Advice

On having reservations

Maybe screaming down left wing voters for “having reservations” about Hilary is exactly the problem. Because that’s the entire Democratic Party approach in a nutshell, and it’s not working very well so far hey. Maybe, just maybe, some of these reservations are actually fucking legit and worth talking about. Maybe, this is time to talk about how a two horse race is a fundamentally flawed example of democracy.

The “Democratic” party expectation (and it is an expectation) that; —“If you are left-wing leaning you MUST vote for this person, no question about it, OR else YOU are responsible for fucking the world up with the Trump monster”—- is so incredibly far out of touch it’s condescending. Not to mention ironic. But I guess it does illustrate a fairly typical American view of ‘democracy’.

The truth is, Hilary Clinton neglected the core “Democratic” constituency long ago. Hilary Clinton will continue bombing the Middle East , funded by the banks, and we will continue on with the neo-liberal status quo, with rising global inequality and environmental destruction.

Maybe people don’t want that future. Maybe the conversation shouldn’t be about Clinton v Trump. Maybe the conversation should be creating a better system, for the long term.

But that’s hard, I know. Especially when screaming VOTE HILARY over all the (often valid) reservations is so easy.

 

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

Maybe you should quit acting like party unity is a fucking disease. Maybe you should recognize that creating a better system is a painfully slow process measured in decades rather than election years. Maybe it should occur to you that in this particular election, your left wing reservations are more dangerous than right wing ignorance. Maybe I should just tell you to go fuck yourself.

Listen, kid. You need to grow a thicker skin, because you damn well know what it is I do here. You love the way I write when you agree with me, but now that we’ve got some minor political differences, suddenly I’m condescending? Get the fuck out of here.

And you know what? As long as you’re voting for Hillary, we can sit around all day and talk shit about her centrism, her hawkishness, or her shitty position on Palestine. It’s a bit of a stretch for you to define truth on behalf of the core Democratic constituency, but hey, we can ramble on about global inequality and environmental destruction and the faults of a two party system for as long as you like, as long as you’re voting for Hillary.

I promise, kid. Screaming you down for having reservations is not the fucking problem. People like you deciding to stay home on election day is the fucking problem, because if Hillary loses, all those other problems that you care so much about won’t mean dick in an administration run by a narcissistic demagogue.

Your frustration with the system is justified. Truly, it is, and I totally understand your desire to make the conversation about something else, but you’re a childish asshole if you think you actually can. The conversation is about Clinton vs. Trump. You don’t get to change that.

Have all the reservations you want. Hold your fucking nose in the voting booth if you must. Resent the shit out of me for telling you this, I really don’t give a fuck, but goddamnit vote for Hillary.

Standard

246 thoughts on “On having reservations

  1. Chops says:

    Dont like the two party system? Trump winning wont change it. But Trump getting absolutely wrecked might just cause the GOP to implode…

    • Bry says:

      40% of the country will vote for Trump and 40% will vote for Hillary. Don’t be delusional. Did the GOP implode when Obama rolled over them both times? I wish this notion passed the reality test but it simply doesn’t.

      • BENJAMIN SILVERSTEIN says:

        “Did the GOP implode when Obama rolled over them both times?” Are the stakes for the GOP comparable this time around?

        • Bry says:

          What stakes? They have billionaire funding guaranteed and 40% of the vote so long as religious delusion exists. On a side note, how ironic is it that the religious right should be voting democratic since Jesus hated wealth and loved the poor? That’s a whole other conversation, I guess and smarter people than you and I have beaten it to death.

          • BENJAMIN SILVERSTEIN says:

            I don’t disagree. I’m just thinking that losing 3 elections in a row, along with the threat from what seems like an insurgent voter base could lead to some crazy shit happening.

          • Bry says:

            They still do just fine in the house, Senate, and state elections. It’s could even be reasonably argued that they thrive when a democrat is president because they work better as an opposition party. People that run on a platform of government sucks tend to perpetuate that sentiment when they get in office.

          • BENJAMIN SILVERSTEIN says:

            You have more faith in the social and political stability of the US than I do.

      • Chops says:

        Ignoring that the dems have both a larger and more active base…

        Eventually, they’ll get tired of losing and maybe read that report that they came up with in the wake of the Obama victories. The one that said they needed to stop being the party of racist old white dudes.

        Maybe they won’t implode but let’s not pretend that if Trump loses, we’ll be looking at the same GOP

        • Bry says:

          I do think you’ll still be looking at the same shit for another 4-5 election cycles. It will get better when the decrepit old fox news demographic dies off, though. I certainly hope that Hillary will be in office and the GOP gets with the times, though. Nothing would please me more besides maybe Trump to Syria with “I hate Allah” tattooed on his face. I do admire your optimism and I hope I am wrong!

    • JC says:

      That’s right, Chops!

      Anyone thinking they are going to “teach the Democrats a lesson” should explain what lesson exactly was learned by the Dems in the whole Bush/Gore/Nader fiasco. Did they move move to the left to appease the Nader voters, or did the move to the right to pick up moderate votes?

      Bernie was right to run as a Dem, and he show y’all how to do it. Hey may not have won, but he was a powerful force in this process.

      • G says:

        See also: 1968, when the anti-war left (who definitely got shafted hard, much worse than Sanders supporters have been treated) recused themselves from voting and that worked out SO well.

        • JC says:

          One wonders what would have happened if LBJ ran again. He ended his life deeply regretful of Vietnam and with the realization that fighting that war cost him the ability to implement the goals of the Great Society. One wonders if he might have pulled us out of there 10 years sooner.

          Anyway, LBJ is another can of worms. I happen to be a fan, but I know he’s a controversial figure.

  2. NELL says:

    I wanted Bernie Sanders as much as anyone, back when we didn’t know for sure that Trump would get the nomination. But I learned sixteen years ago what happened when I voted for Nader and Bush got elected. I won’t be making that mistake again and neither should you. The system is flawed beyond belief, but it’s nowhere near as fucked up as Trump getting elected.

  3. AC says:

    The point coke is making is that this is all bullshit, but we have to live in the real world. If you’re a liberal that means choosing to vote for Hilary even if you don’t like her politics or the political system we have.

  4. G says:

    It strikes me that this letter, far more than Coquette’s responses, represents the “fairly typical American view of ‘democracy’” that the “progressive” holdouts have – the desire that the party and its representative appear, fully formed like Athena leaping from the skull of Zeus, with all the beliefs and desires that this particular person has and wants because who needs cooperation, collaboration, and compromise? I feel like they look at the Tea Party and instead of seeing the people who turned the Republican party into a fascistic garbage fire, they see a “successful working strategy” because they’re too myopic to see the long term damage.

    You want the Democrats to change and be more reflective of your beliefs? Are you volunteering and working in the party, sending letters to your representative, getting better informed on policy so that you can debate policy intelligently and on its merits rather than “I like this person so this policy they support that I don’t know about must be good and I don’t like this person so the policy they support must be bad” (which seems to be what’s going on with free trade which I’m not particularly impressed with as a party move). It’s a PARTY – it’s a group composed of people, so you know how you move the party to the left? You get involved and you stay involved and keep working and convincing people incrementally toward the change you want because this country belongs to fucking everyone and we all have to compromise a little to work together: it’s not that moderates and even conservatives are all sellouts and corporate shills, they just have a different idea of what works and different values and they STILL get to live here and vote too, so you better fucking figure out how to work with them and get them on board because you are NOT Athena fully formed and full of all wisdom, and you might be wrong too (though as a liberal I think we’ve been doing pretty well on the scoreboard of human progress, and I’m glad Keynesianism is finally having a proper resurgence after years of deregulation and trickle-down bullshit).

    But cry me a river that your perfect belief-system doppleganger isn’t the nominee (and let’s be real, so many progressives have projected ideas onto Bernie that are neither truthful nor even good ideas – Bernie’s not a military isolationist but rather lucked into a good vote on Iraq, and he’s anti-free-trade to woo local union votes not because he seems to particularly care about human rights violations abroad insofar as I can tell, or he wouldn’t have made an oil deal with Venezuela). Reflecting your beliefs aren’t the only things that matter – competence at the actual skills of the job matter: the ability to be an intelligent advocate for policy and a good diplomat in the international sphere are key elements of the job. Trump is clearly not competent to do either of those things, and even if the third partiers were, they’re not going to be elected.

    WE ARE FILLING A JOB, NOT LOOKING FOR SOMEONE TO BE YOUR CONSCIENCE. Suck it up and vote for the best candidate who can win. Stop looking for fucking Jiminy Cricket. He’s dead because you want to be a puppet with a head of wood, and listen to Trump propaganda as he cozies up to Putin. There’s your third party candidate for you.

    It’s not magic. There’s no magical revolution (I mean, shit, have you seen the general track records of democracies post-revolution, aside from the United States? It’s not pretty). You have to work, bitch. If you’re not ready to work for the change you want, at least vote for someone who can do some of it, and won’t try to actively undo the things we’ve been working toward.

    But this active fomentation of paranoia and denial masquerading as disillusionment (please, you’re swimming in delusions if you think a mass exodus to the Green Party from the Democrats is going to do anything but cripple the left in the same way we were between 2000-2008) is a bunch of apostolic socialists brewing their own flavor-aid. Please don’t make us drink it.

    Sigh.

    • VeryOff says:

      ” Stop looking for fucking Jiminy Cricket. He’s dead…”

      I had to laugh or cry…I chose laugh.

      *slow clap*

      • G says:

        For context: In the original story, Pinocchio kills the talking cricket with a mallet because the cricket tries to get Pinocchio to face reality and, when he won’t, the cricket tells him he’s a puppet with a wooden head.

    • Lucille says:

      Does….does writing your representative really even do anything? Ever? I always kind of imagined that all those unread letters kinda get scraped into a little pile at the end of each week and set on fire to the derisive laughter of the interns. I don’t know, it’s just hard to imagine that any of them give a moldy shit about what any of us thinks.

      • Rainbowpony says:

        Yes, actually they do matter, especially if you start locally or at the state level.

        At the presidential level I’m sure they get too many letters, I bet they open a sub sample and report general trends to the boss.

      • J Lynn says:

        On issues where there are a lot of letters (“I’m for/against this bill” as opposed to some unique personal or local situation) a staffer or intern is usually assigned to skim and tally them up, counting the number of for, against or other. Personally written notes are more likely to be passed up the chain the auto-generated emails. Same with phone calls. So it is a kind of vote in a sense. Not that your rep is beholden to that count, and not everybody does it, but in most offices someone does monitor it. That’s what I’ve been told be people who’ve worked for Congress members and state legislatures. It can also effective to speak to your rep at town hall forums and things; then there’s also the chance a reporter may write about it, and of course your fellow citizens will hear it too.

