Much to our chagrin, Donald J. Trump won the 2016 election, and will become President on January 20, 2017. I and so many others thought that Hillary Clinton would have won for sure. And she did, in fact, win the popular vote. But unfortunately, Trump won the Electoral College, crossing the finish line of 270 with likely over 300 electoral votes. As he himself said, the game is "rigged" alright, just not in the way he said.
So how did he manage to pull off such an unlikely victory? Well the key "swing" states such as Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin were all part of the Rust Belt, and he managed to tap into the frustrations of disaffected white working-class men--nationwide, but especially in those states. That was literally all it took. Combining the legitimate grievances of the working class (who have been practically eaten alive by our oligarchy, plutocracy, kleptocracy, and kyriarchy for decades now) with thinly-veiled racism, misogyny, and xenophobia turned out to be a winning formula. And as we are seeing now, he is already backpedaling on many of the lies he has told to his base. All of this will eventually backfire on the men who voted for him.
A Trump presidency is clear and present danger to America, and will seem to set the Women's movement back quite a bit at first. But ultimately Women will prevail, and this should be the ultimate wake-up call NOT to abandon their efforts.
MAN: You know, honey, we did win practically every single battle for the past 7000 years.
WOMAN: Yes, I know, dear. And it's also irrelevant.
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