Late night last night, so no post today.
Inexplicable. Likely corrupt. But no matter–I’ve lost my country, and I am devastated.
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A jaundiced look at the world we live in.
A jaundiced look at the world we live in.
Late night last night, so no post today.
Inexplicable. Likely corrupt. But no matter–I’ve lost my country, and I am devastated.
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So sad
So so sad
IN/kY. Lost them
I need a big doobie
You’re not alone.
It’s not over Sheila.
There are still millions of mail-in ballots to count all over this nation. I’m still hopeful.
While McConnell and Graham hold their Senate seats I’m am hopeful for an even split in the Senate, at the least, which will make Kamala Harris a power to be reckoned with.
I had to tune out last night so slept about 5 hours.
While driving 131 South through Alabama to our condo in Santa Rosa Beach, we were caught off guard by miles and miles of yard signs: “Jesus 2020”. Second only to Jesus, were Biden Harris signs. My guess is the local Baptist rule and Democrats from the north brought their signs with them and posted at midnight on the way to the Florida Panhandle. Polling places all had lines and guessing from the gun racks, they were not casting ballots aligned with yard signs would otherwise indicate.
I’m done fighting for this country.
Last night’s results were a Requiem For Hope! How can we survive another four years of deconstruction, dictatorship, racism, bigotry, condoned violence in our streets? Mitch McConnell is still in control of the Senate and will continue to control this country even if Joe Biden wins the presidency. Those of you who have forgotten the past of his control over the Obama administration’s progress are doomed to watch it continue with the rest of us who tried to end it.
I turned to MSNBC early to watch the results start coming in; had polls even closed when INDIANA and Kentucky had final results and entered their Electoral College votes? I suddenly felt empty inside and didn’t want to watch any more, only spot checked then turned off my TV.
Yes. It’ s very disappointing. Our expectations were for those we thought were rational beings. What we see is that almost half the people who vote are not rational, not aware of history, not aware of history and are so self-serving that a two bit con man can lead them to their own destruction. That, by definition, is a cult.
The Trump death cult is astonishing only to rational people. The Trump-ites think that a government that screws up their own best interest is good. They are willing to gasp to death with COVID because Trump and Atlas said it was O.K. to do so. No political message can overcome that sort of mental dysfunction.
And then there are the Florida Latinos. They, foolishly bought one word and one word only: SOCIALISM. Well, Democrats aren’t socialistic, but they abject cultural fear of Castro’s Cuba sent them over the lemming cliff for the worst human being this country ever produced. Trump makes Castro look like an angel, and yet they went all-in for the lies. How does anyone rationalize that?
Biden may yet become President, but with McConnell controlling what the Senate votes on, our government will simply stop functioning. It won’t matter how packed the courts are, because there will nothing to contest after SCOTUS overturns the ACA, Roe v. Wade and all the regulations intended to protect our air and water.
Well done, American voters. You stuck your heads up your asses and saw who and what you are. And you enjoyed the view.
There are a lot of votes yet to be counted, but what struck me this morning was a basic cold fact – January 20, 1981, was a benchmark in our history. That was the day upon which the program to dumb down America began.
No matter what, the most evil man in America will still control the Senate. We are more racist that I thought we were and that’s truly a sad day for America.
I don’t know my own country anymore.
Talk about shock and awe!
Americans cannot differentiate the truth from the false because of all the propaganda in the media. If you don’t trust the media or the government, you’ll fall for a con man in a business suit.
Even though I lowered my expectations to nothing, I thought we would see a rejection of an authoritarian wannabe. I was wrong.
I see the same performance from the DNC as 2016, even though we had a clear track record of Trump’s poor leadership skills.
As we continue watching the results trickle in from the remaining states, I am sure the analysis has already begun. Who will be the scapegoats in this election? Will the DNC reevaluate how they handled the primary? Who showed up to vote and who didn’t?
