It is simply amazing and confusing at the same time how the 2016 American Presidential election is panning out. On the one hand, there is a candidate that seems to have the depth of experience required to grace the most powerful office in the land and by extension, the world, but fighting to earn the trust of majority of the American people; And on the other hand, the most inexperienced, most unconventional and caution-free person the world has ever known to contest and win the nomination for election for the post of president of the United States. Is this really a choice between the rock and a hard place? Or will it just simply be a referendum on the character of which one of them is the lesser of the two evils?
Images of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton (Reference: https://commons.wikimedia.org)
That said, seriously,I have never seen or heard in the history of presidential elections in the US, that a candidate can simply wake up every morning and choose what section of the American society he wishes to annoy or use to get cheap publicity for his campaign. If it is not women today, it is Mexicans. If it is not Mexicans, it is Muslims, war veterans, and even the parents of those he sees as opposition, whether dead or alive are not sacred to this cynical kind of political opinions. When will this madness stop? It appears as if a section of the american society seems to love this guy even with the gutter politics and shameful things that flow out of his mouth. It make one ask the question : Is America sitting on a gun powder? After many years of dealing with racism, do people really have these kinds of opinions and prejudices towards others who do not "look" , "sound" or "seem" American in the 21st century? For the sake of the future of this nation, I truly hope not.
I try to image for a moment what it would be like if Donald Trump actually becomes the 45th President of the United States. It simply is unimaginable!. I may sound biased, for common sense though, but it just simply is unimaginable, period! I hear of people who have started making plans to move out of the US to places like Canada. Some also say they intend to renounce their citizenship, an extremely extreme measure you would say.
I think he feels because he runs a chain of businesses, that should simply translate into running the office of the president of the free world. With this notion, he already got it wrong even before he started! There is a great contrast between leadership and management. Leadership is about influence and alignment. Management achieves results mostly by coercion, mostly using the carrot and stick approach while leadership is simply a matter of influence. Although it can be said that influence can be positive or negative, with Hitler being a perfect example of negative influence. Is he going to turn the most democratic nation on the face of the earth into a dictatorship? That remains to be seen.
Anyway, whatever my opinions are, I am simply talking from the sidelines as someone who feels it was time to put an end to this madness and let patriotism rule over cynicism, unity reign over divisive politics and genuine passion triumph over selfishness.
Donald Trump's America? I just can't see it!