Did Trump win because many people in middle America feel like losers?

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Did Trump win because many people in middle America feel like losers?

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Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

Rush Limbo posted:

Yes, it's certainly the candidates fault that people are willing to vote for them. I mean, it's not as if the people who vote have any agency, it's those horrible mind control rays that was responsible.

I mean, if these people truly have no agency, no concept of what it is they're voting for, or why, then maybe they're not in a fit state of mind to actually be able to vote. The alternative is they knew exactly what they were voting for and did it anyway. I prefer the latter explanation.

A presidential candidate in the general election has literally one job, and that's to convince people to vote for them. It's pretty bizarre that people like you have chosen to strategically forget about this self-evident fact and instead pretend that the voting public are perfectly informed and rationally cast their votes according to whatever motive you choose to ascribe to them, which is an even dumber assumption than your strawman about election campaigns being mind control.

# ? Dec 31, 2016 14:21

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# ? May 4, 2024 06:06

Teriyaki Koinku: Nov 25, 2008; Bread! Bread! Bread!

Bread! BREAD! BREAD!

Nevvy Z posted:

Obama should have done something about the bankers but the teaparty wave is the result of racism and nothing more.

Or maybe the inaction of Democrats 2008-2010 to capitalize fully on the Obama wave to make strong, decisive steps forward on policy instead of immediately backing down or watering down several policy positions (eg universal healthcare, Gitmo, prosecuting the bankers for ruining the economy and W. Bush for war crimes, etc) they campaigned on without a fight, opting for milquetoast incrementalism that could be wiped away by the next Republican administration?

If you recall, the big issue was down-ballot Democrats questioning their affiliation with Obama or otherwise running away. Was that because of racism or simply tepid, ineffectual politicking when they had the government on a silver platter for two years?

I know you have a bias for Hillary, but you really need to call a spade a spade when it counts. We need to learn from the Democrats' mistakes from the past 8 years if we/they have any hope of undoing the wreckage of a Trump Presidency. We can't afford another disastrous administration on top of that.

Teriyaki Koinku fucked around with this message at 14:25 on Dec 31, 2016

# ? Dec 31, 2016 14:22

BarbarianElephant: Feb 12, 2015; The fairy of forgiveness has removed your red text.

If Democrats field candidates based entirely on charisma, you aren't going to see candidates like Bernie, either. He's not Mr Charisma. He's Mr Ideas. You'd see more Hollywood stars or other showbiz types.

# ? Dec 31, 2016 14:32

Teriyaki Koinku: Nov 25, 2008; Bread! Bread! Bread!

Bread! BREAD! BREAD!

Deified Data posted:

Generally you educate people to allow them to make wise choices informed by facts. An educated populace knows that the same economic policies that'll give minorities a leg up will give them a leg up, too.

Except that the general American voting populace is decidedly not educated (not in terms of knowing facts but a fundamental inability to cope with a technocratic economy and way of looking at the world) and does not make these kinds of cost-benefit analyses when they vote.

BarbarianElephant posted:

If Democrats field candidates based entirely on charisma, you aren't going to see candidates like Bernie, either. He's not Mr Charisma. He's Mr Ideas. You'd see more Hollywood stars or other showbiz types.

Or maybe another Obama-figure? It doesn't have to be a literal celebrity like Trump.

The problem there is that the Democratic bench is empty besides maybe Tammy Duckworth, let alone clear rising stars that could fill Campaign Obama's shoes in 4-8 years from now. That guy from Ohio (I can't remember his name) failed to unseat Nancy Pelosi, for instance.

I seriously think that the DNC bet all their chips on a Hillary Presidency to bide time to groom new young Democrats to fill in the political vacuum after her tenure in office and are caught completely flat-footed by all of this because of complacency and hubris.

That's a really, really big problem. I don't know the answer to that one.

Teriyaki Koinku fucked around with this message at 15:25 on Dec 31, 2016

# ? Dec 31, 2016 14:49

A Wizard of Goatse: Dec 14, 2014

tower time posted:

Why Hillary Lost

She was up in the polls. She won all three debates. She had crowned the Winner Of far more Weeks than her opponent. She had temporarily thrown the FBI off her tail, vexing their investigation into her email treason. And she had won the Meme Primary. So why did Hillary bite it, after running a literal perfect campaign?

Despite the Herculean efforts of her celebrity supporters, the out-of-work coal miners and factory workers in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin (the �Meth Belt�) were unmoved to vote for the first woman President. While working class people abstained from voting more than they broke for Trump, their silence speaks volumes. The deadly chemicals that workers are exposed to can cause a variety of cancers, but more importantly, they just make you a bad person.

