Mad_Machine76
Mad_Machine76's JournalNot this one. And why should/would Trump cause us to forget
If anything, at least for me, it will be at the forefront of my thoughts. Women, POC, LGBTs, the poor, the sick, and and the elderly (and anybody who isn't a WASP, Neo-Nazi, KKK Member) are ALL at risk under Trump/GOP.
We survived George W. Bush
Of course, back then we all thought that he was the worst we'd ever have to deal with. Now, some of us would probably be *relieved* to have him and Cheney back in the WH instead of a Donald. Yes, we have sunk THAT low. Which is pretty damned scary IMHO.
Ok
Is it in our national interest to have Electors throwing elections into the House of Representative? It's a procedural safeguard for our government in the event that a candidate doesn't get 270 EVs but I thought that that would only come into play on Election Day. Not sure a scenario where the Electors go rogue, resulting in a decrease in EVs. The votes have been cast and DT was declared the winner of 270+ Evs. He is the President-elect according to the Constitution. We all agree that Trump is going to be walking dumpster fire. No doubts whatsoever. But if we get electors to flip and/or throw the election into the House now with Trump (which will still result in a Republican President and perhaps one that won't be as divisive, which will make running against them in 2018 and 2020 harder), Republicans will try to do it the next time (and yes, there WILL be a next time) we win the EC Vote. Do we want to start down this road? I submit that we should not.
I really liked it
It was both exhilarating and sad. I think that this movie punched me in the gut emotionally even more than Revenge of The Sith. When you start having the feels for a Droid we've never known before, you know that the movie is doing something right. And the score wasn't too bad but nowhere near as memorable as any of John Williams' scores. I think the fact that Giacchino came in so close to the end, replacing the originally assigned composer probably had something to do with it. What I liked the most about the movie is that it made the Rebellion feel like something bigger than what we originally saw in ANH and made the Empire seem more menacing/powerful like we saw in TESB (and Stormtroopers actually hit their targets more often than not).
Maybe. The vote in the Legislature hasn't happened yet
and FWIW it looks like Charlotte just voted to repeal its anti-discrimination ordinance that prompted the NC Legislature to do the "emergency session" in the first place to slap HB2 on the state, so even if HB2 gets repealed (which would be good on a number of levels), basically things would go back to how it was before Charlotte passed their anti-discrimination ordinance, so no more protections for Transgender (LGBTQ?) individuals in Charlotte period. Sort of a hollow victory if this is the case IMHO.
As much as I don't want this to happen
there doesn't seem to be a way out of it, unfortunately. We can and should do everything we can legally to make him wish that he hadn't won, however. Maybe he will get sick of the job and give up in four years (if not earlier). If everything ends up being as bad as almost everybody believes it's going to be over the next four years, I can't see him winning re-election in 2020 to a decently qualified Democrat. But enough people are going to have to stop acting like politics is just a "hobby" like sports and crochet and start acting like it's a matter of life and death (because it is). When people don't vote, vote in Republicans for whatever reason, or simply refuse pay attention to politics at all and they turn around and look around at crumbling infrastructure and increasingly lower standard of living and start complaining how much their lives suck, do they ever wonder if maybe *MAYBE* it's because of what is going on in their local City-Council? Statehouses? Congress? WH? Who's in charge when things are going wrong?
2018 will be a referendum on the majority party, in this case Trumpublicans
a "bloodbath" is not all but assured IMHO but we need to support and defend our seats and fight hard for any potential pickups. Congressional Democrats, particularly in the Senate, need to make things miserable for Republicans/Trump in whatever way they can and DNC needs to quickly figure out a way to turn out our voters in 2018. Given the antipathy already generated towards Trump before he even takes office and his own personal baggage, I believe that holding our own and possibly even making gains is quite doable.
Frankly
if Donald J. Trump can be President, we shouldn't really be spending so much time haggling over race, gender, age, etc. We just need to support and get behind (and get other people to support) whoever wins the Democratic primary to oppose Trump in 2020. We should be proud that we have a lot of qualified, electable people on our side of the aisle. Figuring out a way to get our voters to understand that politics isn't a "hobby" but a real "life vs. death" responsibility and get them out to the polls in every election should be what we really need to figure out. Republican voters sure already have. The irony seems to be that Republican policies tend to harm our voters more but we vote less.
*Blargh*
I can sort of understand why McCaskill, who's up for re-election in 2018 in a red state, might feel like she has to make some conciliatory statements (and if that's all they are, then, well, fine) but IMHO if Republicans decide they want to repeal ACA, THEY need to own whatever mess they make in the process and be made responsible for coming up with a viable replacement plan. I think that improvements need to be made to ACA but I think that they could be done- and the process be less messy- by focusing on the problems and not simply ripping everything up first and starting all over with McCain's "blank piece of paper". Besides, raise your hands here if ANYBODY here actually believes that the Republicans will actually include Democrats in the replacement plan or if they do, listen to anything we have to say about how to come up with a better plan? IMHO they just want political cover so that they can blame us for not "fixing" things when they go and mess everything up for a lot of people after repealing it. It's a trap!
I think that it's hard to settle on any one cause
I prefer a more "Perfect Storm" theory:
1. Democrats controlled the WH for eight years. Parties rarely hold on to the WH for more than 8 years and haven't since George HW Bush nearly 30 years ago. People seem to want "change" after eight years of one party in the WH.
2. Donald Trump is/was a celebrity and didn't- on the surface- appear to be a completely "typical" Republican on some of his positions, which probably attracted a few people otherwise not inclined to vote Republican or at least encouraged some "down on their luck" people in the midwest to "give him a chance".
3. Trump generated Obama-like enthusiasm on the right that brought the far-right base out to vote for him in droves. There was not, unfortunately, comparable enthusiasm for Hillary Clinton even though she is the first woman ever nominated for POTUS.
4. Intense right-wing hatred and years of Republican-driven/media-driven phony scandals and accusations of corruption (and worse) against the Clintons and lack of focus on Trump's scandals and more focus on concerns about things involving Hillary, including phony allegations against the Clinton Foundation, her private e-mail server, and hacked e-mails from the DNC, none of which was as real or as bad as some of things that Trump was dealing with (Trump Foundation, Trump University, rape lawsuit) but got way more attention.
5. Rightly or wrongly, the e-mail server issue tainted Hillary. The effect of that seemed to have worn off since Comey announced that they had not found any criminal wrongdoing in July and she seemed to have recovered and seemed to be running strong but him coming out with that letter a week (a WEEK!) before the election that generated intense media coverage/speculation instantly put her under suspicion yet again and may have caused some undecideds to break against her at the last minute.
All of these obviously weren't enough to prevent her from winning the PV, but it helped shift just enough votes to deny her the EV needed to win.
Profile Information
Name: Mara Alis ButlerGender: Female
Hometown: Indianapolis, Indiana
Home country: USA
Current location: Indianapolis, Indiana
Member since: Sat Feb 28, 2004, 01:13 AM
Number of posts: 24,452
