I posted this about 50 minutes ago, and have had a number of reTweets and likes, so I suppose it struck a chord with a few people:
Can’t believe I’m actually watching Donald Trump win actual states, actual electoral votes, for President of the United States. Of America.
— Brad Warthen (@BradWarthen) November 9, 2016
Yeah, sure, he might win a primary here and there, even capture the nomination of a divided, traumatized party.
But this… this is different.
These are actual votes that actually count for the presidency of this great country. THIS country. Not Bolivia. Not Nicaragua. Not even Italy, which inflicted upon itself the Berlusconi madness. THIS country.
What I am seeing is simply impossible.
He’s not on pace to win the election or anything — so far — but the fact that actual states in this my country are voting for him in a general election… it just beggars belief. I thought I knew that was going to happen — I’ve seen the projections in recent days — but somehow, on some level, I suppose I still didn’t believe it.
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So, clearly there are a lot more angry working-class white people voting than everyone predicted.
By the by, the sheer fact that Hillary Clinton hasn’t locked this up by now is proof of how horrible a candidate she is.
Well, that’s a given. That’s still no excuse for ANYONE to vote for Trump.
Since I despise both candidates, this mild suspense is…okay with me.
I am not (OK with it). It was ESSENTIAL that this nation utterly reject Trumpism. We’ve known for some time that it wasn’t going to happen as decisively as it needed to, but this is beyond belief.
By “this,” I’m not referring to what I addressed above — Trump merely winning states he was expected to win.
Now, he’s leading in key battleground states.
This is madness.
There is no excuse for this. None at all. Talk all you want about “angry working class white voters,” there is no excuse for this to be happening. There is no excuse for a single person to have voted for this nightmare, much less what we’re seeing…
Won’t be UTERLY rejected. Just hoping for slightly rejected.
It’s interesting that DOW futures are down 500 points. My own mood much more.
Now 700. Bad omen for the USA
It’s not an omen. It’s a JUDGMENT on us…
AP just called FL for Trump. My stomach is beginning to hurt.
Not sure I get it Bryan. Hillary will be a fine president. Trump will be a horror.
Trump would be a very bad POTUS if elected. Maybe the Democrats should have nominated someone better.
If Trump wins, do Democrats decide that the whole country is deplorable, or that maybe they nominated a fatally flawed candidate?
As a litigator who battles in court all the time, I can tell you I learn more from my losses than my wins. You always learn something when you lose. Winning, not so much.
It would have been nice if they had. But it would have been nice if the Republicans had too. They had a whole lot more choices and they picked the very worst one. Man I wish this had been a Kasich Biden race.
Wouldn’t it be nice if we were sane
then we wouldn’t have to cry this night
we could have picked another
then we wouldn’t be in this plight
wouldn’t it be nice
apologies to the beach boys.
Agreed. Nice Beach Boys paraphrase, too.
I voted Bernie. I think he would have won.
You new to these parts, son?
Down to Michigan?
Or even Nevada?
I think Nevada is solidly blue. It’s elected Harry Reid so many times.
And you’ve REALLY got to love you some Democrats to do that.
I have one other beef with Nevada, aside from the inflicting-Reid-on-us thing: They need to learn how to pronounce the name of their state…
This is really not good. My husband is curled into a fetal position. My kitty cat is the only one here not concerned.
Lucky cat.
I just want to give props to Doug, who has been saying for months that Trump would surprise us all with his strength in the Rust Belt. I didn’t believe it, didn’t want to believe it, but it’s looking like that has exactly turned out to be the difference. Doug, I tip my hat to you, sir.
Thanks, Phillip. I haven’t watched TV or accessed the internet until midnight. I’m a little surprised but not a whole lot. I’ve been reading Scott Adams blog for months now. He’s the cartoonist who draws Dilbert and he’s been spot on since day one about Trump’s methodology.
All I can say is that I wasn’t just guessing. I have the advantage of spending a lot of time in a lot of places around the country and hearing different people talk about what they think of the government. I’ve been in at least half the states over the past four years and spent weeks or months in many of them. NOBODY ever said anything positive about Hillary. NOBODY.
