Business, Economics, History, Law, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Post-Election Thoughts

153 Comments

In no particular order:

1) Despite his “approval rating,” this was an utter repudiation of the last eight years (and to a lesser degree, the previous eight years under Bush). Trump is Obama’s “legacy.”

2) I hope, and even expect, that Giuliani will be the next AG. He will take the handcuffs off the FBI, and finally get to the bottom of all of the Obama lawlessness as well as hers. In the spirit of reconciliation, Trump should offer her a pardon, on condition they shut down the foundation, and she exit our lives.

3) There will obviously be no post-election confirmation of Garland. Ginsburg and Breyer will probably be rethinking their retirement plans.

4) I assume that House Republicans have a repeal and replace plan to give to Trump in January.

5) Expect a flurry of executive orders undoing much of Obama’s lawlessness in the first week.

More anon.

[Update a few minutes later]

Will “liberals” finally discover the appeal of limited government?

[Update a few minutes later]

Predictably, embittered Democrats engage in racist outbursts. Well, this is nothing new; they have historically been the party of racism.

[Update a couple minutes later]

[Update a couple more minutes later]

Would’t accepting a last-minute pardon from Obama be a tacit admission that someone did something wrong? That’s why Nixon didn’t necessarily want one.

[Update a while later]

It occurs to me that now that the crime family has no favors to offer, the donations to the Clinton Crime Foundation will start to, or immediately dry up.

[Late-morning update]

Yes, a large part of Trump’s appeal is a backlash against the fascism of political correctness.

153 thoughts on “Post-Election Thoughts”

  1. Wow.

    I in no way supported Trump. But now that he’s elected, I’m thinking that he may be the best man for the job of _cleaning house_. Firing a lot of people in the federal government is one of the things this country needs most right now.
    And unlike Pres. Obama, who was elected because people liked him and because he was black, Trump has one heck of a mandate. No one liked him. We only voted for him because we want his policies passed.

    “Ginsburg and Breyer will probably be rethinking their retirement plans.” They’re going to hang on for four more years? The Senate is really really unlikely to change hands in 2018 with all those Democrats coming up for reelection; it should get easier not harder to confirm a new justice.

    1. Firing a lot of people in the federal government is one of the things this country needs most right now.

      Impossible without a civil service overhaul, unfortunately. But now at least they can be prosecuted.

      1. I think it could be done. Some are political hires; unlike George W. Bush (but like Bill Clinton) those should all be gone the day he comes into office. Put a freeze on new hiring, tell them to get new people from different areas in their organization. Reduce appropriations for agencies that should get smaller. Get Congress to cancel whole parts of the agencies, or Trump can do it himself if those parts weren’t created by acts of Congress. Not that I know what I’m talking about, but he has a mandate to do this and I think he could bully Republicans in Congress about it. No Republican wants to be held up as a defender of fat government. These days that would get them primaried.

        1. Where do you get the impression Trump is a conservative who wants to shrink the government? He has declared himself firmly opposed to entitlement reform.

          1. He’s not opposed to reform (can’t believe I had to say that!) What he’s against is needlessly causing harm to people. People pay into social security. Knowing that, he isn’t going to threaten cutting off people now depending on it as Obama threatened to.

            He would like to keep pre-existing conditions and children on parents insurance. How? He doesn’t know and may not be able to figure it out. But he does understand that insurance is a business so whatever solution is found will have a competitive market.

      2. One way to begin the reduction process without a civil service overhaul is to outlaw replacement when someone leaves.

        And another way is to eliminate the projects the civil servants were hired for.

          3. The left is like the metal terminator frozen and shattered. We have a small window of opportunity here. Two years. Maybe four.

      3. No need to fire the civil servant if you eliminate the department. Start with the department of education. Have a Ross Perot style infomercial that shows a graph of budget vs. results. Then make the case that states compete on results as the founders intended. Wash. Rinse. Repeat for other depts.

        1. Ken,

          I’ve often wondered why our representatives don’t use YouTube to get out their message. I’ve often thought Cruz would enjoy a weekly “radio address” a la Reagan.

          Trump could do this. He already loves tweeting. It would really help to get his message out without distortion from the media.

          2. Well, he’d also need to get the distortion out of his own way of speaking. But it is a good idea. As president he should be more scripted which doesn’t require him to change his goals.

        2. When has Trump ever indicated he is in favor of eliminating cabinet departments? Which ones? This is Donald Trump, liberal Democrat.

          1. Budget is going to be central to every decision, which means smaller govt. overall even if he does increase some areas.

            He has indicated the elimination of entire depts., but with caveats.

  2. So much to say:

    Shot: Brexit

    Chaser: Trump Landslide; Clinton humiliated.

    Jim’s predictions:

    >Electoral college prediction: Clinton 322, Trump 216.

    WRONG – Trump has over 300. The Witch couldn’t even bring herself to stand in front of her acolytes and slaves and thank them on the night of her humiliating defeat.

    The vaunted Blue Wall wasn’t just breached – it was blown up and burned to the ground.

    >The 2012 map, but Trump flips IA, OH and ME-2, while Clinton flips NC.

    WRONG – not the 2012 map and Clinton didn’t flip NC. Trump flipped Pa. and others.

    >Senate prediction: 51-49 Dems

    WRONG.

    >House prediction: 20 seat Republican majority

    WRONG – 44 majority for the GOP

    So Jim performs as usual: utterly wrong.
    And everything Jim stands for has been utterly rejected and destroyed.
    Or will be destroyed – if Trump keeps his promises.

    And …oh…….the shadenfreude…….. is very thick.

    Podesta – go away and never come back.

    Doug Band – I wouldn’t want to be standing next to him…
    Weiner – same thing.

    The MSM – I sincerely doubt they will look at this event and come to understand that they have been exposed as Democrat Operatives with Bylines. They are too stupid to learn……anything.

    Yes Trump was not my first choice or even my 10th. But Trump got my vote because Clinton the Hag was unutterably worse.

    One thing I wanted was that whoever won, they would win so big that there wouldn’t be weeks of legal wrangling like 2000.

    I got my wish.

    Can we now please leave the Clintons in the dustbin of history and be done with them? Yes I know…Chelsea is waiting in the wings….

    Now for the future:

    Yes Trump was not my first choice or even my 10th. But Trump got my vote because Clinton the Hag was unutterably worse.