        Another thing is getting to know the people who hold your local offices. Some will be complacent and uninterested, but others are earnest Leslie Knope types and truly worth knowing, and you can be heard that way.

        Finally, join your local Democratic committee. Unless your area is really politically active already, they are usually wanting for members. If you can get several like-minded people involved as well, and you’re team players and not dicks, that can influence a lot. These committees make valuable endorsements on the local level, and it can make the difference between sending Leslie Knope to your state capital vs somebody’s flunkie nephew.

        • WhoAmI says:

          Thank you J Lynn for taking some of your time (again) to post all of that information here. That’s a lot of work ,and extra kind of you. And verry interesting to read for the readers from other countries.

      • G says:

        From what I understood from politicians when I volunteered when I was younger, it’s generally assumed that for every letter received, there’s some non-insignificant portion of the voting populace that also cares about this issue but hasn’t written. So letters tend to actually get weighted more heavily. Hence why letter writing campaigns were so powerful. I haven’t been as involved with political volunteering as I was 10 years ago, so I assume that weighting has changed and been reduced what with the ease of email and communication generally (communications to reps has increased dramatically), but I don’t think it’s that interns and staff don’t “give a moldy shit.” (Look at the Tea Party – their politics and litmus test strategies are deplorable but they’re a constituency that the Republicans won’t ignore because they’re so mobilized.) It’s generally that they’re overworked and underpaid, if even paid (which has in turn resulted in a lot of politicians treating lobbyists as staff with regard to creating policy), so I assume that’s where some of the cynicism in these offices come from (especially if the ease of communication noted above has resulted in people sending nasty emails or making nasty calls, if you think about how a lot of underpaid staff are probably starry-eyed young people who went in because they wanted to help people through government, given that underpaid/unpaid positions are weighted towards young people who have less responsibilities/bills than older folk, and who leave for better paid jobs as soon as they gain any expertise – probably with the same lobbying companies).

        See:
        http://www.rollcall.com/news/opinion/congress-needs-better-paid-staff
        http://www.rollcall.com/news/congress_is_good_at_shrinking_one_part_of_government-239368-1.html

        Basically we (the United States citizenry in general, by voting in candidates who have been consistently voting to defund government and then complaining about how it doesn’t work well with less money) shot congressional staff in the foot and expect them listen happily while we complain at them. So maybe every letter to your representative should also include a call to pay staff better. You can be sure the staff will at least be happier to read it then.

        • J Lynn says:

          That’s a great idea of praising the staffers/interns. “P.S. Senator Smith, your staff are working their little buns off, please give them a raise or free burritos; you are harvesting their youth, that’s the least you can do.” Kind of like how the most important people at work after your boss are the secretaries and janitors.

  5. Chops says:

    And like… we wanted Bernie. What we got is a candidate that voted with him 93% of the time and has eagerly adopted a lot of his pertinent causes into her platform. S candidate that has the clout, experience and talent to actually get a lot of that stuff done.

    It really couldn’t have gone much better. Im really not sure what folks are so upset about.

  6. Nerdlinger says:

    Also this: http://elections.mytimetovote.com/dates/default.html
    Because this: https://www.thenation.com/article/white-supremacist-david-dukes-new-senate-campaign-fits-a-pattern/

    Much as I cringe at the woke neolibs who invent a new type of bro for anyone who disagrees with them, they will always remain insufferable clowns. The show’s not over if Clinton becomes prez. This election is not the be-all and end-all of resentment towards the establishment. Mock the shit out of the contigent that wants to solve everything with an app and believes thinkfluencer is not an insult, but organize inbetween slapping them around.

  7. Anonymous Poster says:

    Disillusionment with the system is no excuse for self-imposed disenfranchisement. If you want to improve the system, go do the fucking work to improve it. Vote for politicians you think will listen to you and voters like you; get in the fucking streets when they don’t. Call your Congress critters and thank them for voting in ways you approve of; call them and berate them when they vote in ways you don’t like. Nothing changes through either apathy or idealism—pragmatic action in the face of a system designed to wear you down is the only thing that creates change.

    Look at LGBT civil rights: The gay(/LGBT) civil rights movement didn’t go right for same-sex marriage after Stonewall. That took decades of work—decades of getting politicians on the side of gay people, of doing everything possible to humanize gay people in the eyes of society, of creating a society that is moderately accepting of gay people—and even then, it came down to a SCOTUS decision that could’ve gone against same-sex marriage and created a patchwork nightmare of marriage laws across the country. They changed marriage laws throughout America because they put in the fucking work to make that happen.

    You don’t win the game by sitting at home. You win the game by getting off your couch and doing whatever you can, whenever you can, to make sure politicians serve the general public instead of their political parties (or their corporate campaign donors). It’s not easy work, and you’re not guaranteed a victory for doing it. But you stand a better chance of winning if you’re not narfing down Doritos in front of your TV.

    • Richard says:

      “Disillusionment with the system is no excuse for self-imposed disenfranchisement.”

      Yes but how will the white 20-somethings who make upwards of $50k a year pretend that they are part of the oppressed working class?! If they drive to a nearby polling station on their lunch break they might have to admit the system isn’t as rigged against them as they love to whine about!

      I’m convinced they’re just too lazy to google the address of their polling station.

    • J Lynn says:

      “Not voting is not a protest — it’s a surrender.”

      – Rep Keith Ellison (D -MN), who campaigned for Bernie, addressing the Dem convention last night

      BTW, he’s worth checking out on Twitter, @keithellison, and if you scroll back to July 23, he’s answering some questions just like the ones in CT’s last few posts. Bio, fyi: https://ellison.house.gov/about/keiths-biography

      • Gaybeard says:

        Great quote.

        Choosing not to vote in certain circumstances makes sense to me; if you’re someone convinced that change can’t come through the vote and choose to spend your time actively campaigning to change the system in other ways, then it seems like a legitimate choice as opposed to a lazy excuse.

      • Datdamwuf says:

        Absolutely true, I always vote. I’m in my 50s so there have been many votes for the ‘lesser of two evils’. In this election it’s stark contrast.

  8. hmm says:

    I’m so tired of listening to clones of the same monied white dude talk about how he’s going to change establishment politics via grass roots without foresight beyond the last smug meme posted on Bernie Sander’s Dank Meme Stash. I’m smothering in the sharts of opinions that people who’s day to day won’t be effected by a raving wonder bread megalomanic who will take a giant steaming shit on me and everyone I hold dearly.

    Suck a dick. Obviously Hillary Clinton is flawed, obviously the system is flawed, and obviously I’m fucking upset about it. But if you’re willing to subject people who aren’t you to the terror of the trump, please shove your head in a toilet and flush until you stop fucking breathing.

  9. Silvia says:

    From the outside one would think this election is a no brainer…and then all this. Sometimes I’m quite schoked.

  10. M says:

    Thank you. I’m starting to want to go off on friends. People are being so short-sighted and it’s painful. And it will be the reason Hillary loses (if she does).

  11. Strangely Rational says:

    “Maybe the conversation shouldn’t be about Clinton v Trump. Maybe the conversation should be creating a better system, for the long term.”

    Forget “shoulds” and “shouldn’ts” and reconnect with fucking reality.

    Right now, the conversation IS about Clinton vs. Trump whether you like it or not. That’s the decision we have right now before us. So we are going to have to deal with that right now.

    There are exactly two possible outcomes of this election. Either Trump will win, or Hillary will win. That’s it. You are not going to do anything to improve the system with your vote. All you will do with it is help Trump get elected, or help Hillary get elected.

    So which is it going to be?

    If you vote for Hillary, you help get Hillary elected.
    If you vote for Trump, you help get Trump elected.
    If you vote for another candidate, you help get Trump elected.
    If you stay home instead of voting, you help get Trump elected.

    Notice that none of these possible outcomes involves you changing a damn thing about the system.

    Notice also that you don’t get to remove yourself from the equation. You don’t get to bow out and let everyone else decide. As Rush (the band) puts it, “If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.”

    Now, once that decision is out of the way, THEN we can talk about improving the system as a whole. Consider this: who do you want in the position of President (two choices: Trump or Hillary) and what do you want the content of the Supreme Court to be while you’re trying to improve the system? Which is most likely to send it in the direction you want? Which is most likely to support things like campaign finance reform?

    • Ashley says:

      actually, logic says:

      If you vote for Hillary, you help get Hillary elected.
      If you vote for Trump, you help get Trump elected.
      If you vote for another candidate, you help get another candidate elected.
      If you stay home instead of voting, you stay home.

      or, if this makes more sense to you, since its equally true:

      If you vote for Hillary, you help get Hillary elected.
      If you vote for Trump, you help get Trump elected.
      If you vote for another candidate, you help get Trump or Hillary elected.
      If you stay home instead of voting, you help get Trump or Hillary elected.

      considering the current polls show a neck in neck horse race. but you know, us sanders supporters warned you that your girl will lose. you ignored us. you made your bed now sleep.

      • Nina says:

        Fuck off. You call yourself a Sanders supporter but you’re not. Bernie’s message has always been about better treatment for the common people. Your pissy tantrums and thirst for blood fly in the face of that.

        • Perspectivator says:

          I love the fact that she thinks she has the power to punish us by voting drumpf. “Everyone stand back or I’ll shoot myself repeatedly…you might get caught in the cross fire!”

          • Ashley says:

            im not voting for trump. I’m voting for stein. in NY, my vote for stein is a vote for hillary. even if i voted for trump, its still a vote for hillary.

            fucking ignorant idiots. i guess you never learned about the electoral college? maybe you were too young to remember the 2000 election?

      • Betsy says:

        Remember how voting Nader and getting Bush elected really sent a message to the Democratic party? Remember how that REALLY pushed the discourse further to the left? Yeah, me neither.

      • J Lynn says:

        “Punishing” the Democratic Party by withholding a vote and withdrawing from the party moves the Overton window to the right, not the left. The FDR-and-after Dem Party moves left when it’s in power, that’s history, and that’s what happened under Obama.

