Why We Need Mail -In Ballots In Every State

If mail balloting was available in FLA - like here in Colorado - voters would not have had to wait in line for hours only to find not enough ballots available at the polling station in North Miami.

"Save your hundreds of millions of dollars Don't replace your aging machines. Throw them on the scrap pile.. Go back to paper ballots. Then think hard about abolishing the polling place and moving to a system that puts the voter first and ensures in every election far more people are casting ballots." -  Phil Keisling, former Oregan secretary of state, in interview with Cynthia McFadden on NBC Evening News Saturday.

 Colorado Mail Ballots arrived at our home more than two weeks ago and we each filled our ballots  out : a total of three pages of voter choices, including for positions such as Governor, and state Attorney General as well as minor (county) positions and at least a dozen propositions and amendments. The latter included a proposition (112) to prohibit frack wells within 2500' of homes, an amendment (A) to prohibit slavery and involuntary servitude, and another amendment (73) to provide increased funding for public schools by raising state taxes.

Both of us, let me note, have also done the traditional thing of going out to the polling station - both here in the Springs and earlier in Columbia, Maryland - and believe me there is no comparison.  It is far easier to not have to take time off from a job to vote, or to battle illness, physical handicap or whatever. Nor is it necessary to stand in long lines to wait to cast a ballot- only to learn on arriving at the polling station there are no more ballots (See top graphic, in what transpired over the weekend in North Miami). 

In the N. Miami case the powers-that-be in Dade County had underestimated the number of ballots needed. Such fiascoes are avoided with mail ballots because ab initio the voter records are checked before ballots are mailed out.

Why don't more states offer the convenience of mail ballots and early voting? Who knows? But my suspicion is basically they want  to make it difficult to vote for certain demographic groups they don't trust - such as African-Americans, Native Americans and others.

Now it appears libertarian knucklehead Jon Caldara wants to take the state back to the olden days of traipsing to the polls to cast votes. Never mind if you're deathly ill, an invalid, or can't get time from work.  He believes it's the "American" way, like he believes other balderdash (such that health care is not a positive right.)

On Caldara's Independence Institute bio page it proclaims he "hates bullies".  Well, for a guy who hates bullies he sure as hell does a good job emulating them.  His latest target - after going after those who defended health care as a right- is Colorado's mail in ballots.He insists these "skew results to the left" - but when one reads between the lines of his recent tract (Denver Post, Sunday, Oct. 28, p. 2K) it is clear he considers them unAmerican, or at least not patriotic.  He blabs, for example:

"The  ballot isn't just the symbol of democracy - it is democracy. It is the very instrument of self-governance.  The ballot is the fundamental building block of our Republic....So isn't it a little odd that in Colorado we fling these sacred ballots through the mail like King Sooper's coupons...."

Well hey, Jon, would you rather show up at a "proper" polling station after wasting hours of your time waiting in line only to find out they are all out of ballots?  Or, would you prefer a station inundated with electronic voting machines, for which there isn't an iota of QA?  No ability to check that the "sacred" ballot you cast has any paper trail?  Hell, we already know some of  the most notorious hacking stories have recently been exposed e.g.

An 11-Year-Old Hacked Into a U.S. Voting System Replica in 10... - Time

Wherein we learned:

"Emmett Brewer , the 11-year-old who successfully hacked the replicated Florida voting site, wasn’t the only child who got into the election systems at the conference. In total, about 50 kids ranging in age from 8 to 16 attended the conference, DEFCON said in a tweet, and around 30 of them were able to hack into the imitation election websites."

For any who gullibly believe Diebold machines - for example- are as good as paper ballots, I invite you to take a gander at the machine below showing vote switching (from 2012) in action, e.g. at: http://wonkette.com/488754/watch-this-pennsylvania-voting-machine-hilariously-refuse-to-accept-a-vote-for-barack-obama

Things better now, you say? Problems solved? Not so, as one early voting Texan observed, who voted whole ballot D, and found his vote being switched to Ted Cruz before his eyes (instead of Beto O'Rourke)

Zeynip Tufekci in her recent NY Times piece ('The Election Has Already Been Hacked') puts a further light on the underlying issue with elections in this country:

"This election has already been hacked even if not a single voting machine has been compromised. It has already been hacked even if not another ruble has been spent on spreading disinformation. It has already been hacked even if voter registration information has been undisturbed and no vote tallies are altered.

Why, because in much of the United States, we are no longer able to assure people that none of those things has happened. A recent poll shows that 46 percent of the American electorate do not think their  votes will be counted fairly, and about a third think it is likely that a foreign country will tamper with the results."

My bet is if all these Americans could use mail in ballot like those of us in Colorado, Oregon and Washington, that would not be such a huge concern. Why? Because we (all 3 states) use PAPER ballots that are not vulnerable to outside hacks given they're counted by hand. Also our internal checks disclose integrity, i.e. as Boulder County District Attorney Stan Garnett put it, quoted in The Boulder Daily Camera :

“Local governments and county clerks do a really good job regulating the integrity of elections, and I’ll stand by that record any day of the week. "

The same holds in Oregon and Washington, the only two states where voting is done completely by mail (CO still allows voters to go to polling places if they prefer. Kind of antiquated, but maybe it gives mainly older folks something to do or perhaps feel more red, white & blue.) .  Indeed, in an NBC News segment on Friday ('Securing the Vote')  reporter Cynthia McFadden traveled to Oregon where she interviewed  Phil Keisling former Dem secretary of state and  current officer holder, Republican  Dennis Richardson.

As Keisling explained: "I think the polling place has become the single biggest voter suppression device in American politics."

Both agree their state's system (the first to adopt an entirely vote-by-mail method):  "gets more people voting and is cheaper and more secure."

The reason? They use only paper ballots.  Each of 2 1/2 million registered voters receives a ballot via the U.S mail, no form has to be filled out, it doesn't have to be asked for.  As Keisling put it: "You just give everyone their ballot and let them decide how they want to mark it, if they want to mark it at all."    There's no need to be impeded because of child care demands, or inclement weather, or the artificial barrier of having a specific kind of ID card which 32 states now require. Kind of ridiculous, just as Caldara's insipid complaints, in a nation that features one of the lowest voter participation rates on the planet.

As for security, like here in Colorado each signature is verified by comparison to that on the voter registration card.  What about voters who've died, moved or changed their names? Is there a danger someone might use their ballot? According to Phil Keisling:

"They'd be committing a felony, vote by vote. This is about one of the stupidest ways to try to steal an election."

When McFadden asked the duo about the plans of many other states to invest in new electronic voting machines, the advice was instant:


McFadden concluded that "though much of the country is divided along party lines, these two are in total agreement when it comes to the state's vote by mail system".

The point is, contrary to Caldara's vapid presumptions about single day polling at specially assigned places, there is nothing "sacred" or "sacrosanct" about ballots if they can be hacked or votes switched.  Or if the process in general raises suspicions concerning fairness!  The sacredness of the voting process then inheres in its being faithfully executed according to the will of the voter. This also means the mechanics of how voting is done are immaterial, again so long as the process bears integrity and is faithful to the  voter's will. Mail balloting, contrary to Caldara's bitching, is one of the best ways to ensure the franchise is protected, as both Keisling and Richardson agreed.


