and all that entails and there will always be somebody who just has to discuss the election and if unlucky the checkout person who might just decide to want to speak about the election knowing I blog on politics. There is absolutely no way to run to a safe place when at the checkout counters. One cannot escape waiters, especially those who know you blog politics, from their asking your take on Donald Trump. Where are my safe spaces from these people who insist on knowing what my advice is to survive the coming apocalypse known as the Trump Presidency? Where do I go to escape these hurt feeling leftists who automatically believe because I appear intelligent (and who knows, I might actually be intelligent, but that is not for me to claim) I must be appalled by Trump winning the election. Honestly, we who actually are glad that Trump won need safe places from these leftists who believe that Trump won without anybody actually supporting his candidacy. They even believe that there cannot be anybody in their lives who might support Trump. Then, lastly, why am I being so silly as everybody knows that supporters of Trump are not allowed in safe places. Trump supporters are evil and must be shrieked at in a fashion eerily resembling the pod people from Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

 

Then there are the ongoing horrors on the faces when these mind-numbed people finally figure out the bored and fed up look on your face is not your traumatized look due to Trump being elected but your growing impatience with people assuming you could never have supported such a person. Funny, that is how I feel about people who voted for Hillary Clinton. These infantile people think that if they continually bombard you with question on how you can explain how each appointee can be explained or even pretend to have any experience which would qualify them for each position. Really? Like how can a retired general who commanded military intelligence could ever be considered qualified to be security advisor since he did not take the right elective courses, attend Columbia, Harvard or Yale, and obviously does not possess the sensitivity to feel the right direction and how to softly apply American presence in such a manner as to not upset any snowflakes who are currently coloring books, playing with play-dough, cuddling puppies and sipping herbal teas hoping to continue at these projects until somebody sensitive is elected to the Presidency.

 

There has to be a way to permit those so taken out-of-sorts by a simple election not agreeing with their perceived correct choice, to opt out of any future election. As their ability to understand any differing opinion than their own is to opt out of any activity within the real world and allow them to continue with their puppy cuddling, coloring-book coloring, tea sipping and joint primal screaming sessions insulated from the real world so it does not hurt them and their influence does not harm the rest of us. There are those who chose Hillary Clinton for actual reasoning and who can actually explain why they did so and also explain why the idea of a President Trump is troubling to them rather than simply repeating the accusations of Trump is a racist, hater, idiot, fascist, not nice, evil, the devil, scary or any of any number of one to three word slogans which can be seen on the vast majority of protest signs. Mind you, the signs with the big red hearts followed by Trumps Hate or Love Trumps Hate are so intelligent except how do they apply to the election of Donald Trump? Are they implying that Love is Trump or that Trump Hates or are they simply using a phrase they saw and thought was like way kewl and just so smart that it had to be the thing. Bad news for these brilliant minds, it is absolutely meaningless as we all wish that Love Trumps Hate and do not see where that implies anything about the President elect except that the word Trumps contains the letters T-R-U-M-P in the sign and thus might imply something about the President elect, but sorry, it doesn’t really mean anything obvious and definitely that Trump Hates as the chant which has accompanied these signs implies. Signs are supposed to be intuitively obvious and not confusing or vague as you are conveying a message and not a trite saying which everybody would love to actually describe an actual truth in life. We all hope that Love (or big heart) Trumps Hate but we do not automatically equate that with Trump Hates as we do not just take the last words from the sign and move the ‘s’ from Trump to hate and feel so smug and smart.

 

Safe Space with Puppy Cuddle

 

