You know who complains that they can’t win because the game is rigged?  Losers.  – Frederik deBoer

If only we lived on Earth Prime, Hillary totally would have won.

If only she had won these three counties, these four states, if they hadn’t released those darn emails, if only people didn’t hate pantsuits so much, if only we lived in another dimension where Donald Trump had an evil goatee or a magical universe where unicorns had the right to vote, Hillary would have won.

If only we didn’t have an Electoral College, Hillary would have won.  Oh yeah.  Totally. That.  It is SO wrong and SO crooked, that Electoral College.  It was based on protecting SLAVE STATES!!  Abolish it right away!!!

This chain of thought takes magical thinking to a whole new level.

Firstly because this parallel universe we are envisioning assumes that things remain precisely the same up until election night, which they wouldn’tve.  The candidates would have run different campaigns, focused on different states, the voter breakdown would have been completely different.  People who didn’t turn out to vote may have, and others may have stayed home.  People who voted 3rd party or Harambe may not have done that.   It’s like losing a baseball game and then blaming it on not following the rules of cricket.  The assumption that Hillary would have won if not for the Electoral College is unproven and unverifiable and it is the pipe dream of silly people who watch too much Black Mirror (and if you know what that is, you probably voted for Hillary.)

But let’s set that aside to talk about the Electoral College vs. the popular vote.  A helpful breakdown of how the popular presidential vote broke down is here. http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/11/16/us/politics/the-two-americas-of-2016.html   Do you notice how overwhelmingly divided this is and how geographically minuscule the pockets of Democratic voters truly were?  Does it seem right that people in New York City (and not all of NYC, please check out this breakdown demonstrating that parts of NYC went completely the other way https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/numbers/clinton-trump-president-vice-president-every-neighborhood-map-election-results-voting-general-primary-nyc ) is setting public policy for people in Billings and Cheyenne and a lot of neighborhoods in New York City and pretty much all of rural America?

Actually, I think it does seem right to them.  That’s the concerning thing.  The number of people who look at that map and think it is just and right that those enclaves are put in charge of everything all the time, because they are better and wiser than the rest of the nation.  That these same people are also unironically posting Hunger Games memes right now is a subject for consideration at a later time, perhaps.

These Blue Tribers prefer a very top heavy form of centralized Federal power in which their candidate becomes president and then hopefully with the help of a unified Congress and Supreme Court, enacts their grand vision of progressivism across the entire US.  But the rest of the country does.not.want.that.obviously.duh and just rejected the idea pretty overwhelmingly – regardless of population, geographically speaking, most of the country does not accept Clinton-style progressivism as the desirable policy of the United States and was willing to vote for a fucking lunatic to avoid it.

Whether or not you think this is right, it did happen, and the fact that it happened indicates that it’s going to be difficult to do away with the Electoral College.  It would require amending the US Constitution, first by proposals in Congress (unlikely for now), and then by approval by 3/4 of the states.   It is very, very, very unlikely that 3/4 of the states are going to do that, not only because it just kinda worked for them, but because it would negate a very important check and balance that the states hold and will ensure that the votes of the people of those states would no longer count.

But wait – they would still count, right?  In a popular vote, those votes would still be counted?  So it’s all fair.  In a way, yes, they would, but in another, much more accurate way, they wouldn’t.  I live in Washington State, and everything here is controlled by the large liberal population of Seattle.  My vote here in the Great Sagebrush Empire is meaningless.  I may as well not even bother to cast it for a Republican because the Democrats always win.  It’s useless.  I have little say over who my governor is, who my senators are, and over a lot of really bad referendums that get passed that make my state a worse place to live.  It’s taxation without representation all over again.

People who are calling for the electoral college to be dismantled, what you are really asking for is the disenfranchisement of a huge part of the country.   And you’re doing it at the same time as you push for a super strong Federal government that will enact your personal pet policies at the expense of the areas that you plan to disenfranchise.  It’s a dick move, ok??   You’re suggesting that rich people in Manhattan and the Los Angeles suburbs decide how someone in rural North Dakota or urban Detroit lives their life, giving them no say in who the President of the United States is.   Simply because there are more of you.

It isn’t right.  If you believe your own rhetoric at all, you have to admit it is not right.

But beyond all that, it’s stupid for you too.

You see, it very much remains to be seen if this is a last hurrah for American conservatism or the complete implosion of the left.  The demographics are shifting, it’s true, but the millennials will grow up, the Republicans may stop to decide catering to the Stoopidz and start making coherent pro-liberty arguments again, and the dogmatism and hypocrisy of the Democratic party may end up driving a lot of minority voters to the right (which in many cases, based on their values, is their natural home).   You lost because a LOT of people hate you – not only your policies but actually kind of you, personally – the arrogant, entitled people who think Lena Dunham’s tears mean anything at all whatsoever to like 98% of voters, very much including black, Asian, Middle Eastern, and Hispanic voters.  It is entirely possible that in the future, this tide of changing demographics you are relying on is indeed going to shift, and it’s going to shift against you.

