Another rant from a liberal, plus some words of hope

The New Neo Posted on by

Get ready for an awful lot of the f-word in the following video, which is by a guy who detests Trump and would have preferred Sanders. But this rant is actually very good. I think he may just be learning what most of the left—of which he is a part—is all about. I’ve been seeing a fair amount of this sort of thing from unexpected sources ever since Tuesday, as the Trump win (and the larger GOP win to go with it) sinks in:

I’ve noticed a strange phenomenon among some of my liberal friends, as well. Although some are still reeling and understandably frightened of the loose cannon Trump and some of his more extreme campaign promises/threats, others have made a quick adjustment. Surprisingly quick.

I’ve already related the conversation I had with a Hillary-supporting Democratic friend of mine on Election Day evening, before any but the very first dribble of returns had come in, the conversation in which she had added—as an aside to her fervent wish that Trump would not become president—a simultaneous and contradictory feeling: “But I’m almost hoping he does win, because I’m very curious what it would be like. It would be exciting.”

That surprised me at the time, and I took it to be a unique and idiosyncratic reaction of this particular friend. But subsequent conversations since the election with a few of my other liberal friends—the ones who’ve made a rather quick adjustment—have convinced me that this sentiment of hers was more widespread than I’d supposed. Now that the election is over and we have President-elect Trump, these people have voiced discontent with Hillary and with Washington. They’re all been somewhat encouraged by what’s gone on since Tuesday. And one even said to me that maybe this would be a wake-up call to both parties to not continue to ignore a bunch of people who’ve been ignored and hurting for years.

I know that this is the traditional honeymoon period for a president-elect. But whatever honeymoon aspects this has—and it most definitely has some—are further enhanced by the fact that this was a honeymoon that was unexpected and unplanned by most people. It’s as though we expected to spend some time in the hospital having a colonoscopy, and after doing all the nasty prep and getting to the point of lying in the hospital room with the IV about to be inserted, instead a brass band came into the room and the drum majorette announces that we need to get up, because instead we’ve won a free trip to a luxury resort in Hawaii.

Now, that resort might be a bit tawdry. It may not be the exactly perfect hotel we would have chosen it we’d had our druthers. But hey, it’s a whole lot better than that colonoscopy.

It may be a silly dream, and it may soon be time to wake up. But the relief and tentatively burgeoning hope so many people are willing and eager to experience underscores what stress both sides have been under, perhaps without fully realizing it, not just for the Obama years but for the Bush years as well. Maybe, just maybe, this improbable, unusual, weirdly-coiffed and spray-tanned reality show president is here to tell us to lay down that weary load, if only for a moment, and enjoy a feeling of national wonderment that we’ve arrived at such an odd place, and to hope that America’s good luck might just be holding out after all when most of us least expected it.

[NOTE: I don’t know exactly where the following item goes, so I may as well put it here. I was watching Fox News last night, and I saw a clip of a recent interview with Trump (I think it came from a forthcoming “60 Minutes,” but I’m not sure). Trump was being asked about the phone call he got from Hillary when she conceded, and he said something that seemed astute, telling, respectful, and even perhaps (dare I say it?) empathetic. He said the call was very hard for Hillary to make—“harder for her than it would have been for me, and it would have been very hard for me,” and then went on to say a few nice things about her.

The guy can turn on a dime, from Hillary-love to Hillary-hate to Hillary-understanding. But of course, we already knew that. But right now I’ll take it, because showing a little graciousness to the other side now that he’s finally won can only help us all in the end.]

Election 2016: fear itself [Part I]

The New Neo Posted on by

There’s a lot of post-election fear out there on the part of many liberals who voted for Hillary Clinton.

Not all of them by any means, as I think I’ve made clear in other posts. But along with some my liberal friends who are quickly adjusting and even already welcoming some of the possibilities they’re now sensing in Trump’s impending presidency, I have a lot of other friends who are in various states of alarm and grief.

I’m not talking about celebrities like Streisand. I’m not talking about people making a spectacle of themselves, or destroying property in their anger. I’m talking about ordinary folks who are liberals, some politically active and some much less so, who were genuinely frightened by Trump’s demonstrations of impulsiveness, cruelty, and some of his stated policy intentions during the campaign. And they have every right to be frightened; he gave them an awful lot of fuel for their fearful fire.

