An Optimist’s Take on the 2016 Presidential Election
There are plenty of reasons to be frustrated, disappointed, and disheartened by the results of the 2016 presidential election. Once the last ballot was finally counted, the incoming president lost by almost three million votes. Furthermore, he did so by actively campaigning on racism, misogyny, and xenophobia directly on the heels of consecutive terms by the first African-American president in United States history. Further still, the winner and president-elect of the United States (PEOTUS) Donald Trump rose to national political prominence initially by questioning the veracity of outgoing president Barack Obama’s birth certificate and national origins. But when it comes down to it, the most divisive election in US presidential history featuring two of the least popular nominees ever was likely to yield an outcome that pleased even a sizeable majority of the electorate. Still, it sucks to be on the losing side and facing at least four years of what looks like a fracas at best and a series of irrevocable mistakes in domestic and foreign policy in the more likely (and more frightening) scenario.
However, I’m not here to write about all that could go wrong with PEOTUS Trump’s upcoming presidential term. Partly because the amount written to that point greatly outpaces the inflow of new, fact-based insights about what we can reasonably expect to happen, but partly also because vigilance and tirelessness can actually bend this man to execute within the bounds of “normal” politics. It’s frustrating that I and others sharing my political ideology will have to expend so much energy just to achieve mediocrity, but it’s also just about all we can expect at this point. So it seems that it’s worth the effort.
The past eight years have by no means been a progressive utopia filed with universal health care unicorns and deregulated marijuana rainbows. As we bid farewell to Obama and remember all that he, his cabinet, his staff, organizers supporting his work, and everyone else involved in doing the good work of the past eight years have been able to accomplish, it is worth remembering how this was all achieved. The Affordable Care Act, the benefits and boons of which begin with increased health insurance coverage for millions of Americans and could fill scrolls, has been a mistake-filled rollout of a necessary but annoyingly controversial policy that was likely among the top five reasons for Trump’s victory. Despite countless instances of gun violence, the most prominent of which was the Sandy Hook shooting that resulted in the deaths of 20 innocent children, firearms manufacturers have ensured no lasting progress was made on preventing similar tragedies from being repeated in the future. Women’s reproductive rights, voting rights (especially for people of color), and the rights of trans Americans are no better off and, in some states for some people, arguably worse off in 2016 after eight years of Obama than in 2008 at the beginning of his term. I’m not saying that’s Obama’s fault or that he necessarily could have done something to affect alternate outcomes. I’m just saying that things have been tough even with the country led by a man whose leadership had the greatest potential to tangibly benefit the lives of the aforementioned people.
Where does the optimism come in? It’s quite simple — despite the struggles and shortcomings I describe above, and despite the countless others not enumerated, a spirit and actual evidence of progress prevailed throughout Obama’s presidency. We look back on the past eight years remembering the very real ways in which the economic, environmental, and physical well-being of America and its citizens have been improved. While remembering the work required to achieve these ends, what stands out most prominently is the result — that it is possible to achieve given the right goals, strategy, collaboration, and dedications. Is it a given? Absolutely not, but meaningful accomplishments are certainly attainable and that in itself makes the juice worth the squeeze — I see nothing to lose from applying the same logic to the presidency of Donald Trump.
The way I see it, the past eight years have essentially been filled with questions of “what” — what is the best policy given “X” problem; what is the most affordable way to provide healthcare to vulnerable populations; what is the best way to address the issues presented by a changing climate with the potential to affect health, well-being, and even survival on a global scale; and so on. I saw this in my own work and life largely being at the intersection of the growing use of data-driven solutions and their application towards public policy questions — we, as a nation, spent a lot of time figuring out what was the best approach to fixing our problems. But we didn’t spend a lot of time understanding or agreeing on why these solutions were preferred, or even why the questions we’ve been focused on are the most important for the largest majority of the population. I see this is as very important work which, to an increasing extent, has been replaced by assumptions and generalized answers that (at least partly) depend on the presence of echo chambers. For many of us on the so-called “progressive” side of things, this echo chamber is a lovely place to spend some time. For all the reasons Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky wrote about, many of us have and will continue to fall into a plethora of traps that make it difficult to “truly” consider outside (and especially contradictory) perspectives. My optimism stems from the fact that we now have an opportunity to ask ourselves a different set of questions — these are the why questions which would only have come up during a Trump presidency.
I think it’s important to clarify exactly what I mean here. I’m not trying to imply that the thousands and thousands of dedicated organizers, advocates, community leaders, and so on don’t have a reason for what they do. It’s obvious by the passion and love which permeates through the work of all these individuals that the motivation is not only present but also crystal clear. Rather, my argument focuses on the why questions we haven’t asked and answered on a broader scale. While each group and even large swaths of the population can point to a handful of reasons underlying their decisions to vote, rally, protest, and decry in very specific ways, it isn’t evident to me that these groups can easily explain the broader benefit of what they do. One can argue that there doesn’t need to be a benefit to anyone but the people directly impacted by the action undertaken, but that argument has to be comfortable with people like Donald Trump at the helm of our nation at least until the next big demographic shift. Simply put, there aren’t enough young, progressive-minded voters out there to offset the ballots cast by older conservatives. If there are, the 2016 presidential election did not bear evidence to this fact. So, there needs to be some head-scratching about the why on a broader scale than what we currently see.
Looking ahead to the upcoming presidential administration, characterized by Ben Carson making decisions regarding access to affordable housing and Jeff Sessions championing the rights of all Americans to participate in elections regardless of their race or ethnicity, it’s natural to first think along the lines of what questions — what do we do to minimize the impact Trump and his surrogates will have on the success of the past eight years; what do we to preserve and improve the ACA and continue to build on the ways in which it’s improved health outcomes for millions of people; what do we do about a president who is currently denying the role of Russia’s meddling in the election and treats Putin in a manner his past crimes and offenses do not inspire? These are important questions, but only if answered alongside the why questions — why are we convinced that we’ve identified the most pressing issues facing the nation; why are we convinced that we’ve been rigorous in identifying the optimal solution given the problems we’ve identified; and (maybe most importantly) why has it been so difficult to convey these positions in ways that unite and sway rather than divide and breed more disagreement. Maybe “they” are just wrong and will never understand that “we” have it figured out. But I think it may be trickier than that.
