9 November 2016 may be the saddest day of my life. It was far worse than 11 November 1975. It was the day the Great Republic failed.
I mention only two things now.
First, the German people never gave Adolf Hitler 50% of the vote in an electoral contest. (The plebiscites are too silly to mention.)
Secondly, H L Mencken understood our weakness.
No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby…..The mistake that is made always runs the other way. Because the plain people are able to speak and understand, and even, in many cases, to read and write, it is assumed that they have ideas in their heads, and an appetite for more. This assumption is a folly.
With Compliments 
It was the very worst day of my life.
Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.
It exacerbated a bout of depression which was just gaining a head of steam in me.
Now, 2 weeks later, the horror of Trumpdom is taking tangible shape in the sort of human dross he is appointing.
The best we can hope is that t will teach the US and the world a salutary lesson. But will it ?
I’m sure you can draw on history, Geoff, to answer that question.