I see quite a bit of mockery of these people all around the right side of the blogosphere, from those who are understandably high on the amazing victory that Trump and the GOP have just experienced. Schadenfreude is a popular emotion because it feels so good, and I’m not meaning to rain on anyone’s celebratory parade or to reiterate Trump’s flaws for no reason—I feel hopeful and optimistic right now myself. But I’m very aware of the very real fears of many liberals, fears that I could come to share if Trump’s worst side comes back into the ascendance and stays there, and if some of his worst suggestions (ones he has mostly walked back, thankfully) come to pass.

These are real people to whom I’m very close, several of whom I love very very dearly. After the 2012 election, when they knew how bad I was feeling and how hard I’d worked against the result of that election, some of them were very kind and comforting to me, and none of them rubbed anything in.

So I ask you not to totally forget that there were things that Trump said and did that stoked fears, fears that were even aired at times by a lot of conservatives on this blog (and even many Trump supporters) prior to the election. Remember also that, because most of us here agree with many (not all, but many) of Trump’s stated political aims, we have the luxury of being happy about the GOP Congress along with this presidency. It’s much easier for us to hope for the best and jettison the worst.

Liberals are in a very different position.

A commenter here wrote:

Is professing to be afraid [of Trump’s victory] virtue-signaling? Or do they believe their own propaganda?

For a small minority I suppose it’s virtue-signaling (they’re probably some of the ones posting sobbing videos in order to publicly demonstrate their fears). But not for the people I know, and I know a lot of them. For them it’s very real and very sincere, and it should be very understandable even to Trump supporters.

And for the most part it’s not the result of propaganda, either. There was real evidence—from Trump’s own words—of things which people are genuinely fearful about: his apparent mocking the disabled, his original vow to deport all illegal immigrants (which would necessarily include children), his seeming acquiescence to setting up a registry of Muslims (he walked that one back almost immediately, but many people don’t know that and still remember it with fear), his proposal to stop all Muslim immigration and even (initially) to not allow Muslim citizens or legal non-citizen residents to return to this country if those people leave were to leave. There’s also reason for some people to be afraid of the end of Obamacare, which can be a terrifying thought if its subsidies are the only way a person believes he or she can afford insurance and/or has a pre-existing condition, and doesn’t trust the Republicans to keep those features. For some, ending gay marriage (through SCOTUS appointments), ending abortion (same mechanism), and the whole drift towards conservatism is frightening and disheartening in a very personal way.

These things may not frighten you. In fact, you may highly approve of many of them. But it’s not “virtue-signaling” for a liberal—or anyone affected, for that matter—to be frightened about them. I think that, as time goes on and as Trump’s actual policies and plans emerge, the vast majority of these fears will be allayed. But we don’t know that for certain—and most definitely, they don’t know that at all.

There’s also the alt-right, in particular the bigoted and hateful wing of the alt-right. Whether or not you believe that Trump is in agreement with them (I certainly don’t), he gave them subtle encouragement and they certainly think they’re on the rise. Even without any official Trump stamp of approval or encouragement, they could become very cocky and cause trouble, in the streets or elsewhere. This is another very real fear that I don’t think deserves any kind of mockery.

And then of course there’s Trump’s impulsive nature and some of his impulsive and/or ignorant words about nuclear weapons and the nuclear triangle. Again, you may not agree that he’s that unstable—especially at the moment, when he’s been acting calm and presidential—but there has been plenty of reason that someone could be genuinely afraid of those things. Trump’s own words and character during this campaign season have engendered the fear, and it will naturally take time for trust to build, particularly in those who were on the other side.

As for me, I feel very hopeful at the opportunities this election has opened up, although I don’t know that Trump and the GOP Congress will be able to pull any of it off. But with change of this magnitude—and a president completely untested in political office—a certain amount of anxiety is in order, even if you’re on the right.

Maybe because I was once on the other side, I have no trouble whatsoever imagining how it would feel to be a liberal Democrat and to have watched those election returns on Tuesday night. So I’m asking for some compassion for frightened liberals, and I hope more people extend it, if they really want to Make America Great Again.

[Part II, an examination of the response of Schadenfreude, will be coming soon.]

