By John Lawrence
(Photo: Wikimedia)
Trump Astounded and Shocked Democrats — and Even His Own Pollsters
Hillary was a shoo-in… or at least that’s what everyone thought. Hillary had a blue firewall and many paths to 270 electoral votes. Donald had a bunch of heavy lifting including an almost impossible flipping of one or two blue states.
Whaaa hoppened?! What happened was that angry, white rural voters went for the guy that was against free trade (much as Bernie Sanders was) and promised to bring their rust belt jobs back from China and other Asiatic places. You had only to look at the state by state maps to see solid red in rural areas — even in blue states — with the only blue being in the big cities.
It wasn’t enough for Hillary to win even though she came close, and unmistakably the popular vote by more than two million. According to an article by the New York Times, this 1.5 percentage point surpasses margins Al Gore, Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy
Factors in Trump’s Win
1. The media. And I don’t just mean television which graciously gave him tons of free air time all the while he was calling them out as rigged and corrupt. Why did they do it? Trump is a flamboyant show man and his unpredictability and dynamism drove up ratings.
Hillary got nowhere near equal coverage. Trump was much more interesting. What would he say next? Hillary was too workmanlike. The public didn’t care about her competency and the fact that she would get up every morning and work her heart out for the American people. They wanted to be entertained. What else is new?
2. The media #2. Hate talk radio pervades the rural U.S. Rush Limbaugh and his acolytes have revved up white American hatred over immigration, job loss, transgender bathrooms in public schools, Hillary’s supposed transgressions (that have supposedly been accumulating for years, but in reality don’t amount to more than a hill of beans) and everything else rural white Americans hold dear including guns and Jesus.
In most rural areas there is no alternative to hate talk radio. Walk into any sports bar or diner and you will only see Fox news. On the internet social media has been circulating hateful images of Hillary and Obama for years.
3. Hyperbole. Donald Trump would make absolute statements without regard to either their factuality or their groundedness in reality. Hillary was too nuanced, too in touch with what would be even possible after her election. She was an incrementalist. Trump would make statements without anything whatsoever backing them up.
Hillary knew what was possible, should she be elected, and she did not deviate too far from that in what she promised. Trump had no concern about that whatsoever. He just promised anything he felt was politically expedient, anything that would turn on his audience and get them cheering.
Ever since Ronald Reagan, the crowd has lusted for an Entertainer-In-Chief. Hillary would have been an excellent Workaholic-In-Chief. The crowd didn’t want reality; they wanted fantasy.
4. Hillary represents the global elite, the meritocrats. She’s all for globalization which her husband initiated with NAFTA. In Hillary’s mind globalization is the wave of the future, the ineluctable reality, the status quo. Now all those who have been left behind by globalization, not just in the U.S. but all over the industrialized world (think BREXIT), are saying Whooaa! We think the jobs should have stayed here and not gone overseas.
Trump promised them he’d bring those good paying jobs back to America, but will he? Probably not.
(Source: Wikipedia)
The big corporations, who pay the lobbyists to do the sausage making for Congress and then promise them good paying jobs when they exit “public service” to spend more time with their families, like globalization just the way it is. It totally serves their interests. Trump himself does most of the sourcing for his products overseas. Fat chance that the Republican establishment, including Trump himself now, is going to do anything to halt the march of globalization.
As far as the little guy is concerned, Trump has just used you to get elected; now he will discard you and trample all over you in a race to enrich himself and his class even more. In his mind, you are just LOSERS. As far as the economic divide is concerned, you ain’t seen nothing yet.
5. Wall Street. Hillary was just too close to Wall Street and protecting their interests. After all it was her husband that signed the legislation deregulating them and terminating the Glass-Steagle Act which separated investment banking from commercial banking. But there will be no more $250,000 speeches for her. She’s used goods as far as they’re concerned at this point. Trump never railed against Wall Street. He’ll be giving the $250,000. speeches now, and he’ll protect their interests.
Bernie Sanders was the only one who stood up to Wall Street. Hillary’s “me-tooism” was utterly unconvincing. She saw the Wall Street crowd as meritocrats and workoholics like herself doing God’s work in the 21st century economy. Who did Chelsea Clinton go to work for? Answer: Wall Street.