Now here is some advice for these people who are all bent and forlorn. Start looking for a candidate who can garner the support of more people than Hillary Clinton was capable of snaring. Hint, Elizabeth Warren might be a better candidate as would Bernie but they are both very extreme in their beliefs and many Americans do not share their beliefs. Many Americans do not agree with everything Trump has said but many believed that the one thing Donald Trump would be capable of doing is choosing solid and qualified people to advise him and be responsible for the different areas and Cabinet posts. Work to find candidates for position less lofty than President and see if during the next elections you can win back the House of Representatives or the Senate and then work with a President Trump to assist in the recovery necessary in both the economy and in the United States international standing. Democrats should be seen as desiring a better America rather than striving for an extremist agenda which does not function, and candidates who believe the United States is a necessary force for good and what is right in the world and forges a greater peace. The exit from the world over the past eight years or so has brought disaster down on many parts of the world including many allies in Europe, Asia, Africa and elsewhere. Work toward a constructive presence and not simply choose to find reasons to tear the nation apart and complain that things are not going just as you desire because you need to take effort and compromise in order to make friends and win elections. Ideologues usually find their way difficult and opposition strong while those willing to listen to others and work together accomplish far more. The last though, let us all work to make a President Trump as successful taking America forward and improving all our lives and making the United States important again as when America acts with means which prove important, the world usually wins. America has been one of the greatest forces for good and it would be horrific if America ever became a force for evil, and Donald Trump does not desire an evil future for America no matter what you may have heard. At least wait and see what he does and judge him on his actions and policies and not on hearsay from people who refuse to even grant the man any chance to prove he is not the bringer of the Apocalypse.

 

Beyond the Cusp 

 

If We Lose then Everybody Loses

 

The demonstrations (riots) occurring across the United States largely in the major cities, especially Democrat Party strongholds claiming that Trump is not, can not and never will be their President refuse to abate. Apart from this being a definite example of delusional denial, it is also much ado about nothing as the rules on how the office of President is chosen has been known for well over two-hundred years and all contenders understood the rules going in. It is not like Hillary Clinton has even shown the slightest designs or desires to challenge the results. There has been a number of disgusting results turn from these examples of bad behavior with one of the most egregious was the beating of a fifteen year old Rockville, Maryland High School student by numerous classmates for wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat. This was far from the only casualty from the protests where stores have been breached with their windows smashed and merchandise stolen. In one case a Starbucks Coffee store was broken into and coffee mugs were stolen and used as projectiles thrown at the police. Numerous other reports have surfaced of Trump supporters or just some refusing to join the protests being pummeled and beaten simply for not agreeing with the mob. For those who agree with these activities I have a simple question, what would your reaction have been if Hillary Clinton had won the Electoral College vote but lost narrowly in the popular vote and Trump supporters took to the streets rioting and beating Hillary supporters? If that would have struck you as indefensible, as I would hope it would, why are the current malcontents then tolerated. If Hillary supporters and all who voted for any of the candidates other than Trump, especially respected members of those groups, would come out and denounce these rioters then perhaps the United States could start working towards healing.

 

Civility is the basis for civilization and what allows disparate groups to coexist despite differing opinions. Elections are presumably the peaceful means for choosing leaders which has presumably been accepted as a replacement for generals or others leading their band of armed insurrectionists and taking the seat of power by force. That is the alternative which these demonstrators, especially those causing damage and beating anyone thought to be from the opposition, and the reason elections were initiated. Changing government by revolution every time a sizeable and well-armed group decided they should lead coming in and murdering the current leaders and destroying much of the capital city and sometimes leading to a major civil war destroying much of the kingdom all just to make a transition in power might be considered paying too high a price when compared to simply voting. Is this the system which is now being proposed by those rioting in the streets? Do any of them really believe they are going to get their way and Hillary Clinton will suddenly become the next President because they are rioting and destroying property? Lastly, what gives with the governors and mayors who are permitting such lawlessness? And lastly, enough with the ridiculous Trump supports the KKK or the Nazis or white supremacists of any stripe. That is no more true than Hillary Clinton being called a Communist or an Anarchist simply because some well-know Communist sympathizers or Anarchists came out supporting her, as I am sure there were at least a few. Just because some malcontent from any extreme on the political spectrum comes out in support does not make the candidate a supporter of the extremists represented by the particular claim of support. We do not control which crazies support a candidate and often cannot fathom even why there might be any reason for such support. Donald Trump has little to no actions in his past which infer in the slightest that he has a bigoted bone in his body. He is not a racist, anti-Semite, homophobe, sexist or even misogynist, though some might try to argue the last due to his action in decades past when male-female relations were quite different than today.

