The way I see things, I figure we’ve got a couple more months of Democratic infighting and finger-pointing, and by then Obama will be gone and Trump and the Republicans will be in charge of everything, and then we can start organizing in earnest.
The honest truth of the matter is that nothing is really going to happen until a shitload of white people who didn’t realize how many government benefits they got experience a fuckload of pain. When Medicare is gutted, they fuck with SS, and all the other shit they take for granted, they’ll get furious and… blame Democrats and black people.
And the media will let them.
I’ve been sick since Friday, which is my fault for a.) bragging a week or so ago on twitter that I have not had a serious cold since I quit drinking and b.) for not eating or sleeping since Tuesday. I’m currently roasting a chicken and then going to make chicken and lentil soup with onions, carrots, spinach, and peas.
I kinda just feel rudderless and depressed. Guess I should just focus on the shit I can do.
Also, I know you all have sent me a bunch of emails. I’ll read them tomorrow. I swear.
Corner Stone
YES. This is absolutely going to be what happens after they get what they think they wanted, good and hard.
dslak
Focusing on what you can do is exactly the right approach. Get that house fixed up.
If you’re feeling despondent, do some housecleaning or something to help other people in need. Get your things (and your mind) in order, so you’ll be prepared when things get worse.
WereBear
Don’t forget your Vitamin C! It works for me, anyway.
I have been fighting off something. Despair undermines the immune system. Feel better.
WarMunchkin
Yup. Failed state.
WaterGirl
So, Cole, do you think it’s hopeless? You say that nothing is really going to happen until a shitload of white people who didn’t realize how many government benefits they got experience a fuckload of pain. But then you follow that with they’ll just blame democrats and black people anyway.
I feel as much despair as anyone, but I don’t see how there’s cover to blame it on democrats once the Republicans have every fucking branch of the government, including the Supreme Court once they approve another member.
I hope that however the hell we organize that communication and education are very prominent.
I also wonder why we aren’t starting right now trying to get people registered to vote and help them get IDs for voting. Do we think that every single one of those people who experienced voter suppression aren’t every bit as mad as we are, maybe worse?
And Cole, thanks for saying you will be reading the emails we all sent you.
Robin G.
I want to throw myself bodily in front of all the kids in my life right now. That’s all I know how to do.
HILFY
John, do you put the roasted chicken in the soup, or is the soup a side dish?
I have a lot of lentils to use up, and no experience cooking with them. Hot lemonade is good for colds. Hope you feel better soon. We can’t wait for two years to recover from what really ails us.
Gin & Tonic
Just got back from a long bike ride, as it is a beautiful, cool fall day here. At one point passing by a farm (fallow now, of course) a huge buck came dashing from the field, across the road about 10 feet in front of me and into the woods on the other side. I think we were both surprised.
But fresh air and physical exertion do me good these days.
GregB
Yes. You can see the Democrats are savaging each other and you can see the right is now compiling their lists of witches to be burned.
Journalist. Rope. Tree. Some assembly required.
The anti Hillary hysteria continues.
The otherizing of protesters as animals.
3 months to get a plan in place and it shpuld include an escape hatch.
MomSense
I’ve had a horrible headache and now a cold. I’m guessing the not sleeping, not eating, rage and sadness have something to do with it.
Baud
@GregB: All the factions are vying for control in a post-Obama party.
martian
I am not doing so well and would welcome some suggestions on dealing. I wake up back in denial every morning and have to reprocess that this actually happened. It’s making question my sanity a bit that reality keeps slipping away from me. I cried some more today watching Kate McKinnon as Hillary singing “Hallelujah”, and I am not a crier. I do not know how to cry things out, maybe that would help?
I can’t believe that we’re arguing about what Hillary did wrong when nearly half the voters chose a man they watched boast on video about sexually assaulting women. We’re arguing about how she failed to motivate people. I can’t wrap my mind around the insanity of this election without breaking it.
kindness
I survived Reagan, Bush41 & bush43. I’ll survive this. I only hope my country does too.
WaterGirl
I’m gonna be lazy and copy something I wrote to MomSense last night.
I’m still experiencing profound sadness and now I’m very angry, too, but at least my brain is starting to function and even feeling all over the map is better than saying and thinking ‘oh my god’ over and over and over. We are all moving at our own pace, as people always do with grief, but I am not giving up hope and I’m not interested in hearing there’s nothing that can be done to mitigate anything because we are fucked fucked fucked.
I am not going to sit idly by while Dump destroys my country and destroys the lives of millions of people and everything I believe in.
Meg
Please no spinach. Okra and cabbage instead.
Trentrunner
@kindness: Trump45 will be worse than those.
debbie
@kindness:
Me too. It’s a lot easier when you’re younger, though. ;)
kindness
@Trentrunner: See: I only hope my country does too.
Patricia Kayden
And after angry White people blame Blacks and President Obama, what happens next? Republicans will continue to screw them over royally until they get a clue and stop voting against their own interests. Duh!!
Cermet
Vitamin C does nothing for colds – in fact, no vitamin does; however, Zinc has been shown to shorten colds (in some test) but it sucks that you have to suck on the zinc stuff. Long term, Vitamin D will prevent colds BUT you MUST take a regular amount (2K – 3K) every day for at least four months before it prevents colds – via the body uses Vit D to build the key elements it uses to block cold viruses.
Hope there is a lot of finger pointing because the dems missed the boat big time. Need to start forgetting super delegates and create a wider pool of candidates to offer more options. Maybe hire people in the fields of electing people to office that know what in the fuck they are doing because these current geniuses missed the boat big time. Just saying (again and again because too many are still in denial about this aspect of Hillary’s loss.)
bemused
We couldn’t figure out how a Partridge ended up dead in our garage and then noticed the broken garage window. The Partridge went through a double pane window and screen and landed on the opposite side of the two stall garage, glass all over. That took quite a bit of force. We’re kind of scratching our heads. The smallish window is shaded so no reflection for Partridge to get confused the garage wasn’t there.
Keith G
I guess can move around feeling rudderless, or in contrast, one might right this very moment start doing small things that can help add up to larger activities addressing issues that we face and will face.
For example, in a very short amount of time 15 minutes ago, I found the email address to the leadership of the Texas Democratic Party. I sent them an email explaining why I wanted them to choose a DNC chair who would take that job as their only job. It’s a very small thing, but what they need to hear voices like mine and it did make me feel like I wasn’t just sitting around avoiding newscasts.
If you care about the future, please stop whinging about what has happened and get fucking moving. Do something. It’s not that difficult considering the fact that I am outfitted with compression hose and dangling a catheter tube/bag and am just getting started.
MomSense
So Conway said on CNN that they are going to hold a special session on January 20th to repeal Obamacare.
Great. I don’t think we can wait a couple months to see what happens. They are telling us what will happen now. She also said that Reid should watch himself or he will have legal trouble.
Authoritarians move fast.
Corner Stone
@Keith G:
Friend, I have not laughed that hard since Tuesday. Thank you.
WereBear
I’m doing chorizo and black beans with lots of jalepenos.
greennotGreen
I have decided to bury myself in my studio and make art. In my rural, very red county (can’t have those immigrants taking our jobs running our meth labs!) I don’t want to chance running in to someone who might make me lose my cool. Ignorant fucking morons. They are more to be censured than pitied.
At least that’s how I feel today. The other day talking to my pet sitter who I’m sure voted for Trump (despite being a lesbian!) I felt a bit more generous. She gets her news from Fox News and CNN “for balance.” Ergo, clueless. I’d say we should string up most of the MSM “journalists”, but I think the Trump Reich will beat us to it.
raven
@Keith G: Everyone must believe in something, I believe I’ll go fishing.
Trentrunner
@Keith G: Amen.
Trentrunner
We can’t avoid infighting as we regroup, but I’m profoundly sure that once Trump & new Congress take office and start shitting all over everything like they promised, we will unite and focus pretty fucking fast.
We are living in Sauron-level-times of evil here, and I doubt we’ll spend too much time or energy bitching at the Council of Elrond, once we actually see the armies of the night stalking the land.
martian
@MomSense: I appreciate hearing the timeline upfront as I try to figure out what time I have left to stack up appts. and medical care for my child and for myself. So, there’s that, I guess.
WarMunchkin
@WaterGirl:
This is so easy even I can do it.
“We would have loved to keep Social Security and Medicare the way it was for our constituents, but years of Democratic mismanagement and handouts forced us to end the programs. Had Democrats fairly distributes the gains from these programs, we’d have been fine – now we’ll never be financially sound enough for these programs again.”
Has everything – fiscal consercatism, dogwhistled blame on blah people, dodged blame for Republicans.
Imagine hearing this once and how mad you’d be. Then imagine this repeated 3-5 more tomes. Becomes normal. Then blanketed all over rural and suburban America. They’d be furious with Democrats. Then picked up by elite consensus. That’s how it becomes part of historical truth.
We need a hard messaging counter yesterday.
Trentrunner
@WarMunchkin: Re “messaging counter”:
My hypothesis about both Hillary & Obama taking their initial measured and “smooth transfer of power” tone was to give them space to speak out when needed.
Could also be me just fucking wishful thinking.
Peale
@MomSense: yep. Months of debate about ACA. The Replacement passed without debate when the press is talking about inaugural gowns.
Baud
@MomSense: Last I heard, McConnell was keeping the filibuster rule. Can’t repeal the ACA unless that’s gone.
WaterGirl
I want to share a short story and then connect the dots so you’ll understand why the hell I am sharing it now.
Years ago I worked for the suicide prevention hotline. You had to be approved in an interview process in order to be accepted into the program. There were 48 hours of actual in-person training over multiple weekends, and then we were given our first shifts.
You are there all alone taking the calls in your home – I believe we were on-call for 12 hour shifts, or maybe it was 8. there was no one listening in on the call to jump in to help, there was no one was holding your hand for even the first minute of the first shift. After the training, we were ON OUR OWN. Holy shit was I apprehensive before the first call came in.
What am I going to say? I wanted to figure out what I was going to say when someone called wanting to commit suicide. Well, you know what? You can’t know what you are going to say until you hear what their situation is, until you hear what they are going to say to you. Then you can respond.
Same here. We can’t figure out what exactly to do because we don’t know whether things with Dump will play out to our worst fears or only our second-worst fears.
But each of us can get our shit together personally, each in our own way and our own timeframe. We can get our lives in order. What skills do we each have that can be useful? We can figure out who we are going to look to when shit starts happening. Whose team will we be on when shit starts happening?
I decided this week that I want to be on team BJ. There is only one person in my real life, a neighbor, who even gets the danger we are in. Most of the people in my real life are hoping it won’t be that bad. There won’t be any team I can gather from within my friends and family. We have a lot of smarts on BJ and a lot of skills on BJ and a lot of heart on BJ. So that’s my team and I hope we decide on some concrete things to do.
And just like my training for the suicide hotline gave me some skills to use when that call came in, there are things we can see right now that will be important in our fight. We can make it about people more than politics. We can help fill the gap, educate people about how our democracy is supposed to work. We can help teach the history of how our country came to be. We can help people recognize that it’s possible to fight instead of just decide that it’s hopeless. We can help people see that we need to fight the battles that will now be in front of us instead of fighting the battles from the campaign.
okay, end rant. I’m going to do wash some dishes and do some laundry and make some order around me, because that will help me feel calmer.
Bobby D
I just can’t get past one thing – my entire life’s work is about to be chucked down the toilet, virtually overnight. I’m a civil/environmental engineer, had my first “real” job at the EPA, and have spent my career in environmental protection, as a civil servant on both the regulator side and on the regulated facility side. I keep military bases in compliance with env stds these days.
So on one hand, my agency will surely see a fat budget. DoD will be swimming in money in general. Other hand, the Cmdr in Chief, my ultimate boss as a military employee, and his lunatic cronies are dismantling the environmental protections I’ve spent my entire adult life working for/in. A climate denier to head the EPA transistion – I feel physically ill. Not just for our vague long term future, but for the immediate future of my old colleagues still in the agency Careers will dead-end, young upcoming talent will leave. And some of my dumbass colleagues in my own office, career environmental field people, proudly voted for this orange menace, these are grad-degree holding environmental engineers, not some redneck gas huffers. Just send the meteor!
CarolDuhart2
I donated to a liberal blog today. You can too. Give to the NAACP, the ACLU, whatever organization is already out there fighting the good fight. As of now it only takes a minute or two to do, and they need the money.
Anyone up for an online funeral? That’s the one element we are missing here, the act that gives closure. The family weeps, eulogizes, eats together and goes on to the next day. This is certainly a big loss and an unnerving one.
GregB
Paul Ryan already said Obamacare ruined Medicare.
Repeat as many times as crooked Hillary.
The social media is on fire. George Soros, Hillary Clinton and Al Sharpton are on the top of the list.
Idiots protesting Trump filmed defecating on a Trump sign sent around FB.
People will be cheering the roundups.
Trentrunner
Trump is tweeting again:
Yup, “speaches.”
p.a.
A bit more post-mortem and autopsy from The Bonddad Blog.
Turgidson
You’d think that once Trump starts breaking all of his bullshit promises to the demented cracker dolts who put him in office, and once he lets the Zombie-Eyed Granny Starver set the safety net (which those dolts think “they earned” the right to use) on fire, and once Trump starts some sort of foreign policy crisis, that his approval ratings would tank, at least some of his voters would abandon him and the GOP, and we’d be back on our way to regaining at least some power.
But we just elected this dipshit in spite of him having higher negatives than any other candidate ever, including Hillary, and in spite of all the heinous shit he said, lied about, bragged about…and we just went through an election where objective truth meant absolutely nothing. And we just went through an election in which the biggest story was that Hillary wrote some fucking emails, even though we had an ignorant narcissist authoritarian carnival barker running as a major party nominee.
So I have no belief that cause and effect will ultimately win the day. The GOP will lie about their plans, lie about objective reality, lie about who is to blame when they can no longer get away with lying about how they made shit so much worse – undoubtedly blaming Obama or Hillary’s emails for everything they possibly can. And the media will let them do all of this with hardly a peep. After all, they had to be dragged kicking and screaming to the blindingly obvious reality that Bush2 was a total fuckup, long after most of the country had come to that conclusion. Already they’re acting as if Trump won 45 states and has a blank check, totally ignoring who won the popular vote.
And we’ll find a candidate in 2020, assuming the GOP doesn’t cancel federal elections. And the GOP and the media will find a “Hillary’s emails” story about that person too, no matter how clean that person is. And we have a voting public that is so apathetic or disillusioned that more than 40% of them didn’t cast a vote even though a demented maniac was within striking distance of winning. Some of them were no doubt prevented by the GOP’s “Jim Crow Part 2 – Disenfranchisement Boogaloo” bullshit, but not most of them. How do we activate voters to vote if they can’t even be bothered to vote to keep Trump out? What could possibly get them to vote if not that?
Yeah. I’m sure I’ll get past this, eventually. But I’m not seeing where we go from here.
Keith G
Cynics are people too, I guess. At least when I join in the fun of typing empty profundities here, I can do so knowing that I have tried any number of things in the real world to try to work to solutions.
p.a.