[NOTE: By the way, some of the fearful are even children, who have picked up on the swirling fear around them, not always from family but some of it in school and social media. I think that’s especially sad and especially worthy of compassion.]

Veterans Day, Armistice Day

The New Neo Posted on by

[NOTE: This is a repeat of a previous post.]

Yes, indeed, I am that old—old enough to just barely remember when Veterans Day was called Armistice Day. The change in names occurred in 1954, when I was very small, in order to accommodate World War II and its veterans.

Since then, the original name has largely fallen out of use—although it remains, like a vestigial organ, in the timing of the holiday, November 11th, which commemorates the day the WWI armistice was signed (eleventh hour, eleventh day, eleventh month).

I’m also old enough–and had a teacher ancient enough—to have been forced to memorize that old chestnut “In Flanders Fields” in fifth grade—although without being given any historical context for it, I think at the time I assumed it was about World War II, since as far as I knew that was the only real war.

You can find the story of the poem here . It was written by a Canadian doctor who served in the European theater (there is no separate URL for the discussion of the poem, but you should click on the “John McCrae´s Poppies in Flander’s Fields” link on the left sidebar). It’s not great poetry by any means, but it was great propaganda to encourage America’s entry into what was known at the time as the Great War.

The poem’s first line “In Flanders fields the poppies blow” introduces that famous flower that later became the symbol of Armistice—and later, Veterans—Day. Why the poppy?

Wild poppies flower when other plants in their direct neighbourhood are dead. Their seeds can lie on the ground for years and years, but only when there are no more competing flowers or shrubs in the vicinity (for instance when someone firmly roots up the ground), these seeds will sprout.

There was enough rooted up soil on the battlefield of the Western Front; in fact the whole front consisted of churned up soil. So in May 1915, when McCrae wrote his poem, around him bloodred poppies blossomed like no one had ever seen before.

But in this poem the poppy plays one more role. The poppy is known as a symbol of sleep. The last line We shall not sleep, though poppies grow / In Flanders fields might point to this fact. Some kinds of poppies are used to derive opium from, from which morphine is made. Morphine is one of the strongest painkillers and was often used to put a wounded soldier to sleep. Sometimes medical doctors used it in a higher dose to put the incurable wounded out of their misery.

Now a day to honor those who have served in our wars, Veterans Day has an interesting history in its original Armistice Day incarnation. It was actually established as a day dedicated to world peace, back in the early post-WWI year of 1926, when it was still possible to believe that WWI had been the war fought to end all wars.

The original proclamation establishing Armistice Day as a holiday read as follows:

Whereas the 11th of November 1918, marked the cessation of the most destructive, sanguinary, and far reaching war in human annals and the resumption by the people of the United States of peaceful relations with other nations, which we hope may never again be severed, and

Whereas it is fitting that the recurring anniversary of this date should be commemorated with thanksgiving and prayer and exercises designed to perpetuate peace through good will and mutual understanding between nations; and

Whereas the legislatures of twenty-seven of our States have already declared November 11 to be a legal holiday: Therefore be it Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring), that the President of the United States is requested to issue a proclamation calling upon the officials to display the flag of the United States on all Government buildings on November 11 and inviting the people of the United States to observe the day in schools and churches, or other suitable places, with appropriate ceremonies of friendly relations with all other peoples.

After the carnage of World War II, of course, the earlier hope that peaceful relations among nations would not be severed had long been extinguished. By the time I was a young child, a weary nation sought to honor those who had fought in all of its wars in order to secure the peace that followed—even if each peace was only a temporary one.

And isn’t an armistice a strange (although understandable) sort of hybrid, after all; a decision to lay down arms without anything really having been resolved? Think about the recent wars that have ended through armistice: WWI, which segued almost inexorably into WWII; the 1948 war following the partition of Palestine; the Korean War; and the Gulf War. All of these conflicts exploded again into violence—or have continually threatened to—ever since.

So this Veterans/Armistice Day, let’s join in saluting and honoring those who have fought for our country. The hope that some day war will not be necessary is a laudable one—and those who fight wars hold it, too. But that day has clearly not yet arrived—and, realistically but sadly, most likely it never will.

Settling down

The New Neo Posted on by

There may be riots in the streets, but some of the people I know are settling down at least a little, post-election. One of the big reasons, in my opinion, is demeanor.