 

Anti-Trump Demonstration

 

Then there is the claim that the Electoral College is unfair as it grants a resident of Wyoming as carrying greater weight than a resident of California or Texas or New York or even Alaska. Oddly enough, that was the whole idea of the Electoral College. When the Constitution was drawn up the founding Fathers realized quite quickly that any candidate for President if they could win New York and Virginia by wide margins could lose nine of the remaining eleven states and still win the election. This, in their thoughtful minds, seemed to give Virginia and New York far too much power and they needed all the states to sign onto the new Constitution. Remember the Federated States of America was the dysfunctional governance where the Federal government was too weak to run the nation and the country was disintegrating. The Constitution was the grand compromise which gave the smaller states significant additional representation in choosing a President simply by adding two Electoral Votes, one for each Senator, to the number of Representatives and thus making it so all the states would be represented in the White House. As the United States grew and Wyoming became the least settled state per square mile, Wyoming receives the greatest benefit of the Electoral College system and California is likely harmed the most followed by Texas, but it all works in the end as Wyoming still has but three Electoral Votes and is seldom the deciding state. We need remember that without the Electoral College system the United States would never have come into being and the Federated States of America would have dissolved into individual states and more resembled Europe economically, militarily and in all too many other ways, Alaska would still be a part of Russia, Hawaii would still be a Spanish colony or an independent nation, Texas would either be its own nation or still part of Mexico after Santa Anna beat the Texas militias. And Wyoming would still be Wyoming all alone and pretty much ignored as nobody would want to take the time or energy to conquer her. Wyoming would be pretty much unchanged as any invading army would need to defeat a number of states before reaching Wyoming and then would stand little chance against the mountain men who know their woodlands and highlands very well and live as they please even now. Lastly, Wyoming has some of the most breathtaking views that can be found anywhere within the United States, and that comes from having lived there.

 

In closing, can we do something which has gotten the United States through tougher and more distressing times than anything a President Trump can cause. The country is nowhere near as divided as many seem to wish to have it appear. You might have heard of this other time when brother took up arms against brother and the nation was divided into the blue and the grey and we fought a Civil War, a real Civil War and not just civil unrest. We realize you believe you are fighting a civil war, but trust that you are not and should you actually become that violent, well, let us just warn that you would not like how that would end. The United States survived President Grant, it survived President James K. Polk who did not even campaign but was elected due to two things, the party he represented had the election in the bag and his opponent ran on the slogan of, “Who the h3ll is James K. Polk?” Perhaps if his opponent, who is just as nameless today as then, had campaigned with his name in a slogan instead of his opposition, perhaps he might have won but instead all anyone knew was both sides were preoccupied with James K. Polk. He ran against Henry Clay who was one of the founding members of the Whig Party. We even survived a President who pretended to have a middle name, well, middle initial because all the great Presidents had a middle name. Thus we had President Harry S (for nothing) Truman sometimes stated by his contemporaries as Harry ask for nothing Truman because persuading Harry Truman was wasted effort as he drew his own course and never deviated from a decision and was the reason for a sign on his desk which faced the door reading, “The Buck Stops Here.” We survived a President who was an avid big game hunter, went hunting with the Czar of Russia and spent as little time in Washington as possible, a man who despite great wealth gathered a group of roughnecks and went to war because it would be jolly fun, yep, President Theodore Roosevelt. The United States has survived virtually every kind of President imaginable, Harvard educated, Yale educated and self-taught, raised in luxury and poverty, military men and pacifists and somehow the United States has developed a life of its own which manages to always return to a central pillar based on equal freedoms being granted to ever wider portions of the nation’s peoples. One example was due to President elect Donald Trump who opened his Palm Beach resort called Mar-a-Lago; he insisted that it be opened to everybody including specifically Jews and Blacks, something never permitted in “exclusive” resorts, clubs and other venues breaking this barrier which held into the 1990s. The outrageous fact here is not that it was Donald Trump who broke the barrier and fought a running battle with the city officials for over a decade because of his inclusive policies but that Palm Beach had such rules in place into the 1990s and was still regarded as an all American resort town, now that is unbelievable and a truth that needs more emphasis. Still, if we all calm down we will survive the coming four years and then we can review whether Donald Trump was more President or clown and if clown, replace him and get on with life. Thank you.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Your Protests and Microaggressions Annoy Us

 