The Little Guy has chosen the wrong person in Donald Trump to halt the march of financialization and globalization in the economy. After all Donald Trump is a meritocrat himself at least in his own mind. “I was smart” in avoiding taxes, he said. Now he’s in a position, along with his Republican compatriots, to bore more loopholes in the tax code and to outright get rid of taxes and regulations altogether at least for the wealthy class.
Where will the government get its money? From the Little Guys who voted for Trump. They’re used to voting against their own interests and they did it Big Time in this go around. They voted for a lot of hot air which will dissipate almost immediately. They essentially committed hari-kari.
You Can Kiss Action on Climate Change Good-Bye
Trump has promised to pull out of the Paris agreement which would doom any action by the world community and make climate change denial the policy if not the law of the land. You can kiss 350.org, Bill McKibben and Leonardo DiCaprio good-bye. They will probably never be heard from again. The oil and gas industry will continue to pollute. Fracking will continue. Even Oklahomans, who are at the center of the earthquake produced fracking industry, are not speaking out against it.
Minorities Can Kiss Their Ass Goodbye
Good-bye Dreamers. Your dreams at this point can only be about making the most of it in your native countries or in whatever other country you can get into. You thought Obama deported a lot. You ain’t seen nothing yet. Trump will make your lives miserable. White America under Trump will be ascendant. Minorities can adopt white values or else.
(Source: Will O’Neill/Flickr)
Obamacare
Forget it. It’s over. It was compromised at the start by pharmaceutical corporation lobbyists. There was no cost containment thanks to them.
Now the rich will live and the poor will just die. Those with pre-existing conditions will not be able to get insurance just like it was in the good old days. I’m sure Trump’s supporters will understand. They’re used to not blaming those who are actually making their lives more miserable.
After all I’m sure Trump will not disappoint when it comes to entertaining the Little Guys. But then he’ll pull the rug out from under them and say, “You’re fired!” They’re losers. The winners will be those who climb aboard Trump’s bandwagon, especially if you’re white and rich already.
Foreign Policy
Trump is a naif when it comes to foreign policy. In a way this might be good, but I think he will be overruled by the foreign policy establishment – the Republican neocons. Trump has cozied up to Vladimir Putin. This has the potential of calming the renewed Cold War which the current Washington establishment wants to get us into. Cooperation between Russia and the US could do much do diminish tensions in the world. Recognizing that Russia has interests in its sphere of influence and giving them a break on the Ukraine situation would be a good thing. Cooperation in the Middle East, Syria in particular, could hasten the demise of ISIS and other terrorist organizations. NATO should not march relentlessly on in Putin’s back yard and try to take over former satellite countries.
As far as funding goes Trump is right that the US shouldn’t bear the total cost for defending the world. Wealthy countries such as Germany and Japan should pony up thus diminishing the US defense budget. Problem is defense contractors don’t want the US defense budget diminished. They would be losing money and profits especially if other wealthy countries purchased their weapons domestically and didn’t buy them from US defense contractors. Trump may be given a dose of reality by defense contractors and their lobbyists on this score.
Listen, Up Democrats
You need to start filibustering. You need to do to them what they’ve done to you. Filibuster anything and everything. This talk of unity is so much post-election hogwash. At the same time you need to stand up for essentially what amounts to Bernie Sanders’ agenda.
When Trump renegs on his purported trade policy, you need to remind him that he was going to bring those good paying jobs back home. You need to get your media into white, rural America so they have more than Rush Limbaugh and Fox news to listen to and watch. You need to court those white rural Americans who overwhelmingly voted for Trump who are less well off today than they were eight years ago even though according to conventional employment and GDP figures we are all better off. You need to make it clear that just because the corporations and the wealthy are better off that it does not trickle down to the average – should I say it again – rural white American. You need to reject the financialization and globalization of the economy.
Finally, Democrats, you need to embrace the Bernie Sanders wing of the party and stand up for the middle class, the poor and the homeless like you used to. Bernie, we need you now more than ever.
