Obama talked about the fundamental goodness of the American people for eight years and then we went and elected Voldemoron to succeed him.
— Filibuster Fanboy (@Johngcole) November 12, 2016
Unprepared? Jared Kushner asked on his West Wing tour how many staffers would remain for the next administration https://t.co/aNhwWqkCI7
— Amy Fiscus (@amyfiscus) November 12, 2016
Jobs that don't work on reduced hours schedule:
-Lighthouse keeper
-Fire watch
-Fucking President of the USA, fucking obviously https://t.co/5MoTvMlrME— Splitcoil (@Splitcoil) November 12, 2016
***TAKES SOME MORE ALKA SELTZER COLD AND FLU AND WEEPS QUIETLY INTO PILLOW***
WereBear
THAT would be a hella protest: all the staffers walk out.
Because, JHC, we are ALL in the cross hairs, people. Even if you think you don’t have a particular vulnerability, Trump is more than capable of crashing the world economy, and this time at the beginning of his term, not the end.
Mathguy
Trump lost by 2 million votes. An archaic bs electoral college put that sh!tgibbon in office. Still a lot right about the American people.
mai naem mobile
The other dau my sister was grasping at straws saying that maybe Obama could be like a teacher to Putins Poodle. I laughed at her but,now, I am thinking who knows? I am sure Obama taught some arrogant mofos at UChicago.
Felanius Kootea
I put this in the dying thread downstairs but think it bears reposting here. We need to emphasize that Trump does not have a mandate.
In a thread yesterday, someone wondered about missing Democratic voters. The Atlantic has a feature article today about how Clinton’s popular vote lead will continue to grow over the next few weeks (won’t change the election outcome, obviously). This is because there are over 6 million outstanding absentee ballots to be counted in California, Washington State, etc. By the time December rolls around, she could have a 2 million vote lead. The article basically says that Clinton shouldn’t be blamed for “missing voters” as some on this site have already done, because there are millions of votes still to be counted. She is on track to match the Dem turnout of 2012 (not 2008).
JPL
Unprepared? Jared Kushner asked on his West Wing tour how many staffers would remain for the next administration
OMG
Do they have any idea, that it’s not only the West Wing staffers, It’s across the board for appointed positions in Government. It is starting to appear that we won’t have a semblance of a government.
japa21
I also believe in the fundamental goodness of the American people. Which is not the same thing as saying that all Americans have a portion of that fundamental goodness. But yes, Clinton did receive more votes.
Just as importantly, polling shows that 40% or less of Trump voters were actually supporting Trump. The rest were anti-Clinton votes because she is the anti-Christ (I know, that was supposed to be Obama) and she-devil combined. They fell for the con and the media’s presentation of Clinton as a threat to the security of the nation and, I think, actually perceived themselves as patriots by preventing her from winning.
Keith G
Well, it seems as if the White House is more than likely going to be equivalent to a car driven by a sight impaired, emotionally distressed, inept, drunken driver. In their minds, their intentions and methodology will be good, but in reality they will be swerving all over the place and end up in countless ditches, mowing down countless pedestrians. Therewill be just flat-out ineptitude of process. There will also be a scandal. The cherry on top of the shit cake will be the factional fights between folks like Gingrich & Giuliani and all the other rat bastards who are going to have some influence in what’s going on. And that actually worries me since in addition to the obvious issues, this will serve to make the legislative branch a bit stronger and there are no shortage of crazy over there as well.
Mary G
Feel better soon JGC. Between the election and house reno, you’re off the chart on the stress scale. Keep Lily close. She’ll get you through it all.
Darkrose
The fact that the majority of voters chose Clinton needs to be hammered home over and over and over again. No, it won’t change the outcome. But we cannot let the idea that the shitgibbon and the rest of the fuckwits have a mandate go unchallenged.
The other thing that we need to do is refuse to call what’s happening across the country right now “hate crimes”. It’s terrorism. We need to call it that, and demand that the shitgibbon, the fuckwits, and their media enablers denounce it immediately and loudly.
We lost this election because the other side was allowed to set the narrative. That has to stop now.
TS
2008 – Republicans lost the house, the senate and the presidency – they then proceed to impede in any way possible (with the help of a few dems) anything that the President tried to do. They stated it was their goal and they voted 100% in unison. The Media helped them with their non stop attacks on the new President – and the support of the birthers.
Democrats now need to stop talking about why and how & who won the vote and what is wrong with the electoral college & who should lead the party & how they can attract the undesirables. Democrats should be working as a united group to impede each and every thing this government wants to do. Don’t assume they can just “do it” – didn’t work that way in 2009/10.
This lot have NO idea what the President does – nor how he does it. Time to work non stop to show them up every hour of every day.
JPL
Kathleen mentioned the other day, that the deliberations began in the Dubose case. That is the black man who was shot in cold blood in Cincy. Because of video tape and witnesses, it should be an easy case to convict. The defense painted a picture of the officer being scared for his life. The jury appears to be hung. I am sickened.
TS
@JPL: And who on earth who worked for President and Mrs Obama would want to stay and work for this load of sh!t in a suit made in China.
Baud
@Felanius Kootea: So national polls weren’t really that far off.
OzarkHillbilly
@mai naem mobile:
That presumes they learned something, a thing that Trump has shown himself to be incapable of.
WereBear
Absolutely.
I am aghast at all the people, including my own FIL, who chuckle indulgently and act like I am over-reacting. I AM NOT. Just because my denial stage lasted a half hour, in minute increments, Election Night, doesn’t mean I should indulge your state of denial, that you are still IN.
TS
From the LA times link
“To be sure, some of the observations made by White House officials could be colored by partisan differences or concern that Trump appears set to dismantle Obama’s legacy achievements. Many had counted on a smoother transition to a Clinton administration in which top personnel would likely include former coworkers.”
STILL both sides by the media – Blame the President’s people for speaking negatively about the transition – it can’t possibly be the stupid Trump family and their zero knowledge of government that is the problem.