We realize that the fact that the majority of us who supported Donald Trump and came out in his favor despite his shortcomings and other difficulties was because you drove us outside of our safe-zones, which are far larger than yours as we are nowhere near as easily perturbed by the rest of humanity as you appear to be. You lost a singular election. We were polite during the past twenty-eight years since we rose from our endlessly toiling and had our desired person in the White House. We are the next generation of quiet Americans who elected Ronald Reagan. They call us the silent majority because when we lose the election we simply return to work Wednesday morning and do our jobs. We definitely do not riot, smash other people’s windows, destroy their vehicles, steal merchandise or any of the other lawlessness which far too many of the tender aged youth along with associated paid agitators, trainers and riot leaders who are leading you onward in your own eventual destruction. Stop and ask yourself exactly why you are really out in the streets being part of an ignorant mob being used by those who would enslave each and every one of you. If you can answer why somebody as tainted and corrupt as Hillary Clinton, whose track record looks more like an accident spread across the many years and her campaign was the celebration of rules for the masses, that includes all of you and the rest of us, but no rules for your superiors, the few holding the power then maybe somebody will listen and even care and you will have an accomplishment. At the very least, Trump does not owe foreign and dangerous influences favors for their generous gifts to his own slush fund disguised as a charitable institution. Yes, that’s right; we are referring to the Clinton Foundation. Has Trump cut some corners and likely pulled his share of rolling stops at blinking red traffic signals. Who hasn’t? Still, President elect Donald Trump will not be tied to any moneyed interests except for businesses of any and all sizes. This will be a good thing and may finally jumpstart the economy and return some manufacturing to the United States.

 

If you must know, there were some things about Trump to like and some reasons to be very concerned, but when push came to shove and many of us stood in the voting booth, we weighed everything and Donald Trump was the safer bet to lead the nation from the doldrums which currently are afflicting America. Trump represented much the same reality and non-membership in the political class. Trump has had employees and even told some, “You’re Fired.” Yes, we knew about his silly show and the fact that much of the time Donald Trump is mainly concerned with selling the brand of The Donald. Yes, we realize he is an uncouth braggart and went through a period where he partook in womanizing, it was called the late sixties and first half of the seventies and all too many of us were almost as bad and that included many women who now claim their vestal status which they had so cavalierly discarded back in the day when fun ruled where there were no rules. Yes, we had our wild days but did not try to burn down cities or destroy entire community areas because we lost an election or two or more, we continued on, grew up and even managed to learn a few lessons along the way. As far as what those lessons were, well, they were lessons acquired the hard way, brutal experiences in which we almost jeopardized our futures. Some of our peers acted as you are currently doing and paid a steep price. What advice can we give you? Make sure you are not among the stragglers and the hanger-on’s who continue protesting until the mass arrests bring it all to an end. When this comes down, all those paid agitators and organizers will magically disappear and those still protesting will pay the full price.

 

Furthermore, what are you protesting about? You lost one election, granted it was possibly your first time voting, but there will be more elections. Eventually, if you ever awaken from the lullaby being sung to you by your professors, who are supposed to be teaching you how to work and operate in the real world at about $30,000 per semester, then you might figure out that there are no safe spaces and you win some and you lose some. Many of your professors never have held a job outside of the ivory towers of academia and thus have no practical knowledge to impart; so they instead fill your heads with propaganda which they were fed by their professors. When signing up for courses you need to do a little research and a lot of soul searching. The first item is you want to take courses taught by some professor who also worked in the real world as they are able to impart at least some useful input. Secondly, choose a major field which will prepare you for employment and making a decent salary once you get on that path, then your life will be one of greater ease and satisfaction. Majoring in Seventeenth Century French Poetry and Love Sonnets may give you greater depth and some valuable quotes and even some pick-up lines, but what kind of job does it prepare one to earn a salary. One need remember that there are probably thirty or forty professors who teach such a major field and none other as most also teach Chaucer and other writings and may also have an archeology degree to augment their great love of Seventeenth Century French Poetry and Love Sonnets. The fields which produce the greatest number of jobs are the STEM degrees, Science, Technology, Engineering and Math major courses.

