Daily Kos

We lick our wounds, we grieve, and then we fucking fight

I'll continue to teach my kids inside and outside of school not to be bullies. We need to learn from this.
Chait has another decent piece worth digesting.

But I do not believe they will win, at least not over the long run. As the shock of a Trump presidency set in, I told my children Tuesday night that I did not want to hear anything about fleeing. We are not going anywhere. And the America I have raised them to believe in will one day prevail.

NYT Opinion Writers

Krugman -
We thought that the nation, while far from having transcended racial prejudice and misogyny, had become vastly more open and tolerant over time.

It turns out that we were wrong. There turn out to be a huge number of people — white people, living mainly in rural areas — who don’t share at all our idea of what America is about. For them, it is about blood and soil, about traditional patriarchy and racial hierarchy. And there were many other people who might not share those anti-democratic values, but who nonetheless were willing to vote for anyone bearing the Republican label.

Maureen Dowd -

It is unthinkable to imagine the most overtly racist candidate — and head of the offensive birther movement — driving in the limousine to the inauguration with the first African-American president. What would they discuss? How Trump plans to repeal Obamacare? How Trump will appoint Supreme Court justices that will transform America into a drastically more conservative landscape over the next 20 years? How Trump plans to undo the Iran deal? When will Trump begin deporting Hispanics? When will Attorney General Rudy Giuliani pardon Chris Christie and put Hillary in jail?

Also, goodbye to civil rights and equality. Go to the back of the line, the back of the bus, back in the closet and back to the kitchen. Wealthy white men are back in charge and will no longer be the victims of political correctness.

Like many others here, I'm in shock, I'm sick to my stomach, I'm depressed and I'm terrified. The country will be set back for the remainder of my life. The only glimmer of hope I can see right now is that Obama makes a recess appointment of Garland in January. We have to convince him to do it.

CNN reporting Clinton will address supporters "in about an hour and a half."

Around 9:30 am, I guess?

Thoughts and prayers for what has been our country. I truly hope this expression has greater effect other times it's invoked, such as every time there's a mass shooting. (Disclaimer: I'm somewhere between agnostic and atheist. Maybe a deist at best.)

We do need to drain the swamp of "news" media that has utterly failed us. If you want to learn about who Trump really is, you'd have to look for a good journalist who has followed him. It's too hard to point average voters to absorb such exhaustive work done by Kurt Eichenwald or David Fahranthold. Also Mark Zuckerberg's enterprise and other social media has probably served to undermine everything we know and love. Mic drop.

I find Tim Burchett's observations to be very much on target this morning. See what you think.

In the KNS, Tennesseans react to Donald Trump's Win.

(EDIT: Well, let me add just the disclaimer that I don't think Jimmy Duncan "listens"--Burchett's read--so much as he just panders. That distinction aside, Burchett makes sense to me.)

After you reelected all the old Congressional alligators.

Beyond being well and truly screwed... Link

The data is early and could change, but here are three points:

- Trump won the white vote big time. The only white demographic group Clinton won was white, college educated women (51%).

- Trump won 29% of the Latino vote. Let that sink in...

- Trump won the 18-29 year old vote 48% to Clinton's 43%.

And since we heard so much about the white working class this tidbit is interesting:

Broken down by income bracket, 52% of voters earning less than $50,000 a year – who make up 36% of the electorate – voted for Clinton, and 41% for Trump. Among the 64% of American voters who earn more than $50,000 a year, 49% chose Trump and 47% for Clinton.

Trump's America

Putin applauds Trump win

David Duke: Trump win a great victory for 'our people'

This morning, the WaPo has the best analysis I've read yet to explain "America's Brexit moment" last night.

And yes, we locals will immediately recognize it as an expansion on Burchett's observations.

How Trump won: The revenge of working-class whites

The stock market is up slightly. Looks like this result was already baked in.

Southern Beale...

(link...)

There no job for her in Washington, D.C. next year, Ms. Clinton didn't get elected and this form over substance type of government just get rejected at the national level.

America nor government is not an academic exercise, we can't all work for the government, and the sooner the city of Knoxville figures that out, the better off the community will be.

Another bullshit alert in MSNBC's reporting this morning, here:

In Michigan — which was a must-win for Clinton, but was still too close to call as of Wednesday morning, according to NBC News projections — Johnson and Stein had collectively taken a little more than 222,400 votes, or about 5 percent of the vote there. Trump, in contrast, held just over a 15,600-vote lead over Clinton.