        A lot of people in the 18 to 24 group don’t REALLY remember how horrifically awful it was when the Supreme Court gave the 2000 election to the popular vote loser, and then all the retrograde Republican policy that followed. It was worse than you think you remember, esconsed in the bosom of childhood as many of you were. By way of comparison, I grew up with mostly Reagan &Bush 41 as pres, even seeing Oliver North on TV during a sick day, but my family wasn’t deeply political. I didn’t grasp the full depth of the shock and revanchment Reagan brought to the country in the early 80s, especially to those 1970s liberal, civil rights and labor people, until I got to know some of them as an adult. I don’t say this to invalidate anyone’s legitimate opinion, I’m just saying that living through it brings a visceral painful knowledge that is searing.

        Just as you listen to groups with first-hand experience on other matters, I beg you to simply *consider* what politically involved people who remember both the late 90s and early 2000s as adults have to say.

        ..
        Final point on a different subject. I notice Jill Stein and her followers pushing “neoliberal” as a buzzword lately, and as a reason to not vote for Hillary and other Democrats. This is off-base. I wrote my college thesis, in part, on neoliberalism. The 2016 Democrats are not “neoliberals.”

        • G says:

          There’s an unfortunate strain of self-identified social justice activists that think that political labels and definitions are meant to be used as insults as opposed to shorthand for discussing policy. I think that’s where the “neoliberal” buzzwording is coming from. I think they want to draw analogies between neoconservatives without actually knowing what neoliberalism is.

          PS: I also think it’s because of the increased emphasis on trying to get rid of free trade wherever possible, which I think is a mistake despite otherwise being wholeheartedly a New Keynesian.

          • J Lynn says:

            Here is a short essay that explains it pretty well:
            https://www.mackinac.org/7504

            FYI the guy who it is named for seems to have been a member of a conservative think tank, but the idea applies across the spectrum — and the fact that conservatives grasp it indicates why they are sometimes more successful!

            Attempt to explain in my own words: In ultra-simple terms, politicians won’t vote for any policy or law that endangers their re-election chances too much, no matter how good the idea or how much the individual pol might personally like it. Maybe they can stick their neck out once or twice, but any politician who does it too often will be voted out. (And lose more than 1 big election, and your career in elected office is over, better hope you went to law school.)

            Imagine the range of policies on a given topic on a yardstick, from ultra-left to ultra-right. Only policies representing a portion of that yardstick — say 20″ to 30″ — is currently acceptable to the voting public. Not the general public — the voting public.

            When you can change public opinion, and when you can demonstrate progressives being successful public servants (basic job requirement, because most of government is constituent service on bread-and-butter issues like good roads and schools) then you can shift the “Overton window” to the left. Showing the voters that liberal/progressive policy can work, and that Dem politicians are successful, then the Overton window might shift to the range of 15″-29″ being acceptable to the public — and by “public” I mean again the voting public.

            If you remove yourself from the voting public, politicians don’t give a damn what you think because you don’t help them win elections — more importantly, you don’t save them from losing if they take a political risk.

            [[I started to write several more grafs about why Overton window theory explains American political phenomena better than the Marxist theory (“the worse, the better!”) that still implicitly influences the far left, but holy shit, way too long, gotta go eat lunch.]]

        • Ashley says:

          youre wrong about 2000, and i can tell you that because i remember it like it was yesterday.

          gore won the popular vote. bush won the electoral college. more democrats and independents in floriduh voted for bush than nader. the SCOTUS ruled in favor of the electoral college. NADER WAS SCAPEGOATED AND HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH IT.

          people are so fucking brainwashed its disgusting. THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE DECIDES THE ELECTION. PERIOD.

          • J Lynn says:

            You’re mistaken on a key point:
            The issue in the SCOTUS case Bush v Gore was whether or not to allow the Florida recount to proceed — not electoral college vs popular vote.

            There was a manual recount going on in contested Florida counties, as provided for by Florida law. Manual recounting is slow, and they were running up against a statutory deadline. In response, the Florida Supreme Court granted county officials the right to proceed past the deadline, until the count was complete.

            If allowed to proceed, those recounts may have revealed enough votes such that Gore would win Florida, thus the electoral college.

            Bush’s people appealed the Florida Supreme Court decision allow the recount to SCOTUS, and SCOTUS stopped the recount.

            SCOTUS did not “rule in favor of the electoral college.” SCOTUS ruled to stop the recount, overturning the Florida Supreme Court ruling.

            You’re correct Bush voters cast more votes against Gore than Nader voters did. Some of those Bush voters were probably registered Democrats. Presumably Democrats who voted for Bush wanted conservative policy, despite their party affiliation. On the other hand, Nader voters in Florida presumably wanted progressive policy. Thus, by voting for a candidate who stood no chance of winning — and despite projections of an ultra-close race between the major parties — they took action to thwart their own policy preferences. And they took the rest of us down with them.

            ..
            I have no idea why you would ALL-CAPS your last sentence, or accuse anyone of being brainwashed. Nobody has ever disputed that the electoral college decides the election, that’s common knowledge. I’ve heard that charge a lot this election from the far-left — that people who disagree with them are “brainwashed” because they don’t know about the electoral college. The electoral college is basic high school civics content required for graduation.

          • Anonymous says:

            When she can’t get her conclusion lauded, she jumps to another random point in order to demonstrate her knowledge and superiority in challenging authority. It doesn’t matter at all that you have patiently unrolled every reason not to throw away a vote. She cannot be persuaded. My prediction is that now she will throw a tantrum showing us how she can change her mind, but then won’t.

            J. Lynn, I just want to commend you for your patience beyond reasonable duty.

          • Richard Charnin says:

            Gore won in Florida and Nationally in a near landslide.
            https://richardcharnin.wordpress.com/2011/11/21/unadjusted-state-exit-polls-indicate-that-al-gore-won-a-mini-landslide-in-2000/

            First there was the 2000 Judicial Coup and then the long-running media con that Bush really did win. Let’s take another look. Al Gore won the unadjusted state exit polls (58,000 respondents) by 50.8-44.4%, a 6 MILLION VOTE MARGIN compared to the 540,000 recorded. There were nearly 6 MILLION UNCOUNTED votes – the great majority were Gore votes.

            Twelve states flipped from Gore in the exit poll to Bush in the recorded vote: AL AR AZ CO FL GA MO NC NV TN TX VA. Gore would have won the election if he captured just one of the states. Democracy died in 2000.

            Officially, Bush won Florida by 537 recorded votes. But it was not even close. Gore won the unadjusted Florida exit poll (1816 respondents) by 53.4-43.6%. Given the 3.0% exit poll margin of error (including a 30% cluster effect), there is a 99.9% probability that Gore won FL and a 97.5% probability that he won by at least 200,000 votes.

            There were 185,000 uncounted ballots: 110,000 over-punched and 75,000 under-punched. In addition, thousands of “butterfly” ballots meant for Gore were marked for Buchanan in heavily Democratic Palm Beach County. The recount was aborted by 5 Republicans on the Supreme Court. But Florida was not unique. The 9.8% margin discrepancy was exceeded in 10 states: TX AL NC TN GA AR ID MD SC FL

            The True Vote Model is based on 1996 and 2000 votes cast. It was a close match to Gore’s exit poll share. He won the True Vote by 50.9-45.3% assuming he had 75% of 8 million returning 1996 voters whose ballots were uncounted and 75% of 6 million uncounted votes in 2000.

          • Datdamwuf says:

            Not in 2000. The Supreme Court appointed Bush president. I remember it very well. They should have refused the case.

        • Betsy says:

          Hey, would you mind explaining a bit about how 2016 Democrats are not neoliberals? Not doubting you, just curious. American politics is generally more right-wing than Europe’s (hence “Liberal” parties being considered right wing here), so I wonder what it’s like right now.

          • J Lynn says:

            Liberal in Europe means classical liberal, like ye olde Adam Smith, and a political economy closer to laissez faire than not. Twentieth century proponents include the Chicago school economists, most famously Milton Freidman. I think in England, Thatcher’s Tories have been called “neoliberals.” (My college study of neoliberalism was more in the World Bank/IMF structural adjustments and development schemes in the “third world” countries, rather than “first world” politics.) A European example of neoliberal policy might be the privatization the UK steel industry which had been national since the war (or even before?). Just found this handy Guardian feature, “Short History of Privatization” https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/mar/29/short-history-of-privatisation

            (If you are in Europe, you probably know all that better than I do! Sorry if that was too redundant or simplistic.)

            On the other hand, “liberal” in the U.S. means progressive or perhaps social democrat in European terms. They favor a mixed economy, basically capitalist and not centrally planned as in true socialism, but also including a social programs, Keynesian demand-side economic preferences, and central monetary policy (via the Federal Reserve).

            Why does liberal mean left-leaning in the US in the first place? I haven’t been able to find the source this morning, but I once read a great article that this was a bit of re-branding by FDR & the New Dealers. Until the 1930s, leftist social reformers had indeed been called “progressives” — search “Progressive Movement” in US, great history– and they were very successful in +/- 1880s-1920s in ending child labor, gaining suffrage, building urban sanitation services, etc. But they made one big overreach: Prohibition. Because Prohibition was so unpopular by the time FDR took office, New Dealers relabeled themselves liberals. (I presume they chose this instead of socialist because of red-scare anti-communism in the US.)

          • J Lynn says:

            Short version:
            “Neoliberals” are called “fiscal conservatives” in the US … even though Reagan himself, the guy most closely aligned with Thatcher, wasn’t actually fiscally conservative because of massive budget deficits … confusing, I know! Political labels can be very slippery in the US.

            American “liberal” = social democrat or progressive, traditionally speaking.

            Labels can be very slippery in the US because politicians tied to specific geographic constituencies that are usually heterogeneous in several ways. So unless they come from a home state/district that’s ideologically homogenous (e.g., San Francisco), most politicans don’t want to claim any ideological label, and prefer to say they’re for anodyne things like “common sense” (usually code for conservative) or “smart government” (code for liberal/progressive).

          • WhoAmI says:

            This explains a lot. So by american standards western Europe is seen as ridiculously liberal in the US, just like by european standards the US are seen as ridiculously liberal in western Europe ?

          • J Lynn says:

            Yeah, kinda! Pretty funny when you put it that way! American “liberals” (progs/social dems) fantasize and salivate over western European social programs. We imagine the NHS as some sort of spa-like utopia! We think Scandinavia is Valhalla-on-earth. OK, obviously exaggerating, but you get the idea.

            American “conservatives” on the other hand, smear these policies as “communist” — I wish I were joking! And their favorite epithet for the American “liberals” who want them is “tax-and-spend liberals.” American conservatism since Reagan has been very ideologically anti-tax. (It wasn’t always: Dwight Eisenhower in the 1950s was a moderate conservative and presided over high income tax rates and a big infrastructure spending program.)