What�s more, the white working class has actually been doing great under Obama. They�ve enjoyed unparalleled levels of prosperity thanks to Washington�s shameful failure to pass Simpson-Bowles-type entitlement reform. Rural whites have simply been living it up with their fat Social Security checks and gaudy public schools, while the deficit suffers. Without having any economic issues to vote for, this prosperity freed whites to drive their Cadillacs to the polls and vote solely based on their gut racism and misogyny.

But most of the blame falls squarely on the shoulders of Bernie Sanders and his army of basement-dwelling dirtbag leftists.

Before he officially campaigned against her, Sanders was already harming Clinton. Since his arrival in the U.S. Senate in 2007, Sanders had been regarded by some as an unapologetic harasser of women. Knowing this, Hillary Clinton decided that instead of using a federal email server that Sanders could cyberbully her, her staff, and children on, she would employ a private server far away from Senator Sanders� uncouth web techniques. Unfortunately, the FBI repeatedly harangued Secretary Clinton as this violated federal protocol, and she could not explain herself as it would incur more death threats and Pepe frogs from Bernie Bros.

After his violent and misogynistic campaign, Sanders enacted a devious plot to sink the Democratic ticket by pretending to campaign for Hillary. Bernie knew that he was so tragically unpopular that just by appearing on the same dais as Hillary to scream about the �corrupt bankuhs� and the price of soup, he would send the Hillary�s poll numbers crashing. Well, mission accomplished, Bernie. You have ruined the country, the Democratic Party, and my career. I ate my Election Cake off the gum-caked floor of a dangerous and unacceptable subway station in the Lower East Side thanks to you.

Going forward, if they ever want to win another election, the Democratic Party needs to fix both its Appeal Problem and the Bernie Problem. They can do this by tacking to the Center and spending the next four years compromising with Trump and Paul Ryan on policies that will completely destroy the wellbeing of the white working class. Thus, these voters will no longer have the luxury of voting for their ingrained hatreds, and will instead gravitate towards respectable moderates. Then it�s President Jim Webb.

Finally, the Democrats need to silence Bernie and his army of mom�s basement leftists. They should immediately kick Bernie out of the Democratic Caucus as punishment for embarrassing Hillary, then convince Vermonters to replace him with a sensible moderate, like a Jim Jeffords-type Republican. Surely voters will reward such brave bipartisanship.

To end the plague of Bernie Bros, Democrats could even work together with Trump on some of his proposals aimed at silencing critics. Both parties could collaborate on using the NSA to force Twitter to turn over the personal details of everyone who has ever shared a Jacobin article. If Democrats gain a reputation as compromisers, triangulators, and defenders of the sensible discourse and the Twitter mentions of homeless pundits, voters will reward them with both houses of Congress in 2018. But that will only happen if they have the maturity to sideline the Bernie Sanderses and the Keith Ellisons and the Elizabeth Warrens of their caucus and elevate the voices of the Heidi Heitkamps and the Jon Testers and the Joe Manchins. It�s time for a new generation of leadership. As President Obama observed, the Sun will still rise � hopefully out of West Virginia.

needs more fantasizing about genocide, ideally in the same breath as pretending to be the one who really cares about the folks you're loudly working yourself to a cum over the imagined suffering of

# ? Dec 31, 2016 15:47

Harold Fjord: Jan 3, 2004

Teriyaki Koinku posted:

Or maybe the inaction of Democrats 2008-2010 to capitalize fully on the Obama wave to make strong, decisive steps forward on policy instead of immediately backing down or watering down several policy positions (eg universal healthcare, Gitmo, prosecuting the bankers for ruining the economy and W. Bush for war crimes, etc) they campaigned on without a fight, opting for milquetoast incrementalism that could be wiped away by the next Republican administration?

No, the tea party was an astroturf racism thing. They were against Obama the second he was elected and it's not because he was the most liberal president of all time, as evidenced by the rest of your post.

Teriyaki Koinku posted:

If you recall, the big issue was down-ballot Democrats questioning their affiliation with Obama or otherwise running away. Was that because of racism or simply tepid, ineffectual politicking when they had the government on a silver platter for two years?

This is a pretty bad mischaracterization of reality

Teriyaki Koinku posted:

I know you have a bias for Hillary, but you really need to call a spade a spade when it counts. We need to learn from the Democrats' mistakes from the past 8 years if we/they have any hope of undoing the wreckage of a Trump Presidency. We can't afford another disastrous administration on top of that.