In that case, the electoral college could be your only hope of ever regaining political power. The electoral college is a check and balance that prevents the the majority from stripping away from the minority.  Sometimes, yeah, it means that Wyoming seems to have a disproportional say in an election.  But another time it could mean that Vermont does.

Fun fact about the Electoral College – it has virtually always led to a transition of power instead of a consolidation of power.   It has NEVER kept an incumbent in office.  It’s not a tool of oppression, it’s not a tool of the party in power to stay in power indefinitely, it is a way for people who are possibly underrepresented in the population to still have some say in the direction the country is headed.  To want to flush that because your team didn’t win – it’s throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

 

 

Michael Moore claims, and I mostly agree with him, that Donald Trump never had any real intention to become president.  I have even contemplated (very seriously) the idea that he was deliberately being outrageous to throw the election.  I think he maybe just wanted a place in the history books, a name that people will remember through the ages (if fuzzily) like Eugene V. Debs or Adlai Stevenson.  Maybe he wanted to grow his brand or fuck some shit up, or maybe even just have some fun.  When I’m feeling more kindly disposed to Donald, I second guess this.  I have seen some old interviews on Youtube that indicated that he’d thought of running for president many ages ago and his political viewpoints were pretty consistent over the years.  Maybe he’s legit.  Couldn’t tell ya.

What I can tell you, I think, is the reason why he said some of the absolutely shocking and awful things that he said during the election.  I believe that Donald Trump if, he did in fact, want to become president (or, if he was just in this to fuck shit up) correctly identified people’s frustration with political correctness, the unholy alliance between the Blue Tribe and the media, and the utter failure of the Republican Party to answer it.

And he was the only one who did.  The rest of them tiptoed around and acted ashamed and apologetic for having seemingly unpopular opinions (not so unpopular as we’ve been led to believe, tho, are they), or gloated over a victory that they assumed was just a foregone conclusion.  They wrang their hands and scraped and groveled and begged people to clap for them like Jeb Bush, or pushed a rapping Lena Dunham (srlsly?) in our faces like Hillary Clinton. Both parties and the media demonstrated a fundamental inability to understand the depths of what a lot of regular everyday Americans of all races, classes, and genders were thinking and feeling.

I believe Donald Trump tailored those statements he made not out of a desire for divisiveness or inability to control his tongue, not out of a quest to tap into some secret underbelly of white hate or whatever spin the media is putting onto this to absolve themselves of the huge amount of culpability that they have for the outcome of this election.  Donald Trump made those statements as a calculated ploy to prove to the people that despite his wealth and fame, that he was a man of the people, and not one of THEM – not of the political establishment, and not a creation of the media.

By running his mouth and refusing to observe the niceties, he demonstrated that he was a self-made man, an individual with free will and not a puppet of the parties or the press.  That was what people wanted, at the core of it all.  That is what connected with voters.  His individuality, courage, and the concept that he was an independent thinker who doesn’t play by the rules.  He may be rich, he may be an utter bastard, but at least he wasn’t crapped out in exchange for political favors by one of the two parties both of which have utterly failed America.  He wasn’t fawned over by the media that’s been complicit in it.  And he wasn’t scared of them.  He proved it every time he opened his mouth.

If he did that on purpose, then the guy is a genius and all props to him.  If he did it on accident, then he’s the luckiest SOB ever.  Because it was pitch perfect for the way a lot of people are feeling.  It would have been super awesome if it could have come in a prettier package, but maybe that was too much to ask for.  Maybe to play the part of an iconoclast, you have to actually BE an iconoclast.

At times it felt to me like Donald Trump was trolling the media and the two parties.  It was a troll that we, the great unwashed, were in on.  It was a joke between Trump and half of America on the folks who have just run it into the ditch.  Republicans are so out of touch they don’t even know what trolling is, and Democrats don’t understand trolling, that’s why they think Pepe the Frog is a hate symbol.  The media fell for the troll hook, line, and sinker and reported all this stuff as fact because they thought it helped their side.

Peter Thiel, the co-founder of Pay Pal and Trump supporter, said that the Blue Tribe did not take Trump seriously but took him literally.  Whereas the rest of the voters (those who voted for him and those who simply refused to vote for Hillary and stayed home or voted Harambe) took him seriously, but did not take him literally.  I don’t think most Trump supporters believe much of anything he says, but they take him seriously.  If nothing else, as a ballsy individual that is in no one’s pocket.  He proved it by saying stuff that no establishment candidate ever could and surviving things that no establishment candidate could ever have survived.  His dishonesty actually came off weirdly honest, at least to me.

