by Jack Kelly
November 10, 2016

It would have been fitting if the band at Hillary Clinton’s “victory” party had played: “The World Turned Upside Down.”

But Hillary is into making history, not learning from it. She’s the first woman to be nominated for president by a major party; the first to be nominated while being investigated by the FBI for multiple felonies, and the first senior government official to skate after gross negligence in handling the nation’s secrets.

And now Hillary is the Democrat who lost despite the most biased reporting toward a candidate by the entire US media in US history.

Donald Trump won because he promised to take a sledgehammer to the smug, selfish, corrupt and inept political establishment Hillary Clinton epitomizes.

In Chapman University’s Survey of American Fears last month, 60.6 percent said they were “afraid” or “very afraid” of corruption of government officials. Second, at 41 percent, was a terrorist attack. The federal government is “somewhat” or “very” corrupt, said 81 percent in a Rasmussen poll in January.

This election was almost as grave an embarrassment for pollsters as it was for pundits. But Pat Caddell, Jimmy Carter’s pollster, nailed it.

“The American people, in a great majority, from left to right, have been in revolt against the political class and the financial elites in America,” Mr. Caddell said.

“The real struggle for America is not between Democrats and Republicans but between mainstream American and the ruling political elites,” said 67 percent in a poll he conducted.

“Political leaders are more interested in protecting their power and privilege than doing what is right for the American people,” said 86 percent.

“The country is run by an alliance of incumbent politicians, media pundits, lobbyists and other powerful money interests for their own gain at the expense of the American people,” said 87 percent.

Many who told pollsters Mr. Trump is unfit to be president voted for him anyway. The demand for change overrode concerns about its agent.

A real Republican would have done better, Team Clinton thinks. Yet Trump carried Dem bastions such as Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, even leads as of this writing in Michigan.

We don’t know yet how Mr. Trump will staff his administration, how well (or poorly) he’ll get along with GOP leaders in Congress, what his priorities are, or how active a role he’ll take in governance.

If federal bureaucrats who said they’d quit and Hollywood celebs who said they’d leave the country if Mr. Trump won keep their word, his presidency would be off to a good start. Conservatives now indifferent or hostile would warm up if he does nominate a conservative to replace Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court.

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President Trump’s foremost domestic challenge will be to replace Obamacare with something that won’t screw the middle class, or bankrupt the federal treasury. House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis) has an excellent plan. I hope The Donald listens to him.

The “mainstream” media eagerly will report dirt on The Donald, discord within the GOP. But Democrats are in worse shape.

There were 59 Democrats in the Senate when Barack Obama was inaugurated, 257 in the House. Democrats occupied 29 state houses, controlled 60 state legislative chambers.

Republicans will control both houses of Congress when Donald Trump is inaugurated: the Senate 52-48 (Republican John Kennedy will easily defeat Democrat Foster Campbell in the Senate runoff in Louisiana); the House 238-193 with 4 races still undecided.

There’ll be at least 33 Republican governors, the most since 1922. The GOP will control 71 state legislative chambers.

Who’s left to lead Democrats out of the wilderness? An aging crackpot from Vermont? (Vermont just elected a Republican governor by the way.)

What issues will Democrats champion to regain the trust of ordinary Americans? Forcing girls to share bathrooms with “transgendered” guys? Denying Islamist terror has Islamic roots?

Democrats have sown the wind, reaped the whirlwind. That whirlwind is Donald Trump. You asked for it guys.

 

— Jack Kelly is a former Marine and Green Beret and a former deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force in the Reagan administration. He is national security writer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. This article originally appeared at To The Point News.