There, there, it’s alright
People of Boulder, we know these first few days after the election have been tough; the poo really hit the fan, didn’t it? We’ve used other pages in the paper to address the very real concerns many people have with a Trump presidency, so we want to spill a bit of ink here to highlight some of the good things that happened while we were collectively losing our minds over the election of Donald J. Trump.
• Though Hillary Clinton may not have gotten her chance to shatter the glass ceiling as the first female president of the United States, the election still represented some big wins for women. Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada became the first Latina elected to the U.S. Senate.
• Ilhan Omar of Minnesota became the first Somali-American Muslim legislator in the House of Representatives.
• California Attorney General Kamala Harris became the first black woman in more than two decades to be elected to the U.S. Senate.
• Iraq War veteran Tammy Duckworth took Barack Obama’s former seat in the Illinois Senate. She is only the second woman to hold an Illinois Senate seat.
• Kate Brown became the nation’s first openly LGBT governor in Oregon. While New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey came out in 2004, he was already in office.
• North Carolina ousted Governor Pat McCory, the human piece of garbage best known for asking folks to show their birth certificates before entering restrooms in the Tarheel State.
• California, Massachusetts, Maine and Nevada voted to legalize recreational pot use, and Arkansas, Florida, Montana and North Dakota approved the use of medicinal marijuana.
• Minimum wage increased in a number of states. Arizona, Colorado, Maine and Washington have all agreed to raise their state’s minimum wage. Wages in Colorado will go up from $8.31 to $12 by 2020.
We’ve survived hard times before. All hope isn’t lost.