@Bobby D: These people are engaged in treason. How many of the climate change denying congressfucks have access to the Pentagon’s climate studies, predictions, and action plans??!!
raven
@Turgidson: go past this
elm
Once a party starts winning elections on naked racism when would it ever stop?
Cermet
Unless the dems learn from their mistakes, they will continue. Sticking one’s head in the sand and deciding to move forward just means repeating both old mistakes and not avoiding new ones. The small handed dick head will surely screw over all of us but his followers will learn that most of them don’t matter. The dems had better be positioned to pick up the pieces – first, learn how to obstruct; never agree to go along with the thugs because they throw you a bone – do exactly like they did; agree only after they gut their bills and then don’t provide a single vote for cover. There- simple. And they didn’t need to spend millions of dollars to learn these critical lessons.
Anya
@MomSense:
Did she get pushback from the ‘reporter’ she said that to? Did he/she point out that her boss has attacked everyone and no one threatened him with legal action.
NR
@MomSense:
This should be all the proof anyone needs about how big a failure the last eight years of centrist incrementalism were.
From now on, it should be go big or go home.
mai naem mobile
Re:the CNN coverage of Putin’s Puto – is there some possibility it has a little to do with the Time Warner/ATT merger. CNN playing nice nice with Lewandowski and knifing Brazille on the outside chance that Putin’s Puto would win. The Dems were going to be harder on the merger regardless of coverage.
DeliciousGuac
De-lurking after 8+ years to say:
1) I love this site, the FPers, the commenters, and especially our curmudgeonly host and his pets.
2) We can start organizing right now, by supporting Democratic candidate Foster Campbell in the final Senate race of 2016, in Louisiana. I’m in NOLA and Foster is the underdog but it’s winnable in the Dec 10 runoff. Please consider a donation, and/or volunteering if you’re in LA. Thanks!
Diana
I downloaded and am reading Sinclair Lewis’ “It Can’t Happen Here,” his 1935 novel about a fascist Democratic Party (after the fascists win the Democratic nomination and then the election, they appoint FDR to be ambassador to Liberia). The parallels are striking, but two things jumped out at me: first, we’ll wind up grateful for Bush’s Iraq War. It’s going to make it a lot harder for the current administration to gin up enthusiasm for a foreign war.
But the second was that in 1935 everyone considered it perfectly normal for the weather to be snowy on election night in November in NYC, and for snowdrifts to be piling up in New England. Whatever happens to the people, this planet is well and truly fucked.
Ruckus
@kindness:
Not to harsh your mellow….
But put Regan, GHWB and GWB in a pot, add sulfuric acid, stir and what you end up with is what we have now, +/- a couple of disasters that we haven’t anticipated. If, and it’s not all that far fetched an if, they get everything they want, we will be living in a utopian hell. Yes in time we can correct some of those errors, but it is never as easy to rebuild as it is to destroy and there is always collateral damage. Lot’s of collateral damage. I’m even thinking of changing my name to Collateral Damage, to save time. Besides how neat would it be if the papers listed that Collateral Damage died? That would be a successful life if one could make that happen.
philpm
You better believe that every time I hear a Trump voter bitching that Medicare is getting gutted, SS is getting gutted, they don’t have health insurance anymore, the roads and bridges are falling apart, or (and I truly believe this will happen) the government comes for their guns, I will be in their face making sure they understand that this is exactly what they voted for, and if they had been paying any attention, they would have realized that before they voted for him, and that I have zero fucks or sympathy for their predicament.
Corner Stone
Some cynics have engaged the machine and fought for change, repeatedly and for decades. And know what they are talking about.
debit
@Turgidson:
I think the difference with Bush and Trump is that Bush and his people loved the media, gave them nicknames, sent them out little plates of food from their parties, tried to make them feel like part of the cool kids club. Trump has already declared war on them. The media kissed Bush’s ass because it meant they got access and special treatment. The only they’ll get from kissing Trump’s is ass smell on their lips.
MomSense
@WaterGirl:
I’m making order today. too. Rearranging living room furniture since I decided rugs needed to be taken outside so the floors could be thoroughly washed. Already did my room including my desk and closet and I’m looking at the kitchen cupboards, counters, and pantry in a ruthless sort of way. Purge. Organize. Clean.
p.a.
@Diana:
You are way way underestimating the stupidity of the current American populace, or to be more accurate ~ 49% of them.
MomSense
@NR:
Once person’s centrist incrementalism is another person’s lifesaver.
greennotGreen
@Diana: And on the climate note, I’m hoping Florida goes completely underwater.
jenn
@martian: Do something to move the process forward. I have cried every single day – Thursday, I cried almost the entire day. But I have an enormous number of letters I’m writing to various people, political and otherwise, to exhort/shame/encourage/thank (and occasionally some combination of the above). Since I found out the results, I have been determined: if the forces of authoritarianism and bigotry are going to defeat this country, they are going to have to go through me. So I’m writing letters, I’ve rearranged my budget (hello beans and rice for the next 4 years) so that I can channel funds as soon as possible to organizations who are going to fight to preserve civil rights and the environment so they can be geared up and ready to go on Day 1, and next week I’m heading to my local Democratic party to find out how things work to prep for 2018 state houses and Congress. I’m also making sure I’m making time to talk with friends and family, and am doling out hugs like crazy.
Re Hillary, people can talk about mistakes in her campaign. I think all campaigns make mistakes, so I’m willing to hear folks’ opinions on where they think she made them. I think Bernie’s lack of experience in how presidential campaigning works meant that he damaged the process – but acrimonious primaries are not new. The biggest difference between this election and any other presidential election this country has ever had is that a foreign power and a “transparency” organization with a grudge against Obama and Clinton also campaigned against her, there was an overwhelming disparity in disclosure (voluntary and otherwise) between Clinton and Trump, and the FBI interfered in the election (purposefully, in the case of the NYC office; in the case of Comey, I suspect incompetence rather than intent to help Trump). This enormous disparity was then magnified by how the media operate, and their bias toward Republicans and against all things Clinton.
Anyway. I’m approaching this like my football team (Go Hawks!) approaches games – it’s a long season. You play a game, you work your ass off to the best of your ability, and you have an outcome. You take a day to tell the truth – what you did right, what you need to work on – and then you move on and you don’t look back, because there’s another game next week, and you need to work your ass off to the best of your ability to prepare for that game. And the circle continues. Keep the main thing the main thing. The goal is never just to attain power, it’s to make peoples’ lives better. All people, regardless of race or gender or religion or sexual orientation or anything else. That’s the main thing. Focus on what you can control – and not what you can’t. Take a wide look at that, though. I can’t control how the media is going to operate, for example, but I can contact them to tell them my opinions, and keep contacting them. I can’t stop the incoming congress from gutting all environmental regulations, but I can give time, effort, money, and/or encouragement to the groups and Senators/Reps that are going to try. There are limits to what I can do to help communities weather the storm on the other side of the country, but I can do what I can here in mine.
Anyway, that’s my plan. Best wishes!
Kryptik
@debit:
But they’ll be cowed all the same, because they have the fear of the torch and pitchfork mob looming over them if they dare stray from the line.
rikyrah
@Trentrunner:
You ain’t never lied.
NR
@MomSense: Except the Democrats could have done much more than they did, and not only would that have also saved lives, it wouldn’t have put us in the position we’re now in where the “lifesaver” we have is going away.
Kryptik
@Corner Stone:
At some point, ‘cynicism’ is just the name the naive give realism.
Darkrose
I’m a wreck. My sleep schedule is completely fucked, which means my eating schedule is too, which is really not good for a diabetic. I’m swinging wildly from manic energy and wanting to set up a rapid response network to hammer the press on stories to despair and depression.
I got into Twitter beef with a writer I respect. He said something that sounded to me like he was suggesting anyone who blamed Bernie for this was anti-Semitic. I shouldn’t have said anything but I responded and made it worse and now I’m feeling like an asshole.
And I’m meeting with a class partner for a mock interview in two hours.
(Sorry y’all. I just needed to vent. )
mai naem mobile
@elm: it stops with genocide/reeducation camps and such… last part I hear in Ahhnold Schwarzeneggers voice
WereBear
If it helps, the republicans (I am never capitalizing them again) are still going to tear themselves apart. Unfortunately, they have the government. I hope there’s still enough stalwart warriors there to keep it all alive long enough for rescue to come.
Because rescue is gonna need to come.
JMG
The first and most important job for everyone here is to get past despair and grief and hopelessness. Hopelessness is the ultimate self-fulfilling prophecy. I mean, if you assume a majority of voters will accept any and all lies about what’s going on, emigration is the only practical solution. Remember, a good percentage of Trump’s voters did so with misgivings, because they are into that “we need change” or because they just hated Clinton that much. They are there to be reached by us, alienated by him, or both.
The first week after an election is always full of conflicting rumors, statements and reports, let alone this one which has no hand on the tiller. Friday it’s “we’ll keep some of Obamacare.” Sunday it’s “we getting rid of Obamacare on day one.” Which is right? Who knows? There’s nothing we can do now but prepare, and that means preparing ourselves as individuals first.
rikyrah
When I say that this vote has snapped Black America’s last Black nerve, I mean it.
And White people aren’t ready for the result of it.
They never thought we’d get to this point. A collective Black Nerve snapped.
But, here it is.
They talk about working together, AS IF Black folks have been on Mars for the previous 8 years.
AS IF we don’t know that everything PBO did, he did WITHOUT GOP help.
AS IF we don’t know that they met on JANUARY 20, 2009, to decide to commit ECONOMIC TREASON against this country.
AS IF we don’t know that THIS MAN was the BIRTHER-IN-CHIEF.
AS IF we didn’t sit through the GOP leadership playing fast and cute with their GOP Birther voters, never coming out saying that they were phucking crazy, because OF COURSE, the President was born in the United States.
AS IF we hadn’t watched how they had disrespected the Presidency itself, in a way that HAD NEVER BEEN BEFORE, with the previous 43 White Presidents.
AS IF we didn’t see them disrespect not only this President, but his wife, his children, his mother-in-law, in a way that NO other President’s family was attacked.
Stop trying to play innocent that this is about a ‘vote’.
No, muthaphuckas. It’s not about a ‘ simple vote’.
It’s about what that vote represents.
And, we understand, plain and clear what that represents.
But, unlike the other Reconstructions of America, you don’t understand that times have changed.,
Nobody is playing with you.
NOBODY is gonna let your party like it’s 1948.
White women better call those children that you didn’t home train…before they roll upon the ‘wrong one’, and get a lesson they will never forget.
This isn’t 1948.
It’s 2016.
And, we are not about to let you weasel out what you have brought on this country. And, we’re not about to let you try and ‘ whitesplain’ it to us.
No dear.
It’s done.
Corner Stone
@rikyrah:
I never knew you were originally from TX?!
GrandJury
@martian: Blame the Sandernistas for a lot of that. Fuck those people. Cannot see the forest from the trees. Both in supporting him and now trying to blame everything on the fact one dimenional issue man never won the primary.
Like an old Jewish guy blaming Wall Street for everything the entire election would have totally done better ya sure you betcha.
MomSense
@NR:
You sound really concerned for the people who will suffer and/or die as a result of repealing the ACA.
WaterGirl
@NR: It doesn’t fucking matter what we could have done or should have done. What matters now is WHAT WE DO NOW.
MomSense
@rikyrah:
Truth.
jenn
@rikyrah: Truth.
jenn
@MomSense: In stereo!
debit
@rikyrah: Preach it.
NR
@MomSense: I wanted Medicare for all. The Democrats decided we shouldn’t have it.
And now here we are.
gogol's wife
@Keith G:
You have the right attitude. I have to stop thinking about all the things that should have or shouldn’t have happened. It’s driving me mad. I have to do something every day that moves the world forward rather than backward. It’s on us now.
NR
@WaterGirl:
It does when that can provide valuable lessons for us going forward.
Like I said: From now on, go big or go home.
3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike)
@Meg: Okra is great. Being from the South, I grew up on okra in several forms. The thickening ability does wonders for soups. I get the little teeny black French lentils from our local hippie co-op, and they make delicious stews with okra, a can of smushed tomatoes, and some chicken. (Thighs give a richer flavor. Cook them first in the oven, chop them, and add to the finished stew. And cook your lentils in veggie or chicken broth and the juice form the tomatoes rather than water.)
Okay, heading to the kitchen now.
gogol's wife
@Baud:
Rule no. 1 for my sanity: Listen to nothing that Kellyanne Conway says. She is the devil incarnate.
SFAW
@debit:
Which they will tell themselves is the finest perfume available, and kiss his ass some more. Or did I miss the MSM endlessly trashing Trump’s lies, his Russia connection, his myriad business failures, his LYING EVERY FUCKING DAY? Outside of Fahrenthold, Ari Berman, a few others, there wasn’t a whole lot of evidence of the MSM taking its job seriously.
I know, I know, I’m just a cynic — any day now, they’ll have a collective epiphany, and they’ll turn into the Crusaders for Truth and Justice that we keep hoping for.
Lalophobia
People were talking about things we can do going forward like helping people figure out how to get ids and voting registrations and such….I was thinking maybe a Turn Off The News campaign, maybe? Be all ‘these are the folks who gave us Trump’ and encourage people to get their news from other places?
I mean, it wouldn’t be the most important or imperative thing we could or should do, but…
Shell
Oh, probably along the lines of decades of government programs have made the electorate dependent and weak. Ayn Rand fan-boy Paul Ryan wants to make Americans strong and self-reliant again. Whee!
Ohio Mom
@WereBear: In this household, we swear by those zinc lozenges. They don’t taste very good but if you start with them as soon as you feel the first cold symptoms, they really seem to work. I used to up the Vitamin C when my throat got scratchy but have given it up since discovering zinc.
That, and Abreva brand ointment when I feel a cold sore on my lip coming on.
Hill Dweller
@NR: Dems didn’t have the votes to lower the qualifying age for Medicare to 55. Lieberman, who ran for reelection on a platform of lowering the Medicare age, said he couldn’t support it when Dems tried to do it in ’08. How in Hell were they going to get Medicare for all through congress?
Corner Stone
@gogol’s wife:
I’ve been wondering if she weighs the same as a duck.
It’s fucking eerie.
GregB
Some infighting among the one party in power always happens. Those that get in the way are neutralized.
Thinking that the media that ennabled Trump to stop Trump is lunacy.
gogol's wife
@Corner Stone:
I don’t get this reference?
Shell
See that Trumps lawyers want his Trump U. trial postponed till after the inauguration.
I guess their reasoning is that its harder to get rid of a king once he’s crowned.
gogol's wife
@Corner Stone:
Okay, Monty Python. Haven’t seen it in a while.
Earl
You all will scream at me how it’s just racism, and no doubt there is plenty of racism to go around, but Democrats need more than free trade and bullshit soundbites about education to address the real concerns of voters in eg WI about jobs. As as mistermix’s link down page said, not jobs at mcdonalds or walmart either, but solidly middle class jobs. The (Michael Moore coined) rustbelt brexit that moved 64 electoral votes can swing the presidency next round.
