Post-election Blues

Maybe I just listened to too much talk radio, but I was convinced Romney would win. Obama ran a tired, negative campaign that seemed to be sputtering and staggering toward the finish line. Romney seemed to be gaining momentum with a positive vision for the future and a CEOs eye for knowing how to control deficits without killing the economy, and how to forge consensus in a divided country. I'm still in disbelief that most Americans would rather re-elect an incompetent poser who I consider to be truly the worst president of my lifetime.

I have lost some respect for my fellow Americans. How can they not see that this path leads to a stagnant European style welfare state? It is depressing that people want that. That's not the America that I love. For the first time I can say I feel a little less love for my country today.

One thing that is clear to me is the Republican party can't survive as a white party. Most Hispanics voted for Obama. Why? They are mostly hard-working, upwardly mobile, socially conservative people, more interested in opportunity than handouts. They were pushed toward the Democrats because Republicans harbor so many paranoid xenophobes who spew harsh anti-immigrant rhetoric. That has to change.

I can comfort myself with the fact that the president doesn't really have that much power in our system. Or at least that was true traditionally. Obama has expanded executive power in alarming ways and that will continue. I am up to my eyeballs in new business opportunities and risks. When I think of where he wants to take the country I start to seriously consider pulling an "Atlas Shrugged" and moving to Singapore.

I thought venting would make me feel better. I still feel sick. I was convinced when he was elected the first time that he would be a disaster but in 2008 there was always a sense of inevitability. This is different. Having seen what an Obama presidency looks like, with complete dysfunction in the Senate, we voted for more of the same. God help us.