How Clinton lost Michigan - and blew the election

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I don't dispute any of this, but Hillary Clinton would have lost even with winning Michigan.

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Michigan was similar to WI & looking at the article, it could be argued that she could have easily won WI & MI

Not sure about that. Milwaukee County is nowhere near the percent of population to Wisconsin as Wayne County is to Michigan.  Milwaukee County is also nowhere near as Democratic.

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How Clinton lost Michigan - and blew the election  

Well, at least she blew something.  I hear her old man was having to sneak around to get his jollies.

Anyway, it's not a bad analysis, but it's unnecessary.  There were far more salient reasons to explain her loss.  For one thing, The Donald tapped into the anxiety of the rust belt workers.  For another, she was a poor choice.  You in particular may have trouble believing this, but many folks don't relate well to a devious, elderly lawyer with a criminal psychology.

But, they voted for a devious, elderly businessman with a criminal psychology.

And who, unlike Hillary Clinton, has not only been criminally charged, but criminally convicted.

 Yeah, that makes sense.

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Michigan was similar to WI & looking at the article, it could be argued that she could have easily won WI & MI

Not sure about that. Milwaukee County is nowhere near the percent of population to Wisconsin as Wayne County is to Michigan.  Milwaukee County is also nowhere near as Democratic.

Perhaps Clinton should have spent more time hitting the white working class belt in medium sized towns across the trip-state rust belt, stressing bread and butter issues in some detail, and showed that she really cared about the slide in their social economic status, and disintegration of their family units, exacerbated by a mass opioid addiction. Beyond everything else, I think this cohort felt profoundly unloved by the public square - until Trump blew them wet kisses.

Just a thought.

Trump actually didn't blow them any kisses, wet or otherwise, as his cabinet selections are making thoroughly clear.  They're just genuinely stupid enough to believe that he did.

It was Hillary Clinton who had an economic plan with detail, as opposed to Trump's mindless sort of promises of high tariffs.

I dispute your last sentence as well, as you didn't actually express a valid thought.

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Trump definitely blew them kisses - whether it's real or not is irrelevant, to the fact that he actually saw them. And that's more than establishment politicians for 30 years have been doing. Even if he goes back on every promise -- and he's far from doing that -- the very fact that they got your attention ('you' being the coastal elite) and showed you the big, unmistakable finger is enough.

Well, some of them have already lost their health insurance. Is it a big enough unmistakable finger from me to say that I'm pleased this happened as they're now about to learn for themselves that actions have consequences?

Barack Obama did, in fact, try to pass a number of pieces of legislation that would have helped these people but was blocked by the Republican Congress.

It seems to me that these people are now going to see what happens when the real elite (people like Donald Trump) are in charge, and I think they deserve all the suffering their going to get.

[136or142]

Michigan was similar to WI & looking at the article, it could be argued that she could have easily won WI & MI

Not sure about that. Milwaukee County is nowhere near the percent of population to Wisconsin as Wayne County is to Michigan.  Milwaukee County is also nowhere near as Democratic.

Perhaps Clinton should have spent more time hitting the white working class belt in medium sized towns across the trip-state rust belt, stressing bread and butter issues in some detail, and showed that she really cared about the slide in their social economic status, and disintegration of their family units, exacerbated by a mass opioid addiction. Beyond everything else, I think this cohort felt profoundly unloved by the public square - until Trump blew them wet kisses.

Just a thought.

Trump actually didn't blow them any kisses, wet or otherwise, as his cabinet selections are making thoroughly clear.  They're just genuinely stupid enough to believe that he did.

It was Hillary Clinton who had an economic plan with detail, as opposed to Trump's mindless sort of promises of high tariffs.

I dispute your last sentence as well, as you didn't actually express a valid thought.

Subjective perceptions matter more than objective facts here, as Beet noted. As Bill Clinton would tell you, you need to exude the vibe that you feel their pain. In short, the fact that Trump promised them the moon, when his policies (at least some of them, until when perhaps he changes them, since Trump really does not believe in much but himself), will just make their condition worse, or bankrupt the country, sending every down into the abyss, is irrelevant - at least for now.

I already wrote that:  "They're just genuinely stupid enough to believe that he did (throw them kisses"


I don't know if you're an air-brain or not.  I know that post of yours had no valid points.

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Well, some of them have already lost their health insurance. Is it a big enough unmistakable finger from me to say that I'm pleased this happened as they're now about to learn for themselves that actions have consequences?

Markos, is that you?

Are you one of the Redneck Justice Warriors who now thinks they're in charge?