Did he lie, yeah, I don’t think anyone thinks otherwise.  But the media and Hillary were lying constantly and flagrantly and anyone who’s paid any attention over the last 25 years knows it.  Did he say stuff on the campaign trail he had no intention of doing?  Let’s hope so!!  Then again, every candidate does (Obama and 800,000 shovel ready jobs, I’m looking at you here.  Still waiting on those).  But in a battle between someone who’s lying outrageously to your face with a wink and a nod and a joke you’re both in on, and a battle between someone who’s lying to your face and refuses to admit they’re lying even as they’re positioning the knife they’re gonna stab into your back, who seems more honest?

The main reason why people are so pissed right now appears to me to be that they lost.    Losing is never fun, and losing when you think you’re for sure gonna win really sucks (trust me on that, I’m a Seahawks fan.)  They have reasons, but I don’t think those are REALLY really the reasons.  I think they’re assigning noble words to nasty emotions and the main nasty emotion they’re having right now is pissed-offedness that they lost.

My question to Hillary supporters is not why are you angry that you lost, but why do you think you get to win on every front all the time with no opposition??  Why is the only win acceptable to you, the unconditional surrender and eradication of the other side while you stand over their bodies and scream victory at the sky?

I know that most on the left do not know what I’m talking about right now.  I’m speaking Greek to them.  Because they believe that their way is the only way because it’s the only RIGHT way.  It’s self-evident and everyone all around them also believes it is self-evident.  Our team is totally right, we have the moral high ground, and thus we should always win, because we are totally right and we have the moral high ground.  But the funny thing about moral high grounds is that standing righteously upon them can make you see everyone else not on that high ground as not only wrong, but immoral.

But here’s the thing.  You may have lost an election, but you’re still winning the war.   Why do you have to win EVERYTHING?

After 8 years of an African-American president, the nearly successful presidential candidacy of a woman, the legalization of gay marriage, and your apparent total control of the media, why are so many people not jumping for joy right now??  Why are they screaming for blood??   Guys, YOU’RE WINNING.  Why can you not accept that a lot of people just didn’t like Hillary, and some people just aren’t liberals, and gee whiz guys, let’s do better next time?  Let’s think about how we can woo and persuade, how we connect with voters instead of demonize them, how we can change hearts and minds.  That’s how rational people come back after a setback.  Burning people in effigy and destroying the city in America that most represents your values, is not.

While I hate invoking other countries to describe the anomaly that is America, a lot of other countries have some political parties that are in direct opposition to each other.  Conservatives and Labour, in the UK, for example.   Sometimes the Conservatives win, sometimes Labour wins.  And that’s ok.  In most countries, neither side has the expectation of totally winning on every front, every election, every issue, all the time.  In a world full of diversity, no one should expect that.   Some countries even have several parties all representing different subsections of the populace and they are quibbling about this or that.  None of them expect to come out victorious over their enemies, not really.

In the US until very recently, neither side ever had the expectation of totally winning on every front.  I think that the Republicans still do not have that expectation.  That’s why they’ve been so passive about everything.  Their supporters have been typically patient and reasonable.  That’s why they send us Jeb Bush as a presidential candidate.  Because they still think this is business as usual and that “ya win some, ya lose some” and that is why they look so flat-footed next to the Democrats who are on a clear mission.

Why is the default mindset for so many on the left over the last decade or so, a scorched earth policy in which your opinion is the only one that is allowed to be voiced and the rest of America needs to, oh, I don’t know, crawl off somewhere and die?

It is because this has become a moral issue.  Democrats good, Republicans bad. Conservatives, bad.  Libertarians, bad, and kind of weird.  Christians, very, very bad.  The wicked shall not be unpunished, but the seed of the righteous shall be delivered.   And the method of that punishment shall be social media.  It’s not enough for progressives to win, most everything, most of the time.  They have to grab their torches and pitchforks and chase those Frankenstein’s Monsters that live in Flyover Country and those weird neighborhoods in New York City that no one cool ever goes into, down and stab them a few times.  And then burn whatever remains, with sick burns on Twitter.

The wicked shall not be unpunished.

And it is NOT Donald Trump, don’t tell me that it is, because I saw this trend rising long before this latest election cycle.  Donald Trump is not a conservative or a Christian and he’s really not even a Republican.  Donald Trump is irrelevant to this conversation.  He’s just what people threw at you to try and stop this insanity.

It is not right or normal to expect your personal moral views to become the law of the land with no room for compromise or dissent or the simultaneous existence of anyone else’s morality.  That is how the Taliban thinks.  That’s how ISIS thinks.  They may call it religion instead of social justice, but the upshot is the same.  It’s theocracy.

 

 

If you start whining before the game is even over, if whenever things are going badly for you, and you lose you start blaming someone else, then you don’t have what it takes to do this job.   – President Barack Obama

The analysis is in, the soul searching is done.  And apparently, Hillary Clinton truly believes she was just trounced by the worst candidate in, like, ever, because of the FBI.  The email thing, I guess, or something.  I may be only one voter, but I can tell you, the reason I voted for Gary Johnson instead of Hillary Clinton has nothing to do with the FBI.

