2 separate posts, basically...
1:
Reflecting on last night, the outcome doesn't necessarily "shock" me. Don't get me wrong, I expected a Clinton win and a pretty big one electorally-speaking. But popular vote wise, she was probably only going to win by 3 in my mind. So the polls missed by around 2.5, which isn't that bad historically speaking. It was always possible that national polls had herded themselves into a corner and were mis-weighting turnout. But the state polls were very variable. Clinton outperformed her polls in areas with large latino populations like Arizona, Nevada, and New Mexico, and pretty seriously underperformed most everywhere else. It was always possible that a key variable like this was getting mismeasured and could lead to a cascade. While polls showed her leading most every swing state, they were always close leads and many of them are pretty well correlated. If Ohio falls by a lot, you know Wisconsin and Michigan are going to be way closer than Democrats can comfortably handle. If Ohio falls by like 8+, you're probably losing Wisconsin, maybe even Michigan. And possibly Pennsylvania too. And that's what happened. Florida and NC were always going to be close and her losses there were unfortunate, but ultimately irrelevant so long as the Ohio +8 and correlated occurred. That's what happens when you have narrow leads in a group of states and then underperform your national poll by 2.5 on the back of demographics that are overrepresented in the swing states you were narrowly leading. The perfect storm happened. Trump won a lot of swing states by even more narrow margins (just a point or so) than Clinton was expected to. The early signs of this were pretty obvious as Virginia was filling up. Although high turnout in metro-DC eventually brought it up to around +5 Clinton, the early votes showing Trump's large gains in the rest of the state scared me. Still, I held out hope because Florida looked untouchable. Then panhandle results came in... I knew that the night was probably over before many based on those Ohio results. There was a narrow path, but it needed PA and MI, which was unlikely given the Ohio results. In the end, both narrowly fell. Finally, it is horrifying that we have now had our second popular vote wins but loses election in five elections. There's no easy path to get past this, but we really must. The great irony is that the original purpose of the electoral college was to prevent a populist demagogue from rising to power. But now that we've bounded electors to state results and also relinquished control of the primary system to the people, there's little stopping popular opinion from tsunami-ing every intended constitutional protection of the republic.
The second major reflection is that we truly live in 2 Americas. Sitting down and thinking through a list, I realized I knew at most 3 or 4 trump voters under the age of 50, and I knew none of them well. I knew this would be the case, whether Trump or Clinton won, but it really struck me after the fact, especially given how the vote ultimately broke down. Liberals have self-segregated themselves into cities and, unless they came from a small town originally, know next to no one from rural America. This was a oft-repeated idea in Brexit between "big britain" and "little britain." It appears to be even worse here. I, unfortunately, see no easy solution to this major problem. It would only appear to get worse in the future. Even as demographics will likely continue to change in Democrats favor long-term, it's no more reassuring. I would not be happy with a society where Democrats win with a reverse situation to what has just happened. It is a dangerous degree of geographic and demographic polarization whichever side wins.
2:
I am incredibly uncomfortable with what I'm doing with my life right now. I don't know for sure if I will change, but I'm going to be thinking pretty hard about it in the next week or so.
I've seen many friends express the feeling that they didn't do enough. And I was thinking about it and I realized, there was nothing I could have really done. 99% of my friends who could vote voted. My state went blue, my district very blue. I wasn't going to canvas in a different state, so what really could I have done?
Still, I feel that my job, which btw is going to be hit pretty hard by the inevitable obamacare repeal, is so inconsequential. I've never been one of those "dreamer" millennials. I wanted a practical degree. I didn't want to need an advanced degree. I wanted 4 years of college and being ready to contribute to society. And so I went to business school at Wharton (yes, really... hi Donald). I now work at a government contractor that deals with health care and human services. What I've seen in over a year there is that my work is challenging and important, but only to a very small point. The health care innovation being tested around the country only marginally reduces costs and even more marginally improves outcomes. I have a hard time believing that once you subtract out the costs of doing business with a company like mine that any money is being saved at all. We do great, of course, but I'm not sure the ultimate outcome is significantly positive on society. So I haven't been one of those dreamers. But I feel I may want to be one.
