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Regardless of the outcome of this Tuesday’s election, remember that either candidate has a daunting list of obstacles ahead. Here’s a few: poverty, overcrowded prisons, a continued presence in Afghanistan, a mostly unregulated financial industry, an ominous potential crisis in the Middle East, possibly three new Supreme Court justices, increasing storms and climate-related catastrophes that may or may not be the product of global warming, and a housing crisis that’s only now beginning to end. Oh, and there’s too many people. That’s just a start.
Democrat, Republican—who cares? Either way, we will face the next four years with the same fear and unease we bring to everything nowadays. Even after many of us embraced the last election with a sense of optimism rarely seen beforehand, four years later, we realize that some things change but most things stay the same. And if things didn’t go exactly as we hoped, what should we expect from the next four years, especially when we embark on that journey without any of the rosy-hued conviction we had in 2008?
