It has been an education, watching the mass public meltdown on the part of the not-Trump faction over the last week and a half. OK I get the shock and denial, said to be the first stages of grief. Hillary was supposed to become the first woman elected president of the USA! (Yay, vagina!) It was her turn, per the Ruling Uni-party and a whole lot of people who should have known better. And she was supposed to be qualified the most qualified woman evah! – although specifics about those qualifications are somewhat thin on the ground and mostly to do with her grabbing in marriage an attractive, promising professional pol on his way up, and sticking with him no matter what personal humiliations that entailed for decades.
I’d interject a personal note here: I once had a security clearance, and handled classified material for a couple of years. If I had been so damned careless with those documents as the Dowager Queen of Chappaqua was as Secretary of State, I’d still be in a cell in Leavenworth, instead of blissfully retired from the Big Blue Machine for two decades. Too, she had the establishment national media in her pocket, slavering to be of obedient service to the Queen, and a whole lineup of celebrities, likewise dropping to their knees and elbowing each other out of the way in their haste to swear fealty. Her campaign spent a bomb on pollsters, advertising, and whatever else presidential campaigns are supposed to spend megabucks on which until now was always supposed to signal victory. It was in the bag for her, without a doubt! And yet … the dominoes dropped, one after one, after one. And the coronation was off. No wonder the Dowager Queen is reported to have had a particularly horrific tantrum on Election Night, and vanished from the eyes of her adoring public for more than a week, reappearing looking like a side dish of Death indifferently warmed over.
Her supporters’ first reaction seemed to be shock and denial, followed swiftly by skipping over the pain and guilt and going straight to the anger and bargaining, as demonstrated by a diverse variety of “never MY president!” advocates. Some of them may simply be virtue-signaling to their fellows, going along with the herd, as it were like the cast of Hamilton. Others, mostly has-been celebs like Cher and Yoko Ono appear to be screaming “Look at MEEEEEE!” The celeb virtue-signaling wing appears almost universal among the glitterati – to the point where cooler heads like Oprah Winfrey advising a “wait and see” approach are treated as if they are vile Trumpist fellow-travelers.
The whole liberal meltdown and mass-virtue-signaling exercise exerts a kind of horrified fascination, like contemplating a spectacular 20-car pileup on the interstate. Out of decency, you want to look away … but you just can’t, because the vehicles involved have wound up in such bizarre positions: on-end in the median, pretzeled around an overpass support, or balanced on the safety railing like a child’s teeter-totter.
The pathetic part of it all is that right up until the day before yesterday (or so it now seems) Donald Trump was just a rich, blowhard Noo Yawk vulgarian, a habitué of the tabloid pages with a no-more-than-usually centrist-to-socially-liberal political stance, a reality-show businessman. Against that parody image, his businesses seemed to be well and profitably run. His family (divorces aside) appear well-adjusted; assorted wives and offspring to be quite happy and functional. He had a reputation, as it now turns out, for picking good people borne out this very week as he selects a political dream team for his cabinet.
But to judge by the screaming tantrums of the anti-Trumpists, he is the very incarnation of Hitler, Genghis Khan, Simon Legree and Oliver Cromwell, all rolled together in one horrid package. The screaming, or as one pundit puts it, the freakoutrage, will go on for the next four years, unabated by any success on the part of a Trump administration. Racist and anti-Semitic, against every evidence to the contrary the accusations fly, and fly and fly again, no matter how much evidence there is on the ground to counter them. The protests, the virtue-signaling, the routine street violence and the academic spazz-outs will likely continue for the foreseeable future no matter what events may befall a Trump administration for good or ill. Good thing that the establishment press having revealed themselves to be so nakedly in the tank for partisan interests appear to have less and less credibility when it comes to matters political among red-state Americans.
Trump’s run for the presidency seemed like a joke at the start, but to everyone’s surprise the car-chasing dog not only caught the car, but is sitting alertly in the driver’s seat, deftly spinning the wheel and touching the brakes as the vehicle roars through traffic.
Discuss, if you can bear it.
I have had people call me evil, the devil and the sheer desperation of some of the more lefty sites is palpable. I have been cackling rather too much and baiting people for trivial reasons. I’m not a nice person, but wow the butthurt is epic.
And you thought I was on their side. ;)
I too have laughed and laughed.
It’s quite clear that Trump will not get a fair crack of the whip from the newspapers – but how many newspapers will survive the next four years anyway? Nor will he get a square deal from the TV networks. Maybe people will react the way we have to the BBC News – we stopped watching it years ago.