The post on DailyKos was hardly the first to state this sentiment and I completely agree with it.  When it came time to everybody else expressing their disenfranchisement, virtually the entire Republican Party, including these people, had no sympathy, but now I'm supposed to have sympathy for these people  many of whom are genuinely deplorable?  As the song goes, for them 'my give a damn is busted.'

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 Yeah, that makes sense.

hardly.  At least not to me, which is a big part of the reason I didn't vote for either of them.

Still, the three points I made are valid:  1.  She's a poor candidate  2.  Trump tapped into the electoral votes he needed in a clever way.  3.  This business about gaming the system isn't guaranteed to win with a candidate whose prime qualification is inevitability. 

Unethical and clever aren't the same thing.

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These people, like people everyone, vote in their self interest. They vote for guys who speak their language. Trump did that, Hillary didn't, as simple as that. Hillary's poll-tested politician speak mumbo jumbo was so condescending.

You know what the most pathetic thing about all this is? These working class whites in MI, and PA, and WI were the last ones who stayed loyal to you. When the working class whites in the South and the West and in Appalachia left, the ones in the Upper Midwest stayed. They were your firewall, or tried to be, in the last 4 cycles. They faithfully pulled the party lever, even when you guys were doing nothing for them, for 20 years. And now they get to be the deplorables for not being dutiful little soldiers, ha ha.

Nothing?  So, Obamacare didn't extend health insurance to millions of these people?  (Passed without the vote of a single Republican, the ones who lie that they do care about them.)

The Americans Jobs Act that was blocked by Republicans:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/09/08/fact-sheet-american-jobs-act

Whether it is decorous or not, you are increasingly demonstrating that you are an air-brain.

If they vote in their self interest, then they must regard it as being in their self interest to lose their health care.  So, I'm happy that they must be happy that they lost it.

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The election wasn't a referendum on the American Jobs Act or the Miners Protection Act. It was between Clinton and Trump. Clinton's case was that Trump shouldn't be president because he called a Hispanic lady fat. Maybe she should have campaigned more on jobs and health care for miners.

Post hoc.

Maybe that was your perception at the time, but it wasn't mine.  She campaigned on 'stronger together' which is an economic message of "America does best when everyone does well."

My perception of Trump's message was one of either "Because I'm so uniquely great I, and I alone, can fix your problems all by myself" which only a moron can believe or "You white working class people, unlike all other disaffected people, you're not to blame for your economic problems, but these scapegoats: Chinese workers, illegal aliens... are."  which only a genuinely deplorable person can support.

I get your point.  These hardworking people are suffering...   My point is you can't promise all things to all people and that those who do are lying.  And that these people, many of whom frequently said "at least Trump tells it like it is" were really saying "he tells me what I want to hear,  and even though, deep down, I know it's probably nonsense, I'm going to vote for it anyway."

And that was even quite a number of them recognized that he was completely unfit to be President and was almost certainly only running to further his own interests.

So, it was hardly a case of as bad as Trump is, I think Hillary Clinton will be even worse, it was a case of "Donald Trump is as bad as a person can be, but I'll still vote for him."

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The election wasn't a referendum on the American Jobs Act or the Miners Protection Act. It was between Clinton and Trump. Clinton's case was that Trump shouldn't be president because he called a Hispanic lady fat. Maybe she should have campaigned more on jobs and health care for miners.

You are really a trip. Clinton had a plans to create jobs all over the country and very specifically mentioned all areas, including Appalachia. That aside, Trump's behavior towards women was definitely a big issue. Why should anyone who gropes, harasses and humiliates women be President? That's a huge character issue and character counts for a lot when running for President. Newsflash, groping and harassing women is not okay. Those are not some constitutional rights that politically correct liberals have stripped men of, so let's get that straight.

You are one of those folks who think that Hillary should have run a racist campaign in order to win. Running a racist campaign would have caused her to lose by even more, because fewer minorities and women would have shown up to vote. For the record, Hillary did the right thing and it's better to lose doing the right thing that is to win doing the wrong thing.

I don't think Beet wanted Hillary Clinton to run a racist campaign, I don't see that at all.  I think he effectively wanted her to pander to these people by speaking 'in their language'  and by making a lot of dishonest promises to them.

I'd like to agree with your last point, but,  to me, in a binary race like this, part of doing the right thing includes defeating the person who is doing the wrong things.

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These people, like people everyone, vote in their self interest. They vote for guys who speak their language. Trump did that, Hillary didn't, as simple as that. Hillary's poll-tested politician speak mumbo jumbo was so condescending.