    Still, this is where the rubber meets the road. Trump had better come across…the wall better go up; ICE had better be re-energized; illegal alien convicted felons had better be shipped out pronto and not allowed to return; Muslim immigration had better be suspended; corporate tax rates had better be cut to 15%; the middle class had better get a tax cut; and last but certainly the MOST:

    Obamacare had better be repealed and replaced.

    We will see.

    Lessons:

    As I wrote above, the MSM ought to learn from this but I hold out no hope.

    But then we have Ryan and McConnell. If Trump lost, those two would have used it as a bludgeon to middle America and maintained their GOPe elitist operation.

    But Trump not only won, he won in an unprecedented landslide. If those two have a brain in their head, they will also see it as a repudiation of THEIR fat cat policies as well as the Democrat/Socialist idiocies. This was as much a repudiation of them as it was of Hillary The Hag Clinton.

    So…let’s see what Trump does. if he does what he said he will do – what Ken has assured us he will do – I will be pleased.

    If not…..revolution.

    1. Wall, schmall. While I’d love to see it–no other country has willingly abandoned control of its own borders like this[1]–there’s simpler ways to get substantially the same effect. #1 mandate the use of E-Verify. Inform the SSA that they will get (say) a 10% budget cut unless they immediately begin notifying the appropriate authorities of abuse of SSNs. Employers that knowingly hire people who’ve failed E-Verify pay an escalating fine. Let’s say, $500 per individual hired after failing E-Verity, doubling with each successive individual.

      The other big one: a hefty tax on foreign remittances. Let’s say 40%. This will probably cause millions to self-deport, and the best part is, Trump can position it as a sop to Democrats: “look, it’s a tax increase, you guys love those, right?”

      [1] that I’m aware of, anyway. I guess you could sort of say the EU has, but not quite in the same way.

      1. The other big one: a hefty tax on foreign remittances. Let’s say 40%. This will probably cause millions to self-deport, and the best part is, Trump can position it as a sop to Democrats: “look, it’s a tax increase, you guys love those, right?”

        I strongly disagree on this one. First, it’s an unwarranted intrusion on someone’s financial decisions. Second, what’s supposed to be the problem with foreign remittances? It helps out who the money is sent to. In the long term, it also makes the destination society wealthier and less likely to send the sort of immigrants you don’t like. Third, it’s politically costly. Not only are there a fair number of voters directly affected, it wouldn’t be hard to find poor, photogenic people who have benefited from foreign remittance.

        My view is that foreign remittance is cheap foreign aid and just not that big a deal to the immigration problem.

    2. You’re right, and I’m here to eat crow. I wasn’t counting on NC or FL, so those didn’t really surprise me. It’s PA, WI and MI that were a big surprise. And I was wrong about the Senate (I thought Dems would win in WI and MO).

      That said, my popular vote prediction (Clinton by 4%) wasn’t off by very much (it looks to be Clinton by 1-2%). Clinton had enough votes, but not in the right places. And I’m glad that my volunteering and vote helped her win a squeaker of a race here in NH, as well as helped flip a Senate seat, and send the first all-female, all-Democratic Congressional delegation to Washington.

      he won in an unprecedented landslide

      I’m not sure how you get that. He’s going to end up with fewer electoral votes than Obama got each time. His popular vote performance was second worst ever for a winning candidate, with only Rutherford B. Hayes doing worse. It was an unprecedented win in a number of ways (e.g. first winner to not have previous experience in government or the military), but it wasn’t an unprecedented landslide.

      Given my terrible record with predictions this week, I might as well make some more:

      * Obama won’t pardon Clinton or anyone from the State Department or IRS
      * Trump won’t be impeached
      * Senate Republicans will eliminate the filibuster for SCOTUS appointments and legislation sometime in the next 2 years
      * At least one high-level official from the Trump administration will face criminal charges sometime in the next four years
      * Four years from now there will not be a big, beautiful wall stretching the length of the U.S.-Mexico border

      1. At least one high-level official from the Trump administration will face criminal charges sometime in the next four years

        If so, it will only be because Republicans, unlike Democrats, care about the rule of law.

      2. “That said, my popular vote prediction (Clinton by 4%) wasn’t off by very much (it looks to be Clinton by 1-2%).”

        1) 1-2% is enormous. And let’s wait until all the votes are in.

        2) Popular vote is utterly irrelevant. All that means is that Clinton won California and the big cities. Why you and Steffie Stephanopolous and other Dem Operatives with Bylines harp on popular vote is beyond me except that you all still think the general population of the US is stupid and you can get away with it.

        I repeat: It doesn’t matter a whit as to who is elected President. And it’s a flawed metric because the vote is bifurcated by big cities and big population states. Furthermore, it’s precisely for that reason we have the EC.

        So the more you harp on popular vote the more you prove you are uneducable.

        So your prediction regarding the popular vote? Pure piffle. Hillary had a 98% chance of winning right? You were certain she was going to win, right?

        One of the ways this landside was unprecedented is that it took away States the Dems have won for decades. PA and MI for example. States that you, Jim were CERTAIN Hillary the Hag would win. Electoral College votes aren’t the only way to measure a landslide. Especially with California so hard core Socialist and with so many electoral college votes.

        Leave it to you, Jim, to try and set the parameters of “unprecedented” in such a way as to negate the severity of your drubbing. You don’t get to set the parameters.

        You failed.

        One way (and there are several ways) that this is unprecedented is that those states – such as MI – which have been under Dem control for decades and which have imploding cities (such as Detroit) and which have been Dem strongholds for years…..voted for Trump

        Were you wrong Jim?

        Yes…..you were wrong.

        1. Yes, their obsession with the popular vote is mendacious at heart. To see the effect of it on a national level, just look at the states. In 1964, Reynolds v Sims eviscerated every state’s right to have two legislative bodies equivalent to the federal congress. It turned the state senates into a redundant body based on population which then allowed the major cities to dominate the state. The smaller towns and rural areas now have no say in a state’s decision.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reynolds_v._Sims

          1. I’m sad that instead of even acknowledging the other side of the argument on why the popular vote might matter for choosing a president and vice-president, you call it mendacious, but your citation of Reynolds vs Sims is very interesting, so let me ask you this:
            Why aren’t state governors chosen by an equivalent to the Electoral College on the state-level? In other words: why doesn’t each county (or parish, etc) receive some minimum number of electoral votes for governor, regardless of population count?