I do? surprise to me. I thought I had a bias against donald. Either way, I won't call Obama a spade but you go right ahead.

# ? Dec 31, 2016 16:26

Call Me Charlie: Dec 3, 2005; by Smythe

Kthulhu5000 posted:

The key to Trump's victory is probably that he essentially said "A lot of poo poo's hosed!" in a way that resonated with his audience. No hedging, no couched language, no seemingly insincere reassurances that things are fine and nothing needs to change.

For a middle-class Trump voter, every report of outsourcing, of H1B visa abuse, of American workers being made to train their replacements, of layoffs and age discrimination (since they're old) and their supervisor or manager or boss being an rear end in a top hat to them and their frustration at having to take it probably poured fuel on their fire. Add to that anxiety about their economic position (because middle-class is a relative thing when you're really in debt to your eyeballs, 40+ years of age, and afraid that you'll get pinkslipped just because next quarter's projections are "problematic"), bigotry ("It's all Indians doing the tech work cheap! Companies are more concerned with diversity quotas and hiring queers, minorities, and women!") and some single-issue interests that a "Hill Clinton" victory would have been bad for in their eyes (be it guns, gays, God, abortion, whatever), and you have a veritable bonfire.

Hypothetically, there are valid issues in all of that, which the Democrats could have pressed on now that middle-class white society is potentially feeling some of the same pinch that the poor and minorities have. Income inequality, a strengthening of labor rights and protections, expanding social safety nets, and so on. It wouldn't have swayed the incorrigibly right-wing to vote Dem, but some strident language and policy positions about these issues and even a honest (if vague) acknowledgement that things aren't as good as they could be might have done wonders at getting out more support and nudging the electoral college to their side. I believe that the Democrats have been complacent as poo poo about not rocking the boat, and I think much of the electorate has been complacement about it, too. After eight years of Obama at the helm and a few high-profile social advancements, it can be kind of easy to take an "end of history" view that things might be getting better in the long run, so long as nothing profoundly changes. That's now been shown to be a false and shaky view to maintain.

We (liberals, progressives, general Democratic voters and the like, and I include myself in this voter group of course) have been in a kind of Lala Land of believing that staying the course and expecting incremental change is viable over the long haul. And now we've been nastily awakened as to what a pleasant but delusional dream that is. And it's obvious now, in the light of the morning after - a party that can only work in small increments isn't one that can stop a swelling wave, be it political or (in the case of climate change and potentially rising sea levels) literal. We've been content to twiddle our thumbs while hoping "our side" gets its poo poo into gear to tackle the big problems, and that hosed us over. It's time to admit it, be embarrassed and angry as poo poo about it, and move towards action.

Meanwhile, the Republicans have been rocking their boat constantly, fistfighting each other, ratfucking each other, and paring things down considerably. And while that can be a sign of a party in disarray, it can also be a strong gamble for rebirth - the survivors are the most ruthless, daring, and scrappiest of the gang. And so long as a majority of their particular electorate believes that to be a sign of strength, that makes them all the more potent. Trump's reckless, but that also shows a willingness to shake things up and get things done regardless of the consequences. That's undoubtedly attractive to an electorate that is tired of (in their view) inactive and uninspired governance, mealy-mouthed excuses for why Issue X can't be dealt with seriously, and gladhanded assuagement of their fears while "their jobs" and "their money" and "their country" just get sold out and flushed down the tubes. And Trump's appeal is that he has ignored playing the game of principles and decorum, because to his electorate, all that respectability and decorum has done for them is lead to poisonous stagnancy (hence "drain the swamp!") and made them passive victims for the sake of governmental appearance and theatre up front while they're screwed over in the back.

Finally, I guess, to his supporters Trump's win is both an attempt to reform the system (albeit in the worst possible way) and, subconsciously, a test to see if the system can be reformed and redeemed politically. It's all guesses as to how much fervent tolerance his support base will have as his administration rolls forward and what their limit is, but I suspect a key to Trump 2020 will be delivering something tangibly and visibly new or different from the status quo (even if, again, it's something horrible). No overt changes could lead to a dampening of fervor, perhaps even more so than horrible policy side effects. Of course, that could lead to even more radicalism as they start crying "Democracy has failed, bring on the enlightened dictator!"...

This is a really good post that doesn't deserve to get ignored on the last page.

BarbarianElephant posted:

If Democrats field candidates based entirely on charisma, you aren't going to see candidates like Bernie, either. He's not Mr Charisma. He's Mr Ideas. You'd see more Hollywood stars or other showbiz types.