You know what the most pathetic thing about all this is? These working class whites in MI, and PA, and WI were the last ones who stayed loyal to you. When the working class whites in the South and the West and in Appalachia left, the ones in the Upper Midwest stayed. They were your firewall, or tried to be, in the last 4 cycles. They faithfully pulled the party lever, even when you guys were doing nothing for them, for 20 years. And now they get to be the deplorables for not being dutiful little soldiers, ha ha.

The idea that the Democrats haven't done anything for the white working class is preposterous. I agree that there was a massive marketing failure on the part of the Democratic party in this election (with plenty of other blame to go around, but the party and its candidates deserve a healthy share), but Democratic policies have clearly been much better for the economic well being of these voters for 80 years now as compared to Republican policies.

There is more than a marketing failure here.  While I think it's important to not stereotype all people, I sadly think there is a lot of truth to the idea that many working class whites would rather that nobody receives any assistance if it means that 'the others' also will receive assistance aside from themselves.

The theory as it was explained to me, is that many working class whites don't mind as much being poor and having no hope for improvement as long as they can take comfort knowing that there are people worse off than them.

I think that is a horrible thing to think and I think it's horrible to think that about other people, but when the debate came up, there were many articles that backed up Hillary Clinton's claim that many Trump supporters are, in fact, deplorable.

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These people, like people everyone, vote in their self interest. They vote for guys who speak their language. Trump did that, Hillary didn't, as simple as that. Hillary's poll-tested politician speak mumbo jumbo was so condescending.

You know what the most pathetic thing about all this is? These working class whites in MI, and PA, and WI were the last ones who stayed loyal to you. When the working class whites in the South and the West and in Appalachia left, the ones in the Upper Midwest stayed. They were your firewall, or tried to be, in the last 4 cycles. They faithfully pulled the party lever, even when you guys were doing nothing for them, for 20 years. And now they get to be the deplorables for not being dutiful little soldiers, ha ha.

The idea that the Democrats haven't done anything for the white working class is preposterous. I agree that there was a massive marketing failure on the part of the Democratic party in this election (with plenty of other blame to go around, but the party and its candidates deserve a healthy share), but Democratic policies have clearly been much better for the economic well being of these voters for 80 years now as compared to Republican policies.

There is more than a marketing failure here.  While I think it's important to not stereotype all people, I sadly think there is a lot of truth to the idea that many working class whites would rather that nobody receives any assistance if it means that 'the others' also will receive assistance aside from themselves.

The theory as it was explained to me, is that many working class whites don't mind as much being poor and having no hope for improvement as long as they can take comfort knowing that there are people worse off than them.

I think that is a horrible thing to think and I think it's horrible to think that about other people, but when the debate came up, there were many articles that backed up Hillary Clinton's claim that many Trump supporters are, in fact, deplorable.

Really makes sense when you consider just how many many decades they voted Democrat!

Only some of those in the Northern Midwest.  Not those in the South, Southwest or Southern Midwest.  They've been voting solidly Republican at the Presidential level since 1980 or so.

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These people, like people everyone, vote in their self interest. They vote for guys who speak their language. Trump did that, Hillary didn't, as simple as that. Hillary's poll-tested politician speak mumbo jumbo was so condescending.

You know what the most pathetic thing about all this is? These working class whites in MI, and PA, and WI were the last ones who stayed loyal to you. When the working class whites in the South and the West and in Appalachia left, the ones in the Upper Midwest stayed. They were your firewall, or tried to be, in the last 4 cycles. They faithfully pulled the party lever, even when you guys were doing nothing for them, for 20 years. And now they get to be the deplorables for not being dutiful little soldiers, ha ha.

The idea that the Democrats haven't done anything for the white working class is preposterous. I agree that there was a massive marketing failure on the part of the Democratic party in this election (with plenty of other blame to go around, but the party and its candidates deserve a healthy share), but Democratic policies have clearly been much better for the economic well being of these voters for 80 years now as compared to Republican policies.

We were doing things on the margins sure, a little health care here, a little overtime pay there, but the core of good paying jobs in a lot of these communities were getting devastated. Marginal benefits don't matter when your livelihood has been downgraded.



^^^

These people sensed, not without reason, that voting for a conventional president would be more of the same. Really, they know the jobs aren't coming back though. They know sh**t is broken that can't be fixed.

But what was worse then that, they sensed that the coastal elites don't care... this attitude Adam T has. They sensed Democrats talking about demographic-driven majorities of Hispanics and other minorities... think about it from their perspective. It's sort of like you're getting replaced, right? Your town built this country, won WWII, there would be nothing without the sacrifices of your community. But now, not only is all that gone, but you're getting replaced by someone whose parents came here illegally. Not just your job, but as a voter. The Democrats were saying "We don't want you any more, we've got our Texas, we've got our Florida, we've got our new coalition. We've got our new America. You're a racist, you're a sexist, you're a xenophobe. Our enlightenment is over here in Arizona..." Oh, and by the way, think about your white privilege. Black Lives Matter, but if you say Blue Live Matter or All Lives Matter you're a racist. Think about your whiteness, think about it hard. But don't be proud of it, because then you're playing identity politics.

