Can we admit now that we need a narrative, not just a list of policies, however enlightened they may be?
Don’t get me wrong. Profound institutional failures, in the media and the FBI and the Republican Party itself, led us to where we are.
But the Clinton campaign never acknowledged in a substantive way the populist nature of this election cycle. They played to not lose. Even in last night’s closing argument, Obama led with why Trump wasn’t fit to be president. The positive case for Clinton seemed tacked on.
Well, Republicans, you have it. You were willing to elect a child-raping, sociopathic, pathological liar and cheater to do it, but you’ve got it. You were willing to align yourselves with the most deplorable fascist, racist, sexist, and xenophobic neanderthals to make it happen, and it happened. You built an entire media empire to sell your lies and innuendos to a populace as “entertainment”, destroying the entire functional fourth estate in the process, and it worked. Congratulations.
Now let’s see it. We call your bluff. On the table, now: proposal to fix healthcare that works without having any negative effects for anyone anywhere; legislation to build a wall along the entire southern border along with the funding to build and maintain it; a program to deport 11 million residents of this country without disrupting the economy and sending us into a recession; “fix” trade imbalances with the rest of the world without raising the prices on the cheap shit we buy at Walmart or sending the dollar into an inflationary spiral leading to complete monetary collapse.
Any terrorist attack in the next two years? On your shoulders. Any setback in Syria? That’s you. Any mass shooting? You asked for it.
You have gone all out to win it, and you did it. Congratulations. You have the crown. And you have no excuses. You own the House. You own the Senate. You own the Presidency. You have successfully cheated your way to a free appointment to the Supreme Court (at least one) so that won’t be in your way either. It is all yours. No excuses.
Let’s see the “Republican Paradise” you have been promising.
If it isn’t here in two years, or clearly on its way, there will be hell to pay. This bill is coming due.
Whom will the blue collar workers blame when their jobs do not return?
The election is over. Trump won. The Breitbart conspiracy theorists and hate mongers won. We will soon have an alt-right extremist government in all branches. We now know that the majority of Americans do NOT learn. In a fact-free, conspiracy laden environment, they will ride their ideologies right over the cliff. The tragedy is that they will take all the rest of us with them.
I don’t know if Donald Trump is a psychopath, but his public persona certainly is. This outcome is an outright disaster - no matter what happens.
I have never understood the logic of Hillary as our candidate - in a change election - she represented continuity. Now, it looks like the entire federal govenment is being handed over to the Republicans. This is a massive disaster.
Hillary’s nomination was secured by her domination of the southern states in the primary process. How many of those states voted for Hillary? Was that predictable?
There were absolutely no reliable Democrats that would not have voted for Sanders and he would have attracted tons of change voters from the Midwest and Pennsylvania. Hillary’s nomination offered people who want change nothing.
To understand the motives behind the electorate, look at a graph of median hourly wage since 1972 - it is flat - vs GNP since 1972. I call that a crocodile jaws graph. The median worker has become ever more productive but has been awarded with nothing for that. When the great recession hit, Wall Street was restored, whom Hillary is tainted with, Main Street was left flat.
Obama created 10 million jobs but he also allowed in 10 million LEGAL (not illegal) immigrants - many of whom need jobs (During the Great Depression immigration was nil) and push down wages and make relative opportunity scarcer. The life style of the rust belt never recovered. The cake was baked in early 2009 when Obama did not press for a BIG STIMULUS when it was fairly clear that he was only going to take one bite of the apple. The small stimulus stopped the decline but did not fix main street. The public gave Obama a second term but, he was running against a big money type establishment Republican and so they gave him more time to see how his policies would work. The rust belt has given up waiting.
If Trump pushes for a big infrastructure bill to “make america great again” the economy will finally recover from the Great Recession and he’ll be out of control. This is exactly what happened in Germany during the 1930s. He implemented massive armaments work which put Germans back to work and secured his position. There’s no way that a Trump presidency works out well for the country of the world over all.
Now we are looking at a President totally unfit for office. God help the world. This is what things must have been like in fifth century Roman empire.
It’s 2:30 AM on the East Coast as I post this (all three branches of the U.S. Federal government now are owned by the Republicans). I’ve been watching the France 24 and Japanese NHK news channels. You can see fear in their eyes, especially as they interview tRump supporters and campaign officials.
The Asian markets are in complete chaos at he moment. Not going to be a very good week for the world economy.
America voted to Burn It Down.
Prepare to suck ashes for the entire next generation.
Just stop it. Bernie was, and continues to be, just as unfit for office as tRump, a complete and unmitigated disaster.
Hillary fucked up and lost this election all on her own … for the most part … but it was not something that happened in a vacuum. If you take a moment to reflect upon what happened with the Senate & House races, you’ll see a lot more depth to this than just beating Hillary was in play.
Look back on the past couple of months and try to imagine what would have been done to Bernie. He was mostly unvetted and a lot of skeletons of his never saw the light of the right-wing press back when they wanted to run against him. Had he somehow taken the nomination, he would have been curb-stomped by that machine.
Trying to pretend that Bernie would have won this election is flat out delusional. If you really believe that, I urge you to seek professional counseling.
[ ETA - After I posted the above, @tim went into his post and removed several sentences in which he made several demonstrably false statements regarding Bernie and his qualifications, popularity and fitness for office. It was pretty unhinged and delusional, thus my strong response.
I stand by my response and leave it unedited. In the future, @tim, I will quote you literally, rather than using an editorial shortcut, so that you can’t go back and re-write history to fit your convenience. ]