I’m not trying to kick the woman when she’s down, I’m really not.   Just trying to record the truth as I see it for the sake of accuracy because the media is out to lunch and the rank and file Hillary supporters love their narrative too much.  The FBI was not the reason why I didn’t vote Hillary.  Not even a little.   They did their job, cleared her before the election.  No worries.

So, I had my kids pick a number between one and 50 because I thought I could probably come up with at least 50 reasons that were much more important reasons to me than the last minute email revelations.  Hillary-specific reasons, not the cultural stuff.  This is just the stuff that Hillary herself has responsibility for.  They picked 38.  Here they are in no particular order.

1)The fact that the emails ever existed to begin with and whatever happened between the FBI and Loretta Lynch that triggered their release.

2)The fact that you destroyed a whole bunch of them and expect us to take your word that they were personal

3)Bengazi

4)Clinton crime bill

5)Dismissive, manipulative email regarding Black Lives Matter and how to use them politically in light of Clinton crime bill

6)Obamacare is a joke, websites never work

7)Used to believe gay marriage was wrong less than 10 years ago (or at least that’s what you said) but everyone conveniently forgot that

8)Both Clintons and Obama administration misusing IRS against political enemies

9)That bullshit where the Clinton staffers trashed the White House and pried all the W’s off of the computers when George W was taking office and caused $15,000 of damage

10)All the times you said crappy things about other women like “trailer trash” and “narcissistic loony tune” and “bimbo” and threatened to destroy and crucify them

11)Auctioning off spending the night in the Lincoln Bedroom and a bunch of other stuff more important than that, that I can’t remember, in exchange for campaign contributions

12)The Clinton Foundation

13)Defended a dude who raped a 12 year old (ok, that was your job, I get that) but then laughed about it and got all the evidence dismissed on a technicality

14)Kept FBI files on your enemies when Bill was in office (she who lives by the sword, dies by the sword, I guess)

15)Bill’s issues and the fact that you had the arrogance to play the “Donald groped women” card despite that

16)That the reason why you had the arrogance to do so was because the press never mentioned the irony of all that

17)That the reason why the press never mentioned the irony of that was because we have emails that prove you were actively colluding with them

18)Donna and the debate questions (and I love Donna, I wish she had been running)

19)That despite racial tensions being very high, people in your campaign sent paid operatives to Trump rallies to incite violence and pretend to be Trump supporters

20)That that is probably still going on

21)That neither you nor Obama have said anything to stop the protests breaking out across the US even though you easily could – if it was me I’d be moving heaven and earth to stop them.  (ok this is a little retroactive, but still, speaks to character)

22)Hired all your cronies for Bill’s administration

23)That Bill has been pal-ling around with Jeffrey Epstein and flying on Epstein’s jet a whole bunch of times and the media has said nothing

24)Said you landed under sniper fire in Bosnia when you didn’t

25)Marc Rich and other questionable pardons for cash that went to your brothers

26)Randy Weaver and the Branch Davidians

27)Dirty tricks on both Bernie Sanders and Barack Obama and your campaign actually invented the birther idea

28)Common core is dumb

29)Gun control

30)The Supreme Court

31) I believe the media manipulated the Republican elections by giving Donald and fellow wackadoo Ben Carson (I actually like Ben tho) tons of free press and making the legitimate candidates into nobodies, because they thought you’d be better able to beat him/them

32)Said mean things about coal miners

33)Clinton fatigue

34)Donald Trump may not have released his tax returns, but you did not release your secret speeches.  Seems weird.

35)Government bailout to your big money pals on Wall Street

36)A lot of really shitty stuff that happened under the Obama administration that we did not hear but barely a word about because the media is under your guys’ control.  Had you won, this media blackout would have continued without question.  Not a doubt.

37)Those gross Planned Parenthood videos

38)It’s the economy, stupid.

She’s the ocean.

My kids were sad when Hillary lost.  They wanted a girl president, because “because why can’t we have a girl president”.

I want a woman president too, someday, and hopefully soon.  But “because” is not a reason to vote for someone.  It is a child’s reason to vote for someone.   “Because my kids are sad the next day” is not a reason to vote for someone.  “Because elderly women wanted to live to see a female president” is not a reason to vote for someone.  “Because I want to check off an item on my bucket list” is not a reason to vote for someone.

Hillary really didn’t give me any reason TO vote for her.  Gary Johnson did, and so I voted for him.  I expect that’s how most people felt.  They considered the options, and selected the alternative that feels right to them.  Some people voted for Jill Stein, some people voted for Donald Trump, some people voted for nobody and left the slot blank.  Some did a write in vote for Harambe.  A lot of other people just stayed home.   This is not the voter’s fault.  Hillary did not connect – not with me, and not with many others.  The only thing she had to tell me was the names of the celebrities that were voting for her.