It doesn't take someone who hates Mexicans or anyone else to feel put off by that. And then on the other side you have this guy Trump, he's a jerk, he's an asshole, and you don't like him. Heck, he's almost certainly lying. But boy, does he piss those people off! Boy, does he know at least how to blow up the system. And he at least sees things from your viewpoint. With him, someone is finally, finally paying attention to you. Saying you're important. Acknowledging your role in this country. Acknowledging that you didn't come here illegally, that you work hard and play by the rules. Trump is the one who got it. No one else from either party got it, but Trump did. And heck, maybe he's just crazy enough to change something, no?

First of all, even though I live on the Coast I'm neither wealthy, nor even American, so I'm not a Coastal Elitist.  And your suggestion that somehow living on the Coasts makes anybody who lives their automatically part of some elite is completely idiotic given that Donald Trump and most of this cabinet nominees are part of the real elite.

I agree with what you write here, but what you don't realize is what I think is the clear implications of your writings.  The National Democratic Party wrote off these voters, to the degree that they did right them off, I think because as you wrote
1.They want help for themselves but have disdain for other disenfranchised people and don't want these 'others' to receive any assistance.

2.They know they're being lied to by a con artist but he'll blow up the system and that's better than the alternative.  I don't see any way that you can appeal to people like that on any sort of rational level.  They voted for Trump based on gut emotions and not logic, to the degree that they have the ability to actually think logically.

As I wrote previously, it's impossible to be all things to all people.  

I'm sure Trump is crazy enough to try to change a lot of things, and we'll probably succeed at changing some of them.  But, whatever changes he makes will be to his benefit and nobody else's.

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These people, like people everyone, vote in their self interest. They vote for guys who speak their language. Trump did that, Hillary didn't, as simple as that. Hillary's poll-tested politician speak mumbo jumbo was so condescending.

You know what the most pathetic thing about all this is? These working class whites in MI, and PA, and WI were the last ones who stayed loyal to you. When the working class whites in the South and the West and in Appalachia left, the ones in the Upper Midwest stayed. They were your firewall, or tried to be, in the last 4 cycles. They faithfully pulled the party lever, even when you guys were doing nothing for them, for 20 years. And now they get to be the deplorables for not being dutiful little soldiers, ha ha.

The idea that the Democrats haven't done anything for the white working class is preposterous. I agree that there was a massive marketing failure on the part of the Democratic party in this election (with plenty of other blame to go around, but the party and its candidates deserve a healthy share), but Democratic policies have clearly been much better for the economic well being of these voters for 80 years now as compared to Republican policies.

We were doing things on the margins sure, a little health care here, a little overtime pay there, but the core of good paying jobs in a lot of these communities were getting devastated. Marginal benefits don't matter when your livelihood has been downgraded.



^^^

These people sensed, not without reason, that voting for a conventional president would be more of the same. Really, they know the jobs aren't coming back though. They know sh**t is broken that can't be fixed.

But what was worse then that, they sensed that the coastal elites don't care... this attitude Adam T has. They sensed Democrats talking about demographic-driven majorities of Hispanics and other minorities... think about it from their perspective. It's sort of like you're getting replaced, right? Your town built this country, won WWII, there would be nothing without the sacrifices of your community. But now, not only is all that gone, but you're getting replaced by someone whose parents came here illegally. Not just your job, but as a voter. The Democrats were saying "We don't want you any more, we've got our Texas, we've got our Florida, we've got our new coalition. We've got our new America. You're a racist, you're a sexist, you're a xenophobe. Our enlightenment is over here in Arizona..." Oh, and by the way, think about your white privilege. Black Lives Matter, but if you say Blue Live Matter or All Lives Matter you're a racist. Think about your whiteness, think about it hard. But don't be proud of it, because then you're playing identity politics.

It doesn't take someone who hates Mexicans or anyone else to feel put off by that. And then on the other side you have this guy Trump, he's a jerk, he's an asshole, and you don't like him. Heck, he's almost certainly lying. But boy, does he piss those people off! Boy, does he know at least how to blow up the system. And he at least sees things from your viewpoint. With him, someone is finally, finally paying attention to you. Saying you're important. Acknowledging your role in this country. Acknowledging that you didn't come here illegally, that you work hard and play by the rules. Trump is the one who got it. No one else from either party got it, but Trump did. And heck, maybe he's just crazy enough to change something, no?

