Approximately 305 days ago, I published a story that mocked the hilarious state of 2016 Presidential Primary Election and its various candidates, and now, as many had feared back then, the only two candidates that remain with a feasible chance of winning the election are GOP nominee Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. No one’s laughing anymore: so, as opposed to writing another satire piece on the remaining candidates, we are going to take a legitimate look at what the next four to eight years could look like for the United States’ executive branch.

Let’s start with our Republican “friend,” Trump. Since June 2016, Trump has managed to say enough (honestly, countless) numb-skulled, half-baked, idiotic things that people have made lists of the “best” of them, and even a technicolor slideshow of those things. But in the shadow of all of the hateful comments, his positions on the key issues of this election have been glazed over without hardly batting an eye.

The policies that one of Trump’s employees rather obviously wrote were really quite terrifying for a copious number of reasons. Trump’s platform revolves around typical conservative ideals: increased jobs through an unregulated free market, reduced taxes for American citizens, increased war on terrorism–in this case, ISIS–and gun ownership rights for all under the second amendment of the Constitution.

The biggest and most distinguishing idea of his campaign is his immigration policies. First and foremost, Trump has, on multiple occasions, defended the idea that racial profiling of immigrants is an effective way to prevent terrorists from entering the country and has specifically pegged Middle Eastern people. But that is not the most ridiculous idea of his policy. Most of you are familiar with the infamous wall (if you are not, this is a good explanation but beware: it is mildly profane). The wall lining the U.S.-Mexico border will be implemented “on Day One” according to Trump, and “Mexico will pay for it,” regardless of the fact that the Mexican government and its President have refused multiple times over. And yet, Trump has not supplied a legitimate plan to pay for any of his campaign promises, implying a deeper debt on top of the already daunting $19 trillion of debt. But aside from all of the wonderful things Trump has said, done and says he will do, he still legitimately remains in the running for President of the United States.

Now for his competition. In an attempt to research Clinton’s stance on issues, I was greeted with a prompt (and various others with subsequent visits to her website) to “help keep Donald Trump out of the White House” and to “receive texts from Hillary” because “Donald Trump is temperamentally unfit for the presidency.” While Clinton’s website may have valid points in its campaign prompts, digging through her 41 positions on the major issues surrounding this election was mind-bogglingly boring. Whether it be an increased minimum wage, equal market opportunity, social justice, environmental issues or physical disabilities, Clinton’s campaign focus is “leveling the playing field” in every single aspect of life by increasing government intervention with legislation, tax hikes and social programming.

I’ve always found the overprotective-parent style of government appalling, but the part of Clinton’s campaign I find most difficult to stomach is the fact that she is not consistent, period. All of the statements she makes or positions she takes can be refuted with things she has said or done in the past and present: she does not stay with them. Her statements are entirely based on what the American people want to hear (if you don’t believe me, see this video). The issue with the Clinton campaign is that if we don’t know what Clinton will actually do, if her positions are not solidified in any way whatsoever, then there is no definite way of knowing what will happen if she takes office; at least the public has a vague idea of what Trump plans on doing in his presidency. When it comes to issues such as ISIS, social equality, global trade or any other huge issues today, it would be better to have someone in charge who is making decisions with their own conscious mind, regardless of how idiotic they may be, over someone who would make decisions as a puppet of the people.  

I’m not gonna say ‘vote for Trump’ or ‘vote for Clinton’ because that’s not what I’m here to do; I’m here to paint a realistic picture of who legitimately remains in the race for the presidency. What needs to be remembered is that the responsibility of choosing who goes to office to represent the American people is ours to make and ours alone. It is a disappointing reality that Trump and Clinton are the two people that we have chosen as a country to represent us in office, but it’s what’s happened and it remains up to us to decide which of them wins.

If you as a person are just completely against the idea of any current candidate making it to the White House, check out this alternate: a “demo-cat” named McCubbins.

A constantly updated electoral/popular vote map for the 2016 election.