The young progressives were raising flags all over social media leading up to this race.
Theresa Bowers; I just forced myself again to get off of my couch and get back into the reality of today. My last thoughts before leaving the haven of my couch was that I have never wanted to live in a foreign country; but somehow here I am living in a foreign land without leaving my home.
It seems, at least, half the population is masquerading as human, is ok with being deceived, and is ok with funding corruption. Disappointment isn’t even the word.
JoAnn and Cheryl, Yes and yes again.
“The young progressives were raising flags all over social media leading up to this race.” They likely did not vote and think they won and will take over in 2024. Speaks as much as anything to our education system…
“America, love it or leave it” they told us in 1970….they are screaming it again…
Many of us have the luxury of living basically the same lives regardless of who is elected. If your values don’t align with the leaders, please remember all the people whose lives really are in danger. Don’t stay in devastation. Realize that many, many, many have lived without representation in our country for years. Now is not the time to shut down. It’s the time to hold on to your power to live your values on a very personal level.
I think it will take many of us a long time to come to grips with the fact that a huge number of people in this nation are comfortable with having an…orifice as president. I had thought that despite our differing views we largely agreed on things like decency, working together, etc. I was wrong. I’m not sure the country I thought we have ever existed.
I am truly disappointed in my fellow Americans that they would support Trump after the things he has said, things he has done, the way he has governed and the constant proven lies he has spread.
I never wanted to believe 50% of all Americans are below average but that seems to be the proven case, I just can’t believe they are that far below average but they are.
The misinformation was successful and the republicans are good at solidifying all those falsehoods. As someone on this blog said recently – “Democrats are a party of godless, communists out to take away your guns, bibles and big screen TV’s”…and as trump said many times at this rallies, they will dismantle the police, take away Christmas and on and on and on. I also believe there was a push to elect trump because there was no way, no way, many of his followers would ever accept a woman as president, let alone a black woman, if something happened to Biden. I agree, Theresa, I don’t recognize my country anymore and have to face the fact that the majority of our citizens are racist, highly gullible and selfish. The qualities that we hope to attribute to our leaders – honesty, integrity, compassion, fairness are out the window.
What Mark Small said – and everybody else, too, but I, too, have been saying it all started with the actor 40 years ago — and with the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine.
Our niece Aimee Rivera Cole lost the State Rep 37th race to Todd Huston by 58% to 42%. There’s only one way I can look at this. Hamilton County, which is the 35th wealthiest county in the entire nation, has a voting population comprised of almost 60% racists. LaGrange County is 3/4 racists and about every other Indiana county is somewhere in between.
Even if Joe and Kamala win the White House they will be hobbled for 4 long years by a GOP-led Senate. This makes 2022 even more important but without voting rights legislation and with our skewed red courts we are significantly handicapped to take the Senate. But take it we must and the fight goes on.
However it goes I can never look at my Country the same way again. My Dad did not fight for 4 years in the Philippines and New Guinea for this.
Thank you all, and especially Prof Kennedy, for helping me stay sane. ☮️
If you think it’s easier to not live in the states anymore, you’re so wrong. It affects us just as much but with the soul crushing fact that we don’t want to live with you anymore! WTF America? Why isn’t this election result a total reputation of IQ45? It’s so close!
My gawd, I’m embarrassed over here. How can I ever admit that I’m American living abroad.
Unbelievable that it was so close. Damn.
For what it’s worth, Biden is likely to win at this point. Biden ahead in AZ, NV, WI and MI. That gives him 271 even if Trump ends up winning NC, GA and PA.
Court challenges likely ahead. Fearing also R state legislatures trying to replace electors. Also, one fear I’ve always had is that electors get bribed to switch their vote. That’s something nobody ever talks about.
Unbelievably the D’s lost U.S. House seats even though they had strong leads in every generic ballot poll. (Maybe it’s not shy Trump voters as much as shy Republican voters.) The House still
majority D. The Ds could still get a majority in the U.S. Senate but that’s pretty unlikely at this point. Perdue’s vote total would have to fall below 50% and both races go to a run-off that the Ds win.