I don't like the dismissal of Black Lives Matter. If you look at policing in this country it's absolutely a necessary movement. I do think that Hillary ran a horrible out of touch campaign and I really can't stand the smug style in liberalism but I don't think we have to abandon racial justice. That's the kind of binary thinking that allowed Clintonites to cynically portray anyone slightly to the left as insensitive to race or non-intersectional when they're the ones that race baited their entire career up to 2008. No, what you really need is a candidate that empathized with people, that didn't run on the horribly out of touch slogan of "America is already great" and one that countered Trump's racist populism with a more inclusive one that called out him for what a fraud he was.

Smug style of liberalism.  As opposed to the populist appeals of conservatism?

"Barack Obama is unqualified to be President because he's just a community organizer."

"All the concerns of disenfranchisement from minority groups are just the whining of Social Justice Warriors."

"It's wrong for the Democrats or the Courts to mandate Gay Marriage on us little people in the United States.  As a little person I should have the right to tell other people who they can and can't marry and no elitist Democrat should be able to take that away from me."

I think this whole thing about smug liberals and populist conservatives is a messaging bullsh**t that unfortunately more than just conservatives now actually believe.

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There is more than a marketing failure here.  While I think it's important to not stereotype all people, I sadly think there is a lot of truth to the idea that many working class whites would rather that nobody receives any assistance if it means that 'the others' also will receive assistance aside from themselves.

A lot of snobby white liberals have made this argument since the Great November Electoral Fiasco. It makes intuitive sense to them, I suppose; if you are raised to believe in your own superiority then you tend to believe in it still when you grow up. But though American society is riven by ethnic tensions and can't be understood without reference to them, this is an argument without any basis in observable reality whatsoever. Federal government support has been particularly associated with minorities (and especially with the most unpopular of minorities) for half a century, and yet this massive collapse in support has come about only now...

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The 'theory' explained to you by who, exactly?

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Yes that's a great way to win elections: everyone who votes for the other guy is a ****. Well so long as you're secure in your own sense of moral superiority, eh? Better than winning.

1.Only now since the passage of Obamacare.  

Also, there seems to be a slow but final realization from many of these people that 'The American Dream' is no longer a reality for them.  It had been said for many years, with a great deal of polling to back it up, that especially poor whites believed they were future rich, so they didn't mind Supply Side economics that lowered taxes on the wealthy and that cut some social programs in order to finance them.

I think polling data already backs up that that was a recent change and would explain this recent switch.

2.This theory isn't new and although it obviously wasn't explained to me by this person, this person did succeed in becoming President of the United States and retained the office with the largest vote in history. So, I think he knows what he was talking about (especially if you believe that if Trump won it must have been because he realized something nobody else noticed):

President Lyndon B. Johnson once said, "If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you."


http://www.snopes.com/lbj-convince-the-lowest-white-man/

This is a genuine quote.

3.And the disdain for the disenfranchisement of minorities by pejoratively referring to them as 'Social Justice Warriors' or referring to President Obama as the 'community organizer President" isn't the other side running on everybody that doesn't vote for our candidate is *********?

The thing is, contrary what I think you want to admit, Trump and the Republicans partly running on that very message succeeded.

So, I wouldn't mind seeing an election campaign from the Democrats based on demonizing white (male) working class voters, because many of these people are, in fact, stupid and many of them are, in fact, deplorable.

As to my sense of moral superiority, if you reread your post, I think you'll see you're just like me.  I hope you're satisfied.

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Lastly it is the other way around - Dems can't win the White House without the Mid-west, no chance. And the Dem party is on the verge of ruin, I fear it may become obsolete like the whigs - Look at the performance in state governor races.

Trump will not abandon his core voters as he is a smart person in 1 aspect - He wants to win in 2020, he will give the Midwestern people something or won't completely abandon then. I am confident he will be a failure, but I am pretty sure Trump will try to ensure not to make these people "suffer" as he has to win in 2020. There will be something for these folks.

Also it is pathetic to talk about letting people suffer & they deserve it because they didn't vote for your candidate. Especially when your candidate is an absolute fraud & a horrible candidate!

I didn't write that.  I wrote they deserve to suffer the consequences of their actions because they voted for a President and for a party even though they knew the re-elected Republicans would take away their health care.

So, why shouldn't I be happy that they are getting what they voted for?

I can't be bothered to comment on your assertions about Hillary Clinton.