          3. The other side of the argument is that totalitarians think that a single, or small group of cities, should dictate taxes and laws to people they don’t know, understand, or respect.

            The EC is a check and balance over tyranny.

            You could propose an amendment to the constitution and call it The Hunger Games Amendment.

            Even now with the election of Trump, do you not understand the importance of checks and balances? Do you really think Democrats will always be the majority in big cities? You might want to take a look at how pissed off Democrats are at their own party right now.

          4. “I’m sad that instead of even acknowledging the other side of the argument on why the popular vote might matter for choosing a president and vice-president, you call it mendacious, …”

            Be sad if you want but it only betrays your utter ignorance of reality.

            A popular vote would eliminate the votes for most of the states of the Union.

            Surely you are one who whines about how every vote must count yes?

            Well then why do you want to disenfranchise the bulk of the nation?

            Do yourself a favor and eliminate a touch of your ignorance and look at the county map at the top of Drudge while it’s still there. Blue counties were won by Hillary. See how FEW there are? And yet she was slightly ahead by the popular vote. All of the counties in the heart of the US would be disenfranchised.

            All candidates would go only to the cities.

            I guess you are a product of our educational system which hides such important facts in their civics curriculum

          5. Perhaps Jon or someone else here knows the history of at least some of the 50 states and can shed some light on why the governorship of all 50 states is directly elected, thus favoring urban counties over rural counties. The history of tensions between the early states which led to the establishment of the US electoral college is well known, but why don’t/haven’t states, particularly states with both rural areas and and large urban centers, have/had electoral colleges?

            But whether you know the history or not, there are related questions anyone can answer:

            1) Do you think the pros and cons of the way people in a state elect their governors is relevant to the way Americans elect their president, and if so,
            2) Does anyone here think the system of electing governors (in their state, or in some other state) should be changed by that state’s voters to an indirect electoral college system to better reflect geographical differences within a state rather than reflecting the choice of the state’s population as a whole?

            I had never considered this before, but this morning I did an internet search, and of course, someone else has written about it. Here’s a very biased discussion of the topic:
            http://www.fairvote.org/what-if-we-used-the-electoral-college-to-elect-governors

          6. 1) Do you think the pros and cons of the way people in a state elect their governors is relevant to the way Americans elect their president,

            No.

            and if so,
            2) Does anyone here think the system of electing governors (in their state, or in some other state) should be changed by that state’s voters to an indirect electoral college system to better reflect geographical differences within a state rather than reflecting the choice of the state’s population as a whole?

            I wouldn’t presume to speak for other states, but I think things wouldn’t be as effed up in California if we did that. But California is a microcosm of the nation as a whole. It really needs to be broken up into smaller, more manageable states, accountable to their own populations. As it is, it’s like the Hunger Games, with the Capital City and the powerless provinces. Illinois is similar. And they’re both going bust from crazy pension systems.

          7. Bob, the states have the right to their own constitution. I’m sad that you don’t understand the 10th Amendment.

            It’s all there, in the Constitution.

          8. Perhaps Jon or someone else here knows the history of at least some of the 50 states and can shed some light on why the governorship of all 50 states is directly elected,

            I don’t know why. Maybe they thought they had enough checks and balances with the state senate. Maybe the popular vote works a little easier on the state level. The states get to decide, that is their right.

            I should ask you why you think the popular vote is so critical. If so, why even bother to have a court decide on constitutional issues? The will of the people should override the courts, correct?

          9. You could propose an amendment to the constitution and call it The Hunger Games Amendment.

            That is brilliant and hilarious.

          10. “Bob, the states have the right to their own constitution. I’m sad that you don’t understand the 10th Amendment.”

            I understand it quite well. I’m asking about the history of the governorship in the 50 states, and I’m asking about what system Rand and his commenters think would be optimal.

            When arguing with conservatives about states rights, I’ve often been impressed with the argument that the 50 states are “laboratories for democracy”. But in this conversation, instead of thinking about experiments being performed in the laboratories, and instead of thinking about new experiments which could be performed in those laboratories, you’re just using federalism as an excuse for not thinking.

            I have more to say about the merits of the electoral college but I’d like to find a smart conservative who shows an willingness to think hard about it.

          11. what system Rand and his commenters think would be optimal.

            A better question would be why you think the current system isn’t optimal. Your candidate won the popular vote (by a quarter of one percent, or a handful of south philly precincts) and got blown out in the electoral college. Your unwillingness to think about why you’re aggrieved at the outcome is very sad.

          12. I understand it quite well. I’m asking about the history of the governorship in the 50 states, and I’m asking about what system Rand and his commenters think would be optimal.

            You certainly didn’t act as if you knew. You sounded completely ignorant of the 10th amendment.

            …and instead of thinking about new experiments which could be performed in those laboratories, you’re just using federalism as an excuse for not thinking.”

            It sounds like you mean “meddling”, not thinking. Perhaps I’m taking that wrong.

            Seriously, Bob, federalism means to leave the other states alone. Washington should be allowed to legalize pot and Louisiana should be allowed to ban abortion. We don’t need someone lording over the states and telling them what is in their best interest.

            If you want me to come up with new experiments for my state, that’s a different question. I won’t bother you with yours because we know what’s best for our respective states.

          13. Curt, I didn’t say one thing here that indicated a lack of support for the electoral college. I asked why such systems are not used more. I was going to move on from governor races to discuss electoral college systems for mayoral races. And then I was going to discuss electoral colleges which don’t distinguish by geographical regions, but instead by other voter characteristics, so that fewer minority voters are disenfranchised.

        2. “One of the ways this landside was unprecedented is that it took away States the Dems have won for decades.”

          Based on who won where, the GOP is now the American Party, while the Democrats are the Foreigners And Fat-Cats Party.

          I must admit, though, I thought the result would be much closer than it was.

      3. Here’s another way it was unprecedented:

        “Trump’s victory cost less than $5 per vote: Campaign beat Clinton by spending less than HALF of the $521 million she plowed into contest”

        Less than $5 bucks per vote…….

      4. And yet another way this was unprecedented is that I know of no successful Presidential candidate that had to:

        1. Fight the opponent, and

        2. Have the MSM utterly against him and

        3. Even have to fight a major portion of his own party who turned their backs on him.

        1. … and still to win not only the Presidency, but to have a Republican controlled Senate and House for the first trifecta in 88 years.