I have no high hopes of Trump partly because I expect a financial calamity within his term, and partly because high hopes for politicians are made to be dashed. But I do admire his ability to upset people who richly deserve to be upset.
I suppose that I will praise him if, in the next four years, he starts no new wars. Or, if he does start a war, he fights it to win. But the latter is so unlikely that I revert to my first test: no wars please, oh Trumpster. And please, do not bluff and let your bluff be called.
This has been the best political cycle evah. I didn’t catch on til last February but I have been hooked ever since. I’m still not sure how he pulled this off. As I have said from the beginning, I don’t know who is using who, if Trump is using the Middle or if the Middle is using Trump. I will be happy, if he is able to bring about the conditions for robust growth. If that growth reaches the Middle long term, that would be icing on the cake. I also hope that he is able to refocus the government to work for “all”, instead of the paymasters, special interests, and the bureaucrats.
Trump was not my first choice, but I was going to vote for whomever the Republicans nominated. I warmed to Trump due to his acts and the acts of his opponents. I liked how he didn’t play the meek Republican when attacked but attacked back against Democrats and their operatives in the media. All the verbal attacks against Trump and physical attacks against his supporters showed me that his enemies were also my enemies.
Trump “Exploded” At Media Execs During Off-The-Record Meeting: “It Was A F–king Firing Squad.”
The article points out that there is another “kindler, gentler” account of the off-the-record meeting.
A lot of us are bitter about the biased media coverage of the campaign, such as Hillary being given canned questions. Donald Trump is not the only person critical of the media. A recent Gallup Poll stated that trust in the media is at an all-time low: only 32% of Americans have a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in the media, a figure which drops to 14% for Republicans. In the last 11 years, Democrats’ trust in the media has fallen from 70% to 51%. Bashing the media is not likely to lose Trump much support. I am considering watching some TV just to find out which advertisers are supporting TV news programs, so I can inform the advertisers I am boycotting their products.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/195542/americans-trust-mass-media-sinks-new-low.aspx
Since the election we’ve received the F-off letters from shocked and horrified relatives and (former) friends. Oh well, so be it. Now we know who’s emotionally stable and who isn’t. This is one instance where social networking has made things worse. No one has the guts to actually shout obscenities to your face when they’re in the same room with you, but they’re more than happy to do it over the internet.
I thought the Slacktivists’ adoption of the safety pin meme was interesting, however. I haven’t seen this justification for it, but in the old (old) days safety pins were used to ward off the evil eye. Often pinned to babies near their heart for that purpose.
“This is one instance where social networking has made things worse.” I really do think social networking has re-created some of the worst as well as the good attributes of the small town, as I suggested in this post:
https://chicagoboyz.net/archives/38851.html
Just(11/13) heard Bernie yap on ‘Face the Nation’ about Koch brothers ‘buying an
election’, and realized how stupid he actually is, or how stupid he thinks the
voters are.
A quick google for 2016 election contributions
http://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2016-35713168
HRC 130,443,637
Bernie 96,311,423
Cruz 54,661,506
Trump 54,661,506
Kasich 8,648,890
Mario 34,652,654
Pct of contributions less than $200
HRC 14
Bernie 70
ted 40
djt 22
kasich 10
mario 18
Those mean “was she/he supported by big $ contributors or people?”
Bernie tops @ 70% ted 40 djt 22 mario 18 hrc 14 and kasich 10
Note, that means the ‘least bought by big industry’ more or less, apparently Kasich was wanted by industry … ditto HRC.
********************
from another site
https://www.opensecrets.org/pres16
HRC
Committee $ 497,808,791
outside interests $189,453,103
DJT
Committee $247,545,449
Outside $59,389,531
Consider … HRC had double the committee and triple outside $$ contributed/spent
…
Just wanted to point out that apparently all the spending under the direction of ‘campaign advisers’ did not win the election.
The recent announcement that Hillary will not be prosecuted is a huge disappointment. She is a traitor and deserves to die in prison, so do many of her henchmen I don’t doubt. I hope to god that this is a fake out and they are just signalling that she doesn’t need a pardon and they will slap the cuffs on the moment Obama is out. A slim hope, but there it is. To think that a decade of selling state secrets and government favors and retiring will hundreds of millions in criminal profit is an outrage. It lets all the little fish know that there is no penalty for this anymore.
Ah, Mr Black, as long as she’s not been pardoned the possibility is alway open that new evidence will require Mr Trump, reluctantly of course, to open a new investigation. She would always have that possibility hanging over her (unless Obama pardons her). Perhaps a new investigation during the run-up to the next presidential election would be fun, just to keep the Dems on their toes.