She also gave me a pretty large and unignorable number of reasons NOT to vote for her. Starting with the fact that she’s a political operative who has been in the government for decades.   During this time, she’s done some questionable stuff that any rational person might have a problem with.  She also hasn’t done some important things that any rational person might have a problem with her not doing.  This idea that she’s this innocent underdog fighting against the system…I’m sorry, it’s just not true.  She was the First Lady, a senator, and the Secretary of State.  She’s the system.  She is the ocean.

Hillary Clinton has had every opportunity to prove herself to me for 25 years – her voting record, her honesty, her successes and her failures…and when it came down to it, I couldn’t close the deal.  I couldn’t make myself vote for her.  Not even to defeat a pretty yucky person. That’s how strongly I felt.  She does not represent my viewpoints and I don’t trust her at all.   That’s on her, not me.

Too many people are trying to make this election about pantsuits and haircuts and sexism.  None of that was true for me.  I thought Hillary looked like a million bucks (and if Hillary’s hair was an issue, have you seen Donald’s) and I’m a woman.  I would love to have a female president.  But I don’t like where the country is headed and she has to be at least somewhat accountable for that.   I have serious concerns about her record, her honesty, the behavior of her campaign and the agenda of her supporters.  I feel she’s really power hungry and all this is some longtime plan that she and Bill hatched ages ago, that she cares nothing about any of us and just wanted the office for her own self-aggrandizement.   Now maybe that’s true for all presidential candidates…but it doesn’t endear someone to me, that’s for sure.  This is legit, guys, that’s what people are trying to explain to you.  I had very legitimate concerns about Hillary Clinton.   Invoking Beyonce and Jay Z’s names are not enough to answer them.   Again, that is on her.

Was I supposed to ignore all those tummy rumblings I was having…the fact that she gave me no tangible reason to vote for her, myriad reasons to vote against her, her ambition, her record, that it would be 4 more years of the same economic policies that aren’t working for me and my family, the secret speeches she didn’t want anyone to hear, the dubious behavior of her campaign and her supporters, her fake Southern accent that came and went with the wind…I would be the worst person ever if I ignored all that stuff just because I wanted to see a female president within my lifetime.  I would be the worst person ever if I ignored that stuff because celebrities told me to or because I was embarrassed when people called me names.  That WOULD make me a uniformed voter that made a bad choice on a whim.  That would make me, as Amy Schumer recently called those who did not support Clinton, weak.  I really would be a weak person if I voted for a candidate that I did not believe in, because of my personal desires or social pressures.

People voted for the person that they thought was gonna do the best job, or they voted for nobody because they really hated both candidates and didn’t connect with a 3rd party, or Harambe.  That’s what cost Hillary the election. She was running against probably the most unlikable candidate, if not person, ever, and she dropped the ball (and not singlehandedly, either, because the media was entirely complicit in this).  Hillary and her campaign and her supporters failed to connect with a significant chunk of people – not only Trump voters, but 3rd party voters, those who refused to vote at all for president or wrote someone else in, and those who stayed home.  I think that Democrats have some very hard questions to ask themselves.  As does the media.

Or, they could blame the voters instead.

I didn’t want Donald Trump to be our president, and didn’t vote for him.  I just find it hilarious that he is.   Enjoying the beautiful irony of millions of assholish, mean spirited, closeminded people whose biggest problem in life is whether to shop at Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods, who’ve just spent the last 10 years accusing everyone who disagrees with them of suffering from cognitive dissonance, experiencing it en masse.

Let’s go back in time a few months.  One of the things that I found incredibly disturbing is how all the celebrities were in this seemingly organized movement to promote Hillary.  At that point in time I was fully ready to vote for Hillary to prevent a Trump presidency.  But the celebrities!!!!  They just never fucking shut up.  I’ve been watching elections since Reagan vs. Mondale and I don’t remember stars coming out so vehemently, so brazenly, so overwhelmingly in support of a candidate.  They may have gone to fundraisers now and then but it was nothing like this past 18 months has been.  It was non-stop all the time, and it was coming from the top down – it wasn’t that celebrities were supporting Hillary, it was that they were apparently this organized force trying to take over on her behalf.   The media, the celebrities, and Hillary.  Go team.

Even celebs that am pretty big fans of, like Louis CK and Patton Oswalt (seriously, get that KoolAid away from Patton, somebody, he’s had way too much) and Jennifer Lawrence and Stephen Colbert were in on this.  I like them, a lot, but I didn’t like the feeling that they were looking down their noses at my neighbors and my Christian and/or conservative friends and making fun of them.  I didn’t like that they could just ignore the fact that Hillary the Candidate has some pretty big flaws and negatives.  I didn’t like that when anybody expressed concern about those flaws, or another troubling thing emerged – like the HRC campaign paying people to pretend to be Trump supporters and incite violence – that’s kind of a big deal, right??  they were shouted down or the story was printed once and never mentioned again.  That they were just so smug, and superior, and thought they were so much better than everyone else.   That they were the ruling class, and we were about to witness the coronation of the rightful queen after the pretenders to the throne were removed from power and hopefully eradicated.  It was really quite offputting.

