COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Wednesday, November 09, 2016

Trump Won - He defeated Bush, Obama and Clinton and Liberated the American People from The Permanent War Party

The Democratic Party Establishment Is Finished

What a joke.







The Democrats will now control next to nothing above the municipal level. Donald Trump will be president. We are going to be unpacking this night for the rest of our lives, and lives beyond that. We can’t comprehend even 1 percent of what’s just happened. But one aspect of it, minor in the overall sweep, that I’m pretty sure we can comprehend well enough right now: The Democratic Party establishment has beclouded itself and is finished.

I think of the lawmakers, the consultants, the operatives, and—yes—the center-left media, and how everything said over the past few years leading up to this night was bullshit.

The midterm losses? That was just a bad cycle, structurally speaking; presidential demographics would make up for it. The party establishment made a grievous mistake rallying around Hillary Clinton. It wasn’t just a lack of recent political seasoning. She was a bad candidate, with no message beyond heckling the opposite sideline. She was a total misfit for both the politics of 2016 and the energy of the Democratic Party as currently constituted. She could not escape her baggage, and she must own that failure herself.

Theoretically smart people in the Democratic Party should have known that. And yet they worked giddily to clear the field for her. Every power-hungry young Democrat fresh out of law school, every rising lawmaker, every old friend of the Clintons wanted a piece of the action. This was their ride up the power chain. The whole edifice was hollow, built atop the same unearned sense of inevitability that surrounded Clinton in 2008, and it collapsed, just as it collapsed in 2008, only a little later in the calendar. The voters of the party got taken for a ride by the people who controlled it, the ones who promised they had everything figured out and sneeringly dismissed anyone who suggested otherwise. They promised that Hillary Clinton had a lock on the Electoral College. These people didn’t know what they were talking about, and too many of us in the media thought they did.


We should blame all those people around the Clintons more than the Clintons themselves, and the Clintons themselves deserve a ridiculous amount of blame. Hillary Clinton was just an ambitious person who wanted to be president. There are a lot of people like that. But she was enabled. The Democratic establishment is a club unwelcoming to outsiders, because outsiders don’t first look out for the club. The Clintons will be gone now. For the sake of the country, let them take the hangers-on with them.

What was the line? Hillary Clinton would do well in a general election, because she’d been “vetted” for 20-some years and there was nothing new Republicans could try? Just writing that, I recognize that it’s the funniest line I’ve ever seen, and yet it was the exact argument Clinton used in two separate campaigns for the Democratic nomination.

The ace ground game, the brilliant ad-makers, the top Hollywood talent, and the best analytics operation ever assembled? This was all a joke. The best analytics team in the world, apparently, couldn’t find in their numbers that it was worth making a single stop to Wisconsin following the convention in a campaign against a Republican whose base appeal was in the Rust Belt. Not that an extra visit would have changed the result.

Think of how wrong the entire national media conversation was—and yes, I contributed my fair share—about how the Republicans were being torn apart as a party. I prewrote a piece Tuesday afternoon, to be published in the event of the expected Clinton win, pushing back against both myself and other members of the media, arguing that Democrats and Republicans were both in existential trouble and that, in the short-term context of a decaying political system, Republicans might even have the edge: Democrats could win the presidency most of the time but never a majority of state governments or the House; while Republicans could always win the majority of state governments and the House, and occasionally—probably in 2020, I thought—the White House. This was wrong. Republicans don’t have a slight edge over Democrats in a decaying political system. 

Republicans are ascendant. Trump has given them a mission. The country is now theirs.

Whoever takes over what’s left of the Democratic Party is going to have to find a way to appeal to a broader cross section of the country. It may still be true that in the long term, Republicans can’t win with their demographics, but we found out Tuesday that the long term is still pretty far away. Democrats have to win more white voters. They have to do so in a way that doesn’t erode the anti-racist or anti-sexist planks of the modern party, which are non-negotiable. If only there were a model for this.

The few Democratic leaders who remain are going to say that it was just a bad note struck here or there, or the lazy Bernie voters who didn’t show up, or Jim Comey, or unfair media coverage of Clinton’s emails, to blame for this loss. I am already seeing Democrats blaming the Electoral College, which until a few hours ago was hailed as the great protector of Democratic virtue for decades to come, and Republicans were silly for not understanding how to crack the blue “wall.” They will say, just wait for Republicans to overreach. Then we’ll be fine.
Don’t listen to any of this. Everything is not OK. This is not OK.