In Florida, which was crucial to Trump's victory, Johnson, Stein and two other third-party candidates on the ballot collectively drew over 293,000 votes — more than twice the 128,000-plus votes that Trump led with as of early Wednesday morning.

Of what possible purpose is this "analysis" that lumps together the total third party votes when they took votes variously from two opposing candidates?

Again, take a look at Florida's final results and Michigan's results to date to confirm that Clinton benefitted from third party voting in both races.

Gary Johnson had been polling at 3 or 4 percent of votes (and higher) to Jill Stein's less that one percent for weeks if not months before the election--and still was last night. Repubs suffered for it, Dems didn't. Period.

from nbc news.com
Presidential Results

Bernie wasnt electable eh?
Bernie is too extreme eh?
The blame lies with the DNC and Hillary sycophants. Let this be a lesson learned for anyone with a Clinton fetish. I also echo the above- Gary Johnson didnt pull any votes away from Hillary.

You made your bed, now sleep in it for the next 4 years, you brought this on yourselves.

Saw this linked on Daily Kos. Worth a read: (link...)

Joe Powell...

(link...)

@Phil_Mattingly of CNN has an interesting take on the two camps' ops into the last week. One main takeaway is that Clinton simply did not hit her margins.

Phil Mattingly ‏@Phil_Mattingly 1h1 hour ago
One of the major driving forces of data success -- and a place where Clinton's op fell down -- was in turnout projections 8/...

Perhaps the most revealing pieces of data came in IA - where the RNC had Trump *losing* and Ohio. Their turnout # was mostly on point. 15/

Other reasons she lost.
The email server and the Clinton foundation.Obviously she should never have done the server.She should have put the foundation in a blind trust when she got the Sec State job and prevented BC from doing any hitting up donors for speeches stuff.
If you tell, a lie often enough people will believe it.The Repub hearings had a cumulative effect over time I think.Some independents started to believe HRC was guilty of something.
I think a lot of whites are unhappy.Some outright hate the govenment because they think it caters too much to minorities, gays and other groups the whites abhor.Some hated Obama because he is black and they could never accept a black man as President.Some years back I had heard some so called Christians here in Knoxville thought Obama was the AntiChrist.Yes they really thought that.I guess they thought a black man couldn't be President without some kind of evil intervention.lol.It isn't funny it is racist and pathetic.And yes some think the economy is bad and they no longer trusted the government to fix it/make it better so they thought an outsider a so-called successful businessman who has lost a billion dollars or so could fix it. The economy is what it is.The heavy duty manufacturing jobs aren't coming back to Ohio, Folks that live there.They aren't And Trump can't make them return.No one can.
Obama was right .Trump wont'change once he gets in the White House.He won't need those Breitbart people any more and I expect he will kick them to the curb.They helped Trump win so they think they can stick around and control him.Trump won't let himself be controlled.He will chafe at those people telling him what he can and can't do and he'll kick them out.
Ultimately Trump will revert back to his old ways and he will get in trouble.Serious trouble I think.
Plus he is in debt to Putin and Assange.they will expect payment.Assange will expect to get any charges, the rape charges as well as any spying charges dropped so he can get out of the Ecuadoran embassey.Putin will expect all sanctions lifted.He will expect no interference when he decides to act against other former soviet block countries.The Baltic Republics would seem to be next in line.
Nato itself is in danger and I expect Trump to try to abrogate the treaties.
Ultimately though I think Trump will do something that will force him out of office.Then we get stuck with Pence until the next election.
That one we must win.

What Trump did was record setting. He would have won over Barack Obama in 2012.

(link...)

You missed the point. This was as big as Obama winning in 2008. It is a change event.

from nbcnews.com ...

The Founders didn't think ordinary people — even the white male property owners who were the only ones allowed to vote — were informed or responsible enough to choose the president. (Letting them do so, said Virginia's George Mason, would be like referring "a trial of colors to a blind man.")

So they created a double buffer. State legislators would choose presidential electors, who would be "most enlightened and respectable citizens," as John Jay put it. Then, these elites would come together at an Electoral College and use their superior wisdom and intellect to decide on a president.

Electoral College Lesson: More Voters Chose Clinton, but Trump Will Be President

KNS interviews people on Market Square, their reactions to the election.

(link...)