And that doesn’t even go into the celebrities that I DON’T like.  Lena Dunham, Sarah Silverman, Amy Schumer (I used to like you, Amy, you’re a funny girl, but you don’t get to kick people out of your shows because they disagree with you…that’s ugly) Seth McFarlane…you guys, you have no clue how that played out here in the real world.   After hearing nothing but lies and negativity and these stupid conspiracy theories out of the mouths of pretty much every celebrity and pundit on the Planet Earth it felt like, after hearing Hillary invoke the names Beyonce and Jay-Z roughly 10 million times over the week before the election and acting like that was supposed to make me DO something like it was some sort of mantra or a magic spell…honestly, if Donald Trump had ridden down on a spaceship from Mars and ripped off a rubber mask revealing himself to be a little green man, I’m not sure I could have dragged my ass to the polls to vote for HRC.

It made me start thinking about a lot of things.  It revealed to me that these people really are one unit, that’s not a misconception on my part.  They think alike, and one of the things they think, is that due to their clear mental superiority, because they’re famous and we aren’t, that they deserve to rule over us.  Well guess what, guys, you don’t.

Congratulate yourself, celebrities, members of the media, because YOU elected President Trump.  Donald Trump would have NEVER won this election without your insufferable, intolerable arrogance and your bloated senses of entitlement pissing off people like me.  And the more you bitch and moan and post your little memes and tweets about how stupidity and racism and sexism and hate are at the core of this, all you do is show to me that I was completely right not to vote Hillary.  It’s not racism, misogyny, stupidity, homophobia.  It’s that we don’t think you get to decide for us the way the world is gonna go on the basis of you happening to have won this weird American lottery we call fame.   So keep talking, you’re not winning any friends.

So now people are rioting.

Why exactly are people so scared of Donald Trump?  It’s confusing to me.  Yeah, he’s a blowhard, he said a lot of bullshit when he was running, but he can’t DO any of that stuff.   The some folks are acting, it’s like they think we just elected an all-powerful dictator or something.  But we can’t elect a dictator in the United States – that’s not how our system works.  The President is NOT all powerful.  I mean, do they not know about the whole checks and balances thing, or do they think that just because Donald Trump ran under the umbrella of the Republican Party that the other members of the Republican Party are now just like, under his thrall or something and now have to do everything he tells them to??  (because they’re not, and I think both Paul Ryan and Ted Cruz have demonstrated that they do not, in fact, have to do what Donald tells them to.)

Then it hit me.  It’s the Constitution, stupid.  (see, I’m the stupid in the title.)

These people who are in tears and smashing glass in the streets are the very same people who think the Constitution is this piece of paper that some old white men made up so they could oppress people.  They think of it as something that is without any value…disposable, and frankly they’d LIKE to dispose of it because it gets in the way of their agenda a lot of the time.   They applauded it when President Obama used executive orders to circumvent the will of Congress (even though he probably shouldn’t ought to have done that and he did a whole heck of a lot of them, just saying).  They don’t believe in the Constitution, they don’t believe in the checks and balances.  Checks and balances get in their way.  They believe in their progressive agenda and they think it’s just fine and dandy to shred the Constitution to forward that.

But you know who does believe in the Constitution?  Conservative voters.  It’s kind of a thing for us.  We’re Constitution fans, and the reason why we dig the Constitution is the whole, “It prevents America from accidentally electing a dictator” deal-io.

All those times where Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich and those guys were going on and on, blah, blah, blah, yadda yadda yadda about the Constitution and everyone’s eyes were glazing over, and the liberals yawned and laughed and didn’t understand why it mattered – THIS is why it matters.  It’s what a lot of us have been trying to tell you – the Constitution is good for YOU, too.  It’s not just the right wingers and our cray-cray love of guns.  That’s about the smallest, least important right in there.  We don’t talk about the Constitution to keep you from doing stuff.  We talk about it to keep EVERYBODY from doing stuff, even people who agree, or pretend to agree, with us.

The Constitution is, like, totally awesome.  It protects your rights, it protects everyone’s rights, and it means that Donald Trump cannot ever be a dictator.  It CANNOT happen because of the checks and balances that y’all applauded when Obama circumvented them with his trusty pen.  (totally not cool BTW Obama).

Sooo…why can’t Donald just continue doing that?  Why can’t he just make a bunch of executive orders like Obama did?  Well, he can, but if he starts doing things that are illegal and wrong and that people hate, he will be impeached.  See how nifty that is??   The President is answerable to Congress.  He cannot be a loose cannon.

And even if he ISN’T impeached, well, the next step is then that the elected and appointed government officials of the nation and the states would have to enforce whatever executive order he inflicts onto us, and they very well may not choose to do that.  In fact, an awful lot of them are not going to do that.   Is it really even plausible that one man, president or not, has the power to do…I don’t even know, the worst thing you can possibly think of…without the will of the people?  He doesn’t.  He can’t do any of those things you just imagined.  That’s the beauty of our system.  We cannot elect a dictator!

