Obama has been re-elected. Given the hyperbole and highly emotional rhetoric of the election, it is hard to imagine that the U.S. is anything but slightly more divided than before, with the gaps and divisions widening more and more as time goes on.
The real tragedy in this story is that virtually none of the really big and important issues were even touched in this election cycle. One party pointed to how much they managed to increase military spending while the other promised to exceed even that. One side said they'd promote even faster drilling and extraction of our dwindling energy reserves and the other promised they could do it even faster. Both said they wanted more growth and more jobs and more, more, more.
Neither said why or where, exactly, any of this would be taking us. Nobody had a compelling vision of where they'd like the country to be in 20 or 30 years and how we would get there.
That, of course, is the very essence of good strategy, just those two pieces – knowing where you want to go (the vision) and how you are going to get there (the resources). If the election seemed full of stuff but free of substance, it's because a compelling vision of the future was almost entirely lacking beyond a promise to preserve the status quo.
More and more people now realize that not only is preserving the status quo impossible, it is likely to be destructive. Sooner or later that strategy ends very badly.
Here's how I see things unfolding:
The Economy
The fiscal cliff is now very much in play. This is simply a very onerous combination of tax hikes and spending cuts that, if enacted, will plunge the U.S. into recession. As always, it's important to recall that our financial system does pretty well when expanding but threatens complete breakdown when headed in reverse. Call it a 'feature' of the system.
My suspicion is that the toxic environment following the election will leave the parties unable to come to any sort of agreement before December 31, 2012, which is when the fiscal cliff will automatically get triggered.
Couple this dynamic with steadily worsening economic news out of Europe and Asia, and you've got a brand-new 2008 crisis all over again, only this time with frayed nerves and a looming sense that this cannot be fixed with the painless magic of thin-air money.
by cmartenson 