But Caldara's bitching goes further,  fulminating  that "But wait there's more! Colorado is currently the only state that has same day voter registration!"

So what? The idea is to make voter registration, and hence voting, easier not more difficult,  you dumb cluck.  But he goes on to tie that ease of mail balloting and same day registration into a conspiracy ideation involving "big data" and using "social media, email, snail mail, phone calls etc." to vacuum up votes.  Nope you can't make this up.

Caldara still in a feverish mental state adds:

"all mail ballots fundamentally changed electioneering, giving an advantage to the team that is more tech savvy and with the most foot soldiers to chase voters."

In other words, the fool is whining about the side having the better ground game, which I thought any one into :"electioneering" would grasp is top priority. I mean, if you don't get your voters out - especially tomorrow for one of the biggest elections in our history, it's all for naught.  So truly all Caldara has presented us with is a big straw man complaint.

Probably figuring he needed another alternate gripe he then bitches - get this - about mail ballots allowing too much time to vote. Can you believe this?  He writes:

"We used to have an election day, a 12 hour period for civic minded folk to get to their polling place. Voting was for those with the tiniest bit of motivation. Political 'machines' had only 12 hours to get their people to the polls.  We no longer have election day, we have election month.."

So what?  Caldara seems to also forget the U.S. is one of the few nations that has voting on a workday. Well, newsflash, for  many citizens that is a difficult bar to voting.  It often presents a choice of  going to a polling station or lost time (and money) on the job, and other inconvenience, especially if one must wait in a long line. Mail voting totally eliminates all of that, as well as possible intimidation tactics used by a suspicious opposition at polling stations- sporadically questioning or confronting people.

Rather than have to face such barriers, as well as possible vote suppression or other tricks - like being told one's name doesn't perfectly match the voter record (as in Georgia, used by bullyboy Kemp) why not mail ballots? Caldara's incredible answer:  It's too easy!

Why is voting, especially requiring special IDs and polling places, rendered so damned hard in the U.S. of A.?  Michael Moore on 'The Last Word' Friday night, offered perhaps the best explanation:

"The reason it's made hard is that those in power, who are beholden to the rich, the wealthy who buy our politicians and elections, don't want more citizens voting.. The last thing those in power, the one percent, want is for you to show up, because there's so many more of working people and poor people than rich people. The more that they can make it hard for people to have their voice heard, the longer they can continue the status quo. So to upset that status quo, you have to get out there and vote."

Moore then advises for each person who may be dithering, to think of 5 friends or family members who don't tend to vote and consider "making it your mission to get them to vote".  Also, maybe having a  voting party to go together to the polling place and cast votes then celebrate after.  As for possibly losing a day's pay, Moore says: "There is no more important day to sacrifice for your country- even giving up a day's pay -  than Tuesday."

But really, it shouldn't be that damned difficult, no matter what Caldara says.

Folks, it's time - after this election - to push activism in the direction of getting your state reps to implement mail and paper ballot systems. Systems that put you the voter at the center of your right and franchise, not an artificial place that is a venue for suppression-  or a vast and inefficient waste of time and energy as the North Miami voters discovered.

See also:

Stop Blaming Millennials for Not Voting. Blame America’s Screwed-up System—and Fix It!

And:

Here's Why Democrats' Chances for a Big Midterms Win Are Looking Even Better — And What Still Stands in Their Way

FAHRENHEIT 11/9 - A Film Every (sentient) Citizen Needs To See

Let me say I was glad to read John Anderson's bogus, distorted WSJ review of Michael Moore's new film  'Fahrenheit 11/9' before going to see it with wifey earlier today.  Reading Anderson's claptrap before  actually seeing the movie on the big screen showed me in retrospect the WSJ clown didn't know WTF he was talking about. Indeed, I was led to conclude the author didn't actually see it but instead resorted to canned fishwrap the WSJ likely had on hand for previous Moore films - with a few tweaks and updates added.

But both Janice and I agreed, that contrary to Anderson's balderdash, i.e. that Moore "hasn't made an honest film since 'Bowling for Columbine (2002)'", this latest effort rings  with veracity in every scene, every segment.   To first set the stage here, the title derives from the fact Trump was appointed president at 2:29 a.m. on November 9, 2016.  Hence, "11/9"  The opening scenes show (in juxtaposition) the Hillary party in Philly - expectantly awaiting the confirmation of history (first female president) counterpoised with the initially dour atmosphere at the Trump camp - accompanied to the opening music from the 1976  film  'The Omen'.

As November 8th transits into the wee hours of November 9th, the real horror story begins  This is as first Ohio, then Florida fall to Trump, followed by Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan -  and we see the scenes from Hillary's would be victory party now looking like a wake. Oh, and all her supporters' stricken faces appearing as if Satan himself had incarnated in their midst, as we behold in the reactions:  sobbing, convulsions, screaming...it's all there. For Janice, this was the most difficult part to watch.

The story then burrows into the particulars of the assorted horrors to which we've now been exposed, especially leading up to Trump's coronation.   From the unholy depiction of infamous Michigan criminal governor Rick Snyder (a Trump wannabe billionaire) - who brought on a "slow rolling ethnic cleansing" of Flint, MI -  e.g. by cutting off its water supply to Lake Huron and replacing it with the toxic Flint River (leading to thousands of cases of lead poisoning), to Obama himself actually showing up in Flint to sip its toxic water in a PR gag . That actually provided cover for Snyder, and left a hall full of African -American Flint citizens appalled.  That faux pas also tamped down any 2016 election response from Flint's minority voters - likely helping to toss the industrial Midwest state to Dotard.

Then there were the scenes of Flint subjected to a live fire exercise, with the Dept. of Defense using abandoned ramshackle bldgs. (in minority neighborhoods)  to unleash  bombs and mortars to practice "urban warfare".   A sad and sorry decision sanctioned by good ol' President Obama.  The scenes at the Dem Convention were also enraging as well as illuminating as we beheld each state, VT, RI, WVa, etc, respond to the delegate roll calls by shouting out false delegate totals, i.e. for Hillary, when Bernie actually took the states. Wonder why so many Bernie supporters never bothered to show up to vote, there you have it after that charade.

Moore also features segment after segment showing NY Times headlines pumping and humping for centrist or capitalist positions, including inveighing against "socialists".  None of the Times clips Moore interjects were fake or touched up.   Yes, The Times has been more out in the open with its criticisms of Trump now, but not always. (And they even botched it up again with a half -baked story misrepresenting a Rod Rosenstein sarcastic jab -  to Andy McCabe of the FBI -   re: putting on a wire, i.e. to get Trump using the 25th amendment.  All the Times butthead reporters did is provide ammo for Mueller's enemies and give Dotard a bogus excuse to fire Rosenstein.  Press like that we don't need, if they can't discriminate the sarcastic from the real!  N.B. The Times reporters who broke this malarkey also admitted tonight the sources they relied on weren't even in the meeting where Rosenstein reportedly made that remark.)