I’m not just talking about Donald Trump’s demeanor. I mean the demeanor of most of the people involved. It began with Trump’s victory speech, which had a calm and unifying tone. Whatever happens in the next few months and years—and I don’t fool myself that it’s not likely to be loaded with conflict—Donald Trump had a choice as to how he would behave in victory. He made the right choice. The guy who showed up in the wee hours of Wednesday morning had a more soothing presence that most people had ever expected.

One of the advantages of the type of juvenile, insulting, provocative behavior Trump often exhibited during the campaign was that he had almost nowhere to go but up. And go up he did. President Obama and Hillary Clinton went up, too, which was also very reassuring. I commend them all for it—and the stock market commends them, as well.

A year and a half ago, when the campaign season began, I had hopes and dreams of a Republican president and Congress. Somewhere along the line quite early on I pretty much gave up on that hope. It seemed that Trump would be nominated and that he was likely to lose, although not certain to lose. And it even seemed as though the Senate would change hands.

So it took a while for it to really settle in early Wednesday morning that no, that’s not what had happened at all. Forget Donald Trump for a moment, and my reservations about him. The unlikely thing had actually occurred, and the hope I had way back in the spring of 2016 had come true—GOP sweep—albeit with a slightly (!) different cast of characters.

So now I get to muse on one of the things I hadn’t let myself indulge in much before: who might be in the new Cabinet. Which things from the Obama years might be undone and which things that have been proposed for the next years done.

Yes, a lot of things could go wrong—a lot. But the longer Donald Trump manages to go without acting like a child, or a loose cannon, or a vindictive narcissist, the better it gets for everyone and for the country as a whole. Hey, the better it gets for the world.

I always said that’s what I would be hoping for if Trump is elected. We’ve had two and a half days of it. Time to celebrate. But now the shoe is on the other foot, the ball is in the GOP’s park, it’s put up or shut up time, and all those other cliches. The GOP must prove to the American people that it can do a better job than the Democrats did. As I noted yesterday, if you pass legislation that doesn’t work out in reality rather than rhetoric, the people will ultimately know, and they won’t thank you for it. The Republicans are running the show right now, and they’ll have to deliver a quality product.

If they manage to do that, though, it could have its own transformative effect on at least some of the people on the other side, who can’t help but notice that Republicans aren’t the demons they’ve been led to fear. And if the GOP doesn’t manage to deliver, the people are likely to reject them next time they get the chance.

[NOTE: Tomorrow I plan to write the post I promised on the fear and angst many liberals are experiencing at the moment, and the reaction of many people on the right to that fear.]

Here’s a brave man

The New Neo Posted on by

Here’s an epic anti-MSM rant by Will Rahn, a political correspondent and managing director for CBS News Digital.

Why brave? He’s at CBS, and his essay doesn’t pull any punches about the press. And I don’t think a lot of people on either side are going to give him many kudos. The left will hate him, and much of the right (at least in the comments to the article that I saw) seems to be hating on him, too.

Election 2016: not so deep as a well; but ’tis enough, ’twill serve

The New Neo Posted on by

This Republican victory was a very republican victory.

Not the small “r” in that last “republican.” On election night I noticed, long before Trump had been declared the victor, that although a lot of states were still undeclared, there was a pattern and the pattern was that Trump was ahead in nearly all of them. The pattern held, and that pattern (and the Electoral College itself) reflected the fact that Founders set up this country as a republic, in which states retained their identities as separate entities of some importance.

But not overwhelming importance. That’s why the House was set up. That’s why there is a popular vote, and it matters. But it doesn’t matter anywhere near as much as the electoral vote, which is done through the states, mostly winner-take-all. Among other things, the Founders didn’t want huge population centers to dominate, and they wanted smaller states to have their say.

The names of the parties aren’t an accident, either. Republicans are called that because in general they believe in republican principles, and many Democrats would actually like this country to lean more towards democracy and the popular vote, and abolish what they consider an archaic and unfair Electoral College. I’m not going to get into that battle today, except to note it and to say I’m on the republican side of it.