My suggestion to people is to get out of your bubbles and travel to different places. People in Pittsburgh, Las Vegas, Anchorage, Boston, and Salt Lake City have a very different view of the country than those in Columbia, SC.
Doug, in our bet…the bottle stands beside me.
Does that mean you think I might win? I will gladly share with anyone from the blog who wants to partake. Let’s start moving forward…
Here’s something less palatable — we have to tip our hats to Michael Moore, who’s been saying for sometime that on Election Day, all the angry nihilists of Flyover Land were going to deliver a gigantic F___ You to the country.
And we’re seeing that.
And I’m not someone who wants to give credit to Michael Moore for anything…
How much time have you spent outside of South Carolina in the past few years? It’s a different world in the Rust Belt.
Hillary’s comment about shutting down the coal mines probably cost her the election because it probably cost her Pennsylvania.
Uhhh, Doug — aren’t you the guy who predicted, just a few hours ago, that Hillary would win with 290?
I, who have failed to educate myself by visiting Pennsylvania in the last year, did not make predictions, y’all may or may not have noticed.
That’s because I believe anything can happen. Also, as I’ve said before (and taken a lot of grief for it), I don’t think it’s wise to try to quantify the unknowable…
Also, let me say that while I haven’t been to Pennsylvania in the last couple of years, I spent quite a bit of time there, in the small towns of the central part of the state, between 2005 and 2009. Mostly pre-crash, of course…
I’m gonna start embedding Tweets here, because it’s ridiculous to type things twice…
Think how DEEPLY you have to hate someone to vote for TRUMP just to show your disdain? It’s amazing ONE person would do that, much less MILLIONS….
Not sure this is legitimate but the NYT has given Trump a 94% chance of winning. If this holds and we don’t have a repeat of the Dewey – Truman fiasco when the election was called early for Dewey, this could be the upset of the 20th and 21st centuries.
If Trump wins, the leadership in Washington should take a long hard look at what they have been doing and examine under a microscope why Donald Trump could pull this off.
Not much more to be said.
Oh, I’ll tell you exactly what the Republican leadership has done wrong — they have utterly failed to stand up and shout NO! to Trump. They normalized him. They played games with words. They said they wouldn’t endorse him, but would vote for him.
The SOMEWHAT braver ones said they wouldn’t vote for him, but they wouldn’t vote for HER, either — “HER” being the only person on the planet who could have stopped him.
Not even the former president Bushes — who had nothing to fear from speaking out, their political careers being over — had the nerve to come out and CAMPAIGN AGAINST HIM.
Well, the GOP has retained control of both houses of Congress — but they have Trump on their hands, unless something amazing happens in the next hour or so. Well, they deserve each other.
You think the American people have been turning their backs on Washington? Watch what happens NOW…
What are all these supposedly desperate working-class whites who were SO mad, and voted for Trump as a big FU to the Establishment, going to do when they see that he’s not going to do ANYTHING to make their lives better?
Talk about bitterness. And what will they do THEN?
It’s not the economy anymore. It’s fear of Others. As long as he vocalizes their fears, it gives them cover for their own small-minded bigotry and misogyny.
The next four years will be an embarrassment for our nation. Our economy will suffer. There will be no action taken on climate change. We will lose young men and women in an ill-advised military action somewhere in the world.
Sorry, Norm, but this is no different than what Obama haters said after he won. How about waiting for something to happen before predicting the end of the world?
Holy cow, you were sure upset last night. How is this any different than the Obama elections? What did Obama do for his supporters the past 8 years? I mean besides screw up their health insurance.
It’s the media in the internet age. That’s what allowed it to happen. People believe what they want to believe and find “news” sources that support their views already. And it snowballs. And they never realize they aren’t getting anything close to objective information. And they get duped.
What’s gonna happen when all these people realize what he really is?
Sorry. The Tweet I was reacting to there was this:
Come, now. I dare say I like a joke as much as the next man, but there’s such a thing as taking one too far. You’re verging upon doing that, TV people…
This is weird. It’s surreal.
PBS just reported that Canada’s immigration website has crashed.
Just wondering how every Democrat who was happy about Trump winning the GOP nomination is feeling now.
Brad was right. Can’t vote for the bad candidate for the other party.