That is the other underpinning theme of Moore's film, the degree to which the corporate media - especially the electronic voices of CNN, NBC,  ABC, CBS had all been in bed with Trump from day one.  All the outlets saw a classic   way to keep viewers' eyeballs glued to their broadcasts while they're ratings soared and they raked in money. As former CBS head Les Moonves was heard saying: "This may not be good for the country but it's great for CBS!"  Yeppers,  profits over country.

The effect, as Moore shows, was to give Trump a gazillion hours of free advertising and air time, that helped his campaign immensely. How could it not?  At one point in the film, perhaps one of the more disgusting in the media segment, we see the gathered network lapdogs and cameras all surrounding an empty stage set for a Trump appearance, salivating with bated breath while Dotard keeps them waiting for more than a half hour.  The people's voices and protective "fourth estate"? More like trained dogs, so when Trump barks 'Jump!' they asked 'How high?'

Of course, as with other Michael Moore films, some levity was interjected at specific points, usually when the viewer is almost too distressed with Trump World's antics. One such example is after Moore tries to make a citizen's arrest of Michigan's governor Rick Snyder - but ultimately has to be satisfied with spraying his property using Flint river water,


Now, let's look at some of John Anderson's complaints.

- "One of the chief plaints of 11/  9  - in which he trashes Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, The New York Times.  the entire Democratic establishment - is about the media's slavish attention to Mr. Trump in a movie devoted to Mr. Trump"

But see, the movie was not "devoted to Trump" but rather foursquare devoted to exposing all the ways our system broke down to pave the way for his bogus selection (by the Electoral college, see     .e. g.

• Had The Electoral College Done Its Job The "Anonym...

So, from Obama's Flint MI hijinks, fake drinking its river water, and ordering a live fire exercise on Flint abandoned buildings, to HRC keeping a low profile in key Midwest states (WI, MI), to the D-establishment rigging the game against Bernie using the superdelegate system (and even more recently Dem centrist Steny Hoyer telling a young Colorado candidate from the 6th congressional district to get with the program) we see none of Anderson's "plaints" have a leg to stand on.

The last complaint about the media's slavish attention to Trump when Moore's film is about him is particularly enraging, given it conflates two separate elements: The media's genuinely giving Trump millions of hours of free air time during the 2016 election, vs. Moore making a single 125 minute film - of which maybe 20 mins. at most treats Trump's antics - but in a negative way, to inspire citizen response. That is why I refer to the film as an anthem to action, for progressives to get off of their butts and VOTE November 6th.  Moore's basic message  is simple: Don't "hope" for Mueller, or the press or (name your hero) to save us amidst the Trump nightmare. Get off your butts and do your part going to the polls this  November!)

- "There's more than a little bait and switch going on in Fahrenheit 11/9 and it raises the question of exactly what Mr. Moore is, other than a propagandist. He's not a journalist except of the aggregator variety."

But aggregators are critically important because they deliver point of view and a needed perspective. In this case of how our country is being adversely affected in multifold ways  The aggregator then in many ways is like the scientific researcher, say in solar physics preparing a paper on solar flare formation-  who first provides an array of  historical background snippets and examples.  These then pave the way to showing the value of the current work,  say offering a flare model based on current sheets, while also delivering an overall perspective of the flare phenomenon.

In the same way, Moore's collection of scenes - from the Snyder "emergency plan"  takeover of the Michigan cities of Pontiac. Detroit, Flint  and Benton Harbor, to the Flint water debacle itself, to the media's slavish treatment and use of Trump for ratings, to the striking teachers of West Virginia, and the Parkland school tragedy and kids response- all weave toward a coherent whole, a point of view that helps us understand what's going on in this country. 

If one looks at similar other efforts by aggregators, e.g. Josh Fox's 'Gasland II',   e.g.

Brane Space: Gasland II - Fracking is Worse Than You Think

One sees that the same method applies. To save time, and not have a 1,000 hour documentary, one selects the most meaningful examples and stitches them together in a coherent whole to forge a viewpoint.   The name for such a person who does this sort of thing then, whether Josh Fox or Michael Moore, is a documentarian.

- "Almost the entire movie is lifted from other sources, and then edited in a way that makes his enemies look as foolish as possible."

This complaint is really, truly imbecilic, because what he describes - at least in terms of using other sources- is exactly what the aggregator Documentary maker does!   It's what Josh Fox did too in 'Gasland' and 'Gasland II'.   So one wonders what planet Anderson inhabits.  As for the editing, there isn't a damned thing wrong with it, having myself seen many of the same scenes, e.g. of the lead catastrophe and brown water in Flint, on the nightly news.  Did Moore have the prescience to put the scenes together in a cogent way? Yes, of course! So what?  That is what he's there to do in order to underscore the account and provide a coherent theme for the movie, i.e. that we are in fire alarm mode with Trump's residency.  Besides, as Anderson then finally admits: "It's not as if Moore has no leg to stand on. ..his was the most prominent liberal voice warning of Mr. Trump's appeal to Midwest voters."

Jeez, on behalf of Mike, thanks for small favors, you blockhead!

And as if to support my contention he's a blockhead:

"And if Moore is going to castigate Mrs. Clinton for her various electoral missteps - shouldn't he mention that despite losing the Electoral College she won the popular vote."

He DID mention it, you fucking dolt! In fact,  he devoted a whole 6 minute segment to it.   This featured the "baby coffins" full of the states' electoral votes being carted in for final verification and counting with Moore's voice over noting "and that should be the end of this"  and "the one who gets the most votes  (Hillary) should be the one elected president"  - as is done in every other democratic nation, He also points out that the EC is a carryover from the "slave master" days.  He leaves little doubt that because of this asinine anachronism the Dems have seen presidential hopes crushed at east twice (including in the Bush v. Gore farce in FLA in 2000).

The most sensational  (and powerful)  tour de force is near the end showing Hitler in one of his many rants but mouthing Trump's own words, directed to his idiot base.  There is also a segment of the last days of the Weimar Republic before Hitler brought it down,  alternating with images of what's happening today, i.e. in separating the children of immigrants.  We also see Hitler using many of the same mass mind appeal techniques Trump is employing now   Pay special attention to the interview with Ben Ferencz - a Chief Prosecutor for the Nuremberg Trials- and the fears raised now, especially in the Trump separation of children from immigrant parents which holds eerie similarities to how the Nazis did the same in their concentration camps.

Anderson - providing more evidence he never actually saw the film (or at least the whole film) also kvetches about the "casual reduction of Trumpites to Nazis."   But  Moore does no such thing. What he does is use a graphic showing the progression (regression?)  of putative democracy to despotism and how Trump hits every marker on it just as Hitler did, beginning with the lack of respect for minorities and outgroups like Muslims.  (The presentation features interspersed clips of assorted white Americans attacking black people in different venues, such as on golf courses and on buses) Also extending to vilification of the press and reporters as well as attacking the judiciary.  The very sort of things Hitler did leading to the Reich laws.   So the analogizing of Trump to Hitler is not off the mark at all.