If you look at the results of Tuesday’s election state by state, you’ll note that Trump’s victory was wide, and in some places it was deep but in quite a few states it was shallow. That is, almost all of those states that were projected to be neck-and-neck broke for Trump. It was as though a very shallow wave came ashore in those states, just enough to wet the sand. But it was enough to wet a lot of sand. In particular, in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Florida (in Florida the victory margin was somewhat larger)—as well as Michigan, which is still undecided but where Trump is ahead—the margins were all very close. Those states are large and influential, and had they gone the other way, Clinton would be president. But they did not, and that turned out to be very very significant, because whatever forces led to the Trump win were acting over a wide variety of close states.

It looks like Clinton has won the popular vote, however, even though the absolutely final count isn’t in yet. What does that mean, in an Electoral College system? Not much, actually, except to provide fodder for those who won’t concede that Trump actually won and who don’t like the system anyway. But if you look at Clinton’s loss you’ll see that it included enormous and very deep support in many of our largest states, in particular California, New York, New Jersey, and Illinois, and this is mainly where her popular vote total came from.

That’s not to say that Trump didn’t win large states, too; he did. Texas, Ohio, Wisconsin, Florida, Pennsylvania, (and Michigan, if he ends up winning it) are large, too. Trump won Texas and Ohio handily. But the others ranged from close (Florida) to extremely close. That’s where the shallow wave effect came in.

The title of this post quotes from Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet.” Now I’ll quote from John Donne, who wrote “no man is an island, entire of itself.” Well, except for tiny Rhode Island, no state is an island; each is “a piece of the continent, a part of the main.” Some of the Clinton states may want to become islands, and may feel that they are already islands (islands of sanity, to their way of thinking). But they are not, and this election has reminded them of that.

Short takes on a busy day

The New Neo Posted on by

One of the aftermaths of this election is that there’s so much to absorb, and so much to think about, that I could read and write 24 hours a day and only cover a small fraction of it.

Today I have a particularly busy day, and so the 100+ posts I would otherwise write will have to wait for another time. Today I’ve already published one longer post, but for this present post I’m just going to do a series of quick takes on topics I’ve been thinking about and might cover more fully another time.

Consider this also an open thread for post-election chatting.

—When I flip around the cable news channels, I see that the transition is being discussed a lot. Here’s a website I haven’t hardly begun to explore, but it looks very interesting. It’s fun to speculate on who our favorite draft picks would be for the new government.

—I really wanted Hillary to lose the popular vote, too. It looks right now as though that won’t happen. I believe the Electoral College is a good system, and is congruent with our being a republic and not a pure democracy. But it’s easy for me to say that when it just so happens that the two times the loser won the popular vote in my lifetime, the Republican was the winner. I think that a disparity between the popular and electoral votes makes for a more difficult sense of division among the people, and the sense of division is already enormous enough.

—People on the right, even many of those who fully supported Trump, are still pinching themselves. Funny post here.

—The color purple.

Election 2016: it all started with Obamacare

The New Neo Posted on by

Some say that Trump won the election because Hillary was a terrible candidate. And that certainly had more than a little to do with it.

Some say it was mostly a class thing—that is, a white underclass thing, and that Trump knew how to appeal to this group that had felt abandoned. Also true. But that group was hardly the only one voting for Trump.

I say that it was Obamacare that was the turning point, although it took a while to play out. Fact is, a government (and a party, for that matter) can’t go on forever without being responsive to the will of the people. That’s what “elitism” is about, really, not about money or education or race. Unresponsiveness.

So, it began with Obamacare, which was a Democratic endeavor, and the Democrats’ failure to understand or to heed the lessons of the election of Scott Brown, a man chosen in the blue blue state of Masschusetts for the express purpose of stopping Obamacare.

When Brown was elected, you may recall that the Democrats didn’t listen. I can’t seem to find the articles right now, but I recall that they ignored the warning, saying it was an artifact of a special election in which most people didn’t vote.

After that it was full steam ahead for Obamacare through reconciliation, since now they couldn’t pass it any other way. After Obamacare was passed, Brown ultimately couldn’t sustain his own senator status, either. But in the end, the fairly moderate Republican known as Scott Brown ended up supporting Donald Trump this year.

The Democrats treated the passage of Obamacare as a huge victory for them. But they forgot that tremendously transformative legislative efforts—Medicare, Social Security—do best when the American people are behind them. And by “American people,” I don’t just mean a plurality or a bare and razor-thin majority, I mean a clear majority with support and input from both parties. That could have happened with Obamacare if the Democrats were willing to meet the Republicans in the middle and design something that had elements of what each party wanted.