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I think this is about the most accurate thing that can be written

Jacob Levy: “An 80,000 vote margin in a 137 million vote election, about .05%, is susceptible of almost endless plausible explanations. The number of different factors that might well have moved that many votes is very large. So there are a lot of different true but-for explanations: but for Clinton’s failure to campaign in Wisconsin, but for the Comey letter, but for stricter voter ID laws and reductions in the numbers of polling places, but for Jill Stein, and so on, ad infinitum. A Democratic party strategist has good reason to take lots of them very seriously.”

“But anyone trying to generalize about popular beliefs or the electorate’s mood should be very wary of any of them. Grabbing a plausibly-true but-for explanation of 80,000 votes, as if it says something big and true about the whole electorate, will over-explain the outcome. An explanation that is one of the many valid ones for those 80,000 votes, and thus for the Electoral College outcome, but that implies some large shift in opinion or mood toward Trump, is a bad explanation overall.”

Jacob Levy

https://niskanencenter.org/blog/defense-liberty-cant-without-identity-politics/

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1.Only now since the passage of Obamacare.

Hardly a programme associated with giving benefits particularly to black people. Quite unlike basically the entire of the Great Society and large parts of the New Deal.

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Pop psychology nonsense, a vague allusion to 'THE POLLS' and questionable anecdotes. All of which point, isn't this absolutely remarkable?, to the reinforcement of a 'theory' that largely seems a lot like a doubling down of blatant class prejudice... classic!

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So a cynical anecdote from a notorious cynic describing a political world that died long before most people on this forum were born? I am not impressed.

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Adopt that attitude further and the Democrats can look forward to losing many more elections to permatanned Reality TV Stars!

But this combination of Diversity Course Speak and actual Thatcherism is vomitous, although sadly typical on the American internet these days. This feels relevant...

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_{Richard Polenberg, One Nation Divisible: Class, Race and Ethnicity in the United States since 1938, (New York, 1980), pp. 226-7.}

The funny thing is that if you make it clear that you regard a certain section of society as being basically trash they tend not to vote for you in large numbers. Isn't that strange? Politics is about power, not patting yourself on the back.

1.Social security, medicare and medicaid were for the specific benefit of minorities? Maybe if seniors are counted as minorities.

The New Deal had a number of government jobs programs that specifically excluded minority hiring.

I assume you are trying to refer to the various Civil Rights Acts but none of them were social programs.


There were some programs to benefit the urban poor (far from all blacks, especially in the 1960s pre 'white flight') but they were and are small in cost compared to medicare and medicaid.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Poverty


2.http://www.pbs.org/newshour/making-sense/why-half-of-u-s-adults-no-longer-believe-in-the-american-dream/

"Nearly half of Americans who once believed in the American dream (defined as the belief that if you work hard, you’ll get ahead) think it no longer exists. Similarly, close to half of all Americans over 18 think their generation is better off financially than their children’s will be."


Poll reported on September 24, 2014

I can't be bothered to address the rest of your post as its pretty clear your knowledge of U.S politics wouldn't add anything to an empty coloring book.

However, you obviously believe you are superior enough, morally or otherwise, to believe you have the ability to comment like an expert even though you clearly know nothing or very little.

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This pretty much confirms that article: http://adage.com/article/campaign-trail/states-where-trump-clinton-spending-most-on-advertising/306377/

While only Trump was advertising in Wisconsin and Michigan, Hillary Clinton was advertising in Texas and California! from October 21 through the election day.

Still, this seems to be thinking in hindsight.

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First of all, even though I live on the Coast I'm neither wealthy, nor even American, so I'm not a Coastal Elitist.

Wait, you're not even an American? How many Americans are even participating in this discussion?

I assumed you already knew that since you referred to me as a 'coastal elitist.'  Since you didn't even know where I lived, why did you assume I lived on a Coast? What sort of nonsense is that?

More importantly could you please define 'elitist' for me in terms of how you mean it here.

Of course, I prefer to assume you've just been trolling me all along, so, if so, you can obviously just disregard my questions.

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The election wasn't a referendum on the American Jobs Act or the Miners Protection Act. It was between Clinton and Trump. Clinton's case was that Trump shouldn't be president because he called a Hispanic lady fat. Maybe she should have campaigned more on jobs and health care for miners.

Post hoc.

Maybe that was your perception at the time, but it wasn't mine.  She campaigned on 'stronger together' which is an economic message of "America does best when everyone does well."

My perception of Trump's message was one of either "Because I'm so uniquely great I, and I alone, can fix your problems all by myself" which only a moron can believe or "You white working class people, unlike all other disaffected people, you're not to blame for your economic problems, but these scapegoats: Chinese workers, illegal aliens... are."  which only a genuinely deplorable person can support.