Biden is going to have to set up a coalition government if he wants to get anything done. DC and PR statehood, court-packing are definitely off the table. If Biden is seen as wanting to work with the Rs and the Rs block him, he could make the case in the mid-terms for more House members and a D majority Senate.
A silver lining is that maybe the Ds and Rs will work together on judicial appointments.
Patrick, the map for the Ds to win the Senate in 2022 is better than it was this year and much better than 2018. I don’t buy that the courts have any impact whatsoever on who wins the Senate. I also don’t much buy the voter suppression line. Lord knows the Rs tried actual voter suppression this time and did nothing more than provoke a backlash.
Stephen,
In my book, “Racing to the Brink: The End Game for Race and Capitalism”, I covered your thesis about Reagan/Regan being the start of the end of our democracy. It wasn’t that hard of a call, either. The facts since 1981 show that you are correct. And here we are.
I tried to keep myself from being hopeful, but this result is incredibly disappointing. While I know it’s not over, there’s still, hope, I can’t help but lament what we’ve lost and will likely not get back. This is not who I want America to be. And we can’t blame Trump for all of it; Barr, McConnell, Gingrich – they’ve been working for this for 30 years. They finally found a puppet who could somehow turn the apathetic and the easily manipulated into outspoken activists spreading hate and falsehood. Before yesterday, I was thinking that no matter what the result, we have work to do. And I was ready to do it. Today? I am with some of the other commenters in the “why bother?” camp. I hear Canada is nice … if they’ll have us.
I am embarrassed to call myself a “Hoosier” any longer. Holcomb is obviously too stupid and corrupt to run a state, but here we go for four more years. ARE WE SURE there was corruption in the election? It seems kind of odd that most races showing the Dem losing by over half.
What the hell is the matter with half of the Electorate? This time you can secede and we won’t go to war about it. ByeBye.
A Don McLean melody with the lyric “The day Democracy died” keeps echoing in my head.
Last week a correspondent wrote an article criticizing the US electoral system.
His Twitter account was flagged.
Twitter and Facebook site shutdown has happened to over 100 sites since we’ve come to DC.
Glenn Greenwald, writing 11/4/20 on Substack.com, has compared Brazil’s similarly-sized election returns — with results available by 6:00 pm on Election Day — with the incapable US election system.
When DT has declared he has won the election, we have no evidence to refute his claim.
Linda, I wrote that comment, “Democrats are a party of godless, communists out to take away your guns, bibles and big screen TV’s”. This was the GOP message you can add more fear mongering Memes to it.
From another blog I read someone posted, “Trump, whatever else he is, is “genuine.” I’d say genuinely bad, but his supporters obviously think differently. They know (they think) who Trump is, and this knowledge resonates with and motivates them”. The author of this quote is correct and the Trumper’s I have encountered fervently believe this. Without the slightest bit of hesitation The Trumpet says out loud what the base believes in this sense he is “genuine”.
What is striking as many of the analysts commented on was the overwhelming margins The Trumpet ran up in the rural counties by huge margins like plus 65% in his favor. They do not have a lot of population individually but taken as a whole they offset the urban Democratic vote. This has been the case for many election cycles.
Is there any point to polling in the next election? Sure, we all want an indication of who is leading in the races we care about, but the technique we now use is so thoroughly discredited it seems like a waste of time, money and brain power better used in more gainful pursuits. No doubt it affects outcomes in undesirable ways (why bother voting if your candidate is ahead by ten points?).
At a deeper level, college courses in Probability and Statistics will have to be revamped if they are to be of use beyond mortality tables. Obviously, either their approach is wrong or people lie so often to pollsters that the whole process reveals nothing of value. Who would voluntarily tell a pollster that they favor a slug who opposes all that is good about democracy? It’s easier to lie and be thought reasonable than to admit that your mind is a dark, bottomless cesspool.