Have you ever watched Bernie speak? He's not a traditionally charismatic guy like Obama but he's really good at making passionate speeches.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RU3NKvvxcSs

# ? Dec 31, 2016 18:24

A Wizard of Goatse: Dec 14, 2014

Call Me Charlie posted:

This is a really good post that doesn't deserve to get ignored on the last page.

It's a good story, fortunately none of it's true. Trump tried for a popular insurrection, and he won, but he didn't get it. For all the Republican scheming he barely squeaked by on a marginal victory, with higher unfavorables even before taking office than his predecessor who's leaving with his party voted out of power nationwide. His votes came from 95% the same people who voted for Romney, who'd vote for anybody with an (R) after the name, with the most notable deviation being a bit of a bump in the minority vote now that instead of a charming black man Trump's opposition was fielding one of the skull aliens from They Live. Where his economic message got him a breakout hit at all, it was in the primary, where he was running against a bunch of other conservative Republicans whose economic plans were basically similar to Clinton's. In the general Trump came out with less of a popular mandate than any president in recent history, his jobs message did not actually swing all the unemployed ex-steelworkers even with a Democratic party historically hostile to unions and labor, if there's a great Republican resurgence (and it's hard to see anything particularly coherent downticket either), it doesn't lie with Trump.

The Democrats just defaulted, plain and simple. The downticket candidates all got tied to a historically unpalatable candidate and platform that dragged them down, the national party abandoned the states, the national news media came out in force for Hillary and against Trump and were such a bunch of fuckups all they succeeded in doing was validating every nasty thing Rush Limbaugh ever said about them, the large segments of the base that had been slowly draining away after years of being ignored and told to shut up finally hit critical mass. Hillary Clinton appealed to nobody but Lena Dunham and Matty Yglesias and a couple of mentally ill internet trolls; much to their indignance and outrage those guys aren't just unconditionally entitled to the subservience of all black people and everyone under 40; and the unofficial Democratic slogan of "What are you going to do, vote Republican? :smug:

" has an actual, obvious answer of "maybe I'll just go home and spend time with the kids instead".

A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 19:45 on Dec 31, 2016

# ? Dec 31, 2016 19:14

Badger of Basra: Jul 26, 2007

A Wizard of Goatse posted:

It's a good story, fortunately none of it's true. Trump tried for a popular insurrection, and he won, but he didn't get it. For all the Republican scheming he barely squeaked by on a marginal victory, with higher unfavorables even before taking office than his predecessor who's leaving with his party voted out of power nationwide. His votes came from 95% the same people who voted for Romney, who'd vote for anybody with an (R) after the name, with the most notable deviation being a bit of a bump in the minority vote now that instead of a charming black man Trump's opposition was fielding one of the skull aliens from They Live. Where his economic message got him a breakout hit at all, it was in the primary, where he was running against a bunch of other conservative Republicans whose economic plans were basically similar to Clinton's. In the general Trump came out with less of a popular mandate than any president in recent history, his jobs message did not actually swing all the unemployed ex-steelworkers even with a Democratic party historically hostile to unions and labor, if there's a great Republican resurgence (and it's hard to see anything particularly coherent downticket either), it doesn't lie with Trump.

The Democrats just defaulted, plain and simple. The downticket candidates all got tied to a historically unpalatable candidate and platform that dragged them down, the national party abandoned the states, the national news media came out in force for Hillary and against Trump and were such a bunch of fuckups all they succeeded in doing was validating every nasty thing Rush Limbaugh ever said about them, the large segments of the base that had been slowly draining away after years of being ignored and told to shut up finally hit critical mass. Hillary Clinton appealed to nobody but Lena Dunham and Matty Yglesias and a couple of mentally ill internet trolls; much to their indignance and outrage those guys aren't just unconditionally entitled to the subservience of all black people and everyone under 40; and the unofficial Democratic slogan of "What are you going to do, vote Republican?" has an actual, obvious answer of "maybe I'll just go home and spend time with the kids instead".

I realize you don't like her but come on dude

e: also for all the complaining about how mean internet liberals made the base stay home, it's apparently fine to poo poo on Clinton supporters because what are they gonna do, vote for a republican :smug:

Badger of Basra fucked around with this message at 20:03 on Dec 31, 2016

# ? Dec 31, 2016 19:57

rscott: Dec 10, 2009

If neoilberals are going to paint everything to the left of them as communism then I'm pretty OK with conflating the broadly similar economic plans of centrist Democrats and Republicans

# ? Dec 31, 2016 20:02

BarbarianElephant: Feb 12, 2015; The fairy of forgiveness has removed your red text.

