By Arun Kumar
Washington, Dec 24 (IANS) They came, they saw and they stamped their approval of Donald Trump as the next President of the United States.And with that came crashing down a third time Hillary Clinton's pipedream of shattering the highest glass ceiling to enter the White House by means fair or foul.
The vanquished Democrat, who before the election was "horrified" at the billionaire's unwillingness to readily accept the results, first used a third party candidate as a cat's paw to seek a recount in three swing states.
When that came a cropper with Trump in fact gaining 131 votes in Wisconsin, her campaign made a desperate attempt to foment a revolt among Republicans in the Electoral College designed to strike a balance between big and small states.
Though Clinton polled 2.9 million more total votes, Trump decisively won the presidency with 306 to 232 electoral votes - 36 more than the magic figure of 270 -- with victories in 30 of the 50 states.
Yet raising the 'win' in popular votes and the bogey of what Trump dismissed as CIA's "ridiculous" charge of Russian interference to help the mogul, the Clinton campaign egged the Republican electors to go "faithless."
They were flooded with emails and telephone calls cajoling them to go rogue. Some were threatened and anti-Trump protesters demonstrated outside the legislatures of several states as 538 electors gathered in the capitals for Monday's crucial vote.
Yet just two Republican electors, both from Texas, voted against Trump. And it was Clinton who lost five electoral votes, while officials prevented three others from going "faithless". In the end Trump won with a larger 304-227 margin.
But like her, hubby Bill Clinton persisted in blaming the FBI director. "James Comey cost her the election," by reopening the probe into her use of a private email server as America's top diplomat eleven days before the election, Clinton insinuated.
The former president too like his wife ignored the fact that Comey was forced to reopen the can of worms when thousands of Clinton emails were found on the laptop of her desi aide Huma Abedin's husband being investigated in a sexting scandal.
Only Vice President Joe Biden was honest enough to "look in the mirror" as he acknowledged in an interview with the Los Angeles Times: "When I saw a Trump rally in October, I said, 'Son of a gun - we may lose this election.'"
To compound matters, Bill Clinton suggested Trump "doesn't know much." But "One thing he does know is how to get angry white men to vote for him."
The billionaire hit back swiftly with his favourite weapon, a tweet. Bill Clinton "doesn't know much especially how to get people, even with an unlimited budget, out to vote in the vital swing states (and more). They focused on wrong states."
Nor did Trump spare his pet peeve, the "dishonest media," as he calls them. "We did it! Thank you to all of my great supporters, we just officially won the election (despite all of the distorted and inaccurate media)."
And on every stop of his "Thank-You" America tour, Trump relived again and again his stunning victory on November 8.
"You want to hear about election night?" Trump asked the packed auditorium in Wisconsin. As the crowd responded with a resounding "yes," Trump recalled how liberal pundits and polls were cocksure he had no chance.
"And then it happened, out of nowhere, and oh boy, they were getting sick, the map was bing, bing, bing, boy that map was getting (Republican) red as hell, that map was bleeding red," he said savouring every morsel as the crowd went nuts.
Meanwhile, after one of the most divisive elections in history, differences in how Democrats and Republicans shop have sharpened, according to a Washington Post report.
If Republicans are boycotting "liberal" Frosted Flakes after cereal maker Kellogg stopped advertising on right-leaning news site Breitbart, Democrats are shunning Yuengling beer since its owner came out in support of Trump.
Citing a recent survey by the advertising technology company Viant, Post also noted that Democrats are 97 percent more likely to watch scary movies, while Republicans watch 68 percent more romantic comedies.
No wonder, Hillary and her supporters keep revisiting the horror of election night as the Pied Piper of Manhattan leads his followers on a journey "To make America Great Again!"
(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)
