2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumMy dad. Immigrant, Minority, Veteran, Trump Voter
He wouldn't talk to me much about it before the election, and that gave me the strong hunch this is where he was headed.
He is retired Navy, and the whole issue with Hillary being careless with classified information was a big deal to him. He is an immigrant but he has long had a hardline attitude that anyone coming here needs to be like him and follow the law- even though his story includes a door opened to him that 99% of people don't get.
But what pushed him most was that he spent his career after the Navy working in textiles. He did maintenance on the machines and in the 90's when the plant he worked in closed he was part of the crew that was tasked to haul most of the machines to the dump. Knowing what parts had value he bought them from the scrapyard and started a business selling them to other plants. But more and more he found himself hired to scrap out closed places and he kept as many parts and machines as he could to keep the existing plants running on their older machines or get them parts cheaper. He didn't just watch the decline of textile manufacturering in this country, he lived it and fought it all he could.
Trumps populist rhetoric spoke to him and his experience there. He says that if the government does things right manufacturing can still be viable here- something we argue about- but he was willing to look past all the other flaws because he saw someone speaking to the battle he fought and saw lost on jobs here.
This is a man who is a swing voter- he voted for Clinton once, Obama once, Perot, and often splits tickets like this year he voted for Trump but Cooper for Governor.
We must as a party learn to connect with people like him on whatever is their core issue. Hillary just didn't have any message at all for those like him- at least not one that connected. Trump did.
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Cha
(296,893 posts)and she beat trump by 2.5 Million voters.
Your father voted for a bloody racist who's an admitted sexual predator and a climate change denier who's going to fuck up the Planet. A gd reality host who lied to his fans.
Not impressed.
NoGoodNamesLeft
(2,056 posts)Cha
(296,893 posts)appal_jack
(3,813 posts)How many fundraisers did Hillary hold among the elite in CA and Martha's Vineyard (etc.) while neglecting states like MI and WI? How many press conferences did she conduct during the campaign? How many town hall meetings with genuine and uncensored questions from voters?
Elitism was a sad reality of the Democratic campaign of 2016. Let's hope that changes by 2018 and 2020. But denial won't help us change anything for the better.
k&r,
-app
Cha
(296,893 posts)You think all those voters were Elitist? She didn't ignore me.. I'm not elitist.
You have no idea what Hillary's Campaign was about.. you're just cherry picking and it's not working.
dionysus
(26,467 posts)Not trying to assign blame post-mortem like a lot of dems are doing.
People are blaming
Sanders
Sanders supporters
Millenials
The greens
The electoral college (i agree with this one)
Comey
Election fraud
The biggest reason IMO, is that she would have been a far better president than she was as a campaigner. She ran a sub par campaign where it mattered the most.
On paper it was good, well organized, well financed good vround game, ect.
But she failed to generate the excitement needed to win. In todays age of shallowness, having that spark is essential to win.
Only getting 62% of the Latino vote, that alone doomed her.
She didnt generate excitement among young voters like obama did, that taken alone could account for her loss as well.
And its not saying that people in these blocs voted for trump, i think most just stayed home.
Losing that badly to fucking trump, of all ppl, that's just sad.
MelissaB
(16,420 posts)Last edited Wed Dec 7, 2016, 07:05 PM - Edit history (1)
because of alert stalkers.
NoGoodNamesLeft
(2,056 posts)So speaking the truth is worthy of being reported? Sorry but that is stupid.
MelissaB
(16,420 posts)
DesertFlower
(11,649 posts)these reasons people voted for trump and i keep asking -- how did they put aside his racism, misogony, mocking people with disabilites,etc.
Cha
(296,893 posts)trump.. it just outs them as a racist, misogynist, enabler of a sexual predator, a climate change denier which is the most important issue we have now
And, they're okay with mocking those with disabilities as you reminded us, DesertFlower.. Mahalo.
sfwriter
(3,032 posts)Was that your goal? Do you feel better? Is this a winning tactic?
We have people running again shortly. I don't think calling half the electorate voters who "voted for a bloody racist who's an admitted sexual predator and a climate change denier who's going to fuck up the Planet" is going to do it. Doesn't matter if you are right.
Hopefully we will have a candidate without so much baggage next time. Sure, it was mostly unfair and Republican manufactured, but at least we'll force them to make more next time.
I'm sorry anyone has to watch a parent to this. It must be painful.
-Sfawriter
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)A significant number of voters DID "vote for a bloody racist who's an admitted sexual predator and a climate change denier who's going to fuck up the Planet." No one is supposed to say that because we might offend those voters and their families?
Funny, I don't see anything close to this kind of empathy and defensiveness for the people on OUR side who are frightened - terrified, actually - and depressed and shaken up by the fact that a racist is going to be in the Oval Office. Instead, THEY'RE being told to shut up and reach out to the people who hate them or have empowered those who do.
NoGoodNamesLeft
(2,056 posts)You would get plenty of empathy if you stopped slandering and attacking MILLIONS of voters UNFAIRLY and actually posted about the fear, depression and even the anger. You CAN do that without attacking others unfairly. You're choosing not to do that. There are plenty of racists out there who do feel empowered by Trump being elected. Yes, people are scared and hurt and disgusted. I don't think anyone here is NOT feeling some of those things. How does allowing those feelings cause you to act just as unfair make that better? It doesn't.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)and, therefor, have blown their chance to have me voluntarily align with them.
You acknowledge that "there are plenty of racists out there who do feel empowered by Trump being elected." And how did Trump get elected, thereby empowering them? Because THESE PEOPLE VOTED FOR HIM. You can't be instrumental in empowering racists and then expect the intended victims of that racism (and those who empathize with us) to reach out to them, take their hands and sing Kumbayah so that their racism tolerance doesn't result in any butthurt for them.
Saying that out loud is not an "unfair attack." It's just a fact.
Dark n Stormy Knight
(9,760 posts)Sick of these selfish enablers playing victim.
tonedevil
(3,022 posts)racist, misogynist, climate change denier you don't get to complain when it is pointed out.
Cha
(296,893 posts)
Cha
(296,893 posts)
ReverendHeretic
(45 posts)Cha
(296,893 posts)herr trump, ReverendHeretic?
hollowdweller
(4,229 posts)
catbyte
(34,341 posts)
Doesn't he have any core values at all? Buchanan? Trump?
forjusticethunders
(1,151 posts)Actually I think it's just kind of generic "anti-establishment". Jesse Jackson ran a truly intersectional campaign that year. He actually appealed to a lot of working class whites because he had an ability to connect POC struggles with rural white struggles. Buchanan and Perot kind of fit that pattern too.