Call Me Charlie posted:

Have you ever watched Bernie speak? He's not a traditionally charismatic guy like Obama but he's really good at making passionate speeches.

You said it yourself. "Not traditionally charismatic." If charisma is all that matters, he's not it.

# ? Dec 31, 2016 20:05

A Wizard of Goatse: Dec 14, 2014

Jeb! and Clinton differed on fine points of how the globalized post-Reagan status quo should be maintained and diverged in rhetoric about their eventual ideal; Trump rejected free trade outright, has inconsistently advocated against corporate self-regulation when he could make it about those parasitic oligarchs instead of the parasitic oligarchs that are him and his friends, and generally leaned towards more authoritarian state intervention in the business world than even the major parties' more hardline authoritarians in every other field of life have been comfortable with. Those fine points aren't nothing if they're all you're gonna get, but there exists a whole universe of ideas outside "Goldman Sachs is too big to fail and it's good that all our labor comes from South Asian slave factories so long as it makes the Dow go up", some of them evidently spoke to the Republican base when the primary controlled for all other factors of being a loathsome right-wing huckster, but Trump's protectionism etc. didn't inspire the general public enough to overcome traditional party divides.

As to the latter point, this forum had a suicide hotline stickied post-election, and you just came back on an argument that Clinton's mainstream economic message wasn't what sank her with "HOW DARE YOU SAY CLINTON HAD A MAINSTREAM ECONOMIC MESSAGE?" Yglesias's and Dunham's positions are a matter of public record.

I would much rather that this election was a referendum on economic populism and the truth was Clinton failed because she's not socialist enough, but it just isn't so, and if you see an unwillingness to tell self-serving lies as an out-of-hand rejection of what you stand for then yeah I don't think there is anything to be gained from sharing a party with you.

A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 21:25 on Dec 31, 2016

# ? Dec 31, 2016 20:12

Neurolimal: Nov 3, 2012

BarbarianElephant posted:

I would be *very* surprised! I know *lots* of lefty New Yorkers and most of them would call you a Nazi for saying this.

Where did they fall on the two-day-long dem push to make people on the no-fly list banned from owning guns?

Because I can tell you that a lot of D's I saw were trying to paint it as nth dimensional chess, rathed than democrats possibly being hawkish bastards.

# ? Dec 31, 2016 21:25

SickZip: Jul 29, 2008; by FactsAreUseless

blowfish posted:

Yeah. Assuming people are irrational, overly emotional and possibly idiots is always a better bet than assuming they're smart and make sensible decisions based on reasoning and facts.

People and reality are complicated and pretending that you can just make a choice based on "facts and reasoning" is ironically incredibly ignorant.

# ? Dec 31, 2016 21:27

Neurolimal: Nov 3, 2012

BarbarianElephant posted:

If Democrats field candidates based entirely on charisma, you aren't going to see candidates like Bernie, either. He's not Mr Charisma. He's Mr Ideas. You'd see more Hollywood stars or other showbiz types.

Charisma comes in many forms. It's exemplary of Sanders' charm that his mere existence constantly overshadowed Hillary, and that people were quick to turn to him after the GE.

# ? Dec 31, 2016 21:28

A Wizard of Goatse: Dec 14, 2014

Trump was literally a New York Democrat, as Mike Bloomberg still is, clearly the kinds of policy that involved assuming innate Islamic criminality and having the NYPD and CIA spy on random mosques resonate with more than you think on the nominal New York "left"

A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 21:37 on Dec 31, 2016

# ? Dec 31, 2016 21:30

mila kunis: Jun 10, 2011

A Wizard of Goatse posted:

It's a good story, fortunately none of it's true. Trump tried for a popular insurrection, and he won, but he didn't get it. For all the Republican scheming he barely squeaked by on a marginal victory, with higher unfavorables even before taking office than his predecessor who's leaving with his party voted out of power nationwide. His votes came from 95% the same people who voted for Romney, who'd vote for anybody with an (R) after the name, with the most notable deviation being a bit of a bump in the minority vote now that instead of a charming black man Trump's opposition was fielding one of the skull aliens from They Live. Where his economic message got him a breakout hit at all, it was in the primary, where he was running against a bunch of other conservative Republicans whose economic plans were basically similar to Clinton's. In the general Trump came out with less of a popular mandate than any president in recent history, his jobs message did not actually swing all the unemployed ex-steelworkers even with a Democratic party historically hostile to unions and labor, if there's a great Republican resurgence (and it's hard to see anything particularly coherent downticket either), it doesn't lie with Trump.

