I used to be disgusted, and now I try to be amused.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

"Neither" isn't the center. It's not making up your mind, but opting out.

But it's not stance without principle. As Hedges notes, if all the system offers is different varieties of corruption, hitting "none of the above" sends a message. The parties are sclerotic, and entirely out of touch, but they got the message this year: Offer More of the Same, and you'll get the mother of all protest candidates.

I think it was Mencken who said every decent man has to hoist the black flag and act as a pirate now and again. If Trump's the near death drunk our system needs to get sober, indulgence of his debauched administration will have served a significant purpose.

Personally, I believe our problems are beyond a political fix, for all of the reasons Hedges eloquently explains. You've read War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning. He applies the same lucidity in Empire of Delusion. Read that and tell me he hasn't perfectly described this country. Perhaps only something as volcanic as the forecasted Trumpocalypse will shake us to serious policy change.

More of the same was going to be fine for people like us. But in case you hadn't noticed, I'm guessing all of the households on this board are in the top 10%. Our perceptions are the rose colored opinions of courtiers. Or as Hedges would more aggressively note, the useful idiot servants and creators of intellectual cover for corporatist masters.

No one misses the irony that some of the loudest liberals we know speak from gilded perches funded by corporations working against many of the progressive policy planks they profess to hold dear. Handing out hypocrite citations to the professional liberal set is like passing out speeding tickets at the Indy 500.

Your nonsense ignores the math. Hil lost because she got fewer votes than President Obama, and third party candidates got a 500% increase. You want to analyze why we have Trump? Look to the Johnson/Stein voters, not the Trump voters.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Your nonsense ignores the math. Hil lost because she got fewer votes than President Obama, and third party candidates got a 500% increase. You want to analyze why we have Trump? Look to the Johnson/Stein voters, not the Trump voters.

Where in that text am I assessing why Hillary lost? I'm discussing why people voted for third party candidates. I think I'm kind of supporting your point.

However, she lost for a lot more reasons than what you cite. It can't be boiled down to one thing. That's the argument we've been having for months now.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Yet the middle, as in people who don't buy into either party whole heartedly, is, I think thinking, but whatever.

If you think I'm criticizing anyone who doesn't fully subscribe to either party, you're not hearing me.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

If you think I'm criticizing anyone who doesn't fully subscribe to either party, you're not hearing me.

I'm doing my best over here.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Exactly. It isn't mathematically precise, but very very close to it.

Giving Wyoming, for example, three times it's proportional share is not at all close to it.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Your nonsense ignores the math. Hil lost because she got fewer votes than President Obama, and third party candidates got a 500% increase. You want to analyze why we have Trump? Look to the Johnson/Stein voters, not the Trump voters.

No, Hank, it's about the 2% fewer prime age people participating in the labor force. Clearly.

The Dem "establishment" (for lack of a better term) completely underestimated (1) just how much scorn there would be for Hillary from the progressive wing of the party, who I personally thought would get out to vote for the first woman over a racists lunatic (or any R), and (2) just how powerful mysogny is. Those to things drove the phenomena that left votes the Dems could have gotten at home.

Sebby's thing mattered too, but there's little the Dems can really offer to get those people on board.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

However, she lost for a lot more reasons than what you cite. It can't be boiled down to one thing. That's the argument we've been having for months now.

Says the only person who has insisted it was really one thing...

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Yet the middle, as in people who don't buy into either party whole heartedly, is, I think thinking, but whatever. You lot are the thinkers, with accepting the dogma. I can't tell you how ill it made me the last weeks of the campaign, when I seemed the only voice saying " don't vote third party, this is a toss up," and then the meme started of "if you say hil is a poor candidate you are sexist." My prayer is the dems dig theirs heads out of their asses and realize how this perfect storm happened.

Shirley, you can't be serious.

Stop acting like you're the only one yelling at idiots who were voting third party.

And stop trying to impute a small group of people's opinions to everyone voting on the left. It's so fucking ridiculous.

This constant complaint about the left calling everyone racist and sexist such that it turns good people to vote for an actual racist, sexist moron is stupid. There isn't a person in this country whose vote Hillary or Obama would have secured but for liberals labeling them racist or sexist for thinking about voting against them. It's just another way for people on the right to either feel sorry for themselves or justify voting for someone like Trump.

TM

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Adder

No, Hank, it's about the 2% fewer prime age people participating in the labor force. Clearly.

The Dem "establishment" (for lack of a better term) completely underestimated (1) just how much scorn there would be for Hillary from the progressive wing of the party, who I personally thought would get out to vote for the first woman over a racists lunatic (or any R), and (2) just how powerful mysogny is. Those to things drove the phenomena that left votes the Dems could have gotten at home.