      5. Some time ago, on another forum, I predicted that, whichever of the candidates won in 2016 he or she would do so with a popular vote total lower than the losers of the last several presidential elections. It seems both Clinton and Trump will barely get above the 59 million votes John Kerry collected in 2004. Neither will probably exceed the 60 million John McCain got in 2008 and neither will come anywhere near exceeding even the 61 million Mitt Romney racked up in 2012. Trump had an advantage in enthusiasm among supporters, but it didn’t translate into anything remotely resembling a popular vote landslide.

        It looks as though Hillary will wind up with, perhaps, a 2/10ths % popular vote margin over Trump, far smaller than even Al Gore’s alleged margin over Bush 43 in 2000. I say “alleged” because the Clinton “margin” is so small – less than a 1/4 million votes – that it’s probably entirely due to the usual corrupt Democratic machine vote rigging practices. Just adding the the North Korean precincts in Philly and the Necro-American vote in Cook County, IL probably exceeds this “margin.”

        After that unforced “coal miners out of business” error, I figured Penn. was a lock for Trump and I was right. Being a native Michigander, and a Yupe, I wasn’t surprised by Michigan and Wisconsin except that I expected Michigan to be called for Trump a lot earlier than Wisconsin. The white working class and, at least as importantly, the white involuntarily furloughed working class, has broken decisively with the Democratic Party. If Trump gets the economy moving again and reverses the outflow of blue collar jobs, the Dems will never get them back.

        If Trump follows through on The Wall and mass deportations of illegals, he’ll also hive off a big enough slice of the black vote four years hence to not only get re-elected but pretty much foreclose Dem. presidential prospects for a generation at least. Blacks used to do a lot of the construction jobs now done by illegals. Four years hence, they could be doing them again. It’s not quite like freeing the slaves, but all Trump needs to do to make Democrats unelectable nationally is hive off as little as an additional 5 or 10 % of the black vote. That looks quite doable.

        Trump will, of course, have his work cut out for him. Both the Republican and Democratic branches of the Cheap Coolie Labor Caucus can be expected to launch kamikaze attacks on Trump’s immigration proposals.

        On the plus side, Trump is the first President-Elect since Eisenhower to reach that position with essentially no markers out. He owes virtually no one else for his victory. He got, needless to say, no help from Democrats and barely more from the Republican establishment. The Republican fat-cat donor base kept their checkbooks in their pockets for the most part. Trump’s personal campaign expenditures were also record-breakingly mingy. The Republican establishment will do their best to take credit for holding the House and Senate with minimal losses, but it’s looking as though Trump had more to do with that than the feckless Rep-stablishment did.

        It’s going to be an interesting next four years. Could even be “fundamentally transformative.”

        1. Just adding the the North Korean precincts in Philly and the Necro-American vote in Cook County, IL probably exceeds this “margin.”

          Everyone is on a roll in this thread with brilliance and hilarity.

        2. It seems both Clinton and Trump will barely get above the 59 million votes John Kerry collected in 2004. Neither will probably exceed the 60 million John McCain got in 2008 and neither will come anywhere near exceeding even the 61 million Mitt Romney racked up in 2012.

          Both will exceed Romney’s 61 million. There are millions of votes yet to be counted from California and Washington. Check again in three weeks.

          1. Ya, these number change quite a bit but the media jumps out there and starts making grand conclusions just after the polls close.

      6. “Clinton had enough votes, but not in the right places.”

        But how many of those voters were:

        a) alive?
        b) legal?

        If Trump actually does deport the illegals, there’ll be millions less Democrat votes in four years. And that’s assuming black Americans don’t swing around to Trump when they realize that illegal Mexicans are no longer taking the jobs they used to do.

        And if #CALEXIT actually happens, as some on the left are starting to shout for, the Democrats are done.

      7. I have some predictions:
        – The media will talk about Afghanistan daily
        – The media will cover the other wars we are in
        – The Iranian militias in Iraq will be an issue
        – There will be anti-war protests again
        – There will be more Democrat party organized campaigns to stoke racial hatred and violence in their base
        – The filibuster will be cool again
        – Dissent will no longer be racism but highest form of moral action
        – The Democrat media will demand Trump take Democrat positions to show he is commuted to unity
        – Democrats will have no public pressure not to be obstructionist jackwagons rather they will be celebrated for it
        – Investigative journalism will be back
        – Democrats and their media will be against politicizing government agencies again
        – Democrats and their media will say executive orders are the worst thing ever
        – Democrats and their media will never realize they are upset with Trump acting like Obama
        – Obama will meddle with politics

        1. We have two years and a mandate to cut their funding. Dismantling the left’s power structure should be a priority.

          1. I agree with the caveat of dismantling their government funded and operated power structure. It is too incestuos a relationship right now.

    3. How does 48% of the vote constitute a landslide? 300 electoral votes is a good majority, but its no landslide either. Presidents of the United States do not have magic wands. Everything you want done (and so do I) requires an act of congress. Getting legislation passed requires political skills which, thus far, we have no reason to suspect Trump possesses. I figure an Obamacare repeal is a given, that has already passed the congress but was vetoed, we just need someone to sign it. Obama’s executive orders can be rescinded with a signature. He can do that the first day. Most other things, are going to take some work. We’ll see if he can figure out how to do them.

      1. There are things that Trump could do that don’t require Congress. For instance, he could reverse JFK’s executive order allowing federal civil-service unions. But since he’s in actuality a Democrat, I don’t expect him to do that.

        1. What makes you think Trump is a union supporter? He got support from union members, but that’s not the same thing as you know.

          1. What makes you think Trump is a union supporter?

            What makes you think I think that Trump is a union supporter? I continue to have no idea what Trump really believes, and unlike you, don’t try to fool myself that I do.

  3. I was surprised that Hillary didn’t even give a concession speech. To me this speaks volumes. She wouldn’t even go to her supporters and thank them for their hard work.

    Yep, it was all about Hillary. It reminds me of when the Clinton White House removed all the W’s from the computers in 2000. Just a bunch of angry, resentful monsters–which is what they are already calling Trump supporters.

    1. OTOH, the woman is not well. I expect we will soon learn the extent of her ailments as she checks in for some major medical work.

      2. Neither Bill nor Hillary Clinton are ageing well. I rate the chances of both still being above ground in four years at no better than 50%.