The Democrats just defaulted, plain and simple. The downticket candidates all got tied to a historically unpalatable candidate and platform that dragged them down, the national party abandoned the states, the national news media came out in force for Hillary and against Trump and were such a bunch of fuckups all they succeeded in doing was validating every nasty thing Rush Limbaugh ever said about them, the large segments of the base that had been slowly draining away after years of being ignored and told to shut up finally hit critical mass. Hillary Clinton appealed to nobody but Lena Dunham and Matty Yglesias and a couple of mentally ill internet trolls; much to their indignance and outrage those guys aren't just unconditionally entitled to the subservience of all black people and everyone under 40; and the unofficial Democratic slogan of "What are you going to do, vote Republican?" has an actual, obvious answer of "maybe I'll just go home and spend time with the kids instead".

Hahahaha, this is the best description of Hillary I've seen anywhere yet.

Unfortunately I don't think the Democrats are going to improve. The ol' iron law of institutions still applies and I think the parasitic right wing is going to work harder than ever to ensure that their donors' will be done even in the face of the continuing destruction of their party. They have one job, and that's to ensure that a left platform never ever drives policy again.

# ? Dec 31, 2016 22:24

Pollyanna: Mar 5, 2005; Milk's on them.

tekz posted:

Hahahaha, this is the best description of Hillary I've seen anywhere yet.

Unfortunately I don't think the Democrats are going to improve. The ol' iron law of institutions still applies and I think the parasitic right wing is going to work harder than ever to ensure that their donors' will be done even in the face of the continuing destruction of their party. They have one job, and that's to ensure that a left platform never ever drives policy again.

1000 Years of Darkness it is! Welcome to hell.

# ? Jan 1, 2017 04:14

Willie Tomg: Feb 2, 2006

A Wizard of Goatse posted:

Trump was literally a New York Democrat, as Mike Bloomberg still is, clearly the kinds of policy that involved assuming innate Islamic criminality and having the NYPD and CIA spy on random mosques resonate with more than you think on the nominal New York "left"

In the age where humor is a daily show graduate on a late night slot reading the headlines and going "TA DAAAA!" people stating their familiarity with a political context and only revealing the painful limits of their engagement with said political context is about as close as we can get to an honest-to-god joke.

# ? Jan 1, 2017 04:36

Potato Salad: Oct 23, 2014; nobody cares

Teriyaki Koinku posted:

Or maybe the inaction of Democrats 2008-2010 to capitalize fully on the Obama wave to make strong, decisive steps forward on policy instead of immediately backing down or watering down several policy positions (eg universal healthcare, Gitmo, prosecuting the bankers for ruining the economy and W. Bush for war crimes, etc) they campaigned on without a fight, opting for milquetoast incrementalism that could be wiped away by the next Republican administration?

If you recall, the big issue was down-ballot Democrats questioning their affiliation with Obama or otherwise running away. Was that because of racism or simply tepid, ineffectual politicking when they had the government on a silver platter for two years?

I know you have a bias for Hillary, but you really need to call a spade a spade when it counts. We need to learn from the Democrats' mistakes from the past 8 years if we/they have any hope of undoing the wreckage of a Trump Presidency. We can't afford another disastrous administration on top of that.

So, is part of the lesson "Hit as hard as you can as fast as you can when you are able?"

# ? Jan 1, 2017 19:53

daydrinking is fun: Dec 1, 2016

Potato Salad posted:

So, is part of the lesson "Hit as hard as you can as fast as you can when you are able?"

Or, at the very least, realize that nobody gives a poo poo about bipartisanship, it's 100% about getting your crew and ramming legislation through to spite the assholes who will do every dirty trick possible to gently caress you over. Obama and Clinton especially were guilty of this "high road" poo poo that has done nothing but pay dividends to the GOP obstructionists who have done little else but use cheap tricks and play chicken with the debt ceiling. Now I'll be furious if the democrats don't shut down the government because the GOP has proven that nobody actually punishes their party for obstructionism, and the Dems should at least have the decency to fight as hard as assholes like Cruz did.

daydrinking is fun fucked around with this message at 20:53 on Jan 1, 2017

# ? Jan 1, 2017 20:31

AmiYumi: Oct 10, 2005; I FORGOT TO HAIL KING TORG

daydrinking is fun posted:

Or, at the very least, realize that nobody gives a poo poo about bipartisanship, it's 100% about getting your crew and ramming legislation through to spite the assholes who will do every dirty trick possible to gently caress you over. Obama and Clinton especially were guilty of this "high road" poo poo that has done nothing but pay dividends to the GOP obstructionists who have done little else but use cheap tricks and play chicken with the debt ceiling. Now I'll be furious if the democrats don't shut down the government because the GOP has proven that nobody actually punishes their party for obstructionism, and the Dems should at least have the decency to fight as hard as assholes like Cruz did.

