I just assumed it was because if they did “own it”, then the next logical step would be for them to step down from positions of influence and power within the Democrat party.
I’m not saying the Russians didn’t put their fingers on the scale. I would suggest they tried like the Saudis, Qataris, and Israelis tried to help their preferred candidate. I suggest they had very little influence on the overall result. Not compared to part time campaigning, focusing on the wrong areas, bad data, and running a candidate with too much baggage that was just not that popular within the party and pretty damn unpopular outside the party.
1bn dollars up in smoke, and the blame is concentrated on Vladimir Putin. Absurd.
Maybe the total disregard and disdain the DNC had for what their constituents wanted, the voter suppression the DNC engaged in in many caucuses and primaries, and the nepotism openly shown by the party as these things were exposed.
Oh yes, and then the blaming their loss on everything except for the candidate that they pushed through while ignoring the will of the people.
But the older generation that wants status quo and is looking forward to a comfy retirement, was once that energetic, lively youth crowd that promised to change the world 50 years ago. Now look where we are at. I have hope in my dreams, but not much hope in the real world.
Of course. You are welcome to make that suggestion; it’s quite mainstream, sedate and lacking in distastefully emotive language. Odds are good though, that other readers will ‘consider the source’ when they see it. You may want to keep this in mind.
Here’s the thing. Donald Trump will occupy the office of the Presidency for at least a few years. Four years if he has to face reelection, less if he commits impeachable offenses, or dies in office.
During this time period, he will slander his enemies as “corrupt.” He will rail against “liberalism.” And he will use this rhetoric to enable the Republicans to destroy what Clinton values, what Sanders values, what I value, and what I assume you value.
It would very useful if we could come to some agreement that prevents Trump from picking off various factions in his quest to destroy the values that we hold in common.
I’m a Democrat. I even voted for Sanders. I don’t think Clinton was pushed through against my will. I don’t think my vote was suppressed. I think the majority of Democrats voted for Clinton and I can see why. Clinton was a long standing asset to the DNC, had contributed to it and worked with it for decades. Sanders was a last minute Democrat who only joined the party for personal gain.
Your description of the, “will of the people,” is nightmarishly biased and clearly reflects only your interests, not those of the actual people who voted, in the millions, for Clinton. It’s impossible to take claims that twist and spin reality that aggressively and subjectively seriously.
In the meantime, an intelligent, objective observer will blame, regardless of their party affiliation, things like the GOP closing over 800 polling stations for reducing voter turn-out, because that’s a factually verifiable, objective event that definitely had that effect. That’s the opposite of claiming that the person with the majority of votes was pushed through against the, “will of the people.”
If we want to create a political environment were quality and fact triumph over emotion, partisanship and false claims this is something we have to start committing ourselves to caring about and focusing on.
I agree and I didn’t want to be offensive to the original poster; it’s the carrier vehicle for his reasonable idea that gets to me. A demand for solidarity (couched as usual, in haughty tones) from Joan Walsh is inherently repellent. And counter-productive. Her statements have more to do with soothing the wounded sensibilities of her cohort than helping the ‘little people’ who will be damaged by ultra-right wing policies over the next few years.
The chattering class under-estimates the impact of the non-Presidential part of this election. The extreme right has all the federal government in its hands, and a deep field in the state governments. They are drooling over their options. The Democrats have some sway in the Senate and will be able to hold the line on some strategic issues, but that is it. I suspect even in the Senate they will fail more than is projected (in media analyses of the near future). The Senate Republicans will undo the remaining rules that demand super-majorities to pass legislation. We will suffer under one-party rule for at least 2 years, but likely more. The Walsh’s and Streep’s of our coastal elites will shake their fists and hiss, but they won’t do jack in the end. And neither will the former power elite among Democrats in Washington.
There is little more they can lose just now, so now is the time to effect real changes in their organization and power structure. Or just wither them away if it come to it.
Bernie totally would have waved his magic wand and made everything good. Then he would have rode off on his job-farting unicorn without a single obstruction from the corporate-fellating orcs of the Republican Party.
I think we’re way the fuck past the point where people need to calm the fuck down. I realize you’re addressing one person, but I feel the need to repeat something.
There were 868 less polling places in 2016 than there were in 2012. Yes, really.
I got to hear the rhetoric after Obama won: he won because he’s black. I worked in a mostly right-wing media outlet in 2008. That kind of talk was not praise for what a great country we’re in, it was damning commentary from Republicans who were pissed because they were absolutely convinced that Obama didn’t win on his merits but on his skin color. So they decided they had to do something about it. They talked about what to do, openly. And you know what? It happened.
It’s how we’ve ended up with all this talk of ‘real Americans.’ Are you a real American? Well, here’s a question: are you a minority in an urban area? Maybe a white person, but an urban liberal? You’re not a real American.
When the reduced number of polling places stayed open to let people vote, people like Donald Trump whined about the fact that they were getting to vote. You know, them. Those people.
I guaran-damn-tee that there will be attempts to put time limits on when polling places close down.
And here we are, a website full of white liberal voices, and we dare blame these people for being suppressed.
