I received this in an email. It is from a highly literate, educated, articulate friend who is more liberal than I am politically. It is so well phrased that I am posting it as a blog post of its own, rather than as a comment. As always, I invite comments, especially from those who disagree with my ideas. My goal in writing here is not so much to pontificate as to stimulate interaction and exchange of ideas. Here is the comment-
Hi Ted, RE your latest post (well written as always):
Protest: I have heard of no rioting. I have, however, heard of protests, public and personal, against the clearly divisive rhetoric that Trump reveled in. These people are angry and truly terrified (my gay brother among them) - not because their candidate lost, but because the candidate who won and those who support him have offered nothing but threatening language and policies. Even since the election, hate crimes have skyrocketed and the President-elect has been far too slow to condemn them. I think it's frankly hypocritical for the Right to condemn the Left for the same extremist language that clearly won the election for the Right.
"People don't like being put down, being told what to think and feel, or being taken for granted." Agreed - but apparently people DO like watching others being treated that way, which is what Trump reveled in and was cheered for. He was more than disrespectful - he was vicious. Not even his own political peers escaped his bullying insults: "Little Marco", "Low-Energy Bush", "Crooked Hillary", and all the rest. It's really disingenuous to win the election with jeers and posturing, then accuse the Left of the same.
I agree that we need to be talking about policy - and that's exactly what Trump did not do, except in the most broad and unrealistic terms. "Build a wall?" "Bring back jobs" somehow? It's exactly talking about policy that the Democratic party tried to do, and they (barely) lost the election doing it.
I agree that, in general, CLinton won urban areas and Trump won more rural ones - but your implication that somehow the people living in cities shouldn't have their votes counted as heavily because they occupy less real estate makes no sense in a pluralistic democracy. You're right: the President should represent the "whole country." But "whole country" should mean people, not real estate; and by that measure, only a popular vote makes sense or is fair.(You're also correct that the "surprise" was in the turnout numbers - which is another problem entirely.) Your implication that voters in cities should be discounted because they're all concentrated in a couple of areas (and the fact that there are a whole lot of them is somehow irrelevant) is frankly dangerous; that idea, if taken to its logical conclusion, justifies gerrymandering, which is probably one of the most effective ways to warp our elections.
Finally, your entire argument is, at root, based on the idea that non-minority voters have been somehow ignored by the Democratic Party. You must remember this group in the past has largely been represented by trade unions, who were enormously successful in securing good wages and working conditions. But modern corporate structure has managed to bypass trade unions, to a large extent by mechanization. That's a large part of the loss of blue-collar jobs. Unions have historically almost always found common cause with the Democratic Party; the Republican Party continues to be almost universally hostile to them. Scott Walker staked his career on rooting out unions from Wisconson government, and he was hardly an outlier. It is incredibly disingenuous for Republicans to then claim that Democrats have been the ones "putting them down for years," and that somehow it's the Republicans who speak for blue-collar workers.
Ted, my friend, from my point of view, your research is impeccable but your conclusions ... well, you're just dead wrong about Trump and the Republicans. Trump is nothing but a showman; his "business success" is largely from licensing and promoting his name, and he brings nothing but bombast and self-interest to the White House. The Republican Party continues to truly represent only corporate and far right interests, and now (with Trump) the "alt-Right", who are shameless in their embrace of white supremacists.
The Republican Party platform is filled with aims that I know you disagree with - ending abortion, ending gay marriage, offering Bible study in public schools, opposing any response to climate change, etc.
You are trying to paint the election as a rational response by a rational electorate. Call me arrogant or condescending, but I think you are generally wrong. I'm surprised that in your blog you have not noted the fact that the top (most popular) 20 "fake news" articles got more web attention than the top 20 actual news articles - nor the fact that it was almost entirely Trump supporters who paid attention to them. ("Fake news" articles favoring Clinton got little attention, so "fake news" writers stopped generating them.) You yourself re-posted half a dozen "fake news" or otherwise obviously wrong statements and memes on facebook during this campaign; you were appreciative when I "called" you on them, but I was disappointed that you didn't check them yourself before posting. It's too easy to dupe people who want to be duped, because they feel angry and impotent and want validation, and it has been too easy for Trump and the Republican party to oblige.
I looked recently at the Fox News website. The website design makes a clear point of conflating fact and opinion; the most prominent links on this "news" website all link to inflammatory op-ed pieces by "contributors"; actual news stories are hard to find, and (on the day I looked) 4 of them were about sex. You might not like the NY Times's liberal slant (and I agree to some extent), but at least they report facts, and clearly label opinion as such.
Much like the British, who are now regretting their Brexit vote, I am very confident that you yourself will regret having voted for Trump by the end of his term, or at least will recognize that you were fooled into believing what Trump had no intention or ability to deliver. In fact, my friend, I'd be willing to place a wager ... !
In the meantime, I encourage you to post this (and all my other) responses as comments on your blog, which I notice you haven't done yet.
Please understand, Ted, that I really value your friendship and the respect that you hold my opinions, even when they are different from yours. I've truly learned a lot about bias and about the true needs of Trump supporters from your posts and writings this year.
To the extent that my ramblings sound incoherent or unconvincing, blame it on my sense of feeling overwhelmed. Trump is refusing to receive intelligence briefings that are prepared for him. His tax policies threaten to balloon the national debt. Every single one of his appointees so far has absolutely no experience in the field they're in charge of. Meanwhile, Swastikas are multiplying. We may be headed for disaster sooner rather than later.
