" The opening phase of President-elect Donald Trump’s second trip to the White House has been nothing like the first. What this portends for the coming four years is exactly what Trump pledged in the campaign: disruption and retribution." - Dan Balz, Washington Post, Trump Intends Disruption & Retribution
Robert Reich recently wrote (There Was No Mandate for Trump. There Was No Red Shift. There Was Only a Blue Abandonment, Substack)
"Trump is saying the election gave him a “very big mandate.” Rubbish. It wasn’t a mandate at all. It wasn’t even a “red shift” to Trump and the Republicans. It was a blue abandonment. We now know that nine million fewer votes were cast nationwide in 2024 than in 2020.
Trump got about a million more votes than he did in 2020 (700,000 of them in the seven battleground states). That’s no big deal.
The bigger news is that Harris got 10 million fewer votes than Biden did in 2020 (400,000 fewer in the battleground states). The biggest takeaway is that Biden’s 9 million votes disappeared. Why?"
To echo a recent observation by David French (NY Times):
"One of the most maddening aspects of the 2024 election was the extent to which so many voters viewed Trump as a mostly normal political candidate."
In other words, this lamo lot, either because they didn't follow serious news sources enough, or were too mesmerized by vicious Trump campaign ads and FOX News propaganda, "dropped the ball", failed to show up - and basically tossed our democracy into a veritable shithole. As Mr. French goes on to write:
"One of the challenging realities of American politics is that while vast numbers of Americans participate in presidential elections, only small minorities of voters actually stay engaged. And the priorities of the two groups are not the same, far from it. The majority is focused on the things that directly affect their lives — prices, crime, peace. How much do concerns about democracy matter if people don’t feel safe on the streets? Or if they’re struggling to keep a roof over their heads? The minority, by contrast, follows politics closely and can focus on issues that can feel more abstract or niche to the majority."
Janice and I as well as our circle of friends, family, all have followed politics closely especially the Trump campaign over the last two years. Hence we are all fully aware that Trump is a piece of decayed snot who has no business running anything except maybe a porto-potty. This deeper and more intimate knowledge of the political process means we are the ones Jefferson referred to in his Notes on Virginia when he wrote:
"Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves therefore are its only safe depositories. AND TO RENDER THEM SAFE, THEIR MINDS MUST BE IMPROVED"
Jefferson knew, as any intelligent American would, that being a "safe depository" of democracy in one's nation meant being attentive to its politics, history and political dynamics. That includes having a command of its basic principles, the Constitution - and especially what is and isn't allowed. Also a recognition of the most important, critical issues at a given time, the most rational choices in each case, and an ability to recognize a qualified candidate and distinguishing that person from an incompetent buffoon and demagogue.
Alas, the 2024 election shows too many Americans have lost that capacity for critical perception. Maybe the residue of the pandemic ate out the rest of their microglial (brain) cells or they just lost their bearings with drugs and alcohol. Or plain laziness, who knows? But their callous lack responsibility as voters - not to mention warped citizenship - basically handed the highest office in the land to an incompetent asshole as well as 34- times convicted felon. This explains French's next observation:
"MAGA Republicans see Trump as a singular figure, but an immense number of voters thought the talk about Trump was overheated in both directions. If you’re like most Americans and don’t follow the news closely, it’s easy to see why you would see Trump in more conventional terms."
The bollocks regarding talk about Trump being "overheated" in particular showed vast number of Americans are brain-benumbed or mentally dysfunctional. I mean the man's whole being and rhetoric fairly screams abnormality and criminal, from bragging about grabbing pussies, to threatening to shoot generals, to calling soldiers who lost their lives in wars "losers". Oh, and gushing about his 'love letters' from the bloodthirsty North Korean dictator Kim Jong -Un.
NO normal candidate does those things, says those things, and broadcasts them over his social media platform hundreds of times a day. But some form of mental numbness or derangement appears to have blunted Americans' sense of outrage as well as perceptions. I suspect it is part being pulled into the FOX orbit, part being the aftermath of the pandemic and economic dislocation and part simply not following the deep politics closely enough.
French again:
" A Politico analysis of the Trump campaign’s ads showed that “the single most-aired ad from his campaign since the start of October is all about inflation, Medicare and Social Security — arguing that” Kamala Harris “will make seniors already struggling with high prices ‘pay more Social Security taxes,’ while ‘unauthorize’ immigrants receive benefits."
French also noted the targeting of swing state votes using ads (mostly paid for by Musk) warning of Kamala 'plans' to offer more trans surgeries, as well as giving carte blanche to migrants via "open borders". We actually have received similar mailers to that effect and I have invariably ripped them up and tossed them because I know - from my political knowledge- they are a pile of horse shit. But it seems too many Americans sucked up this crap hook, line and sinker. The end result, coupled with the Gaza and Ukraine tumult, translated into either voting for a 34 count felon and traitor, or not voting at all. In any case handing the election to an unqualified ratfucker.
