America under Trump - Year One: January 2017 to ... January 2017

xp as someone pointed out on twitter, that cartoon confuses politics for technocracy, which is seductive but a surefire losing strategy

I'd argue that the reaction has been, if anything, understated but that it's the proposed effect on the HRC campaign which has been wildly overstated.

russian nationalism is bad

putin's foreign policy is bad

the vulnerability of civic/gov't institutions is bad

julian assange really hates hillary clinton

russia did not "hack the election"

xp OL yeah i'd agree with that

The hacking wouldn't have had the impact it had without an overly-credulous US media making a mountain out of their molehill and an overly-credulous citizenry uncritically lapping it up.

raiding private emails and sifting them out to confreres for maximum misleading dissemination... is bad!

but wikileaks didn't tip this election. if any single person did (who isn't hillary clinton or donald trump), it was james comey

i mean, if you read the press it's hard to keep straight that we had two "email hacking" scandals at the same time

btw happy new year everyone

it's hard to isolate whatever effect wikileaks had, it probably had some minor effect and every minor effect ended up tipping the election. the russia hacking stuff is important because:

a. it delegitimizes trump's election. we need to be doing this constantly and from every direction.
b. it helps limit his ability to pal around w/ a dictator. obv he's still going to do it, but this does make it look even worse.
c. regardless of how many voters changed their minds because they hated podesta's risotto recipe, the russian government was able to take over an american news cycle at will. this wasn't even the first example of foreign governments using hacking + american free press to achieve some goal (north korea and sony) and it won't be the last.

I don't think the Podesta emails swung things a whole lot, but the "DNC screwed Bernie" thing definitely moved the needle some. I don't know any Bernie voters who went Trump but I know a lot of them didn't bother to vote at all.

the russia thing seems to me like something of a redo of the hanging chad squad back in 2000. i had no patience with this line of argument back then, but surprisingly i'm much more okay with the sequel.

in 2000, as in 2016, the democrats ran a shit candidate in a shit fashion. all of the "hanging chad" bullshit was just that, bullshit, but it didn't detract from honest analyses of their candidate's failure because nobody is motivated to fucking do that anyway. a serious moral reckoning is only going to come if people start kicking the bums out, get involved and primary these assholes.

I mean our weak candidate still won the popular vote by a comfortable margin, the failure was ultimately geographic. I don't think bush admin people in 2004 were sitting around doing honest analyses about why they only won the election by 3 million votes. their 3 million votes were distributed better.

the GOP doesn't really care about mandates one way or another

i mean, they act like they have one no matter their electoral position

do the gay marriage democrats not?

What a bad idea it seems for the Clintons to attend the inauguration. I mean, I can see why they would do it, but I can also see Trump gloating and targeting them in his speech, or his followers starting the "lock her up" chant, which would not be a good scene.

I've seen the figure thrown around w concern from people on left who are annoyed that Russia (or if literally any other reason for Trump winning than "Hillary is bad") is brought up that "50% of Clinton voters think Russia hacked voting machines" which you know when people were saying "rigged primary" for months seems like something you probably shouldn't express concern about.

It would make sense for the Clintons to not show up if all of the former Presidents were going to stay home. If it's just them, it makes it look like she is so hurt and cowed by losing the election that she can't bear to be in Trump's vicinity. If none of the former Presidents put in an appearance, it would look like everyone who has previously held the job has no respect for the man about to take it, which I think is probably true across the board (even for noted anti-intellectual populist GWB).

I thought so far Carter was the only one who said he would attend

http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/03/politics/george-w-bush-laura-bush-to-attend-trump-inauguration/index.html

I would be shocked if it doesn't get ugly. Either Trump will say something, or his supporters will say something, or Trump will play nice and humiliate them later.

No one is going to be shocked when it gets ugly, including the Clintons.

I mean, I can see why they would do it

wedding photo reboot! hilarious

was discussing this in a bar with j0rdan, i told him she will be mouthing the oath along with him, just in case

do the gay marriage democrats not?

― j.

gay marriage democrats can, i believe, differentiate between a moral mandate and a popular mandate. republicans cannot.

> that cartoon confuses politics for technocracy

One party has had technocracy as its major selling point for decades.

It lead them to a misbegotten affair with neoliberal economists. The ones who comprise 90+% of the economics profession/religion/dogma. They'd do well to rediscover the academic dissent.

yeah 'we need to sympathize w/ and better understand trump voters' is just self-flagellation. I don't think the gop won because they spent 8 years 'understanding obama voters'.

