For today’s Provocative Question, Fandango asks:
What do you think about what happened in the United States yesterday? Are you shocked or surprised at the outcome, if it’s even known as you read this? Or are the results of the election what you expected? And finally, are you happy or unhappy?
The last time I looked, when I first got up, the result still wasn’t in. But the result doesn’t really matter to me – what matters is that so many American people share Trump’s vision of the world. That will be the same, regardless of the result.
It’s not uncommon, on here at any rate, to hear quite a unified voice from US bloggers – there might not be absolute alignment but people are certainly pointed in the same general direction. The election shows that, however vocal people from America might be on something, half of their countrymen most probably disagree. So it serves as a reminder that their voices only represent a certain fraction of US opinion. I mean, that is true anyway, but the election serves as a reminder. The UK saw the same with Brexit – people could make a terrific amount of noise about their particular cause, but when push came to shove, they were in the minority.
The saving grace for me, it doesn’t really matter – in fact I think Americans are prone to over-estimate just how much the rest of the world cares. It’s disappointing – I think that the only credible result would have been one in which Trump’s ethos was decisively rejected and he has clearly done better than that – but it isn’t going to change life, not here at any rate.