          1. In all fairness to him, I understand his doctors have had him on a vegan diet. Have you ever in your life seen a healthy looking vegan?

  4. Couple other things:

    1) Now we know why Clinton cancelled the fireworks and why Obama said, a couple days ago that no matter what happens on election day the Sun will still come up…….

    they knew they were toast. I hope they suffered mightily.

    2) I really hope we get good choices for cabinet positions….Giuliani for Attorney General; Bolton for State. For Treasury it would certainly be nice if Trump picked someone who – unlike Geithner – paid his taxes.

    Maybe Ted Cruz for the Supreme Court – but only if he’s replaced by a solid conservative temporary for his Senate position.

    3. Supreme Court?

      If it were up to me, I would appoint John Yoo. Too bad the Left would accuse him of being a war criminal. But he is the finest legal mind we have.

  5. Other possibilities with Trump:

    The US flirtation with Globalism is over….

    Destruction of the US Economy and massive cronyism with regard to climate alarmism is over……

    We’ll see…..

  6. ABC News panel discussing how Hateful Hillary is likely to win the popular vote and how unfair that seems.

  7. Say what you want about Bill Clinton as a person – he’s always been a very good politician. And in the last 2-3 weeks he clearly laid out why Hillary the Hag was going to lose:

    1) Obamacare is the craziest thing in the world

    2) “……..the death rate among white Americans is rising.” Clinton continued.

    “Why? Because they don’t have anything to look forward to when they get up in the morning. Because their lives are sort of stuck in neutral. “

      1. Let all the crony capitalists use their stolen loot to leave. It would prove the point that emigration is driven by malcontent–regardless of the political perspective.

      2. If people like Whoopi or Miley are clamoring for slots I’d be glad to help them pack!

        (Actually, I’d love to go to Mars or the Moon, myself, so out of selfishness I don’t want them there.)

    2. It would be great if our fascists (the ones here in USA not saying you are one) would just go start a new colony or country someplace. It would be a real world test to see if totalitarianism can build a thriving culture. Or they could just move to Venezuela.

  10. “In the spirit of reconciliation, Trump should offer [Hillary] a pardon, on condition they shut down the foundation, and she exit our lives.”

    Not so fast. There was one Wikileak revelation that got lost among all of the rest, partly because very few people could appreciate its magnitude. Hillary had a SCIF in her house. One needs a TS/SCI clearance to enter a SCIF unescorted…unless, of course, you are Hillary’s maid. She was routinely sent into the SCIF, which was left unlocked, to print out emails and retrieve classified faxes from the secure fax machine.

    On occasion, the classified fax the maid was sent to retrieve was the President’s Daily Brief. That is the most highly classified document in the United States, consisting of the day’s inputs from all of the U.S. intelligence agencies. Only a handful of people are allowed to see it, and they are all super users (cleared for all access, without having to be read into individual caveats).

    I have stated before that we have to assume that the emails Hillary destroyed contained information from the PDB, and was thus compromised. But this is worse. An uncleared Marina Santos went into an unlocked SCIF to fetch a document that should never exist outside of a SCIF. That is a whopping three major felonies in one short sentence. And it means that the actual PDBs she retrieved have to be considered compromised, which is far worse than the possibility that Clinton included some information from one in an email.

    This can’t be allowed to stand.

      1. Not only that, where do the pardons stop? Does he also pardon Bill and Chelsea? Huma Abedin? Loretta Lynch? Obama? The list goes on and on here. That’s one heckuva way to drain a swamp.

        1. Give Trump time to warm a presidents chair. Trump supporters want law and order. After the transition we will see if Trump goes squishy on this.

          1. It should be pretty easy from a political standpoint. And he can magnanimously commute their sentences in mid 2020 for political goodwill. Maybe time it with the conventions.

        2. And what about everyone at State that participated through email and then later obstructed investigations, destroyed evidence, and abused classification powers to give Hillary talking points?

          State has a lot of people that need to go.

      2. We can’t assume that a bullet has been dodged. A classified document in uncleared hands must be considered to have fallen into enemy hands. That’s the whole reason for the document control system.

        1. Your efforts only serve to break the cover of the highly trained secret agent that was only posing as a maid. Of course we don’t know if she was one of ours or theirs.

        3. Yeah, but at least we won’t spend the next four years with the entire administration having such a lackadaisacle attitude toward national security. The Trump administration is likely to have other problems due to his inexperience, but not that one.

    2. A troubling wikileak was the google guy saying they should deanonymize internet traffic to target individual voters.

      1. That’s why Startpage and Duck Duck Go are good alternatives. Startpage uses Google, but Google doesn’t get your IP Address.

  11. Kaine giving the pre-concession speech…he talks about how Hillary the Hag won the popular vote and “…..that is an amazing thing….”.

    Not all that amazing when you consider that California, and East Coast cities are safely in the Dem pockets. More to the point:

    utterly irrelevant.

    Kaine: they whupped us but they haven’t kilt us (faulkner)..because the work remains….

    Well it’s true Marxists never give up

    Here comes Hillary

    Fairly nice speech. Little Georgie Stephie almost in tears.

    Commentator: this was a race of good vs evil …right vs wrong….

    Sheesh

    1. “Commentator: this was a race of good vs evil …right vs wrong….”

      How obliviously ironic. Kinda hard for the Left to be claiming the moral high ground after abandoning all morality.

  12. “In the spirit of reconciliation, Trump should offer [Hillary] a pardon, on condition they shut down the foundation, and she exit our lives.”

    She would not honor any agreement like that.

    But it won’t be necessary as I expect Obama to give her a full pardon.

    1. I’d actually like to see that, because it’s be rightly interpreted as an admission of crimes.

      Seems like something he’d do, too: one last knife in the back.

  13. While I did expect a Clinton win, I’m not hugely surprised at Mr. Trump pulling off an upset. (That is, I’m not hugely surprised based on recent polling. I remain surprised that a character like Mr. Trump found the following he did in the U.S., but then I’ve never understood the attraction of professional wrestling either.)

    Even when Nate Silver’s modeling was giving Clinton/Kaine 2:1 odds, that still meant a Trump upset one time out of three, which made him the underdog but not a long shot.