Biden has a reasonable chance of winning unless Amy Covid Barrett gets to select our next president. But if he does, what does another four years of a virtually stalemated government look like? O.K., it’s far better than another term with a Putin admirer, but will the coronavirus and climate change wait around for us to get our act together before demonstrating that Mother Nature remains in charge? I think not. We are – quite probably – screwed.
amen
I remain hopeful Biden wins when all absentees and other early voted ballots are counted. But I am very upset that Trump somehow is competitive even though he’s quite willing to expose and kill his own staff and supporters with COVID AND that pollsters for every major news outlet still can’t seem to get it right on presidential or U.S. senate races even after their major embarrassment in 2016. Grrrrr.
I went to bed at 5:15 this morning – and couldn’t sleep. I finally slept for three hours, reconsidered my move to Kamloops, British Columbia (if Trudeau would have me), and out of deference to the memory of two of my friends who were killed in WW II in the defense of democracy, decided to stay and fight. So now what?
Here’s what. Assuming a Biden election, Mitch will not have the free hand he has had with Trump in re judicial selection and other such initiatives and will have to work with a president who knows the ropes. We will continue to enjoy a majority in the House, and here’s the way we handle this: We hold things together for two years until we have another shot at the Senate. Just as Trump has had his Nancy so Biden will have his Mitch. Such a reality suggests compromise will be available with perhaps a few Republican senators who will be out from under the influence of a twittering Trump, so all is not lost, at least not yet, so let’s start, as usual, from where we are, and persevere.
Parenthetically, remind me that I have now guessed wrong in two consecutive elections and that as a result I must forever look askance at “statistical analysis.”
I am not as pessimistic that Biden can’t accomplish things working with the Republicans in the Senate and a reduced House majority. There are a lot of common issues they could work together on. For example, infrastructure, ethics reform, etc. It just won’t be the progressive issues many in the D party wanted.
Bottom line, Trump was a fake deal maker. Biden is someone who can cut deals and get things done. While McConnell might want to block him, there are Rs who would probably be willing to work with him on common goals.
I put my dream team baseball cards on the table and wave sage incense to rid the surroundings of evil thoughts and thwart the demons … and what do I see … Biden in The White House; Senate seats tied; Pelosi presiding over a Blue House Chamber; and Kamala Harris riding to the Congress in Session with a Secret Service entourage to break the tie. God! I just just love the smell of smoking sage! ?
We have lots of political lemonade to make. Need focus on solutions-not-problems. Biden and fellow democrats must keep O’Connell under heavy thumbs. Never have I seen such a terrible state in this country….but we must act on it…instead of despairing. Biden with powers of veto will be key to holding down the outlaws.
Catty Kay from BBC World News said on MSNBC this morning that Europe is stunned that, at this point at least, Trump didn’t get an immediate and total drubbing, which implies that a substantial number of Americans aren’t offended by his incompetence, racism, xenophobia, misogyny and “America First, Eff Everyone Else” attitude. She said that even if Biden wins, the reputation of the US as the standard-bearer for democracy will still be tarnished.
To quote PZ Myers…”The fact that [we]couldn’t get a definitive majority when one candidate was a corrupt, incompetent ass, and that we’re still playing games with that archaic electoral college, tells me that I’m living in a s**thole country run by corporate stooges pandering to an ignorant, racist white electorate.”
I think that covers everything.
Norris–I don’t know you and yet I adore you. I saged my house and the yard last week and I appreciate the Baptist comment. I am going to vent for a moment and then I quote Mike Barnacle from Morning Joe. First, I am tired of the Electoral college and am tried that Racist Bubba and his wife Racist Karen living in BFE (Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, etc…) attending their Southern Baptist, Pentecostal, non-domination churches who preaches hate from the pulpit for anyone who is a Democrat or an ‘other’ that we are going to hell-I am tired that somehow their vote counts more than mine in suburbia Indianapolis, now Nashville. I drive by their little church signs stating…make America great again and I am aware of what they are spewing from their pulpits and I am tired for being told for YEARS that you can not be a Christian and be a Democrat. The way to heaven is to vote Republican.