Absolutely not. Not EVER…
Bad
Calm down everyone. The best thing you can do tomorrow is go to work and do your jobs. Don’t blame anyone, don’t gloat. Take this as a sign of what Americans think of what our political process has become over the past 16 years. Too much war, too much debt, too much of everything. This isn’t about Trump, it’s about a government that has failed hard working Americans.
Doug, I thought hard-working Americans didn’t NEED government. THEY built it, right? Their fate is in THEIR hands. So what’s their beef?
I don’t understand what you are saying. Trump is a response to what politics and government has become over the past 16 years. Hillary would continue that trend and a lot of people (not racists, not misogynists) said “Enough!”.
That may be the cause. But this is very much about Trump. Because now we have to hope our democracy survives and that he will actually step down in 4 or 8 years, assuming something more terrible hasn’t happened in the meantime due to some impulsive immature inappropriate response of his.
Scout, it’s already happened.
As I said a few moments ago, a country like Italy can do something like this — elect a Berlusconi — and go on being Italy.
Italy is not a country the rest of the world depends on — for their economies, for collective security, for political leadership. It just doesn’t matter that much who leads Italy.
Well, what we’re seeing tonight is what it looks like for the United States to turn into Italy…
That’s actually the best comparison I’ve heard. Trump isn’t Hitler. He’s not Il Duce. He’s Berlusconi.
Yes. That’s bad.
Hillary is likely to win the popular vote since most of the outstanding vote is from CA. The one good thing to come of this debacle is seeing Brad defend that atrocious part of our constitution.
So fair to say it was Obama’s coalition of voters, not the Democrats?
Cool. All you gotta do is amend the Constitution.
Clinton is ahead in the popular vote. With mostly west coast states still counting it could end being a wide margin, perhaps a million votes or more. Small comfort.
Hillary’s margin in the popular vote basically comes from the cities of Chicago, Philadelphia, and Detroit. She won some demographic groups by a wide margin. That doesn’t really mean anything other than those groups will always vote Democrat.
S&P 500 trading has been halted to stop it from plummeting further.
Who is going to call this and put us to bed?
I need a Jack Aubrey power-nap — lie down for 15 minutes, go to sleep immediately, wake up totally refreshed.
But this is more of a Maturin night. I think I’ll take my laudanum now. Then take it again in an hour, when it hasn’t worked…
Wrong premise. The rejection was of Hillary. Biden wins easily.
Bernie probably would have won as well.
Right, Bryan. As I said earlier, they really, REALLY hate her. They have since ’92. It may have all started with the “baking cookies” remark…
Why is it that all/most of the east coast precincts that haven’t reported yet lean Democrat. What takes so long to get the votes counted?
On another note – Rachel Maddow and Chris Matthews are fighting now on MSNBC. Beautiful. Matthews is blaming Hillary now for not being tougher on illegal immigration. HA!
@BryanCaskey @TheDouglyTruth Guys, I think we’re the last ones left on the blog tonight. I’ve said what I have to say, regardless what else happens. Hitting the sack….
Tomorrow is a new day. Find something else to focus on,
Doug I hope you’re right. But given the collapse of the DOW futures the money people are very worried.
It always vibes back. I could have bought Bank Of America stock for pennies in 2008.
Comes back.
Obama is still President, this collapse happened under his leadership. From what I’m been told the past 8 years, we have nothing to worry about, he’ll fix it.
The DOW is up this morning… so much for the Crash of 2016.
Ten reasons Hillary lost (no particular order):
1. Trump outworked her day after day for the past six months. He never stopped campaigning while she took days off to prepare for 90 minute debates that don’t influence people that much.
2. Hillary’s actions from day one of the private email server issue. Every step along the way was about hiding the truth. Remember: release the emails a year ago and James Comey doesn’t matter.
3. Obamacare premium hikes. We all knew this was coming. All of the good news was frontloaded into the bill with the reality kicked down the road conveniently after Obama was done.
4. Passing out at the 9/11 ceremony. That really may have been the tipping point. It was a terrible visual. And once again, hiding the fact that she supposedly had pneumonia just made it look like another coverup.
5. Bill Clinton is a boat anchor that she had to drag around. She should have cut him loose a decade ago.
6. Her comments about shutting down the coal industry cost her Pennsylvania. There was a ripple effect across the Rust Belt.