I get your point.  These hardworking people are suffering...   My point is you can't promise all things to all people and that those who do are lying.  And that these people, many of whom frequently said "at least Trump tells it like it is" were really saying "he tells me what I want to hear,  and even though, deep down, I know it's probably nonsense, I'm going to vote for it anyway."

And that was even quite a number of them recognized that he was completely unfit to be President and was almost certainly only running to further his own interests.

So, it was hardly a case of as bad as Trump is, I think Hillary Clinton will be even worse, it was a case of "Donald Trump is as bad as a person can be, but I'll still vote for him."

"Stronger Together" was a horsecrap slogan.  Why?  Because folks saw through it.

Someone who calls 25% of the population "deplorables" doesn't really believer AMERICA is "Stronger Together".  What she was saying is that the DEMOCRATIC PARTY is "Stronger Together" when Clintonistas and those Feeling the Bern stand together against the Trumpian Hordes.  That's the real meaning of that slogan, and I believe folks figured it out and were not impressed.

Right, so Trump insults pretty much every group of people except for white males throughout the campaign but supposedly tells it like it is, but Hillary Clinton gives one insult (on several occasions) that is actually backed up by evidence, and you were so insulted it justified voting for Trump.

I thought part of this campaign was a backlash against the hypersensitive politically correct 'social justice warriors' but it seems you white working class redneck justice warriors are every bit as hyper sensitive and politically correct (or at least you are, but I know you're not the only one.)

With logic like that, I can understand why you are among the losers in the new(er) economy.  This new(er) economy requires intelligence far more than physical labor and you and the people who think like you are genuinely stupid.

And I don't need to hear the 'you won't win them over that way' nonsense.
1.I don't believe in pandering to anybody even if I actually thought it would work, which I know it won't anyway.

2.I write my own opinions and I'm not working for any party or beholden to any body.  If somebody reads my writings and resents all liberals or the Democratic Party for that, I won't take responsibility because anybody who thinks that way is also genuinely stupid.

3.As far as I'm concerned I'm genuinely telling you like it really is.  I'm not actually pandering to you while you believe he's telling it like it is because he's actually just insulting everybody other than you.

For anybody offended by my post here, if it makes you feel any better,  I assume some Trump voters are good people.

[136or142]

Adam T, do you know that had blacks voted as Democratic as they did in 2012 it would have kept MI/PA/WI in the Democratic column? Are black people therefore stupid and deplorable?

Not voting at all and actively voting for Donald Trump aren't the same thing.  So, what you wrote here makes no sense to me.

Also, Unless you have updated data based on county vote totals, the only numbers that I saw that black turnout was down was based on that one exit poll that looks to have been wrong on just about everything.

[136or142]

Let's dispel with the fiction that the Clinton campaign was centered on a positive economic message. It was not centered on a positive economic message.

Here are the top 10 ads broadcast in swing states. 6 by Clinton, 4 by Trump.

Of the 6, 4 are about how Donald Trump is dangerous.

Let's dispel with the fiction that the Clinton campaign was centered on a positive economic message. It was not centered on a positive economic message.

Of the two that are positive/not about Donald, 1 is an incredibly generic "Oh gosh, Hilldawg loves kids!" biographical ad. The other is in such generalities that it barely counts as anything. "Hilldawg wants opportunity for families! And college! Did we mention kids?"

Let's dispel with the fiction that the Clinton campaign was centered on a positive economic message. It was not centered on a positive economic message.

Let's dispel with the fiction that the Clinton campaign knew what it was doing. It had no idea what it was doing.

The fun thing about all of this is that most of what's proceeded has been an argument entirely orthogonal to what happened in the election. Adam T has sure had his jimmies rustled by white working class voters that voted against their own self interest *sips latte*, but the truth is that FAR more  voters, white, black, young, mostly poor didn't come out for Clinton (unlike 2012) than WWCs voted for Trump, because Clinton was fundamentally unable to make a winning coalition outside of the affluent coastal suburbs care about her campaign. The story of the election in the crucial states isn't a story of one single thing going wrong; Adam's right about that. It's a story of the Clinton campaign having a thousand paths to victory, and missing Every. Single. One.    

The Clinton campaign didn't inspire voters. It didn't persuade voters that mattered. In all of the states they lost that counted, their field operation either didn't exist (WI, MI), was mis-targeting voters (PA), or was an absolute shambles. Her biography of centrist elitism was the wrong message for the times. No one read her policy papers on her website,  as is good and proper, since jfc who does that? But the Clinton campaign seemed to think that that was enough, and focused on telling everyone that Donny was a bad, bad man. Which everyone knew already.

