This togetherness stuff

There are lots of pundits looking over the last couple days and pontificating at length about What It Means. Most, likely all, have no idea what they’re talking about. So I’ll add my own and be just as knowledgeable.

First some facts (through Twitter and posted in a blog, so original source is unknown):

231,556,622 eligible voters

46.9% didn't vote
25.6% voted Clinton
25.5% voted Trump

Wow.

And the voter turnout from Wisconsin:

Clinton lost because Dem voters didn’t show up. In Wisconsin that’s almost a quarter million missing Dem votes. If about 10% of the missing had voted in three states the results would have been different.

Many have noted (though not in the media) this is the first prez. election without the full protections of the Voting Rights Act. A key part of it was gutted in 2013. And Wisconsin was one of those states that instituted voter restrictions and saw a big drop in Dem turnout. New Hampshire, another close one, also had new restrictions.



Melissa McEwen of Shakesville notes how hard Hillary and her supporters worked:

Three times as many field offices. An expansive ground game. The colossal GOTV effort. The tens of thousands of words of policy. The open letters from experts in their fields. The writing, the art, the flash mobs.

As for the nasty guy:

All he had to do was repeat bullshit talking points about her and disgorge disgusting bigotry during unscripted stream of consciousness garbage monologues, and then coast to victory on a wave of hatred.

I had written a while back (the Windows search utility can’t seem to find anything written in the last two years, so no link) that if you allow a person to look down on another he’ll empty his pockets for you. Insecurity, and its desire to feel important by belittling others, is a strong human force. That appears to be a huge component to the nasty guy’s win. And his appeal to bigotry is much stronger than Hillary’s “Stronger Together.” If one is insecure and in need of building up by tearing down others this togetherness stuff just doesn’t resonate.

An example of what McEwen said: America’s white supremacy groups are delighted with the results. We’re not extreme. Millions of our fellow citizens agree with us. This wasn’t just the nasty man’s doing. It was also the result of the rest of the GOP who are in office refusing to condemn his statements.