Incredibly, Anderson also bitches about Moore's choice of a film poster,  e.g. "the poster for the film is a highly unflattering shot of the president's rear end, midswing at  golf course."  So WTF?  You want Moore to be dishonest and touch it up or photo shop it, fake news style? If you have a beef with the poster tell Fatty Arbuckle Jr. to lose a few pounds. (Oh, and maybe spend less time golfing at his properties!)

The most idiotic comment of Anderson's I saved for last, writing of Michael Moore:

"Some might even say he's the left's version of Donald Trump."

No, see uh... Michael Moore has a functioning brain!

The very fact a paid hack like John Anderson couldn't handle this film is reason enough to see it.  But in terms of content and insights (some of which not even Janice was aware of) any citizen who misses it will regret it, especially in the run up to the midterms.

TrumpCare Flops - Will The "Fuhrer's" Tax Code Effort Be Next?

"The Democrats are to blame for Trumpcare going down! The Democrats are to blame! BWAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!"

Let's admit that if I deliberately give you a 44-stone advantage  playing 'GO',  the onus is on you to win, i.e. surround my men so they've no place to move and do so pretty quickly. No excuses! Given this sort of handicap, if you still lose, then you are the one to blame.  Even with a massive piece (and position) advantage you were not competent enough to marshal your forces to best advantage and instead let victory slip through your fingers.

In like manner, if your political party enjoys a 44-seat advantage in the House of Representatives, the largest in modern history, then the onus is on your party to get its desired piece of legislation passed. It is emphatically NOT on my party to lend you its numbers or support, especially if your legislation is designed to repeal my party's original bill.   If you blame my party because your party failed - though they enjoyed a 44-seat advantage- then you are either an idiot, psychotic, stoned drug addict  or drunk.

But such was the case yesterday after Trump's (aka "Der Fuhrer's")  much ballyhooed "health care" (repeal and replace) of Obamacare came crashing down. After seven long years of vowing to kill Obamacare, and months of Trump's yapping on the campaign trail he'd do it (making it one of his main promises), e.g.

"On my first day in office I am going to ask congress to send me a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. Immediately!"

The supposed vote had to be mercy -killed before it could even commence. Why? Because a quick, informal tally showed it as much as 34 votes short.   No, there were no Dem votes for it, but why should there have been?  As Rep. Joe Kennedy put it last night, to Chris Hayes on MSNBC: "The message from hundreds of thousands of Americans was 'don't do something stupid and vote on a bad bill."  Adding: "Doctors hated this bill, patients hated this bill, nurses hated this bill, hospitals hated this bill and seniors hated this bill, It was a bad piece of legislation"

And, indeed, had any Dems been stupid enough to vote for this misshapen mutation (which killed 10 health care requirements) they'd have paid dearly at the polls in the 2018 midterms.  So anyone with more than air between the ears certainly couldn't have expected them to cooperate to pass an odious bill that hurt far more than it helped. (Actually the only ones it helped were the hyper wealthy because it was actually a tax cut bill to deliver $330b in cuts on the backs of those whose ACA benefits, Medicaid were cut). Further, no sane person could expect Democratic  cooperation to kill a bill they had sacrificed to get through seven years ago! Hell, get real!  But then remember, Trump - now playing the blame game - isn't sane, but a psychotic. So he would say anything to get the monkey of loss off his back.  While President Harry Truman was the first to say "The buck stops here", Trump has now revised that to: "The buck stops with those guys there, not me!"

But what would one expect of a two-bit real estate weasel who built his "empire" on cons, bankruptcies and suspect money from Russian oligarchs.

Add in Sean Spicer's false bravado and optimism that a vote would be held, not to mention Trump's absurd  "ultimatum"  to get the Tea Baggers (Freedom Caucus) on board, and you had all the makings of a grade B drama about to unfold.  Adding to the suspense, an emergency meeting of the House Republican Caucus was called shortly before the scheduled vote. As it was announced, the House went to recess, with Democrats shouting in a taunting manner, “Vote, vote, vote”, daring Republicans to bring the bill up.  Democrats had reason to needle these Reepo miscreants as it was mainly their people - at assorted town hall meetings- who brought the shame on the Repukes as they recounted how their loved ones would be adversely affected by repeal. Did the Repukes care? Hell no!

In a short meeting that ensued, Paul Ryan announced that the bill was being pulled from the floor in a terse statement to members. What ought not have been surprising, as I noted in the previous post, is that the 'pukes ended up playing whackamole tryin to appease the Tea Baggers by adding more and more refuse to their bill. (Namely eliminating ten cornerstones of sound health care, including everything from hospitalizations, ER visits, and maternity care to prescription drugs and mental health services. )

So no wonder a losing wicket emerged with any moderates in swing districts wary of supporting the legislation, which included major cuts to Medicaid. The original bill  was estimated by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office to lead to 24 million fewer Americans having health insurance over the next 10 years, and the final mutated, tortured product was even worse. So why in hell would any Dem help provide cover for these termites by adding a 'yea' vote?

The real blame for the loss, if one could be singled out, had to be the 24-odd member Freedom Caucus.  So committed were they to ideological principle and purity that they absolutely refused the opportunity to send the ACA into the annals of history, even after Paul Ryan removed all ten health requirements they asked for. They didn't want a bloody half loaf, by golly, it had to be the whole enchilada or nothing at all. The WSJ Editorial yesterday (p. A14, 'The Freedom From Reality Caucus')  put it this way:

"By insisting on the impossible over the achievable, these self-styled guardians of conservative purity could become the worst friends conservative ideas and free markets have had in decades."

Meanwhile Trump, who bragged endlessly about his ability to make this happen and his deal making, couldn't budge one single Tea Bagger. Not one. This left him bellyaching over issues of "loyalty" in the wake.  SO much for the art of the deal, but as one pundit put it last night:

"This bill isn't some abstraction. It's the entire health insurance market for a nation of 330 million people. You can't just negotiate it like you're doing a development deal in Atlantic City."

But see, with Trump the Reepos had a turkey who (unlike Obama with the ACA) didn't even keep up with the changing content of the bill or what those changes meant for individual congressional districts and their reps. One Goopr Rep even complained to Ryan Lizza of The New Yorker:

"We're astonished how in over his head Trump is. He seems to neither get the politics or the policy of this."

But what would one expect of an ignorant, arrogant, psychotic asshole? Especially one with delusions of grandeur and authoritarian narcissism issues that rival those of his Onkel Adolf.

As far as Trump was concerned it was as if he was just dealing with so many below par properties to be fobbed off on gullible suckers.  Trouble was the would be victims weren't gullible, and by the end of the recent recess most of the Reepos knew it. At least those who had the balls to attend their town halls, as opposed to hiding or inventing the lamebrain excuse those gathered were "paid protesters".