You can only cheat when the ref is on your side, how do people still not loving understand this? :psyduck:

Republican obstructionism works because the media hammers non-stop that it's the Dem's fault for not giving in, or at worst goes full South Park "both sides are just as bad, that's politics".

Democrats who trying any of the poo poo Republicans get away with constantly immediately face the full force of the media smear machine. For instance, what happened during the entire presidential primary and election season.

# ? Jan 1, 2017 23:25

rscott: Dec 10, 2009

I'm not sure how what happened in the primaries and election season proves that if Democrats are as obstinate as Republicans were from 2008-2016, the media would lambaste them

e: Actually I can't think of a recent stand the Democrats have taken that approaches any of the times Republicans dug their heels in over the last eight years, courage of convictions isn't exactly their strong suit

# ? Jan 1, 2017 23:38

Zachack: Jun 1, 2000

rscott posted:

I'm not sure how what happened in the primaries and election season proves that if Democrats are as obstinate as Republicans were from 2008-2016, the media would lambaste them

e: Actually I can't think of a recent stand the Democrats have taken that approaches any of the times Republicans dug their heels in over the last eight years, courage of convictions isn't exactly their strong suit

The approaching ACA repeal is the most recent example and my sample size of 1 (WaPo) sure seemed to paint Democrats in a good light for saying they were going to force the Republicans to live with their lovely decisions. Like, outside of emails (server, DMC), which are news and thus would get some reporting, most of the articles pushed on WaPo/SFChron and what I would see on evening CNN/MSNBC at the gym was nearly constant negativity towards Republicans. If the concern is that Fox et al will ramp up the poo poo flinging then who cares?

Zachack fucked around with this message at 00:30 on Jan 2, 2017

# ? Jan 2, 2017 00:27

Badger of Basra: Jul 26, 2007

A Wizard of Goatse posted:

Jeb! and Clinton differed on fine points of how the globalized post-Reagan status quo should be maintained and diverged in rhetoric about their eventual ideal; Trump rejected free trade outright, has inconsistently advocated against corporate self-regulation when he could make it about those parasitic oligarchs instead of the parasitic oligarchs that are him and his friends, and generally leaned towards more authoritarian state intervention in the business world than even the major parties' more hardline authoritarians in every other field of life have been comfortable with. Those fine points aren't nothing if they're all you're gonna get, but there exists a whole universe of ideas outside "Goldman Sachs is too big to fail and it's good that all our labor comes from South Asian slave factories so long as it makes the Dow go up", some of them evidently spoke to the Republican base when the primary controlled for all other factors of being a loathsome right-wing huckster, but Trump's protectionism etc. didn't inspire the general public enough to overcome traditional party divides.

As to the latter point, this forum had a suicide hotline stickied post-election, and you just came back on an argument that Clinton's mainstream economic message wasn't what sank her with "HOW DARE YOU SAY CLINTON HAD A MAINSTREAM ECONOMIC MESSAGE?" Yglesias's and Dunham's positions are a matter of public record.

I would much rather that this election was a referendum on economic populism and the truth was Clinton failed because she's not socialist enough, but it just isn't so, and if you see an unwillingness to tell self-serving lies as an out-of-hand rejection of what you stand for then yeah I don't think there is anything to be gained from sharing a party with you.

I wasn't trying to rebut your argument that Clinton's economic message wasn't what sank her - I just wanted to highlight that and disagree with "Hillary had the same economic platform as Ted Cruz." If you mean that they were both capitalists then yeah I guess I agree.

My main point was not that Yglesias and Dunham did not support her, but that reducing anyone who supported or liked Clinton to vox people or mentally ill internet people is just a mirror of Clinton people saying everyone who voted for Trump is a racist. We've had five million threads since November about how anyone who would dare say that is actually an Elite East Coast Neolib, and that you shouldn't do that because if you're mean to those people then they won't vote for Democrats and Democrats will lose. If you spend the next four years saying anyone who supported Hillary was a monster or an idiot who just got what was coming to them, you're not going to be able to get them to vote for your candidate. I know that you would like to think you don't need their votes anyway because really everyone hated Hillary so it's not a huge loss, but there are at the very least enough of them to win a primary. Like sure Haim Saban or whoever supported her, but so did my grandpa who grew up on a cotton farm in central Texas.