            Thus, American “liberals” have spent the last 35 years since Reagan just fighting — sometimes unsuccessfully — to hold onto the social programs and progressive taxation we got in the 1940s and 1960s with Roosevelt and LBJ’s “war on poverty,” respectively. Additionally, remember we never even had as much in the way of programs/taxation as you guys did in the first place.

          • WhoAmI says:

            Yeah, and you never had a strong communist presence in the high spheres, and that’s why some of your politicians throw the communist epithet so easily. 🙂

            Which isn’t a bad thing in itself ; back in the days, in France, maoism was all the rage. Some parts of the french intelligentsia even kept the label after it was revealed to the world what Mao really was doing with China (I wish I were joking, too).

            And don’t worry, european socialists are huge Sweden fanboys too. Sweden could be burning baby animals alive and they would be like “YAAAAAS you’re so progressive mama !”.

          • J Lynn says:

            That’s very interesting about Maoism. I know things got pretty hot in France back in ’68, and I know there are general strikes from time to time (which seem cool and exciting to us Americans!), but I admit I don’t know much about the ins and outs of French politics.

            ! Liberte Egalite Fraternite!

          • WhoAmI says:

            About general strikes : there have been several ones this year. In between terrorist attacks and sports events. It calmed down now because of the holidays, but if the government don’t stop their nonsense they may have another Mai 68 on their ass, and it will all be their damn fault. They’re blaming protesters for going on strike when there are already other problems going on in the country (!) and use the state of emergency to lock people away when they protest too much (one guy even got house arrest for being a vegan militant, how extra is that), and to justify police violence (and to condemn the people who dare to fight back when the guy right next to them just loss the use of their eyes permanently).
            And they already tried to bypass the system 3 times to impose the project of law at the origin of it all.
            The worst part being that the government has the socialist label (that’s moderate left ; by comparison, democrats and republicans are just two different shades of moderate right) and has been going more and more neoliberalist with the months.

      • Strangely Rational says:

        “If you vote for another candidate, you help get another candidate elected.”

        No, that is not possible. Remember that either Hillary or Trump will be elected. No other candidate will be elected. If you think so, you’re insane.

        “If you stay home instead of voting, you stay home.”

        If you stay home, you will not cancel out the vote of a Trump supporter. This helps him get elected.

        ”If you vote for another candidate, you help get Trump or Hillary elected.”

        I’m assuming a liberal audience here, because otherwise we’d all be voting Trump and this wouldn’t even be a question. For a liberal, using your vote for something other than the only electable candidate who comes close to your views helps the other guy; i.e., Trump.

        My husband and some of his relatives are strong Sanders supporters, and I also would have preferred Sanders but am okay with Hillary. Every single one of us is voting for Hillary. Why? Because having someone whose political positions align most closely with our own – even if they’re not perfect – is better than having a temper tantrum that results in someone completely opposed to them.

        If Hillary loses, it will be because of liberals who stayed home or refused to vote for her. That’s the bottom line. You’ll be the ones making the bed we’re all going to have nightmares in if you don’t grow up and face fucking reality.

    • MaybeDoomed says:

      Epic lols.
      Even the name is perfect.

      Can’t stop laughing…please say, “well actually.”
      Wait wait, say “all lives matter.”

      • Ashley says:

        my name is perfect? ok then.

        lets address the electoral fraud instead of being smug holier than thou neoliberals, perhaps?

        https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5O9I4XJdSISNzJyaWIxaWpZWnM/view

        oh yeah, you’ll just tell me I’ve got my tin foil hat on and ignore all th evidence laid out in front of you – all 100 pages – because it upsets your worldview.

        i already sent this to coke talk, I’m sure shell give me the same smug condescending treatment. keep doing it. your girl will lose in november with or without us. we warned you. you ignored us at your own peril. we weren’t bluffing when we said bernie or bust.

        enjoy another war of aggression, either candidate will start one.

        • MaybeDoomed says:

          Hello, it is I, Ashley of voter group Millenium. Am here to discuss voting against self interest and sittings on couch as form of extreme protests. Do not bother self with reading discourses in above section. This is only post and link you need to click. Is not virus at all.

          But seriously, you are missing the point by not paying attention to this entire comment section. You want to change the system, that’s great. But if you don’t vote for Hillary, that system won’t have a chance to change because there won’t be a civilization left. Do you understand?

          Do you think you can cleanup voter fraud if the Donald wins?

          • Nerdlinger says:

            Quit that. You can easily address the flaws in her argument without rolling out the cliché that her political stance comes from internalized self-hatred. You’d think all the ways in which Freudian voodoo and hack evopsych has been used to undermine women’s experiences would make people hesitant to run to accusations of false consciousness at the drop of a hat. It’s blatant Bulverism: http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Bulverism
            Do better.

          • Ashley says:

            i learned something new today. thank you for that. bulverism is what my diehard hillary supporting cousin does every time she argues with me. attack the messenger, ignore the message. i can’t blame her, she’s following hillary and the DNC’s lead when it comes to hearing things they don’t like. see the recent wikileaks response for example. pivoting to russia was a brilliant way to redirect the press and the conversation away from the content. I’m used to it.

            apparently the sentence “your girl will lose in november with or without us” must of triggered her OMG MISOGYNY response.

            i guess i should post a trigger warning since this is a safe space for hillary supporters.

            /sarcasm

            why is it that whenever anyone criticizes hillary its MISOGYNY! SEXISM! do you guys hear yourselves? pathetic. an embarrassment to women who really do face misogyny and sexism everywhere.

          • Nerdlinger says:

            I’m sure “Hillary faces sexism” and “some people wave away any complaints about her as sexism” can both be true. There’s a certain fallacy of relative privation in saying she’s insulated just because she’s rich and powerful.

            Also be careful not to go Bulverism on your cousin yourself. “She allows mindlessly shallows the party line” is also a way for you never having to engange her argument on fair terms.

        • Strangely Rational says:

          ” we weren’t bluffing when we said bernie or bust.”

          Speak for yourself.

          “Pew asked those consistent Sanders supporters whom they support in the general election. Ninety percent said they back Hillary Clinton.”

          https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/07/25/the-democratic-convention-is-chaotic-the-democratic-base-isnt/

          After looking this up, it makes me feel a little better. There’s awhile until November, so it’s likely that others will grudgingly come on board when they realize that they have absolutely nothing to gain by sticking to their guns when the majority of people screaming alongside them have said, “Okay, let’s not be stupid. Of course we’re voting for Hillary.”

          For God’s sake, Bernie himself thinks you should do it.

          “By these measures, any objective observer will conclude that based on her ideas and her leadership, Hillary Clinton must become the next president of the United States . . . Brothers and sisters, this election is about overturning Citizens United! Citizens United is one of the worst Supreme Court decisions in the history of our country. That decision allows the wealthiest people in America, like the billionaire Koch brothers to spend hundreds of millions of dollars buying elections and in the process undermine American democracy. Hillary Clinton will nominate justices to the Supreme Court who are prepared to overturn Citizens United! . . . If you don’t believe that this election is important, if you think you can sit it out, take a moment to think about the Supreme Court justices that Donald Trump would nominate and what that would mean to civil liberties, equal rights and the future of our country . . . It is no secret that Hillary Clinton and I disagree on a number of issues. That is what this campaign has been about. That is what democracy is about. So I’m happy to tell you that at the Democratic Platform Committee there was a significant coming together between the two campaigns and we produced by far the most progressive platform in the history of the Democratic Party . . . Our job now is to see that strong Democratic platform implemented by a Democratic-controlled Senate by a Democratic House and a Hillary Clinton presidency! And I am going to do all that I can to make that happen.”

          (Full transcript: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/07/26/transcript-bernie-sanderss-full-speech-at-the-2016-dnc/)

          If you’re such a Bernie supporter, maybe you should listen to him.

    • G says:

      What are you defining as ethics here?

      Also no one is going to click on that google drive because that’s not even slightly a reputable way to source information (and as others pointed out, could easily be a virus or some other scam). Try a better source.

      • Ashley says:

        the source is election justice USA. their site is being hacked continuously with DDOS attacks. thats the file that you would find from their site. maybe a well respected mathematician who has studied every election since JFK is more acceptable to you? or does it have to come from the corporate owned media to be deemed acceptable?

        https://richardcharnin.wordpress.com

        the election justice link has the actual evidence of electoral fraud and voter suppression of every state in question. they have lawsuits filed in AZ and NY. but you know – since you don’t agree with the premise of the link its not like youre gonna click it anyways.

  12. Bry says:

    Sheesh, this is abhorrent. It may as well be a yahoo comments section. Ashley, your facts do matter. I share your outrage not just at what’s come to light but also at the shunning and indifference to reality that you face from buffoons that may as well be in a cult or on the right. This block of server space seems to have become nothing more than an echo chamber of self congratulatory sentiment with no tolerance of facts or objectivity. I would prefer Hillary, but the amount of masturbatory shit spewing out of these sycophants mouths lauding themselves as the adults is maddening. I understand where they are coming from but I also hear and understand you and I am troubled that people would rather shout down your very legitimate concerns than engage you in a manner befitting thinking people. It seems that this is simply a space for the 40% of Hillary voters to parrot and congratulate each other. It’s not very different than the 40% of Trump people as far as tolerance to differing opinions goes except that they share their words with smug self righteousness instead of anger. I also encourage you to avoid drudge report boards with any objectivity or factual concerns. Most people these days simply dismiss what doesn’t reinforce their views and internalize what makes them feel right. I prefer Hillary over Trump as I’m sure you do too but you have every right to be disheartened and to feel disenfranchised and insignificant. You’re made to feel that way but please don’t give up on democracy. It’s ugly and corrupt but I assure you that it beats anything else out there right now. Also, as the father of a young daughter, please keep your independence. The only way to solve the complex and nuanced problems that face us is by going through them line by line, not by buying into anyone’s pre packaged ideology. I hope this pithy bitch goes back to lecturing morons on their insignificant place in the world and gives up on blowing up her ego in nasty diatribes that would befit conserivative talk radio hosts. I want Hillary to be appointing supreme court justices over Trump as well, but goddamn! This egotistical and submental ranting serves no one but your own sense of self righteousness and to rile up people who have their tongues in your asshole before you ever type anyway. I apologize for any and all grammatical errors, this is a smart(dumb) phone and I’m very sleepy. I hate to address this beforehand but it seems that’s a favorite detail of people who have no retort towards the details of s person’s statements so I thought I would address it beforehand.