John Lawrence
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All those white workers who have had their good paying jobs sent overseas voted for Trump. They used to be unionized and the unions would have reliably delivered them for the Democrat. All those white workers in Ohio, Michigan and Pennsylvania are now deunionized and have been basically told by the Democrats to fend for themselves or get a college education. If they had still been members of unions they would have voted for Hillary, but that horse has left the barn.
Well, you could go on and on, John. I think Michael Moore’s 5 key points pretty much say it all. Highly recommended for those who have not seen them.
And this is more to the matter than rural vote. One writer is calling them The Forgotten Class. So invisible the Democrats just overlooked them.
And he’s already setting up his transition team with energy company lobbyists and corporate consultants according to the New York Times. Ooh Bernie we need you!
Wolf-Pac: convene a states-led amendments convention whose agenda is to propose a new constitutional amendment to get big money out of politics. It’s our only hope now.
Good luck getting 3/4 of the state legislatures to approve a constitutional convention. Won’t happen (though I wish it would).
My bad. 2/3 of state legislatures. 3/4 of states are needed if Congress passes an amendment with 2/3 of both houses.
Desde,
…or if a convention passes a proposal. Either way, 3/4ths of the state legislatures must ratify any proposal, either way it is produced… a tough gauntlet, as intended. Wolf-Pac finds that 8 of 10 people asked (from wither of the two major political parties) believe there is far too much money in politics, and that it harms the process. Most people are fed up with political access only if you can afford it and do not believe “pay-to-play” politics was the intention of the framers of the constitution. I don’t believe Wolf-Pac anticipates a well-crafted proposal to have any difficulty being ratified.
2/3 = 34 state legislatures. 5 states have already passed an Article V resolution to get big money out of politics by convening a state-led amendments convention per Article V of the Constitution (as it is written now). You say an Article V amendments (NOT a constitutional) convention will not happen. I wouldn’t be so sure. Besides, I don’t see any recommendations from you for a better way to get money out of politics. Do you have one? If so, let’s hear it. If not, then go to Wolf-Pac’s website and offer to help out!
You work on your windmill and I’ll continue working in my community of Barrio Logan where I’m needed more.
What windmill? I don’t have a windmill. Whatever Barrio Logan is, you’d better stay there.
You don’t understand a Don Quixote reference or know of the working class Mexican community of Barrio Logan? Get back to me when you do.
Desde,
I have not read Don Quixote. I started it a long time ago and put it down. I just ran a Google search on “Barrio Logan”. Wikipedia describes it as a residential community in San Diego. By all means if the people in Barrio Logan need you, you should serve them. Being all the way across the country, I’m not surprised that I’ve never heard of it. I doubt many people in the northeast have even heard of Barrio Logan in San Diego.
If you are serious about getting money out of politics, Wolf-Pac’s strategy is the only one with a realistic chance of actually accomplishing that objective. Don’t just assume it will never happen. It’s already happening. There is nothing stopping you from doing both: serving the Barrio Logan community and volunteering for Wolf-Pac.
Mr. Keleher:
You are a bit behind the curve here. There are already several amendments in the Congressional hopper to counter the Citizens-United ruling. I think the best one is from MoveToAmend (https://movetoamend.org/wethepeopleamendment). Of course, we now have a great set back to eliminating C-U.
michael-leonard: I don’t believe Congress will ever pass (2/3 majority required) a proposal to amend the Constitution in any meaningful way on the subject of campaign finance reform. It is not in a Congressperson’s personal interest to do so. So, Wolf-Pac’s strategy is to go around Congress per Article V of the US Constitution and call a convention of the states who are far more likely to propose meaningful campaign finance reform than is Congress. I don’t think MtA’s proposed text (as it now appears on their website), although well-written IMO, stands much of a chance of passage in a Republican-controlled Congress. It’s probably not going to even be discussed for some undetermined time to come. Therefore, we, the people, are being forced to take matter to a venue other than Congress… so Wolf-PAc is appealing to the states to convene to propose a constitutional amendment. The beauty of Wolf-Pac’s strategy is precisely that it is not affected by either the US Congress or the President.
Besides, reducing the corrosive influence of money in this culture will take a lot more than just overturning the Citizen’s United decision. Overturning the CU decision would bring us back to 2009. Are you saying that things were fine in 2009? And am I still behind the curve?
Amen