Trump's other egregious claim in washing his hands of the bill, is that he would "just let Obamacare explode". Of course, he's on some kind of drug or else losing even more gray matter. There is no "explosion" as the CBO noted in its report. But, there is a danger of erosion of benefits given the Reepos did manage to nix the mandate which paid for the benefits most people value the most, such as for pre-existing conditions and keeping adult kids on parents' plans.

This is why, as Michael Moore warned last night, the Dems can't spend too much time gloating or in jubilation mode. They - we- have to get to work and ensure those provisions are made more secure.  This is especially given the final iteration of the AHCA that almost went for a vote last night was the most extreme form possible eliminating such things as emergency services, hospitalization, pregnancy and newborn care, rehabilitation services, lab services, prescription drugs, outpatient care, pediatric services and preventive services (e.g. colonoscopies, PSA testing etc)

Moore emphasized the nature of the bill on offer was that health insurance wouldn't have to provide the above services even for those with regular health insurance!  That is how sweeping the bill was and how devastating the repercussions would have been if passed: None of the listed service would have had to be covered by insurance companies. (All were put in to sweeten the bill for the Freedom Caucus assholes. )

Moore's solution is that we now need to push for a "Medicare for all"  type of healthcare, similar to what oldsters like me already have, as well as most citizens of the planet. But he isn't unrealistic concerning what would be needed, i.e.the Ds winning next year with veto-proof majorities. A long shot to be  sure, but after Trump's election it was also regarded as a long shot that the ACA would remain in place  after the first year.  Everyone on the R-side, and certainly Trump supporters, expected it to be repealed as per his campaign promise. (But given how his Mexican wall promise also fell down, i.e. getting the Mexicans to pay for the thing and not U.S. taxpayers, we ought not express too much surprise.)

At the very least, Dems need "to fix those parts of Obamacare that cost us votes last year."  Moore also advised the resistance now needs to shift focus from the congress critters to the for profit insurance companies.  So, we need to exert as much political pressure as possible on the money-grubbing bastards.

Trump, ignoramus that he is (apart from being a psycho) actually believes now he can pivot to tax reform and have better success. But I have news for him, he won't. As Rep. Karen Bass (CA) put it last night:

"If Trump thought this was tough wait until he comes to tax reform"

The same issues that divided Reepos with their foolish AHCA will also divide them on the tax reform - why?  Because they again will need the votes of the same Freedom Caucus extremists to get anything through. But, those extremists - as per their performance yesterday - will demand far greater cuts than Ryan will put up, and more centrist Reeps will tolerate.

The WSJ today ('GOP Focus Shifts To Tax Code Revamp', p. A5) also pointed out an overlooked little fact: the healthcare bill was to be the lead-in for the tax code revamp, i.e.:

"Repealing Obamacare would cut spending on health care subsidies and cut $1 trillion in taxes."

With their stupid AHCA bill having bitten the dust, most of the momentum is lost for the tax bill. As a policy strategist for Cornerstone Macro LP quoted in the piece notes:

"Defeat on healthcare is a blow that could make it harder to pass a more ambitious tax plan such as proposed by House Republicans."

Indeed. And because the Reepos are going to use budget reconciliation again (where only a simple majority is needed, so they don't have to depend on Dems) they will have to adhere to the reconciliation rules. Those "forbid any plan from increasing budget deficits beyond the current budget window."

So, not only will Ryan and Trump likely have to contend with the touchy twerp Tea Baggers....errr....'Freedom Caucus', but also the budget hawks. That lot that won't tolerate one more cent added  to the deficit.

If Ryan and Co. expect Dem cooperation for this next round they won't get it. Because the Dems are smart enough to know that any tax bill put out by Ryan & Co. will have "bombs" buried inside. As  Rep. Bass observed: "We must be on our guard because another way for them to come after health care is by cutting the taxes that pay for health care coverage."  In other words, she recognizes a party of rats when she sees it, and also that -  like rats- they will keep coming after the 'cheese' by new and varied avenues if a primary one is denied. Dems can't rest and neither can the resistance movement.

Rep. Bass may also have nailed the basis for the Republican anti-ACA campaign most accurately, noting it was probably "political rhetoric to gin up their base" and "this was really sad because it misled an awful lot of people".     As she further observed, many of the ACA problems in states were self-inflicted, because when given the chance for Medicaid expansion and federal subsidies, they demurred - tossing their citizens into the crapper.

Bass, like Moore, did leave room for the Reeps to "come back to the table" - and maybe even work with Dems to improve Obamacare.  BUT that has to be for an affirmative (not destructive) objective. Dems will never cooperate so long as the mission is to deny healthcare to millions and toss people off what they have, then use the money saved for tax cuts to give the upper 1 percent.

See also:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/p-m-carpenter/71804/its-official-donald-trump-is-a-loser


And:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/steven-rosenfeld/71803/why-the-republicans-bizarre-and-failed-efforts-to-repeal-obamacare-is-a-major-defeat-for-trump-and

Teleprompter Trump: An Hour's Worth of "Sane" Boilerplate Balderdash

Trump during his performance last night: the snake oil salesman selling bottles of strychnine and passing them off as an elixir to a gullible audience.

"President Trump’s speech had an air of unreality because what he said tonight was so different than how he has governed in the first 40 days. He’s proposed nothing on trade or infrastructure, which might help working families; and his budget seems to cut education and medical research, which he talked about improving. The president is simply using populist rhetoric to cloak his hard right, anti-middle class agenda." Sen. Chuck Schumer

"The bad part of this is that it will fool a lot of people. If you knew nothing about Donald Trump before this and you just watched this you would say, 'oh there's a Republican president, he looks like a fairly reasonable guy'.  But what worries most of us is the personality, You can't have somebody who is diagnosable like this guy with the narcissism and all the rest and think that it's going to come out well for us. Somebody who sees things that aren't there. And we've seen that he doesn't know anything, saying the other day that he's finding out health care is difficult."  - Bill Maher on MSNBC last night


On the plus side, Trump didn't come unglued or unhinged in his speechifying last night to a joint session of congress. On the other hand that was a minimal threshold to cross and actually obscured the venomous aspect of the Trumpists' underlying policies. That was distinguished by a stilted,  fake appeal to "unity" - all belied by his actual recent actions, as well as his budget proposals.   For example, I read yesterday morning that among the cuts to be enacted - if he gets his way- are 80,000 AmeriCorps teaching assignments in disadvantaged urban and rural communities. It is like an American Peace Corps.