    • Grouch says:

      “It seems that this is simply a space for the 40% of Hillary voters to parrot and congratulate each other. It’s not very different than the 40% of Trump people as far as tolerance to differing opinions goes ” —

      Wait… what? You realise that if Hillary wins, homophobes are still free not to engage in same-sex marriages, and poor people are still free to not have health insurance and never go to Planned Parenthood…

      I think there’s a bit of a difference between those two groups. One group has opinions that will impact and hurt a lot of people.

      • Bry says:

        I didn’t say there wasn’t a difference between the two platforms. I said that, increasingly, there’s little difference in the way either group treats people who disagree or even have a slightly different take. For an example, see whoami’s entirely substance free and meaningless comment. It’s just an attempt to stifle the conversation, not open it up. Excuse me for expecting more from liberals.

        • WhoAmI says:

          Dude. You’re taking yourself (and that conversation, for that matter) way too seriously. To the point that it makes you sound dumber than you are. For everyone involved, and especially you, please take a chill pill. La gravité est le bouclier des sots.

          • Bry says:

            So, you still have no counter argument for any statement I’m made and I’m the dumb one? Got it. You’re right about your point of taking this conversation seriously. It’s not even a conversation.

          • Ashley says:

            “For an example, see whoami’s entirely substance free and meaningless comment. It’s just an attempt to stifle the conversation, not open it up. Excuse me for expecting more from liberals.”

            proving his point well i see.

        • Ashley says:

          “For an example, see whoami’s entirely substance free and meaningless comment. It’s just an attempt to stifle the conversation, not open it up. Excuse me for expecting more from liberals.”

          exactly.

    • Ashley says:

      lol at the smart dumb phone and the drudge report. did you look at the file from the link i posted? its absolutely ABHORRENT that people refuse to see whats right in front of them.

      i should just fake being a hillary supporter so people will listen to me and actually take the electoral fraud seriously. if they want to live in this country for the rest of their lives, they better – because this country on the path it is will end before their lives are over. who knows what will replace it.

      youre dead on about the congratulatory echo chamber that this comments section is (as well as all of Facebook right now). they’re gonna be extremely disappointed come the first wednesday in november when their infallible candidate fails. their smug self righteous attitude as well as resorting to scare tactics for the past year will be to blame. they said the brexit would never happen – and it did. why? because remain pissed off so many people with their smug attitudes that they voted leave just to give the finger to the establishment. the same will happen with trump.

      thank you for your respectful comment. it is refreshing today.

      • Bry says:

        Of course, madam. You’re not alone but unfortunately, we are outnumbered and flanked on both sides. I take this seriously because I live in a vastly red state and I find that when you go through issues people can be reasoned with but when you only talk candidates and party platform then people’s lizard brain overtakes their cognitive capacity. As for this waste land of critical thinking, it’s disappointing people can’t look at what’s at stake and be pragmatic while also speaking out against systemic issues and factual injustices instead of burying their heads in the sand and fear mongering. It’s incredibly disheartening. Fuck no, I don’t want to help Trump win but I am also 32 and have seen now that every election has a conservative boogeyman (legitimately) in the elections I’ve seen. First Cheney then Palin then Ryan and now Trump and this won’t change anytime soon in this environment of reason free idiocy on both sides. Those people did all suck but guess what our dems were and are boogeymen to them as well. It’s no excuse not to use information and reasoning to demand real changes instead of saying legitimate critique will somehow kill the world because the opposition might win so vote for this person because you’re more afraid of the other person! Also, this won’t be the last leak so stay tuned for more of this nonsense. What make you of the deluded notion that somehow right wing nationalism and ignorance will die out if Trump loses big ? I think it’s a joke and completely doesn’t pass the reality smell test. The only elections that will matter are in swing states and that will never change until people demand that the electoral college is abolished. There is no democracy where a popular vote doesn’t decide things. What’s funny is that I’m so jaded that Hillary was my first choice initially because I thought she was a good political operative and could break gridlock and get at least a few things done but her whole campaign has been woefully inept with the crescendo being to bring in DWS after she resigned in shame. Fucking completely tone-deaf and moronic campaign. As for her email shit, I have family and I couple of friends in that dirty northern Virginia cyber security game. It’s understood that having a private server is pro quo and it’s ignorant to think a government server is any more secure so that’s irrelevant. What is relevant is that she deleted all of those emails without handing them over and suppressed staffers concerns while also now campaigning on the provable inaccuracy that she was compliant and helpful win the investigation. Just absolutely stupid. Who knows what was on the emails but Jesus, don’t lie about things that are provable. That just gives the right moderately legitimate reason to perpetuate what they have always said about the Clinton’s. Woefully inept campaigning. The only person Trump could beat is Hillary and the only person Hillary could beat is Trump. This is going to be a nail biter and the blind and glib left behaving like stereotypes isn’t helping.

          • Bry says:

            Yes, get a life compared to the sub mental troglodyte who trolls us with passe and baseless statements. You embarrass this whole community. Go troll a yahoo board. This is supposed to be a community with something to say and you’re a total moron who has no clue on how to even make counterpoints. Laughable.

          • WhoAmI says:

            What is passe even supposed to mean in english ? Because in french it can have a very dirty meaning, lemme tell you.

          • The Coquette says:

            That’s enough, you two. Kiss and make up, because I don’t wanna have to spank you. Remember, you’ve got more in common than 99% of the rest of humanity.

          • Bry says:

            Anyone who has read a decent book since high school knows that passe is a synonym for irrelevant and a perfect description for a person like you. A conversation requires either agreeing with or refuting someone’s statements. You clearly haven’t the basic understanding of what meaningful communication entails. Cue embarrassingly moronic and tone deaf response. Actually, coke, I haven’t much in common with a petulant ignoramus who can’t even address the merits of a person’s statements and I hope you don’t either. You should hope that this jackass is just a blemish on your under carriage but a little reading points to the fact that it’s not isolated and seems to be herpes.

          • Anna says:

            Précision : ce message s’adresse à Whaomi, et non pas l’autre connasse.
            OMG are you French ? Canadian maybe ? Probably Canadian actually. I was excited for a hot minute, but we probably wouldn’t be able to orally communicate in French anyways, not without me having fits of giggles.

          • Anna says:

            Ah bah tiens une jolie surprise ! Sont fous ces américains (surtout sur ce post), c’est marrant que tu te révèles être français. Bizarrement, je t’imaginais plutôt femme sud est asiatique, mais je crois que ct juste le pseudonyme.

          • Anna says:

            Ca y’est, Jonna Lee est officiellement ajoutée à la playlist “trucs à écouter sur la 4 à 8h” 😉

      • O. says:

        And now Britain is shitting itself if this Brexit nonsense actually happens. The candidates who spoke for Brexit twisted facts and figures to suit their political agenda, and when that didn’t convince some members of the general public, mostly over 60s with xenophobic fears, the Brexit party essentially lied and when the result was announced that they’d won, they backtracked on ALL of their campaign promises within hours on national television and in the press. With some luck, our new PM Theresa May is biding her time to let the dust settle after the referendum, and then saying something similar to: “Thanks everyone for voting and giving your opinion, however, we’re going to stay in the EU, the value of the pound will rise as a result of this choice, there won’t be a wall built between NI and southern Ireland, Scotland will still be a part of the UK, etc., etc.”

  13. C says:

    Coke just missed the point that the person asking the question clearly isn’t American and won’t be voting in their election. They’re trying to say about bad the duopoly of their system is never did the asker say “our”.

  14. The Coquette says:

    Since this comment thread has devolved into arrogance and ad hominem bickering, I’d like to prove a small but important point:

    Is anyone here looking forward to voting for Donald Trump? Amongst the thousands who will read this post, is there a single one of you who’d like to offer your full-throated support for the Republican candidate for President?

    I’m serious about this. Go ahead. Anyone.

    • DisillusionedVoter says:

      Yeah … nice try — HCR is still a corrupt, incompetent and disliked candidate who’s very lucky she is going up against someone marginally worse, instead of someone like President Obama, otherwise no one than her most loyal apparatchiks would vote for her.

      I challenge you to actually address the substance of the DNC leaks, instead of being deliberately obtuse about it.

      • J Lynn says:

        Wikileaks emails:
        I’ve gone over the highlights semi-closely and what’s been released so far is mostly inside baseball, hacks vs flacks, like the Ralph the wolf vs the Sam the sheepdog on Bugs Bunny. Hacks = press; flacks = campaigners & PR.

        All campaigns try to influence — but can’t control — reporters; during campaigns political reporters have the upper hand and they fucking revel in it. (Opposite of WH Press Corp, they can be more trapped/beholden, depending on situation.)

        Nothing in Julian Assange’s little revenge porn release suggests any improper influence on the primary election outcome. Nothing.

        What you have is a bunch of totally predictable private opinion. The worst is contemplating highlighting Bernie’s presumed atheism, but they never did it. If anything, that makes them look decent for not going there. All campaigns, all political operatives, everybody talks shit privately about everybody else’s political weaknesses. Who would want the gchat or snapchat shit they say during work hours published? This stuff is really on that level.

        ..
        Bringing it ’round … Coke’s challenge remains unanswered.

        • Poleznye Duraki says:

          Dezinformatsiya — specifically the act of placing false information among facts — is a time honored technique among Russian intelligence services. You can almost be certain they have placed disinformation in their purloined documents to harm Mrs. Clinton’s campaign.

          Disinformation is most effective when it plays upon truths, half truths or perception. Since Hillary is perceived as corrupt or less than honest, and the DNC actually has shown a lack of impartiality and impropriety saying negative things about Mr. Sanders, lies that amplify those themes will be readily believed by many Americans.

          It’s obvious who that KGB Thug in Moscow prefers in this election, and what better way to help get his preferred idiot into the White House than to discredit Mrs. Clinton this way?

      • MaybeDoomed says:

        Hey, that’s not how you answer a challenge. When someone lays down a challenge you don’t say, “Noooo, you take MY taste test first!” Don’t answer a question with a question unless you are trying to truly understand the argument.

        By the way, it’s not a “nice try.” That’s you projecting your own failure.

      • lucy says:

        Lack of listening is a real theme here. And that will be the reason Trump wins.

        “Is anyone here looking forward to voting for Donald Trump?”

        ….well that completely misses the point… yet again

        Seriously? no legitimate fan of this blog would fully, whole-heartedly 100% support Donald Trump. what do you expect? …Yeah, I’m really looking forward to the whole fucking world burning down. (???)