7. The DNC rigging the primary process with super delegates to defeat Bernie made her look like an insider. And she never really brought Bernie into the inner circle to gain his voters.
8. Debbie Wasserman Schulz, Donna Brazile, and Huma Abedin (via Anthony Weiner) proved that women can sink as low as men on the unethical scale. Hillary never made the tough decision to publicly distance herself from them.
9. Hillary thought that celebrities like Jay Z would bring in voters. That’s basically saying that her voters are not interested in issues and can be easily led.
10. She made the election about Trump instead of about Hillary. She oversold his negatives (especially those from decades ago) instead of promoting her own capabilities. Candidate Trump made missteps along the way but got better day by day.
Republicans won the Presidency, Senate, House, and increased their lead in the number of Republican governors.
This is the party that is in disarray and dead?
Democrats – if you want to win any future elections, start by cleaning out Congress of people like Pelosi, Schumer, Rangel, etc. Get rid of anyone who has been in there more than 20 years.
Nope; that was pretty much the end of the GOP. The parties we will have going forward will be radically realigned, the Democrats, too.
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I am having an excellent start to my day.
The Republican own whatever happens over the next 4 years.
Just like the Democrats own what has happened the past 8 years?
How do you figure, Claus? Last time I looked, the GOP controlled Congress.
Not that it matters. Parties are worthless.
Arguments trying to paint one party as the good guys and the other party as the bad guys are tiresome and pointless.
In this situation, I blame Republican leaders for failing to take a real stand against Trump. Instead of all that “I don’t endorse him but I’ll vote for him” garbage.
And I blame Democrats for not having generated anyone who could have won their nominee instead of Clinton.
But then, whom am I blaming? Is anyone in charge in either party? No, of course not…
Who do we blame for Obamacare?
Oh, everyone. What we should have is single-payer. So I blame Republicans for irrationally opposing that most sensible of civilized arrangements, and Democrats for failing to have the resolve to pass it anyway, back when they had control of Congress.
Power is wasted on the wrong people. (How’s that for timely commentary?)
bud, you are absolutely on point. We agree on your comment. Now, it is up to Republicans to prove they can be responsible leaders and not take the “my way or the highway” approach. It is time to hang up the gloves, shake hands, and sit down at a round table and work together for the good people of this country.
THIS. Let’s start small. Maybe the federal government could establish an actual budget. Anyone remember the budget? You know, the thing that Congress used to pass and the President would sign? Let’s start there.
Oh, I’m sure they’ll come up with a terrific budget, the best budget ever. Trust me…
Just as along as it’s not YUGE, right?
Oh, it’ll be yuge. Also terrific. I already said that, but if saying the same words over and over doesn’t bother him, I guess I can do it, too…
Did you watch Trump’s speech early this morning yet? It was very conciliatory, very positive… he has adapted. And I expect he will adapt to the job as he goes along.
If I were in his shoes, I’d arrange to meet each of the living Presidents for a day prior to being sworn in and get their perspective on what to expect.
Nope and don’t plan to. He’s such a fraud his words now are pretty hollow. We’ll be in a recession within 6 months.
I’ll take your predictions with a grain of salt based on previous predictions. You’re suggesting that President Trump will be able to do something within 90 days of taking office that will send us into a recession?
The more likely scenario is that the Fed will bump up interest rates in December since they had to hold off until after the election to try and help Hillary. That will have more impact on the economy than anything Trump (who doesn’t pass laws related to spending or taxes) could do. Now if Trump happens to get a corporate tax cut through Congress, my guess is we’ll see a big influx of cash that has been held offshore. Apple is sitting on tens of billions of dollars.
“You’re suggesting that President Trump will be able to do something within 90 days of taking office that will send us into a recession?”
Come on, Doug — again, you’re thinking in ones and zeroes. Politics isn’t an “if-then” proposition. I think it’s slightly silly (sorry, Bud) to try to predict a recession, because the causes of something like that are complex.
But it’s not unreasonable to think that an irrational, impulsive, thin-skinned POTUS with NO qualified advisers to speak of (they mostly came out for Hillary, remember?) will, day in and day out, do things that will further depress confidence in this country, both at home and abroad.