    In this Dana Milbank WaPo opinion piece

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/no-matter-who-wins-the-presidential-election-nate-silver-was-right/2016/11/08/540825dc-a5eb-11e6-ba59-a7d93165c6d4_story.html

    from 8 November, he complained that Mr. Silver “foreshadowed a Trump victory” by admitting that even HRC’s popular vote polling lead was within the margin of error, and he contrasted him with others who had jumped on the optimism bandwagon and gave 92%, 98%, and 99% probabilities of a Clinton win.

    It is almost as if people looked at the modeling which suggested 2:1 Clinton over Trump odds and interpreted that to mean that she would get twice as many votes, instead of understanding it to mean that Mr. Trump appeared to be the underdog, but still had a very real chance.

    1. And if you prefer the Washington Times, how about this piece from 9 November

      http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/nov/9/so-called-faithless-elector-could-decide-president/

      which is, in effect, calling the election in favor of Ms. Clinton 270:268.

      If either one of the Washington state electors withheld their support at the Electoral College vote in December, Mrs. Clinton would fail to reach the 270-vote threshold and send the election to the House of Representatives.

      My best guess is that it was written in case of a 270:268 outcome, and accidentally released into the wild.

      1. Did we ever find out how that guy voted?

        It was a ballsy move. Washingtonian Democrats have a long history or abusing native Americans that get out of line.

    2. The thing with Silver is that it isn’t a prediction. His number is a probability of a winner at that specific moment. It changed day by day. Its interesting but the only one that would have been predictive is the number he gave the day of the election.

  14. I was a bit ambivalent regarding this US election since the beginning. Didn’t know who would win. But for the last couple of days I was kind of expecting Trump to win. Hillary’s Secretary of State record acted against her, unlike what she expected, and people were tired of Obama and the Democrats so they wanted a change. If I was a US citizen I would have voted for neither of them…

    1. I think the endless bullying of Democrats had something to do with it but would be nice to see some polling.

    2. A goodly number did. Fewer people voted than in any election since 2004, even though there were 40,000,000 more registered voters than there were then, and third party candidates got more votes than usual.

  15. Yes, a large part of Trump’s appeal is a backlash against the fascism of political correctness.

    I think many of us here can easily say, they never wanted to hear us. We were never a part of the conversation. Enough of us finally had had enough of it.

    How many times has Jim poo-pooed everything we’ve said, probably with the smug assuredness of an educated liberal who knows what is best for the country?

    Without a doubt, the media, academia and the goverment (including the public school sector) dismissed us as “bitter clingers” and assumed we would be swept into the dustbin of history.

    That may still happen, but not today. I’m sure our betters are already finding a way to build a better broom.

  16. According to CNN some Wall Streeters are worried about a big change at the Fed when Trump takes over.

    1. I wonder if a change is necessary?

    – I admit I haven’t given this much thought.

    2. If so would Trump think to do it?

    1. Fed governors have fixed terms. He can’t just say, “You’re fired,” and appoint new people. He will only get to appoint new ones, including a chairman, as their terms come up.

  17. Complaints about a ‘whitewash’ from Vann? He’s a Leninist bottom feeder from San Francisco, which of course is very revealing about the actual nature of the ‘Democratic’ Party.

    1. Can’t wait for the day that people who profit through creating racism can’t get a paycheck.

      Its telling that CNN has him on the air.

  18. You know one of the the interesting things about this election is that the group that put Trump in office USED to be the Democrat Party’s bread and butter – blue collar non-college educated workers.

    The Dems ignored them and figured they can be replaced by latino’s the LGBT community, and african americans…..

    Of course what they failed to realize is that there are blue collar workers in all of those groups.

    1. On election night, I was asked to be a part of a dinner from a would be vendor wanting to talking to various potential clients about how their product could be improved. Instead, the vendor decided to open up about politics, as they were not from the US and so had a few questions. I watched as they actually questioned a nice lady, who they recognized as African American (I recognized her as a potential business partner), as to why she didn’t fully support Obama, and certainly shouldn’t she prefer Hillary over Trump because she was a woman? The same people asking these questions asked me if I was embarrassed about the election.

      I talked with the lady the next day, and neither of us are interested in doing business with the vendor in the future.

      Later on election night, my wife and I watched ABC news coverage of the election. They had this lady sitting next to a former Clinton White House staffer pretending to be an impartial anchor. The lady was just apoplectic about uneducated white Americans accepting Trump and his sexist comments, and oh my even some women were willing to vote for Trump. She simply had no idea how much of audience she was insulting. I’m more certain she had no idea how insulting it was for those of us that were not in the camp of people she wanted to shame. It was the first time in probably two months we watched a network national news program, and we won’t be doing that again anytime soon.

      The Dems did a lot more than just ignoring certain people. They called those people the enemy and then attacked them. What they ignored was the notion that such offensive behavior wouldn’t work.

      1. It puts me in mind of a marriage breakup. I have seen several among friends and family. At some point, one of them generally gets into the frame of mind that they can shame the other person into loving them. The women will tell men what a dirty dog they are. Men will ask the women, “how can you do this to the kids?”

        They don’t seem to realize that they are only driving the other partner further away, and making reconciliation impossible. Because if you give in to shaming, you are accepting responsibility for all the problems that occurred, and making yourself into a slave for the other party, who will pull the same shtick on you forevermore.

      2. The Dems did a lot more than just ignoring certain people. They called those people the enemy and then attacked them.

        For at least the last 16 years, Democrats have treated, and thought of, Republicans as worse than AQ, the Taliban, ISIS, and Russia. It is a strange hypernormalization where actual evil is considered just and regular people are viewed as subhuman monsters.

        Much like the media, these bigoted stereotypes are inculcated through narratives in populations that have little contact with people other than their fellow Democrats. Look at any county by county map of election results and it isn’t hard to see how the majority of Democrats are concentrated in a few areas that they rarely stray outside of.

        The Republicans need to counter this. Even if they don’t win any votes, they need to go into these big cities to counter the racial and demographic narrative of the Democrats.

        Movies, books, symposiums, guerilla art, business workshops, career and education planning services are just a few of the things that could be done. Would some deep pockets fund stuff like this rather than give money to the Democrats to run commercials?

    2. the group that put Trump in office USED to be the Democrat Party’s bread and butter – blue collar non-college educated workers.

      They voted for Obama, twice! But now they are racist KKK white nationalists because they didn’t vote for Hillary. Maybe that message will get them back on board for the Democrats in 2020 or maybe Democrats haven’t learned any lessons.

  19. For all the talk of popular vote; the right side of the aisle won the majority. So it looks like the right has a mandate.