Badger of Basra fucked around with this message at 01:05 on Jan 2, 2017

# ? Jan 2, 2017 00:58

the talent deficit: Dec 20, 2003; self-deprecation is a very british trait, and problems can arise when the british attempt to do so with a foreign culture

Teriyaki Koinku posted:

The problem there is that the Democratic bench is empty besides maybe Tammy Duckworth, let alone clear rising stars that could fill Campaign Obama's shoes in 4-8 years from now. That guy from Ohio (I can't remember his name) failed to unseat Nancy Pelosi, for instance.

it always looks this way four years out when there's no clear 'next in line'. the democrats have a pretty good field to select from, however. kirsten gillibrand, jason kander, julian castro, joaquin castro, tom perez, cory booker and john hickenlooper are all pretty good candidates

# ? Jan 3, 2017 07:13

A Wizard of Goatse: Dec 14, 2014

Badger of Basra posted:

I wasn't trying to rebut your argument that Clinton's economic message wasn't what sank her - I just wanted to highlight that and disagree with "Hillary had the same economic platform as Ted Cruz." If you mean that they were both capitalists then yeah I guess I agree.

My main point was not that Yglesias and Dunham did not support her, but that reducing anyone who supported or liked Clinton to vox people or mentally ill internet people is just a mirror of Clinton people saying everyone who voted for Trump is a racist. We've had five million threads since November about how anyone who would dare say that is actually an Elite East Coast Neolib, and that you shouldn't do that because if you're mean to those people then they won't vote for Democrats and Democrats will lose. If you spend the next four years saying anyone who supported Hillary was a monster or an idiot who just got what was coming to them, you're not going to be able to get them to vote for your candidate. I know that you would like to think you don't need their votes anyway because really everyone hated Hillary so it's not a huge loss, but there are at the very least enough of them to win a primary. Like sure Haim Saban or whoever supported her, but so did my grandpa who grew up on a cotton farm in central Texas.

I'll go as far as not referring to Clintonites as mentally ill internet people when I'm not addressing a specific audience of mentally ill internet Clintonites but beyond that I don't really give a poo poo about pandering to them, I'm not one of those people who thinks endless pointless wars or secret police wiretaps are radically improved by Team Democrat being behind them. If giving in to the kind of people who identify closely with that kind of ideology is what it takes for Democrats to win, then the party is useless and we should all just focus on getting the Pansexual Peace Party hippie into the city council.

A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 16:01 on Jan 3, 2017

# ? Jan 3, 2017 15:56

Main Paineframe: Oct 27, 2010

Potato Salad posted:

So, is part of the lesson "Hit as hard as you can as fast as you can when you are able?"

The lesson is "don't take the midterms for granted and try to save things until the reelection campaign". The Dems didn't have much to campaign on because they did basically nothing in 2010 other than passing Obamacare, and after their big defeat they suddenly had a really productive December, as the Dems suddenly scrambled to ram stuff through before they lost their near-supermajority.

# ? Jan 3, 2017 22:23

steinrokkan: Apr 2, 2011; Soiled Meat

tekz posted:

Hahahaha, this is the best description of Hillary I've seen anywhere yet.

What about Mom from Futurama.

# ? Jan 4, 2017 10:55

Talmonis: Jun 24, 2012; The fairy of forgiveness has removed your red text.

steinrokkan posted:

What about Mom from Futurama.

Oh wow. I never thought of it, but now I can't unsee it.

# ? Jan 4, 2017 15:52

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# ? May 4, 2024 06:06

steinrokkan: Apr 2, 2011; Soiled Meat

AmiYumi posted:

You can only cheat when the ref is on your side, how do people still not loving understand this?

Republican obstructionism works because the media hammers non-stop that it's the Dem's fault for not giving in, or at worst goes full South Park "both sides are just as bad, that's politics".

Democrats who trying any of the poo poo Republicans get away with constantly immediately face the full force of the media smear machine. For instance, what happened during the entire presidential primary and election season.

That is not only exaggerated, but also 100% the Dems' own fault, the media as a whole is not inherently anti-liberal, hell I'm sure lots of reporters are frustrated that Dems don't give them enough to work with. In a world of functional press, you would have investigative journalists looking for scoops, but in the era of Twitter journalism they will just regurgitate whatever they are spoon fed.

# ? Jan 4, 2017 17:00

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Did Trump win because many people in middle America feel like losers?

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