Because of your engineerish perspective, I always have trouble convincing you of the impact of such intangibles. But the impact is real. As someone keeps saying, Trust Me…
Brad you’re convinced that Trump will not be able to assemble a team of advisors? I’m convinced that we’ll see a team of advisors like we’ve never seen before because Trump doesn’t need to use career politicians to do so.
“a team of advisors like we’ve never seen before”
Oh, I fully believe THAT. And is that what you think has advised the presidents we’ve had up to this disastrous break with history? “Career politicians?” Presidents — actual, normal, rational presidents — rely on professionals who have spent their lives studying the subjects the presidents have to deal with. And all those people in the GOP announced months ago they would have nothing to do with this guy. Nor will he want them.
No, he’ll be advised by “career politicians” — and the worst, least principled of the bunch, such as Rudy Giuliani, Newt Gingrich and Chris Christie.
Which is why I posted this earlier:
My point is that there are too many variables to predict ANYTHING related to the economy. The vast majority of those variables don’t have anything to do with the government or the President.
A recession isn’t caused by people’s feelings. There are technical reasons for each one. The last one was caused in part by too much risk in the mortgage and credit markets. It’s coming back now (during Obama’s term) — low money down mortgages, low interest balance transfers, home equity loans. The next recession is already programmed into the economy. It’s just a matter of when — probably driven by the eventual interest rate hikes which will impact any variable rate loans. Other “baked in” factors include student loans, unfunded pensions. They’re ticking time bombs that have nothing to do with Trump.
“My point is that there are too many variables to predict ANYTHING related to the economy.”
On that, we’re in agreement…
And explode the deficit.
This is a day to remember. Actually bud, I don’t necessarily disagree with you. Not because Trump will be the next president but the cycle is due for a downturn and a recession is in order. Even though the employment/unemployment numbers are great but do not account for the ugly underbelly of the number of people who are employable but have dropped out of the market because of no jobs being available, the reported numbers are about where they should be when the economy is healthy and has been sustained for a few months.
The stock market was supposed to have tanked after the announcement of Trump’s victory but based on the latest numbers, it is up by 210 points, not down and the S&P is up by 20 plus points as well. And I agree with Doug. I believe the Fed will increase rates but hopefully not to the point where a recession is the result.
I voted third party and would not go against my conscience but at the same time, even knowing neither one is worthy to be POTUS, I was going to support the winner and do whatever I can to help the new POTUS be successful if his or her efforts were truly intended to help all, not repay in kind for huge donations.
I did stay up out of a odd attraction to the ongoing events of the evening and with a surreal sense of disbelief that Trump actually won Pennsylvania, Wisconsin (really?), and Michigan. My internet went down so I had to watch the rest on TV. It was interesting to see the difference between the two. Yahoo’s election map called it long before the networks did, even before Fox. And to finish the night, I did watch Trump’s speech and Doug is right. It was a decent and well received speech. Not the same Trump we have become accustomed to seeing on campaign ads.
How soon before Hillary starts campaigning for her old Senate seat back? Or is s he washed up and that is now Chelsea’s seat?
Here’s how we end up in recession. Trump submits a bill that dramatically cuts federal discretionary spending while cutting taxes on the rich. The net effect is a drop in income to consumers who no longer have government job. This spirals into a r mild slowdown. Combined with the tax cuts the deficit explodes as it alway does when the GOP is in control. This triggers caution among consumers who cut back further on spending. The large tax cuts for the rich largely go into overseas bank accounts furtther draining the nations capital resources. As the recession picks up the lax regulatory environment created by congress bring about risky lending behavior that ultimately affects real estate markets and big banks. In effect a replay of 2008 meltdown. But this time the free market zealots succeed in blocking bailout efforts. A new Great Depression is at hand. Eventually voters throw Trump and his GOP minions out and the Democrats rescue the economy yet again.
And that happens by April of 2017? Ok. Apparently the dummies who trade stocks had a different opinion as the markets rose today. But they’re all dummies waiting to get schooled by the Tao of Bud.
Did you even hear Trump talk last night about investing heavily in infrastructure? What if he makes that happen?