President Trump: Part II

[TragicMonkey]

What I meant, and what I suspect Emily's Cat meant, too, is that prior to the election, an awful lot of very normal people were being called deplorable bigots, and as the election season rolled on, people who declared that they were leaning toward Trump were informed that they must be deplorable bigots, or they wouldn't be supporting Trump. Well, they didn't feel like deplorable bigots. They felt like normal people, and they decided they didn't like being called deplorable bigots, and would vote for the candidate who very clearly did not call them deplorable bigots.

A huge factor in deciding the election? Enough to sway 1% of people who live in Wisconsin.

Anybody who votes out of spite and hurt feelings is a deplorable bigot. "Waaaah! The smart kids said I was dumb! Well, I'll hold this firecracker in my mouth! That'll show 'em who's dumb! Heh heh heh! I'm smart!"

 

[Bob001]

You can say it all you want, and I'll call you on it all I want. The investigation was as bogus as the 13 or 14 Benghazi hearings. There's a reason Comey said no prosecutor would ever prosecute such a case.

You know what? I agree with you. It was bogus. Nevertheless, it was a weapon the Repubs used against Clinton that could not have been used against any other Democratic nominee. Clinton was qualified to be President, and she might have become a good one, but she was a flawed candidate who ran a weak campaign against a dangerous demagogue. And now here we are.

 

[Bob001]

.....
Gore received 543,895 more votes than Bush. Clinton won 2,864,974 more votes than Trump. That is a very wide margin. So all the discounting of Clinton's election outcome need to keep in mind, she carried significantly more people than Trump did.

Yes, she did. In fact, including the third-party candidates, an actual majority of voters wanted somebody other than Trump. I'm sorry we don't have proportional distribution of electors. But instead of focusing on just winning the election by locking up the blue states, she spent a lot of time in red states hoping to run up her electoral college totals. She spent more time in Arizona and Indiana than in Wisconsin and Michigan. And now here we are.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I do find it darkly amusing that the right and its apologists have to blame other people even for their own votes. Hillary made them vote for Trump by saying a mean thing! Didn't they pretend to be for personal responsibility at one time? And now it's 'don't criticize me! I had no choice! Feelings!'

 

[alfaniner]

Are you comparing Trump to a Star Trek continuity flaw? Because it's apt.

I've said (often) lately that I feel like I'm living in an alternate timeline or parallel universe. Have we had any ion storms recently?

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I'm imagining sometime in the future, a foreigner looking at our history and asking an American, "That was one of your Presidents???"

American replies, "It is an incident not discussed with outsiders."

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

It's possible that there are multiple factors. So the "deplorable bigot" name calling might not be WHY we lost the election, in the sense of the one reason, but I think the "deplorable bigot" name calling was enough to sway 1% of the electorate from Democrat to Republican, or if you prefer, from Hillary to Donald. I would go so far as to say that of the things that the Democrats and/or Hillary had control over, and that they could have modified without severely compromising their values, that was it.

Of course there were multiple factors. Offending people who were almost certainly voting for trump anyway is waaaaay down on the list.

Why does it offend you so much? Not like Trump wasn't courting the racist/bigoted/misogynist crowd of deplorables.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I do find it darkly amusing that the right and its apologists have to blame other people even for their own votes. Hillary made them vote for Trump by saying a mean thing! Didn't they pretend to be for personal responsibility at one time? And now it's 'don't criticize me! I had no choice! Feelings!'

I do believe that is what some people in this thread would have us believe.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

...But instead of focusing on just winning the election by locking up the blue states, she spent a lot of time in red states hoping to run up her electoral college totals. She spent more time in Arizona and Indiana than in Wisconsin and Michigan. And now here we are.

Forgive me but I don't share your version of the election reality. I agree to disagree.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

You know what? I agree with you. It was bogus. Nevertheless, it was a weapon the Repubs used against Clinton that could not have been used against any other Democratic nominee. Clinton was qualified to be President, and she might have become a good one, but she was a flawed candidate who ran a weak campaign against a dangerous demagogue. And now here we are.

No, no and no.

Unless you use a double standard her flaws were no different than almost any other average politician.

No, the fact she won by almost 3 million votes belies your assessment her campaign was weak.

You just bought the lies and you are still buying them.