Found via @SeanMcElwee on twitter:
An excerpt from _The Great Exception: The New Deal and the Limits of American Politics_ by Jefferson Cowie
Democrats need to get on closing that gap. Loudly pointing out government programs that directly aid the middle class is a great place to start making the case for government in people’s lives.
JPL
@Baud: I haven’t finished reading the comments, but the repeal has already been passed. He plans to add Medicare to this and pass it along with budget reconciliation. 50 votes…
WaterGirl
@NR: We are NEVER going to agree on what went wrong. Hell, I could name 10 things without having to skip a beat to think of them.
Arguing about what got is here is not going to help us take action to fight the Dumpster fires that are being planned right this minute. The house is burning, let’s not argue about whose fault it is. Let’s do everything we can to save ourselves and our country.
SenyorDave
Does anyone know any good online petition sites? I want to start something to “out” Steve Bannon as someone who runs a website that is overtly racist and anti-semitic, and serves as a clearinghouse for the white nationalist movement. What the hell is this person doing as a senior advisor to the president-elect? Hillary tried but got no traction (it would have been nice if some of the Democrats had joined her). This should have been huge.
SFAW
@NR:
What does that even mean?
Gin & Tonic
@NR:
Please explain how you would have gotten anything more past Senator Lieberman. Take all the time you want, and feel free to write on the back of the paper.
NR
@Hill Dweller: You realize that saying “the Democrats didn’t have the votes” is just another way of saying “the Democrats didn’t want it to happen,” yes?
But the truth is, Medicare for all was dead long before any vote ever took place. The Democrats refused to even allow it as a position in the health care debate. Because they didn’t want it.
jenn
A few Guardian links:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/12/hillary-clinton-liberal-feminists
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/11/hillary-clinton-progressive-politics-supporters-donald-trump-win
Goblue72
@NR: but but but promising free college is UNREALISTIC!
debit
@SFAW: No I would never expect the press to be crusaders for truth and justice. The only thing that matters to them is money. Money for them comes from eyeballs. How many eyeballs will they get from saying everything is fine and great? Like I said before, they created a rage monster and it’s going to want to keep eating.
I could be wrong, but I don’t see how they keep the rage going without going after the actual newsmakers.
Earl
@Shell: One has to wonder if the Rs wouldn’t be pretty happy to see Trump impeached and Pence in office. Though there’s a good chance they get largely the same result because nothing in Trump’s life seems like evidence for him being able to understand policy and/or work for it over durations longer than a couple minutes. So whoever in the white house is tasked with running policy for X (if there is anyone in the white house tasked with so doing!) seems like he or she will be largely able to do what he or she wants…
Baud
@JPL: Nothing has been passed until Obama leaves office. They can hurt Obamacare through budget reconciliation, but they can’t repeal it completely.
I’m not even sure if they can use budget reconciliation if there is no budget. Need to ask an expert.
JPL
@rikyrah: Do you except white seniors in your group.
NR
@Gin & Tonic: Lieberman only had the ability to block things because the Democrats decided he would have the ability to block things.
Eliminating the Senate filibuster was fully possible at any time. The Democrats chose not to do it.
Chris
@debit:
I think the media has pretty severe Stockholm Syndrome where right wingers are concerned.
Citizen_X
The good news is, the poor struggling middle-aged workin’ white ‘Murican is dying at faster rates than the rest of the population.
Sorry to be grim, but that’s a good part of what it’s going to take. We’ll take our country back one funeral at a time.
Goblue72
@Hill Dweller: maybe that Dems in office weren’t even willing me to have that convo is part of the fucking problem.
Double down! Clap louder!
JPL
@Baud: Ryan said on day one. I assume they will extend the temporary budget, but thanks for that info.
Time to go rake up some leafs
Goblue72
@rikyrah: and how are you gonna do that exactly?
Earl
@Gin & Tonic: And don’t forget that Pawlenty/Coleman kept Al Franken from being seated until June 30 2009. So there was a very very narrow window with 60 (nominally — see Leiberman) Democratic senators.
NR
@WaterGirl: That’s exactly what I’m talking about–what to do going forward. It’s other people here who are arguing about the past, which is incredibly stupid when the complete, utter, and abject failure of the Democrats’ approach of the last eight years should be blindingly obvious to everyone with at least three functioning brain cells now.
Going forward, what it’s going to take is bold proposals to address the problems facing this country. Telling the people that what they really need is more third-way neoliberal incrementalism, with a heaping helping of calling them racists on top of that, isn’t going to cut it.
brendancalling
i’m still having trouble wrapping my head around the whole concept of President Trump.
It is so fucking stupid. Like I said over at Booman Tribune it’s like electing Big Bird. Or a slice of lasagne.
Go home America, you’re DRUNK.
WereBear
@JMG: I swear, it’s the suspense that is killing me.
If I KNEW there would be a full scale burning down of the safety net, with Mr WereBear losing his SS and the economic meltdown losing me my job, okay, I can make plans for that.
But not knowing what the heck is going to happen or from what direction? I think that’s one reason why we are all so upset.
NW Phil
Time to put some pressure on your local Republicans. They only really want to stay in power. We can’t afford to wait and see if the National Democratic Party will be able to pull it off next time.
Please, please, please get involved with local GOTV and progressive groups. A little support now goes much further than waiting for the next election.
NotMax
Am the sort who very rarely contracts what’s going around or fights it off right quick. But when I do come down with something, the pendulum swings hard in the other direction.
Day 2 now of intermittently discomfiting chest congestion. Very minor coughing and no fever to speak of. However can tell the body is gearing up for a potential lollapalooza by way of the sinuses screaming red alert matched simultaneously with a sudden quantum jump in production of ear wax, historically accurate personal early warning signs when coupled like Frick and Frack.
Friends have mentioned there’s some type of nasty crud going around, lasting 2 to 4 weeks. Have indications of nipping the worst in the bud – today is better than yesterday, more of a muscular achiness which ebbs and flows rather than the deep bronchial constriction of Saturday.
SFAW
@debit:
OK, now I know you’re kidding.
With all the bullshit that the Rethugs have pulled over the last eight years, how much has been screamed about in 64-point type (figuratively speaking)? No, they only go after “newsmakers” if they have a “D” after their name. Or were Benghazi and Hitlary’s still-unhacked server the most important things EVAH?
They’ll go after whoever Roger Ailes (or his replacement) tells them to go after. That might be an overstatement, but not by much.
Mnemosyne
@GregB:
Yep. I think I’m going to have to unfollow one of my coworkers because he liked someone’s video rant about how we should have known that white dudes were never going to vote for Hillary so it’s our own fault for shoving her down their throats.
DIsclaimer: if you are a white man who voted for Hillary, you are not one of these white dudes. You are an adult man who was able to rationally weigh all of the pros and cons of each candidate and make the right choice. But fuck me if I did not vastly overestimate the emotional maturity of thousands (possibly millions) of white dudes who preferred to throw a temper tantrum rather than vote for a woman who reminded them of their mom/first wife/that really mean teacher in grade school.
Kryptik
@Citizen_X:
This presumes the newer generation isn’t just as bad, or that there won’t be any further institutional barriers constructed to ensure the entrenchment of the Right-Wing Eternity.
The demographic shift didn’t change much, especially when, if I remember correctly, the white millenial vote went the exact same way as the rest of the white demographic did. And you know for fucking sure the GOP is gonna ensure that those votes are the only ones that get to count.
Hill Dweller
@NR: The Dems eliminated the filibuster on all executive and judicial nominees(other than the Supreme Court), but did that stop Republicans from bringing the confirmation process to a grinding halt? There are so many choke points in congress, especially in the senate.
Ohio Mom
@Darkrose: I think it was Audrey Lourde who said taking care of yourself is an act of revolution (or something like that). So be a revolutionary — stabilize those blood sugar levels!
ETA: because you already know how blood sugar levels affect emotional well-being and judgement.
bluehill
Obviously the dems are in disarray and we’ll see how that plays out. I think the near term focus should be on how to stop/slow/counter the slew of bills, executive actions, appointments that are coming. They should consider how to structure bill amendments that clearly help the middle class, but are likely to be rejected by the repubs.
The repub party is changing too. Trump doesn’t belong to the repub party. He is his own party. The repubs are hoping to control him and while there will be some/a lot of overlap in objectives. I think there are some big differences between Trump and the repub party that can be useful going forward.
Ruckus
@WaterGirl:
I have a couple of people I can relate to but not a shoulder to cry on. Life just hasn’t worked out that way for me. But, and it’s a big, firm, round but, this group of mostly strangers is a great place to hang out.
I do find things a bit difficult right now, because while one shouldn’t maybe expect the worst in every way and for every event, I don’t see any other way right now, for me. And I know that if I’m in that position there are lots and lots of others in the same or worse. And I’ve figured out that I do have to plan for how to deal with things not gong my way, because for me, that’s almost always the way things end up. And in this case that planning doesn’t sound all that out of line. And yet, as the things that are important right now are, for me lifelines, and pretty much last resorts, you pull those and I have no idea what to do. Hard to think of a plan when there is a very limited future to plan for. And once again I’m not alone in this, I know personally of a lot of people who are very likely to be swept off this same boat. It frightens me. It angers me, It makes me care far less for many others. And I despise that in myself. I despise that while this country has a long way to go, we have come a long way and that in far less time than it took to get here, in a flash actually, that progress may go away. People fought for that progress, people got beaten for that progress and people died for that progress. And now the same kind of morons who beat and killed those people are going to, with a raising of their hands and a stroke of a pen, wipe out all of it. Give them credit, they couldn’t do it with force, but they managed with hate.
delphinium
@rikyrah:
. Yep that is why I am fed up with those who keep insisting we need to try and appeal to Trump voters (or WWC who didn’t vote for Hiliary). It hasn’t even been a week since the election and this is the crap we see. It is completely and utterly disrespectful to be doing this. As I stated a few days ago, Obama has shown more class, dignity, and grace imaginable given what people have thrown at him and then we have Bernie Sanders jumping up to say he’ll work with the incoming administration before Obama is even out of office. Seriously Sanders fck you! Can’t even have the common decency to wait? I am not going to join in on normalizing Trump or his behavior nor try to appeal to people who had a clear cut decision to make and failed to make the right one.
schrodinger's cat
@Lalophobia: I agree, the news media is not our friend. This is the third Democratic candidate in the last 16 years that MSM has helped destroy.
WereBear
@Ohio Mom: See, we tried that and it didn’t work for us. I think it’s a combo of how much one’s body needs certain things, and how much you supply it. And that can vary by person.
One thing that does great things for my mood, for instance, is chelated magnesium. I must have had a long deficit. Now, some people I mentioned it to tried plain magnesium, but that just a laxative.
World of difference :)
NR
@Hill Dweller:
The Republicans are going to show you just how wrong you are about this over the next two years.
Corner Stone
Ok. Even worse than having to listen to Trump campaign surrogates still gloating and never going away. I am so desperate to have Nina Turner go away and never be heard from again.
Citizen_X
@NR:
Lol. Last week it was, “Obama shoulda fixed the economy first instead of going after healthcare. What a stoopit loser, don’t he know nothing?”
Kryptik
@bluehill:
But how many are likely to latch on to the exact Trump strategy of encouraging the basest of Nationalist and Xenohobic impulses as a means to victory? Look how many road on the coattails of that. Look how many of the supposed ‘parts of the problem’ got reelected precisely because they were part of ‘Trump’s’ GOP.
These assholes are not going to do shit. They want power for power’s sake, and they see how to grab power: hate, hate, hate, hate, and more fucking hate. Just make sure to hate all the right people and you win AMerica forever.
Lizzy L
The political naivete of my fellow Americans is breathtaking. One of my dearest friends, an adjunct professor, who earned a PhD from UC Berkeley, told me this morning that she hopes Obama during the next two months will be able to persuade Trump to moderate his plans. This person has been a professional therapist, teaches psychology, and knows what narcissistic personalities are like. I pointed out to her that Barack Obama is the outgoing president of the United States and it is not his job to be Donald Trump’s therapist.
God give me strength.
I’m doing better personally: sleeping okay, and finding solace in physical movement and in hanging out here. I don’t watch TV, so the insanity is not showing up in my living room every few hours. I’m not even turning on NPR, they make me want to throw things. But the rage is still there. If I believed in witchcraft I would be making little dolls and sticking pins in them.
Baud
This thread is like deja vu all over again . . . and again . . . and again. . . and again . . .
Mnemosyne
@Cermet:
You mean like Robby Mook, the guy who got Terry McAuliffe elected in Virginia?
Oh, wait, he was part of Hillary’s team. As were a large number of the folks who got Obama elected. And we still lost the Electoral College with an asterisk.
If Hillary had lost the popular vote, I might be more willing to listen to you guys, but she didn’t. She’s on track to win it by 2 million votes, and “crappy campaign” or “bad candidate!” doesn’t explain that.
In short: what is your plan for 2018?
TS
@WaterGirl:
When did the republicans or the media need “cover” to blame the democrats? They will blame Obama for everything that happens for the next 8 years
MomSense
@jenn:
If we ever meet in person we can buy each other a coke!
Not sure why but we used to say “jinx. You owe me a coke” when we were kids.
debit
@SFAW: Like I said, I could be wrong. But one has to have hope, right?
NW Phil
@NotMax:
Mine lasted 3 weeks and came back. Now on antibiotics, which seem to be working.
Goblue72
@Earl: There’s a whole lot of housecleaning needed. Clintonland is DEAD. Get off the fucking stage. Bill, Hillary, Podesta, DWS, Donna Brazile, et al.
When the Chair of the House Dem Caucus can’t even criticize Wall Street, there’s a goddamn problem.
Mnemosyne
@Keith G:
You are a wise man. Good luck with your recovery.
Emma
You know who I’m tired of? The triumphalists. “I told you so” “Oh but if you had listened to me” “look at me! look at me! look at meeeee!”
You will be useless in a fight. You’ll sit on your asses preening about your wonderful prescience and then try to take credit for the win.
NR
@Citizen_X: I have no idea what you’re on about.
jacy
@Earl:
Problem is, sometimes you can’t tell people things they don’t want to hear. Those jobs are not coming back — that way of life is not coming back. Trump told them it would, and they believed him because they can’t accept the truth. Now, I don’t know how you get around that. The things the Democrats accomplished are solving the problems, but it won’t solve their feelings.
Kryptik
@TS:
They managed to blame fucking Jimmy Carter for stuff that was happening in Bush the Lesser’s term. And enough people bought it until it became too large to ignore, and by that time, enough happened that Obama couldn’t unpack and fix even half of it in the 8 years he was allowed. And now we get someone who will compound that tenfold.
They will blame Obama. They will blame the CLintons. They will still blame Carter. And they’ll get away with it.
Darkrose
@rikyrah: Mmmhmm. Thank you.
Emerald
@Trentrunner:
This. I couldn’t bear to watch Hillary’s concession speech, and only saw a bit of Obama’s speech.
Yeah, I get it why they have to do that at the time, but they’ve done it now. They are the major leaders on our side (Hillary won the popular vote by an ever-growing margin) and we need them to lead our opposition . . .