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)Because Clinton's economic message was far more progressive than was Trump's slogans. But the corporate media chose to focus on the glamour of Trump, and the media failed to examine his simplistic slogans.
DesertFlower
(11,649 posts)very little coverage to hillary who had a message.
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)Even on so-called news programs, much of the news is reporting about various violent incidents that are happening around the country and world, as well as occasional reporting that tends to be focused on the visuals of an event.
And messages are harder to digest than are short slogans. In a population with a mid-high school reading level, anything complex can be a problem, especially when listening to it.
democrank
(11,088 posts)The textile industry, like so many others, took a terrible hit. I can only imagine how diffult this was for your Dad and so many others.
I know a lot of poor, blue collar Democrats who felt exactly like your Dad did. They felt hopeless, like nobody cared about them any more. Many of them put Trump signs in their yards out of sheer desperation, not racism.
I'm touched to read about your Dad's ingenuity in buying those machines back from the scrapyard. Good for him for at least trying. At least here in northern New England, even scrappers are having a tough time making a living because scrap metal prices have plummeted. I know a lot of hungry scrappers where I am.
Thank you again, Lee-Lee, and I thank your Dad for his service.
*EDIT- spelling mistake
LisaL
(44,972 posts)democrank
(11,088 posts)I supported Bernie, then voted for Hillary and now I`m trying to gain some understanding by also listening to people who made different decisions.
realmirage
(2,117 posts)want to change nothing and keep losing
Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)Yes, democrank's strategy is better
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)give a shit about. But there are more of the former than the latter.
realmirage
(2,117 posts)
brush
(53,743 posts)it's figuring out how to stop the repugs from cheating and stealing elections — Comey, Putin, Assange, vote suppression.
Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)I feel better about continuing to live among my fellow Americans after reading them
https://medium.com/@jesseleburke/how-trump-won-or-how-hillary-lost-aa6dfbcd4b8b#.23sl1oh2k
snip...
Consider — if you believe the preceding arguments about the vast majority of his voters (enough of the general pop to win) prioritizing economic security and justice over social issues, it stands to reason that the best strategy to ensure/expand the size and loyalty of that group would be to ensure that Hillary never gets their ear. So, if I (Trump) want her to stay off the topic of economic security and justice, my strategy is:
1. First position social issues as the misguided (in that they’re not thinking about us and our survival) obsession of the out-of-touch elite who care about me not at all
2. Second, ensure then that she only talks about those very elitist social issues (thereby, creating the cognitive association of her as elite and not for them).
http://slatestarcodex.com/2016/11/16/you-are-still-crying-wolf/
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/11/rust-belt-democrats-saw-trump-wave-coming
And the best article I've read about how to deal with people moving forward:
http://charleseisenstein.net/hategriefandanewstory/
At such moments, it is a normal response to find someone to blame, as if identifying fault could restore the lost normality, and to lash out in anger. Hate and blame are convenient ways of making meaning out of a bewildering situation. Anyone who disputes the blame narrative may receive more hostility than the opponents themselves, as in wartime when pacifists are more reviled than the enemy.
Racism and misogyny are devastatingly real in this country, but to blame bigotry and sexism for voters’ repudiation of the Establishment is to deny the validity of their deep sense of betrayal and alienation. The vast majority of Trump voters were expressing extreme dissatisfaction with the system in the way most readily available to them. (See here, here, here, here) Millions of Obama voters voted for Trump (six states who went for Obama twice switched to Trump). Did they suddenly become racists in the last four years? The blame-the-racists (the fools, the yokels…) narrative generates a clear demarcation between good (us) and evil (them), but it does violence to the truth. It also obscures an important root of racism – anger displaced away from an oppressive system and its elites and onto other victims of that system. Finally, it employs the same dehumanization of the other that is the essence of racism and the precondition for war. Such is the cost of preserving a dying story. That is one reason why paroxysms of violence so often accompany a culture-defining story’s demise.
snip...
Even if the person you face IS a misogynist or bigot, ask, “Is this who they are, really?” Ask what confluence of circumstances, social, economic, and biographical, may have brought them there. You may still not know how to engage them, but at least you will not be on the warpath automatically. We hate what we fear, and we fear what we do not know. So let’s stop making our opponents invisible behind a caricature of evil.
We’ve got to stop acting out hate. I see no less of it in the liberal media than I do in the right-wing. It is just better disguised, hiding beneath pseudo-psychological epithets and dehumanizing ideological labels. Exercising it, we create more of it. What is beneath the hate? My acupuncturist Sarah Fields wrote to me, “Hate is just a bodyguard for grief. When people lose the hate, they are forced to deal with the pain beneath.”
more at link
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)
SammyWinstonJack
(44,129 posts)
radius777
(3,635 posts)The 2016 election was an entirely different world to that of 2008 or even 2012.
The past four years were the most racially divisive in 24 years or so (since the late 80's/early 90's, LA riots, etc.), with police shootings of unarmed PoC, shootings of innocent police officers, protests, high profile cases like the Treyvon Martin/Eric Garner cases, BLM, Islamic terror shootings/acts in America and Europe, ISIS, etc.
Racism exists on a continuum, where many anxious white voters may've been mildly racist, and voted for Obama, but became more so, more ethno-centric/ethno-populist (on the right and even on the left, much of the alt-left Sanders movement is white-centric) in such a polarized atmosphere of the past four years.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)We have no idea if the additional numbers on the Republican side were the same people who voted for Obama.
Anything to defend the indefensible.
radius777
(3,635 posts)which show that some white working class Obama voters switched and voted for Trump this time, and counties that switched from Obama to Trump.
But as I outlined in my previous post, those same voters could've voted for non-racist reasons in 2008 and 2012, but due to the racially charged atmosphere of the past 4 years, voted for racist reasons this time around.
And some of these voters may've simply wanted a change in direction, thought healthcare was too expensive, blamed alot of things on the existing party that holds the presidency (as voters usually do, especially after 8 years), etc.
But to deny, as the alt-left/Berners like to do, that race played no role in an election that was essentially won by an ethno-nationalist like Trump, is laughable, and reveals much of their own ethno-centrism, that seeks to center the white working class as the "true backbone of America," while denying that most Hillary voters were working/middle class voters also, many of whom were PoC, immigrants, women, etc.
Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)But I don't believe that ALL of Trump's voters are racists, or even comfortable with racism and sexism. People felt they had an imperfect choice to make, and there are a lot of reasons people choose to base their vote upon.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)I don't care how much they claim not to have bought into it. They were comfortable enough with it to help a racist sexist become the leader of the free world. Those are qualities that should be deal breakers - "I'm going to vote for the racist who treats women like crap but at least I'm not completely comfortable with it" doesn't cut it.
Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)as First Gentleman.
Most people who voted had to compromise some of their principles one way or another.
atreides1
(16,067 posts)...not all Germans were party members, and not all Germans hated Jews...but they learned to ignore the obvious!
They had to make the same choices, they learned to look away as their Jewish neighbors were disappeared, they said nothing during Kristallnacht, and while millions were murdered for just being Jewish, they went on with their lives!
And, even years after the war...the world blamed all of the German people for the atrocities carried out by the Nazis, because they did nothing, because they felt they had imperfect choices to make!!!
JI7
(89,241 posts)Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)He's doing a series for CNN, here's a long interview about it, with clips
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)Yet "how can Trump voters be racist if they voted for Obama" has become the new mantra around here.
Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)22 years ago in 1994, California passed Proposition 187, making it illegal for undocumented immigrants to receive state services including sending children to school. It was subsequently overturned in the courts.
Prop 187 was a primal scream against illegal immigration. Many people voted for it (not me, I am an adult in the voting booth), knowing it was stupid to exclude children from school and trusting the courts wouldn't let that happen, because it was the only way available to tell the federal government that illegal immigration hurts people. The immigration and labor laws must be enforced. It's not fair to anyone to have people here that can be exploited by unscrupulous employers, and it does hurt the wages and job opportunities of native born and legal immigrant workers, especially low-skilled workers.
When Trump first started his campaign, I told my SO that he sounds like Prop 187. I remembered that it DID pass. Were the demographics of the entire country about equal to California 22 years ago, such that 187/Trump could win? Yes, just barely.
Here we are.
I recently read this prophetic article from 1999, predicting a nationwide Prop 187 and the rise of white nationalism, as whites become the 'new emerging minority.' It's worth reading, and thinking about these issues, imho.
http://www.unz.com/article/california-and-the-end-of-white-america/
California and the End of White America
The unprecedented racial transformation of California and its political consequences.
RON UNZ • COMMENTARY • OCTOBER 17, 1999
much, much snipped......
But surface appearances are deceiving. Underlying social dynamics, whether in California or in the nation at large, have not changed, and ethnic conflict, temporarily submerged, has far from disappeared. To the contrary, given the nature of the demographic processes now at work in the country, the potential for such conflict is growing rather than diminishing, and any sudden crack in our unprecedented economic prosperity might well be the occasion for its revival.
This need not occur. The overwhelming evidence is that today’s immigrants are at least as economically productive and socially assimilative as their European predecessors, with low rates of crime, welfare dependency, and social instability. Asians have followed the pattern of high academic achievement and economic entrepreneurship exhibited by America’s Jews before them, while Latin American immigrants have demonstrated much the same social conservatism and working-class values as Italians or Slavs. (One remarkable sign of their assimilationism is the high rate of conversion to evangelical Protestantism among Latin American immigrants.) As the campaign for Proposition 227 proved, today’s immigrants are no less eager than yesterday’s to have their children merge into our English-language society. Most significantly, nearly 40 percent of third-generation Asians and Latinos are intermarrying, usually with whites, a figure far greater than the intermarriage rates of Italian-Americans or Greek-Americans with other ethnic groups as late as the 1950?s.
It is therefore a tragedy of the first order that, even as the reality of the American melting pot remains as powerful as ever, the ideology behind it has almost disappeared, having been replaced by the “diversity” model and by the politics of grievance. A social ideology that allots to blacks and Latinos and Asians their own separatist institutions and suggested shares of society’s benefits cannot long be prevented from extending itself to whites as well, especially as whites become merely one minority among many minorities. Before it is altogether too late, those who support this status quo must realize that the diversity prescription contains the seeds of national dissolution.
America today stands as one of the very few examples in history of a large and successful multiethnic society. If we are to continue and extend our success–which is hardly foreordained–we can only do so by returning to the core principles of Propositions 209 and 227: ethnic assimilation, and individual equality under the law. Otherwise, we face the very real threat of future movements along the lines of Proposition 187, each worse than the last, and on a national scale. There are few forces that could so easily break America as the coming of white nationalism.
bettyellen
(47,209 posts)And they really needed their supremacy reinforced, because "other"people might actually catch up. I'm sorry but I'm not sure people who think this way believe women and POC are fully human and deserve an even playing field. They feel they have to put other people down to stay ahead, and turn a blind eye towards discrimination because it serves them.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)"You are not being oppressed when other groups gain rights that you've always had."
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)What in the hell message could Hillary - or anyone on the Democratic side - have sent to your father that would have made him feel "connected" to us? That we were as mean and nasty and hateful as Trump and we were going to go around kicking everybody's ass? That we were going to go after THEM - "them" being everybody but him and the racist white folks your dad cast his lot with (even though many of them probably think he's a piece of sh*t)?
Your dad sounds like a decent, intelligent man, so if he had been paying attention, he should have known that Hillary DID speak to those issues, but she did it in an intelligent, nuanced and honest way - she spoke to people like your dad as if they were intelligent, sensible people. She told them the truth. She didn't yell and throw red meat and scapegoat and promise to bring back jobs that are never coming back. But for some reason, your dad still decided to vote for the loud-mouthed racist with no plan but who put on a hell of a show, if you like the reality tv meets Nuremberg rally kind of thing - and helped put an ignorant, misogynistic, xenophobic bigot into the most powerful position on earth.
Our party doesn't have any more time to try to "connect" with your dad and people like him. We need to spend our time and resources on helping to empower people who are actually are paying attention and will vote with us in huge numbers without having to feel a personal "connection" if we just reach out to them and help remove the barriers that the people your dad voted for is hellbent on putting in their way. Once we do that, maybe he'll see the light and come over willingly. But I don't want our party to waste another second or dime on people like your dad.
Sorry if that's harsh, but I'm speaking from the heart. And I don't have any more patience for people who vote against MY interests and the interests of people we should be fighting to protect and then expect us to kiss their asses while begging them to please just tell us what other body parts we can kiss to make them love us.
NoGoodNamesLeft
(2,056 posts)
TwilightZone
(25,430 posts)You honestly think that thinking people are idiots for voting for an obvious charlatan is the same as racism?
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)And your claim that it is demonstrates you don't understand what elitism is and you definitely don't understand racism. But you've been twisting yourself into knots for awhile trying to justify voting for a racist while attacking everyone and anyone who has a problem with it.
Your true colors have been flying for some time.
radius777
(3,635 posts)The modern day Dem party is the party of metropolitan areas, i.e. cities and industrial towns and their bordering working class neighborhoods and suburbs - all across the country, even in red states.
Wherever metro areas exist, Democrats usually control/win these areas.