Again, I agree to disagree. We see this situation differently and I don't see either of us moving toward the other's POV anytime soon.

 

[uke2se]

If uke2se actually believes that there are no right-middle folks out there, and that anyone who's even a little bit on the right fits into that deplorable basket... then that means that he is also placing *me* into that basket. The intent is to point out the irrationality of his approach.

If you took the time to read the posts of mine you keep quoting, you would know that I did not call all right wing people deplorable.

I'm not even sure if it's worth posting this, as you'll no doubt quote it and say I called all right wing people deplorable again.

 

[The Great Zaganza]

It is true that the political center in the US is way off center to the right: what goes for liberal here would be right-center or just right wing.
Many GOP policies are considered far-right in other Western democracies.

So even a moderate Republican is still not really near the traditional political center.

 

[uke2se]

I think this is exactly true.

Nope. Again, this is shifting the blame from the people who voted for the orange menace. They are the ones at fault here. Nobody else. The democrats could have ran a potted plant, and I would still blame the people who voted for Trump for Trump getting elected.

 

[Archie Gemmill Goal]

It is true that the political center in the US is way off center to the right: what goes for liberal here would be right-center or just right wing.
Many GOP policies are considered far-right in other Western democracies.

So even a moderate Republican is still not really near the traditional political center.

There are plenty of centre-right/moderate right politicians in the US, it's just that they are all Democrats. Obama for example.

 

[Hlafordlaes]

I don't know. I first became familiar with the that clock when I was in high school in the '70s. Nuclear war, at least the full scale, civilization destroying variety, just doesn't seem as close now as it was then, and back then the magazine cover I think said five minutes to midnight. Maybe four. Sure, the election of Trump, the Chinese moves in the South China Sea. Putin. Those things all make the world more dangerous, but I don't think back to full scale cold war days.

Of course, we didn't have North Korea building missiles back then. It seems like the chance of a single city-destroying nuke have gone up since the days of disco and Jimmy Carter.

Just one further comment, as there is now a dedicated thread to the topic: The unthinkable and least-expected is exactly what we should be on the lookout for in these times of major social upheaval and jingoist nativism. Voters and constituents in many countries sound too much like lynch mobs these days: kill first, think later.

 

[Belz...]

Go ahead and post more, I'm fine with judging it.

Several of us have already made the effort to A) find out where we stand on the spectrum and B) post it here for comparison.

How about you man up and do the same, doing something productive for once.

 

[Belz...]

Anybody who votes out of spite and hurt feelings is a deplorable bigot.

I'd call them stupid and misguided or ignorant, but I don't see how "bigot" applies.

 

[Arcade22]

It's surreal: Less than week in and Trump has shown himself far worse a president than most expected.

• He has already caused a international conflict with Mexico by being unable to convince them to pay for his border wall. Trying to bully your weaker neighbors into caving in to your demands isn't exactly going to make America popular.
• Publicly supported torture and called for it to be US policy, seriously undermining his relations with European and other countries.
• He has lost just about all of his credibility by peddling obvious lies about completely insignificant and irrelevant things like the size of crowd at his inauguration, but also the extent of electoral fraud during the elections despite the complete lack of evidence and thus undermining American democracy.

Seriously, i have a hard time recalling someone who started off this badly as a national leader. Honestly it's quite spectacular to watch this train-crash while it's happening. I mean what's he going to fail at next? Starting an armed confrontation with China? Saying that the Illuminati is undermining his presidency by portraying him badly in the media?

 

[SezMe]

So the "deplorable bigot" name calling might not be WHY we lost the election, in the sense of the one reason, but I think the "deplorable bigot" name calling was enough to sway 1% of the electorate from Democrat to Republican, or if you prefer, from Hillary to Donald.

The total votes for president (ignoring third party votes) was 128,825,233. So you believe that almost 1.3 million voters changed their vote because of Clinton's deplorable remark. You might want to reconsider your estimate.

 

[Arcade22]

The total votes for president (ignoring third party votes) was 128,825,233. So you believe that almost 1.3 million voters changed their vote because of Clinton's deplorable remark. You might want to reconsider your estimate.

I think some voters are trying to rationalize the fact that they voted for someone who was obviously unsuitable for president due to emotional reasons.