. . . as long as an opposition within the country is allowed. Witness Kellyann Conway’s threat to Harry Reid. After that I believe they should lead it from outside the country, but I fear they won’t leave. trump will jail them all.
Goblue72
@Mnemosyne: We’ve been losing State and House races for years and years. The only thing the Obama Team has proven good at is electing Obama. Even when he won in 2012, we lost everywhere else.
So yeah, YOUR head is the one in the fucking sand.
Fucking Clintonistas.
Lizzy L
@SenyorDave: Because online petitions are really effective, and government institutions are totally responsive to them. //snark
Please.
WereBear
This is what Fundie congregations were told was the plan all along. So they went out and voted for it.
jenn
And here’s a really good one:
http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/11/13578618/why-did-trump-win
Mnemosyne
@BIG410:
You are important, and people care about you. Please call this number or do a live chat with them, and do it right away. They say they are getting a high volume of calls right now, so you are very much not alone in feeling despair right now.
Please take care of yourself and be kind to yourself. And call that hotline.
Emma
@Goblue72: What are your plans? What are you going to do to help? Are you running for local office? Writing letters to the editor? What?
JPL
@Baud: This is very bad.
Starting tomorrow we can tackle one issue that is in danger. Medicare and the lies about bankruptcy would be my choice because they already announced that.
We have to watch the attacks on the press, and net neutrality. Those are areas where they could really endanger our democracy.
Citizen_X
@Emma: That.
@Kryptik: The total millennial vote, however, wasn’t even close. It was a Hillary landslide.
And yes, they’re going to continue with what worked so well, i.e. vote suppresion. At the very worst–sigh–apartheid didn’t last forever, now did it?
WereBear
@NotMax: Whatever you do, don’t read Stephen King’s The Stand.
Shalimar
@MomSense: Did Conway really call it a “special” session? That doesn’t make sense. Some state legislatures only meet X days per year constitutionally, so there are provisions for special sessions if the governor wants them to address specific issues. Congress meets whenever it wants. There is no need for a “special” session. They will already be in their normal session.
elm
@Mnemosyne:
Evacuate to a non-Nazi country and prepare to resist the invasion.
qwerty42
@NR: I wanted Medicare for all. The Democrats decided we shouldn’t have it.
And now here we are.
Oh, I see the problem here. While you were on the voyage to examine Saturn, we had a big months-long argument on this. Zero help from Republicans, and a few of the Democrats were not that reliable, but just enough were. So, you see, we got this because we figured out how to get it done with zero help from the GOP and a few unreliable Democrats. Mission Control probably did really give you the details. It accomplished an initial mission and could serve as a platform to build on.
Ohio Mom
@WereBear: Whatever works — life is one big long experiment. On the individual biological level, and as we are about to see, on the national/international level…if your lab is being run by a mad scientist.
Ruckus
@Darkrose:
I shouldn’t have said anything but I responded and made it worse and now I’m feeling like an asshole.
I’ve been trying to keep my mouth shut because at work, we have a loud mouth Shit-Gibbon supporter. He’s an ex meth addict, has 2 illegitimate kids (he does support them) but he’s loud and proud of his support. At home, I think my roommate is a Shit-Gibbon supporter. I can’t ask because I am on the lease and can’t just leave. We will make things worse by saying anything. We will make them worse for us by not saying anything.
Chose your words carefully, think with your brain, not your tongue. Stay out of arguments that make no sense, but don’t not say nothing if saying it is necessary. We can’t win by being silent, we won’t win by being angry, we have to do it by being right.
Redleg
Take care of yourself, John. If those bastards wear us down, we can’t do what we need to do.
jenn
@MomSense: Sounds like a happy plan to me! ;*)
NR
@qwerty42:
It won’t be a platform for jack shit after the Republicans repeal it, now will it?
Scout211
@DeliciousGuac:
I have been so out of it since Tuesday night that I wasn’t even aware that there is a run-off in LA for senate.
Can you post some links for us to contribute, please?
raven
@Ruckus: And don’t let your mouth write a check your ass can’t cash.
daverave
From what I just read Trump’s Wall is also becoming a casualty of reality as he is now saying that parts of it may be just a fence or some of the border will be patrolled by drones in lieu of a physical wall.
CarolDuhart2
NAACP Membership Department
4805 Mt. Hope Drive
Baltimore MD 21215
3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike)
@NR: I hope I can get my impending chemo and radiation done in three months. I have my surgery consult tomorrow at 8AM.
We’ve got to get this show on the road. It is definitely personal to me now. A matter of life, death, and bankruptcy.
Yes, my insurance is ACA. I can’t afford it otherwise.
jenn
@BIG410: Sending you an electronic hug, if you want one! Best wishes to you, and please take care.
NR
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike): Good luck to you. I hope all goes well.
Corner Stone
@Baud: Didn’t you just say this the other day?
liberal
@Mnemosyne:
Sorry. With this kind of stinging defeat in such a crucial election, he should never work on a campaign again. If that isn’t obvious, you’re fucking braindead.
Mnemosyne
@Turgidson:
It’s not about 2020. It’s about 2018. We need to flip Congress and statehouses, and we need to prepare the ground now for the inevitable meltdown by the Republicans.
Are you willing to work for that?
SenyorDave
@Lizzy L: One of my dearest friends, an adjunct professor, who earned a PhD from UC Berkeley, told me this morning that she hopes Obama during the next two months will be able to persuade Trump to moderate his plans.
I suspect that Obama had to restrain himself from punching shitgibbon’s face in during their meeting on Friday. Work with him, fuck that. The Democrats should let the Republicans make their proposals public prior to working with them
elm
@daverave:
It doesn’t matter. They care less about the wall than a DoJ that won’t interfere with them beating and lynching black and brown people.
jenn
@NR: Well, sure, but Republicans are vowing to take out Medicare, too.
Chris
@Lizzy L:
Most Americans, probably including most Democrats, and certainly including most white Democrats, simply can’t grok that one of the two major parties in the country is now running entirely on hate and spite. And that it’s that way because close to half the population, certainly half the voting population, is also running on nothing but that.
liberal
@daverave:
On the one hand, it sounds like he’s going to keep very few of his campaign promises. (Though that’s largely good, e.g. the promise to fuck with Obama’s Iran deal.)
On the other hand, there was an article in WashPost (IIRC) that his fucking stupid supporters don’t actually care if he carries out his campaign promises.
Cain
The way I see it, we need to have the following plan:
1) Get in charge of as many state legislatures as possible. We need to do this before the next consensus.
2) we need a DNC that does a 50 state strategy and we need to a plan for rural voters, they aren’t going away, we need to address them.
3) For every state that has a voter id law, give those people the goddam voter id, help pay for it if possible. If we need to get voter ids in states like wisconsin and north carolina, then let’s do it.
4) We need to prepare for the midterms, we need to target flipping the house so that we can a) not pay for any of Trump’s bullshit b) start investigating everything
That’s the plan, and that’s what we need to do. and we need to push limp wristed establishment Dems to push this plan. I know what their mindset is, they are so fucking scared of dividing the nation, nto realizing it has already been divided and the Republicans have won. Now our entire platform and achievements are in danger of being rolled back. We’ve been following a set of political behavior from the 80s, trying to respect the political institutions for the past 30 years. We are going to have throw it all away now. We need folks in charge to believe in that.
I’ve been willing to handle Trump and conservative voters with kid gloves. But I’m not going to give an inch towards conservative and republican politicians and media. We are going to burn the ground and salt the earth where they stand.
jenn
@Mnemosyne: Yep, all this.
qwerty42
@NR: You realize that saying “the Democrats didn’t have the votes” is just another way of saying “the Democrats didn’t want it to happen,” yes?
Of course! It all falls into place now. A master conspiracy so grand it swept up everyone. Everyone but you! By God, man, this can only mean the real force acting here, a force so powerful it could orchestrate all of this, with such timing (do you think they assassinated Ted Kennedy or was he in on it?) could only be the Lizard People. Some will say the Elders of Zion, and others the Jesuits, but it has to be the Lizard People. You have rendered great service.
Ruckus
@Lalophobia:
A lot of liberals have been turning off the news for 10-20 yrs. Maybe it’s time for us to write those nasty letters to the editors. Maybe it’s time for us to remind them that our money in their pockets might just keep them in champagne and caviar. We complain about the press here, maybe we should complain about the press to their advertisers, the people who actually support them. We have economic power, maybe we should use it.
Mnemosyne
@NR:
What is your plan for 2018? Be specific. “Less incrementalism” is not a plan.
liberal
@jenn: Yeah, that’s going to be an interesting one. I’m presuming Trump will just sign anything Granny Starver sends him, but who knows. Second, it’ll be interesting to see how/whether people assume it’s the Democrats’ fault, or it doesn’t really matter because reasons, or it happened like some kind of fucking deus ex machina.
I’m not all that fond of Obamacare, but I’ve been pretty receptive to arguments that it was a net win for social welfare. But voucher-izing Medicare would be much, much more damaging than getting rid of Obamacare, just in terms of the number of people affected. (Not that I think the douchebags should get rid of Obamacare.)
jenn
@CarolDuhart2: Also, here’s Rev Barber’s site: http://www.breachrepairers.org/ if you want to do some North Carolina-specific work.
elm
The only plan I could see possibly winning elections without making life significantly shittier for religious and ethnic minorities is to bullshit voters.
Promise a $15 minimum wage and medicare for all, promise a moon base, promise blowjobs and steak for everybody.
It doesn’t matter if you lack the votes, put on a show and blame your enemies when things fail.
Shalimar
@NR: PEOPLE I AM CRITICIZING SHOULD DO MORE NEXT TIME! is not a plan.
Emerald
@philpm:
Oh FSM, you’re right! THIS government WILL come for their guns. Not that their little pop guns are any deterrence against governmental howitzers, but trump is not going to want the mere citizenry to have any means of resistance should they feel peeved at some point.
Although I’m sure trump will turn the alt-right militias into his brownshirts fairly quickly, so they’ll get to keep theirs as official Reich employees.
gogol's wife
@CarolDuhart2:
Good idea.
NotMax
Time for an Illegitimi non carborundum tag?
(Attention fellow pedants – yes, it’s not correct Latin.)
Mnemosyne
@NR:
MomSense is currently figuring out who can take guardianship of her children if her genetic blood disorder should flare up and kill her after her Obamacare is cut off.
So, yeah, take your pie-in-the-sky couldawouldashoulda bullshit and shove it up your ass, you overprivileged white dumbfuck. People you actually know are going to die, and all you can say is, Hur-hur, I want to play Fantasy Legislation!
FlipYrWhig
@qwerty42: NR is never going to give up his theory that all Democrats either (1) already believe the same things as he does about every issue but don’t act on them because of corruption or spite or something, or (2) should change their minds to agree with him because that way they’d obviously win every election. Because, ultimately, the crucial issue of every election in America is “what would make NR briefly less of a dick?”
Darkrose
@Ruckus: THIS. I have thoughts on some strategies but later.
PsiFighter37
I’m just worried about my sanity. Honestly, every single day I have woken up since Tuesday has felt like a nightmare. I can’t think straight, and it is harder than ever to focus.
I thought I had come to acceptance with this, but it seems to get worse and worse every goddamn day.
Chris
@Citizen_X:
No, but it helps that the entire West was willing to put South Africa under embargo and generally apply a steady stream of pressure to force an end to the system.
Similarly, if it hadn’t been for the different views of and pressure from the rest of the country, American slavery could probably have gone on for a long fucking time.
jacy
@Ruckus:
Everybody should write this on their hand and look at it five times a day. Pointless arguments bad. I got in one first day, but no more. I’m going to be loud, but make sure I’m not being useless.
Peale
@Gin & Tonic: I’m fine with blaming lieberman and a bunch of now retired and defeated Dems for this. Because they did actively screw over a lot of what would have been popular policies during the recession. That said, the fact that they bailed out the banks, the bankers sued and got their bonuses and HAMP was a disaster. Well the Democratic Party can definitely blamed for some of that and all of HAMP. If we ever do get back in power (and I doubt it will be soon), I hope the next set of democrats facing a crisis will remember that being the adult in the room has its drawbacks.
Mnemosyne
@Lalophobia:
We need a propaganda channel. I know people hate the idea of propaganda because they assume you have to lie, but we need stuff like this WWII short film.
The only thing that works against propaganda is more and better propaganda. We need to get to it.
Shell
Jesus, this week just won’t stop. Just read Robert Vaughn died.
elm
@Chris: Additionally, South Africa was a majority-black country.
liberal
@Emma: Jesus, I’m sick of this fucking shit.
Anyone who points out that the Dem establishment is fucked up is challenged on their credentials.
Fuck you. I think the Dem establishment sucks and needs to be rooted out.
What are my credentials? I gave a total of $2,000 to Democratic Senate candidates this cycle. Yeah, I’m wealthier than a lot of people here, but I’ve got two young children, and I don’t know anyone with my household income that gives that much. (I’m probably in the top 3%.)
Piss off.
Emerald
@MomSense: This is what Al Giordano says to do. Nonviolent resistance won’t start until after Jan 20, and people engaging in it need to get good training.
But for now, clean house.
(Al won’t be around for awhile. Personal problem. He’s said it’s OK to tell people, but I’ll let his personal friends do that.)
WaterGirl
@Ruckus: I wish I knew what to say. Dump winning the electoral college isn’t a victory for anyone; it’s a stunning blow to our country and to all of us, even to the people that aren’t smart enough to know it yet. Many of those people voted for Dump and have absolutely no idea about what they have unleashed.
I know that many people will die if Drump can push through the things he is talking about. I fervently hope that you are not one of them. All of us have to fight for those people as if we are all fighting for our lives, because we are, and we are fighting for a way of life that is democracy.
I cannot fathom how we will be able to stop Dump, but we have to try. That’s the only thing I know with certainty right now. When they move, we have to be ready for action.
I am filled with dread and apprehension, and I am not nearly in as vulnerable a situation as you. But even with the dread and apprehension, and despair, and the profound sadness, and the anger and the rage, all of which I am feeling, I still have hope that we will be able to stop some of the worst they will try to do. My having hope isn’t logical, but hope never is; you can’t think yourself into hope. But I do hope some comes your way.
Ruckus, I truly wish I could think of something more useful to say, but this is what I have on this day.
qwerty42
@NR: It won’t be a platform for jack shit after the Republicans repeal it, now will it?
Which would mean … what? I’m not seeing your logic here. The Republicans can repeal the ACA? They’d like to end Medicare, Dodd-Frank, the EPA. Were you unaware elections had consequences?
Ohio Mom
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike): Most of my cancer treatment was finished over three years ago but I still play the cancer card when I talk to Republicans: “I have a pre-existing condition! Why do you want me to die!” The last time (Election Day)
I came close to pulling out my foob and waving it in that fool’s face. Something tells me the day may come when I do.
Good luck with your surgery and treatment. I hope you find the support you need.
FlipYrWhig
@Shalimar: The plan is for Democrats to have less of a range of opinions because that will make them have broader appeal, obviously.