    1. This guy called it in April.

      http://www.vox.com/2016/4/21/11451378/smug-american-liberalism

      Excerpt:

      Trump capturing the nomination will not dispel the smug style; if anything, it will redouble it. Faced with the prospect of an election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, the smug will reach a fever pitch: six straight months of a sure thing, an opportunity to mock and scoff and ask, How could anybody vote for this guy? until a morning in November when they ask, What the fuck happened?

    2. Journalists exist primarily in a world where people can get shouted down and disappear

      They call this reason and covering a story. Note how this method is taught now in college. Everything is their pampered right. All expenses are paid by others. There is a free lunch. So quit complaining and pay the bill while we think up some new rights.

    3. I’m not sure he does get it.

      Pull Quote: “We diagnose them as racists in the way Dark Age clerics confused medical problems with demonic possession.”

      Ah, so we aren’t possessed by Demons, we just have medical problems. Oh, and they are still the clerics to heal the problems; they just need to use modern medicine, not the Dark Ages.

      Sure, lines like that one and others could be dismissed as a poor choice of words, but choice of words is this guy’s profession. That article didn’t get published on CBS.com without editorial review (or perhaps it did: “there’s be a winking”?), and I suspect it was carefully worded.

      How many times can he still call Trump supporters racists, and talk about the intelligence of the press, while merely suggesting that the Press just dial it back? A sincere opinion piece would have a tone like, “Hey, we got it wrong because we were smug assholes. They aren’t racists. Rather they are tired of being called racists, and other things they are not, particularly by people uninterested in covering their very real concerns. So we missed what really matters to people we chose to mock, and for our poor behavior, we were shocked to learn we were on the wrong side of history and covering the wrong events”. There’s be contrition.

      I’m not reading much contrition in the CBS article. Rather, I’m reading simply a little diagnosis and a suggestion to dial it back a little so as not to anger the audience to the point of rebellion. This looks like a piece written to appease the advertisers, while throwing in some back hand punches to the Trump voters.

      1. “A sincere opinion piece would have a tone like, “Hey, we got it wrong because we were smug assholes. They aren’t racists. Rather they are tired of being called racists, and other things they are not, particularly by people uninterested in covering their very real concerns. So we missed what really matters to people we chose to mock, and for our poor behavior, we were shocked to learn we were on the wrong side of history and covering the wrong events”. There’s be contrition. ”

        That’s what he said (in the CBS article):

        “Journalists love mocking Trump supporters. We insult their appearances. We dismiss them as racists and sexists. We emote on Twitter about how this or that comment or policy makes us feel one way or the other, and yet we reject their feelings as invalid.

        It’s a profound failure of empathy in the service of endless posturing. …………..
        But much of that starts from the assumption that Trump voters are backward, and that it’s our duty to catalogue and ultimately reverse that backwardness. What can we do to get these people to stop worshiping their false god and accept our gospel?

        We diagnose them as racists in the way Dark Age clerics confused medical problems with demonic possession. Journalists, at our worst, see ourselves as a priestly caste. We believe we not only have access to the indisputable facts, but also a greater truth, a system of beliefs divined from an advanced understanding of justice.

        You’d think that Trump’s victory – the one we all discounted too far in advance – would lead to a certain newfound humility in the political press. But of course that’s not how it works………………

        That’s the fantasy, the idea that if we mock them enough, call them racist enough, they’ll eventually shut up and get in line………………

        That the explainers and data journalists so frequently get things hilariously wrong never invites the soul-searching you’d think it would. Instead, it all just somehow leads us to more smugness, more meanness, more certainty from the reporters and pundits. Faced with defeat, we retreat further into our bubble, assumptions left unchecked. No, it’s the voters who are wrong.

        As a direct result, we get it wrong with greater frequency……..”

        1. I noticed you removed a lot of items. For example: “You’d think that Trump’s victory – the one we all discounted too far in advance – would lead to a certain newfound humility in the political press. But of course that’s not how it works. To us, speaking broadly, our diagnosis was still basically correct. The demons were just stronger than we realized. ” You dotted that out.

          He’s just saying how they got the results wrong. A diagnosis for sure, but he still calls Trumps voters racist, demons, and people with medical problems, which in context is psychological problems.

          But I will give you this, Gregg; “We have to stop writing these know-it-all, 140-character sermons on social media and admit that, as a class, journalists have a shamefully limited understanding of the country we cover. ” I must admit I missed this part, but then it was buried near the end. My point is even this guy has a long way to go.

  21. Well so Chris Christie is the head of Trump’s transition team…….

    Ken – I have to say it…this does not bode well.

    McConnell says there will be no vote on Senate term limits – nixing one of Trump’s primary promises. We will see how Trump handles that. I expect to see resistance from GOPe Grandees because Trump is tipping over their rice bowl. So we’ll see what Trump does when the rubber meets the road.

    1. Mark Levin reports that he has received information from a solid and highly placed source saying that Christie is stuffing the staff with Romney and Bush re-treads.

      I don’t know how solid that information is – no matter what Levin says. But if it’s true, this could very well push the administration more towards……

      Compassionate Conservatism.

      1. Trump is a moderate who doesn’t have a problem with government programs. We knew going in that he isn’t an ideological standard bearer for conservatives. The Tea Party types will have to work hard to find some influence.

          1. Ken knows it too but hopes Trump will exceed expectations.

            The choice we had was Trump and Hillary. The time to pick a conservative standard bearer was in the primary and Cruz got attacked by the establishment because they feared him more than Trump.

            Conservatives best chance at having any influence was/is with Trump. Things would be even worse for them if Hillary was elected.

            We will have to wait and see.

            Someone in a different thread said that Trump would protect his brand. I think this is true and he will either select some people now to help do that or later if his brand is damaged. He wasn’t afraid to chew through campaign staff until he found the right people.

            I hope he does this with generals too.

          2. Any other standard bearer would have lost.

            It has only now become clear to me how brilliant was Trump’s strategy. Without the working class voters of the Rust Belt, he would not be President. Neither would any other Republican have been. They would have focused on the Romney strategy, trying to hold the states he got, and vainly trying to pick off a member of the Blue Wall, but ending up with the same result as Romney.

            Instead, Trump recognized that a large trove of votes were up for grabs, and targeted those voters, promising he would fight for them. And, they responded. And, the rest is history.

