Concerning the election, a few next-day observations:

1) It is not hyperbole or simple rhetorical flourish to say President-elect Donald Trump’s victory represents the greatest political comeback in American history. He joins Grover Cleveland as only the second president to lose re-election and then regain the White House. Trump’s remarkable political resiliency, whatever you think of the man, is something truly extraordinary. He performed better than he did not only in 2020, but in 2016.

2) We seem to say this every election now, for at least the past decade or so, but the political profession has still not seemed to be able to get a handle on how to conduct polling. Polls had the race as essentially tied, with perhaps a slight edge for Vice President Kamala Harris. That was not the case.

3) Trump and his supporters are due their victory lap, but the election was far less about votes for Trump than against Harris. It was a wholesale repudiation of the last four years, of progressive polices and what they sowed — inflation, the crumbling of American credibility and deterrence overseas, the insecurity at the border, the ascent of identity politics, the palpable increase in crime, and so on and so on. Both candidates were obviously deeply flawed, but the voter’s intuition judged Harris’ to be ultimately more dangerous.

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4) At the time of this writing it appears Trump has soundly won the popular vote. That is essentially meaningless, given the American system of electing presidents is specifically designed to serve as a check on the democratic supremacy of population centers and to ensure a proportional voice for every state — except in so far as it offers an ego boost to the winner, and to those who have campaigned so vigorously over the years to redesign the system. May they now be tempered in their enthusiasm for plebiscitary revolution, at least for a few more years.

5) It is still too early to say for certain which party will control the House, but Republicans already have a slim, but solid, majority in the Senate, with a few more seats likely to tilt their way (Montana, Nevada, e.g.). It seems similarly likely the GOP will retain its majority in the House as well. This will make it considerably easier to pass conservative legislation and pave the way for nominees, of course; but it also means critical institutions will remain intact — the very real threat of a politicized U.S. Supreme Court and abolition of the filibuster were on the line, albeit somewhat in the background.

6) The economy, as usual, played an important role in the election results. The Harris campaign, and her allies in the media, made a great deal about some of the numbers improving, and saying inflation was down; but this is on the order of pointing out a reduction in the number of volcano-related deaths in Pompeii a year after Vesuvius erupted. The damage had been done, with the gratuitous spending on Biden-Harris’ watch, and Americans are still feeling the effects.

7) After his victory lap, president-elect-again Trump will need to figure out how to govern. Nostalgic as many are for his first term, it was not all success — and the biggest successes were generally the work of good advisors. Some good things could come of this new administration — if he appoints good people, not mere sycophants. Conservatives can breathe a sigh of relief, but it is now our duty to hold the president accountable — not only to follow through on things like the border, extending the tax cuts and rebuilding the military, but to urge restraint against his more liberal instincts on trade and a robust, realistic foreign policy.

8) Here locally in Colorado, the story seems to be of schizophrenic voting tendencies and the inapplicability of logic. In some ways Colorado was an outlier to the rest of the country — except Trump did better here than he did in 2020. U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert’s district-shift gamble paid off, but she lost in Douglas County, and her Democratic opponent did far better than any has in recent memory on that district. In the legislature, it seems essentially status-quo — the Senate Republicans held to 12, denying the Democrats a super majority, and House Republicans appear to have limited their expected pick-ups to one, although a few races remain to close to call.

But here too are the unexplainable anomalies; in Colorado Springs, for instance, the numbers suggest a substantial number of people who voted for Donald Trump and Jeff Crank also voted for far-left Stephanie Vigil. On ballot measures voters were all over place, voting for tough-on-crime measures and against animal-rights extremism — but also for a gun tax and against school choice.

Chalk it up to democracy being a messy business, and, as Churchill said, the worst form of government, except for all the rest.

Kelly Sloan is a political and public affairs consultant and a recovering journalist based in Denver.