Barbara
@Citizen_X: @JPL: I should not say this because so many people depend on it including my mother, but I am tired of spending so much energy protecting a program when the majority of its beneficiaries cannot be bothered to vote for people who want to preserve it.
martian
@jenn: Thanks, jenn. Best wishes to you, too.
@GrandJury: I have a lot of bitter feelings about that, but for now I’m pulling back from the internecine warfare. It takes up too much energy I need for protecting my kids from what’s coming as best I can. And opinion shifts from the diehards are practically unicorn sightings, so I don’t see the fighting as much more consequential than venting. There is no prize to be won. Though, my temper will probably get away from me at some point.
D58826
@liberal: But the beauty of voucherizing Medicare and privatizing social security is it won’t kick in for for those 50 or so and older. BY the time it really starts to hurt The Granny Starver will be living the high life with his congressional retirement package and won’t have to face the victims of his plans. And since those victims have been told that unless these reforms are enacted SSN/Medicare will not even be there for them, they will be grateful for the few crumbs that the GOP so gracious left them.
Mnemosyne
@Goblue72:
Hillary promised free college, too.
What is your plan for 2018? Be specific. “Eliminate civil rights from the Democratic Party platform” is not a plan.
Emerald
@jenn: Inspiring post! Thanks!
Gex
@WaterGirl: I asked my historian friend this question, “So it’s just going to go how it’s going to go, huh?” He said, “Yuuuup.”
A person can be smart but people are dumb. We are herd animals and it seems the stampede has already started. Almost all the people I know who are most in denial about how serious this is are white women who voted for Hillary whose husband/boyfriend voted Trump and who desperately need to believe he is a good person.
Which isn’t to say that we shouldn’t fight. Maybe we can turn the tide. And even if we can’t there’s great value in being vocally on the right side of things.
A lot of Americans who ask why the Germans did nothing are currently blithely doing nothing.
As an 0-fer (not male, not white, not straight, not religious) I’ve been pretty much unable to eat or sleep all week. My friend, a gaysian woman like me was harrassed in the parking lot of a Target that I also shop at. Among the various things shouted at her was to go back to Japan. So this shit is not even remotely hypothetical to me.
So I try to set aside the despair as much as possible and find peace in doing my very best to resist and speak up. Even if this has to run it’s regrettable course. (Please please please let me be wrong. Let Americans actually be as exceptional as they like to think themselves. Odds aren’t good though.)
Mnemosyne
@NR:
Whining about what happened in 2009 is “going forward”?
liberal
@Mnemosyne:
You just don’t get it, do you.
We’re in a war. Yeah, the other guy isn’t fighting fair, and in a just world his leaders would be hanged for that.
But when your general loses a massive battle, causing grave loss to your side, you don’t just point at the enemy not fighting fair. You sack the general and question your strategies and tactics.
Barbara
@D58826: There will be chances to change things before that really starts to matter, in 15 years.
SFAW
@debit:
I have hope, too — just no expectations.
Ruckus
@Hill Dweller:
I wish we’d just drop the Medicare for all bullshit.
Medicare is great, if you don’t have/can’t get any other form of coverage. Otherwise Medicare is crap. You pay a fixed amount out of pocket every month, not a huge amount, unless you have a rather limited income (SS?) and you pay copays for lots of things. Yes it is far better than nothing at all. But if we had Medicare for all we’d all still be paying for Medicare Advantage, which is about 3-5 times the monthly cost of Medicare, to have what is actually minimal coverage.
The plain facts are that modern medical care is expensive. Less so in countries that don’t worship the almighty fucking dollar rather than the product, but still not cheap. Modern medicine can fix stuff the just killed you 50-60 yrs ago and most of that is expensive. Very expensive. Medicine and ethics about money do not have a meeting point in this country. We need that conversation and we need it among adults. But we don’t have adults on both sides of the aisle.
Mnemosyne
@NotMax:
Are you at all prone to asthma? That sounds like the kind of stuff that would happen to me before I got my asthma under control, complete with the earwax problem. Singular has helped a lot.
Yoda Dog
@martian: I am reading and re-reading the Tao Teh Ching. I am also doing as much exercise as I cram in my schedule. Especially cardio, but weights too, helps me release tension and dwell less on this catastrophe.
I have an 18 month old daughter and my wife is 9.5 months pregnant; we’re inducing in three days; a little boy we will name Elliot. I have so much love in my heart for them (and also all of you here) combined with abject terror, isolation and bitter, bitter anger at any and all Trump voters, ESPECIALLY family… Its too much emotion at once, its too overwhelming.
This is beyong hard but Im dealing. Trying to stay close to the Tao.
FlipYrWhig
@qwerty42: See, the people who liked a better plan should have fought harder for it, because when smaller numbers of people want something, um, LOOK A NEOLIBERAL
JPL
If only we had a mind reader, that foresaw the election of a fascist, who praised the leadership after the Tianamen Square massacre, then we could have our ponies.
We didn’t so now we have to regroup and come together.
Ruckus
@JPL:
Please?
Emerald
@rikyrah: Preach it.
I say this as a glow-in-the-dark little old white lady. What the F do I know? I’ve learned to listen to Black folks, especially Black women, cause you already KNOW how to survive and fight this mess.
Teach us!
JPL
@Ruckus: I’m willing to help and I’m filled with angst. I think the donation to NAACP makes sense.
NotMax
@PsiFighter37
Hear you loud and clear. Every person experiences and expresses trauma (and it is traumatic, no question) in slightly different ways.
It’s a crude phrase but have been incapable of coming up with a better one – the sensation of having been ideologically raped.
In my case, don’t expect to fully heal but do anticipate being able to overcome and surmount the experience (and, with hope, to gain some smidgen of wisdom from doing so).
Mnemosyne
@Emma:
Goblue72 works in a high-rise in San Francisco and owns a home there, but he’s totally in tune with what the white working class man in Wisconsin wants to hear.
Ruckus
@brendancalling:
Either of your choices would have been better. Smarter. Far less venial. More mature. Need I go on?
SFAW
@TS:
No shit. They blamed Carter for about 6 years into the Reagan admin, Clinton for a long time into the Bush Admin (for, — surprise, surprise — bullshit reasons), but were Johnny-on-the-spot to shriek about Obama blaming Iraq and its aftermath on Bush.
And, of course, Obama got blamed for the 2008 Recession, 9/11, and Katrina.
I guess a side benefit of Trump destroying the world is that we won’t have to listen to the Rethugs blaming Obama for eight or 12 more years.
JPL
Tom Nichols has a book coming out, but still in the proof stage. This is one paragraph
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CxHpmjfW8AAdPag.jpg:large
The book is called the Death Of Expertise.
NotMax
@Mnemosyne
Nope. Zero history of anything even close to that.
James E Powell
@debit:
With respect, you couldn’t be more wrong. They will get invited to all the right parties, they will get access to the primary propaganda sources, they’ll fly first class, they’ll get promotions & book deals. And they get to write columns explaining how Democrats just don’t understand the white working class.
Chris
@Ohio Mom:
One of the few Republicans I still talk to (more out of social necessity than actually liking her) had this conversation with me last Wednesday. I pointed out that I was about to lose my health insurance (Medicaid). After giving the canned party lines about how Obamacare was unsustainable and premiums were rising like crazy and insurance companies were dropping like flies, she had the good grace to offer a reassuring “well they’ll replace Obamacare with something I’m sure.”
Currently skipping her birthday party to help the local Democrats with the last round of data entry. It’s not that I think I’m punishing her or anything. I just don’t think I could be in the same room as her oblivious face, let alone that of the other Repubs that’ll be there, without punching her teeth out.
JPL
@SFAW: Clinton got blamed for 9/11 and the great recession..
Emerald
@NR:
Democrats did not decide we shouldn’t have it. Joe Lieberman decided we shouldn’t have it. He withheld his vote for the ACA until that idea was dropped (and originally it was his own idea). Remember that it took 60 votes, and we had 60 senators?
And the ACA literally saved my life. So I’m glad the Democrats passed it without waiting for the unattainable.
WaterGirl
@Gex: What’s happening is unfathomable, and I have no idea how we stop this oncoming train, this stamped, this mob action. All I know for sure is that we can’t stop it if we don’t try.
Mnemosyne
@Cain:
Co-signed.
sukabi
Just throwing this into the mix, because everybody has an opinion about what went wrong, who’s to blame, but I haven’t seen any sourced numbers… food for thought
Major Major Major Major
Il Douche wants to deport three million people
Ruckus
@Mnemosyne:
You just described about 75% of all the white guys I’ve met in my life. Some to a greater degree and some to lessor, but still right on. And BTW, I’ve known a few white women who have exactly the same disease.
Lizzy L
@Chris:
I firmly disagree. Yes, spite and racism and misogyny and “I got mine, fuck you” are a part of what drove Trump’s vote. But it is not the whole. If we insist on this point of view we will never win another election.
Denise
I live in a county that gave 75% of its vote to Trump. At work on Wednesday, you might expect to hear a lot of gloating. There was a little, but there was more, “Trump sucked less.” Let Ryan go after Medicare and blame Obamacare. You will see old people out in the streets protesting and burning cars. His support is soft outside all but the true believers. Even the Klan will be pissed when he doesn’t follow through on massive deportation.
A little more about my county, when we get a good local Dem, that person gets elected to the state legislature or governor. Most of fellow citizens, at least 70% registered Republicans want people taken care of, jobs, and freedom. They know they’re not free if they are living paycheck to paycheck with one health crisis leading to bankruptcy. I know this because I’ve gone door to door here and talked to people. We can get those votes with the right candidates.
The outcome of the election was Trump wins and has to try to govern or Hillary wins and Trump launches Trump TV propaganda machine. Either scenario is ugly. So 49% of our fellow citizens gave him a chance to put his money where his mouth is. I may see it as a self-destructive act of desperation and I’m going to be talking to them when they find out his economics promises are worth as much as a “degree” from Trump U.
D58826
After having read and commented on a number of threads over the past week about what did Hillary do wrong, how can we fix the democratic party, how not to hurt the fee-fees of the WWC and various male demographics, like and the vote count goes on
When the last vote is counted Hillary will have what in any other western democracy would be 2 million popular vote victory. So maybe she wasn’t such a bad candidate running a stupid campaign (have a hard time thinking that her staff, most of whom ran the 2008/2012 Obama campaigns got so stupid all of a sudden) or the Trump anger tornado might have only been an f2 and not an f5.
I realize this is cold comfort and the D’s have a lot of things that need fixing, like the state and local party structure, but an intra-party civil war does not seem to be the proper reaction. Now part of that civil war seems to be driven by the Bernie wing but I suspect that if Hillary had won every last EV, Bernie would be demanding the party that he never belonged to be restructured in his image. And not to put to fine a point on it I don’t think there are enough voters, outside of VT, who will support a Berncrat party. I really don’t think the much discussed WWC will swarm to Bernie’s banner. Socialism or even warmed over diluted socialism has never had much voter appeal in the US..
GrandJury
@SFAW: Thing is that a lot of Dems often side with Repubs on this shit. The US is not a true deomcracy anymore. Repubs control all 3 levels, most states, and most judiciary appointments. That is not a democracy.
I think that should be the message Dems should be putting out there. Vote for us if you want to save the democracy. That’s the only message.
Everytime they try blame Dems just go back to that. “We don’t control all 3 levels of gov’t, most states, and most judiciary appointments….which btw means we no longer have a true democracy anymore”.
Just repeat that over and over.
JPL
@Barbara: I agree but I’m concerned about my sons. The republicans passed a law preventing the government to negotiate drug prices, and now plan on removing their negotiating power from doctors and hospitals. The cost will skyrocket.
Trentrunner
@Mnemosyne: Co-co-signed.
Also: Coco Chanel.
jenn
@Gex: With a lot of hard work fueled by love and hope and a helluva lot of stubbornness, yes, I think we can “turn the tide” and get our country back onto the right path. But, man, is it going to suck in the meantime – and some losses we will never be able to regain. I’m sorry to hear about the harassment of your friend – please send her my best wishes.
Mnemosyne
@Ruckus:
I don’t know if it’s going to work, but I’m going to keep trying the A Wrinkle in Time strategy with my family: I love you, but I disagree with your actions. I love you, but your facts are wrong. I love you, but thinking that Muslims should be deported is not a political difference.
PsiFighter37
@NotMax: I can sympathize with the fact that I am not culturally attuned to ‘real America’. I was in NOLA for a bachelor party this weekend, and the town is going nuts over a regular-season NFL game. I get being a sports fan, but this is really an entirely different level. So, that’s fine.
What isn’t fine is that I’m biracial, and the half-white part won’t do jack shit for me in Trump’s America. It’s my wife being more depressed about the election outcome than I am, with our time outside of the office just being quiet and very self-reflective. We weren’t thinking of having kids for at least a couple years – but now we wonder if it’s worth it at all with Trump in charge and an unknown as to what Anerica will even look like in the next couple of years.
Ugh. Just ugh. I have to be able to focus more at work this coming week. Life just needs to get a little back on track, somehow…
JPL
Tech question… At comment 230, I tried to copy and paste a paragraph. The only successful thing I could do is drag the link.
Is there anyway to copy and paste the paragraph?
James E Powell
@Ruckus:
It’s not a question of adults. The problem with discussing/debating any public policy changes is that the discussion/debate will be dominated by the people who are making money of the situation as it is.
Ruckus
@Lizzy L:
What can it hurt? How bad will you feel if you don’t do it and in decades to come find out that was the answer?
Lalophobia
@Ruckus:
What we need is resources. For everything, but for that in particular if we could have some kind of thing where it says ‘this news cast is supported by so-and-so, here’s so-and-so’s number’ it might help. Sort of like when there were threads before about calling senators and having links to lists of their names. I think it might be helpful in the coming months to have resources threads here. I don’t think there’s much, comparatively, I can do in my state in two years, but I wouldn’t know where to start to try or if I’m right about that. I’m probably not alone in that, either.
NotMax
@JPL
It’s an image of text, not text in and of itself, so the answer is no.
MomSense
@Emerald:
I’m really gutted to hear about it. There are a lot of us who have organized with him in New England who will reach out and find out what we can do to help. I can certainly make soup and bake bread and make sure they have healthy food.
Mnemosyne
@liberal:
No, you don’t. You look at why the battle was lost. If your enemy won the battle because they brought a shiny new weapon to bear, you figure out how to counter that weapon, not how to find more soldiers to throw in front of it.
Again: Wisconsin has one of the most restrictive voter ID laws in the country. Voters were being turned away at the polls without being offered provisional ballots.
Milwaukee, WI, saw a decline of 41,000 voters compared to 2012. Trump won Wisconsin by 27,000 votes. But I’m sure it was all a coincidence, just like you guys keep telling me.
Ruckus
@raven:
Yes! I knew I forgot something. Thanks for having my back.