Quinerly
@Felanius Kootea:
Saw the Atlantic piece. Everyone should read it. Including the Bernie Dead Enders, the Stein voters, and the people who “protested” by staying home. I don’t hold out hope that these groups will, though.
Rommie
Manchin is going to flip to the Republicans to try and save his job, isn’t he? He seems halfway to buying a ticket on the Trump Train.
Bostonian
Democrats should be united in agreeing with the Republicans that we have to wait until the American people speak to appoint a new Supreme Court justice. They haven’t yet, given Trump’s failure to win a majority. Eight justices is enough until a president is elected by popular vote.
Shalimar
@Darkrose: How? We can and should bitch about the sorry state of the media, but the main reason Republicans set the narrative is because they have developed a network of tens of thousands of full-time employees over the last 35 years in radio, newspapers, think tanks, online and at Fox whose job is to set the narrative. Democrats need to do something similar if they want to compete.
Darkrose
I got an email offer for an academic subcription to the New York Times today. This was my response:
GregB
The people have spoken, Hillary gets to choose the next Supreme Court Justice.
Bostonian
@TS: nobody, if they ever want to work again.
Betty Cracker
@Bostonian: Agreed, but they have the votes appoint whomever they want now.
OzarkHillbilly
@Bostonian:
Actually yes they did, and a majority said they wanted Clinton, not that that matters any.
Alain the site fixer
@JPL: or perhaps that’s the plan to save $$ in the budget!
Darkrose
@Shalimar: Not entirely. The main reason Republicans set the narrative is because the non-right wing media became terrified of peolple accusing them of liberal bias. Why? Because when conservatives were angry about the media, they wrote letters. They complained. The media realized that fake balance got the wingnuts off their back, and the left will grumble but not respond.
That needs to change. We need to flood them with complaints–not just blog posts, but calls and letters and emails. We need to complain to advertisers, as well. And most of all, we need to keep the pressure on even when we win individual victories. When Rush Limbaugh called Sandra Fluke a slut, people contacted his advertisers, many of whom pulled their ads. And we got what we wanted, so we went away. This time, we need to keep pushing.
Felanius Kootea
@Darkrose: Right on!
WereBear
@Darkrose: Great letter.
JPL
Journalists need to call a lie, what it is. Until they do, MSM will only be paid to be stenographers for the RNC.
MomSense
@Bostonian:
Word! Problem is breaking through all the. Ullshit narratives already being promoted that she lost bigly because she didn’t care about the poor white working class who are totes not racist at all and that this is a repudiation of Obama. Don’t pay any attention to his approval rating being higher than Reagan’s was or her popular vote win or the laws that stole votes in the rust belt states or the terrorism against black people and Muslims or the kkk endorsement and rallies. That older lady just didn’t excite her voters with starbursts like ladies are supposed to do.
Felanius Kootea
@Bostonian: I keep saying that Trump’s ego will be disturbed by the fact that he didn’t win the popular vote. The Dems should keep rubbing that in his face at every opportunity, every day and pointing to his own tweet about how the electoral college is a disaster. They can say that this is one point on which they agree with the president-elect; it is a disaster. And the Dems should absolutely obstruct when they can (for things like repealing Obamacare, destroying Medicare, privatizing social security, etc.) and keep repeating “you do not have a mandate for that” over and over and over in every public forum.
TS
@efgoldman: I was trying to make the point that the media is still supporting Trump & co
– they are 100% unprepared for the transition but the LA times is saying – it might really not be as bad as people are saying – cause current White House officials are upset – they might be lying about the level of unpreparedness of the transition people.
I understand what Adam was saying but that has nil to do with the media wanting to blame the current administration if the new lot don’t have a clue as to what they are doing. The GOP right to rule is supported by every last member of the political media. All those newspapers who endorsed Hillary had a qualifier – “she has issues, problems, is not trustworthy”. Did they think this would help elect her?
I’ve said for months the media was doing all it could to elect Trump – with help from wikileaks and Comey it excelled in that regard.
Mathguy
@japa21: I agree. This is why I get tired of these turds that screech “They aren’t stupid!” Believing that lie about Clinton marks them as stupid. If walks like a duck and quacks like a duck….
WereBear
This is a great idea we must broadcast far and wide.
Republicans are never good losers. We shouldn’t be either.
Another Scott
@Mathguy: Yup.
One thing we need to remember is that while we lost the big prize, this wasn’t a wave election. We picked up 2 Senate seats and 6 House seats (IIRC). A small change in the turnout in MI, WI, PA would have given Hillary the win.
Yes, it was a disaster. Yes, changes are needed in how we think about national elections (e.g. Assuming as a baseline that partisanship is baked into the cake so that turnout is even more important than it always is. That we have to fight for every vote every single day. That politicians pay attention to people who vote for them, not those who carp from the sidelines. That demographics may save us in the long-run, but in the long-run we’re all dead. Etc.), but we have to be smart about the changes. Firing everyone or burning the place down or deciding that we can’t win without the male WWC that lives in WV would be a disaster.
Will Ryan get re-elected speaker? There’s bad blood between him and Trump and Trump supporters.
In a little less than a month, the 2016 federal Continuing Resolution expires (December 9). The most reasonable expectation is that they will extend it again, but one should keep an eye on that, I think. If the GOP and Donnie get into some battle over lead cleanup funding for Flint and other cities, or Zika and Ebola funding, or cutting off Planned Parenthood funding, then it could be an indication of how weak they are in getting their agenda through.
They still have the responsibility to govern. They still have a lot of conflict and divisions that we can exploit (e.g. how will the CoC types react to their foreign-born labor being forced to leave?). We need to hold their feet to the fire and make them do it.
Have a good weekend, everyone.
Cheers,
Scott.
MomSense
@Darkrose:
Please submit that to them as a letter to the editor.