Mike Barnicle announced that this election is his last that he will be reporting/commenting on and mentioned that people need to realize that there is 45% of the population who resent/hate the 55% of the population and democracy is not sustainable at this level of resentment.
I realize the irony in my statements and then me quoting Barnicle.
Even though I lowered my expectations to nothing, I thought we would see a rejection of an authoritarian wannabe. I was wrong.-
Todd, you made me laugh and cry at the same time! Yes, I agree.
There will be more Senators up for election in 2022, not the 4 years some have worried about. Democrats can still flip the Senate then and start legislating for the people instead of the rich corporations/bankers who donate to the Republicans.
Elaine, you’re good with me. You wage civil discourse while demonstrating mental dexterity garnered by character of integrity. In addition to the ballot, that counts, too.
Joan–as I told my mom today. I think humans are lazy, lazy thinkers and are not able to really critically think. The majority want to be told how to act, how to think and they need it to be concrete. I think that is why mega churches and some of these conservative religions are so appealing to so many. They are told how to think, who to vote for, how to live their lives, who to hate, who deserves and who does not deserve….they attend authoritarian institutions and need the government to replicate that. I do not know if this is a new thing–ie-people needing to be told and needing authoritarianism in their life because it has become so complicated or if this is just a natural trait in humans.
It’s going to be a free for all for states’ rights. Move to the west coast and teach at one of our amazing colleges. At least you will be getting your basic rights.
How fast will a barrel of apples perish when half are already rancid?
Things said today on this blog give some indication of the answer:
Biden may yet win.
All is not lost.
I’ve decided to stay and fight.
I don’t recognize my country any more.
I am not pessimistic.
Well, I am pessimistic. My pessimism comes from learning last night how many residents of this country are lost beings. Those lost beings are sub-woofers who are content to take, steal if need be, the golden fruit a democracy gives them, suck every inherent value from it, until nothing is left but an ugly, hard and heavy object, and then, tittering incantations like tetched witches, they toss it into the gears of the system that produced the golden fruit in the first place.
Right, all is not lost…but fully half this country is now rotted to the point of putrefaction. How fast will a barrel of apples perish when half are already rancid? Even if Biden wins, the barrel is doomed.
Paul – you really think the GOP senate will work with Biden for “ethics reform” after the impeachment charade, the court packing/whacking, etc. You still hung over from last night? Wake up bro…
Back in the 60’s I argued with my dad, who was a Republican, that the United States of America is not the private property of the Republican Party. I still believe that. I also believe that until we begin to seriously work on eliminating institutional racism, we will continue to have elections like this one. We wonder how people can vote for a person who is obviously brain damaged, and I think the answer begins with racism. We may not be able to get rid of personal racism, but the racism in institutions can be dealt with. We made a good start in 1965 with the Voting Rights Act (remember Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman?) which was eventually gutted with the excuse that it’s not needed anymore, but obviously it is. We need to strengthen voting rights, not try to eliminate them. It’s an important first step.
Lester, you’re assuming Biden can’t pick off some Republican Senators to go along with a sizable Democratic minority. I think he can. You also have to remember that the reason why many of these GOP Senators did nothing these past four years was that they were terrified because Trump was President and would go after them. Now they won’t have to worry about that. I could see GOP Senators going along with laws such as requiring disclosure of income tax returns for presidential candidates, protecting whistleblowers, protecting inspectors general, making the Justice Department more independent so it doesn’t face political pressure. In fact, Republican Senators might be even more inclined to support these reforms because they will apply to limit the power of President Biden as opposed to President Trump.