Major Major Major Major
@Ruckus: isn’t that really more voodoo than witchcraft?
martian
@Yoda Dog: Thank you, Yoda Dog. I’ve never actually read the Tao, and I think I should. As jenn, Water Girl, and others have also said up thread, this is a time for centering and stabilizing in our immediate surroundings and lives to shelter and prepare for what’s coming. Sounds apocalyptic doesn’t it? I keep wanting to downplay the situation in my own mind, normalize it, but I think that would be a dangerous mistake. I’m feeling the fear, and bitterness, and rage, too, and I have no idea how to get past this with family. I’m hoping just time will help. I’m jittery this week over having to strategize over how to obtain healthcare for my high medical needs child. It’s a shock. I got an appointment for a check-up with my surgical oncologist and am just hoping for an all clear that will hold through however long this mess goes on. But I’m going to take the good advice here to focus tightly on improving what’s immediately around me and draw solace from my kids.
MomSense
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike):
Sending you all my best wishes for successful treatment and health. Please take care of yourself.
Chris
@Lizzy L:
That’s… a point of view, I suppose. I can’t say I’m convinced though.
@GrandJury:
It’s “democracy” like Mexico under permanent PRI governance for most of the 20th century, I think. It’s not illegal for another party to run for office or literally impossible for one to win. The corruption and the way the system is set up just make the barriers to success incredibly high.
mai naem mobile
The only thing that is giving me some hope and,lord, its a stupid reasom is that Eric Holder on Bill Maher on Friday didn’t seem all that freaked out. My assumption is that he’s knows that shot ain’t gonna be as bad as we are imagining. I am ignoring the voices in my head that are saying that Eric Holder may not give a shit because 1/ he’s got the power and money to GTFO of here 2/He’s given up on the American population 3/He’s put up with so much from the GOP that his tolerance level for not freaking out is very very high
Miss Bianca
@rikyrah: preach it. I’d like to see the Black Panthers come back with a vengeance. But winning this time. I don’t know if that’s possible.
Blueskies
@Trentrunner: Sorry, wishful thinking.
GrandJury
@Mnemosyne: You can go on and on about voter ID laws all you want but that battle is basically lost. Without SCOTUS ideological control or federal judiciary appointment control that battle is lost.
You are focusing on the small problem of voter id law when the real problem is in fact the judiciary.
With the Scalia opening about to be filled by someone I can guarantee you will be just as bad or worse (if they can find such a person) that is SCOTUS control for another generation or 2 at least. If Ginsburg goes then that’s the whole ball game for 3 or 4 generations.
So while the voter id laws are a serious problem. They aren’t even the worst problem.
Again, it’s really about the US no longer being a functioning democracy anymore. I don’t think I am overreacting or being overly dramatic by saying that. This is the reality of the situation.
trnc
@NR:
Point me to the senate republican who would have been more likely to vote for, or less likely to filibuster the public option than for the ACA we ultimately got. Point me to any tool Reid or Pelosi had at their disposal that they did not use. Post a link to the mainstream media stories that cheered on the public option I would love to see them. I wanted Medicare-for-all, but we had to fight tooth and nail to get what we did get. It had to be done through reconciliation, and it still squeaked by with one vote.
Ruckus
@liberal:
Fucking Bullshit.
He didn’t fail. Hillary didn’t fail. We won the popular vote. Just like we did in 2000. HATE won the electoral college. And Tuesday morning even he didn’t expect that. We don’t run on hate, it’s not in our DNA.
Renie
Both of my 20s somethings kids have been very upset by the election to they went to the protest in NYC yesterday. They found it very uplifting and cathartic especially when standing by Trump Tower chanting ‘drag him out’ ‘not my president’.
Got 2 new activities in my family now; both were Bernie supporters who voted for Hillary
cthulhu
@Baud:
There is a reason for this. As bad as it seems, the GOP/Trumpers are not exactly wanting to head in the same direction on all things. Dumping the filibuster would make it far easier to get Trump’s more populist economic promises through, especially with Dem support and encouragement. I certainly expect Trump to be a casual President but he also still wants to go out and do political rallies (!) and thrives on the adoration; they won’t be too pleasant if he doesn’t try to get some of the “winning” stuff done. The problem remains that much of the GOP platform is unpopular and the Dem platform popular and honestly I don’t think Trump cares all that much as long as his approval doesn’t crater*.
I am not saying the next 4 years will be easy but the Dems might have more leverage with Trump and against the GOP on domestic economic policy. I think we are kinda screwed on the foreign policy side which is looking more and more like GWB redux. Still Trumpland is already talking about keeping the Iran deal not even a week in after the election.
*I do suspect he will set records for lowest starting approval and lowest average approval for his term.
JPL
@NotMax: Thanks..
Mnemosyne
@sukabi:
Sorry, we’ve already been assured by our white dudebro betters that there was no voter suppression, or if it happened, it was only small numbers on the margins that wouldn’t have affected the outcome, so we’re not even allowed to point out that at least one million voters were affected by it.
polyorchnid octopunch
14th Amendment:
Why aren’t people attempting to sue to rejig the weightings of the EC based on this clause? AFAICT there’s been no effort historically to try to enforce this. Enforcement of this would result in a serious impairment of the benefit of voter suppression for Republican state governments. Even if it couldn’t be done in time for this election, I’d think it’s worth resolving going forward… but for this election, given the amount of voter suppression that has happened, that it’s worth pursuing.
NotMax
@Major Major Major Major
Did someone say voodoo?
(Just trying to offer a short pleasant interlude.)
Travels with Charley
@WaterGirl: I agree! Hillary as president would have represented incremental change for improvement. Not that that was wrong! It was certainly the way to go! Donald represents a system shock….which is a LOT worse than most people realize. But…it opens up an opportunity for us to define significant change. Maybe.
Mnemosyne
@Denise:
If you have the time, PLEASE volunteer with your county Democratic Party. They desperately need you and people like you.
I live in midnight-blue Southern California, so I’m still trying to figure out where my activism is best directed.
Ruckus
@Mnemosyne:
This deserves to be seen again. And again. And again.
Glidwrith
Hi folks – for anyone that hasn’t caught some of the downthread stuff, some of us are asking how we can get people registered to vote and procure the necessary IDs on an ongoing basis instead of only during electoral cycles.
Curating the collective BJ wisdom we have some answers on how this could be done but there is still a lot of structural work to figure out:
1. Is there a conflict for a partisan group to register voters? Gretchen says she worked for the Obama campaign and the only need was to make sure the registrations got to the SoS in a reasonable amount of time. So: NO, WE DON’T HAVE TO BE NONPARTISAN, though obviously it is against the law to trash ANY registrations.
2. How do we procure IDs when birth certificates are needed? Steeplejack knows a company called VitalChek to whom the states have largely turned over the need to get birth certificates. With 50 states there are some exceptions (aka California) but this would remove a lot of roadblocks to getting IDs. The main problem here is it costs money: $30 is significant to a lot of people. So: YES, THIS CAN BE DONE FOR A LOT OF PEOPLE IF WE LIFT THE MONETARY ROADBLOCK.
3. What are the state requirements for IDs? VoteRiders has done this work and we can use that as a resource.
Structurally speaking, it takes time to build an organization. Do we have that time? Can we help organizations that are already in place to speed up the process and have experience doing this?
4. Google search for ‘voter registration organizations’: There are upwards of a thousand organizations that are out there: League of Women Voters, Rock the Vote, NAACP are just the tippy top. One link (http://nationalvoterregistrationday.org/partners/) has very long lists of organizations that participated in National Voter Registration Day, which was September 27th of this year. At the top of the page were companies that are sponsoring these drives: Google, AOL, MTV, Univision, Twitter, etc.
I am at something of a loss: if there are so many organizations why is nearly half the population not registered to vote? Are the structural impediments that high? That many people dis-interested in voting?
Today happens to be my birthday – I am going to enjoy what I can and mull this over. Perhaps the best thing is to seek out those multiples of organizations and help with money or time. I only have time to devote during the weekends – so talk to y’all later.
MomSense
@sukabi:
Unpossible! Disenfranchised Democratic voters have nothing to do with close losses in key states. The woman just couldn’t excite the poor, maligned working class white guys.
SenyorDave
@mai naem mobile: I saw it too. I thought it was a lot of #2 and #3. He put up with an amazing amount while he was AG. I think he was one of those guys who knew he had to be twice as smart as an average AG because of his skin tone. For now I’m on #2, the idea that a significant portion of the country would vote for an ignorant, now-nothing racist to say fuck you to America is more than disheartening.
Chris
@cthulhu:
Dang, I am actually being inspired to hope by a person called “Cthulhu.” Now there’s a sign of the times right there.
kindness
Guess what the incoming Congress is going to pull. McConnell, Ryan & Trump announce in the spirit of comity and gratitude to the outgoing President Obama they will take up, pass and sign ‘President Obama’s Signature Bill TPP’. Whatcha bet they do. Then blame it all on Obama.
Another Holocene Human
@Cermet: C does reduce the severity of colds, but doesn’t help when you already have one. So eat citrus every day during cold and flu season.
Also, be careful with Zinc. Some people have lost their sense of smell taking Zinc sprays.
MomSense
@Denise:
If the klan keep going like they are maybe self deportation will be a thing and not just for Mexicans.
The place brendancalling is moving to looks very appealing. It looks like paradise except for all the active volcanoes. Anyone know when they are due for an eruption?
Mnemosyne
@GrandJury:
So we don’t even try to get IDs for people who need them in time for 2018? Just roll over and die because it’s totally hopeless?
Sorry, that’s not what I’m made of.
Mary G
I was all gung-ho with big plans yesterday, ready to storm the barricades and fight, fight, fight. Then I spent two hours working on my housemate’s application for citizenship and OMG what a nightmare. It’s going to be a huge amount of work. I can’t even tell if I should use form N-600 or form N-400 until I call tomorrow, because he was born before Nov. 14, 1986. They want certified copies of a million things, including his father’s marriage certificate to his stepmother. The idea that brown people are just waltzing over the border is so far from the truth that it is insane. Even Obama’s administration takes 6 months to process it if you have it all right, so he has left it too late to avoid Trump’s regime, which is terrifying. He put it off because it costs $690 to apply, which is going up on Dec. 23.
So this morning I woke up feeling hopeless and wanting to pull my covers over my head and stay in bed until I die. I haven’t even been able to read all the comments on this thread except for rikyrah, Baud and Ruckus. Not dissing everyone else, but the fear of losing medical coverage for 3JaneAKALorindaPike (not your actual nym, sorry, too distraught to go back and look it all up) made me burst into tears.
I don’t plan to watch any TV, but I was getting back to at least reading the headlines and a few articles on WaPo and things people recommended on twitter. Today I opened WaPo and saw that Kellyanne wants Obama and Clinton to stop people protesting, flew into a rage and had to close it up. I am thisclose to cancelling my subscription because Chris Cizilla is a monster from hell just based on tweets.
GrandJury
The country is run by a failed casino mogul now so expect the economy to become the same way.
bemused
@Ohio Mom:
Good one. “Do you want me to die?” Oh, now you have to tell us what their responses are, pretty please.
martian
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike): Hoping the best for you and for everyone else balanced on this knife edge. Pinning my hopes on the ACA taking a long time to unwind, giving us more time to prepare. They can’t really make it vanish in a puff of sulfurous smoke, right?
Hekilë Esselóra
I thought I was done shouting into the wind (“May You Live in Interesting Times“)
but it turns out I have a few more thoughts burning holes in my fingertips.
This one occurred independently to me and several on Wonkette the last few days:
The Jill and Bernie and Paris Hilton write-in protestors are the political version of the antivaxxers who believe in the efficacy of vaccines but don’t want the .001% chance that their special snowflake might have a bad reaction, so they’re counting on “herd immunity” to save their family from the consequences of their choice.
Except they don’t really understand how herd immunity works, or how small their fraction has to remain to stay safe — and NOW they want to be immune from the consequences in spite of that, including the consequence of returning-fire scorn from the people they planned to both use as human shields and look down upon, for being “impure” — of bodily fluids contaminated by (not-really) mercury and active diseases, or of morals for voting for the candidate who has done bad things, because they have actually done anything at all.
They can take their Quisling sanctimony and shove it up their rectums along with their organic coffee enemas and never speak in public again, or they can grow up, accept their culpability, do their mea culpa time and work to remedy their mistakes like the (very few) responsible ex-Nader voters out here.
What they cannot do, is whine about how they didn’t anticipate succeeding and they didn’t really mean all that talk about the transformative power of disaster and hardship and they don’t really want to live in a Fury Road hellscape of fire and blood, please can we act like they didn’t do it and brag about it and grant them collective absolution so they can go on being holier-than-everyone Hard Lefties without having to feel bad about themselves, let alone do any of the heavy lifting? Because they are notably short on the ground when it comes to actual community organizing that has visible benefits, particularly in the environmental field out here in fire country, and all they’ve proven themselves good at is spoiling things for everyone around them.
If they whine then that they’re our ALLIES, duuuude, and if we don’t comfort them and tell them it’s okay, we don’t hold their abuse and their disastrous choices against them, because we know they were just poor helpless babies who couldn’t be expected to do the research and accept the Original Sin of being a voter at all (which is to share in the collective responsibility for the evils our nations do, you cannot share the feast but not the fall) they’ll just screw up elections worse next time for the Left? Then they never were Left at all, just supporters of the status quo in more severe denial than most.
Secondly, anyone who thinks that backing off on reproductive rights will win over some of those coveted “prolife voters” is delusional. There is only a small fraction of “prolife voters” who can be reached, because there is only a small fraction who actually are motivated by care for (imagined, hypothetical) fetal strangers. The vast majority of them, speaking as one raised so for twenty-five years among the protestors and propaganda makers of the movement, are all about the slut-shaming, first and foremost. It really is about punishing women on an emotional level, and about guaranteeing a permanent Republican/Conservative majority on an intellectual level, and it’s pretty easy to demonstrate this.
How do I know this? When confronted with the facts that abortions ONLY go down under liberal governments because of liberal policies, that there is zero proof that the Pill causes abortions, that all of the claims made by the prolife movement to motivate their base’s emotions are lies (safety of childbirth, “frivolous” abortions, especially late term, fetuses ground up for cosmetics) and that there is no concern or effort made to minimize prenatal risk or protect neonates, no care for the vast number of miscarriages or children born into poverty and contaminated environments (often the same thing) — they don’t care. They would rather make an empty symbolic gesture than ACCOMPLISH their stated goal of “saving babies”.
It’s a combination of Purity Snowflakes and unspoken allegiances — because when there does happen to be a “pro-life” D running for office? It’s dismissed as a fake, or well, they won’t be able to accomplish anything so VOTE THE PARTY OF MORAL VALUES!
There are a handful of us who woke up when we did the research and found out we’d been lied to (another is Libby Anne on Patheos) but by and large? “Prolife voter” is a cover for white racist xenophobe sexist got-mine victim blamer who thinks that because their Irish or Polish or Italian ancestors had a harder go of it than the WASP-descended immigrants, that all current talk of racial discrimination is nonsense and lies by the lazy and Hillary is a witch who rejoices in tearing babies limb from limb to honor Satan, didn’t you hear there were condoms on the White House Christmas Tree and what do you mean we’re reciting the Old Blood libels? You’re going to H-E-Double-Hockeysticks (because we’re too civilized to swear like you foul-mouthed liberals…)
Nope. Running to the Right on reproductive rights in an attempt to court the “values voters” is as useful as dropping support for minority rights in order to propitiate the “economically anxious” white male American. Because those are just fig leaves, which is why those same Evangelical Christians voted for the openly adulterous crass molesting tycoon who flipped on abortion to cater to them, and the “economically anxious” white male American voted for the king of outsourcing and bankruptcies.