Worse: Under Trump’s “simplified” tax plan, millionaires would see taxes reduced by ten percent. Some families earning between $20,000 and $50,000 would pay more in taxes—for a shrinking social service infrastructure. The burden falls heaviest on lower-income workers, including the roughly 40 percent of the workforce earning less than $15 an hour. These are also the folks who stand to have their existing healthcare "repealed and replaced" with Repuke "access". (Transl You can get healthcare if you have enough $$$). On the other side of the ledger, Trump seeks a $54 billion boost for military spending, to be offset by slashing social programs. (Like Americorps and Senior Service centers)

As Chuck Schumer put it, the speech and reality have never been more detached.  Indeed, Schumer noted that when you peeled away the piffle the speech was "like the campaign." Meaning he says one thing and governs differently, or rather "pseudo -governs" For example, he talked about education and medical research but the budget he proposed will slash those things to the bare bones. Then he said he was going to "reform" Washington but his government is filled with swamp creatures including one, Wilbur Ross - who had become head of a Cyprus bank that helped Russian oligarchs launder money e.g.

https://boingboing.net/2017/02/28/new-secretary-of-commerce-wil.html


And one in particular with Trump's help - selling the particular oligarch a $40m hacienda in Palm Beach for $95m

In addition, while he bamboozled the assembled legislators and millions on TV, his war against the press goes on unabated as well as his war against the people of this country, including immigrants, minorities, and all those who'd be decimated by repeal of Obamacare. In this sense, Trump emulated the classic snake oil salesman handing out his favorite elixir but neglecting to the tell the buyers it is laden with strychnine and arsenic.

As exhibit A we can refer to Bernie Sanders' Twitter message after the performance:

"Perhaps most astoundingly … I did not hear President Trump say one word, not one word about the need to combat climate change … In fact, he pledged to increase our dependence on fossil fuels.
I had a difficult time not laughing out loud … on this very, very day he signed an executive order rolling back President Obama’s clean water rules."

So, as Trump was blabbering his anodyne hogswill to the peanut gallery, e.g.

"what will America look like as we reach our 250th year? What kind of country will we leave for our children? I will not allow the mistakes of recent decades past to define the course of our future."

 He already knew he'd signed away that future by signing an E.O. to allow coal companies to dump their waste into rivers, and (yesterday morning) gutting the Obama update of the "Clean Water Act" ,  enabling the larger poisoning of the nation's watersheds with more poisons: lead, arsenic, perchlorates. benzene, xylene, atrazine etc. At the same time he had to know  all that contaminated water would  spawn millions more cancers (pancreatic, kidney, liver, colon, breast, prostate),  that none of the victims would be able to afford to treat. Not with their ACA subsidies replaced by tax credits and health savings accounts!

Another patch of BS that he bloviated concerned infrastructure repair:

"Crumbling infrastructure will be replaced with new roads, bridges, tunnels, airports and railways gleaming across our beautiful land."

Does Trump have any clue how much that will cost? I doubt it!  An illustration of how much spending has fallen is indicated below with a graphic image of one consequence of inattention:















We act like essential idiots, paying more attention to the Business News crawl of the DOW's daily jumps, than to our REAL wealth - tied up in water mains, pipes. highways, bridges and sewer systems. Yet the cost of that unattended and lackadaisically maintained infrastructure is growing by the day. The American Society of Civil Engineers already estimates a cost of over $2 trillion to attain a stage of basic repair.

WHERE is Trump going to get that kind of money, given he won't even raise the revenue via taxes to do it - and cuts can't make it given all the other stuff he's promised? WHERE do we get that $2 trillion to begin maintaining our infrastructure?  As long ago as 2011, The Economist   ('Life in the Slow Lane', April 30, p. 29)  proposed introducing a "fuel tax rate increase"(currently at 18.4 c a gallon) but also noted that "these are even more unpopular than deficits".  But this is exactly what Trump would need to do, or have congress enact,

Instead, his actual plan entails a "private-public" cooperation but with private sharks grabbing most of the money (e.g. 82 cents of every dollar going to financiers, banks). In addition, Trump's plan requires drivers to pay high tolls, far greater than the fuel tax advanced by The Economist.

But merely to blab away about replacing crumbling infrastructure with "new roads, tunnels, airports and railways gleaming across our beautiful land." is nothing. Anybody can talk and promise the Moon. Talk is cheap, but people have to be intelligent enough to know when "bullshit walks" . The fact Trump didn't "lose it" already has many in the media believing that we have a real President after all because he didn't erupt in a psychotic meltdown. But they miss the point that he shouldn't be doing that ANYWAY!  Again, a low bar and low expectations - such that reading vacuous baloney from a teleprompter has idiots comparing him to JFK with his American University speech, e.g. "one people who bleed the same blood", compared to JFK's "we are one people on one planet who all breathe the same air". The difference being that JFK referred to all the peoples of the planet, not one people in one nation.

Another cynical play concerned invoking as his personal, grandstanding prop the widow of an American soldier, Ryan Owens, killed after being sent on an ill-conceived mission to Yemen.    (The whole mission itself  dreamed up at one dinner date with Bannon and son-in-law Jared Kushner, as Michael Moore noted last night:).  But for Trump in his consummate narcissistic bubble it was all about the applause meter. Grotesque!  There was Trump playing on the patriotism and sense of honor of those assembled to accrue more brownie points for his malignant ego.

As Bill Maher observed, talking to Chris Matthews afterwards:

"I wish she hadn't allowed herself to be used as his prop like that. I don't see any great courage here. Where's the courage?  Who wouldn't stand and applaud for a war widow? It's all very well and good to elect this guy who's going to be the bull in the china shop until people realize the china being broken is your china. You losing your health care. Your coal job not coming back."

Maher went on to note it's all "fun and games when you're out on the campaign trail" and rousing your base and the hate radio kind of stuff but now it's actually happening and people are being hurt. Families being separated, rivers polluted.  Again, emphasizing the disconnect between the rhetoric and reality.  Like the disconnect between the smooth spiel of a psychopath like Ted Bundy, and his actual deeds.

I still recall after Bundy was finally apprehended in Florida after his vicious sorority house murders at FSU, my friend Rick  (a psychologist) telling me: "The most brutal murders, especially of women, have been done by soft spoken, smooth talking psychopaths, like Ted Bundy."

Now, of course, we have a soft speaking (at least this time) malignant psychopath ready to murder our own country. But is anyone paying attention? Or will they now allow this pseudo-speech, a travesty if ever there was one, to lull them into a sense of false complacency?

Don't believe for a second that because Trump exercised a bit of restraint last night that he's sane. NO he is not. Even a psychotic - once he has his thorazine and a few shocks of ECT - can appear lucid and sane for an hour or so.  The mistake of too many women who crossed paths with Ted Bundy was they took his practiced normality signals as indicating he was safe to be with. They paid with their lives.  Our job is not to let Trump pull a Ted Bundy on all of us. Our duty is to resist until we are no longer able to do so. This loathsome maggot and his attendant parasites must not be allowed to prevail.

See also:

http://www.salon.com/2017/03/01/donald-trump-pseudo-president-media-embraces-his-latest-pivot-like-the-proverbial-drunks-under-a-streetlight/

Excerpt:

"Old habits and impaired thinking lead to a suboptimal outcome.

In the age of President Donald Trump, too many members of the American news media have acted like the drunk searching for his or her keys under the streetlight. They are looking for answers in all the wrong places.  Here are several examples drawn from the tour de force of lying and deception that Trump performed on Tuesday."

