I
had an epiphany recently as Donald Trump carried on a five-day Twitter attack against the mother and father of a US Muslim serviceman killed in combat: The election is over; Trump has lost; no need to read any more prognosticators. Not only am I liberated but so dear reader are you from any more election articles after this one.
Following the Republican convention FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver gave Trump a 55 percent chance of winning. Had Trump gone on a two-week vacation afterClevelandand shut down his Twitter account he’d likely be in the same position today.
All he had to do was convince the electorate that he has the minimal emotional stability to be president: he failed. No doubt every advisor including Ivanka shouted at him not to attack a Gold Star family and to drop the imbroglio with the Khans. But he could not.
LET NO ONE CONCLUDE however that I am resigned with equanimity to Hillary Clinton’s election. “The evil that men do lives after them” says Shakespeare’s Mark Antony and the negative impact ofClinton’s Supreme Court appointments will remain long after she is gone. We are only one or two Supreme Court decisions away from it becoming impossible for Orthodox Jews to maintain our internal communal structure — i.e. determine behavioral standards for admission to our yeshivos and seminaries or for those who teach our children. Hillary’s appointments could put us over the brink.