Sebby's thing mattered too, but there's little the Dems can really offer to get those people on board.

Part of the problem is a traditional problem: there is always a disconnect between campaign/party HQ and the grassroots. I think it was worse in this case for a bunch of reasons: (1) Under Obama and Wasserman-Shultz, the Party had focused on their core strength: a dynamic, very appealing President who could reach people directly and had not done as much grassroots and state based work as they should have - by the general, the party was on the sidelines; (2) Everyone who knows Hillary at HQ has trouble understanding the complaints about her because they know they are all fundamentally untrue; the degree to which Bernie supporters, for example, came to share a characterization of her similar to that pushed by Issa and Gingrich, still shocks them, and they thus dismissed what they couldn't understand; (3) Hillary herself is a wonk not a candidate by nature, and didn't play to her strength; in the debates, she didn't engage him in wonky discussion and show how shallow he was, but instead pushed him on zingers and tried to demonstrate his instability...

I can go on. But the reason for the shock of the election wasn't just that Johnson voters were idiots (though many are). It was also that a fairly traditional disconnect was aggravated and both Hill's campaign and the party were out of touch with that.

We need a lot of local activity to build a base to make sure that doesn't happen next time.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

Shirley, you can't be serious.

Stop acting like you're the only one yelling at idiots who were voting third party.

And stop trying to impute a small group of people's opinions to everyone voting on the left. It's so fucking ridiculous.

I meant more on FB, where I seemed to be forever reading Michigan people explaining how there was a real chance Johnson can get to 10% (or whatever the line was) and then things will be pretty! Here I think we all posted along our own takes to get our 1 undecided voter to start thinking straight. We failed, but we tried.

This constant complaint about the left calling everyone racist and sexist such that it turns good people to vote for an actual racist, sexist moron is stupid. There isn't a person in this country whose vote Hillary or Obama would have secured but for liberals labeling them racist or sexist for thinking about voting against them. It's just another way for people on the right to either feel sorry for themselves or justify voting for someone like Trump.

TM

I agree with you on people pushed to Trump. Disagree on people who ended up with a 3rd party vote. If em knew in em's heart Hillary was not good, and then em read 10 memes about how that makes you sexist, I can see it moving em to Johnson.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

I agree with you on people pushed to Trump. Disagree on people who ended up with a 3rd party vote. If em knew in em's heart Hillary was not good, and then em read 10 memes about how that makes you sexist, I can see it moving em to Johnson.

Not so sure. If you voted for Johnson, you're looking for absolutely any reason not to vote for Hillary.

TM

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Adder

Says the only person who has insisted it was really one thing...

I acknowledged it was a number of things. My objection was to the early emphasis on racism and xenophobia being the cause. There was an attempt, and I think there remains an effort among many, to delegitimize the election by focusing on racism and xenophobia as the main reasons Trump won. There are numerous reasons Trump won, and I've seen nobody make a credible case any one was significantly greater than the other.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

This constant complaint about the left calling everyone racist and sexist such that it turns good people to vote for an actual racist, sexist moron is stupid. There isn't a person in this country whose vote Hillary or Obama would have secured but for liberals labeling them racist or sexist for thinking about voting against them. It's just another way for people on the right to either feel sorry for themselves or justify voting for someone like Trump.

TM

This is true. Nobody shifted exclusively because they were called racists or sexists. But there is a hysterical left out there right now, making enormous asses of themselves, by labelling anything and everything that disagrees with them racist or a sexist. That sort of childish idiocy - identical in its infantile nature to right wingers calling Obama a socialist for eight years, and birtherism - does the Democratic Party no favors.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

Not so sure. If you voted for Johnson, you're looking for absolutely any reason not to vote for Hillary.

TM

Or you're looking to send a message.

I didn't expect the result we got. But to the extent that, regardless of who won, the third party vote would have emerged as a serious spoiler, compelling a sclerotic two party system to reckon with it, I'm encouraged.

Competition is a good thing. That a large part of this country rejected the squalid offerings foist on it by a pair of tired parties is democracy working as it should. If people don't like the fact that a lunatic won, the parties now understand: Run better candidates next time.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Or you're looking to send a message.

I didn't expect the result we got. But to the extent that, regardless of who won, the third party vote would have emerged as a serious spoiler, compelling a sclerotic two party system to reckon with it, I'm encouraged.

Competition is a good thing. That a large part of this country rejected the squalid offerings foist on it by a pair of tired parties is democracy working as it should. If people don't like the fact that a lunatic won, the parties now understand: Run better candidates next time.

Message you wanted to send: I want a third choice

Message you sent: If no one will cater to my entitled ass I'd just as soon let the country go to hell

And yes, I'll happily concede that both statements above are true.