And:

http://www.salon.com/2017/03/01/trump-is-leaving-the-state-department-mired-in-chaos/

Excerpt:

“They really want to blow this place up,” a mid-level State Department officer told The Atlantic. “I don’t think this administration thinks the State Department needs to exist. They think Jared can do everything. It’s reminiscent of the developing countries where I’ve served. The family rules everything, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs knows nothing.”

Some of the Positive Highlights of This Year's Election

Brittany Maynard- had to move to Oregon to take advantage of a right to die measure. Coloradans no longer have to.

While it's easy to focus on the negatives in this past election, the fact is there were also a number of bright spots for any liberals looking for silver linings. I list a number of them below for the benefit of anyone who believes all has been lost by the ascension of Donald Drumpf to power.

1. Proposition 106 passed by a huge margin in Colorado.

This is our state's new aid in dying measure for those unwilling to live in abject pain with a terminal illness - say like the brain cancer Brittany Maynard suffered from two years ago. She had to move to Oregon to take advantage of such a law. Here in Colorado, despite over $1 million spent by the Roman Catholic Church, it passed by nearly a 3 to 1 margin.

 

The law offers all terminally ill patients who are at least 18 years of age to access life-ending, doctor prescribed sleep medications so they can die peacefully. To qualify, the patient must be diagnosed with a terminal illness by at least two doctors, be Colorado residents, and have no more than 6 months to live. They must also be mentally capable of making an informed decision in order to receive the prescription.

2. Passage of Amendment 70 to increase the minimum wage.

The state of Colorado passed a law making the minimum wage $12 per hour by 2020. Next year the minimum wage will go up to $9.30/ hr. then an additional 90 c / hr. each year until reaching $12/hr.  This will be a huge boon to the  thousands of service workers in the state and also help many more of them access housing that is currently out of their reach. All research carried out thus far shows that the job losses predicted by the nervous (conservative) Nellies will not cone to pass, and in fact the higher earning power of tens of thousands will translate into a more vibrant economy.

3. Initiative 300 passes in Colorado:

This extends Amendment 64 passed in 2012 and allows MJ users to now be able to use it publicly, e.g. in bars, cafes and even Yoga studios. Hitherto, those who purchased MJ had to return to their own homes and be out of public view.

4. Joe Arpaio booted from office in Arizona.

The heavy-handed bully sheriff Joe Arpaio will lose his job come January thanks to being thrashed in the local AZ  Sheriff election. Even better, after his crushing defeat by Democrat Paul Penzone on Tuesday, Arpaio faces the possibility of a criminal conviction as a final public humiliation. 

5. Kelly Ayotte knocked out in New Hampshire.

 

The odious Trump bootlicker Kelly Ayotte was thankfully knocked out of her own Senate seat in NH to Democratic Governor Maggie Hassan. Ayotte, believe it or not, is being rumored as a Defense Secretary pick for Trump, but I don't buy it. Not even Donald Trump could be that obtuse. Most in the know in New Hampshire put it as a PR leak, similar to an Arizona leak that Joe Arapaio will get a Homeland Security post.

6. Liberals kick ass in Nevada.

In Nevada Democrats scored big wins as Catherine Cortez  Masto bested Repuke Joe Heck and Dem Jacky Rosen defeated Republican Danny Tarkanian in Nevada’s 3rd District.  Nevada also passed a recreational marijuana law which Republican Sheldon Adelson (long time funder of Republican causes) poured lots of money into.

7. Florida passes a medical marijuana law.

 Florida voters approved the state constitutional Amendment 2 Tuesday to effectively legalize medical marijuana. The amendment, known as the Florida Medical Marijuana Initiative, passed with a 71 percent approval.

The People United for Medical Marijuana raised almost double what the opposition campaign did, with The Morgan Firm and the Florida Democratic Party counting among the top donors to the effort.

The amendment language allows for medical marijuana to be prescribed by doctors to patients of diseases such as HIV, glaucoma, post-traumatic stress disorder, ALS and Crone's disease. This is a significant expansion of the limited program in place now, which allows for certain physicians to prescribe non-smokeable low-THC cannabis to patients with cancer or who suffer from seizures or severe muscle spasms.

8. California approved a recreational MJ law that will have the biggest impact ever on acceptance.

Of course, most of us knew California would do this anyway, and perhaps it will finally inspire the Feds to look again at MJ banking rules..

9. A New Grassroots movement is building to oppose Trump's agenda and rebuild the Dems

To those unaware, Bernie Sanders' progressive campaign has now evolved and mobilized to become an activist movement with networks nationwide.  The aim will be to mount protests and congressional call ins to stop any overt Trump initiatives that don't redound to the national welfare, as well as primary Dem candidates who refuse to embrace the necessary change to include all Americans in their policies.  These groups are also now organizing for a "million person march" in the words of Michael Moore, for Trump's Inauguration Day.

10. People are now looking at finally getting rid of the archaic electoral college.

About time we junked this antiquated system and actually elected Presidents using direct democracy!

See also:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/robert-reich/69809/why-we-need-a-new-democratic-party

A Post-Mortem On A "Primal Scream" From The American Working Class

As the heads of Neoliberal elites in the U.S. and world can be heard popping in the wake of last night's Trump victory, it behooves us to look beneath at what drove it. I will maintain the warning signs were there all along for those who had eyes to see or ears to hear. Five months ago, in fact, I posted on film maker Michael Moore's prediction that Trump would win the election based on working class rage in the "Brexit states". I wrote, referring to his appearance and statements on Bill Maher's Real Time":

Moore zeroed in on the "Brexit" in the US of A, comprising three  industrial states: Wisconsin, Ohio and Pennsylvania with their 64 electoral votes. Those 64  electoral votes were the difference between Mitt Romney becoming the 45th President in 2012 and just another loser to Obama. But this time around, as Moore explained, they could easily be grabbed by Trump - especially given all three feature Republican governors who can gin the voting rules in their favor, including via use of electronic voting machines which were a major factor in Bush winning Ohio in 2004.

This turned out to be the case, as all three 'rust belt' states named were lost to Trump, putting him over 270 to the consternation of all sane people on the planet. (As commentator David Axelrod put it on CNN, the voters had issued "a primal scream". Yep, and they also jumped off the political cliff)

Less noted was how the excitement in Democratic quarters absolutely nose-dived when Bernie Sanders (another change populist) was knocked out by HRC, assisted by the DNC's superdelegate system.. It didn't seem to register at the time that many voters wouldn't just jump on the Hillary ship, or evince the same level of excitement they did for Obama back in 2012. Indeed, exit poll results released this a.m. on CBS showed "Change voters" were swept up by Trump to the tune of 83% to 14% for Clinton. It is hard to believe many of those weren't actually former Sanders' primary voters - who jumped ship to the Donald because they didn't believe they could get real change from Hillary. (Her VP pick of Neolib Tim Kaine also factored into that, say as opposed to picking Elizabeth Warren).