As one recent letter writer to the Denver Post put it:
"Most disconcerting to me as I read through Open Forum responses is the level of disconnection from the factual evidence. Trump's own actions and words have repeatedly demonstrated his attacks on democracy, bigotry and misogyny. The evidence is overwhelming and is not the product of 'liberal media'."
But this political miasma is the result when people's minds are removed from the core of issues and then are no longer "safe depositories" in preserving our Republic. As Benjamin Frankin warned, when asked what form of government we have: "A Republic, if you can keep it."
It seems too many of our fellows aren't interested in keeping it. As they behold what unfolds after this misfit takes office in January they may come to regret the decision not to keep him out of the WH again this time.; Which would have meant doing for the nation what the Supreme Court refused to do.
See Also:
by Robert Reich | November 15, 2024 - 6:48am | permalink
— from Robert Reich's Substack
Friends,
Trump is saying the election gave him a “very big mandate.”
Rubbish. It wasn’t a mandate at all. It wasn’t even a “red shift” to Trump and the Republicans.
It was a blue abandonment.
We now know that nine million fewer votes were cast nationwide in 2024 than in 2020.
And:
Trump allies, Republicans eye changes to federal safety net programs - The Washington Post
Excerpt:
Among the options under discussion by GOP lawmakers and aides are new work requirements and spending caps for the programs.
However, concern is high among some Republicans about the political downsides of such cuts, which would affect programs that provide support for at least 70 million low-income Americans.
Limiting what food items SNAP (food stamp) recipients can purchase with benefits would also reduce costs.
And:
Yes, indeedy, fellow Americans, happy days are here again. The bells are ringing, thanksgiving is in the hearts of all Americans from the homeless to the head of Home Depot. Wall Street is euphoric. Tax reductions for the plutocrats are locked in, and more are coming for the richest Americans. Those most-deserving folk are doing their happiest happy dance. Oil company execs are ecstatic. Netanyahu is now free to be his worst self without worry about even the most feckless and limp-dicked restraint. The majority who wanted to own the liberals got their fondest wish. It’s morning once again in America, God’s in His Heaven, and all is right in the best of all possible worlds.
There is so much happiness to be found as we see the media coverage of Democrats and other lefties rummaging around for ways to blame their party for losing again. It had nothing whatsoever to do with the nihilists who voted as so many "patriots" and "Christians" did. It was all Kamala’s fault, and all because she couldn’t find the time to sit down to shoot the shit with Joe Rogan, though she did enter the lion’s den to go head-to-head with Brett Baier, that ever-so-objective journalist on Fox who pounced on every opportunity to interrupt and contradict her, no matter what. Never had any Murdoch employee questioned much of anything Trump ever said.
The post-mortems on Donald Trump’s victory and the Democrats’ defeat are coming from all directions. Most focus on Kamala Harris’s shortcomings, and many are contradictory.
Did Harris lose because she was a weak candidate, despite the initial optimism surrounding her campaign? Did she move too far to the right, alienating a critical mass of potential progressive voters by palling around with neo-cons like Liz Cheney? Did she veer too sharply to the left, alienating moderate old-guard Republicans and independents who saw her as too woke? Did Harris’s stance on Gaza cost her the “Blue Wall” states, or was it inflation or the crisis at the border? Was she a victim of intractable sexism and racism? Or was it Biden’s refusal to step down until late July that sealed her fate?
Each of these perspectives has some merit—especially the argument, concisely made by Bernie Sanders in a post on X, that the Democratic Party has abandoned the working class and that, as a result, the working class has abandoned the party. These voters instead backed a candidate whose actual policies undermine the interests of working people.
What these arguments all miss, however, is an essential element of Trump’s triumph—the simple and sad truth that hate sells. Ever since he descended the golden escalator at Trump Tower in midtown Manhattan in July 2015 to declare his candidacy for President, Trump has preached an unrelenting gospel of hate, scapegoating immigrants, the LGBTQ+ community, minorities, political opponents, journalists, academics, and scientific experts as the cause of our alleged national decline. He has flagged them as “the enemy from within” as a target that must be removed or neutralized.
Donald Trump’s stated economic policies have economists “extremely confident that food will get more expensive,” Brown University professor Rachel Friedberg warns.
According to a Saturday report in the Atlantic, while Americans are “very concerned” about the price of groceries, two major Trump campaign “promises — mass deportations of undocumented immigrants and more restrictive trade regulations —would almost certainly raise food prices” as a domestic labor shortage and increased import taxes tack costs onto Americans’ grocery bills.
“It’s just very straightforward principles of economics,” Friedberg said, telling the Atlantic the “cause-and-effect dynamic ‘could be my final exam.’”
As the Atlantic reports, “the farm industry is already in a prolonged labor crisis."
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