Felanius Kootea
Are the Democrats prepared to start gerrymander reform and lay the groundwork for people to understand why Dems get more votes for Congress but fewer representatives elected? They need to get on this yesterday and frame it as an issue of fairness and keep hammering away at it. One thing I’ve learned from Republicans is that repetition and discipline works in framing an issue – they do it for bullshit, we can do it for the truth. At least let there be one useful thing that voters learn about how their legislators choose them and not the other way around.
Poopyman
@WereBear: What’s the word on RJ?
D58826
@Felanius Kootea: First let me repeat I think there were multiple reasons, in multiple places for what happened.
But putting on my Tinfoil conspiracy hat. Mi/OH/Wi/nc are controlled by state governments that worked actively to suppress the democratic vote prior to the election. Given the narrowness of the margins in these states and the ‘missing votes’ in heavily democratic areas I wonder if that pre-election effort also became an effort to, how should I say it ‘deflate’ (maybe each AA vote only counted as 3/5th of a vote) the vote totals in these areas. I have no evidence, other than cynicism, but if it comes out later that this happened, Like Louie I would be shocked shocked.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Darkrose: The fact that Clinton won the popular vote is why Trumpkins will continue to hound her, and finally lock her up. They will have to rob her of legitimacy. Same thing happened with the KPD and SPD in Germany after the NSDAP gained power. We’ve seen that with more recent authoritarian and fascist takeovers as well. They’ll do it with Obama too.
D58826
@Felanius Kootea: I did see on twitter last night that in addition to getting more votes for Prez and the Senate, the same pattern in the house repeated from previous years – the d’s got 55% of the house vote but 45% of the seats.
Mary G
@Darkrose: Word. When I cancelled my subscription, the woman I talked to said that they hoped I would change my mind after the election. NOT.
bemused
@efgoldman:
Lawrence O’Donnell had an excellent, thorough segment on ACA, Repeal & Repeal-Not So Fast last night with Jonathan Allen and Rick Wilson.
Paul in KY
@TS: Agree. They need to get the same sauce that Pres. Obama got.
Juice Box
@japa21: And I really believe that a good portion of the anti-Clinton voters will be horrified and vote the right way in 2018. I hope. If we have an election then.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Why is this the worst news ever? Thank god Trump doesn’t have his shit together, has a brain trust filled with fellow travelers who can think and has his first 100 days to return America to the 1850s planed out in detail.
Baud
Like.
Darkrose
@MomSense: I plan to.
rikyrah
Morning Cole. Animal pictures are always welcome. I am still angry. It will be awhile until I am not. ????
japa21
@Juice Box: I have to hope that because a lot of Clinton voters will find it even harder to vote.
The GOP mantra is that it is better that 100,000 legitimate voters not be allowed to vote than that one fraudulent vote be cast. They always talk about how these laws they have passed are to guarantee the integrity of the election. Sorry, when hundreds of thousands of people are disenfranchised the election has no integrity. Remember, if Clinton had won, she would have won despite the suppression techniques whereas a major reason Trump won was because of them.
ETA: A very popular President is about to leave office and has made it clear a major priority for him will be to protect the right to vote. Having him on our side will make a difference.
rikyrah
@D58826:
I completely agree with you.
Matt McIrvin
@Juice Box: Don’t count on it. The anti-Trump demonstrations are going to get bigger and more violent (there’s always some idiot in there who wants to smash everything), and the Trumpist line is going to be classic Nixonian shit, law ‘n’ order and smash the skulls of the scary rioters. A lot of moderates and liberals will eat it up.
WereBear
@Poopyman: Oh, thanks for asking!
We are doing a “diagnosis by treatment” because I cannot commit several hundred dollars for the usual battery of tests. That kind of resources must be saved for treatment, if possible.
However, he thinks it is not a worst case, judging from his overall health. We will start with age-related protein digestion problems, so I have switched him to a fish and maybe rice program. Fortunately, he is eating it so far.
And discovered our vet is as appalled about the election as we are, which is a nice thing. Because I am cutting off Trump voters. They are dead to me.
phoebes from highland park
FWIW, the Dems have always been timid messengers. We don’t speak with one voice because there never is one message. The Republicans – bless their demented little hearts – have always been right on target, speaking together.
I think first the Democrats have to decide what WE’RE for, and articulate it. I was surprised when I heard Hillary give a clearly pro-choice response at one of the debates (could have been the third). It’s the first time in years that I heard a Democrat speak firmly about pro-choice. There are many issues that are important and are yet never spoken about.
The other thing is GET BACK THE 50 STATE STRATEGY! Get Howard Dean back and start looking at the up-and-rising Democrats – Jason Kandler, for instance – as well as the Dems in the House and Senate. We should have been highlighting our “Bench” all along. That was my only problem with Hillary; I thought Obama’s generation should have taken the lead when he was elected.
I also thought it was a laugh when the Democrats were talking about the “death of the Republican Party” and predicting what would rise up in its place. I knew then that even if Hillary won in 2016, that we would have to remake our own party because all we would have controlled was the Presidency.
I look back at the off-year election of 2006 when Dems made such gains. We’ve got to start NOW and move towards that goal. Let’s get to work.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@mai naem mobile:
One of my on line friends is a retired Indian politician and keeps on stressing to me the importance of not demonifing the other side and patently looking for opportunities to get threw to them.
Poopyman
@rikyrah: At this rate it looks like I’ll go to my grave angry, and nothing indicates that would be anytime soon.
Fighting back will help.
Juice Box
@Rommie: If Manchin switches parties, then he’s an idiot. Part-switchers never win and he would be switching into the party that is likely to lose support at the mid-terms. I hate to lose even one blue (dog) senator though.
Poopyman
@WereBear: My vet is a Jewish mother of 4, so at least I’ve got that going for me.
Baud
@phoebes from highland park:
Can’t. We don’t agree internally even on small things.
She was strong on a lot of issues. In the end, I think it cost her votes and did nothing to increase turnout.