So stand fast on our principles, and work on making theirs socially unacceptable. It worked after Proposition 8, and aside from shame, we have very few other avenues left, thanks to a DNC that has been losing the war for the nation on every field — message, state house, governors’ mansion, school district, Congress — while winning the White House campaign for generations, surrendering to House Murdoch without a fight for as long as I’ve been alive. Because making nice with Fascists has never, EVER worked.
And now I stop trying to wade back across the waters of Lethe (I tell myself again)…
Ruckus
@WaterGirl:
Thanks. That’s more than enough.
I have my life, it is what I make of it. I have friends who have lived in wheelchairs for most of their adult lives. I had friends who were my age but didn’t live past 21. Life can be good, life can suck hairy donkey balls, sometimes both on the same day. I’ll live as long as I can, if for no other reason than to not let the bastards win as long as I can. Really there isn’t much more any of us can do. You do what you can, as long as you can and that’s the ball game. It’s much better if the last game was the world series that you’ve won but really, isn’t just playing the game to the best of your ability the entire issue? OK, that and trying to leave it just a little bit better than when you entered?
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@Ruckus: James Madison failed.
Ruckus
@qwerty42:
It would be easier to ask if he were just unaware? Covers all the possible ground and is more a realistic question.
matryoshka
@martian: Yeah, ignore the autopsies of Hillary. It’s a dead end that people are amusing themselves with because they don’t want to face the moment. My suggestion, as someone who feels just the way you do, is to take very good care of yourself. Get outside, walk, be with friends and family with whom you can speak freely, take pleasure in the small things, be kind to people you know are scared too. Ignore cable TV and stick to Netflix or whatever. Call things what they are. Spend time doing whatever recharges you, because we are going to be fighting waves from every side of the boat.
GrandJury
@Mnemosyne: You can try but it’s not going to happen.
Once again, Repubs control all 3 levels, most states, and the judiciary. It’s not going to happen. May as well wish for unicorns.
Mnemosyne
@GrandJury:
Great. Go sob in the corner and get out of my way. I have work to do.
Major Major Major Major
@GrandJury: STFU pantswetter
Denise
@Mnemosyne: You know I will. I’m talking to my beloved and formerly beaten down WWC family and friends.
5x5
@Glidwrith:
I have decided to add League of Women Voters to my contribution list (Planned Parenthood, ACLU, DwB, Oxfam.) I’m also going to volunteer with the LoWV to do… something.
David Waldman of DKos is very good with congressional matters. His podcast (“Kagro in the Morning”) might help as a guide.
DailyKos also had a “Nuts and Bolts” series about running for Congress (that I didn’t read) that could offer insight into how to help Dems on a local level.
D58826
@sukabi: @Mnemosyne:
Couple of things. I have seen other articles about that voter suppression program.
We have kicked around the question of could the vote have been hacked. Now the CW is it would be difficult to hack the individual voting machines. Of course with the resources that the Russian hacker have at their disposal I’m not sure the CW holds. But are the voter registration databases vulnerable? I saw on Twitter that in Oct. three states, FL, WI and forget the third, suspected that their voter databases had been hacked. So the database is hacked, voters in the appropriate demographic are deleted. The voter show sup at the polls and is deemed ineligible because he/she isn’t on the database. THey are given a provisional ballot and they go away happy. The hackers are counting on the fact that many of the people with the provisional ballot do not know they have to go down to the elections office and validate that ballot. Or if they do know they can’t affords the time off work. Or with the new voting rules they don’t have the required paper work (or can’t get it in time) from the time they originally registered. And if all else fails the corrupt local officials just trash the ballot after the voter leaves.
Or do I have extra tin foil on may hat?
Tazj
@Miss Bianca: Sadly, it’s the only thing that will make them consider gun control.
Mnemosyne
@D58826:
I think you have extra tin foil in your hat. The Republicans have been openly suppressing the vote ever since the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act, so I think everything we’re seeing is fully traceable back to the Republican Party.
If actual evidence of Russian fuckery comes in, fine, but there’s no need to invent an enemy when we have one in our line of vision who is documented as doing this: the Republican Party. Let’s not waste our time hunting for an imaginary enemy when we already know who’s responsible.
cthulhu
@Chris: Ha, thanks.
But I am pretty serious about this. Take Trump’s talk with Obama. He walked out of that talking about keeping some aspects of Obamacare.
It would greatly behoove the Dem leadership to get Trump’s attention as much as possible and talk up popularity and legacy. Music to a narcissist’s ear. In that regard, we’d probably be better having Bannon as COS than Priebus. Of course, Bannon worries me for other reasons.
In any case, we need to do our best to protect those most at risk and push for advantage where ever we can. I think we would be even more screwed if this was a Cruz admin we were facing with GOP control.
DeliciousGuac
@Scout211:
Here’s Foster Campbell’s website, and if you click the “Donate” button it will send you to the ActBlue site:
He supports a higher minimum wage, equal pay, and coastal restoration…
Ohio Mom
@bemused: They usually laugh uncomfortably and try to assure me that isn’t going to happen. That is why I’m getting closer and closer to shoving that fake silicon boob in their faces. I think that would cut the guffaws, just out of shock.
They don’t grok that someone who looks like them (white, suburban) could be hurt, being hurt is for “them.”
I’m hearing that Trump wants to keep the ban on denying people with pre-existing conditions. That has to include no caps on lifetime expenditures and a limit on how much the insurance is going to cost. Because unaffordable insurance is as good as no insurance.
NR
@qwerty42: That was incoherent even by BJ standards.
Major Major Major Major
@D58826: it’s easy to hack an individual voting machine. But the elections are federated across thousands of machines in thousands of precincts, so it’s impossible to have a meaningful effect at scale that way.
I maintain that the Colorado SoS website would be target number one for a real hack. It went down mysteriously for only about a half hour, so if that was a DDoS it was a shitty one.
Another Holocene Human
@Mnemosyne: Terry McAuliffe nearly didn’t pull it off. If the Comey letter hadn’t happened looks like Hilary would have had a squeaker as well. Hardly an endorsement given Obama’s 2012 totals and map.
NR
@Mnemosyne:
Because the Democrats didn’t pass Medicare for all when they could have, dumbass.
matryoshka
@PsiFighter37: It’s good to come here and say so even if no one responds. It’s helped me, but I do wonder why people waste so much time responding to trolls and people who didn’t even vote. We need each other right now and having a case of “the feels” is an entirely appropriate response as far as I’m concerned. And that’s not to say I’m not blind with fury, because I am.
Another Holocene Human
@Goblue72: The true colors come out. White dude styles himself smarter than Obama, ragey that anyone supposes otherwise. Film at 11.
sukabi
@Mnemosyne: so what? Roll over and accept that framing, or push back at every chance?
ArchTeryx
@Lizzy L: They are effective. They’re ready made target lists for the blackshirts.
NR
@Emerald:
Yes they did. They could have passed it at any time by getting rid of the filibuster and passing it with 50 votes plus Biden.
The only reason we didn’t get Medicare for all is because the Democrats didn’t want to pass it.
NR
@trnc: You’re complaining about Senate Republicans when the Democrats would not even allow Medicare for all as a position in the health care debate. The Democrats killed the idea long before any vote ever took place.
Focus on the real culprits.
Major Major Major Major
Well, this thread is as over as Medicaid will be in January. Don’t feed the trolls, morons.
NR
@Mnemosyne:
And also because you guys fucked up the election.
Emerald
@MomSense: Best thing you can do probably is to take up a collection. He’s on the ACA.
I do envy you your experience with him! I discovered him in 2007, lamented that he seemed to lose interest in ongoing American politics for awhile, and have been relying on him for advice this election.
And I really want him to still do that political campaign he was talking about. When the time come.
Mnemosyne
@NR:
Better get your T.A.R.D.I.S. out of the garage and go fix that, then. Or is your time machine a DeLorean?
Mnemosyne
@sukabi:
Sorry, I forgot to add the sarcasm tags. :-)
I’ve got your back against the dudebro horde trying to shut us up about the massive voter suppression that we just witnessed that they want to ignore.
NR
Pretty amazing that people here are still shitting on liberals when the third-way neoliberal Democratic party leadership just gave us one of the biggest electoral disasters in the history of the Republic.
You’d think that some of you might consider listening to the people who were right all along. Just a suggestion.
Ruckus
@D58826:
Why do you say that those over 50 won’t be affected? The conservatives that wanted to end SS and Medicare and all the rest of the programs they are after never wanted to count out those over 50 or 55. They just didn’t think there was a way to sell that to even their base. They didn’t have to with the Shit-Gibbon. He sold them on hate, which as we have seen is a much more important concern to them for their continued survival than money or food or shelter.
Lemon Kraken
@liberal: Yes, but by now it’s been pointed out ad infinitum.
Mnemosyne
@NR:
What is your plan for 2018? Taking your time machine back to 2009 is not a plan, it’s just jerking off.
D58826
@Mnemosyne: The hacking in Oct. may or may not have been the Russians but given what has happened they seem like the likely culprit.
The scenario was a hypothetical. I’m not saying it happened last week just that IF someone wanted to hack the results would that be a plausible way to do it. Sorry I didn’t make that part clearer.
tobie
@Goblue72:
But she did pass Dodd-Frank which Wall Street hates with all its might. Too bad her words didn’t speak as loud as her actions. I wonder why that is? Could it have anything to do with the media?
Can we please stop with the circular firing squad? This is so damn counter-productive!
Barbara
@JPL: In no way am I suggesting that we support or that Dems support decimating Medicare. We should oppose it and use scare tactics and apocalyptic language. The notion that cuts will apply only prospectively is ridiculous and it should be portrayed as a wide ranging assault on seniors. All okay. But in terms of where to spend anticipatory energy, it is ,y view that redistricting and midterms are where my resources are going, along with climate related causes.
Ruckus
@JPL:
Figured that would go this way.
I was asking to also please be included. I have none of the experience of being black, I can’t, it’s impossible. But I can see that it happened, is still happening and that it’s shit. And really all one needs to do that is have the smallest amount of empathy for your fellow human beings. But that seems to be about 5 million miles beyond the grasp of about half this country.
Mnemosyne
@D58826:
I don’t mean to be an asshole (not to you, at least ;-) but we already have plenty of fantasizing going on right now. The Russian-sponsored email leaks did enough damage on their own without inventing things.
FlipYrWhig
@NR: You’re not a liberal, you’re an ignorant fuckface who bleats about wanting Things to be Better. Just crawl up your own asshole already.
NR
@Mnemosyne: Address voter suppression, replace the Democratic party leadership, create an alternative for working Americans that we can offer when Trump’s promises don’t materialize. Above all, start working for the working class again, instead of the party’s big corporate donors. That’s what got us in this mess to begin with.
NR
@FlipYrWhig: You don’t know anything about me, Sparky.
D58826
@Ruckus: Most of the plans I’ve seen phase the changes in over a couple of decades so as not to annoy the oldsters who are a reliable part of the GOP base. One plan I saw would allow younger workers to start putting money in an IRA immediately but it would have no practical effect until they reached what ever the retirement age was. For older workers their social security would remain as it is now. Of course what the GOP fails to mention is that all of the younger worker contributions help pay for the older workers retirement. That money would be gone and to maintain existing benefit levels the government would have to use money from the general fund, which it doesn’t have. Result really huge deficits. They also fail to mention that all of the Soc. Sec. taxes that the now deported aliens have been paying will have to be made up as well. And these folks only pay in, they can’t collect benefits when they hit retirement. But as Chaney said deficits don’t matter and neither does math.
FlipYrWhig
@tobie: I’m going to keep firing until we inflict enough of the right casualties.
Taylor
@NR:
I don’t hang out here much, but I thought it was important to let you know that you are a monster.
Hope you die a slow and lonely death, you worthless shit.
FlipYrWhig
@NR: I know that you exude disease.
Mnemosyne
@NR:
And you plan to get those things by carping about couldawouldashoulda from 2009 how, exactly?
NR
@Taylor: Look, I know it’s hard admitting you were wrong, but it’s a necessary step to grow as a person. Try it sometime.
D58826
@Mnemosyne: True but there had been speculation here and else where about hackers affecting the election. I also seem to remember that most of the state election boards asked for Homeland security help to tighten up their data security against hacking.
Now I’ll use that extra tin foil for what it was intended for – wrapping up the left over meatloaf:-)
FlipYrWhig
@Taylor: His entire argument hinges on the pronoun “they.” Just ignore the contemptible pissant.
NR
@Mnemosyne: Understanding how we got here is key to getting us out of this mess.
NR
@FlipYrWhig: There you go projecting again.
Mnemosyne
@NR:
And yet you think that the healthcare fight of 2009 is more indicative of what went wrong than the massive voter suppression numbers from 5 days ago. Huh.
D58826
@NR: first plank in the new and improved democratic platform and campaign playbook – DON’T FEED THE TROLLS
Uncharismatic megafauna
@Bobby D:
This. In my case I’ve spent 30 years working to conserve plants and animals and the forests and wetlands on which they depend. Like our democracy itself, these gains are so very fragile and can be undone within the span of just a couple of years.
I regret that I only found BJ a few weeks before the election, through a comment on DailyKos. I hope to hang around and hopefully contribute now that I’m here.
Ruckus
@James E Powell:
I’m pretty sure that was my point but I didn’t make it all that well. Our medical care is provided by corps who are interested in making the most money they are allowed, while providing the least costly product allowed. And now those doing the allowing are fine with allowing the product to be zero and the profit to be maximum, damn the consequences. They don’t do consequences up front, those are too much like work. And afterwards they blame everyone else. I seem to recall that 4 or 5 yrs olds are exactly like this.
NR
@Mnemosyne: What went wrong over the last eight years set the stage for what happened last week.
Obama’s presidency was an absolute disaster for the Democratic party, electorally speaking. The Democrats went from having huge majorities in both houses of Congress to being in the minority in the House in 2010, with the Senate finally falling in 2014. They also lost massively at the state level.
To ignore that is to simply put your head in the sand.
Edit: Also, you could say the same thing about Clinton’s presidency in the 90s. A third way, neoliberal Democratic administration presides over massive losses for the Democratic party at the Congressional and state level, manages to win a second term against weak Republican opposition, and then watches as another corporate-friendly neoliberal candidate loses a close election following their term. It’s deja vu all over again.
Democrats don’t learn, apparently.
Mnemosyne
@NR:
Well, have fun relitigating that into infinity. I’ve got to get started on moving forward. Toodles!
NR
@Mnemosyne: Hey, you can acknowledge the simple truth of the matter, or you can keep pretending that the party leadership you’ve unquestioningly supported has done an absolutely fine and dandy job. It’s really up to you.
Denali
@Senor Dave,
Petition at Choice.org currently has over 3 million signatures. It asks electors to vote for Hillary Clinton, the undeniable winner of the popular vote, on December 19th.
