The New York Times has always fancied itself as “the paper of record.” It wants to be seen as having been correct not only on the day after an event, but 50 years down the road. Well, I know that we’re a couple of weeks on and much of the dust (more like Strontium-laced fallout) has settled, but I have a few things to say. Three centuries from now, when nerds at the Star Fleet Academy are studying the election of 2016, I want them to know that Tom from Tucson had it right.
A few points:
• Donald Trump may not be a bigot, but he damn sure plays one on TV.
• I will admit that the first thought that popped in my head when I realized that Donald Trump was going to be President of the United States was, “Well, I guess America is even more racist and sexist than I thought.”
That was a knee-jerk reaction and a rather silly one. The fact is that America is EXACTLY as racist and sexist as I thought. The problem was that most of them came out to vote.
• I agree wholeheartedly with Charlie Murphy, who said, “Not all Trump supporters are racist, but all racists are Trump supporters.”
I really have no idea how many people voted for Trump out of bigotry. But, in an election in which Trump won Florida by one percent, where he is (at press time) ahead in Wisconsin by three-tenths of one percent, and so on, it simply cannot be dismissed as being one of several factors that led to the outcome. I’ll admit that I have taken sardonic pleasure in watching some of my Republican friends twist themselves into pretzels trying to defend the ridiculous claims that bigotry had nothing to do with the election or that Donald Trump isn’t a misogynist.
Remember back in A.P. English where you had to debate? Which stance would you have preferred taking: That bigotry had absolutely nothing to do with the election or that it had something to do with it (“some” being defined as anything between none and all)? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
• For several girls on my basketball team, this is the second time in their short lives that the person who got the most votes didn’t become President. If you’re conducting an experiment and it fails 40 percent of the time, there’s something seriously wrong. (Unless you’re working on a renewable government grant, in which case, you say that the results are “promising.”)
• Several well-meaning Catholic friends and acquaintances sent me things telling me how I—as a Catholic—should vote. Yeah well, don’t ever do that again. Let me make this clear: My religion tells me how I should worship, not how I should vote. I believe it was that Jesus guy who said that people should “render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and unto God the things that are God’s.”
• For decades, the Sean Hannitys of the world have sneered at people who express their feelings. And yet the shocking Brexit vote and the even-more-shocking Trump victory can both be traced to our having plunged into a post-truth world. This year’s International Word of the Year as determined by the Oxford Dictionaries, post-truth, is defined as “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.”
Unemployment is half what it was when Barack Obama first took office. The stock market is up 150 percent. Gas is under $2 a gallon, more Mexican citizens are leaving the U.S. than are entering it illegally, the housing market is coming back, and wages are rising. And yet a whole lot of old white people think we’re heading in the wrong direction. Idiots.
• Another nice touch of irony: Trump supporters waving Confederate flags and shouting, “You lost! Get over it!”
• However, let me add that Donald Trump won, fair and square. I was an athlete for a few decades and I’ve been a coach for a few more. I have always prided myself on being a good sport, gracious in victory and not being one to look for excuses when I lose.
Like most math nerds, I do take some solace in the numbers. Hillary Clinton’s final margin in the popular vote will probably be in the neighborhood of two million. Donald Trump received nearly two million fewer votes than did George W. Bush, despite the fact that there are 11 million more eligible voters today. Heck, Trump received a half-million fewer votes than did Mitt Romney in 2012.
That just shows me how lousy a candidate we Democrats had. Lousy usually beats horrendous. This time it didn’t.
My friendly nemesis Vince has pointed out that Trump is not yet President and suggested that I wait until he has actually done something before I criticize him. That’s good advice. There’s always a chance that Trump will grow into the office. There’s also a chance that I’ll wake up tomorrow and have a full head of my curly black hair back. I’m not counting on either one happening.
But what the heck. I lived through Nixon, Carter and Reagan. I need to get myself in better shape so that someday I can say that I also lived through Trump.
This article appears in Nov 24-30, 2016.
Good luck. Many in the media will have to find an honest profession. Maybe the legal field next? LOL.
Over 4M claimed they decided not to vote for Trump as the media convinced them he could not possibly win. Rigged? You betcha. Electoral College worked perfectly as the founders did not want a few over populated states to rule the country.
Any other talk is just sour grapes. Democrats tried to exploit sexism to get Hillary elected. Obamanomics was on trial and it wasnt acceptable.
You really believe that Trump supporters are racists. ? You are a very sick man whom I honestly feel sorry for. I’m done.
You honestly believe that all Trump supporters are racists? You’re a very sick man whom I honestly feel sorry for. I hope your fan club gets in as many dislikes as possible because I’m done with dealing with a man who needs professional help. Allow me to leave you with this.
PRESIDENT DONALD J.TRUMP!!!! Deal with it.
@CW13:
Door. Ass. Kick. Don’t let.
Danehy,
1. We haven’t had this many people unemployed, in these proportions, since 1977.
2. We haven’t had this many people in part time low paying jobs.
2. Blacks have born the brunt of it. Unemployment among 15 to 24 yr old Blacks is 88%. Only 12% have jobs. Those that do, have primarily part time jobs.