Is This the Campaign Hillary Clinton Wanted?

49 comments:

  1. Trump needs to pardon Chelsea Manning, Julian Assange and Wikileaks.

    ReplyDelete
  2. He ought to offer Assange refuge here.

    But what about Hillary ?

    Trump said he would have her prosecuted.

    Obama might issue a pardon.

    All sorts of problems.

    We shouldn't have a tradition where an outgoing President pardons an 'ally', yet we probably shouldn't have a tradition where an incoming President always turns fiercely on his opponent.

    It's a tricky situation and not sure what the answer is.

    She deserves some jail time but is it really worth it ?

    The Clinton Foundation is finished now, with nothing to sell, Bill is chewing his lips, and stares into space, Hillary can't walk to the car, and is constantly drugged up....

    You be the Judge....

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Then there's the issue of The Law, too.

      Justice is supposed to be blind, regardless...

      Delete
  3. I'm just really really glad Clinton won't be appointing the Judges.

    That itself is a big big deal.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Why aren't I fifty points ahead?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJgbI2Mcxuk

    ReplyDelete
  5. Celia Hayes •

    "The decade sold out everyone it could -- including Bernie Sanders. It aborted babies; betrayed the white working class, impoverished the black inner cities, destroyed health insurance, started a campaign against every form of decency even in public bathrooms, presented blatant liars as the most qualified candidates and demanded that we greet it with hails and hossanas."

    Word.

    Yes, the US was formerly one of those high-trust societies. No longer - no matter who winds the presidential election. And an establishment press which sees itself as the obedient servants of the Uniparty Ruling Class ... yes, that is the unkindest cut of all.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sure don't worry about the establishment press giving Trump a free ride, though.

      Just cheering on the Pubs in their submission to big government, PC and the left.

      Delete
  6. Congrats, Deuce, you called it. I guess Ash will be moving to Canada....oh wait... 😀

    Ash, please help fast track all those who threatened to leave if Trump won: Cher, Whoopie, Miley, Barry Diller, Babs, Clooney, Etc.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Last I checked Hillary had 28% in Idaho.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Which are I think the two lowest scores in the country for Hillary.

      Delete
  8. Herman Cain and KellyAnne Conway up soon on Fox !

    They will be in good moods.

    ReplyDelete
  9. "...and Liberated the American People from The Permanent War Party"

    Are you sure you aren't projecting your desires on the man? He is on the record as fully supporting Israel, advocated doing whatever it takes to defeat ISIS, and he has railed against the Iran deal. That leads me to believe America will become more involved in those endless wars not less.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ISIS would have been more of an Instant War, had not Obama let them parade wherever they pleased in broad daylight on the roads of Iraq.

      Brilliant, simply brilliant.

      (Of course a lack of intelligence was not the problem:
      It was and remains, a distinct lack of respect for a manifestly superior culture.)

      Putz

      Delete
  10. The NY Times is putting up a US map showing where there are a lot of white people without a college education and who voted for Trump.

    I looked for a map where there are a lot of Spanish speaking people that don’t have a high school education or are not proficient in reading English. I can’t find the page. If anyone finds it,please post it. I’m sure it must be somewhere.

    What a pack of pukes!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I posted something recently, just wasted half an hour looking for it.

      At any rate, number 1 was Huron, California, 14 miles from where I grew up, and 20 miles from where I was born.
      Think the Spanish speakers numbered 94 percent.

      Growing up, the Central Valley was lush and safe.

      Not so now, as VDH can attest.

      Back then we had the Bracero Program, which worked well for us and Mexicans alike.

      Obviously had to jettison that, along with anything else that worked well in California.

      Delete
  11. .

    We'll see when they start going through the exit interviews, but I'm thinking foreign policy would be way down the list for why people went for Trump.

    The way I see it, the vote was a protest against the elites and the establishment. It had to do with the economy (stagnant growth, income, and jobs, even healthcare).

    The people had concerns other than what is going on 6000 miles away.

    Though I predicted Trump would lose, if I were still in the predictin business, in the end, I would bet on the MIC.

    It's impossible to know what Trump will 'actually' do. He has changed positions way too often, 26 times on one particular issue as I recall. However, going with the last I saw, Trump was talking about a massive build up in the military. Long term, you can't keep building and building up the military and stockpiling ships, and planes, and rockets, and bombs forever without using them. Without a war, there's no way to justify it. Eventually, the American public will reject it especially when it is crowding out entitlements.

