Storm Clouds and Silver Linings

I know I'm not alone in saying that I was pretty invested in the recent Presidential election. Many people, from both sides of the aisle, were all in on this one. Emotionally, spiritually, financially, you name it. It really felt as if this was "the big game" and my team came out flatter than a pancake. My disappointment spans a few thresholds. I was really hoping for Romney to take office and come in wielding a big deficit cutting sword. Not a surgical blade that would neatly slice off a few pieces of fat and put smiles on the deficit hawk's faces, but something that would have taken wide swaths of waste and duplication and lopped them off. We won't fully feel, or understand the effects of Obamacare for a few more years. Once everything that's known, and some of the unknown, begin to reshape our health care benefit landscape, it'll be too late. Employers dumping benefits onto the government, work weeks being cut to 29 hours, innocent (and healthy) people being fined for not having government mandated coverage. These are scary propositions people! Enough of the storm clouds, how 'bout some silver linings? Well, at least here in Wisconsin, we seem to be able to acknowledge what seems to be working for us (deficit-wise). Although we seem to be pretty schizophrenic voters (we elected Scott Walker TWICE in eighteen months and sent crazy Tammy Baldwin to the Senate?) we've still managed to capture Republican majorities in both the State Assembly and Senate. I know, Wisconsin also tipped for Obama, again. That's what I mean by schizophrenic. So our voting tendencies may not be an easy call from outside looking in, but we are managing to keep our own house in order and bring our state's budget back down to Earth. Barring any Senate Democrats fleeing to Illinois, we should be able to concentrate on a conservative agenda for the foreseeable future. That is, until our elected officials actually legislate something some person or group disagrees with and wind up having to go back into campaign mode to fend off another round of recalls. You have to squint and look very closely, but behind the storm clouds a silver lining is straining to be seen. Don't stop looking.