Protest? Yes. ... Riot? Decidedly no.

I'm good with protests. I think they're a valid, productive and satisfying way to show that people are unhappy with something. I've got no problem with the protests going on throughout the country right now displaying the peoples' unhappiness with the new president. Violence is bad though, and when protests become violent, they turn into riots, and that's no good for anyone. The message gets lost in a mist of fear, fire and smoke.
But before everyone gets all angry at the kiddos who are doing this, remember that electing Trump for president was not the will of the people. It's the will of the Electoral College. And remember that these kids have no other outlet to show their frustration. As far as most as concerned, they couldn't vote for their president because they're too young, and now they're stuck with one that will probably do more damage than they'll be able to fix well after Trump leaves office. ... Also, remember all the Republican supporters who promised to do exactly this, but vowed to bring their guns and whatnot, too?
There was a protest at Arizona State University today, and had I been in school, I would have joined. Also, I would have voted. My irritation is that if any of these protesting kids could have voted, but didn't vote, they've got no place in the protest. It's like my mom always said, "If you feel bad, but haven't taken anything for the pain or sick, you can't complain." In essence, don't whine if you haven't done your part to make it feel better.
Those protests should be for the Hillary voters who are dissatisfied with their candidate winning the country's popular vote, but losing the Electoral College. They're for those who wish to stand in solidarity with the minority groups that will be facing a very rough road for the next several years, because their vote wasn't enough to help protect them from prejudice and evil. They're for the people who feel so helpless and frustrated that they just want to go for a walk with like-minded humans.
Protests are a good thing. Keep them that way.

Lost potential, but a road has been paved

So let's talk for a moment about the lost promise of our first female president.
I remember, perfectly, blogging several years ago about my wanting to see a female president at some point in my life. I had thought, just a few days ago, that I may be able to see such a thing while in my relative youth. As well as that, I was in love with the thought of my daughter not knowing that a president couldn't be African American or a woman. Up until eight years ago, presidents had been only two things: white and male. Now one has been not white.
But hey, look at that, now the president is going to both of those things again.
I cried during Hillary's concession speech. Me and almost every other woman who had hoped she'd be our champion in the White House. Sydney was touched by it and cried with me, as I had hoped she would. And when Hillary asked for the attention of the little girls who looked up to her, my daughter sat up straight, and listened to her. I was so proud of her for that. And I cried even more. (Let's not mention the dismay over how the statement about young girls knowing that they are valued and powerful needed to be said at all. Because they shouldn't ever have to be reminded of that. Ever. That should be a given not to be questioned.)
But when I think about it in a more abstract way, it was a matter of 12 years or whatever ago when I wondered if I would ever see a woman president. And a mere 12 years or whatever later, I almost did. I plan on living for quite some time more, and if we can get this close in 12 years, perhaps we can actually achieve it within the next 30 or 40 or 50 years.
I'm in mourning for the potential that was lost a couple days ago. And I hope that someday, I will be able to vote in a woman president. (This assumes that the first female president will be a Democrat, because, well, you know. Duh.) The ultimate glass ceiling has yet to be shattered, but someday, it will be. And again, I hope I'm there to see it.

Gonna tackle this in parts, I think

I'm stunned, you guys. Like, straight stunned.
Who in their right mind would have thought that that man would ever become the president? Like, for real, become the president? All the polls were wrong, all the people who talked to the pollsters lied (or didn't have phones), and the data was off to a dramatic degree. I have to think that if the people who had planned to vote for Trump felt like they had to lie to perpetrate some kind of grand political coup, then they knew what they were doing was intrinsically fucked up.
And those people deserve the results of this election. What they're going to discover is that their new president won't be able to deliver on the bigger promises that they think mean the most to them. He won't bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States, because workers in the United States are too expensive to employ. He won't build some ridiculous wall along the southern border of the country because that is a ridiculous expense that no president would want to undertake. He won't be able to stop terrorism or anything like that, because if it could be stopped, it would have been already.
What he will be able to do is gut the Affordable Care Act. And he'll be able to "fix" agreements around the world that have been made with allies and not-so allies. He'll be able to destroy the economy by increasing the already crazy deficit, and he'll be able to destroy the environment by ignoring science. He'll be able to turn this country into a joke, and take away all our credibility in any and all arenas. As I say it, it all sounds pretty horrible.
And it may be, but it may not be. As Seth Meyers said tonight, we know that the president-elect has been on both sides of all issues, so his actual decisions or leanings may be, I say diplomatically, in flux. He's probably sharting himself all day today because he didn't really think he was going to win. I doubt he even wants the job, because really, it pays less than he was getting; his income will be public knowledge; and he won't be able to put his name on the White House. I kept waiting for him to yell "Cut," and then "Scene," and then walk away with an entire season of the reality show, American Horror Story: White House.