Some of us really were looking and listening. Although all the liberal publications were saying Hillary Clinton would win big, I was hearing other voices. Michael Moore, to name one with whom you might be familiar, was saying the opposite. So were other important analysts — all issuing warnings that it was not going to be so easy. There were many things that could go wrong. Not only had the fat lady not sung, the concert hadn’t even begun and the orchestra was just tuning their instruments. Too early to pop the corks.

Even when we say “What could possibly go wrong?” which means we really do know that things always go wrong, regardless of whatever plans you made, it’s rare that absolutely everything goes wrong at the same time.

That is what happened for Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Who’s fault was it? Hers, certainly. The FBI? Absolutely. The Democratic and Republican establishments’ unwillingness hear the angry voices in coal country and the rust belt. The people who neither Democrats or Republicans have been able to help for the past 30 years have felt abandoned. They have a point, but there’s a huge question whether or not there’s much to be done. No one can turn back the clock to the glory days of American manufacturing because that was substantially based on a postwar Europe in smoking ruins who, of necessity, bought their “stuff” from us.

You aren’t going to bring back the coal industry. Oh, maybe a little will be revived, but those miners need to learn new skills, like the fishermen of New England who have lost their livelihood as fisheries closed due to persistent, relentless, over-fishing.

We have voted badly before and can do it again. We have yet to plumb the true depths to which we can sink.

Change happens and sometimes, no one is to blame. The world keep turning. Crying and shaking ones fists at the sky while howling “Stop the world! I want to get off!” is futile and pathetic.

A very big change happened yesterday. How much we will we personally, as individuals, be affected? It depends on too many different variables to make an educated guess much less a prediction. In any case, big changes to law and legislation don’t happen overnight.

The remnant of Bernat Mills. A reminder of how things can change.

Many voters who got Trump into office are going to have a bad case of buyer’s remorse when, in the not-too-distant future they realize there won’t be a wall. The mines aren’t coming back. America’s manufacturing base is not coming back any more than the empty mills in the Blackstone Valley will ever again transform cotton and wool into cloth. Sometimes, when it’s over, it’s over.

Moreover, they will discover that as much as the man supposedly makes the office, the office of the president will remake Trump.

This isn’t a toy job. By the time President Trump realizes what he’s gotten into, he won’t be the same guy. Reality has harder edges than TV reality shows.

The presidency changes those who take office. Always. Which way it will go this time, we can’t know. I’m pretty sure the candidate doesn’t know either. It’s going to take time to sort it out. Determine who the power players will be. Who will populate the Trump cabinet. And who will be on the Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, back in the deep blue Commonwealth of Massachusetts, we didn’t vote for Trump. We did legalize marijuana and vote to protect farm animals from cruel treatment. Yay us.

Categories: #American-history, Blackstone Valley, Culture, Politics

Tags: #American-history, change, Donald Trump, economics, Election, history, industry, Politics