        The actual point is that there is a serious lack of listening going on – by you, by the people in this thread, and by the Democratic party at large.

        If the Hillary camp does not listen, it could actually lose. That’s the reality. And yes, it’s fucking scary. Listening means she needs take on more of Bernie Sanders policies. She needs to give him a significantly larger role in her government. Listening means she has to actually represent this constituency. She has to actively, truly, whole-heartedly listen to this group of people.

        It’s not enough to say “BUT TRUMP THOUGH”. That’s the actual point.

        Only America could end up in a situation where Donald Trump is a viable president, who could seriously win. Judging by this entire thread, I can absolutely see why.

        just unfortunate that this election indirectly affects only every person on the planet. keep it up guys.

        • J Lynn says:

          I completely agree that “but Trump tho” is not a sufficient argument. The argument instead is the platform of the more-or-less united Democratic party.

          1) Sanders is already a Senator, and given his seniority in Congress a relatively influential one. That’s the largest role in the US government other than POTUS and SCOTUS. Much, much more influential than VP or a cabinet position. VP is scarcely more powerful than First Lady unless the president dies. Watch the first seasons of VEEP on HBO to see that portrayed hilariously.

          A lot of people outside the US don’t understand this.

          2) They already had nearly identical policy proposals. Much that wasn’t the same was adopted into the Democratic platform, and the ones they shared have been tweaked closer to his. As the nominee, Hillary is running on and representing that platform now.

          3) Bernie has urged his supporters to vote for HRC and endorsed her. 90% say they will. These Bernie-or-Bust and/or Jill Stein people are a small minority. They do matter, but they aren’t a huge bloc.

          4) Yes, Hillary needs to listen to ALL her constituents in the broad Democratic Party coalition. Everybody. Bernie’s supporters are certainly important and their interest matter, but at the same time they don’t get special pleading above and beyond other voters (especially not above the minority voters who are the heart & soul of the Obama coalition). It’s a coalition. But regarding listening, check out the VOX article Tessa posted, though, its exact topic is Hillary’s listening:
          http://www.vox.com/a/hillary-clinton-interview/the-gap-listener-leadership-quality

          5) Realistically speaking, if Hillary loses to Trump, white racism will have played a much bigger role than a handful of Bernie supporters sitting out. And if the Democratic coalition wins — as it did in 2008 and 2012 w Obama — we will mostly have minorities and single women to thank.

          • G says:

            Your first point is actually why I decided I wanted Hillary over Bernie. I want Bernie to stay in Congress and tweak policies further left, more than I want him in the executive. (Of course, we’ll see how nominations shake out and if he ends up staying there, but that was my first thought – he’s much more my ideal Congressperson than my ideal diplomat/executive).

        • WhoAmI says:

          “Seriously? no legitimate fan of this blog would fully, whole-heartedly 100% support Donald Trump. what do you expect? …Yeah, I’m really looking forward to the whole fucking world burning down. (???)”
          Exactly. That’s her point. Nobody here wants Trump as a President. The best way to make sure that he doesn’t get elected is to vote for Hillary, as she is the one representing the Democrats this election. Everything else out there is just intense nitpicking that divides Coke’s reading base and makes it ineffective in attaining the same goal.

    • Ashley says:

      no. never. the only thing that excites me about him is that the DNC will be forced to change its course with an embarrassing loss of their infallible propped up candidate that was not democratically elected.

      I’m still waiting for anyone to seriously address the very serious and very real allegations of electoral fraud. but instead all i see is rabid hillary fans attacking me – the messenger – for it. too bad. attacking me doesn’t make the information any less real.

        • Ashley says:

          he investigated the multiple conspiracy surrounding JFK. big fucking deal. most people don’t believe the official story re JFK, nor should they. the ballistics didnt match the story.

          he has also more importantly been following elections since JFK – and he’s not alone. at the bottom of his post is links to multiple experts saying the same thing: electoral fraud is happening. https://richardcharnin.wordpress.com/2016/06/28/response-to-nate-cohn-of-the-ny-times/

          but you know, again, attack the messenger ignore the message. hillary taught you well.

          also the source of the electoral fraud is not him, he merely additionally confirms it in multiple posts. the source is election justice USA which has filed multiple lawsuits in multiple states.

          this is the document they released. go ahead and read it. you wont. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5O9I4XJdSISNzJyaWIxaWpZWnM/view

        • MaybeDoomed says:

          I was willing to just laugh at her for terrible logic, privilege, and an inability to stay on topic. Now I have to pity her for being exactly as rabid as Bill O’Reilly…and he’s the only sandwich you can make with Alzheimer’s, dementia and white bred.

      • Josh says:

        ashley!

        I barely made it through the table of contents—the writing is simply terrible! How is anyone suppose to take this flaming pile of garbage seriously?

      • Betsy says:

        Your link does indeed seem pretty damning. I had no idea the issue was so widespread.

        Listen – I agree your system is corrupt. But a Trump presidency will not result in an improvement. He wants to lower corporate taxes *even more.* He wants to destroy the planet. Nobody’s saying (I hope) to vote Hillary and shut up. Go, vote Hillary, and keep the pressure up. What the Bernie campaign accomplished is remarkable, and you should keep it going. You have more power than you think.

    • J Lynn says:

      Just read that, really good. Also Melissa McEwan at shakesville.com has been talking about that a lot in 2015-6.

  15. Elsie says:

    They’re talking about trying to pass the Equal Rights Amendment again if Hilary is elected. My aunt campaigned hard and fervently for it. She died a few years ago. I’d like to honor her by working towards that.

    So I’m with Hilary.

  16. Hmmm says:

    This has been said so many times, but I need to say it again because I’m so baffled by people’s willful ignorance. Refusing to vote for Hillary because she’s not your ideal and perfect candidate even though you KNOW she’s better than Trump is selfish, childish, and straight up stupid. The high ground you think you’re standing on doesn’t exist. You’re not making the world a better place. You’re not contributing to progress. You’re not helping the very movement you so strongly stand behind. You’re not being defiant in a way that’s going to lead to positive change.

    Throw your temper tantrums. Stay home and don’t vote. Vote third party. By all means, make it that much harder for the possibility of a future Bernie as President.

    Seriously. Fuck anyone who can’t see past their own ego. Fuck anyone who knows how terrible Trump is, but who’s so far up their own ass to do the one thing to stop him.

  17. Soooooooooooooooo says:

    Not to sound like a bitch, but why wouldn’t we just discuss coke’s post in coke’s comment section again? Did I miss something?

    • Melissa Low says:

      This is intended as a complement to, not a replacement of Coquette’s comments section. The idea is to use a platform that has additional features. For example, we can receive notifications when someone responds to our comment. We can vote on comments. We can upload media.

      • WhoAmI says:

        All of the additional features you name sound extremely, extremely optional.
        Especially a vote system, that’s a recipe for disaster when it comes to the overall quality of comments.

        • J Lynn says:

          No opinion on specific forum platforms, but I agree that it’s better without an upvote/downvote system. There was one thread where there was an option to “heart” comments and it got, as the kids say today, “gross.”* IIRC, it was some thread in which Coke was accused of “white feminism” and people were heart-ing all kinds of personalized hostility towards la Coquette. The function was just used as agree/disagree, not as a topic-sifter.

          At this point, there isn’t really enough volume of content/contributors that we need to bring better content up, IMHO. My impression is that most active people read or skim most of it anyway.

          * Tidbit: When I was a kid, “gross” only meant physically disgusting things and was associated with Valley Girl talk, a la Moon Unit & Frank Zappa song. In the last 8 years or so it’s started to mean “things I disapprove of.”

          • Anna says:

            I was also 100% against CQ introducing “hearts” to her posts, bc :
            1) it didn’t look good, aesthetic minimalism is part of this website
            2) it didn’t serve any purpose : most liked comments weren’t features in any way, discussions weren’t made any shorter or reduced to their most pertinent components
            3) it did encourage this kind of schoolyard behavior.

            But I’m not against an upvote system at all. As I said in an earlier comment, I think the reddit system works fine. It’s a mix of upvoting, weighing down old comments, and having people with human judgement to moderate. It’s great for having a discussion on the internet about particular areas of interest.

        • Melissa Low says:

          What are important features of CQ’s forum?

          Keeping it classy
          Visual medium: allowing photographs and videos to be posted
          Self and peer moderation
          Option of anonymity
          Push notifications
          Private and safe space

          Obvious:
          Reliable
          User friendly
          Cost effective
          Good ethics
          Server space

    • R says:

      It’d be nice to have a space for in-group conversations that don’t directly pertain to a post. News discussion, book club, that sort of thing. CQ’s readers are a pretty intelligent bunch, and it would be nice to keep in touch, you know?

      Also, if you want to discuss an old post, are you going to go to that post’s comment section (that no one reads) to do it?

      • Melissa Low says:

        Yep. I’m thinking along the lines of forums universities use. I agree with no up/down vote – I prefer a prudential comment to a vague indication of like or dislike. Stuff doesn’t exist in binaries afterall.

    • The Coquette says:

      Again, this is an interesting conversation about an interesting idea, and I’m going to stay out of it except to add one thought: I’d be willing to host a forum of some kind right here on this site, but you guys would have to help me pick which app/service/program/whatever to set up and implement. Let me know.

  18. Anonymous says:

    I’m afraid Facebook isn’t really ideal either. Threading is horrible. Organization and search is terrible. I do wish you luck. And hey, you won’t have to tolerate ME! 🙂

      • WhoAmI says:

        Last time I checked it was the decaf to golden years 4chan’s coffee. Really there’s no point in drinking that.

        • Anna says:

          Never touched 4chan, only recently got into reddit. The idea of reddit is that there isn’t an idea of reddit. There is a certain culture and reddit shorthand, but mostly I use it as a means to overhear discussions similar to what would happen if you put two or more nerds with a common nerdy interest together in the coffee room.

          • WhoAmI says:

            Given my observation, you can guess that “last time I checked” was some years ago. I don’t know how it evolved, except that the layout is still hard for me to read for some reason ?

          • Anna says:

            Argh, I was about to say “for me it’s a bit like Research Gate” before realizing how much of an asshole that made me sound.

      • VeryOff says:

        It’s not exactly a prejudice as much as an observation that what is normally 40 comments supporting or addressing the post has devolved into completely random shit…just like a lot of Reddit posts I’ve seen. The more traffic, the more divergent the conversation and Reddit is all about traffic. While a couple flame wars have happened in the past, and I admit embarrassingly that I participated, it’s not the norm…as much as it might be on Reddit.

