It is 9:14 P.M. Mountain Standard Time on election day November 6, 2012 as I begin typing, and the announcement just came that Ohio will cast its electoral votes for President Obama. That virtually guarantees that President Obama has won reelection. What next?

I expect that Republicans will be quite critical of themselves and Mitt Romney’s campaign strategy. They will ask why he did not mention Libya in the foreign policy debate when there was ample evidence that the Obama administration bungled the security for the consulate by responding to requests for additional security by reducing the number of security agents. They then covered up the terrorist attack that resulted in the death of the ambassador and three other Americans by repeatedly claiming the attack resulted from a spontaneous demonstration. The only reason to cover up the truth was that the facts would be embarrassing to the administration. The focus was protecting President Obama’s chances for reelection, and the facts of what resulted in the four dead Americans might have been “problematic.”  The cover story succeeded because Mr. Romney did not make it an issue.

On a societal note, I find it distressing that we have reelected a president whose campaign was almost exclusively based on advocating that people who earn more should be taxed at higher rates. His campaign worked despite the flaw that it won’t work. Wealthy people already pay most of the taxes, and even if you take all of their money it won’t solve the budget deficit. The only way to control the deficit is to staunch the government thirst for more and more spending while getting out of the way of economic development. Economic development is the key. Romney’s approach would have encouraged entrepreneurs to develop businesses, the business would pay taxes, the employees would pay taxes, and the government would have more income. The majority of voters went with the guy who promised to raise taxes on people other than themselves.

So what is next? I guess we will learn what President Obama wants to do on foreign policy. He was caught on open microphone telling the Russians, “After the election I can be more flexible.” I assume he is planning something that he did not want to reveal before the election and that we will now learn what he intends to concede. I am also curious whether the media will now begin to dig into the scandal of the underreported terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi Libya now that Mr. Obama has been safely reelected.

The most important immediate questions will be whether government can function with the House controlled by Republicans and the Senate and White House controlled by the Democrats. Will President Obama “move to the middle to govern” to build his legacy, or will he continue to follow his ideology? I predict the latter.

Failure to do something about renewing the “Bush tax cuts” will surprise many people, because all earners and not just the higher earners will have rates increase. Looming mandatory cuts in defense spending will push thousands of defense workers onto unemployment. The stock market seems to be betting there is uncertainty that our politicians will be able to work together to prevent the country from falling off what is called the fiscal cliff.

Time will tell what the politicians have in store for us. I don’t feel very optimistic that bipartisanship is about to break out under the leadership of President Obama.