Our party is in shambles and dysfunctional. Will it ever be able to overcome the fact that Wikileaks has exposed our leaders as lairs. The great 8 year experiment has exposed us as unable to create anything positive for the people. I lose my insurance the last day of December but it is just as well. I can not pay the increases and can't see my normal doctors anymore. I would never get past my ever-increasing deductibles. What have our policies done to us and the credibility of our party?

They were determined that Clinton would be the nominee. They made fun of and belittled Bernie, DWS did everything in her power to squash the debates, limiting the numbers and putting them on at 10:00 pm Saturday nights. They were completely tone deaf to the huge crowds and responses he had.

Moving on, I'm actually somewhat relieved the Republicans took it all because this monster they created is ALL on their hands. Their bluff has been called and now, they have no Dems to blame or hold them back, so lets see if they stand up to their word of building a wall, getting rid of Obamacare, Roe v Wade, SS, Medicare and Medicaid, and let's see how their delusional supporters feel about all that. Go ahead Republicans, it's all on you, now. Good luck with that.

I had never heard of it before.

The Electoral College Was Designed to Prevent Trump. You Can Make This Happen.

(link...)

Yes Trump is a sexual predator.However it is what it is.He is POTUS. MAYBE maybe the responsibilities of the office will awe him so much he will get treatment and turn around.I doubt that though.He is a Malignant Narcissist and those people are irredeemable.

and....

(link...)

The first of many such victory celebrations no doubt.

and.....

(link...)

I expect the US portion of the sanctions to be lifted pretty quickly. The Europeans and asian countries who have sanctions will resist lifting theirs despite Trump asking them to do so.

The last line is telling:

"A senior diplomat also said the Russian government was in touch with members of Trump's political team during the U.S. election campaign."

As we thought.

(link...)

from CNN ...

The Loyal White Knights of Pelham, North Carolina, announced on its website that its parade will take place on December 3. Details for the parade, including where it would take place, were not immediately available, and a message left with the group was not immediately returned Friday night.

North Carolina GOP condemns KKK parade honoring Trump

(link...)

That we are....

We will start seeing 20 foot portraits erected alongside Trump buildings. Our dear leader, Donald...

(link...)

Would be funny if it happens.Repubs always have said dems were weak on defense.We were commie lovers, pinkos and the like.That if the bad guys won it would be our fault.The fault of the democratic party.Now it looks like it could be their fault.

To quote Alanis Morrissette:

"Ins't it ironic, dont you think ? "

YouTube Mark Blyth and Wendy Schiller
at the Watson Institute International & Public Affairs at Brown University discuss Election 2016: What Happened. Blyth wasn't stunned at the outcome, Schiller mildly so.

There's no doubt Clinton was a flawed candidate and an uninspiring campaigner, but I think she would have made an excellent president. I think she lost for many reasons, the main ones being:

1. The press treated Trump like a celebrity who boosted their ratings. Needing to appear even handed, they equated her emails to his numerous and much worse scandals. She didn't handle this well, especially in her Fox News interview with Chris Wallace where she was defensive. She was also hurt by her "basket of deplorables" comment, which was a stupid thing to say. Ultimately, though, the press didn't do its job, and - given how the media landscape has changed- may be incapable of ever doing it again.

2. Too many millennials and former Sanders supporters either didn't vote or voted third party "on principle". Many of these same non-voters are now demonstrating in the streets against a Trump administration. Well, guess what?

3. James Comey's FBI letter 8 days before the election sunk her. It sealed the deal for undecideds and caused enough wavering supporters to change their mind. It also made her change her campaign strategy in the final days, which probably wasn't wise in hindsight. This is the real story of a "rigged election". Only time and history will inform us of Comey's true motivation. I'm also not convinced the Russians didn't influence this election in more sinister ways than we know.

Could Sanders or Biden have won? Its certainly tempting to speculate, but we'll never know. Let's not forget she did win the popular vote, and Trump beat every single candidate he was predicted to lose to starting with the Republicans.

I have seen only two hopeful statistics in this whole, soul crushing fiasco. First, Trump isn't a true conservative and owes the Republican Party nothing. However, I don't think he has any interest in (or ability to) govern and might turn everything over to Pence. Pence at the helm is worse than Trump in my opinion.

Second, and most hopeful of all, is that Chris Buice pointed out in his KNS column yesterday that if you look only at voters 18 to 25, all but six states were blue.