Instead, it was Democrats’ choice to pass a bill that was already unpopular in its details, that would affect a vast number of Americans in a very up-close and personal way, and to do it by lying and by unusual parliamentary procedures. Then it was Democratic politicians’ choice to say—and for many of them to actually believe, I think—that an unwieldy system with a poor design was going to work well enough, or their propaganda was going to be successful enough, that people would grow to love it or at least like it.

That’s not what happened. Instead, the Tea Party movement began. But the anger wasn’t just limited to the Tea Party. It was widespread, and it was reinforced in other ways by other actions by politicians.

The election of Donald Trump was determined by many things, but I think the largest thing was that anger, an anger which had crystallized in the story of Obamacare’s passage. It is fitting that the legislation has Obama’s name on it in popular usage (although not officially), because it was with his election that the Democratic Party decided that ignoring the will of the people wouldn’t come back to haunt them.

Now it has come back to haunt them. One of the factors I don’t hear too much about in the election of Donald Trump was that not long before Election Day a lot of people read that their Obamacare premiums were about to rise an average of 22%. This was not a fact that was susceptible to being propagandized away. It was not an abstraction; it was and is a stark and very personal reality.

You might call it the revenge of Scott Brown.

So if you’re going to pass transformative legislation without the people behind you, you better make sure that reality doesn’t rear its ugly head someday.

[NOTE: This ignoring of the people was hardly limited to Obamacare, by the way. Illegal immigration was another important example. But Obamacare came earlier, and the announcement of the hike in premiums right before the election almost certainly fanned the flames at a crucial time.]

Post-election: now the work begins

The New Neo Posted on by

I mentioned earlier that Trump’s victory speech was good and hit the right tone. I have no idea whether he can sustain that tone, and what’s more whether he can follow it up with successful action. But when Trump walked onstage to give the speech, I thought I noticed a different and more somber look in his eyes. Maybe it was wishful thinking on my part, but I believe I saw it. And it makes sense that a person would feel the weight of the office descend on him or her, now that the prize is won and the competition with other contenders is over.

Before the polls closed yesterday, I was having dinner with a friend who’s a liberal Democrat. She worked for Hillary and voted for Hillary, but she wasn’t a fervent Hillary admirer. None of the returns had come in yet, but we were talking about the election and the possibility of a Trump victory. I didn’t think it likely but I was definite that it was a possibility, and not a distant one, either. She and I agreed that a Clinton presidency would probably be more predictable in terms of her behavior as president, and that a Trump presidency would be more unpredictable.

And then she surprised me by musing, “But I’m almost hoping he wins, because I’m very curious what it would be like. It would be exciting.”

And I agree. Of course, “exciting” is a double-edged sword. And I don’t think most Hillary supporters would agree with her sense of adventure.

One prediction I make is that Obamacare will really be thrown out. The GOP needs to come up with a very detailed plan for replacement, because now they have the power to do it. There will also be a fairly quick reversal of some of Obama’s executive orders on illegal immigration. As for the rest, I do not think there will be mass deportations, nor will there be banning or deportation of Muslim immigrants. There is much fear about this among those populations, though, and that fear is very understandable. I think, however, that Trump and the Republican Congress will not be fulfilling the most extreme version of his campaign rhetoric.

That’s my belief, and that’s my hope. Whether it is reality remains to be seen.

This reversal in the GOP’s fortunes gives them an amazing opportunity, one that has occurred seldom for them since the days of Calvin Coolidge. It’s an awesome opportunity and an awesome (in the deeper sense of the word: “inspiring great admiration, apprehension, or fear”) responsibility. I hope they’re up to it. If they are, they could change a lot of minds about what Republicans stand for.

Right after an election it’s possible to imagine that things will be okay, and that all those pleasant words about the future will come true. Trump is no exception. I’ve always said that if he wins, I’ll hope that he’ll show his better side, and be a better president than I expected, based on his campaign. So, I’m prepared to do just that.

I did it with Obama, and it only took a couple of months for him to disabuse me of the idea that it was going to be okay. It would be wonderful if this time it works out a great deal better.