Fair Economist
@Another Scott:
I disagree. This was a pro-Republican wave election. They did better than they’d done in the past and there was a substantial late surprise – partly a late polling shift and partly polling error. These are both characteristics of a wave election.
The takeaway is that Republican support is getting so weak even a wave has trouble putting them in power.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@japa21:
It could also be voter suppression kept the blacks who are the real committed Democratic voters away while at the same time Trump’s TV persona soothed a lot of Democratic voters into complacency between a mixture of “well he does good on the show” and “no way that idiot can win”
Bostonian
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: hmmm… yeah, I’m gonna agree with you there. I’m all for my bad guys being incompetent. Let’s hope for a massive faceplant of a first 100 days, followed by a midterm electoral castration.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Fair Economist:
Yes, this. Everyone seems to be acting like this is Regan again, yet the only way the GOP could win was cheat like hell and get a candidate in who doesn’t give a shit about their movement.
Gin & Tonic
I think it’s clear that Il Donaldo neither expected nor particularly wanted to win this thing, and is completley unprepared for the responsibilities and the obligations. He pretended to be a public person for years, but wasn’t, and now that he’s POTUS he will have pretty close to zero privacy. I will laugh.
With the bloodsuckers and second-rate retainers he’s surrounded himself with, I also expect a veritable orgy of backstabbing and leaking, and the first big financial scandal before Valentine’s Day.
OzarkHillbilly
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Won’t work. They have been demonizing us for decades to the point where if one of them voices even the slightest recognition that we might have a point, they are instantly labeled a RINO and primaried out of office. Their political survival demands they toe the RW line.
Poopyman
@Bostonian: Um, you left out what happens in the 630 intervening days. Gonna be a problem avoiding becoming a smoking crater by then.
OzarkHillbilly
@Fair Economist: If that was a wave it was about 2 inches high.
Fair Economist
@OzarkHillbilly:
Word. Remember Lugar-IN? Primaried out because he worked with Obama ONCE to keep nuclear materials out of the hands of terrorists.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@phoebes from highland park:
Really, show me the differance between the Bernie bros and the Clintons on policy? Everyone wants the same basic policies, just the debate is on how fast to push them and how they should be implemented.
Matt McIrvin
@Fair Economist: Except that they control the vast majority of the states, which is an incredibly solid base of power that they’ve parlayed through creative districting into a hard-to-break House wall. Even a Democratic wave has a hard time dealing with that. It’s only the Presidency where they have trouble winning, and if they can pass any laws they want they could make that impossible to lose too.
A while back I said I thought the US might turn into a permanent apartheid state ruled by a white minority, and people said I was on crack.
Hekilë Esselóra
It’s been a long time since I dared post here (not your fault, hostile reality of living blue in a red-run world even in a “blue state”) but I need to get something out before I choke, somewhere that people who can use it can make use of it I hope.
I’m seeing a lot that I’m not the only one who thinks that Sinclair Lewis is the right author for the hour, shooting up to the number one position over George Orwell by a hair, because it HAS happened here -but I think it’s really important to remember that there were three, no four (I’ll come in again) things that allowed the Corpo machine to put an ignorant showman in the White House in that projected alternate history.
One is that a lot of people remained in economic bad straights, even after FDR was elected. This allowed the Corpos to run a primary against him from the right — which worked because secondly, they found everyone to blame for the Depression but the previous conservative administration’s policies: women in the workforce taking jobs from deserving men, those godless liberals in the universities, the Mexicans, the Chinese immigrants, the blacks, and yes the gays, as well as (of course) the Jews. War with Mexico is an explicit feature of the Windrip platform.
And they have an extensive media machine already in place, and lots of corporate funding to run it, and create swag and uniforms for supporters (not red hats though) and people with extensive marketing and PR experience, including a gay consultant who thinks he’ll be safe, like Peter Thiel. But it succeeds because thirdly, it is essentially unopposed: the Sensible Centrists of 1935 think Windrip is funny and not a threat, that the Corpos don’t actually mean their platform, that reasonable adults won’t let it happen, that maybe 20th century society was due for a correction, OF COURSE WE AREN’T ROLLING BACK WOMEN’S RIGHT TO VOTE or going to war with Mexico, don’t be ridiculous!
And the Loyal Opposition? Would rather continue fighting amongst themselves over who is purer, truer, Leftier-than-thou, just like in Spain, right to the bitter end when the Corpos roll up and throw the Moderate Liberals and the Radical Leftists and everyone in between into the same prison camps. Because this is where Sinclair Lewis and George Orwell are on the same page: they witnessed it happening up close and personal, and people either didn’t listen – the NYT infamously saying that now he’s elected, Hitler is surely going to back off on his campaign rhetoric about the Jews! – or took it as an instruction manual.
Now eventually the same greed, incompetence, ignorance and crassness that led the Sensible Center and mainstream media of the day to laugh at Buzz Windrip the ex-radiovangelist turned politician bring them down, overreaching and infighting and failing to bring anything to America but a failed economy and coffins coming home from the southern border – but fat lot of good that does to the college teachers executed in their own back yards, the torture victims, the ones in the prison camps or forced into hiding or fighting and dying in the Resistance, as the Sensible Centrist newspaper editor from Vermont who laughed at the alarmists learns to his lasting sorrow.
But he, like so many others, underestimated the power of the almighty dollar to corrupt the media, and the power of “infotainment” to convince (white/straight/male) people of the easy road to riches lying just over that hill of Other people’s bodies, with a stream of unadulterated hate on a foundation of macho genetic superiority.
Sir Keith Murdoch the First – Arthur Murdoch, the current Sir Keith (Rupert) Murdoch’s father – set about creating a monopolistic anti-Labour media empire in the 1930s. This has been a very, very long con.
And the Sensible Center media tycoons didn’t just fail to fight it, they abetted it. NBC made Trump – a serial bankrupt, known business failure, on-the-record racist & openly sexist buffoon – into a pop star, and gave him the moral authority to say “You’re Fired!” to Barack Obama & Hillary Clinton, before Obama was even running for office.