― iatee, Tuesday, January 3, 2017 2:21 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

seriously - one month prior to the election, the narrative was the GOP was dead, giving up on the Presidential race and salvaging downticket races, and then after he won, everybody begins applying ex post facto logic insinuating they were more in touch with voters?

Obviously the Rust Belt vote swung the election so they get the attention, and there's a fair point to be made in Democrats re-engaging the middle class, but racism, sexism, the Comey factor, and Russian interference all had a bigger part to play in it and everybody wants to sweep that under the rug.

saw a tweet a few weeks ago where a voter suffering buyer's remorse as more Goldman Sachs folk entered Trump's team, saying something to the effect of "Donald, I voted for you because I thought you'd create jobs, I voted against many things I believed in for this, don't make me regret it". It's like - if you lack scruples to the point where you knowingly vote for a guy who will cause pain to people THAT YOU KNOW for the sliver of the chance that he's going to create you a job...you ain't much better than his alt-right voters.

the russia thing seems to me like something of a redo of the hanging chad squad back in 2000. i had no patience with this line of argument back then, but surprisingly i'm much more okay with the sequel.

in 2000, as in 2016, the democrats ran a shit candidate in a shit fashion. all of the "hanging chad" bullshit was just that, bullshit, but it didn't detract from honest analyses of their candidate's failure because nobody is motivated to fucking do that anyway. a serious moral reckoning is only going to come if people start kicking the bums out, get involved and primary these assholes.

Lol at the endless liberal self-flagellation over winning the popular vote and getting fucked over by a completely absurd system. Our parents really did a number on us, didn't they?

Does anybody think the GOP would treat such a thin (nonexistent) victory as legitimate? Obama whipped them twice and they're still going to be talking about how he wasn't really the president long after he's dead.

It's all about what lessons you want other people to learn based on your beliefs. Nobody does any disciplined analysis. Nobody talks about the fundamental problems in the design of the system. It's all feelings and traditions and arguments from authority or hypocrisy or both.

It's almost like arguing politics on a music discussion board

Does anybody think the GOP would treat such a thin (nonexistent) victory as legitimate? Obama whipped them twice and they're still going to be talking about how he wasn't really the president long after he's dead.

― The beaver is not the bad guy (El Tomboto), Tuesday, January 3, 2017 6:15 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

http://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/static/images/item/trumprevolution2-20121106.jpg

It's like - if you lack scruples to the point where you knowingly vote for a guy who will cause pain to people THAT YOU KNOW for the sliver of the chance that he's going to create you a job...you ain't much better than his alt-right voters.

― Neanderthal, Tuesday, January 3, 2017 5:11 PM (two minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it's not so much lacking scruples as it is lacking any sort of critical thinking skills. Trump was shown to be, time and time again, a baldfaced liar and an obvious con man, someone who MASSIVELY JACKED UP THE RENT ON HIS OWN CAMPAIGN HQ when the donor money started coming in. not only that but it was incredibly obvious to anyone paying attention that the man had to plans whatsoever in case he won; he'd just spout out junk like "giant border wall" and "35% tariff" and unveil tax plans which put us 200 trillion dollars in debt. if you believed a single promise he made, you're an idiot.

that New Yorker cartoon is trademark liberal snot btw. Keep blowing it.

that New Yorker cartoon is trademark liberal snot btw. Keep blowing it.

― Supercreditor (Dr Morbius)

get the fuck over yourself. do you really have nothing better to do with your life than send angry tweets at the democratic party?

Obviously the Rust Belt vote swung the election so they get the attention, and there's a fair point to be made in Democrats re-engaging the middle class, but racism, sexism, the Comey factor, and Russian interference all had a bigger part to play in it and everybody wants to sweep that under the rug.

Iatee & Neanderthal OTM

http://i64.tinypic.com/2zq5vkp.jpg

xpost

yeah fuck it i'm out. thread's all yours, morbz.

Obviously the Rust Belt vote swung the election so they get the attention, and there's a fair point to be made in Democrats re-engaging the middle class, but racism, sexism, the Comey factor, and Russian interference all Clinton being a uniquely bad candidate had a bigger part to play in it and everybody wants to sweep that under the rug.

