US Election 2016: 'What Flavor Do You Like Your Disaster'?

Today is the day people of the United States determine whether Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump or Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton will become the next president, both of them the least popular nominees in history, according to some reports.

In a Sunday editorial, The New York Times referred to the possibility of a Donald Trump presidency as a "catastrophe." Ted Rall, editorial cartoonist, columnist, and author of "Trump: A Graphic Biography," told Radio Sputnik's Brian Becker that the newspaper's choice of words and the general concern with Trump among large financial, corporate, and social organizations was no surprise.

"It's not surprising that they would feel that way. Markets like stability, lead institutions like stability," he explained. "And Donald Trump — the one thing he doesn't seem to be or to offer is a lot of stability. He is by his own account a ‘change agent'."

Rall added that a Trump presidency would be catastrophic in many ways.

"But what's left silent in that editorial is the effect of continuing a third term of Barack Obama, which is surely what we would see under Hillary Clinton," he suggested.

According to Rall, Clinton will not do better. Most likely an America under Clinton would see a further diminishing of living standards for the middle and working classes, a continuation of the endless expansionist wars in the Middle East, no end to the ongoing drone war, and further economic policies that have been economically disastrous.

"It's kind of a question of ‘What flavor do you like your disaster?'" Rall said.  

Even with a Clinton win, he added, the world will know that Trump very nearly won, and that well over 40 percent of the American public voted for him for a reason.

"There's one thing I like about Donald Trump's candidacy. It…exposes the fact that so much of the American electorate is so far to the right and espouses such disgusting views. I think it's important for the world to confront that, and I think it's important for the US to confront that," he said.

"And if anything good were to come out of Donald Trump presidential win it would be the fact that this country doesn't get to pat itself on the back and say ‘Look, we fended off this terrible threat and we elected someone who is our first woman President, and look at us after the first black President, look at how progressive and liberal and awesome we are.'"

The 2016 election process has greatly impacted how the United States is viewed internationally, revealing many previously hidden flaws in its political system, Rall believes.

Both candidates have suggested that the election process is not completely fair. Trump has repeatedly referred to US elections as "rigged," and urged for the judicial system to "lock up" Clinton. Clinton has called the mogul a puppet of Russian president Vladimir Putin, and accused Russia of trying to influence the election.

"It is a little bit hard for the United States to tell other countries what they should be doing when they can't manage to run an election that is viewed by its own citizens, or for that matter by its own presidential nominees, as being free and fair," he said.