I truly feel there is a significant amount of bad that's about to be unleashed - Not necessarily by the government. I reserve my judgment on how Trump will interact with Pence and with congressional republicans until we see it in action. There is a chance it is not as bad as I fear. A bipartisan effort on infrastructure rebuilding is something we can all agree on and is a good place for Trump to begin. Putting that front and center gives me a sliver of hope that he himself will not be as bad as advertised.
No, what I'm existentially threatened by are the supporters and what is to come at the state government level with limited federal restriction on them.
On a personal note, the demographic group that I selfishly fear most for are LGBT people. Just about a week ago, two friends of mine were gaybashed while leaving a house party in one of the gayest parts of DC. We've now just elected a VP who believes if you electrocute a homo enough, he'll turn straight. I am not particularly concerned about marriage equality, partly because it's not at all the highest priority for me, but mostly because I don't think the Supreme Court, even with a new 9th justice would overturn it. The 5 who granted the right are all still there and Roberts would likely respect the precedent too. I'm instead concerned with far worse. I live in a bubble in the DC area. When someone gets gaybashed here, it's major, shocking news. But that is not the case in many parts of the country. I know a college student who was bullied for being gay within his fraternity and committed suicide. I know a trans woman who had her parents die when she was young, then was cast away by her older sister when she came out as gay at 13 (came out again later on as trans). I myself tortured my parents with threats of suicide when I was closeted to them and being severely bullied in school. I know how hard this is for young LGBT people and we have just signaled to them that hatred (read: Pence's, not necessarily Trump's) is an accepted part of the US government. I am scared for resources being taken away for those who are HIV positive. Eliminating fair coverage for those with pre-existing conditions hurts many, like my cousins, among whom there's genetic diabetes, crohn's disease, and lupus, or among many women in my family with breast cancer. But it especially hurts many LGBT people who have HIV. I'm concerned public health resources for STD and HIV testing will be more difficult to attain, especially in my city, where congress sets much of local law for DC because they can. I am largely not concerned that my day to day ability to live and work freely will be damaged because I am in such a blue area. But I fear for kids who grow up like I did and the poor, typically minority LGBT folk with higher rates of HIV and little access to resources.
I have Muslim friends whose local community centers were literally blown up. I have a Muslim friend who had his windshield smashed in with a brick. These happened in Northern Florida and Georgia, respectively.
I have multiple female friends who have been raped. My mother was raped. We have just elected a man who, regardless of whether these newer allegations are true or exaggerated or even fabricated, we know is uncomfortably misogynistic. I know women who would ordinarily be taking birth control now planning on getting an IUD implanted within the next few months because they can last up to 10 or 15 years and will keep their contraception safe in the future.
I have quite a lot of non-citizen friends living in the US entirely legally on visas. Many of them are terrified that they will be made to leave in the course of trade agreements blowing up. One is brilliant. She works here on a visa that's easily attainable by virtue of our trade agreement with Singapore. Trump recently attacked this trade agreement. She wants to live and work here, but fears she will lose that privilege.
I have quite a lot of non-citizen friends who have at one point or another been here illegally. Some who were brought here as children, some who came on a visa and overstayed, some who came illegally as adults. One who came legally as a provisional asylum-grantee, waited years for his asylum application to be processed, be denied, try to apply for a visa he really should have applied for in the first place rather than asylum since he qualified, be told he can only apply for that type of visa from outside of the country, be forced to return home to a country he was not safe in, and wait 2 years for that new visa application to be processed, even with him paying a rush fee. He was a model citizen and a small business owner employing a handful of people. I have already seen the impact on their quality of life when either the federal government went after them or when Georgia passed laws second only to Arizona. While I am quite confident a literal wall will not be built, I fear what Republican policies will do to immigrant families, especially those of mixed status.
My hopes for much of what I consider to be American values, which are clearly shared by only about half of the country, now rest on the conviction of the more moderate house republicans to not rubberstamp an agenda and on senate republicans to not invoke the nuclear option on every little thing. It also rests on the health of an elderly woman named Ginsberg and the spines of two men named Kennedy and Roberts. There's not much for me to cling to. 2018 will likely only get worse, as it's an off-presidential year and the Democrats are defending many more senate seats.
And so with all this being said, I feel I am somewhat wasting away my passions and potential in a boring office job. I haven't yet decided if I will make a change. My personal passion lies in immigration. Maybe I will finally suck it up and go to law school to aid them. Lord knows the process is only about to get harder.