    The MIC and the dolts who depend on it have always been of the mind, 'if there were no war, we would need to create one.'

    .

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Just because you were wrong doesn't mean you have to get out of the predicting business.

      Just don't put that one on your Résumé.

      Delete
  12. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Californians plan secession....DRUDGE

    Excellent.

    It will save us in Idaho the cost and bother of seceding from them !

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. .

      They could turn it into a sanctuary state for all the people listed above who were going to leave the country.

      By the way, despite what these people have said I'm not planning on buying any stock in Obitz or Travelocity.

      .

      Delete
  14. .

    Six months ago, I said that today I would be saying 'it was the best of days, it was the worst of days' regardless of who won.

    Today, I'm still saying it. Neither of the two candidates has changed.

    However, so far, though I'm extremely pleased to see the media, the elites, the establishment, the Clinton machine, and especially Obama defeated and receiving a decisive punch in their smug noses, the catharsis I hoped for is smaller than I expected.

    On the Trump side, since Priebus had a heart to heart with Trump he has been more focused and less volatile especially over the past two to three weeks. I am not as apprehensive at the moment if only because Trump is a cipher. He has changed his positions so many times no one can be sure what he will end up doing. We will have to wait and see.

    I mentioned before that Trump should be applauded for changing the game. (I would have mentioned Sanders but he showed his true colors when when back to the dark side after being defeated by the machine). The other side of the equation is the harm he will do to the populist movement if he fucks up a la what Bush did to the neocon movement in his presidency.

    We shall see.

    .

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. If he backtracks on his 15% Capital Gains tax rate I'm turning on him.....

      Delete
  15. Hillary is supposed to hobble out and make a statement now.

    See on Fox.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies

    1. She may be so messed up they don't let her show.

      Delete
    2. The Scooby Van is on the move, headed to the press site !!

      Delete
    3. Will she be vindication, gracious, sober, drunk....?

      Delete
    4. For her, this may be the worst moment of her life !

      I can't wait....

      Delete
    5. vindictive, damn it

      I am so excited to see how she handles this.....

      I'm betting on vindictive, not gracious....

      Delete
    6. .

      I doubt it. There's no point.

      George H. W. Bush called up Trump to congratulate him and wish him luck.

      .

      Delete
  16. .

    I suspect the cities that hold Thanksgiving Day parades are now bidding for all of those fireworks Hillary had planned on using last night.

    Though she was persuaded by her handlers to cancel those plans prior to the election, I suspect the audacity of the initial plan would have been enough to push many people who where on the fence to move to the Trump side.

    .

    ReplyDelete
  17. Trump got 4.1% of the vote in D.C.

    (if I read the streaming news correctly)

    ReplyDelete
  18. Well now, that WAS gracious and.....simply wonderful !

    And Huma was again prominently displayed, to great applause, some of it her own, thanks to Director Comey's recent caving.

    And I was so moved, so SO moved to hear Hillary express her deep regard for and love of The Rule of Law enshrined in our Constitution !!

    Gone at last
    Gone at last
    Thank God Almighty
    She's gone at last

    ReplyDelete
  19. Replies
    1. .

      Nothing worse than a poor winner.

      .

      Delete
    2. Hardly, a sore loser...

      Now that sucks.


      But the fact is Quirk? The losers? They will not stop their vicious, petty, slanderous and violent attacks against those they demonize.

      So a heads up to Rufus? " You lost" aint much of a shout out..

      There was a lot more I could and didn't say, and won't.

      Delete
  20. i have to thank Trump and the MSM a very lovely profit.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. .

      The markets are like a box of chocolates.

      Up 200.

      .

      Delete
  21. Snowflakes riot on college campuses....DRUDGE

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ah, snowflakes rioting, fingers clicking, in the autumn air....

      Delete
    2. Hillary supporters burn flag, threaten to kill Trump....DRUDGE

      Delete

    3. Susan Sarandon will be leaving the country.

      Can this be bad ?

      Delete
    4. Susan's promise may have tipped the election to Trump.

      Delete
  22. The good ole exceptional USA version of BREXIT.

    ReplyDelete
  23. I thought Obama's speech was better than Hillary's, which was OK, except for the irony about 'loving and respecting the Rule of Law enshrined in our Constitution'....which surely brought howls of laughter all across the land....

    ReplyDelete
  24. Larry Sabato says the entire polling industry isn't worth a shit.

    ReplyDelete