From June Flip side: if Trump wins, why did the Democrats lose
Oldy but goody "Achieving Our Country" by Richard Rorty 1999 via Greenwald retweet

I have one more thing to say. I have no respect for anyone's position that they "voted their conscience " by not voting or voting third party because they didn't like Clinton. Some on this board rationalized that TN was going to Trump anyway and they could afford to indulge their smug idealized view of themselves rather than deal in reality. YOU VOTED FOR TRUMP. Period. This happened across the country. If it hadn't, Clinton probably would have won, but even if she had lost, the popular vote in her favor would have been greater and collectively, we would now have a louder voice.

Still feel good about yourselves? The Muslim family across the street from me is scared.

Craig Gilbert , Milwaukee Journal Sentinel November 12, 2016
Difference-makers in Trump's Wisconsin win

Blue-collar swing: Whites without college degrees are roughly half the electorate in Wisconsin. Romney won them by 8 last time. Trump won them by 28 this time.

Edison Research provided an exit-polling snapshot of these Wisconsin voters for this analysis.

It showed that “non-college” whites:

Were far more negative than other voters toward Clinton (68% had a negative opinion of her).
Had a bleaker view of the economy (67% called it not so good or poor).
Were much more negative about trade with other countries (61% said it takes away jobs).
Were more negative about immigration (45% said immigrants do more to hurt the country than help).
Many voters who had qualms about Trump set them aside. They didn’t do so in Clinton’s case. Those who had objections to both broke by large margins for Trump, the “change candidate.”

National presidential election results in 2016 reveal that Clinton presently leads Trump in the popular vote (by 630,877 votes), as follows:

Clinton 60,981,118
Trump 60,350,241

Those same results also reveal third-party voting as follows:

Johnson 4,164,589
Stein 1,255,968
Others 840,260

If we were to award all third-party votes--conservative and progressive alike--to Clinton, obviously her margin of victory in the popular vote would widen.

However, no evidence exists to suggest that third-party votes cast for conservative candidates might have gone for Clinton, had the conservative third-party candidates not been in the race.

In the absence of any such evidence, a far more reasonable assumption is that third-party votes cast for conservative candidates would have gone to Trump and third-party votes cast for progressive candidates would have gone to Clinton, had no third-party candidates been in the race.

The absence of any third-party candidates at all in the race, then, would reasonably have resulted in a scenario looking like this:

Trump + Johnson equals
60,350,241 + 4,164,589 or 64,514,830 total

Clinton + Stein + all other third-party candidates (a gift, really) equals

60,981,118 + 1,255,968 + 840,260 (a gift) or 63,077,346 total

We see, then, that when we award third-party votes to the major candidates in a manner that may be assumed reasonable given the leanings--conservative or progressive--of those third-party candidates, Clinton's lead in the popular vote evaporates.

In fact, Clinton's resulting loss in the popular vote without third parties in the race (which becomes 1,437,484) would be greater than Trump's loss in the popular vote now being recorded with third parties in the race (which now appears to be 630,877).

This seems a reasonable analysis of how third-party voting has helped Clinton in her present popular vote tally.

In short, more third-party voters cast their votes for conservative Johnson than they did for progressive Stein and all others third-party candidates combined. Pull 'em out and Trump wins even bigger.

Joshua Green & Sasha Issenberg at Bloomberg 11/10/16

Trump’s Data Team Saw a Different America—and They Were Right

Inside his campaign, Trump’s analysts became convinced that even their own models didn’t sufficiently account for the strength of these voters. “In the last week before the election, we undertook a big exercise to reweight all of our polling, because we thought that who [pollsters] were sampling from was the wrong idea of who the electorate was going to turn out to be this cycle,” says Matt Oczkowski, the head of product at London firm Cambridge Analytica and team leader on Trump’s campaign. “If he was going to win this election, it was going to be because of a Brexit-style mentality and a different demographic trend than other people were seeing.”

After being completely wrong abut the election the talking heads continue their denial.

Speaking of denial. Why would anyone want Keith Ellison to head the DNC? We're just going to swear off the rust belt states forever? Did anyone learn anything this past week?

(link...)

Looks like the trend continues.

For the benefit of anyone who (like me) has already used up their ten free page views at the NYT this month--likely this week--Politico also has updated election results here.

Pence is referring to the same overtime rule change I reported here at KV back in March, in the thread entitled Dept of Labor submitting its proposed overtime rule changes to Obama today.