And then there’s the stock market

The New Neo Posted on by

Financial markets were shaky last night with the news of the Trump victory, but guess what? At least for today, all is well and the Dow is up 200 as I write this.

This is just the beginning for Trump, of course. Everyone has known that one of the Trump drawbacks and pluses is his unpredictability as chief executive in the most powerful office in the world. Unpredictability can be frightening, particularly to financial markets, but it also represents opportunity. The world awaited with bated breath Trump’s first speech after his win. He scored high with me on that, and apparently with the people who put their money where his mouth was. The speech hit exactly the right tone.

A speech, however, is just a speech, and a first one at that. The next six months or so will tell a very important tale (as they did with Obama). Who Trump will choose as advisors will be the first indication—that and his demeanor in public statements such as his speech last night (actually, this morning, but who’s counting).

With most winners of a presidential election, a sober and presidential demeanor is a given. With Trump it’s not, and therefore his demeanor takes on a heightened importance, because it can either reassure people or further alarm them about what’s in store.

Miscellaneous musings, post-election

The New Neo Posted on by

My first thought: wow, what a ride.

My second: boy, am I tired. I was up till 7 AM although I went to bed quite a while before that. Just too much “seething cranium” to sleep. So whatever thoughts follow might be a bit more disjointed than usual, and if so, I plead exhaustion.

I am glad it’s over, as I said I would be. But I know that now begins that long hard slog through actual governing, and all the events that can throw even the most well-intentioned administration a curve. The GOP is firmly in control of the presidency and both houses; now they have a chance to show what they are made of and what they can accomplish. I hope (as I said I would hope, if Trump wins) that Trump’s better nature (and the GOP’s for that matter) is firmly in the ascendance, and that the gravity and responsibility of the office helps him always function from that better and wiser nature.

We (and he, and they) will need all the help we can get, from fate and luck and the deity, to get through and try to heal the awful divisiveness of this nation, and the conflict in the world.

On a much lighter note, Melania Trump will be the first foreign-born First Lady since Louisa Adams. I predict some rather nifty fashion from Melania, and the ability to wear it with the grace of the model she once was.

Hillary Clinton’s political career is probably over. That’s just fine with me, and most of America. The Democrats need some new blood.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s retirement plans are probably on hold for the next four years.

Trump won most of the swing states but usually by just a little bit, so his victory was broad but not deep. That indicates that whatever was happening was happening across many areas of the country, although the west coast and New England were markedly immune. It also indicates that the remarkable divide, nearly 50/50, within the American electorate continues. The popular vote margin is razor-thin (Trump is ahead as I write this but just barely, and it’s been changing hands throughout the early morning), as it was in 2000 and 2004. But I take nothing away from Trump: he worked hard, and he won.

I think that Trump’s victory as well as that of the Republican Congress tells the tale of what can happen when a party in power (the Democrats) muscles through policies and legislation that the majority of the American people don’t support. It can be done, but the people do not appreciate it. Not at all.

Trump has an unusual opportunity: a fully Republican Congress to go with his victory. George Bush had much the same thing between 2003 and 2006, and one of the things that angered a lot of people on the right was that he and they didn’t use it to further many conservative causes. My prediction is that this time it will be different, and in particular that the nuclear option will be used to facilitate Trump’s judicial appointments, much as the Democrats did with Obama’s when they controlled the Senate in 2013-2015. The Democrats don’t have a leg to stand on if they try to object when the Republicans do it now, but just watch the Democrats attempt it.

A lot of people are saying the polls were wrong. Well, they were wrong in that they were not exactly right, but they weren’t really far off in terms of the built-in margin of error. People often ignore the margin of error when they look at polls, but after the tightening of polls that occurred after the Comey letter, there were many close states that entered margin-of-error tossup territory. The average and the average over time, however, did point to a Clinton victory, and that turned out to be wrong.

White evangelicals went for Trump about 82% (I heard that on the news in the wee hours of the morning); I would imagine it had to do with abortion. Trump got 46% of the late-deciders to Clinton’s 44%, and that may have given him a slight edge over poll predictions.

If Trump can sustain the tone of his victory speech, and follow it up with the actions that he promises (or even half of them), protect liberty, and help keep this country safe, I will be more than pleased to praise him.