        Also. Reddit is terrible for organization.

      • VeryOff says:

        It’s not exactly a prejudice as much as an observation that what is normally 40 comments supporting or addressing the post has devolved into completely random shit…just like a lot of Reddit posts I’ve seen. The more traffic, the more divergent the conversation and Reddit is all about traffic. While a couple flame wars have happened in the past, and I admit embarrassingly that I participated, it’s not the norm…as much as it might be on Reddit.

        Also. Reddit is terrible for organization.

  19. Nick says:

    To the anti-Hillary die-hards: what’s your best case scenario? What’s the outcome that’s gonna make you feel better? Is it Jill Stein getting 20% of the vote? Is it Hillary refusing the nomination she earned and Bernie running in her place? What can be done to ease you’re apparent torment? Cause it really seems like you’re just pessimism addicts. It seems like you enjoy having something to complain about. Either that or you’re just the kid who didn’t get exactly the present they wanted and now you’re gonna throw a tantrum and ruin the party before Jimmy’s mom can even make pizza rolls. Well fuck you. I want those pizza rolls. I’m not even gonna complain that they were microwaved instead of baked, they’re still delicious. And they’re incomparably better than the leftover butternut squash my mom was gonna make me eat if the sleepover got cancelled before dinner.
    Do the right thing this November. Vote for pizza rolls.

  20. R says:

    I’d love to join some sort of CQ fan club, but Facebook is not the ideal place. For one, I’m sure lots of us would like to remain anon. For another, Facebook’s comment section is fucky when it comes to longform discussions of the type we enjoy here in the comments section.

    I propose Reddit.

    • Melissa Low says:

      How is it “fucky”?

      I like the idea of Reddit. It is similar to FB in that it allows people to vote on comments. Please convince me that it is better than Facebook for our purposes.

      • R says:

        Reddit’s comments section is superior for two reasons:

        By default, you can vote stuff up or down, whereas on Facebook it’s only up. It’s the superior method of deciding what the best stuff is. The downside is vote-down-to-disagree culture, but I don’t think this will be a problem for us.

        Threads are open automatically to the 10th (I think) level. I don’t want to click “open more comments” to read the entire thread. If this is supposed to be a group for discussions, the platform should suit that. Comments below a certain number of votes are hidden automatically, which eliminates trolls from taking up too much space.

        A few other reasons why Reddit is better: it’s anonymous (don’t even need an email to get an account), has a customizable AutoModerator bot, communities are self-managing (to a degree), users get custom flair, subreddits get custom CSS design, a Wiki page, and a sidebar for rules/links/regular discussions.

  21. The Coquette says:

    This is an interesting conversation about an interesting idea, and I’m going to stay out of it except to add one thought: I’d be willing to host a forum of some kind right here on this site, but you guys would have to help me pick which app/service/program/whatever to set up and implement. Let me know.

    • coskel says:

      I have setup BBPress a ton, and can configure it to be private and not viewable to the public if need be. Email me if you want to.

      • Maria says:

        Thank you! I’m very interested in CQ hosting something here, but since I haven’t participated in forums for years, I have no idea what to suggest myself.

    • Anna says:

      Would you be willing to host a forum or do you want to host a forum ? There’s a difference. I have no idea how you’re running this now. But I think you might need a moderator or two to prevent this idea from devolving into a dumpster fire or a succession of short boring threads.
      I’m not a huge redditor but still a fan of the platform. Maybe start out with a CQ subreddit and move on from there ?

  22. DisillusionedVoter says:

    America is full of bitterness, hopelessness and cynicism. People are so fed up that they are willing to vote for a clown like Donald Trump just to register a protest against the status quo. Those people are asking themselves “how could it be worse if I vote for Donald Trump?”

    The predatory malfeasance and negligence of the elites running the country has been so excessive for so long that Donald Trump looks pretty good to lots and lots of folks. Decent wages? Forget about it. Reasonably priced health care? Forget about it. An affordable college education? Forget about it. Freedom from predatory finance? Forget about it. Affordable child care? Forget about it. I could go on. Can you point to one important aspect of life in America where things are going well? Where the social contract hasn’t been torn to shreds?

    Why should anyone have faith in our political system? Why would Americans have faith in a political system which has demonstrated over and over again for decades now that it is irredeemably corrupt and broken? A political system which for decades thumbed its nose at the vast majority of the American people and used self-serving “wars” on—countries, drugs, terrorism, pick one—to legitimize and justify its own existence?

    A lot of us do want to burn this motherfucker down, bitch. So fuck you Coke. Fuck all of your sycophantic goons.

    • VeryOff says:

      Healthcare
      GDP
      Taxes
      Deficit
      Violent crime
      Employment

      that’s just six.

      If you think Donald is a “protest” and not a symptom of every single fucking problem you listed…

      go fuck yourself

      • DisillusionedVoter says:

        He’s a symptom of the status quo but also perceived by many as big Fuck You! to the elites who maintain it.

        • J Lynn says:

          You may be right re Trump voters. It’s like becoming a heroin addict in order to piss off your parents, though.

          • VeryOff says:

            More like shooting yourself in the face to prove you have gun rights.

            When Mitt Romney knows it’s more profitable to vote Hillary instead of taking a Donald tax cut…take fucking heed.

    • J Lynn says:

      Not to be a goody two shoes, but way too many people on here end their comments with “fuck you.” Not the best closer.

      • VeryOff says:

        I know.
        I’m sorry.
        I try to be empathetic; and when people fill me with bile, it tends to come back.
        In exactly the same way your posts encourage me to be thoughtful and read about topics, theirs encourage me to be disparaging and vile. On days that I have little glucose left in my frontal lobe, it’s like someone striking a match on my amygdala.

      • Hmmm says:

        Yeah, it doesn’t make us look good, but it’s so hard not to be angry. I’m finding it very hard to be mature with my emotions and I’m kind of disappointed in myself that I’m so easily set off by this garbage monster (my new favorite thing to call Trump thanks to Coke!). Every mention of Trumps name, the sound of his voice and anything that has to do with this vile man fills me with anxiety and anger.

        How are the rest of you dealing with your intense emotions?

  23. Soooooooooooooooo says:

    Isn’t trump one of the elites who maintain it and benefit from it?

    I’m nowhere near as smart as everyone else posting so read my post with childlike innocence.

    • J Lynn says:

      Somehow his stupidity, ignorance and offensiveness makes him seem different from other elites? Actually a lot of his followers like him because (they think) he’s rich and elite, because they want to vote for an authoritarian strongman. They actually oppose democracy in a sad way.

      Going back to watching the women Senators speak!

      • J Lynn says:

        Also, soooo much of Trump’s support is about race, ie white resentment especially white male resentment, and an inaccurate idea that everything was so great at some unspecified time in the past (usually implied 1950s, early 60s). That’s where “Make America Great AGAIN” comes from, his slogan.

        Meanwhile, If you’re a woman or minority, this is the best time in America’s history to be alive, comparatively speaking and remaining challenges or problems notwithstanding. So Democrats are saying “America is already great, but can be even better.”

        Trump’s loyal supporters LOVE that he’s made a campaign issue out of so-called “political correctness,” whatever that means. To them, it seems to mean they’re mad that they can’t say racist and sexist things anymore without criticism. And Trump says those things! Those things they’re not “allowed” to say! Or it’s just a symbolic phrase they’re latched onto because their leader repeats and denounces it.

        • VeryOff says:

          the psychology behind the “not being politically correct” revolves around hiding your bigotry under the umbrella of victimhood. “I’m not being politically correct when I say Muslims are insane, so sue me.” Basically they can hide behind it, not face the consequences of their thoughts and maintain perfect intellectual dishonesty because anyone who brings a fact to the discussion can be instantly demonized as “politically correct.” It’s like being able to shout “hippy!” In order to end uncomfortable discussions.

          • J Lynn says:

            Indeed. Rush Limbaugh was one of the big popularizes of that phrase in the early 1990s. “Feminazi” was another of his great contributions! If he didn’t coin it, he sure got his Dittoheads (their name for themselves) saying it.

            They even used the term politically correct to smear Anita Hill. Poor Clarence Thomas, he just wasn’t politically correct!

            I don’t know for sure, but I think the “politically correct” was meant to be unfunny right wing satire on their idea of a Soviet-style politburo, in which some language would be “politically correct” and other language counterrevolutionary. Anti-communism being huge among Reaganite right-wingers, likewise smearing progressive policy as communist. But if that’s even true — maybe I’m giving them too much credit on the backstory — that would all just be a fig leaf for basically anti-civil-rights backlash bigotry. Thus in their minds, the Civil Rights movement = Stalinist oppression! Poor white men, so oppressed. There was a Twitter slogan going around recently “If you expect privilege, equality feels like oppression” or something like that.

  24. Bry says:

    On a side note, thanks J Lynn for existing. I don’t always agree with you but you’re informed and make an attempt to address people’s concerns when you reply instead of just saying childish moronic stuff. I also agree that the fuck you’s are completely pointless not to mention inarticulate.

      • Bry says:

        Yeah, it’s disappointing but entertaining. I’m sure many will disagree for the hell of it but I feel we should abolish the electoral college and move to a popular vote so that everyone matters instead of just swing states. I believe this could help potentially reduce pandering to specific states and force them to lie to all of us lol. Plus, I believe it would help increase voter turnout because everyone’s vote would truly matter. If you agree, I put up a petition on change.org and while I doubt it would have much effect immediately, I would like for it to be an issue and hear people’s opinions on the notion.

        • J Lynn says:

          Yeah, I’m a California resident now and I would love my vote to count! Tired of being ruled disproportionately by Ohio and Florida, even tho I’m a native of a swing state myself.

          • Bry says:

            I know, right! I just feel like that and term limits for members of the Senate and Congress are a couple of the things that anyone could agree on. Frankly there are enough low hanging fruit issues to keep any official busy for a while but everyone wants to be a goddamn hero and push ideological thetoric so they keep getting RE elected forever. Electoral college abolishment feels like a good Bernie issue.

          • VeryOff says:

            Abolishing the EC isn’t the way. Working to change the rules of it makes more sense. The EC is essentially a layer in a neural net. I used to want the EC abolished as well. After reading about it I just kept finding more reasons not to.

        • VeryOff says:

          It would be far, far, more important to abolish human defined gerrymandering. Computers do this well and they wouldn’t cheat people out of representation.

