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There’s a huge election looming and Americans hate their choices. How did we get here? Most of us think no matter who wins, America loses. The two major candidates get plenty of exposure and we can’t stand either one, so we look at the others. We see Gary “What’s Aleppo?” Johnson and Jill “Everyone’s racist” Stein and get even more depressed. Who gave us these choices? Well, we did. We’re to blame.
America is divided, but not so much between Democrats and Republicans or between liberals and conservatives. Those divisions haven’t gone away, but they’re increasingly overshadowed by another divide: ordinary Americans against the establishment of both parties who have more in common with each other than with those in the ranks.
Each party is divided within itself as well. Would Bernie have won if the DNC establishment hadn’t conspired against him? Millions think so and they’re furious at Hillary, especially after WikiLeaks document dumps prove what Bernie said all along — that the Democrat establishment conspired against him. Republicans have Trump because they’re not happy with their party’s leadership who they see cooperating with Democrats. Rank-and-file Democrats and Republicans all believe the system is rigged against them — and the leadership of both parties is screwing grassroots America.
There’s a lot of common ground between disaffected Democrats and Republicans in the ranks. Union and small business Democrats hate global trade agreements — and so do their counterpart Republicans. All feel betrayed by Democrats Obama and Hillary as well as Republicans McConnell and Ryan as all cooperate more with each other than with them.
So what if Hillary prevails? Will she win over Bernie Democrats? Can she govern when two out of three Americans don’t trust her? And what if Trump wins? Will he keep on tweeting? Will he keep his mouth shut? Will he stick to the script or will he continue tripping over his own tongue? Can he persuade Americans to like him? None of this seems likely.
Will the two-party system continue? It seems hard to avoid a fundamental re-alignment. Will the Republican Party split? After Obamacare, we saw the rise of the Tea Party, but it was quickly subsumed. After November 8th, will it break away? Some see an overlap between the Tea Party and Trump’s constituency. Will the GOP split with Tea Party/Trumpers on one side and #neverTrumpers on the other?
Might the Bernie Wing of the Democrats discover it cannot live within a Clinton-dominated party after November 8th? Wikileaks may yet cripple a President Hillary Clinton, and make her a one-termer. What will the 2020 election lineup look like after this unprecedented 2016 general election? Whoever wins will not be able to wash off all the mud, and there are three weeks during which to sling still more.
And how about the MSM (Mainstream Media)? What will become of them after November 8th?There are two deeply-flawed candidates running, but the MSM (which includes NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, etc.) has gone out of its way to sling far more mud in the direction of Donald Trump while simultaneously trying to protect its favored Hillary Clinton by playing down the WikiLeaks documents and email scandals. Do they think grassroots Americans are blind to that? The MSM don’t even pretend to be objective anymore. WikiLeaks documents prove the MSM is a public relations arm of the Democrat Party. As a recent Tweet by Matt Drudge put it: “Media CAN'T cover WikiLeaks Podesta sh**storm — because so much of it involves them! Will take a generation to recover from this corruption.”
Just before the first debate, the New York Times published Trump’s 1996 tax return from an illegal anonymous source. Was that Obama’s IRS? Just days before the second debate and barely one hour before a damaging Wikileaks dump about Hillary, NBC put out the 2005 Trump/Bush sex tape it had been sitting on for a decade. Coincidence? Will ordinary Americans buy that? Will the MSM retain enough credibility to protect President Hillary for four years? Bernie Sanders railed against Wall Street billionaires all through the primaries and developed an enormous following. Now WikiLeaks has proven that Hillary has been Wall Street’s girl all along. Yeah, Bernie has endorsed Hillary and even campaigns for her, but what about the millions who were “feeling the Bern”? Will their energy be turned into a flame-thrower aimed at President Hillary?
After this election, who expects anything to remain the same?
37 comments:
I agree with just about everything you write here. If I were to nitpick, I would say that the importance of keeping a temperament like Trumps far away from any nuclear codes warrants more coverage than the scandalous details of another political bigwig insider like Hillary. Isn't this what we expect of her? Is it surprising? Yet with Trump, even though nothing he does should be surprising anymore, he continues to up himself with his moronic deeds and statements, and continues to show how unfit for office he is. This being more newsworthy is indeed reflected in the MSM coverage. As for the MSM, what excuse do you have for not admitting they are the most mainstream news of all, beating CNN and MSNBC combined in primetime. They are no less of a problem than the other outlets you mention. Anyway, I agree overall with most of your points here.
Ooops, I meant to say, instead of "they", that FOX News is maybe the most mainstream, and is in no way better than the others.