3. As the probability of Obama becoming president rose to 100%, the stock market collapsed by 5 trillion.
4. As the probability of Trump becoming president rose to 100%, the stock market went up by 5 trillion.
5. The billionaire friends of Obam: Bezos, Zuckerberg and Buffett the ones who create jobs for rich people, don’t pay taxes, not a penny on the billions they’ve made.
6. The people who create jobs for poor people, Republican small businesses, pay taxes at 63%.
7. From 2011 to 2015, test scores in 8th grade math went down for the first time ever. Reading scores did not improve.
We can do better, much better for the poor and minorities of this country.
If you want to look at a bigot and a racist, go look in a mirror.
You really didn’t think you’d be rid of me that easy did you?
Bye-bye, It’s don’t let the door HIT you in the ass, not kick.
Typical ignorant liberal.
1.5 million new immigrants every year versus a historic average of 250,000. That means we’re importing 5 times as many people per year as historic averages and have been for 30 or 40 years.
Wages for working class people haven’t increased at all since 1970.
Republicans, Democrats, learned Economists, and Journalists have been telling America’s working class that nothing can be done.
Some people connected the dots and decided maybe something could be done. That’s why Trump was elected. Plain and simple.
Tom from Tucson, you’ve known me and others who voted for Trump for decades. Your reflexive racial slurs against me annoy more than hurt because they come from a rote-mind incapable of filtering due to life-long prejudice (probably taught in school). Look in the mirror at a closed-mind and examine your conscience. First, you have no evidence from the past 20 years that I am either racist or stupid. Second, your so-called facts ignore reality when you tout current unemployment: the Obama Administration cites an “unemployment rate” that fails to mention more than 95 million American workers (almost 1/3 of the total) who no longer seek employment. They are ignored in Obama’s stats. This alone should awaken you to Government lies and manipulation. You are blind to reality because of Obama’s race. You are also blind to reality because of my race. Wake up. Bill from Tucson.
For all of you who DON’T believe racists turned out to vote for drumpf? Just wait until news coverage airs of the march planned KKK in honor of the donald inauguration. I wouldn’t bet on my predictions, but will make one anyway. All the haters are going to be partying in the streets on January 20.
Sorry, Tom, but Chump did NOT “win fair and square”. In addition to the weakness and incompetence of the Clintonistas, here are two of the key reasons why he “won”: 1) an antiquated electoral college system that was established long ago precisely for the purpose of protecting the power and privilege of wealthy white males; and 2) voter suppression that the Republinazis very effectively implemented over the last decade, which was particularly aggressive in key states such as Wisconsin.
You gotta hand it to ’em. The Rs saw the demographic writing on the wall when Obama swept to victory eight years ago (and some saw it even sooner than that). They understand full well that their agenda of economic inequality and racial and gender discrimination will make it nearly impossible for them to win national elections going forward, so they came up with a strategy to address that: aggressively suppressing the votes of young people and people of color who vote overwhelmingly for Democrats. It’s a brilliant stratagem, however immoral and profoundly anti-democratic it may be.
So, I’ll say the same thing I said when Dubya “won” 16 years ago: the Republinazis STOLE this election fair and square. The Dumbocrats better get real, or it’s going to keep happening, again and again.
Jeez Guys, can y’all read or what? The phrase, “Not all Trump supporters are racists…” means that a certain percentage (anywhere from some to most) of the people who voted for Donald Trump were NOT motivated by racism. (That’s pretty much why the word “Not” is the first word in the sentence.) By falsely whining that I suggested that everyone who voted for Trump is a racist is a lame attempt at diverting attention away from the fact that, whatever excuse you might have had for voting for the person who ran the most racist Presidential campaign since George Wallace is fine, but it puts you in the same club with THEM. And it puts you in the indefensible position of having to claim that racism had nothing to do either Trump campaign or the outcome of the election. Why is it so hard to say “I voted for the same guy that a bunch of racists did, but I did so for different reasons?” I would never in a million years think that Bill Heuisler voted for Trump out of racism, but he has to acknowledge that he and the white supremacists who are spouting “Heil Trump!” on TV both voted for the same guy.
Tom the real questions you must ask yourself are these. Did I acuse blacks of voting for Obama in 2008 because of skin color? Did I call them racist for doing it?
Defense of Trump the Candidate can only go so far when TV cameras caught many, (not all) Trump supporters engaging in some really rabid racist, sexist behavior. Once you see a guy (from another state) wearing a T-shirt that says in big letters “She’s a C-word (spelled out) Vote Trump,” it is unforgettable. The first Tea Party people learned that they had to tone down on-camera loons. Now, the “winners” behind this election have some catching up to do. Trump the President has to lead now.
The suggestion that we are better off now than before Obama took office is laughable, you did not mention the record deficit he ran up, how the unemployment figures are skewed because of the millions who have stopped receiving unemployment because it ran out and are no longer looking for work, how employed people are working 2 or 3 jobs because they are underemployed or how race relations are the worst they have been since the 60s. Yeah, Obama has been great. LOL
There you go again Mark, annoying liberals with facts !! You realize that by attacking Obummer you now become a racist. At least in Pulitzer Tommy’s eyes. Don’t hate him, weep for him like I do. How would you like to look at life the way he does. ?
Funny how most of the comments prove Dabahey speaks the truth. And, Democratic Presidents don’t run up the deficit. Republican Congresses do.