Ruckus
@Lalophobia:
An FP posted the other day, I think it may have been yesterday about what can we do, let’s come up with some ideas. I said I didn’t have any and then came up with one. Here’s another. We have resources, we don’t need a lot of money. We need posts about individual things to do, like what I’ve suggested here, organize a grass roots anti monetary supporter list for the media. That will be, in a lot of cases different in different parts of the country. It may not be possible to avoid all the companies that support the media, just because we need food, and toilet paper and……. But we can figure out this, most of us aren’t that stupid, we just have to think what needs to be done and move on. Right now we are in what used to be known as shell shock, probably frozen in disbelief, some even striking out at our own side for not winning overwhelmingly. I get it, read some of my comments from Tuesday forward. But the initial attack is over, it’s time to rally and figure out how to survive and then move on. There is a lot of work, some of us will be casualties, maybe even me. I don’t think that’s OK and if you read those comments you’d know that. But that’s life, and warfare. There will be casualties, there always are, even in the best of times, the point is to limit them as much as possible and move forward.
Mnemosyne
@NR:
Ronald Reagan kicked off his campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi — the site of the murders of three civil rights workers — and you still think that this election was about policy. You still think that a few minor policy tweaks would have white voters flocking to the Democrats.
They. Do. Not. Vote. On. Policy. If Medicare For All had passed in 2009, the Republicans would have spent the last 8 years trying to defund it, and would be preparing their bill to defund it right now. Because THEY. DO. NOT. VOTE. ON. POLICY.
cthulhu
@NR:
And passing the CRA set the stage for Luntz and Reagan to turn the WWC against minorities.
And the failure of the Reconstruction set up the need for the CRA.
And the decision to allow slavery during the founding of the country set up the need for Reconstruction.
See, we can play this all day.
WaterGirl
@Renie: “Drag him out” does not sound like what we say about a president elect in a democracy. Ugh. “He’s not fit.” Sure. “This is very bad.” Absolutely. “He’s a racist.” Yep.
But drag him out sounds a lot like lock her up, and we can’t be like them. That’s wrong.
Ruckus
@Major Major Major Major:
What’s your point?
NR
@Mnemosyne:
Apparently, you have a comprehension problem. I haven’t been advocating for minor policy tweaks. My first comment in this thread said that big, sweeping policy change is what’s needed. Go big or go home.
And a bunch of those white voters you’re excoriating right now voted for a black guy twice. Kinda kicks a hole in the “they’re all just a bunch of dirty racists” argument. As does the fact that Trump got a bigger percentage of the black and Hispanic vote than Mitt Romney.
But hey, you want to blame all your problems on racist white voters, go ahead. It sure makes it easy for you. You don’t have to change anything. You don’t have to think about anything. You can go on unquestioningly supporting the neoliberal Democratic party leadership just like you always have. And when the Democrats lose in 2018 and 2020, you can just shake your head and mutter about how you can’t believe how many racist white people we have in this country.
Like I said–it’s really up to you.
And with that, I’m out.
Ruckus
@MomSense:
The day after I arrive.
WaterGirl
@polyorchnid octopunch: I agree with you. I am hoping President Obama and Eric Holder will push something like that in their new planned venture together after January 20.
The President has to be very careful what he does now – above all he wants to preserve the United States as a democracy, so he has to peacefully pass the baton even though it surely makes him sick to do so.
After January 20, he is a private citizen and he can say what he pleases. It gives me comfort to know he will not walk about from this without a fight. And Eric Holder? Anyone who thinks he isn’t pissed off every single day about the disrespect with which he and especially were treated? I would not bet on that if I were you.
Ruckus
@Tilda Swinton’s Bald Cap:
I’m missing your point.
WaterGirl
@Mnemosyne: I’m pretty sure this guy is either a paid shill for the other side or that there’s something wrong with him and he wants to spread pain and fear and a sense of helplessness. I wish every person on BJ would just ignore him. He is not our friend. He is not even on our side.
Ruckus
@Another Holocene Human:
This can’t be news you about this one.
jenn
@NR: Yes. Because the only reason 60 Democratic Senators were required was because of (up until then) almost unprecedented obstructionism by Republicans and the threat of the filibuster. In hindsight are there some things that could have been done differently? Yeah, sure – aren’t there always? But to do what was done required an enormous amount of effort to pull together a disparate bunch of groups with competing and opposing interests, and get them to move forward in the same direction. After all of the dissension of the Bush years and in the aftermath of the crash, there was also a desire to try to work together with Republicans for the good of the country. If they had known then what we know now, that the Republicans were going to initiate a scorched earth campaign, they probably would have gamed things out differently. But the idea had been that if everybody was in the same room, and everything got passed by Congress, then the bill was more likely to stick around. Democrats worked hard in the chaos and uncertainty of the moment to pass something that would benefit peoples’ lives around the country – and they did, and lives and life savings have been saved. It was a giant step forward, and if we had had partners in governance, many of the bill’s imperfections could have been fixed years ago, and even further progress made. Sadly, not the case.
It is difficult to do difficult things; and it is very easy to criticize with the benefit of hindsight about this path, but no way to test the results of alternate paths.
Re how people are responding to you – I suspect that some of the pushback is, yes, due to what you’re saying (after all, when folks say “go big or go home” in the face of big obstacles, there’s a good chance they’re going to go home with nothing – and when lives and life savings are at stake, imperfect but a good place to build from is better than nothing), but also the way in which you’re stating it. However, I definitely think that Congressional calculus is a thing – and at some point in the future, if we can get numbers in the Senate and House large enough that we don’t have to pander to the large egos of little men (Lieberman, as one example), yes, making some sweeping versus incremental changes in some areas would be great. I think the push to always think bigger is a good thing – but I also think it can be more persuasive when it’s not paired with a corollary “you suck.”
frosty
@Mnemosyne:
This. Although I was thinking FOAD was about all that needed to be said.
Kathleen
@rikyrah: Amen.
Ryan
We’ll be okay. They’ll take us back to the 1920s, but we can rebuild. The momentum is on our side, despite the generational setback (and motherfucker James Comey, may you die unrecognized and unloved). We’ll be dead before we get there, but it’s not just about us.
Ruckus
@D58826:
What I’m saying is that all changed with the Shit-Gibbon being anointed. They couldn’t get their plan to destroy this past the chimp, it was a completely dead end with President Obama, but I’d bet your SS deposit amount that they think they can sneak through complete wiping out SS, Medicare, really anything that even has a whiff New Deal, in his first 100 days. His advisors all think this is a great idea, the Shit-Gibbon is the only one that can stop it. You see that happening? It might if anyone could convince him that he would have saved the world and be a hero for it. I don’t see anyone who could/would make that argument that can get within shouting distance of him.
cthulhu
@NR:
I doubt you are a Democrat so why do you care? Go start your own party, free of centrist and corporate influence. In your mind, you can easily garner a majority, no prob.
As you for your go big or go home issue with Obamacare vs. MFA, I am not sure what alternative universe you envision that doesn’t include massive attempts to tear down MFA from the moment its signed. If we can’t afford Medicare according so many people how can we afford MFA?! Wait, MFA hasn’t kept the costs of medical care from outstripping wages/inflation! OMG, I have to wait to see a doctor! Death panels !! (would have been part of MFA) Why should we give Medicare to people who afford to pay for themselves?! The Trump applause lines are still there because MFA also gives benefits to “those people” using “your” taxes. FFS, current Medicare has been under assault my entire life. But I guess in your alternative universe, once a law is passed, done and done.
And thus your logic that people who supportive of the half measures of Obamacare are the ones are somehow responsible for it being taken away from people in need rather than the jerks who are always looking to take things away from those same people is baffling.
geg6
@NR:
Just get the fuck out of here. No one here wants you here and I, for one, am completely convinced you are a GOP plant or a Russian troll. You do nothing but try to sow discord and doubt. Get the fuck out now. We hate you and you are the enemy.
Ruckus
@cthulhu:
I think I see your flaw. You forgot that this one belongs to the crowd you are talking about. Always has, tries to make arguments that don’t sound like it. Fails every time.
geg6
@WaterGirl:
This. I’m completely convinced he’s a Russian/GOP troll. Either that, or and ISIS supporter. Whichever, he needs to be sent packing. He’s been pulling this shit for months and only when things are looking bleak. His whole purpose is to sow doubt, despair and dissension. Cole needs to bring the banhammer down on this mother fucker and I rarely call for such a thing.
Ksmiami
@greennotGreen: it’s already a done deal. The whole state is founded on limestone
FlipYrWhig
@geg6: Not months, years. He’s been making the same argument for years. The argument is that Democrats should be more liberal and unified. How do you go about MAKING THEM more liberal and unified? He always yadda-yaddas that part. He just thinks it should have happened already. For years he’s made this same unctuously sanctimonious non-argument, which boils down to “more Democrats should decide to do things how I would like,” and jerked himself off over its brilliance. It’s fucking exhausting. And he’ll keep popping up to say it until one very happy day when it finally, blessedly stops.
Chris
@Ryan:
Honestly, “back to the 1920s” is terrifying in its own right.
I’d love to believe that Trump is going to be the modern version of 1920s Republicans, by the way, or of Jimmy Carter in the late 1970s, one last stand by the people who traditionally ran the country but that ends so disastrously that they’re consigned to the outer darkness and don’t come back until they’ve adapted to the changes their successors make. But that depends on a lot going right (and, in the immediate term, very very wrong).
I think your “we won’t be alive to see it” is sadly extremely possible.
@geg6:
I don’t think he’s a troll. He’s been here for a very long time, and I don’t remember him being like this before election season, though that might just be my memory.
I don’t really disagree with the banhammer, but then I’ve never really understood the policy of letting the same troll appear again and again every three threads and spamming it to death without response, even long after it’s become abundantly clear that he’s not here for anything else – not for Matoko, not for Ted & Helen, etc. At least I’m thankful that Unlimited Corporate Cash was banhammered, especially for election night.
Yoda Dog
@martian: Im trying to do just that as well. FSM bless.
qwerty42
@NR: That was incoherent even by BJ standards.
Appreciate the notice. I was going for something of a Wonkette vibe.
qwerty42
@NR: … Go big or go home….
Storm the Winter Palace.
LongHairedWeirdo
Hope you feel better.
Let’s try to stop the infighting and start organizing *now*. We can’t afford to wait.
And: while Hillary was a flawed candidate, let’s remember: she was allowed to be accused of criminal behavior by a media that knew it was BS, and refused to state that, clearly, for the record. Now, while I’m all in favor of the media *not* doing the job of the politicians political campaign, a candidate shouldn’t have to explain that *no one* can poop gold – the media should be pointing out the hideous fallacy of the “gold poop” accusations made by the other side. Because the truth is only served when people realize that the other side is *not* advancing a meaningful argument.
Forget her flaws; forget the screw-ups by the DNC; figure out what to do going forward to ensure that the Republican President-elect gets precisely the respect and goodwill of the previous. (i.e., Trump should get total opposition. Just like Obama.)
Miss Bianca
@LongHairedWeirdo:
This. But I doubt that this will get heard. Because too many people, for whatever reasons, have too much invested in the “flawed candidate” narrative ever to give it up. Ever.
Chris
@Miss Bianca:
More to the point, when you slander a politician by repeating over and over something that isn’t true, “doing the politicians’ job for them” is exactly what you’re doing – the other politician’s.
Although at least some of the blame for that falls on Comey, not only for his October Surprise but for refusing to fully clear her in the first place, ensuring that there was always something there for reporters to talk about.
Colleeniem
@martian: Martian I am with you. Don’tt despair!
NR
@geg6: If I was a GOP plant, I’d be cheering you guys on now. The neoliberal leadership that you guys unquestioningly support just led the Democratic party to electoral disaster and gave the Republicans complete control of the fedral government and massive power at the state level. Their strategy has been a proven failure and you guys want to double down on it. If I was a GOPer, I’d be doing everything I could to make sure your views won out in the Democratic party. Because with enemies like you, the GOP doesn’t need friends.
polyorchnid octopunch
@WaterGirl: Hey WaterGirl. I’m not talking about them. I’m talking about US citizens suing their states in the states where major voter suppression happened to change the number of EC votes they get when the EC meets in December. This was posted upthread:
Seems to me that lawsuits are in order. Best would be to find a legit voter on those lists who’s willing to take up the torch on it. I’d do it, but I’m a resident of Ontario and a Canadian citizen, so no chance there. The point is that cutting the EC vote in those states that did the suppression will have two effects: the first is denying Trump the presidency, which should be a fucking high priority for all of you. Clinton definitively won the popular vote, and using century and a half old law to make the EC vote reflect that will crush those fuckers… and it’s going to be real fun watching the conservatives on the SC twist themselves into pretzels when the plain language meaning of the law is so clear. Two, it will destroy the motivation for voter suppression for at least presidential elections, and it will put the state Republican parties at odds with the national party, because what will be good for the state will suck for the national, and vice versa.
I’ve contacted a number of folks about this, including our foul-mouthed but gracious host as well as a few other worthies on the progressive spectrum. Ideally, the lawsuits should start tomorrow if possible.
If you guys want to, you know, help people, this is a good way to start, and it would serve serious notice to the shitheels running the Republican party that shit’s not going to go the way it used to.
fuckwit
@polyorchnid octopunch: Hahaha, that’s funny.
And what SCOTUS will uphold that? The one we have now or the one after Troll appoints a Scalia clone?
Hahahahahahaa.
K R Jacks
@fuckwit:
but what if it’s done in a state where their supreme court accepts it? Then it goes to our current supreme court and they split, leaving the decision.
Is there a state involved that this could get approved by their highest court?
SFAW
@GrandJury:
Non-sequitur compounded by a dubious claim.
But you keep pushing that “not a democracy any more” line, I’m sure that will change the minds of approximately 12 people.
It’s not the outcome that makes it a democracy, by the way; it’s the process. The Dems have also had control of the three branches at various times, didn’t mean it wasn’t a democracy then, either.
SFAW
@JPL:
Bill, Hitlary, or Chelsea?
ETA: “All of them, Katie” is not an acceptable answer, by the way.
Gretchen
@D58826: i have the tinfoil hat too. My county has paperless voting machines. They compare the number who voted to the number on the machine, but there is no way to prove that no votes were flipped. The software is proprietary and the county isnt allowed to see, never mind check it. In my job we have one test that doesnt work very well. We raise the factor a little bit. It runs a little higher and works better, but its not strictly right. Nobody has ever noticed and the software is open if they thought to look.
qwerty42
@NR: Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh …. the “neoliberal” word. Powerful. Does it actually have a meaning or is it more a magic word like “abracadabra”?
But the anger only goes so far. More importantly, the DNC has to have a full-time head. The state parties have to be rebuilt. There will be assaults on much that even the red state folks want/like and we won’t be able to fend all of them off. Some fights, no matter if seemingly futile, have to be made. Other times, resources will have to be saved. I’m inclined to an order No. 227 myself, but recognize that isn’t always the wisest course.
artem1s
I see massive voter suppression laws coming up. First state up to petition limiting voting to property owners only – WI is my bet.