Most of these voters are working and middle class voters, PoC, immigrants, women, union workers, urban whites, college students, elderly, etc.
The idea that Dems are "coastal elites" is a right-wing (and increasingly alt-left) meme, that seeks to center the fabled "white working class" as the "true backbone of America," while viewing other demographics as invisible or inconsequential.
Squinch
(50,924 posts)
gollygee
(22,336 posts)JI7
(89,241 posts)Fuck that
True_Blue
(3,063 posts)Born with a silver spoon in his mouth and never took it out. Never worked a decent day in his life. Treats women like pieces of meat. Ripped off his own employees. ZERO experience in politics. The only reason he won because he's a racist wealthy white male.
SidDithers
(44,228 posts)
That's pure, unadulterated bullshit.
Sid
nini
(16,672 posts)Let's knock that bullshit off right now. The repukes are using that term against us to keep the 'uninformed vote against my best interest voters' hating us.
Stop.. Just stop helping them along the way.
DesertFlower
(11,649 posts)SammyWinstonJack
(44,129 posts)
etherealtruth
(22,165 posts)The Democrats have been (sometimes inartfully) trying to prepare Americans for a new reality and the need to be in the forefront of new technologies.
tRump came along and said "we can go back to a better time" ... "we can invigorate and maintain jobs in dying industries" ... tRump lied casually and cynically and a segment of the population ate it up without regard to the absurdity and defiance of common sense.
Throw in racism, sexism, xenophobia, and just about every other bigotry to convince people that they deserve better than "those people"
I do agree that democrats need to frame more honest and reality based policies better.
LisaL
(44,972 posts)Trump isn't the first one to come up with this, you know.
etherealtruth
(22,165 posts)LisaL
(44,972 posts)etherealtruth
(22,165 posts)Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)It was a horrible mistake to nominate Hillary, when Bill had signed NAFTA.
In this 'new reality,' half of Americans can't meet an unexpected $400 expense, and the Democrats told them "America is Greater Than It's Ever Been!"
Democrats won't win until they understand how bad trade deals and uncontrolled immigration hurt native born blue collar workers. They can see it, they can feel it. They have the right to VOTE, no matter what names 'inclusive' Democrats call them.
I made this post on another board (not JPR) on Sept 30, after the first debate:
The Democrats seem surprised that the 2016 election has now turned into a referendum on NAFTA, after they nominated the wife of the man who signed NAFTA's implementing legislation. I'm surprised that they are surprised.
If we elect a demagogue in 2016 it will be in large part as a backlash against NAFTA. It will be quite a direct belated rejection of the Clinton Administration, who invested so much political capital into passing NAFTA.
The worst moment for Hillary in the debate, and the best issue for Trump, was her curt dismissal of the manufacturing job losses and devastation of factory towns across the USA as "That's your opinion."
They don't call it the Rust Belt because manufacturing is booming.
NAFTA also hurt Mexican corn farmers, and sent a wave of undocumented immigrants to America. Decades later, they are still here, and their children have grown up to be Dreamers.
When one out of 20 workers in the US are exploitable, hardworking, very low wage illegal immigrants, it depresses wages for the entire working class.
Working class Americans feel a double hit from NAFTA: so many manufacturing jobs have been shipped south to Mexico, and the remaining hard jobs in the US are filled with low paid undocumented immigrants instead of native born Americans making a living wage, as it was 30 years ago.
Say what you will about Trump: he's at least noticed these people and their hardships. More than we can say about the Clinton Democrats.
*****************
LisaL
(44,972 posts)Meanwhile he will likely lose his medical insurance and other benefits. But at least Trump connected with him and voters like him.
pintobean
(18,101 posts)I disagree with his Trump vote, but he's earned the right to vote as he pleases. I feel sorry for anyone who wants to hate him for that.
realmirage
(2,117 posts)TwilightZone
(25,430 posts)It actually makes it *more* inexplicable.
There is no excuse in voting for Trump. None. We can sugarcoat it or try to explain it away all we want; the bottom line is that no explanation is enough. He's a lying sociopath.
I don't hate anyone who voted for Trump. I simply wonder how anyone could be so gullible. He's one of the most transparent charlatans I've seen in my lifetime.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)Very odd that some people are angrier at people who call out Trump voters than they are at the Trump voters themselves.
pintobean
(18,101 posts)and he doesn't owe anyone an explanation. The fact that you don't understand him doesn't make him gullible, or ignorant.
TwilightZone
(25,430 posts)He can have whatever reasons he wants, and his vote is his choice. That doesn't mean that his choice is not open to criticism.
Believing anything Trump said, in the face of incontrovertible evidence that he was a pathological liar, is by very definition gullible.
J_William_Ryan
(1,748 posts)But it’s not so much a matter of being gullible, it’s more a matter of fear and ignorance, common to most Trump voters.
An unwarranted fear of change, diversity, and dissent.
An unwarranted fear of immigrants, of losing one’s job, of those perceived to be ‘different.’
And it’s the ignorance common to most Trump voters as to what constitutes sound, responsible governance, such as ignorance of the fact that failed conservative economic policy cannot ‘bring back jobs.’
Last, most Trump voters fell prey to the ignorant, wrongheaded notion of ‘elites’ and that government had ‘forgotten them,’ when in fact nothing could be further from the truth.
The fact is that the people and the government are one in the same, the people are alone responsible for the good – or bad – government they get; the disconnect from government most Trump supporters wrongfully perceived was not the fault of government but, the consequence of their ignorance, fear, and apathy.
SidDithers
(44,228 posts)someone who was actually convicted of mishandling classified information.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/hillary-clinton-wasnt-charged-with-mishandling-classified-information-trump-might-appoint-someone-convicted-of-it/2016/12/01/9f44f04c-b726-11e6-959c-172c82123976_story.html?utm_term=.d598fa3cccf0
Will that be a big deal to you dad too?
Your dad voted for a racist, mysoginistic piece of shit. He owns that vote.
Sid
R B Garr
(16,950 posts)That would make America great again for me....if I could only pay what my parents and grandparents paid for their houses. That's not reality, though.
I guess we can't talk about reality and current times. I guess talking about reality does not connect.
herding cats
(19,558 posts)We need to learn to lie at a Trump level to sway voters like your father, is what you're saying in a nutshell.
Then when we win it's fine when we cut taxes and regulations on businesses at a historic level, just so long as we keep wrapping it up in pretty lies about how it's all to save these industries, and by extension jobs. Shifting the burden completely to the working class to to prop up the businesses which employ them, because that's how we earn our right to work in the new United States of America?
