By Cameron Pierre-Pierre
When I think of the President of the United States, I imagine a larger than life figure. This individual holds the most important office in the country, and arguably the world. He or she has control over our military and nuclear arsenal. Of all of the responsibilities of the president, there is one unspoken role that is essential to the success of the chief executive, and that is to unite the people of our country. Right now, I am having difficulty seeing the candidate in our election cycle that could unite us as a people.
Donald Trump to start off is an incredibly polarizing and divisive figure. From the outset of his bid for the Republican nomination “The Donald” has made inflammatory statements about Mexicans and Mexican immigrants, Muslims, people with disabilities and found himself unable to disavow the Klu Klux Klan– the embodiment of American white supremacy. He has made disparaging comments about women, made outrageous promises about a wall on the southern border that somehow Mexico will pay for, and blames every country he can for the problems in our country. I could go on forever about all of the things Trump has done in the past 11 months but there is no point. The fact of the matter is that Trump has in some way upset, enraged, and offended so many people in this county that the idea of him unifying the people of the United States is about as likely as Mexico paying for a border wall.
Hillary Clinton is not in a much better position than Trump to unite the country. That is not to say that I think she is a bigoted xenophobe, because I don’t think that. The problem with Clinton is that not only do many people on the right wing distrust and dislike her; there are plenty of people on the left who feel the same way, albeit for somewhat different reasons. Many criticize her for her performance as Secretary of State, and how she handled the Benghazi attacks. Other sources of criticism stem from her email scandal. Others criticize her for taking donations from big business interests, which is not something unique to her, but particularly unacceptable to many liberal voters this election cycle.