I agree that it's a contest between ordinary Americans and the elite establishment and the MSM is a PR arm of the Dems. However, Trump is by far the better choice for a multitude of reasons which have all been discussed ad nauseum. He fights back and never rolls over which is exactly what's needed to win. Dems destroy everything and everyone in their path, but not Trump.
What I adamantly disagree with is the flat out statement that Trump is "not qualified". And, the community organizer was? We'll likely never climb out of his fundamental transformation mess especially if The Hildabeast wins. Hold your nose but do the right thing and vote for someone who will flush the DC toilet.
I would say Hillary will lead us to war with Russia.
A vote for Hillary is a vote for war. She is definitely qualified to end the world as we know it.
Hillary and Jeb were the establishment candidates. The ones the wealthy and the corporations could live with. Bernie and Trump threw that out of wack with their widespread popular support and populist message. Oh yes, the media is corrupt. The mainstream media is owned by and represents the interests of the establishment. One point of clarification: it is not pro-Democratic party; It is pro-establishment. If Jeb or Rubio were running against Bernie I am sure the press would line up against Bernie.
PS. Hillary is a war hawk. I agree that she is more likely to bring us into direct conflict with Russia.
I disagree, I believe the media would be loving Bernie, and that he would have beat Jeb, Rubio, or Trump in a landslide. It would be the conservatives that would be ripping Bernie apart for his socialist ways.
I won't argue that Trump is not "qualified" but I would definitely say he is unfit. He seems to have a severe personality disorder involving extreme narcissism and a touch of delusion. You don't get more "establishment" than a spoiled little brat born with a silver spoon in his mouth, given vast wealth by his daddy, blowing through businesses with his bankrupt ways, blustering his way through life because of his wealth. He is like a gigantic baby that throws a tantrum every time his feelings get hurt. Thank god voters are smart enough not to send our country down the toilet with this cretin. He already knows he has no chance, which is why he is already thing about fixed elections. Not just a loser, but a bad loser.
For better or for worse we (Republicans and conservatives) are "stuck" with Trump.While he certainly has some character flaws,speech deficiencies etc.he does speak his mind and actually most of it turns out to be right. His non traditional approach on our current economic and national defense problems may be what we need at this point.What we have been doing for the last decade or so sure hasn't accomplished anything worth while.I imagine our enemies are wondering what they will be facing in Trump.
While Trump is an unknown as far as governing ability, Hillary certainly is a known element.She has a decades long track record of lies, slippery deals and disreputable and shady dealings. She is a power hungry, manipulative who will stop at nothing to achieve her goal of becoming president.Currently, Hillary has been carefully shielded from non scripted contact with the public but you can't do that as president. She has no respect for the Constitution, the military, the police or the common citizens. Hillary would use the power of commander in chief just to prove she is the equal of any male CIC, and this will be very dangerous for our troops.
Hillary as president, would be an absolute disaster for this country. Hillary as president would be an certain absolute disaster for this country whereas Trump could be the unconventional cure we need!
Trump has a decades long track record of lies, slippery deals and disreputable and shady dealings. He is a power hungry, manipulative who will stop at nothing to achieve his goal of becoming president.Currently, Trump has uncarefully blurted out idiotic statements you can't do as president. He has no respect for the Constitution, the military, the police or the common citizens. Trump would use the power of commander in chief just to prove his small hands are not to be laughed at, and he will be very dangerous for our troops.
Trump as president, would be an absolute disaster for this country.
Tom includes an image about Chelsea Clinton supposedly not being asked about her dad's infidelity. Pure lazy and shoddy journalism. Simply google "Chelsea Clinton questioned about fathers infidelity" and you will discover the many, many times she has been asked about that. Of course Ivanka is being asked more now because the allegations are new. C'mon, Tom.
Tom, I know that there have been many comments to your posts of the years stating how horrendous the two party system is, and I can't recall you agreeing with them. It seems now as though you may be saying now that this two party system we have does need to be crashed. It is nice to see that hardcore conservatives and liberals have something to agree with.
There is only one party and it is the DC/Beltway criminal party and the Mainstream media is its propaganda arm. Have they ever met a war, a spending spree, shovel ready stimulus, cash for clunkers, zero interest rate FED policy they didn't like.
The criminal party doesn't know what to think of Trump, he actually mentioned jail time, can you imagine who else besides Clinton may be looking at jail time in the DC crowd. What would happen if the FBI and DOJ weren't in the pockets of the DC crowd
These criminals will stop at nothing to continue their theft from the working class.
If Trump is elected he better wear his iron underwear every moment.