 

Anti-Trump Protesters

 

I can hear the moaning and whining complaining that those majors are just so hard and challenging and are not soft and squishy filling one with false sense of worth. You will only get out of life equal to what you invested and then only if you work really smart as well as hard. I know that is what you parents told you and they are idiots and what do they know about the new world, they are so yesterday. Well, back a few years and their yesterday was the future world we were looking at as we stood looking beyond the cusp of our college days and when we all had degrees, it were the students who majored in STEM programs who were getting the lion’s share of higher paying jobs. Even a good share of those who skipped college and went a different route had found their niche and were making good salaries. Technical schools which offer a two year degree are affordable and you learn exactly what you need for a professional career working as an electronic technician, biomedical technician, X-ray technician, and a whole myriad of professional positions which require knowledge in the one area, more than you filling your head with elective courses which teach little of value. There are apprenticeships with large companies who test aptitude and should you have what they need, you can get a highly trained position and some even assist you in buying the equipment you will need to succeed. One such company is Caterpillar, yes, the ones who make all the big yellow behemoths found at construction sites where anything from houses to malls to highways are being constructed. Well, Caterpillar trains people on their equipment and how to operate them safely and productively and then they place you in a position and they even pay a salary while you train, beat that. Driving an earth-mover or bulldozer will make you far more than an ethnic studies degree will likely pay. Granted, many of these professors talk about how people in their field have made very good money; remember these people they speak so highly about are amongst the top five to ten percent of those in their field. Then again, the top five to ten percent of those in virtually any field make excellent money. This includes baseball players, basketball players, golfers and researchers who receive grants to write books about Seventeenth Century French Poetry and Love Sonnets, but there is a very strict limit in numbers of such grants, like maybe one each century and looks like somebody already got this century’s easy train. This means one should consider exactly the earning potential for the line of study you have chosen to pursue. You had best answer this honestly, as it is your entire future riding on this assessment. Oh, and a police record for rioting and destruction of personal property often will make you all but unemployable unless you can also organize and speak publically with moving and motivating words as the leaders of the rioting today are doing.

 

As far as your current acting out because your perceived perfect leader actually managed to lose the election everybody had been claiming for months had it in the bag; not only did your dream woman lose, but she lost to a person you and your peers have deemed to be a cretin. So your perfect candidate who was leading in every poll and who you do not know anyone who was not voting for her managed to lose. How is this possible? Well, have you ever considered that first off, you do not exactly know a whole lot of people and some who are telling you they voted for Hillary Clinton actually voted for Donald Trump. Oh yes there were that select few. If you might widen your pool of people you know to beyond your family, the friends from High School, those two childhood friends you were always seen together with and the people in your dorm and fraternity/sorority, you might develop a different picture of the world seeing it for what it is, diverse. The others who are demonstrating with you have the same tunnel vision of the world and they can only further insulate you from reality, which is obviously in conflict with your perfect little world as otherwise you would not be out in the streets screaming your head off while nobody really cares. That is what even your friends in the media are writing, how these demonstrations will only serve to drive more people away from the leftist defined path.

 

There is one last item, truth. Claiming that Donald Trump is a capitalist pig and then claiming his administration will make America a fascist nation are contradictory. Real fascists love government and honestly believe that the leaders of industry should work under government guidance and the workers’ rights be controlled for the better good. Fascism is actually a left-leaning form of governance where the top management from industry are aligned and working with the government. Industry thus is also guided in order to provide the government their sharing in the profit but somehow the politicians are seldom made to suffer the consequences resulting from their decisions. A capitalist believes industry does best when untethered from government inclusion in the process. The capitalist would oppose any creep of fascist influences hampering any firm from making the highest profit and still manufacture to their own projections and not what government insists be manufactured. Trump is a free market capitalist and if anyone might have favored a fascist form for the government it has been many leftists and especially the high operatives in the Democrat Party and the leftist Republican Party members. Donald Trump is not a member of either group and this will facilitate his working with a select group taken from both parties in the Congress, especially in the Senate where his appointments go for their week of being battered before approval. Should such materialize and Trump include those willing Democrat members in Congress, he will prove to be the President of all the people even including many who are now in the streets rioting. We will need wait and see whether a President Trump is capable of patching together a bipartisan group who will march along with the President and fashion a model and watch it grow. Should Trump increase opportunity, then we will need to admit he was the best person for the job at this time. We will need to see what the future holds.

 

Beyond the Cusp