Somehow I think we'd be further ahead as a nation if we, meaning all of us who know better and have access to misguided people in our lives, worked to explain the differences from one candidates hollow promises vs. another's actual plan. We can't leave this task to our media anymore. They're not doing their job, they don't even attempt to do their job anymore.
realmirage
(2,117 posts)They just don't understand the concerns or thought process of people who disagree with them, and rather than try to understand it so that we can win, they choose the knee jerk loser strategy of just name calling. That's the sort of shit we get mad at republicans for doing.
A lot of people here can see the Party is sinking and they're just sitting in the boat not wanting to do a damn thing different from the strategy that got us in this situation. What we did obviously wasn't good enough, but try telling that to people who, apparently, still haven't realized that we lost.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)Interesting.
But let's be clear. This is not not hateful. It's just honest, And honest talk and assessment are exactly what we need to move forward. The Democratic Party has spent years chasing around after white blue collar Trump voters and keep getting sand thrown in our faces. In the meantime, while we're running around after those voters, the voters who have been loyal and will vote for us in overwhelming numbers if only given the chance are ignored and taken for granted. And what makes it worse, is that a primary reason that the voters the Dems keep chasing unsuccessfully are voting Republican is BECAUSE of those black and brown people. It's insulting and painful for us to stand here and watch Democrats not only coddle and explain and justify those votes but insist that we should double down and try HARDER to get those people to vote with us - when the only way to get them to vote Democratic is for Democrats to kick minorities and women and immigrants and Muslims to the curb.
So you can call it hate, if you want. But that accusation only highlights the very problem. You probably don't even realize the irony and insult of you being so quick to accuse your fellow Democrats of fostering an attitude that you refuse to acknowledge is actually driving the people who are voting against our interests. You accuse us of hate for calling out people who knowingly turned the White House over to the racist darling of the Ku Klux Klan and Aryan Nation, while defending those very people and insisting that their actions aren't hate or bigotry but just the result of their being frustrated and left out and demanding that we try even harder to understand their concerns and embrace them to our bosom.
Perhaps if you showed even a fraction of concern for your fellow Democrats feelings and concerns and expended some of effort to reach out to THEM that you are spending on understanding and reaching out to the folks who purposely gathered on the racist side of the political spectrum, we'd make a lot more progress.
phylny
(8,368 posts)It seems that only Democrats are called "mean" and "nasty " or "rude" when we speak the truth. Republicans can vote for a guy who will lie, be hateful, and spout bigoted or racist talk, but we need to understand them.
Please, no.
TwilightZone
(25,430 posts)People voted for a sociopath and a pathological liar. Anyone who paid even cursory attention knew he was lying - every fact checker on the planet provided evidence that he lied more than any candidate in recent memory. One would have to be living under a rock to not know the guy is a pathological liar.
It doesn't matter if you're "speaking to me" if you're lying out your ass.
I don't automatically assume that people who voted for Trump are racist and/or sexist. I do assume that they're gullible and open to suggestion from the most obvious of charlatans, because there are few other reasonable explanations. They bought into the most obvious bullshit act in modern politics.
I see a lot of complaints like yours about not understanding Trump voters, but essentially zero suggestions on what to do about it or what to do with whatever information it is that you think you've gleaned from these people. What exactly do you think you're going to learn from people like this? That they like to be pandered to?
pangaia
(24,324 posts)This isn't about disagreeing with 'us.'
This is about the danger of willful ignorance and just allowing oneself to be conned.
realmirage
(2,117 posts)voted for Trump are scum according to your way of thinking, and this is your strategy to win next time?
pangaia
(24,324 posts)Do. YOU did ! Don't put words in my mouth.
Read what I said.
SidDithers
(44,228 posts)
Sid
LisaM
(27,794 posts)I am sorry he fell for that. So how will he square Petraus?
spin
(17,493 posts)don't ever allow work related classified information on your unauthorized home computer or server.
If you do remember the Eleventh Commandment is Don't get caught.
Take my advise for what it is worth.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)Hillary's situation didn't involve an "unauthorized home computer." She was using a private server - a totally different thing - and it wasn't unauthorized.
Moreover, she never knowingly had any classified information on her server. The couple of instances they found in which there was classified information, the documents were not properly marked and, in fact, were classified after the fact. No one has ever been charged with a crime based on such a flimsy accusation.
And since you know so much about classified documents, you surely also know that State Department officials hardly ever - if at all - do their classified business via email. They are almost always briefed in person - usually in a SCIF - on secure phone lines or through diplomatic pouch. Rarely do they ever get classified information on email. So someone in Hillary's position would have no reason to suspect that an email to her contains classified information unless it is clearly and prominently marked as such.
I'm not sure why you are so insistent on accusing Hillary Clinton of doing things that even the FBI did not claim she did (but the right wing continues to do), but you're throwing up a strawman that has no legs.
spin
(17,493 posts)Hillary's email?
July 5, 2016
Statement by FBI Director James B. Comey on the Investigation of Secretary Hillary Clinton’s Use of a Personal E-Mail System
https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/statement-by-fbi-director-james-b-comey-on-the-investigation-of-secretary-hillary-clinton2019s-use-of-a-personal-e-mail-system
HassleCat
(6,409 posts)Nyahhhhhh... nyahhhhh... nyahhhhhh... (puts fingers in ears to prevent hearing you)
realmirage
(2,117 posts)I wish we had a more winning mindset
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)You exemplify the problem we're pointing out.
HassleCat
(6,409 posts)Because I refuse to accept the notion that anyone, or at least any white male, who voted for Trump is a racist. And there several posters here on DU who are heavily, heavily promoting that exact theme. If you think that's bullshit, perhaps you might read some of the posts calling a whole group of people racists, hill billies, stupid, ignorant, worthless, etc. Many of them consist mostly of, "Me and my friends are the only ones who deserve consideration. The others can go screw themselves." And I see why people would feel that way. It was a tough loss, a loss to the forces of ignorance, fear, bigotry and all that other bad stuff. But not everyone who voted for him is ignorant, afraid, bigoted, etc. People are more complex than that, but some posters here on DU just refuses to accept that. Maybe they will when they cool down a bit. I hope so, because we need to identify the Trump voters who are basically good people, and get them on our side. The first step, of course, is admitting that some of them are basically good people, but we are making scant progress in that direction.
realmirage
(2,117 posts)pangaia
(24,324 posts)still_one
(92,062 posts)xenophobia, and if so, what does that say?
Vinca
(50,237 posts)Does he know where Trump makes his clothing line? It's in no textile mill within a thousand miles of any coastline here. Does he know that Trump has cracked wise about veterans like your dad saying things like his high school military school was just as hard as being in the "real" military and when his chance to serve came along he cried "bone spur" and then went skiing. Does your dad agree with the notion of privatizing the VA? Most vets don't. Maybe I'm alone in this, but I don't think people who voted for Trump against their own best interests need coddling. They'll figure it out eventually. Maybe your dad will see the light when he gets a voucher in the mail to buy health insurance.
pangaia
(24,324 posts)phylny
(8,368 posts)"I don't have to worry about that. I've got Tricare!"