          3. Any other standard bearer would have lost.

            I disagree. I think almost anyone could have beaten her, and by a wider margin. Both parties put up the worst possible nominee this year. Fortunately, the Democrats’ was slightly worse.

          4. Ken knows it too

            Thank you Wodun, you read me correctly. I agree with your other point as well. The conservatives would have had the final nail in their coffin were it not for Trump. Now they have better than a fighting chance if they don’t blow this unique opportunity (which they did 88 years ago.)

            The first fight will be not a conservative argument, but an anti-PC argument. Illegals are not citizens by virtue of living here and have no right to vote or even be here.

            The left will use the breaking up families argument that Huckabee bought into. The counter to that is children ALWAYS pay for the sins of their parents and we need to fix the anchor baby issue. That law should have expired after its purpose which was to make slaves into citizens. Do other countries have anchor babies?

    2. Trump values loyalty and Christie was loyal, but I agree Christie is not a good choice. I can’t really think of anyone that is. Expect Trump to reshuffle staff until he gets people that fully support his agenda.

      Still, I think we have to suspend judgement until Trump is officially installed. Hillary will not let the electoral college alone (like for Cruz, Rand can now remind us that dems da rules.)

      Trump won because the invisibles voted. It’s pure delusion thinking Cruz or anyone else would have motivated them. As a matter of fact, we can safely assume Hillary’s plan was to hold back reporting in her strong districts (which actually did happen in all the final states starting with FL) but the invisibles prevented that by being over the margin of fraud for those districts.

      1. Cruz (and even more Rubio) wouldn’t have had to motivate them. Against Clinton, they would have gotten a lot more of the traditional Republican vote. And had a more conservative, not mindless populist, mandate.

        1. The never Trumps were not that large a block, especially relative the invisibles. Also, those that switched from Hillary to Trump have to be counted as 2 votes. None of the others would have got those.

          1. The key point here is Electoral votes. Yes, Trump got fewer votes overall than Romney, and from one perspective, what put him over the top is that Hillary got even fewer than Obama. One could argue then that Romney could have beaten Hillary.

            Except that the winner isn’t decided by the popular vote, but by state by state numbers. Could Romney have breached the Blue Wall against Clinton? Could he have won Ohio, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania?

            We may never know for sure. But, I do think that passion is usually the deciding factor, and I doubt that another plain vanilla, boring Republican candidate could have pulled it off. That argues against Rubio or Jeb. And, Cruz gave off too creepy a vibe to too many people.

            Well, such ruminations are moot. We are where we are, and the nation dodged another bullet. A majority liberal Supreme Court, if we ever get one, will fundamentally rewrite the Constitution, and end the great American experiment, so we have a new lease on life for now, and that is the most important thing.

  22. So what’s the over/under on how soon Cindy Sheehan re-appears and starts holding candle-light vigil protests at the White House..castigating Trump for all the deaths occurring in the ME?

    1. They will have to find someone new. The scales are off her eyes. Cindy really got worked over by the Democrat establishment. But I guess she is still protesting so who knows.

  23. 1) Do you think the pros and cons of the way people in a state elect their governors is relevant to the way Americans elect their president, and if so,

    1) In my uneducated opinion: I don’t think individual states put in the effort that the founders did or had the same concerns about abuse of government power or disenfranchising various segments of the population.

    State populations were smaller and cities were smaller. There wasn’t as big a difference between city and rural populations as there is today.

    So I don’t think there really is any relevance except that we can see how a popular vote at the national level would cause enormous civil strife. I think it would be a guaranteed civil war because Democrats are jackwagons and like to bully people. That wouldn’t be good for the country but it would be horrific for big cities and the Democrat party.

    2) Does anyone here think the system of electing governors (in their state, or in some other state) should be changed by that state’s voters to an indirect electoral college system to better reflect geographical differences within a state rather than reflecting the choice of the state’s population as a whole?

    2) I wouldn’t mind an EC type of system for electing a governor. Another option could be selection by state legislature. You could do a rotating system where counties take turns electing a local resident to be governor. Feats of strength?

    The problem is that the existing power structure would never give up power. Just look at redistricting.

    1. Hmm, what if a governor couldn’t be elected without winning x% of the vote in each county? They could do that instant runoff method Jon Goff was talking about a few months ago too.

      I don’t think WA’s governor ever gets over to the east side of the state even during an election year.

    2. I think too that if the rulings were changed, nothing would happen because the cities like things the way they are.

      The Constitution of States could review these decisions. Would they have the power to nullify previous SC decisions?

      The western states that are least populated have leverage in the senate, but not in the house. The counties used to have this leverage in the state legislatures.

  24. Everyone has their pet project they would liek to see Trump do first. And there are a lot of things to do.

    But given what today is, this is what I think Trump’s FIRST priority should e:

    Fix the VA health care system.

    I think this requires short term stopgap solutions as well as a longer term plan.

    The fact that Obama let this languish for 8 years makes him criminally negligent, morally bankrupt, and further adds to his being simply a horrible person.

  25. “Veteran Democratic strategist Mark Mellman, who served as the pollster for John F. Kerry’s unsuccessful presidential campaign in 2004, said the party needed as well to find a way to talk with white voters.

    “We have some people upset with the cultural direction of the country,” Mellman said, “and to win, Democrats have to find a way to advance principles and causes that we believe in, while not angering those people in quite the same way.” ”

    HAHA what does he want to do…anger them in some other way?

    One of the aforementioned ways this election was unprecedented was that Trump won blue collars in heretofore solid democrat regions …and of all races.

  26. Trump needs to put defunding sanctuary cities at the top of his list. This where the most money is being funneled to the dems and he has the mandate during the honeymoon period that he will not have later.

  27. Also note I’ve already heard the left arguing that executive orders are unconstitional even for the removal of previous exec orders!

    1. Good thing too. Christie was packing the team with ex-Romney, Bush and McCain people.

      Precisely the people we don’t want.

  29. There are reports that Chelsea has been groomed to run for a possibly-soon-to-open congressional seat.

    If she wins it, the corrupt Racket that is the Clinton Foundation thrives:

    All it needs to thrive is a Clinton in a position of power. Then they will actually have influence to market.

  30. I notice that the MSM is totally ignoring the history-making event of a female running a successful Presidential campaign (Conway).

    Doesn’t fit the narrative I guess.

    Hypocrites.

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