The 2016 Presidential Campaign

[eleanorigby]

Originally Posted by Andrew Jackson's Hair

Take it back from what? 70% of the electorate, in a democracy? Whites voted Trump in. But what did Hillary offer them as an alternative? More white guilt? More "diversity"? I am stunned by the obliviousness of the DNC.

First of all, 70% of the electorate didn't vote. Second, this country is getting browner by the minute and will continue to do so. It's also getting less Christian. This is happening and there is no stopping it unless we start recruiting Europeans or Canadians, both of whom are smarter than they look and like their decent health care and relatively inexpensive college educations etc.

How can you think there is anything you can take back by being politically aggressive? America just had the most "honest conversation on race" it has ever had, and the final words were "fuck you". Either (a) have a candidate that these people are going to vote for, (b) wait a century for them to become a minority, or (c) get used to losing. And since most every other one of my predictions has come true, here's another one:

This is just the start. Whites are going to get worse. Whites have started voting their own identity politics, just like everyone else does. Whites are now used to being called racists. They are now used to having their conservative political candidates be referred to as "Hitler", and trust me you dumb fucks: that is not a good thing. Every one of you little drama queens screaming "racist" is just going to make white people more comfortable with the term. Do you not get that? It was NOT effective in deterring the votes for Trump. It did not work. Repeat: they didn't give a fucking shit. Are you going to take it back by yelling it more loudly?

If the DNC wants to remain at all relevant, take the bottles of hot sauce out of your purses and start engaging with 70% of the goddamned fucking electorate. Try to do it without condescendingly referring to them as deplorable.

Third, identity politics has always been played in this country, long before we divided in to red and blue.

This kind of talk makes me tired. Democrats always do this after a loss--and it is fostered by the GOP. We self-reflect and worry and become internally chaotic; the GOP doubles down. Guess which is more effective.

While I agree that the term "racist" is bandied about a bit too freely and has started to become meaningless, this characterization of one "side" by the other is not all from the blue to the red. Red state folks (generalizing here, you all know I mean Trump supporters) have just as many labels for us as we supposedly do for them. We're "classist", "elitist", "intellectuals", "snobs" etc etc etc. It is a culture war in many ways (it's also an economic one, and I for one, refuse to allow this group of people to claim some bizarre victim status when they have victimized so many other groups, over and over again. It is and was the "liberal elites" who got this country back to work, provided the things like the GI Bill and social support programs that are still successful today--but less so, thanks to GOP inroads. More whites than blacks are on welfare and food stamps, for example, but "they" demonize black and Hispanics for being drains on the government).

I have no desire to work with people who disdain me, my SES, my post-college degree, my cultural choices. But I will do so because we share this country and I wish others no ill will. So, I am more than tired of being told that not only is my stance of pro-immigration, sensible corporate and gun regulation, universal health care, pro-choice for women's health, and environmentally prudent energy sources "elitist" and "out of touch", it's also "un-American".

Don't even try to say that we blue states have oppressed and looked down upon these forgotten and forlorn innocents who only want to be good Americans. These good Americans are by and large bigots and xenophobes, who want their religion to be the only religion. That is not how or why America was founded, and if they had paid attention in history class, they'd know it. They claim to have wanted "change" and an "outsider" but they just voted in all manner of insiders--and not one of the GOP has these people's best interests at heart. They decry the elites and claim we disapprove of them, but vote in the party that cares the most about the elites--all because their media mouthpiece has sold them a bill of goods in the world's longest shell game. I'm not in a blue state echo chamber--red staters are in a much larger echo chamber and they have managed to separate "truth" from facts. Trump is their apotheosis.

I, and many blue staters are willing to live and let live, but that is not enough for red staters. I'm using blue states and red states as shorthand; I think we all know what I mean. Pro-choice does not mean abortion is mandatory, it means we as a nation support the woman's choice. That is unacceptable to red staters. Why the hell shouldn't I fight this? Where is their attempt to see the world through someone else's eyes? Why is it always up to the Democrats to be the bigger party, the more gracious adversary, the compromiser? This is a double standard, at the very least. Surely you can see that?

Yes, we were just given the loudest and biggest middle finger in this nation's history (barring the Civil War). But that doesn't mean we kowtow to ignorance or normalize sexual harassment and racial/religious intolerance.

I don't want obstruction for obstruction's sake either (and in that alone, the Dems show themselves to be better statesmen than any Tea Partier or any GOP). I think the more long-sighted of the GOP (mostly the Old Guard, who know that politics is all about compromise) will realize that they cannot enact all their insane ideas because they may do longterm damage to their party;they give fuck all about their country.