WOW! i am just blown away with the commentary by "Anonymous". The amount of intellect it took to respond in that matter to my posting (For better or for worse") could only be achieved by a moronic, liberal lemming. And then to hide behind "Anonymous" was truly inspiring. Congratulations you have achieved your intellectual limit!!
David
http://dissidentvoice.org/2016/10/hillary-clinton-the-queen-of-flip-floppery-on-genocide/#more-64269
The Queen of flip-floppery
No wonder Trump is flailing away at the media, it seems all his little lemmings are into that! Waaah, it's the media's fault, they keep reporting what is really happening, boo hoo". A bunch of little babies looking up and worshipping Trump, the biggest baby of them all. Being spoiled rotten by daddy does not go with with being thin-skinned and bad tempered. I have never seen a bigger sissy throwing so many tantrums when his poor little feelings got hurt. And somehow daddy's little pampered prince has you believing that he knows anything about the lower classes, or give's a candy-coated rat's ass about them? Suckers.
And poor David doesn't like the fact that his comments fit Trump so well when turned around. Blind to reality and following your orange-hued savior to....well to a landslide loss.
Let's factcheck this claim that Trump is a big whiney baby.
1. Conservative commentator Ben Stein, a Trump supporter, once said Trumps "whiny bitchiness" made him look like "a big sulky baby."
2. made excuses about his microphone being "broken".
3. Whines that the election is rigged before it even takes place.
4. Also claimed the Emmy's were rigged because his show did not win - see a pattern here?
5. whines about the media being "unfair" like a 3-year old pouting.
6. Whined that MSNBC was not talking about him enough. Host Joe Scarborough was astonished. "What are you talking about?" he asked, laughing in disbelief. "What are you talking about, Donald? How thin is your skin? I've been talking about you for a week."
7. During the second debate, Trump that that Clinton was getting more time to speak. CNN found that Trump actually got to speak longer than Clinton during the debate.
8. As Trump said himself: "I am the most fabulous whiner," he told CNN last year. I'm a whiner, and I keep whining and whining until I win. " Looks like he will be whining his whole life.
VERDICT; The biggest crybaby whining sissypants in the history of politics.
Man, up Dude. Put on your big boy pants. Show some cajones and act like a grown-up.
Take a look at these quotes Trump has made, many in the last year or two. It seems that this far right sham he is pulling on you is just snake oil. In favor of big government programs, pro-choice, admiring Pelosi and Obama for his stimulus package, and outright stating that he identifies more with Democrats. He sure sounds like a liberal to me. Not that the liberals want him in their camp.
“They lied. They said there were weapons of mass destruction. There were none. And they knew there were none. There were no weapons of mass destruction.”
“This is a very un-Republican thing for me to say … I’m going to take care of everybody [with universal health care]. The government’s going to pay for it.”
“I’m very impressed by her [Nancy Pelosi]. I think she’s a very impressive person. … She was really going to look to impeach [George W.] Bush and get him out of office, which personally I think would have been a wonderful thing.”
“Every Republican wants to do a big number on Social Security, they want to do it on Medicare, they want to do it on Medicaid. And we can’t do that.”
“In many cases, I probably identify more as Democrat.”
“I am very pro-choice … I am pro-choice in every respect.”
“I think he [President Barack Obama] did a great job. I thought he was strong and smart and it looks like we have somebody who knows what he’s doing. He’s a strong guy who really knows what he wants and this is what we need.”
Trump heaped this praise on President Obama in a Fox News interview in February 2009, after the president held a news conference to talk about the stimulus package.
And don't forget these Trump quotes!
“I just believe the Republicans are just too crazy right.”
“It just seems that the economy does better under Democrats,”
"I support the ban on assault weapons and I also support a slightly longer waiting period to purchase a gun.”
In the 2000 book, Trump pronounced himself “a liberal” when it comes to health care because it is “unacceptable … that the number of uninsured Americans has risen to forty-two million.” The solution? “While we work out details of a new single-payer plan,”
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2015/07/will-the-real-donald-trump-please-stand-up-120607#ixzz4NYpjjKxi
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Trump seems to be a liberal at heart on many issues, but what he mostly is an opportunist. He will say anything. I honestly think that he has become addicted to the roaring crowds at his rallies and is now just totally playing it up for them. The funny thing is that he seems confused about the rest of the country not being like his rallies. I heard him say that he doesn't understand why people and polls say he is unpopular with women, because he sees hundreds of them at his rally who come up and compliment him!!!