It wasn’t just cravenness — it was greed. They wanted the rubes’ dollars too, and so they stopped doing journalism, and any sort of public service at all. They were always about making money – but they at least used to pretend they were trying to uplift the national conversation with good information as well as to entertain.
And the Left? Would rather fight about who’s purer than thou, which is rich coming from people who are either rich themselves like Stein and Sarandon, or the supported student offspring of well-off parents (but this was also true in the 60s) and over whether or not straight/white allies are necessary (LOL NOPE! Die Cis Scum! aren’t we just the cutest little things in shoe leather? Meat Is Murder!), and over whether or not a fucking asterisk being used or not is transphobic or not rather than trying to figure out what will actually be effective in getting the goals they claim to want accomplished — and congratulations, every incremental gain of the past 15 years, made by hard legal ground work AND continually trying to win converts, supporters – allies – one at a time, with no budget and no weapons but truth and cleverness, is about to be tossed out. Great work, guys! /s
And I don’t see any reason to think that we’re not in for a repeat of 1937 Catalonia – an homage we could do without, but we should be so lucky.
But in Sinclair Lewis’ optimistic AU, the tide is turned by countering the hatemongering and scapegoating propaganda, when formerly-Sensible news media staffers join the Resistance and put their training and insider knowledge to use for Good this time – not by the attempts of the Washington and NY political establishments to carry on as normal when a fascist kleptocracy takes the helm.
We know this. How do we get enough people to pull together, BEFORE it’s time for another round of pointless, useless Nie Wiedering?
WereBear
@bemused: I am having trouble finding that online. Links?
D58826
And a recap of the big stories this cycle:
On the Hillarey side pepetual coverage of
1. the terrible security failure ofthe e-mail server
2. the crime syndicate – the Clinton foundation
On the Trump side we still don’t know or it is being ignored:
1. Trump’s ties to the Russians
2. the business dealings of Trump Inc, the conflict of interest of his kids serving on the transition team and the potentially profitable arrangement of Trump in the WH while his kids run thew family business.
Nothing on the WAPO/NYT frontpage about the transition team conflict.
Fair Economist
@OzarkHillbilly: No, it was a decent sized wave, comparable to our wave in 2012 that allowed us to keep Senate seats in what should have been unwinnable places like North Dakota and West Virginia. It’s just that the Republican tide really is receding due to demographics and so a medium wave barely tops the seawall.
OzarkHillbilly
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: We agree on a lot of things except for how to word it.
Aleta
@JPL: At least he remembered not to say servants.
Alan
@Mathguy:
I keep waiting to see this ~2 million figure but have yet to see it. Where have you seen it?
WereBear
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: What are Republicans? CUT TAXES AND SERVICES.
What are Democrats? TAKE CARE OF PEOPLE.
There. Done. You’re welcome.
OGLiberal
Four things….
*She won the popular but not in the states that mattered
*White women in those states could have won the election for Clinton if they voted for her in the numbers you would expect they would against a serial sexual assaulter who admitted he’d grab their crotch if he felt like it. They didn’t…not even close.
*Fixing gerrymandering won’t happen and no Obama/Holder commission is going to change that. Best you can do is vote in off year elections, win back state houses and governorships and hope you hold enough of them in the right states come 2020. Dems suck at that.
*Republicans and their priorities have a mandate even when they lose…everybody knows that. If you don’t, the GOP and the media will convince you they do.
Yes, I’m cynical because there is no silver lining to this. And, frankly, I have no hope that what allowed this to happen is going to change unless allowing this to happen results in the financial collapse of our and the world economy coupled with massive racial and gender strife in our nation…and even if that happens – and I don’t want it to happen – white people will blame blacks and immigrants and Obamacare and liberal economic policies and the liberal media for years before they finally realize the true cause of the problems, if they ever do.
Don’t fool yourself because we elected a black dude twice and Clinton won the popular and the Dems held Congress for just enough time (not even…remember Scott Brown and reconciliation?) to pass the half measure known as Obamacare. White people in this country are still racist, selfish jerks, they’re not dying soon enough, and I’m beginning to think the younger ones aren’t much better. Trump won millenials by 5 percentage points and 8 percent voted third party.
Hekilë Esselóra
@Matt McIrvin:
No, you were just not asleep at the wheel, like the DNC has been ever since they abandoned the 50 State initiative for coastal coasting on overconfidence in being able to make up enough electoral votes through inertia, forever and ever. It wasn’t as though people didn’t try to warn them that allowing gerrymandering and vote suppression to continue unchecked was going to have this effect. It wasn’t as though the grip of the De Vos family and their Amway fortune – which includes Blackwater/Xe Prince Eric – on Michigan wasn’t well known and publicized by liberal bloggers since oh, 2003? Or the endless flood of “dark money” from corporations, some known for breaking strikes since the Gilded Age! – into “opinion shaping” think tanks, wasn’t equally well documented.
But they thought they could coast – even despite continual midterm losses, even despite 2012 voter turnout dropping putting a win in danger – so that when I heard that Obama was planning on spending his post-POTUS career on working to counter voting rights suppression and gerrymandering, I actually thought, I hope it isn’t too little, too late – but clearly, it already was.
Fair Economist
@Matt McIrvin:
No, not this late in the redistricting cycle and this far along the demographic shift. The median seat is only R+2. A wave of this size for us would easily give us the House now, gerrymander notwithstanding.
OzarkHillbilly
@Alan: It’s a projection based on uncounted west coast absentee ballots. Time will tell how accurate it is.
Taylor
Can I just say that if the new administration puts 3-4 Fat Tonys on the SC…..then the next Democratic administration needs to double the size of the SC.
After all, the Republicans were floating this idea before the election, when they thought HRC was going to win.
The Democrats had power for two years, but never nuked the filibuster in the Senate. Time to stop acting like this is a game in a gentleman’s club.
Tripod
Progressives are the worst. The circular firing squads and navel gazing. Bleh.