I like the thought of a Damocles’ sword hanging over Hillary … of the ever-present chance of new evidence coming out, which as Dearie says, will make a new investigation necessary. But in the meantime, those of her people who have committed chargeable offenses … let the investigations of them continue.
I agree that the e-mail thing has been so distorted by the Media and the Democrats that it is very poorly understood by the public. The Clinton Foundation, also known as the Crime Family, is easier to explain and has not been so distorted. The DoJ can pursue that as a new investigation and it will give the Clinton Clinton underlings something to do in their retirement. It will also occupy Hillary and Bill while they try to groom Chelsea for something.
I would also suggest Haiti and Hillary’s brother would make an interesting FBI project.
“I agree that the e-mail thing has been so distorted by the Media and the Democrats that it is very poorly understood by the public.”
Those of us who have ever had a security clearance know what’s what. Any of us would have rotted in prison had we done 1/10th of what she did. Same as Sandy Berger, David Petraeus, etc., though I’ve never heard of anything as brazen as what she did that wasn’t outright intentional espionage.
Trump perfectly executed a hostile takeover of the GOP using a populist gameplan that had become increasingly obvious would be successful over the past couple decades. If he’s smart he’ll move fast to exploit similar faultlines in the Democrat coalition.
PS. He’s very smart.
With regard to not prosecuting Hillary, I’d like to see Trump make a statement something like this:
“Some people are disappointed that I do not think my administration will pursue a prosecution of Hillary Clinton. I understand their frustration; but if I am going to make any headway in draining the DC political swamp, I will need to focus all of my energy and time on the business of today, leaving nothing to spare for what would certainly become a gigantic distraction. It isn’t ideal, but in the political and media environment that I have to work with, this is the best way for me to move forward.”
“Now, having said that, I want to make it perfectly clear to anyone who works in my administration — now, or in the future — that the kind of behavior exhibited by her and her cronies will not be tolerated. Just because I am making a political calculation not to prosecute her at this time does not mean that I think it’s okay for my people to do the same things. So long as I am President, if anyone who works for me so much as puts a toe over the line, I will demand that they face the consequences to the fullest extent of the law.”
That would make some of the establishment’s talking heads explode, methinks.
Obama will pardon Hellary because the Clintons have plenty of dirt on Obama. Perhaps?
If Obama pardons Hillary, I expect a big price. Rather, I suspect that Trump will let the investigation slowly meander on for three years and watch a couple of her cronies turn state’s evidence,
Then pardon her.
I am an Englishman living in France and I cannot keep a smile off my face at the hysterical anguish of the leftie authoritarians. First Brexit and then Trump what a wonderful year is 2016. As mentioned I live in France the French are great patriotic people their politicians, not so much. I voted for Brexit I love Europe not the EU.
Trump has a way of sorting out the world at his fingertips you have vast resources of energy get it on the market and serve the rest of the West with it as quickly and as competitively as possible. Cheap reliable energy will bring back manufacturing in abundance it will destroy the Saudi Arabia influence and bring Russia to a more pragmatic stance. Get the Keystone pipeline project in full swing plus the latest coal fired technology for producing the cleanest electricity it can and watch your economy, employment, and influence in the world grow. Europe will grab your bonanza with both hands and will trade with you in abundance. Leave the Middle East to sort itself out as without the malign influence of Saudi and other Middle East oil money being used for malign purposes it will wither.
Go USA.
So after three years Trump will pardon Hillary? Why would he do that?
Death6
“Why would he do that?”
Hillary and the investigation will have served its purpose.
She and Bill will be ruined by then.
Mike,
Not my concept of justice and I hope not Trump’s. If he pardons her he becomes actively complicit in her acts. I doubt he wants that tag. A large part of his support came from the strong feelings of many people that the Hildebeast was guilty of unredeemable crimes against the public trust. I am one. I doubt that he would enjoy their continued support if he committed that act.
If he were to do that, I would consider it a betrayal.
Perhaps he just wants to defuse any move by Obama to pardon her since Barry may be thinking of pardoning Bergdahl and the two-fer might be a stretch even for him. Trump has the wiggle room to re-institute the investigations after he is in office based on new evidence (it shouldn’t be hard to come up with some within all the released documents). Perhaps Trump thinks his softening toward the Hildebeast makes him seem more moderate to the GOPe and keeps her on edge and quiet. It is a bargaining chip with some value and a deal maker might be very tempted to keep it handy.
My feeling is that he will have a hard time selling no action against her, but a pardon would not fly.
Death6
The pardon is a negotiating tool. Why use it prematurely ?
Keep her out of the public eye.