What a character. History will look back, shake it's head in bewilderment at this bizarre little footnote, and chuckle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFQcZMGe4p0
A day of reckoning, Trump takes the DC criminals to task in 4 minute excerpt from a rally
I am curious about something. If the MSM is so on the side of Hillary, why do they emphasize so many negatives? A study by Harvard's School for Government found that during the primary season Clinton received far more negative media coverage than Sanders or Trump. For example, Matt Lauer, during his national security forum on NBC, devoted more than a quarter of his interview with Clinton's email server, skipping over any foreign policy bona fides, then let Trump get away with his false claim that he was against the Iraq war from the start. Why? Isn't he part of the "rigged" election? How about Tom Brokaw talking about a stable during a 9/11 ceremony, calling it a fainting spell and suggesting she see a neurologist. Strange behavior for a media member supposedly rigging the news in favor of Hillary. The New York Times reported that during her pneumonia she looked like she had something to hide. I regularly read the Boston Globe and see loads of articles and columns about her emails, and other negatives. Wouldn't media, if they were unfairly biased, avoid this sort of thing?
I realize this is all probably involves too much thinking for many, who just want to go with their "feelings" that have been reinforced ad nauseam by the many right wing outlets - Fox, Hannity, Rush, Coulter, etc. Just throwing it out there anyway in case anybody has the balls to answer.
FACT: Clinton's E-mails are one of the most reported stories in political history. Why, mainstream media, why?
Watching the debate...how incredibly fascinating. This election is a complete reveal about how many voters believe reality.
Trump is like a robot reading off a list of every right wing wacky conspiracy/spin/hyped up talking point that is currently circulating the web. Talking point after talking point repeated and repeated. "OPEN BORDERS!" Ah,..actually no..."OPEN BORDERS"...nope, not true..."OPEN BORDERS!" It sure is going to be disheartening to the side that has been tricked. The side gulping up every single spit out debunked lie that Trump is constantly spouting....when people only listen to, and surround themselves by those thinking alike, are really out of touch with the rest of reality. We are about to find out how many uninformed there is out there compared to those living in reality.
But even after the election the delusions will linger...the election was rigged....the Emmy's were rigged....the mic was broken....whine, blame, whine, deflect...rigged....whine...sweat...lie, whine...it's rigged..whine...
The Emmy's were rigged, my mic was broken, the election is rigged, Hillary got debate questions....will the unsubstantiated excuses never end?
What a wimpy little bitch of a man.
I'm amazed how many Trump supporters live in a fantasy world. They seem to believe that there is a magic switch that the people in charge could push that would make everything like the magical 1950's world of Leave it to Beaver. I'm sorry but the world is complicated and every potential solution has good points and bad points.
Trump talks about building a wall to keep undocumented aliens out. Why not do the much cheaper and more effective solution? Fine the employers and if they are repeat offenders, put them in prison. People won't come across the border if there aren't any jobs waiting. But the people in power know that there are many industries, mostly agricultural that cannot get enough workers at the wages they can afford to pay and can't significantly raise wages because of competition with low wage countries. You can put tariffs on the products but that would raise the price of food, which would be unpopular and probably result in the other country putting tariffs on U.S. products going into their country which would cost the U.S. high paying jobs.
If you look at Trumps actual record, he is a failed businessman. The only thing that he is good at is marketing himself. He tried to run his own business but the lost One Billion dollars. That Billion with a B. Or $1,000,000,000 dollars. He lost it running a casino. How do you lose that much money on a product where people are standing in line to throw their money at you?
He told a news reporter that he basically liked to sexually assault women. How foolish can a billionaire get. Even if he was lying, he was setting himself up for a string of lawsuits. And his defense is that he was lying then but he's not lying now. How much lamer a defense can you get?
One of his favorite business tactics is to hire someone to do a job and then refuse to pay them. How would this tactic work with the U.S. Government. I would bet it would be the military personnel that would pay the price. Republicans are good about talking about defense but bad about actually be willing to pay the real price.
When it come to Hillary, it is difficult to tell what is real and what is fake. She has been under relentless attack by the right wing for more than 25 years. Her public persona is not particularly likable so she doesn't get the benefit of the doubt.
The e-mail scandal is a non issue with me. Anyone who has worked in a large organization for long enough will be put in a situation where you follow the rules or you get your job done. You can't do both at the same time. If you point out that the people who are the most successful are the people breaking the rules, it counts against you. I'm quite sure that the system that the Government wanted Hillary to work with was cumbersome. I've been there. Servers that automatically strip off all attachments. Servers that hold e-mail for days before delivery. She inherited her system. She didn't create it. Should she have changed to the government system? Of course, but what is the good time to stop getting e-mails and learn a brand new system and be out of the loop for a few days? I can see, I'll do it next week over and over again. If it were a male republican, he would have done the exact same thing. As a matter of fact the Republicans in the office before her did the exact same thing.