I signed the change.org petition.
If there is an enemies list, I need to be on it.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@OzarkHillbilly: Trump is as RINO as it gets and has no friends in the GOP,
Second, you do realize India has an outright religious war going with people murdering each other in the streets. You want to talk toxic politics, yet this is what this experienced and successful Indian politician is telling me. S, my Indian friend was telling me he gets our election because they just had a state election when the Hindus won and went around burning Mosques down election night to celebrate. He says the only thing that will end it is when the angry mob’s true believers run the show for a bit, screw up and those angry voters realize this isn’t want they want. Of course they will never publicly admit it, just forget to vote the next election or the like.
Tripod
@OzarkHillbilly:
They’re still counting in a lot of states.
aimai
@Darkrose: Beautifully put.
vtr
You guys see that huge story about the collaboration between the Russian government and the Trump campaign? It was is all the papers this morning.
Hal
One other reason I’m still pissed, presented by an actual conversation I had with my own mother, who I love dearly, the day after the election.
Mother: I can’t believe we have goofy Donald Trump as president. But, I am soooo glad Hillary lost. I hate her.
Me: I’ll be sure to tell that to the patients at the hospital I work at when they lose their health insurance.
Mother: He isn’t doing anything about health insurance. He just said he wants to build a wall between Mexico and make them pay for it.
Me: No. He also said he wanted to get rid of Obamacare.
Mother: Good. Obamacare sucks. It’s terrible.
Me: That’s how many people who come to my work get their cancer treatments. They won’t have health insurance and they won’t be able to get treated.
Mother: They had insurance before, they’ll get it again. Someone will give them insurance.
So then I just changed the subject because like I said, I live my mother, but she knows what she knows and that’s that. Which is why I and my cousins do not talk politics with our like minded mothers.
Matt McIrvin
@Fair Economist: 2018 will probably be another Republican wave, though, once the terrorist attacks and the wars start and the rioting gets worse. Trump will be popular when people get scared enough. Come to Daddy, just like with Dubya.
It’s worth trying to flip it all anyway, but I don’t have a lot of hope.
Hekilë Esselóra
One last thought before I fly – I’m afraid that the DNC strategy was “Wait for the FOX watching generation to die off” because I certainly have heard that used as a calming mantra on liberal sites over the years, but how is that going to work when there is another cohort of sexist/racist/homophobic voters aging in? Gamergate, Reddit, 4chan — none of those are news, although the hollowness of the self-proclaimed “intellectual conservatives” at American Renaissance joining in with their filth is mayyyybe a little unexpected – so without something to counter the potent recruiting strategy of flattering the insecure macho white boys by telling them it’s all the fault of the icky girls/gays/brown people, we’re never going to grow out of it. The race should NEVER have been so close that the popular vote was 50-50, or that less than 5% of Purity Trolls could spoil it. And districts with vast numbers of Trump votes were not all in “red” states, either.
Citizen_X
@OGLiberal:
What? Is this true? Link please.
Alan
@OzarkHillbilly: Thanks.
aimai
@phoebes from highland park: I hate to call you a moron but you are a moron. Hillary Clinton ran a 50 state strategy. She poured money and time into states, like Texas, that she couldn’t hope to get to improve traction and voting in the out years. She simply won’t benefit from that because voters let her down in the blue states–white women, white men, FUCKING BERNIE VOTERS and purity pony and lazy assed whiny titty babies let US ALL DOWN. Also, you may not have noticed it, but the Republicans won not because they all speak with one voice but because the desires of their base were met by Trump’s running far away from the standard republican line about taxes and ending medicare and social security. He lied to them and they lapped it up. But he also gave them full throttle racism, sexism, homophobia, and hate. Clinton tried to give us nonstop, univocal, love and competence and the voters in key states rejected that. No 50 state strategy counteracts that.
JPL
@Aleta: Baby steps..
Darkrose
@Gin & Tonic: Have we ever had a president who took office with an in-progress lawsuit against him?
JPL
@aimai: yup Love doesn’t trump hate.
bemused
@WereBear:
I’m link impaired but it’s on The Last Word msnbc site.
aimai
@Hal: I’m currently studying family therapy and its the case that even heavily dysfunctional families tend to prefer what they think they know to the unknown, and to project onto everyone else the same preference for homeostasis/familiarity/no change. Its hard to get people to understand that things can actually get worse, a lot worse. They tend to let their fantasies and fears guide their reasoning. If you wanted to talk to your mother seriously you would have to ground your conversation in something that was very real and touchable to her. Like her own mole/skin cancer scare, or the situation of someone she actually knows. Its a kind of teaching/talking we do with children where you have to concretize things. I don’t talk about global warming with idiots, I talk about how the cherry crop comes in two weeks earlier every year. I also tell people “we had two meals on offer: steak or shit. You turned down steak because you wanted to punish the steak and blather about being a vegan–and now nobody has anything to eat but shit.”
Felanius Kootea
@Matt McIrvin:
Yes, let’s wring our hands and give up. That always works. Sobbing in a corner got Obama to the White House twice.
Tenar Darell
So not only is Kushner a quisling but he’s an idiot quisling. (& as a Jewish person I’m fully entitled to that opinion).
Aleta
@Felanius Kootea: And emphasize he did not even have a mandate from Republican leaders and Republicans in Congress.
OzarkHillbilly
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Trump is the HEAD of the GOP. Every single one of those scum sucking sycophants is wholly dependent on his good favor to remain in office. Don’t for a second forget that. Trump is where he is BECAUSE of the revanchist GOP base.
We had that happen in 2000-08. We got Obama instead. And then we got Trump. Apparently Americans have decided they prefer screw ups to competence. I will allow you to continue to play nice like the Dems did the past 8 years while the GOP was waging all out war.
I have no more illusions about how bad the GOP really is and how much worse their base is. They aren’t going to stop, even after they lose. Trump is who and what they are.
