I am not a particularly political person. Not because I don't see the importance, but I can only devote so much of my time to things that I have little to no influence over. Since I have very little influence in politics, it tends to be something I mostly ignore when it's not affecting me personally. I just have too many other things (that are more important to me) to do.
That said, here are my unsolicited thoughts on this election.
Just about everything I've seen on FaceBook (because I don't spend a lot of time elsewhere getting news) seems to be divided into two thoughts on Donald Trump. Either he's going to give everyone every thing they've been day dreaming about politically or he's going to personally come and lock up anyone who he disagrees with (such as Muslims, the LGBT community, and people of Latin descent) while assaulting the women. There seems to be almost no middle ground.
I don't really agree with either camp. I hope that he does get to do at least some of the things on his 100 day list. Changing how we fund education and how many bureaucrats involved in it would be great. Not granting asylum to any illegal immigrant just because they are here would be great (INS would probably prefer to actually be able to do something more than having drug dogs sniffing for drugs at the border control check points). Trying to figure out a way to actually confirm that people seeking asylum are really needing asylum would be nice. I want to trust people, but I recognize that verifying things is important in some situations.
I think that putting a non-politician in office might not be the worst thing for this country (I make no promises that it will be the best thing we've ever done, but it might not be as bad as people think). I did not prefer either candidate (I preferred none of the candidates, to be honest), but I did have some serious concerns about Hillary Clinton possibly being in charge. Which does not mean that I think Trump is necessarily going to be great at being president. But he has been elected. So, we must go forward and figure out what that means for our country.
If you are nervous about Trump as president, I understand. He's an unknown right now. But remember, he has over 2 months before he takes office. And he seems to be trying to figure out practical things that might fix some of the problems this country has. He's apparently paid enough attention to how schools work in Europe, and realized that European students do better on actually showing that they've learned something by the time they graduate High School. His education reform is based off of proven European techniques (money following the student, less bureaucrats and standardized testing) and seems to be trying to get rid of programs that were intended for good, but don't really seem to be helping.
So, I am not advocating that Trump is the right choice. I don't think that all my political hopes will be met. But, I recognize that we've made a choice as a country. And since we've made that choice, we should all grow up enough to remember that the President does not act as supreme. He's got checks in place to keep him from being a dictator. He can't do everything on his own, and Congress and the Supreme Court have a say as well.
Lets stop panicking/rejoicing as if everything will be different tomorrow.
And maybe, lets give him a chance. Maybe he'll surprise us all.
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