With Donald J. Trump's arrival to power, many feel astonished by the growth of populism. Others analyze with extreme care the decline of companies that measure public opinion. I am saddened to watch the lack of temperament and political stability of those who 'represent' a trend or ideology.

The truth is that for a Democrat to triumph in a presidential election, it needs to come on the heels of 'the dark times' of an unpopular Republican administration. Carter followed the Nixon era, Clinton succeeded after 12 years of Reagan/Bush, and Obama was a direct result of eight years of Bush/Cheney.

Kennedy was like a rock star. Carter was the earnest outsider at the height of Washington cynicism. Clinton was a bad boy who proposed his 'third way' of Democratic politics, and Obama brought hope and change to a country that so desperately needed it.

The very phrase 'Make America great again' implies some kind of reset to a time long since passed. A mission to restore America to a previous default setting where American economic superiority was without peer, factories and manufacturing plants were humming, and jobs were plentiful for anyone who wanted one.

There are signs jobs will be plentiful in the future, if we train and prepare for it. That means investing in technology, innovation, and, as much as Republicans will hate to hear this, renewable energy.

The study titled 'Impact of Immigration on Wages, by Education Level, 1994-2007' found that increased immigration had an effect of lowering wages for earlier immigrants by an average of 4.6 percent. Running counter to popular perception is the finding that for native-born Americans, wages actually increased by 0.6 percent.

One way to quantify the immigrant contribution to the overall economy is to measure their share of the U.S. economic output. One such examination for the years 2009-2011 found that immigrants contributed 14.7 percent of the total economic output.

Cuban Americans have little in common with immigrants from Mexico and Central America, and often their priorities don't align. If it seems like Cuban Americans don't have to play by the same rules as everyone else, that's probably because they don't.

If you're an independent voter, I'm willing to bet that you were not too happy at the prospect of hitting the polls on November 8, 2016. But let me guess - you did it anyway because after all, it's your civic duty, right?

If the 2016 election is any indication, every four years, millions more Americans will continue backing away from their own parties to choose a third party instead.

As a small business owner myself, I talk to so many other business owners who delay seasonal hiring by waiting until the last minute to make their temporary hires.

Historically, there hasn't been a significant correlation between gold prices and U.S. elections. Furthermore, history has shown that gold prices tend to fall just before U.S. elections and rise immediately after, and this goes on until the next election.

Investing in gold is one of the wisest decisions that you can make as an investor.

In most countries, a lopsided election represents a mandate that the winning party could then use to implement their agenda, but the U.S. political system seems to have been made to prevent such an occurrence.

Sure, if you're a well to do family, you always have the option of sending your children to private schools where teachers spend less time disciplining kids and more time teaching them. However, this option is beyond the reach of most households. And this is what makes school vouchers such a promising solution for lower and middle income families.

Trump is more conservative on individual rights, domestic issues, economic issues and defense. On the other hand, Clinton is quite liberal and wishes to open the borders for more trades and more immigrants.

Derogatory against women - it seems that Trump is not too keen about having women around him, maybe except for his wife and daughter.

No connection to the average voter - Clinton has an air of superiority. Despite her wide smile and pleasant appearance, she is envisioned as someone who is trying to hide something all the time.

Trump wants to build a wall at the border of Mexico, while Clinton wants to tear down all walls.

Social media has changed our lives forever. Some continue to reject social media, refusing to become one of the sheep, but you just can't avoid it.

A 2014 study commissioned by Facebook and done by Deloitte suggests that Facebook alone contributes almost $150 billion directly to the global economy, and when you add the peripherals, it nears $227 billion.

Microsoft, Disney, Ford, Facebook, and a hundreds and thousands of other companies that affect us daily all began life as baby companies, aka start-ups.

A writers' ring is where a group of four or five authors agree to promote each other's work on their own websites and via their social media outlets such as Facebook and Twitter.

In 1960, John F. Kennedy rode a superior televised debate performance to victory over Richard Nixon.

As a real estate investor, you're ultimately accountable to you and your checkbook. Of course, you will need to stay on top of your local coding regulations and ordinances. But once you get the hang of it, you really shouldn't have any problems with ordinances.

Getting into the residential investment business entails lots of renovation work.

Real estate investing is unique in that it's almost as much a career or a way of life as it is a form of investing. Indeed, the fact that real estate is involves so much sweat equity makes it unique among other investments.

The business side of real estate investing is fraught with risk. Unlike purchasing mutual funds or savings bonds, with real estate, you can lose money; this is one of the reasons that seasoned real estate investors caution neophytes never to get too emotional about a property and always be willing to walk away.

Every entrepreneur knows how agonizingly difficult it is to make the decision to give it your all, knowing that failure is inevitable; the successful ones know that the only way to get back up is through learning from that failure.

There are a whole host of psychological phenomenon humans have developed to protect ourselves from the sting of failure, from holding ourselves less accountable for our failures than we do other people, to letting our fear paralyze us and keep us from even trying.

Before you start a business, careful planning is in order to obtain to where you ought to be. The biggest part is to ensure that, once you might have created your own plan, that you simply take motion. Without motion, you are unable to succeed.

The best part of owning a blog is the fact that you are in control. You can write about anything you want to write about. You can decide how your blog looks. You can decide who to target. You can decide how to monetize the blog. You have full control!

Many people decide to jump from niche to niche, as they cannot find success immediately with the niche that they have chosen for their online business.

When you are starting to run an online business, you need to narrow down a niche market and be able to stick with it until you have a good profit coming in. This can take a while, so you need to have a great deal of patience to make sure that your business is moving in the right direction.

It is incredibly important to set goals for your business, as if you have no direction for your business, your online business will be a failure.

Carrie Underwood was just a small-town Oklahoma girl with big dreams in 2005 when she competed on the fourth season of 'American Idol.' She is one of the few true 'American Idol' success stories and went on to have incredible career success.

Cash flow is a problem for a small and developing company, and the lack of it is the reason why many small businesses fail. Ensure that you have enough money in your bank account to make you able to carry out daily basic needs for your business.

The first aspect of a business that you need to make it work well is money. Once the money aspect is flowing, you can freely work on other aspects.

Almost anything worth doing involves some measure of risk - from learning to ride a bike, moving to a new city, and certainly, starting your own business. The point is that no one has ever started a business or created a new product with a guarantee of success.

Many people dream about being an entrepreneur, starting their own business, working for themselves, and living the good life. Very few, however, will actually take the plunge and put everything they've got into being their own boss.

The economic costs of starting your own business can be significant; in fact, most new startup companies fail because of undercapitalization.

Being an entrepreneur does, of course, give you greater freedom than someone who is tied to a fixed work schedule, but you'd be mistaken to think that you're going to have it easier than your 9-5 counterparts.

Starting a new business will take its toll on your time and energy, and this can place strain on family and social relationships, depending on their expectations and how open you are in your communication with them.

I grew and learned, journeyed and understood, that someone who is afraid of failing won't get anywhere, and someone who dares to do it runs the risk of failure if they don't learn, correct their mistakes, and get back up.

Relying on someone else to be successful only ties you down and limits you.

The day you decide to pursue your dreams, don't forget that this is a game you don't enter to compete, but to win. And there will always be someone booing you in the stands, and everything you accomplish could be jeered and hissed at. This is a game between two that you have to win for the people who came to watch you be triumphant.

Anyone who is afraid to lose isn't ready to win.