JMG
Rehashing the election is useless. The question is, “what now?” For now, we should regain our emotional health as best we can, be excellent to each other and those who need us to stand with them, and reassure Democratic officials we’re behind them. Politicians are panicky beasts. If we’re calm, Dem pols may be a little calmer as well.
OGLiberal
Manchin holds more power where he is now than if he were to switch and can continue to win re-election just by saying guns and coal rule because while many West Virginians they are certainly racist (not Cole, of course), I think a lot of them are New Dealers. That’s why most don’t change their party affiliation to GOP. If they’d only realize that coal is dead and not because of tree huggers and the EPA and that the brown folks that most never even encounter and have the same concerns as they do, the state might swing back blue. It’s more likely there than in the red Western and Southern states where white folks question the legitimacy of government in general and are fiercely anti-labor. Southern states with significant and growing minority populations….TX, FL, GA – and Arizona in the West are exceptions but Arkansas and Idaho and Kansas and Iowa – as it appears now – will never change.
OzarkHillbilly
Time for me to go. Y’all play nice now, ya heah?
Fair Economist
Manchin has a hard job if he stays D but an impossible one if he flips. He’s not an idiot; he’ll stay. He’ll be Blue Doggier than usual for the next two years but don’t jump him; it won’t really be making a difference, and we might need his vote in 2021.
Corner Stone
Opening segment by Joy Reid: Determinedly Furious Achievement Unlocked
Pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease Joy. Do not have a single Republican or Trump surrogate on your show today. Please?
Gin & Tonic
@OzarkHillbilly: Where’s the fun in that?
OGLiberal
@Citizen_X: I was@Citizen_X: I was talking in the context of white voters but probably should have specified “white” millenials. Still, disheartening and disappointing:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-11-09/what-this-election-taught-us-about-millennial-voters
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@Fair Economist: Exactly, if we are going to have the much vaunted 50 state strategery aren’t we going to have to put up with more Joe Manchine’s not fewer?
Inmourning
Long-time lurker, and love this blog. Too demoralized to read all the comments in the past few days, but here are some random thoughts and apologies if said elsewhere
1. No honeymoon period, not one millisecond of “he has the right to govern”
2. Begin NOW to push back on Ryan’s privitazation plans for SS and Medicare. I am 74, and I want these programs not just for me but for my children and grandchildren.
3. If he wants to follow thru on plans for tariffs, then “please proceed” hairfurher. Until the rust belt learns the negatives of trying to stop trade, we can do nothing to change minds on that issue.
Rock on!
Brachiator
@Felanius Kootea:
Sure he does. It doesn’t matter how you win.
Dubya didn’t have a mandate, but he sure as hell governed as though he did. And Trump will have Congress to back him up.
Hal
I will say a few things giving me hope. Low voter participation means there are people out there willing to vote given the right incentives. I happily voted for Hillary but I also understand where she stood with much of the electorate, and in part she just couldn’t overcome that lack of popularity. Thanks media (insert middle finger gif here).
But Trump isn’t going to get that much more popular either. He’s either going to piss off the people who actually like him and voted for him believing his bullshit about walls and Muslim bans or the people who didn’t, but thought they would give him a chance. I don’t see how he can keep both those groups happy. Not to mention the Republican Congress he now has to contend with in ways he may have never considered.
At the end of the day, Trump is going to be Trump, and terrible has gotten him far in life, but being president is not hosting a reality show. He won’t know what to do, or how to do it, whatever it is. If there is one thing I have confidence in, it’s Trump’s ability to be the worst president in history. I just hope we all survive.
batgirl
Did anyone see that Ryan’s plan to privatize Medicare is basically Obamacare for Seniors?
Citizen_X
@OGLiberal: Ah. Thanks.
D58826
@Hal: sounds like my sister. Hates Hillary with the passion of a thousand super novas. Hates Trump also. But I suspect is happy because Trump will sign-off on the GOP agenda that she supports. So didn’t vote for him but still com,es out on top in the election/
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@Hal: Huffpo had an article about Trump voters, they’ll be watching and if he doesn’t build the Wall, repeal the ACA, and lock her up they are going to be VERY angry. He’s screwed, just as much as we are.
D58826
ot but mistrial declared in trial of cop who killed Sam Dubose
OGLiberal
@Hal: “given the right incentives”
For anybody who is Dem inclined, simply preventing Trump from being president should have been enough incentive. And you didn’t even have to be that tuned in to realize this. Apparently, it wasn’t – so I won’t feel sorry for them when they have to deal with consequences and I won’t feel bad that I didn’t phone bank them enough.
Kathleen
@Darkrose: This a thousand times.
Schlemazel
@Brachiator:
I still remember the David Brooks column insisting that DumbellU HAD to govern as if he had a mandate because he won. I paired it with his column from 2008 when he insisted BHO compromise and build a consensus since the vote was so close.
Fuck them all
Felanius Kootea
@D58826: Fuck. He shot a man running away in the back and it was caught on video. What the hell else did the jury need to see. I just can’t.
Kathleen
OT Walking down street in Clifton I overheard one man tell another man hung jury on tensing trial. Fuck.
OGLiberal
@Tilda Swinton’s Bald Cap: Link, please…interested in reading.
I suspect that if he doesn’t come through for them and his approval ratings plummet that he will find some way – a la Palin – to step our early and then, wee!, we get President Pence, which may actually be worse.
dww44
@Mathguy: Is this documented fact? I’ve not seen it anywhere. Last I saw last evening she was up over 350M votes, not 2 million.
Brachiator
@Hal: Thanks for this. It does sum up many similar conversations I had. People hated Hillary for stupid reasons or no reason at all. They thought that Trump would be OK precisely because he was an unknown, who at least blasted the Dems and the GOP. And they bought into the fantasy that by turning back time and undoing Obamacare and throwing out immigrants, life would be good again.
We will all have our work cut out for us to fight against this. But it is possible. There is no real alternative but to fight.
Darkrose
@D58826: Of course.
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@OGLiberal: Here it is.