Vinca
(50,237 posts)phylny
(8,368 posts)GeorgeGist
(25,311 posts)until it bites you in the ass.
ucrdem
(15,512 posts)Yes Dems have an inclusive message, but thanks to the interminable primary there wasn't as much time to get it out effectively as there might have been. So Hill started out with a message of inclusion and prosperity for all, thinking back to her launch, but there were mostly young couples in that first video, and then it became a battle for the millennials, so middle-aged vets etc kind of fell through the cracks. They didn't come up much in the debates either except to the extent that they owned guns and that probably didn't appeal to your dad. So due to circumstances the pitch may well have not reached him. That's a shame and the primary war didn't help.
pangaia
(24,324 posts)pangaia
(24,324 posts)However, it frightens me -- the people who were fooled by this lying, sick, con artist.
All one had to do was watch him, listen to him and the horror was there to see. I mean how long could it take.. 3-4 minutes?
Do you mean your dad could not see that he is a narcissist? That he is a liar? That is is mentally disturbed? That he had no plan? That it was all just bullshit? Did he EVER check any facts about what this piece of shit said?
And did his ridiculing the physically handicapped not bother your Dad?
Did his bragging about grabbing a woman's pussy not horrify him?
Did his calling Mexican rapists not jolt him?
Did his insulting Muslims and Jews not bother your Dad?
I will not call your dad a racist. Who is to say. But he sure seems damn gullible.
And millions of human beings, including me AND probably your Dad, will pay for his gullibility.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)blm
(113,019 posts)This is the only part that bothers me. It was plain to anyone who fact checked or examined Trump's claims that he was spouting utter bullshit. How does one counter bullshit when bullshit is what some voters WANT to hear?
elleng
(130,773 posts)
MFM008
(19,803 posts)Of my family. Even the right leaner couldn't vote for maggot.
He is throughly hated.
Dream Girl
(5,111 posts)Lots of military felt that way
samir.g
(835 posts)Makes perfect sense, especially when they resent having any sort of modernity and tolerance imposed on their little club.
BlueStater
(7,596 posts)- Someone with absolutely zero political experience occupying the hardest job on the planet.
- A person who treats women like shit, mocking their appearances and calling them "pigs". He openly brags about sexually assaulting them.
- Someone who wanted to ban an entire religious group from coming into our country.
- A person who mocks the handicap of a disabled man in front of his equally disgusting supporters.
- A childish, idiotic man with a limited vocabulary who responds to every bit of criticisms he receives with a personal attack. He shows constant profound ignorance about the job he's running for and never once shows that he possesses either the intelligence or temperament to do it.
- A pathological liar who spouts something untruthful in practically every sentence he makes.
None of this was a disqualify for your dad, who still cast a vote for this septic tank of a human being.
I'm sorry. Your father sounds like a pretty good guy, but he fucked up big time and nothing could possibly justify it.
pangaia
(24,324 posts)radius777
(3,635 posts)As a PoC male who lives in a blue and diverse area, I heard many sexist opinions/memes about Hillary, from both men and women, that I've never heard about similar male candidates.
The idea put forth by the alt-left, that Hillary lost only due to being a part of the establishment or her past stance on issues, and that someone more populist like Warren would've done better, is laughable, considering that many of these same sexist people I know can't stand Warren even more, and consider her "another Hillary". When I ask them to elaborate, they usually imply that she's too strident, unlikeable, loud, etc, "like Hillary".
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)radius777
(3,635 posts)with the rise of the alt-right/neo-nazis, that Trump embraced, which blames Jews for everything.
Most of the white xtian Sanders voters in the primary didn't know about his religion.
If he had somehow won the nomination, Trump/Bannon/Rudy/Putin surely would've "educated" those voters all about it.
enid602
(8,598 posts)I hope your Dad won't be needing Medicare, as tRump announced he will phase it out this Spring. Your Dad can consider himself an alumnus of the latest class of tRump U. Trump, greatest con man who ever lived.
still_one
(92,062 posts)mia
(8,360 posts)I have a lot to learn.
treestar
(82,383 posts)upset with Orange Disgrace for considering Petraeus, who did far worse.
Dark n Stormy Knight
(9,760 posts)We're talking about a guy who voted for a lying, cheating, sexually assaulting, racist, outsourcing, billionaire fraudster with no actual plans or policies because he claimed he was going to do a magic trick to solve a problem he himself was complicit in creating and was profiting from.
Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)I don't think it's an unreasonable idea that Americans can build what Americans buy and use. I don't think Trump will make it happen, of course, but maybe Democrats need to think about how to speak about this issue and come up with some workable ideas.
JI7
(89,241 posts)I don't think Obama should have changed anything about himself top appeal to him since Obama won both times.
JI7
(89,241 posts)
itsrobert
(14,157 posts)Someone found guilty of his willful giving his mistress classify information?
Lotusflower70
(3,077 posts)I am impressed with his resourcefulness regarding the textile industry.
An important point that we need to learn from is to focus on staying on message instead of being on the defensive. Hillary gave Trump more power by continuing to attack him. I am not saying not to call him out but her message got lost in the mix. Also when she started to shift her platform due to Sanders influence, that turned off some people as well. She was viewed as more Obama and not unique. That worked against her as well.
NoGoodNamesLeft
(2,056 posts)Yes, SOME of Trump's voters are bigots but you know what...I see plenty of bigots right here on this forum and I've seen far more hateful, selfish and ignorant ideas spewed here than from any of the people I personally know who voted for the orange asshole.
All the posts about "Don't abandon us to try to appeal to white blue collar workers!" are so hypocritical! Why the bloody hell do you think Democrats LOST those DEMOCRATIC voters? Because the rust belt blue collar workers NEED FUCKING HELP because there are not enough jobs and people are goddamned going hungry and on the verge of being homeless!
My GOD but some of you are so selfish to think that everything is all about you all the time. The world does NOT revolve around you! Rural white blue collar workers have just as much right as everyone else to get fucking help when they are hurting! The bulk of the funding goes to urban areas because there are more people. There are less services available and less help for rural people. They've been waiting their turn for over a decade while progressives are worried more about being able to smoke weed legally than whether or not children in the rust belt have to go to bed hungry.
Get over yourselves. Stop attacking this members father. You're acting like assholes.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)instincts, thank God.