          • Bry says:

            How would popular vote cheat anyone? How is it not inherently fair? Serious question, not being an asshole. Unfortunate that I feel the need to stipulate that.

          • VeryOff says:

            Imagine you’re a farmer, and like most farmers you are in a state with lower population compared to New York or California. And while there is still a large contingent of farmers in California, most of their needs might be taken care of at a state level. What happens if you need a candidate that the population in general doesn’t approve of to take care of you federally. You would never ever be represented by popular vote. Basically it comes down to “big city folk telling small town folk what to do.” It’s not in our regional interest to let cities do the talking for everyone. “By popular vote we have outlawed farm equipment!”

            Now that’s just my own personal example. Here’s some others reasons…

            https://www.facebook.com/davidbowman/posts/10154013142003725

          • J Lynn says:

            I think Veryoff means legislative branch. Fixing gerrymandering would make US House and state legislature seats more fairly competitive. Every 10 years redrawn, and party who holds power draws boundaries so they can win more easily. (Supposed to be bipartisan but not in practice.) Last redistricting Republicans were in power. That’s why, barring some huge shift in public opinion, a majority in the US House almost impossible to win for Democrats until next redistricting.

          • Bry says:

            Maybe you didn’t address it or maybe I was inarticulate but how does that address popular vote on national presidential elections? One person with one vote is true democracy. I said this should be for president, not state elections. This seems inarguable but please try again.

          • VeryOff says:

            I really don’t know how to be clearer. The cities in the largest states would harshly dominate the voting. The needs of large cities are different from rural America. Many states would become completely irrelevant. Why would that be okay for you? Imagine a candidate who runs on a platform that property tax should be be determined by acreage. You can say, “oh that’s silly” but there are similar issues. if you want me to take you seriously, do some research. God, the first five links that come up when I google that question include the link I posted. Lmgtfy

            So much for your armchair “seems unarguable.”

          • Bry says:

            Well, as far as property tax goes, I’m pretty sure that the president doesn’t set that for Indiana farmers. I did Google it and while I did read some interesting points, I still think that more people are rendered irrelevant now than would be if the EC was tossed. If we want people to take voting seriously then we need direct democracy in the presidential election. That’s just where I stand on it and thanks for your thoughtful counterpoints.

          • Bry says:

            Also, most every pro argument I saw said that the EC promotes a two party system. I actually see that as a con. I think our two party system is a big part of the problem. It is too easily corrupted and forces a left vs right paradigm that doesn’t need to be as deeply entrenched as it is.

          • VeryOff says:

            The president doesn’t “set healthcare”, the president doesn’t “set minimum wage”, the president doesn’t “set anything.” But all of those things are part of a platform.

            Look at it this way, with three parties, the republicans wouldn’t have to muster a legitimate candidate, they just have to buy enough advertising to split the democratic vote in half. If we had three candidates we would be far closer to cinnamon Hitler.

            I really hope you’re as lazy about activism as you are here.

          • Bry says:

            I’m not sure how I’m being lazy? I simply have a differing opinion. As far as three parties goes, I never said that. I said the two party system is a problem, in my little old opinion. In a perfect world, there wouldn’t even be parties and know nothing clowns like Trump couldn’t hide behind a D or an R and would have to actually have their own personal ideas. This will never happen, obviously. I am just sick of this whole politics as professional wrestling spectacle that we have now. To the person who’s so excited after the dnc convention, good for you and I’m glad you’re voting. However, don’t forget that both conventions are garish monstrosities that are nothing more than pep rallies. How much money was spent that could have went to worthy causes? How much were they hyped so that big media could make money off of the continued dumbing down of people with their shitty, editorialized “news?”

          • MaybeDoomed says:

            “Garish pep rallies” because if we abolished them we could just sit at home and press a button. There’s no need to get out, do anything, or celebrate an ideal. All ideals are perfect and need no advertisement. Everyone’s political merit could be displayed on a spreadsheet and they would never have to be seen in public in an ideal world. In the ideal world, a meritocracy, there would be no campaign budget and the news wouldn’t even be allowed to report because all facts would be known through other independently verifiable sources that don’t rely on revenue to report their data. Of course all my own ideas would always win because I’m smart and there’s no way the general public might make a mistake that isn’t in the interest of me personally or even the world.

          • Bry says:

            Wow, that was unhelpful and unnecessary and not what I said at all. I get it, you think the system is great and elections are fine how they are. I wish I agreed. Ironically, I’m somehow the lazy one. Obviously, this conversation has devolved so good day to you.

          • MaybeDoomed says:

            YES. You ARE being lazy. Because all you proffer is ideals. Because you don’t even respond to any of the reasons put forth links and don’t even think your response through enough to realize that none of the party platforms equate to a presidential power.

            Even the tiniest effort would reveal a lot of reasons abolishing the EC wouldn’t be a good idea. But no, for you its supposed to be an ideal world where there’s “no parties.” Then when I make an effort to magically imagine that world, you’re all, “good day to you sir.” As though you have some superior ground to stand on.

            You’re lazy because when YOU change the subject everyone is supposed to address YOUR points but when I do, you just say it doesn’t apply and move on. You aren’t considering anything anyone says unless it’s carefully put on a plate and cooked exactly how you like it. Mm mm. Love that back patting victim of the vote casserole.

            Think for two fucking seconds. How would pure popular vote fix pandering? All that does is move the pandering to the most populated states. And that’s just one more example of how lazy you are. Did ya bring us any numbers? Did you even look up a projection of what happens then? Nope. Just more, “in my ideal world” where you don’t actually do anything. What public office have you held that would indicate you’re making an effort? Surprise me. Neighborhood watch president? Treasurer for cub scouts?

            My snozzberries taste like snozzberries…good day to YOU sir.

          • Bry says:

            You’re a privileged self indulgent and obviously reductive asshole. I’m not lazy, I’m fucking busy! I am a single dad to a three year old whose mom isn’t in the picture since she was 6 months old and I have no family where I live to help me. I barely make ends meet making 42k in an expensive city and I don’t fucking have the goddamn time. Everyone isn’t as lucky as you to have time to give to all of the causes they want to. It doesn’t make them lazy. I will address the rest of your shit later after my daughter goes to bed when I have the Time to. I’m sure you’ll have said many more reductive and prickish remarks by then too. I’m happy for you that you have the fucking TIME to do so.

          • Bry says:

            You’re really right, I won’t. If I get it to the dnc platform then that’s all that matters anyways. You and the many like you on here that aren’t capable of thinking for themselves will blindly support it then anyways. You have no ideas and everything you reference is something someone else said. I did read your sources and acknowledged that they were good points but that I still feel abolishing the EC is worth the downsides. I realize that’s it’s hard for you to grasp someone seeing the merits of an argument while still disagreeing but it’s possible. The articles you posted had merit but it wasn’t yours. There are just as many articles praising the idea of abolishing the EC but I didnt need those for my idea did I? Also, I have a da in Oregon, a judge in TN and three lawyers in Missouri who agree but that’s obviously meaningless to you because I don’t have the time to campaign for City Council. I’m sure that’s somehow meaningless to you but they are the only legal people I moderately know to have asked. As far as your idealizing small town America and boohooing their justified descent into the irrelevance that 90% of America faces now, I grew up there. They have no more right to disproportionate representation than anyone. They hate you and your liberal values and won’t hear any argument to the contrary. They have had disproportionate influence for far too many decades and it needs to stop. Popular vote increases liberal wins exponentially, so who’s side are you on? You’re just a goon who Googled arguments to my idea to be a jackass. You’re also a party shill who does as they’re told and has no actual ideas. The first reply you had was to mention state gerrymandering which is in the dnc platform which is where you heard it from. Obviously, it’s a change that needs to be made but it’s also a thought that you didn’t have and doesn’t touch my point of presidential elections being fucked up because it only addresses state elections. Still, I continuously tried to be courteous and decent even after seeing you had no actual ideal of your own. That’s why I disengaged from you and tried to be generally decent because I was hoping someone with the capability of free thought would reply. Then good day statement that you seem to have projected so much bullshit on was literally wishing you a good weekend. Not everything has to be sarcastic foolishness but clearly you don’t get that. Have fun with president Trump. You’ll only have yourself and mainstream liberals who can’t acknowledge specific failures while still defending their ideals to blame. You and people like you deserve president Trump but unfortunately so many people don’t. Liberal stereotypes like you have alienated much of the left, all of the right and the middle with your douchy condescension and robotic like party centric rationale. For an example, I was ready to vote third party because I live in a red state. After considering points here, I decided to vote Hillary even though it doesn’t actually matter because my state will go to Trump anyways. So decent debate got a vote here and who knows how many more? You should use your words carefully because who knows how many people you turn on or off? It’s so hard for leftist people like me in red states anyways as we try to engage the right and middle to see voting democrat is more to their interests. Stereotypical mainstream democrats like so many here only perpetuate the image of glib, flippant, egotistical, and condescending liberals and it makes it so much harder for those of us on the front lines instead of on college campuses to try to change people’s minds about liberal values. Please stop. I leave you to the echo chamber. I don’t think I have the stomach for this shit hole anymore. It’s just goddamn disappointing. I never bothered to post anywhere else, I just got fed up and thought this was a place for thinking people not glib, self satisfied cartoons. Cue response of who’ll miss you, Fuck off, etc. Far too many of you have disappeared up your own asses. Only a few more ex readers like me to run off before you all can just reinforce each other straight to a Trump presidency.

  25. JC says:

    I have to say that I’m even more enthusiastic to vote for Hillary after this convention. The Dems did a great job, and she fucking rocked that speech. Please everyone make a donation tonight, even a small one.

    • J Lynn says:

      Also look if there are any competitive races where you live, especially Senate, but really any of them. & register to vote!

      • JC says:

        Yes, Dems could get a lot more done if they paid attention to the downticket races, and especially if they voted every two years instead of every four years.

  26. Datdamwuf says:

    I’m in my 50s and I’ve never missed a vote. Not even my local county or city elections. There is always a difference in candidates and if you don’t vote I don’t give a rat’s ass what your opinion is. I felt the Bern, it doesn’t matter now. Hillary is the best of the two we’ve got on the tickets. We can’t fix the broken system by NOT voting. If Bernie took the attitude of some of his supporters he’d be resigning right now, but he’s not. He will keep working for change. Our two party system is corrupt and needs work. Doesn’t matter, sitting on your couch waiting for someone else to do it is bullshit. BTW, I felt just as bitter and disenchanted when the Dems forced Hillary to stand aside for Obama. I still voted for him because he was the best choice left.

    Vote.

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