From my text then:

Under badly eroded guidelines for when employers must offer overtime pay, just 11% of salaried workers and 18% of all workers were eligible for overtime in 2013. This was due primarily to the fact that only hourly paid workers and those earning $23,660 a year or less in salary have been guaranteed overtime pay in recent years.

Obama's plan, which I assume was the action taken, was to raise that threshold to $50,440 a year, thereby expanding the pool of eligible workers by more than five million people.

All of which came about too late to have helped my household. My husband had worked for 18 years for a local engineering firm that had paid his overtime at straight-time rates.

And not only that, they had also followed a policy of sitting on those wages for up to three months and paying them out just quarterly at straight-time rates.

And not only that, they had also followed a policy of taxing them for FIT purposes at a flat 25% (whether or not the employee might be in a lower FIT bracket) AND sitting on those wages for up to three months AND paying the overtime at straight-time rates.

That is, they did this until they decided they could save even more money by just laying off half their staff and outsourcing the work to temps, at lower rates with no employee benefits.

Sure, I'm ticked off at Repubs, but where were Dems during those 18 years? Thanks for nothing, you collective of establishment pols.

This may be the break unions need to get people to take a long, hard look at where profit really comes from and who has actually earned it.

And Tamara, we're right here, screaming into the wilderness, same as always.

from Tennessean via knoxnews.com ...

Barnett and Staggs were more concerned about Clinton’s possible U.S. Supreme Court appointees, people they thought would have taken their guns and loosened immigration restrictions.

“I’ve been stressed for eight years,” Staggs said.

Rural America looks to Donald Trump for revival

from CNN ...

In September, when Trump wrongly claimed Ford was planning to move all production to Mexico, Ford CEO Mark Fields came out and said he was flat out wrong about company plans.

"Absolutely not. Zero. Not one job will be lost. Most of our investment is here in the US. And that's the way it will continue to be," Fields said in September. "It's really unfortunate when politics get in the way of the facts."

Trump takes credit for saving Ford jobs that weren't going to Mexico

Gabrielle Sherman in NY Magazine
Experts Urge Clinton Campaign to Challenge Election Results in 3 Swing States

The academics presented findings showing that in Wisconsin, Clinton received 7 percent fewer votes in counties that relied on electronic-voting machines compared with counties that used optical scanners and paper ballots. Based on this statistical analysis, Clinton may have been denied as many as 30,000 votes; she lost Wisconsin by 27,000. While it’s important to note the group has not found proof of hacking or manipulation, they are arguing to the campaign that the suspicious pattern merits an independent review — especially in light of the fact that the Obama White House has accused the Russian government of hacking the Democratic National Committee.

This from someone whom you know was not a Clinton supporter: Given the several unusual circumstances in this election, particularly the allegation of Russian interference, I would support an independent review of the vote in these three (I've also read four) states.

(I read last night that in one of these states, the deadline for making such a request is TODAY. In another of these states, the deadline is Friday. I also read that Obama opposes any inquiry. In any event, this would have to happen very, very quickly.)

Good on Stein (although I'm not sure I understand why she or the Green Party would have to pay for any recount?).

All I know is that any breach of our country's electronic voting methodology has implications for every election, this one and the ones to come.

Now and always, we just have to be sure.

Well, apparently states do charge the party making the request for a recount (maybe you knew, but I didn't).

Here is CNBC's coverage as to the costs of the three recounts.

Here is how to donate to Stein's effort to cover those costs (via her website).

from Washington Post ...

The CIA has concluded in a secret assessment that Russia intervened in the 2016 election to help Donald Trump win the presidency, rather than just to undermine confidence in the U.S. electoral system, according to officials briefed on the matter.

The CIA shared its latest assessment with key senators in a closed-door briefing on Capitol Hill last week, in which agency officials cited a growing body of intelligence from multiple sources. Agency briefers told the senators it was now “quite clear” that electing Trump was Russia’s goal, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters.

Secret CIA assessment says Russia was trying to help Trump win White House

Russian hacking and the 2016 election, explained

McConnell, senators unite behind investigation into Russian hacking

White House suggests Trump benefited from Russia hacking

We may need a new vote

My vocabulary is expanding. First "malefactors" now this

DONALD TRUMP’S FIRST, ALARMING WEEK AS PRESIDENT-ELECT

Trump's policies and how they'll change America -- in charts

How one 'unprecedented mega-donor' helped shape '16

The blow-it-all-up-billionaires