NoGoodNamesLeft
(2,056 posts)I have yet to see you post one fact on this issue. Not.One.
duffyduff
(3,251 posts)Sorry. There is none.
True_Blue
(3,063 posts)who lost my manufacturing job to outsourcing in China during the Bush admin. "White blue collar worker" is just a lame BS excuse to hide the real reason they voted for Trump. Unemployment is way WAY down from when Bush was POTUS. I hope those "blue collar workers" aren't relying on food assistance to feed their hungry children because slashing that is a very high priority on the republicans' to do list. We'll be lucky to still have a min wage after 4yrs of Trump. There's story after story like the one below about Trump.
"The conditions of the guys building the Trump International Golf Course were the worst I’ve ever seen,” said correspondent Ben Anderson. “Having guys live 21 to a room with rats running around above them; having to work extremely hard in extreme heat for two years just to break even, just to pay off the debts they accrued getting there. "
http://www.rawstory.com/2016/04/watch-vice-reveals-horrific-living-conditions-for-migrants-building-trump-dubai-golf-course/
Response to Lee-Lee (Original post)
duffyduff This message was self-deleted by its author.
JI7
(89,241 posts)baldguy
(36,649 posts)True_Blue
(3,063 posts)that we have no intention of keeping. We just need to find a clueless racist narcissistic lying sociopathic greedy billionaire that molests women and rips off his own employees to run in the next election.
LisaL
(44,972 posts)NanceGreggs
(27,813 posts)But out of curiosity, I have to ask: Is your father aware that all of the textiles for Trump's hotels - bedding, table linens, draperies, towels, etc. - are manufactured in China?
Is he aware that it is people like Trump who destroyed the textile industry in the US by sending this work to low-wage countries - people like your father be damned?
I am curious as to whether your dad is aware of this - and, if so, why he voted for the man who contributed to the loss of his livelihood, and that of other American textile workers.
Arazi
(6,829 posts)To understand how to reach these folks in the future
CakeGrrl
(10,611 posts)Who are willing to overlook OBVIOUS, UNPRECENDENTED proof of a candidate expressing:
Racism
Xenophobia
Misogyny
All because they heard that one magic other thing they thought they'd get.
As has been said: The focus needs to be on people who see the bigger picture and are capable of taking the fuller, more long term measure of a candidate than those short-sighted people who WILLINGLY ignore big ugly red flags of facism.
FrenchieCat
(68,867 posts)Of women, and what Tramp had to say about Mexicans and black people? Or did he even care?
Orsino
(37,428 posts)...is delusional. Luckily for Trump, our MSM is in the business of making delusions come true.
SickAndTiredOfRepubs
(12 posts)I can't discuss politics with him. In the past,he became angry when we had political discussions. His lack of facts, or even respect for facts, puzzles me. He is an engineer who has done well. He is an executive in a large corporation and has lived in several countries. He is financially stable, married to a Latina, and is kind to those he meets. He was raised in a progressive college town. I, and his father, were politically active, particularly when facing injustices aimed at vulnerable people. He is too old to be rebelling against parental control. We will enjoy each other's company at Christmas but part of him remains an enigma. How did the young boy who helped me canvass for McGovern in 1972 become a Trump voter?
LP2K12
(885 posts)My mother voted for Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump.
My father voted for Clinton, Bush, Trump.
It was depressing. I just don't talk about it.
LexVegas
(6,031 posts)Lee-Lee
(6,324 posts)My dad is a rugged, resilient person. He was orphaned in WWII under the Japanese occupation of the Philippines when my grandfather was taken away by Japanese Soldiers never to be seen again and my grandmother died shortly after he was born. He was shuffled from relative to relative and worked as a house servant for US Navy sailors in the barracks and then in homes, he was taken in by a Navy Chaplin and his wife at 15 who tutored him. During that time there was a program where Filipino citizens could join the US Navy but could only be mess stewards. The family officially adopted him at 17 giving him legal resident alien status so he could enlist without that restriction and the next day he enlisted as a Machinists Mate.
He left the active Navy after 15 years and did 10 more in the Navy Reserve to retire, and worked in the textile industry as I said above and faced a ton of racism there. The only place he really found frequents who didn't judge him based on skin color were the veterans groups he joined in 80's and still spends a lot of time in.
His path was never easy since he was born, and as a result very little bothers him. He dismisses so much as just "talk" as he puts it. His responses to Trumps sexists talk was "people offended by that would have a heart attack on a Navy ship and what we said". He dismissed his outlandish things like Mexico paying for the wall as "That is just how New Yorkers are they exaggerate everything and you can't take them literally".
He has long griped about the decline of US manufacturing and told me the other day that even if Trump doesn't have all the answers at least he sees and acknowledged it was a problem and said he would help, instead of how he characterized "Democrats walk around talking about how we all just need to relearn how to have some sort of bullshit green jobs".
It is what it is. He took Trump seriously when he spoke on the issues he cares most about and didn't take all his problems seriously.
Tatiana
(14,167 posts)Last edited Tue Dec 27, 2016, 05:36 PM - Edit history (1)
You obviously know your father made a horrendously incorrect decision that will have disastrous implications in the future.
I know several people like your father. In fact, my in-laws voted for him. My husband is quite ashamed at their ignorance.
Does you father view Fox "news" on a regular basis? Because I am seeing that as a common thread among many Trump voters. They helped to normalize and sell Trump's behavior as "not so bad."
We have to reach out to people like your father. At the same time, I think it's in the interests of our country if we do not shield people like your father from the consequences of their decisions.
He should feel the full burden of having his taxes increased to pay for a tax break for the extremely wealthy. He needs to know the fear of losing his government sponsored health care. He needs to understand explicitly that while many Democrats value his service to our nation, the Republicans could care less about him and view POWs like John McCain as "losers."
He needs to lose the safety net that enabled him to vote against our economic interests and for a con artist like Donald Trump. It's sad to say; my father-in-law just received his first social security check this month. I hope the Republicans vote to repeal those so-called entitlement benefits. Maybe when they are forced to, they will vote appropriately.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)I'd like to add that it's also important that voters like your father not be shielded from the racial, misogynistic and other related implications of their vote. It's not sufficient for them to say, "I'm not racist, but" or "Donald Trump may be a bigot, but my vote had nothing to do with that," etc. Voting for Trump in no way makes someone, ipso facto, a bigot, but it does demonstrate a troubling and dangerous insensitivity to racism, sexism and other problems - they showed that they have other interests that they feel outweighed those horrible attributes and that they believed justified putting a racist into the White House. That can't be ignored, explained away or defended.