Tazj
Trump’s campaign reminds me so much of Carl Paladino’s run for New York Governor. He stoked white resentment and even after his racists emails were revealed, he won Erie County which had been reliably Democratic for years. I would see his “I’m mad as hell” yard signs in relatively affluent neighborhoods and think “what are you so mad about?”
I shouldn’t be shocked that so many white women and Catholics voted for Trump.
Now in the media it’s all, ” Democrats are mean they didn’t care about struggling people enough.” They are trying to make us forget all Republican obstruction on economic stimulus.
It’s fine to do stories about people and areas that are struggling but people have to be held accountable for voting for Trump. It’s ok to sympathize and understand people’s anger but still instruct that Trump is a horrible politician to turn to.
Felanius Kootea
@Brachiator: W. had demonstrators after the Supreme Court handed him the victory, but he didn’t have voters in 25 cities demonstrating against his win in the way we’ve just seen. He didn’t insult entire swathes of the population he meant to govern. People who aren’t connected to politics (coaches, etc.) were not denouncing his win on TV or debating whether he’s truly a racist or just exploiting his base’s racism. Mothers weren’t having a “so we now have President Grab-your-pu$$y” talk with their daughters. He didn’t have an enemies list that includes several Senators and Representatives from his own party. Trump has the highest unfavorables of any president-elect in modern history and he is a narcissist who wants to be admired, especially by people in cities, because he thinks of himself as cosmopolitan – which is why he took to Twitter to denounce the protestors initially (I know he doesn’t give a shit about the working class people who helped put him in office). That can be exploited. He doesn’t have a mandate.
Aleta
@aimai: The reasoning of some T-voters reminds me of a person whose brain has learned to accommodate an abusive person they have not yet been able to escape. “He has many good points.” “He can change if we all help.” “He’s not always like this.” “He didn’t mean that.” “Other people are unfair to him.”
Kathleen
@D58826: I totally agree with you. This whole thing feel s so orchestrated to me,
WereBear
Mr WereBear says if Trump is Hitler, Pence is Heydrich.
Baud
@Felanius Kootea:
The jury was probably suffering from economic anxiety.
D58826
An article on Twitter about interviews with Trump voters. They don’t really expect him to keep his promises. Many don’t even agree with his promises. But they think he has their back and that is enough. One supporter feels betrayed by Obama because her health care premiums went up this year. Never mind that they have been going up every year for as long as I can remember. Never mind that the rate of increase has slowed. She was upset that her premiums went up to pay for those other folks who didn’t pay anything. So if Trump’s support really is ‘I’ll overlook the broken promises, the racism, etc. because he has my back’ then it is going to be very hard to defeat his policy agenda and his 2020 run.
JordanRules
@Baud: Savage. And so well done Baud.
D58826
@Baud: The victim wasn’t the white kind of person. pun intended
Duke's Archives
My cousin has three kids by two different women, one of which is in prison. The last time I saw him (back in June) he had a yuge black NRA t-shirt… They don’t hurt for money they’re just terrible fucking people.
WereBear
@D58826: Oh, Trump will solve her Obamacare problem. He will take that problem right out of her hands!
I emphasize to the blithe that It can happen to you. When I started working corporate, I had company paid health insurance that would pay for everything. No worries!
Now, I have great insurance with my job: and it is a high deductible Bronze plan that I am lucky to have.
D58826
@WereBear: Yep, I remember the help-wanted ads (yes they did exist and I am that old) and they bragged about fully paid company benefits, including medical.
Felanius Kootea
@Baud: Damn Baud! That actually made me laugh out loud in spite of myself. Sigh.
liberalandlovingit!
@WereBear:
JPL
@Kathleen: Truthfully, I was afraid they were going to find him not guilty. Surely there will be a retrial.
D58826
@JPL: I suspect it will depend on what the make up of the jury was and why they could not reach a verdict. If the next potential jury has the same basic make up as this one then the results will probably be the same and it won’t be worth a retrial. If there was just one unreasonable hold out for not guilty then a retrail is more probable
HeidiMom
@Mary G: And remember what you did for Walter — you SAVED HIS LIFE! And now, thanks to you and Debit, he’s a happy old soul living every dog’s dream. You’re entitled to rest on your laurels for the rest of your life if you want to, which you probably don’t, but please take all the time you need to care for yourself just now.
Grover Gardner
It’s Buzz Windrip to a T (cf. IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE). They’re gonna plonk him on his a** in Trump Tower with a bottle of scotch and get down to their own dirty work. And it’s also a good bet that that history professor who called the election is right about them impeaching him within a year.
D58826
Now this is depressing – the GOP controls both houses of 33 legislatures.
This is even more depressing – one more and they can call an Article V constitutional convention.
WereBear
@D58826: Very, very bad word.
Captain C
@dww44: As of about 15 minutes ago, per the AP election results site, she’s up by nearly 600,000. If the remaining votes, mostly in blue states, continue to come in at roughly the ratio that those states voted, she’ll wind up with a roughly 1.5 to 2 million vote edge.
Captain C
@Captain C: AP election results site (via PBS) here.
Applejinx
@Fair Economist:
Trump is not a Republican! If he was, he’d already have a cabinet and would not be trying to use unknowns, clowns, antiques and curios for a cabinet. He is already suspicious of the Republicans backstabbing him, and rightly so, and he controls the mob.
It can be turned against the ‘Republican’ Washington Elite just as easily as it was turned against the ‘Democrat’ Washington Elite. Warren, Sanders know they’re dealing with a third party wave election of unknown qualities. I think the single least likely outcome is for the Republicans to blithely sweep El Trumperino out of the way like a used condom and proceed with the granny-starving.
He’ll call in KGB favors and KILL them. They’re not, not, NOT in control, they’re as bloody out of touch as the Clintonites.
We are waaaaaay off the map.
Tazj
@Tazj: I should have said I’m disappointed in my fellow white women and Catholics. I thought more of us would vote for Clinton.