The ever unpopular states’ rights are yet another check and balance on Americans’ ability to elect a dictator.  Just like the Constitution, this is something that liberals seem to want to do away with in favor of a super strong national government – but do you see how states’ rights are actually a PROTECTION for our civil liberties?  It’s all well and good when your guy or gal is in there doing your stuff, but when they aren’t, the ability of your state to do its own thing can be very reassuring, like a nice cozy set of flannel pj’s when it gets cold.  If we did have a dictator and the states have rights to act with at least some autonomy, his ability to do anything at all to us is extremely limited.   States’ rights are GOOD.  It means that our rights have just one more layer of protection.

But wait.  Aren’t the Republicans just gonna go along with whatever Trump wants to do?  Isn’t that how it works??  Ok, maybe he can’t make executive orders for everything, and maybe he can’t control what the states do, yet, but now he has Congress and the Supreme Court on his side as well.  Doesn’t that undo the check and balance right there?

No.  Not at all.  Firstly because most of the members of the Republican Party are not in lockstep with Donald Trump and do not believe many of his suggestions are good or wise, but also because of We, the People.   Let’s pretend for a moment that the impossible happens and Donald Trump has some kind of mind control and can suddenly make the Constitution-loving Republicans in the House and Senate and on the Supreme Court totally ignore the Constitution and bend to his will.   It still doesn’t matter, because we voters will get a shot to switch out everyone in the House and 1/3 of the Senate in 2 years.  2 years is a long time, but remember that this “dictator” would still be faced with the lack of cooperation from government officials and also that the states themselves would refuse to do anything he says.  Checks and balances, baby.  The Constitution.  It rocks.

Donald Trump cannot do anything.  He’s toothless.  Please stop rioting now.

 

 

 

In March of 2016, I told my husband ‘If Donald-fucking-Trump makes me have to vote for Hillary-fucking-Clinton, I’m gonna fucking scream!”  (I have a very foul mouth.  just gonna apologize for that in advance).   The very idea of Donald Trump as president was just so-obviously a joke, a scam, it had to be some kind of a trick, right???  It could never happen and I told everyone it could never happen.  I hated the guy, I didn’t know a single Republican who liked him or wanted him as their candidate. It could never happen.  The very idea was appalling.

Fast forward.  It’s November, and 2 nights ago on Tuesday, November 8, I laughed for 8 hours straight.  With glee, and delight.   I know, I’m such a big meanie, aren’t I?  That criticism might actually hold water if 1,234,567,890 people would not have laughed just as hard had Trump lost that night and had nearly that many comedians not spent the last year making fun of the guy and his supporters.  The yukz can go both ways, folks.

I didn’t vote for Donald Trump personally – I live in rural Washington State and my vote is cancelled out by the huge population of Seattle, so I voted my conscience and went Libertarian – but I took great pleasure in his victory.  I went from 100% against Donald Trump to 100% enjoying the hell out of his victory over the past several months, even though I’m really not a fan of the man himself.   Really.  Not.  And I want everyone who is confused right now to know the real reasons why half the nation’s voters just cast a ballot for a guy that most of em don’t even like.  Because I kinda get it.

Over the last few years I have been picking up a disturbing vibe among friends, family, and coworkers who are liberal, and the media/celebrities, that is increasingly sanctimonious, arrogant, and downright hateful to anyone who varies from their very narrow party line (which seems to change by the day, growing ever more narrow, ever more extreme).  It frightens me.  It frightens a lot of people.   We ARE afraid, but it’s not a fear of gay people or minorities or women in power.  We’re afraid because you make it very clear every time you open your mouths that you despise us.

You make fun of us for being fatter and uglier than you are, and then lecture us about body shaming.  You say you want to help the poor, and then make fun of lower middle class people for living in trailers and shopping at Walmart.   Why would we ever vote for you?

Bizarrely, the liberals, media, and Hollywood celebrities  don’t seem to realize how lockstep they all are.   They think this is about emails or some shit.  They think this is because we didn’t like Hillary’s hairdo.  It’s like watching half the country gradually fall under the control of a cult or being taken over by the pod people or something, and everybody on TV is one of them.  These people actively hate our ways, lifestyle, beliefs.  We’re jokes to them and they make no secret of that.    This demonizing process is constant and insidious.  It’s everywhere.

Over the course of the last decade, we have had it rubbed into our faces again and again by just about EVERY possible source that we (and by we, I mean even people who are just moderately, mildly, barely conservative like Mitt Romney)  are all human scum, we’re stupid racists who don’t know anything at all and the only reason we have any opinions is because we are stupid racists who don’t know anything at all.  If we knew anything at all, we would know that people like us are not entitled to have an opinion.