Let's dispel with the fiction that the Clinton campaign knew what it was doing. It had no idea what it was doing.

I agree with some of this and I disagree with some of this, all of which I've already commented on.

1.I agree that the Hillary Clinton campaign made mistakes in where to campaign in, and I showed that previously by posting the website that showed that the Clinton campaign did no advertisements in Michigan or Wisconsin after October 21.

2.I assume that it's true that Hillary Clinton did no advertisements on her economics policy.  Living next to Washington State, which isn't a swing state I didn't see a single advertisement except for the occasional advert from PACs that aired on CNN, which I mainly only watched when  I went to the dentist, however she did spell out in some detail her economic policy in campaign speeches, at her convention and during the debates.  So, while I agree with you that television advertisements is the best way to reach voters, she did make her case on economics in a number of venues.

3.I agree that Hillary Clinton did not get her vote out as well as Trump did, and that is true even though Donald Trump received the lowest share of the vote for any Republican nominee since 1996 except slightly for John McCain in 2008.  However, I think it's largely not true that these people didn't turn out to vote.  It seems a fair number of them voted for third party candidates and that, in rural areas and in small towns, a lot of working class Latinos voted for Trump.  I think especially a lot of young voters voted for Governor Johnson and a fair number of young voters who were eligible to vote for the first time this year voted for Trump.  

All of those things I've written on this website previously.


However, this is where I disagree with you completely:
1.If everybody knew that Donald Trump was bad, they also seemed to believe that Donald Trump was no worse than Hillary Clinton was.  I don't know how many times I heard or read that "Donald Trump is the crazy one while Hillary Clinton is the corrupt one."  If these people were rational and were informed as you seem to believe they were,  I don't know how they couldn't be aware of the incredible corruption of Donald Trump ranging from his engagement in pay to play business operations to Trump University to his Foundation that, unlike the Clinton Foundation, seems to be genuinely nothing but a fraudulent money laundering operation.

I've written previously that there are two possibilities here.
A.That Trump was a beneficiary of what the Simpsons had previously jokingly termed the "Three Stooges Effect"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmBj8r1-fDo

Which, in Trump's case, meant that there were so many horrible things that Trump has said and done that nobody could focus on a single thing long enough to remember them in any detail, unlike Hillary Clinton's damn emails, and they essentially all cancelled each other at.

That is essentially my explanation (and the only explanation I can see) for how any rational person could somehow believe that Hillary Clinton was more corrupt that Donald Trump.

The other alternative is that the Trump voters anyway were basically irrational. That irrespective of how ever much Hillary Clinton did or did not make a rational case for these people to vote for her that it didn't matter anyway because virtually all of these white working class voters voted for Donald Trump based on white identity politics (which they may possibly validly regard as a rational response) and that they weren't interested in hearing any alternative discussion.

That is essentially what Paul Simon wrote, also a long time ago:  "Still a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest."

Of course, any argument for or against is impossible to prove, but I suspect the number of white working class voters who actually would have voted for Hillary Clinton if she had campaigned more on an economic message aimed at them is so small that it wouldn't even have led her to win Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, as close as they were.

[136or142]

Oh yeah, one more thing:

You wrote:
"Her biography of centrist elitism was the wrong message for the times"

Could you please define for me what 'elitism' means in this context.

I damn well know, and i think you do to, that elite/elitism is a pejorative that all sorts of politicians (not just those on the right) routinely throw out against their opponents because they know that it's a term that gets many of their supporters riled up against their opponents.

The only thing elite means to me is the so called 1% (I prefer the phrase 'haves and have mores' and/or their political backers. )

The only thing elitism means to me that is different from the term of describing the actions of the genuine elitists is the idea that, for instance, American soccer fans aren't interested in American soccer via Major League Soccer because it's not 'elite' European soccer.  However, in this case, those Americans are referred to as 'snobs' as in "Euro snobs' and not as engaging in elitism.

As I also wrote previously, I think the idea that a person who thinks they have the right to tell other people who they can and can't marry is behaving far more like a genuine elitist and must think they're a pretty special person (as if they've been personally spoken to be G_d) than anything the
so-called 'Coastal liberal elitists' have ever thought or done.

So, I suspect her that you just threw in 'elitism' either genuinely without thinking and not meaning anything by it or you meant it as the meaningless pejorative that it actually is and I'd like you to show me that my thinking is wrong.

Of course, I can't obligate you to do anything, as I'm not part of the actual elite that can genuinely do that in some cases,  but I'll take your refusal/unwillingness to answer this as an indication that my thinking is correct.