Herp a derp derp it's Adam time folks

Yeah I don't know how anyone is expected to take the "we can't allow discussing any reasons for Trump winning other than Hillary and the neoliberals are bad" position as anything other than childish. The Comey letter in particular had an impact.

what exactly does 'not sweeping it under the rug' entail? does it matter that 'clinton sucks!!'? not really. there won't be another politician w/ anything like her story anytime soon.

the idea that clinton was a weak candidate (or a 'uniquely bad candidate') came to being long after she had established her place as the nominee. for most of obama's presidency she appeared to be a very well positioned candidate - the perfect resume, a good historical narrative to sell and fairly high approval ratings:

http://content.gallup.com/origin/gallupinc/GallupSpaces/Production/Cms/POLL/6zre0zbbrk6ojzogkmjo1q.png

in a world where america didn't decide to talk about various bullshit email scandals for a year straight, we might still be talking bout how she was a uniquely good candidate, just as people were a few years ago.

You could also read that graph as her numbers returning to the mean of most of her political life? She was popular when Republicans were going insane about a blowjob and again when she was Secretary of State under a popular President and then her numbers fell as she moved back to being a politician.

I mean, I'm not sure in which universe she was ever considered a "uniquely good candidate" given that she lost the 2008 race to a half-term Senator after being anointed by the party?

the idea that clinton was a weak candidate (or a 'uniquely bad candidate') came to being long after she had established her place as the nominee

oh to live in your fantasy wonderland

I mean our weak candidate still won the popular vote by a comfortable margin, the failure was ultimately geographic. I don't think bush admin people in 2004 were sitting around doing honest analyses about why they only won the election by 3 million votes. their 3 million votes were distributed better.

― iatee, Tuesday, January 3, 2017 10:20 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

in fact, bush claimed a mandate and proceeded to try to fuck with social security, then katrina happened and he was the worlds lamest duck.

the idea that clinton was a weak candidate (or a 'uniquely bad candidate') came to being long after she had established her place as the nominee

oh to live in your fantasy wonderland

― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Tuesday, January 3, 2017 7:16 PM (six minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

sorry adam, let me fix that

the idea that clinton was a weak candidate came to being long after she had established her place as the nominee, unless you were part of the subset of americans who have been waging vendettas against the clintons for 3 decades. those guys knew the whole time and weren't fooled by things like poll numbers.

Nobody talks about the fundamental problems in the design of the system.

Does anybody here not recognize these things and maybe that's why it's not the topic?

The Senate is a reality, the Electoral College is a reality. There are no signs that anyone is developing a feasible idea to abolish either or both. Raging at 'geography' is, if anything, more hopeless than self-flagellation.

the idea that clinton was a weak candidate (or a 'uniquely bad candidate') came to being long after she had established her place as the nominee. for most of obama's presidency she appeared to be a very well positioned candidate - the perfect resume, a good historical narrative to sell and fairly high approval ratings:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CmHiNluWgAQLiLm.jpg

no, she had historically awful approval ratings, those of a surefire general election loser in a normal election. we were all counting on the fact that trump's were worse.

xp- It's almost like you didn't post a chart showing her favorability dipping into the mid-40s the last time she ran for President.

xxxxp

I want to live in the fantasy wonderland where Adam Bruneau has anything other than dull, predictable bullshit to contribute on basically any topic (although when other people who actually care about stuff and know things try to engage with you, it's often educational, so thank you for being a troll?)

It was only Hillary's fault she lost the general election (no other reasons are allowed I can't accept it) and also at the same time it wasn't Bernie's fault in any way that he lost the primary.

Does anybody here not recognize these things and maybe that's why it's not the topic?

The Senate is a reality, the Electoral College is a reality. There are no signs that anyone is developing a feasible idea to abolish either or both. Raging at 'geography' is, if anything, more hopeless than self-flagellation.

Yes, but since 2000 wasn't enough of a lesson, it feels extremely important to me that we use the next few cycles not only to address granular matters of enfranchisement like the right to vote itself, but macro enfranchisement like proper vote counting.

My answer to AK/WY/SD/ND is to create a DC/PR/GU/VI/AS/ statehood with real Congressional representation, and then (as I believe I've said) burn the EC at the stake.

It should be part of the platform. Not doing all of that the very next chance they get is just bad poker.

I believe the average GOP pol is sucking up all his/her revulsion and realizing that's where the votes are. And there's also a little "well, it probably won't be that bad" and "well, if it is that bad it'll be over soon enough" and "well, it'll be horrible but at least I'll get some of my ideas implemented."

They're all such lowlifes

Heitkamp and Manchin's voting for Gorsuch would shock me.

voting

NO, rather

EU and Mexico agree to accelerate trade talks

^^ A+ trolling

"good luck angle-saxmerica"

you libtard snowflakes gonna start a february thread or does it even matter what anyone said two days ago?

look up a few posts brother

Trump's America, February 2017: Autocratic for the People