They must bear the consequences for lining up next to the worst elements of our society, bolstering their votes and giving them the political power they need to inflict truly dangerous impacts on people of color, women, Muslims, immigrants, and others who will be damaged by this man. The least of those consequences is to have their vote and perspective questioned and, if so inclined, to feel uncomfortable about the choice they made. We certainly don't need to beat up on, humiliate or scapegoat your father and others like him, but, by the same token, we also can't pull punches, coddle them or pretend that what they did wasn't tremendously harmful to real people who deserve better than to have their fellow Americans throw them under the bus because a demagogue sold them fool's gold.
Elwood P Dowd
(11,443 posts)In this paragraph you say.........
He has long griped about the decline of US manufacturing and told me the other day that even if Trump doesn't have all the answers at least he sees and acknowledged it was a problem and said he would help, instead of how he characterized "Democrats walk around talking about how we all just need to relearn how to have some sort of bullshit green jobs".
Why didn't you explain this to him.......
If Trump was so concerned about keeping US manufacturing strong, why in hell did he set up factories in places like Mexico and China to manufacture products he and his family sells here in the US? If he is so concerned about American workers, why in hell does he hire so many imported workers from places like Mexico, Poland, and Central America to work on construction projects or in his resorts? He had plenty of chances to help, but he chose to do the exact opposite. Actions speak louder than words. Your father is about to become seriously disappointed.
Tatiana
(14,167 posts)Especially if they watch Fox News... Fox made it their mission to act as a campaign surrogate, providing characterizations and explanations for all of Trump's criminal and morally reprehensible actions. And the people who ended up voting for him latched on to those slimy explanations like a lifeline.
It's like they've been brainwashed and nothing short of a thorough reprogramming will enable them to see the actual truth.
MoonRiver
(36,926 posts)I am well off enough to be immune to orange's rip off of our country. My husband and I will actually benefit. But I didn't want it to be that way, and voted enthusiastically for Hillary. So sad that some, including your father, couldn't get a clue.
Yo_Mama
(8,303 posts)Very adamantly.
And it was mostly the jobs, but he also liked the idea of heavily scrutinizing immigration and getting control of it, both because he is worried about terrorists and because he thinks uncontrolled immigration is an attempt to drive down the wages of most workers in order to replicate a plantation-like economy (from which he fled) to destroy workers' rights and ability to negotiate. He thinks the rising violence in this country is partly due to declining economic opportunities. He also thinks uncontrolled immigration is brutally unfair to the citizens of this country who have been deprived and now can't work their way out of it.
He's a very intelligent man, a retired scientist holding patents, spent his early life in acute poverty, gained an education and a career, and junked that to come to the US because of the safety and human dignity in this country. Then he went back to school and started his career all over again.
He would have walked 50 miles to vote for Trump. He thought Trump offered some hope for his children and grandchildren.
Who is he? A bigot? No, not only is he brown-skinned himself, but he's the kindest man I have ever met. He has an eclectic circle of friend of all backgrounds and ethnicities. He can't pass a person in trouble without stopping to help (probably because of his brutal early experiences), and certainly would not treat a person differently based on skin color, etc.
Thirty-one percent of Hispanics voted for Trump, and I think it was because of economics.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)But if he is so kind that he would never pass someone on the street without helping him, why did he ignore the voices and cries of millions of his fellow Americans who BEGGED him not to allow Trump to become president, who IMPLORED him to understand that we are frightened of what he will do, who PLEADED with him to empathasize with our terror at what he would do to us, who BEGGED him to listen to what Trump was saying and to look at who he was appealing to, and who desperately PRAYED that decent people like him would not line up alongside bigots and racists and the Klan and Aryan Nation and help them cobble together enough votes to make a racist demagogue the most powerful person on earth?
How can he possibly explain why his concerns about the economy drowned out our vocies?
spin
(17,493 posts)clearance 90 would tell you that if they had been found to have work related classified information on an unauthorized home computer or server they would have been indicted and prosecuted.
The remaining 10 would probably be engineers. Engineers often view classifying information as chicken shit.
EffieBlack
(14,249 posts)Even Comey has tried to knock it down, obviously without success, given you're still parrotting this false right wing talking point.
spin
(17,493 posts)I handled classified information on a daily basis.
Therefore I do know this. If I would have been caught removing classified information from the work area or if it would have discovered on my unauthorized home computer I would have been prosecuted and likely fined and sentenced to a considerable amount of time behind bars.
That's the way the system works for most people who have a security clearance. It's not a right wing talking point. It is fact.
Sailor in classified sub photos case gets 1 year in prison
By JOSH GERSTEIN 08/19/16 06:32 PM EDT
A Navy sailor who admitted to taking photos in classified spaces on board a nuclear submarine was sentenced Friday to one year in prison and six months of home confinement.
The sentence imposed on Petty Officer First Class Kristian Saucier, 29, was significantly lighter than prosecutors' recommendation that the former sub machinist serve more than six years behind bars and the Navy's suggestion he get seven-and-a-half years.
***snip***
Saucier was indicted last year on one felony count of retaining national defense information without authorization and another count of obstruction of justice. Prosecutors said a series of photos he took with a cell phone camera on board the U.S.S. Alexandria in 2009 included at least six images considered classified "Confidential" and restricted under the Atomic Energy Act.
In a plea bargain in May, the sailor pled guilty to the classified information charge. The obstruction-of-justice charge was dismissed, but Saucier admitted destroying a laptop, memory card and camera after he was confronted by investigators.
http://www.politico.com/blogs/under-the-radar/2016/08/sailor-in-classified-sub-photos-prison-227211
Back when I was in the Air Force during the Vietnam Era we were prohibited from taking pictures of the aircraft we worked on sitting on the flight line. The pictures would have shown the antennas on the aircraft which would have revealed much about the mission she was designed for. We were told that if we were caught with these photos we would face jail time.
I have no desire to see Hillary prosecuted for negligently handling classified information and would actually like to see Obama pardon her on his way out the door of the White House so prevent any possibility of Trump harassing her.
However I can't honestly say based on my own personal experiences with handling classified information that this entire email scandal was simply an attempt by the Republicans to ruin Hillary's chances to win the election. I'm sure the Republicans hoped she would be charged but realistically that would have led to a constitutional crisis. I hate to say this but I seriously believe that if Hillary would have been just one of the "little people" she would have been indicted and convicted.
I'm now 70 years old and have enjoyed watching the game of politics for my entire adult life. I've discovered that in our system the rule of law does not apply equally to all. At a certain high level of government you can get away with a lot more than you can as an average citizen. This has happened in BOTH Republican and Democratic administrations. Our system is far from perfect. I also don't expect that it will ever change.
adigal
(7,581 posts)that i wont speak up to support him.
I'll be too busy trying to protect those evil immigrants he was so upset about.
