"I am a pessimist because of intelligence; I am an optimist because of will." - A. Gramsci

If you haven't heard, then you haven't been paying attention. And if you aren't furious, then you really haven't been paying attention. November 9, 2016, is the day the world stood still. Americans elected Donald J. Trump as the new President of the United States. A man who, less than 24 hours ago, had his twitter password taken away from him because his campaign team was so afraid that he would say something to blow his chances at winning. A man who, in December, will be on trial for allegedly raping a child. A man who wants to deport over 11 million people, build a giant wall and have Mexico pay for it, and to completely abolish an entire religion. He treats women like they are sexual objects that are only good for men to use. He wants to tax the middle class into oblivion and repeal every law that the LGBTQ+ community has spent the past decade openly fighting for. His VP, Mike Pence, openly supports gay conversion therapy and tried to pass a law in his home state, Indiana, saying that any woman who had an abortion, no matter the circumstances, would have to pay out of pocket to have a funeral or cremation for the fetus. Together, they make up the most radical right-wing team that America has arguably ever seen.

I'm just as afraid as the next guy. As a woman, my rights are at stake here. But I'm not the only one affected by this. My Muslim friends. My black friends. My friends who come from immigrant families. They are at home today sobbing in fear of what these next few years have for them. I went through the same thing last night. I cried out of fear and anger. How could Americans be so fucking careless? How could this happen? And that's just it. It was carelessness that got us here. It was a race of corruption vs. hate. And in the end, hate won.

For the next few months, people will try to flee the country and get as far away as possible. If I were graduating in May, I'd be doing the same thing. All thoughts of hope were lost in my head last night. There is nothing left for humanity. I took a 30-minute nap last night and woke up to go work out today. When I was on the treadmill, I tried to think positively and, to my surprise, I ended up thinking rationally.

First of all, Trump has no plan. He has a platform of ideas that he could embellish on if he had any knowledge of how our political system works. That thought made me laugh out loud. In fact, Donald Trump is not a politician. He has no background knowledge of anything beyond the basic level of business. He doesn't know his way around an office. And he's already changed his entire plan, what he built a lot of his platform on: repealing Obamacare. His plan now includes keeping Obamacare but making minor changes to it.

Secondly, he is going to court in December for fraud committed by Trump University (a scam in and of itself). If indicted, he will lose his elect-presidency and face prison time as well as millions of dollars in fines. Fortunately, this court date takes place before the Electoral College formally votes, but I'll get to that in my third point. What comes next would put his elect-VP in power: Mike Pence. Statistics have shown that nobody likes Mike Pence. And as someone living in Indiana, I concur. This brings me to my final point of hope:

The Electoral College. They vote on December 19th. There are 166 electoral votes that have yet to be formally accounted for. 100 of those are in states which are allowed to change their votes from the way the college voted to the popular vote. Hillary Clinton won the popular vote. 38 of those need to change their votes to the popular vote in order for Clinton to take the presidency. If Trump is indicted for fraud, Pence will take the elect-presidency. And like I said before, nobody likes Pence. A recently study showed that if Pence were to be the one on the ballot for the electoral college, they would vote against him. BECAUSE NOBODY LIKES HIM. Seriously though. He's awful. But if he was the one on the ballot, the college would change to Clinton.

I know most of this is a long shot, but any sliver of hope right now is worth it. If we only counted millennial votes, the States would be bleeding blue. That means that even if the next four years suck, we have a future to look forward to. Plus, Bernie Sanders said he is, if still in good health, going to run for president again in 2020. And that's enough hope for me.