As exit poll numbers and analyses came out this morning these suspicions turned out to be the case. For example, younger voters came out by only 55% this time for Clinton compared to 2012 when it was 7 points higher. Black voters came out to 88 % but this was 8 points lower than before. And Hispanic voters came out for Hillary 65% vs. 71% in 2012. The fact five formerly 'blue' states flipped last night was a case of lowered voter turnout in each of those demographics. Meanwhile, the GOP and Trump benefited from millions of new voters - all mainly blue collar (and many of them registered union Dems) - who came out to turn the tables.

This elicits the question of what happened with the damned polls, i.e.  that they got it so wrong?  In a previous post I cited Charles Seife's excellent book,'Proofiness - How You're Being Fooled By The Numbers' , which explored the problem of getting random samples within large populations. In terms of national polls specifically he indicated the error span could approach as much as 6- 7 percent. This alone could explain a lot of the "flipped states" last night. Another aspect was raised by Frank Luntz on CBS this morning, that Trump voters as a rule "don't want to tell pollsters anything, not because they're afraid but because they are hostile to the system and regard polls as part of it:."  That is something I've long suspected, but it really burst through in the wee hours last night as even Pennsylvania and Wisconsin fell red.

Let me also interject here that FBI Director Comey also merits some of the blame, releasing that absurd letter pertaining to Clinton emails 11 days before the election which - as The Washington Post noted:  "undercut Democratic enthusiasm, and his suggestion that the investigation into her would reopen motivated Republicans to fall in line."

I warned before, in a number of posts, that these  members of the white working class were feeling a lot of strain under the Neoliberal economic boot. Trade deals pushed since the mid -1990s had cost them their jobs, ground them under, even as Dem Neolib cheerleaders like Paul Krugman tried to insist more average people really do benefit from free trade policies like NAFTA. See e.g.

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2016/03/krugman-loses-it-brands-bernie.html

Add in the job loss from automation and the failure of corporations to create new jobs - instead sitting on their piles of cash - and you have most of the negative economic inputs. But why latch onto a billionaire like Trump who hasn't paid taxes the past 20 years as their economic lifeboat? Especially given he has no more use for them than Reagan had for "Reagan Democrats" in 1980 and 1984. Good question, but my theory remains:  that they have aggregated to him because he channels their pent up rage and bombast, from his outbursts against immigrants, to dissing the disabled, to rating women and castigating  other ethnic targets. And always wielding the grievance cudgel as he does so.  The Economist really put the Trumpies in perspective in a brilliant piece from last year, noting (Dec. 5, p. 30):

"The anxiety Trump supporters betray by looking for scapegoats says most, of course, about themselves. Typically members of the white lower middle class, they are at once jealous of the small privileges that distinguish them from the toilers below, and bitterly resentful of the faraway government that provides their Social Security, VA care and Medicare.

Remonstrating in hard times, they are the "radical centre" in academic jargon, who turned out before for George Wallace, a populist southern Democrat who ran for President four times in the 1960s and 70s."

The article then identifies the iconic Trump supporter of this "radical center" with a character  from a John Updike novel named Rabbit Angstrom "from whose flabby mouth dripped endless expressions of impotence, anger and glum humor...having retired to Florida to nurse his disappointment".

Interestingly, this fits perfectly the mold of alienated blue collar worker described by Thomas Frank in his 'What's The Matter With Kansas?' , also pointing out how and why the Democrats began looking past the working class and its interests to focus on the shrinking middle class alone.

It is easy to write such (Economist)  essays when one is a member of the entitled Neoliberal scribe class. It is much harder to bear when one must feed a family of five or six on a pair of $11/ hour "gig" jobs  after losing a good paying factory job.  Multiply that millions of times and one can see the angry 'chickens' coming home to roost, as they did last night, turning formerly blue states red.

 We can go through the endless whys and wherefores all we want, the bottom line is a guy totally unqualified to be President is now President Elect. All the "Rabbit Angstroms" who voted for him and now expect him to "make America great again" are in for a rude shock because he won't be able to deliver on any of those insane promises.   Just building the giant wall he wants will cost at least $200b and that is lowballing it. Where will he get the money? (He did ask facetiously at one rally recently 'Will you all help me pay for it?")

He might make greater strides on killing the TPP but even then will need congress to work with, especially the GOP who are all for it. (Siding with Obama). That is another thing that pissed off the working class, Obama's fetish for the very kind of trade deal  (e.g. TPP) that earlier cost them their good jobs. I am convinced they never forgot, and every time Obama went out to stump for Hillary - five to ten thousand more blue collar Dems decided to either stay home or vote for Trump.

A President Trump will have a much tougher time trying to privatize Social Security or cut Medicare, the "entitlements" those like Paul Ryan have been so desperate to whittle away. Indeed, if the Senate Democrats have any testosterone left at all they will use it to summon the nerve to filibuster such nonsense each time it comes up. Just because Mr. Trump managed to get elected doesn't mean he gets carte blanche to do whatever the hell he wants. And that includes trying to repeal Obamacare and rounding up 11 million Mexican immigrants to send home.

In the end, the dyspeptic scream of the alienated American working class last night echoed one from 84 years ago in Germany, which saw Adolf Hitler ascend to power (after President Paul von Hindenburg capitulated when the Nazi party received a majority of seats in the Reichstag). The "good Germans" had spoken and they wanted done with the Weimar (democratic) system which they perceived as inimical to their economic welfare. But with Hitler, all they got in the end was blood, war and devastation.

Make no mistake, the Dems will have to grow a pair of balls  over the next three months and get used to using the same obstruction tactic that the Reeps have employed the past 8 years and had promised to use again.. That means NO Supreme Court picks approved, NONE - unless they meet certain critical litmus tests (e.g. for Roe v. Wade). This is exactly what these turds had planned to do if Hillary had won. (Google John McCain's remarks on it.)

They will also have to get used to using the filibuster to block any and all legislation that doesn't redound to citizens' benefit including Social Security cuts or replacing Medicare with "premium support", e.g. vouchers. If I had had to use them the past four years (only $10k allocated per year)  it would have put me in a $90,000-plus  debt hole and likely propelled a medical bankruptcy.  The WaPo today claimed that the Repukes will try to get social policy issues passed instead using "budget reconciliation" where a 60-vote majority can be sidestepped. But this is effectively a "nuclear option" which the Dems could use on them in a future, more favorable election cycle. It would therefore be dumb for Ryan and the Reepos to try to use it now, say to push for Medicare budget cuts.

One big consolation for Clinton voters: she is ahead in the popular vote (as of this writing) by:

59, 048, 170 to 58, 926, 233 for Trump.

If it holds, and I believe it will - obviously adding as the three remaining states are finally called- Trump will have his work cut out for him to bring in an even bigger slice of the electorate to: a) accept him as their President, and b) not to alienate them with policies or executive orders that they will perceive as hostile. If he dismisses them, he does so at the risk of being a one term wonder.


See also:

The Democrats Abandon the White Working Class to Trump At Their Own Peril