And blaming Hillary for the things her spouse did. How many presidents have been blamed for the things their spouse did? GW Bush's wife killed a man when she was a teenager. It was almost never brought up. Why? Because it was irrelevant to whether or not GW would be a good president.
I see it that a vote for Trump is a vote for war, perhaps a nuclear one. He is by far the more dangerous option.
I f Hillary has killed people, than so has most every other president and secretary of state in US history.
The chump will lose in a landslide.
That is the nature of high office. You have to make decisions that will cost people their lives. Every decision you make can cost lives. Prime Minister Chamberland refused to defend Czechoslovakia from Germany and it lead to WWII. Choosing military action costs lives. Deciding against military action can also costs lives.
Trump would leave most of the day to day work to his VP. His VP is a religious zealot. Not a good idea if you want to avoid war.
We are about to find out that one cannot win an election with only gloom and doom scare tactics. If Trump were smarter there would have no way he could have not rode the wave of disconnect and mistrust all the way to the White House. How moronic of a campaign do you have to run to lose to Hillary? It was his for the taking. What a joke - he is like a cartoon politician, like you would see on the Simpsons, or Batman.
"How moronic of a campaign do you have to run to lose to Hillary? It was his for the taking," says Anonymous above.
Have to agree with that.
http://www.towleroad.com/2016/10/meme-day-bad-hombre-cologne/
Hysterical
Q: If Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are in a boat and it capsizes. Who survives?
A: America
Trump claims he is going to sue his accusers. Not a chance in hell. If you can't see through that bluff I would love to play poker with you. The truth that comes out of this guys mouth is tiny compared to the BS.
I can understand why people don't like the Clintons and their policies but I do not understand the absolute hatred of them some people have. When I look at Hilary's record, I see a pretty middle of the road Democrat. There have been multiple scandals against her. Every time, the government has spent millions of dollars and thousands of man hours searching for evidence to convict her. In every case despite all time and money spent, they found nothing significant wrong. I'm a firm believer in evidence. At some point, if you can't find anything maybe that means that there is nothing to find.
When someone has been investigated for more than 25 years and tens of millions of dollars have been spent and tens of thousands of man hours spent and almost no evidence has been found, I believe at some point, you can conclude that the reason that you can't find evidence of a crime is because no crime has been committed.
All's that I hear is paranoid talk that that just proves that she's good at hiding. Weaving massive conspiracies with hundreds or thousands of people involved protecting Hillary. Whenever people talk about massive conspiracies its a clear sign that they have a poor connection with reality.
When people talk about Trump, you tend to hear that he is unfit for president because he is (something or other) and then they provide examples. When people complain about Hillary, they say she is a liar or is untrustworthy and just stating it as a fact without backing it up with any facts or bringing up scandals that has no evidence to back them up.
Much of modern conservatives seems to be its wrong because its not right. When I was a child conservatives had many good arguments and it was the liberals that relied on emotional arguments. Modern conservatives don't seem to care about logical arguments its arguments they tend to rely on pure emotion.
Absolutely....the right wing hate machine has done a great job over the last decades of spinning Hillary into some sort of lying, crooked, establishment demon, such a great job that many people believe it. This would have worked perfectly except for one thing - the person they chose to run against Hillary really IS a lying, crooked, establishment demon, and people seeing this for themselves over the last year has "trumped" the make believe version of Hillary.
After November 8?
Oh, no matter what, I'll be busily preparing to ignore any New Rules, AND topping up the wood pile. Looks like it's gonna' be a cold one this year! 'Course, that one hydro spool on the tractor COULD stand tending to. Barn painting oughta' be done by then but the chattel ALWAYS needs caterin' to.
CaptDMO
So some lefties thought it would be clever to put on shirts Trump fans wouldn't like and attend his rallies in order to incite some a-holes to take violent action. That is the extent of what has been proved. But just listen to Trump make up details and serve up another big crock of steaming BS. Sorry, loser, not going to help you in the election.
One thing that just occurred to me. In the 1950's, the McCarthy hearings looked to drive out communist influence in the U.S.
I wonder what Senator McCarthy would think about a presidential candidate who is deeply in debt to red China and who looks up to the leader of Russia as one of his heros?
I occasionally pick up the Conway Daily Sun when I shop north of Wakefield (NH) and I was glad I picked up the 11/25/2016 issue. Your column about your experiences as a history teacher was a breath of fresh air to this moderately conservative guy surrounded by a sea of liberals. Keep up the good work.
Your article was a fine counterpoint to the other article in the same edition defending the boorish behavior levelled against Mike Pence at the Hamilton play.
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