Stranger Things
That men do not learn very much in history, is the most important of all the lessons of history”
Aldous Huxley
I’m pretty speechless about the events of Nov 8th. Brexit was a shock. But looking back, it was clearly a precursor to Trump’s victory, and I think, deep down, everyone knew that.
My knowledge of American politics is deeply lacking (I’m learning as I go). But the events which unfolded yesterday make me feel sad, sickened and fearful of a future where fascism threatens to rear it’s ugly head again, and be more than just a global minority voice.
The morning of Nov 8th was beautiful here in California — a golden sky with a palpable tension in the air, as the sun rose over the Bay. Women were marching to vote in their pantsuits everywhere. They looked proud — and they looked great. People here wore their Vote stickers with beaming pride.
The polls were all predicting a Clinton win for the first half of the day. There was a strange calmness in the air. The sun began to set and San Francisco offered up the most beautiful evening sky I’ve ever seen. The place was literally glowing. We dined at Leo’s Oyster Bar, a beautifully evocative place of a bygone era, occasionally glancing at the polls, feeling safe in the knowledge that Hilary was on track to clinch it.
Never trust big data modelling
And then it all changed. The polls started to shift. Everyone in the city was glued to their phones — in the restaurants, in the theatre and on the street. The polls had got it wrong. We were stuck to Nate Silver’s invaluable fivethirtyeight.com the entire night, shaking our heads in disbelief every 5 minutes, as Trump continued to win key states — Utah, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida — they kept rolling in.
CBS notes today that The Simpsons predicted a President Trump back in 2000, when Fox aired an episode entitled “Bart to the Future”. The writer, Dan Greaney, wrote the episode as a “warning to America”.
Not quite as comedic now.
The stats
This is the most shocking political development of my lifetime. Scanning quickly through the facts online today — Statisticbrain.com reports that out of 231, 556, 622 eligible voters:
46.9% DID NOT VOTE
25.6% voted Clinton
25.5% voted Trump
46.9% of the population DID NOT VOTE??? Nearly half of the entire country could not be arsed to get up and make it count, when it was most needed? The key forces behind these staggering figures appear to be economic anxiety and a lack of education. The Washington Post highlights that the people behind Trump’s success are ‘overwhelmingly but not limited to — white, Republicans with limited education’.
Omar Kamel, whose post on Medium randomly caught my eye, put forward his view on voting for Trump:
“Many of us feel that if America could not choose the best option, then it deserved the worst….A Trump victory would force the USA to admit to what it has become, and would allow other countries around the world to react appropriately now that the cover has been blown.”
What have the events of yesterday taught us?
Well, as I look at my children, I realise again how important their education is, and the responsibility we have to teach them to be enquiring, responsible and intelligent global citizens — for they are our only hope.
It’s also taught me that polls, and predictive models based on those polls could now be seen as a load of bollocks. Rather poignantly, some chap on Twitter pointed out that eight days after Trump’s inauguration in January, the Chinese year of the fire cock begins.
Brave new world indeed.