There couldn’t possibly be any actual philosophy or logic being a conservative – or even a moderate.  (remember moderate Democrats?  I do.  That used to be a thing that existed.)  It’s allllll racism and sexism –  there’s simply no other motivation for anything anyone does, no other explanation – if you disagree with me, if you don’t want to do exactly what I say all the time with no questions asked, and not roll your eyes when I piss myself over the word Trump written in chalk on a sidewalk, then you’re a racist.   It’s so fucking obvious.

And when minorities or women hold conservative positions, which they do, well, it’s unfortunate but it’s just a lack of education.   It’s not their fault, they’re just stupid.  Brainwashed, probably.  Stockholm Syndrome.  (cue Hillary: “Now ladies, remember you don’t have to vote the way your husbands do!”)  Oh, and I’m the sexist one.  RIIIIGHT.

You know what they call it when a person who has all the power (like, the media and billionaire Hollywood celebrities) is picking on a person who doesn’t have power?  They call that bullying.  (Remember how bad that is, everybody?   Bullying is like, super bad.)  And when it’s done against an entire class of people on the basis of their belief system, social class, and/or religion, I call that something a hell of a lot uglier than that.

That’s where we are right now.  Most of us have tried chatting reasonably about the issues facing our nation with friends and family online or in person, and been met with prejudice and close-mindedness. Having your closely held opinion that took you many years and hours of research to fully form, immediately discounted, discredited and decried, by people you love and care about, because, racism sexism homophobia, makes it kinda hard to have civil discourse.

Liberals, that is why you don’t understand us.  It is because you don’t HEAR us.  You put your fingers into your ears and repeat racismsexismhomophobia and scream and cry and tear your hair and rend your clothes and foam at the mouth but you don’t listen to what we’re even saying and we don’t have time to shout over you because we’re too busy putting food onto our table.  We don’t talk in soundbites because we’re not good at it and that seems to be the only way you know how to communicate any more.

But you know what is worse than that, is that you don’t question yourselves.  That’s why you’re so surprised right now.  That’s why you don’t get this and fall back on childishly simple concepts like love and hate and pantsuits to explain Hillary’s loss.  You don’t ask yourselves the hard questions any more.  You live in an echo chamber where you just repeat platitudes back and forth and laugh at nasty memes and call that independent corroboration.

By refusing to listen to us, you absolve yourself of the need to question your own views, defend your beliefs, and explain your own hypocrisy, and then you don’t even have the wherewithal to do that questioning yourselves.  That is why it’s so funny to watch the media, who SHOULD be asking those hard questions, be revealed in one fell swoop as biased (and is there a stronger word for biased?? If so, insert here.)   The curtain fell for a moment and it was hilarious.  That is why I laughed on Election Day.  Cause it was funny.

Trump voters feel left out because they are BEING left out, and I don’t mean economically, racially, whatever.  Most of these people are not activists, they’re not radicals, they’re just dudes and gals going to work and raising their families.  Normal everyday people are being politically shut out and culturally left behind.  It’s not a fit of pique that we aren’t getting enough and so and so has a bigger helping of political power than we do.  We don’t even have a place at the table.  The culture wars are over; we lost.   And you never let us forget it.  You’ll settle for no less than unconditional surrender.

In your eyes, we exist to be the butt of the joke and the blame for everyone’s problems.   Oh, and I guess someone has to keep the lights on and the wheat grown and garbage dumped and the potholes filled and do that police stuff, but god those guys are totally such racists, I totally hate them.  Why do we even NEED police for anyway?

People voted for Trump because they desperately want to be heard and that fucker is loud. It’s not because they’re pouting, it’s not because they have any great love for the man, it is because we of the conservative/libertarian bent believe that all of our futures, even yours, Liberals, hinges on stopping this seemingly unstoppable slide left.   We want to be heard and respected, and we are not being heard OR respected despite the fact that we number into the tens of millions of American voters and hundreds of millions of people.

So to me, the election of Donald Trump 2 days ago, I feel like it is a reprieve from what many view as the inexorable march towards stomping out the beliefs and way of life of a whole lot of people.   We have a shot to reopen the debate that you keep telling us that you won.  It’s a second chance for those of us with the ability to stand up and express ourselves, to do so, while we still can.  And it’s most likely temporary, my peeps. Let’s be brave, let’s stop just putting our heads down and hoping this all blows over.  If Americans are in the streets burning people in effigy after a fair and free election, this is NOT blowing over.  This is extremism.  We have to FIGHT.  It is time to fight.

Electing Donald shocked everyone but we have to follow up.  Shocking people is not enough.  We have to start talking.  We aren’t a convenient scapegoat for everyone’s problems, Middle America, we aren’t the butt of their jokes.   We have to demand to be heard and respected and if Donald Trump is the only one of the lot who’s willing to give us a chance to do that, let’s hold up our end of the bargain and be just as much of a loudmouth as he is.  (only let’s say a lot less offensive stuff and focus on facts and logic and reason tho mmmkay???).   We had one match, we made an explosion, but I still got a lot of fight left in me.  I hope you do too.