What the hell, man? Calm down? Get mad, goddamnit.
I saw this essay at the New York Review of Books the otherday.
… Populists speak in the name of “the people,” and claim that their direct legitimation from “the people” trumps (the verb has acquired a new connotation) all other sources of legitimate political authority, be it constitutional court, head of state, parliament, or local and state government. Donald Trump’s “I am your voice” is a classic populist statement. But so is the Turkish prime minister’s riposte to EU assertions that a red line had been crossed by his government’s clampdown on media freedom: “The people draw the red lines.” So is the Daily Mail’s front-page headline denouncing three British High Court judges who ruled that Parliament must have a vote on Brexit as “Enemies of the People.” Meanwhile, Polish right-wing nationalists justify an ongoing attempt to neuter Poland’s constitutional court on the grounds that the people are “the sovereign.”
The other crucial populist move is to identify as “the people” (or Volk) what turns out to be only some of the people. A Trump quotation from the campaign trail captures this perfectly: “The only important thing is the unification of the people,” said the Donald, “because the other people don’t mean anything.” UKIP’s Nigel Farage welcomed the Brexit vote as a victory for “ordinary people,” “decent people,” and “real people.” The 48 percent of us who voted on June 23, 2016, for Britain to remain in the EU are plainly neither ordinary nor decent, nor even real. Everywhere it’s the “other people” who now have to watch out: Mexicans and Muslims in the US, Kurds in Turkey, Poles in Britain, Muslims and Jews all over Europe, as well as Sinti and Roma, refugees, immigrants, black people, women, cosmopolitans, homosexuals, not to mention “experts,” “elites,” and “mainstream media.” Welcome to a world of rampant Trumpismo.
I recall reading an article or two about how republicans enlisted black democrats in getting the gerrymanders passed. A safe district for you; a safe majority for me.
(d) If you read the links I sent, you’ll understand that there is a wide variety of independent data pointing in the same direction.
Enough Sanders voters opted to maintain their purity rather than vote for Clinton to tip the election to Trump. That’s what the DATA says, and you’re not allowed to choose only the data that fits your desires. Everything else is just bullshit.
My “will of the people” is based on Debbie Wasserman-Schultz completely ignoring the rules of order and crowning Hillary as queen as she ran out the door, into the arms of a cushy gig…in the Hillary campaign. It’s based on the backroom deals exposed by the DKIM verifiable Podesta emails. It’s based on Hillary getting advanced debate questions from Donna Brazile at CNN, it’s based on a systematic suppression of Democratic voters’ desires, confiscation of signs, removal of inconvenient voters, and all before the general election. It’s based on piles of evidence, plenty of which is documented on video, emails, and many many anecdotes from disaffected Democrats that experienced these things first hand.
Just like many held their nose and voted Trump because “well, that’s the turd in the sandwich we were served”, same with Hillary. It’s hardly news that most people vote party line. It’s hardly news that millions vote so the “wrong lizard doesn’t get in”.
So call that “nightmarishly biased”, but I call it “holding my potential representatives to a standard that want in a representative.”
Which I do, but apparently the “win at any cost” mindset trumps any sort of demand for better candidates or less corruption. The DNC needs to clean house and look in the mirror. I’m not interested in our current “left-lite” version of the republican party, “Super Bowl Sunday” politics, or the “here’s your two choices that completely agree on foreign policy, drug ideology, and international banking”.
Also, you may want to self-reflect why you voted for “a last minute Democrat who only joined the party for personal gain.” An intelligent, objective observer may wonder why you found that to be worth supporting. It clearly reflects only your interests.
Also, get bent. You worded that whole thing like a dick.
I don’t think I worded anything, “like a dick.” I think I poked holes in many of your claims and assumptions, for instance that your ideals in any way represented, “the will of the people.” Based on other responses to this conversation, I think that point has resonated with several others.
It’s one thing to want better candidates; it’s another to not be able to deal with the hand you’re dealt. I understand that some people feel the DNC, a private political organization who certainly isn’t obligated to play by anyone else’s rules, didn’t play fair by Sanders. But I also think it’s the height of irrational disinterest in the actual conditions millions of other people will endure to use that as an excuse to pretend that Clinton and Trump were anywhere close in terms of quality.
I’m sorry if stating overtly that I think your ideas are wrong and your justifications for them irrational and self serving, but I do. That’s not being a dick, that’s being honest. Maybe, just maybe, you might consider the idea that, perhaps, your ideas aren’t the best for the nation or the most sound political conclusion in the wake of this election. With Trump calling for, just as one of many examples, increased nuclear armament, I’d like to think that you might take a deep breath and really ponder the idea that anything anyone did that helped him win, up to and including inaction on Nov. 8th, was a serious misjudgment.
I understand how Sanders supporters who let Trump win have to work through their guilt, and this thread is a good place for them to work through it. A lot of you are still at stage two of the process, “anger.” You’ve got a long way to go to get to “acceptance.” Just wanted to let you all know, though, that it’ll automatically close in two days, so you better get a move on.
I have hope in my dreams, but not much hope in the real world.