Protest: I have heard of no rioting. I have, however, heard of protests, public and personal, against the clearly divisive rhetoric that Trump reveled in. These people are angry and truly terrified (my gay brother among them) - not because their candidate lost, but because the candidate who won and those who support him have offered nothing but threatening language and policies. Even since the election, hate crimes have skyrocketed and the President-elect has been far too slow to condemn them. I think it's frankly hypocritical for the Right to condemn the Left for the same extremist language that clearly won the election for the Right.
"People don't like being put down, being told what to think and feel, or being taken for granted." Agreed - but apparently people DO like watching others being treated that way, which is what Trump reveled in and was cheered for. He was more than disrespectful - he was vicious. Not even his own political peers escaped his bullying insults: "Little Marco", "Low-Energy Bush", "Crooked Hillary", and all the rest. It's really disingenuous to win the election with jeers and posturing, then accuse the Left of the same.
I agree that we need to be talking about policy - and that's exactly what Trump did not do, except in the most broad and unrealistic terms. "Build a wall?" "Bring back jobs" somehow? It's exactly talking about policy that the Democratic party tried to do, and they (barely) lost the election doing it.
I agree that, in general, CLinton won urban areas and Trump won more rural ones - but your implication that somehow the people living in cities shouldn't have their votes counted as heavily because they occupy less real estate makes no sense in a pluralistic democracy. You're right: the President should represent the "whole country." But "whole country" should mean people, not real estate; and by that measure, only a popular vote makes sense or is fair.(You're also correct that the "surprise" was in the turnout numbers - which is another problem entirely.) Your implication that voters in cities should be discounted because they're all concentrated in a couple of areas (and the fact that there are a whole lot of them is somehow irrelevant) is frankly dangerous; that idea, if taken to its logical conclusion, justifies gerrymandering, which is probably one of the most effective ways to warp our elections.
Finally, your entire argument is, at root, based on the idea that non-minority voters have been somehow ignored by the Democratic Party. You must remember this group in the past has largely been represented by trade unions, who were enormously successful in securing good wages and working conditions. But modern corporate structure has managed to bypass trade unions, to a large extent by mechanization. That's a large part of the loss of blue-collar jobs. Unions have historically almost always found common cause with the Democratic Party; the Republican Party continues to be almost universally hostile to them. Scott Walker staked his career on rooting out unions from Wisconson government, and he was hardly an outlier. It is incredibly disingenuous for Republicans to then claim that Democrats have been the ones "putting them down for years," and that somehow it's the Republicans who speak for blue-collar workers.
Ted, my friend, from my point of view, your research is impeccable but your conclusions ... well, you're just dead wrong about Trump and the Republicans. Trump is nothing but a showman; his "business success" is largely from licensing and promoting his name, and he brings nothing but bombast and self-interest to the White House. The Republican Party continues to truly represent only corporate and far right interests, and now (with Trump) the "alt-Right", who are shameless in their embrace of white supremacists.
The Republican Party platform is filled with aims that I know you disagree with - ending abortion, ending gay marriage, offering Bible study in public schools, opposing any response to climate change, etc.
You are trying to paint the election as a rational response by a rational electorate. Call me arrogant or condescending, but I think you are generally wrong. I'm surprised that in your blog you have not noted the fact that the top (most popular) 20 "fake news" articles got more web attention than the top 20 actual news articles - nor the fact that it was almost entirely Trump supporters who paid attention to them. ("Fake news" articles favoring Clinton got little attention, so "fake news" writers stopped generating them.) You yourself re-posted half a dozen "fake news" or otherwise obviously wrong statements and memes on facebook during this campaign; you were appreciative when I "called" you on them, but I was disappointed that you didn't check them yourself before posting. It's too easy to dupe people who want to be duped, because they feel angry and impotent and want validation, and it has been too easy for Trump and the Republican party to oblige.
I looked recently at the Fox News website. The website design makes a clear point of conflating fact and opinion; the most prominent links on this "news" website all link to inflammatory op-ed pieces by "contributors"; actual news stories are hard to find, and (on the day I looked) 4 of them were about sex. You might not like the NY Times's liberal slant (and I agree to some extent), but at least they report facts, and clearly label opinion as such.
Much like the British, who are now regretting their Brexit vote, I am very confident that you yourself will regret having voted for Trump by the end of his term, or at least will recognize that you were fooled into believing what Trump had no intention or ability to deliver. In fact, my friend, I'd be willing to place a wager ... !
In the meantime, I encourage you to post this (and all my other) responses as comments on your blog, which I notice you haven't done yet.
Please understand, Ted, that I really value your friendship and the respect that you hold my opinions, even when they are different from yours. I've truly learned a lot about bias and about the true needs of Trump supporters from your posts and writings this year.
To the extent that my ramblings sound incoherent or unconvincing, blame it on my sense of feeling overwhelmed. Trump is refusing to receive intelligence briefings that are prepared for him. His tax policies threaten to balloon the national debt. Every single one of his appointees so far has absolutely no experience in the field they're in charge of. Meanwhile, Swastikas are multiplying. We may be headed for disaster sooner rather than later.
A comment from an email of another highly literate, educated friend, with a slightly different take.....
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, your interlocutor has swallowed the liberal line prit’ near hook, line, and sinker – a few responsive comments:
- “hate crimes have skyrocketed” – no, not really. This is a construct of the press. Further, I personally do not believe that it is DT supporters who are spray-painting swastikas on things. It is far more likely, IMO, that this is being done by the “Trump is a Nazi!” crowd. The incidents in Philadelphia have been traced to same (non-voting “Trump is a Nazi” folks of course…)
- DT “has been far too slow to condemn them” - while the left screams about the “alt-right” and condemns DT for not condemning David Duke, they ignore the fact that DT has repeatedly disavowed these creeps.
- The USA is not a “pluralistic democracy” – we are a representative federal republic, which is different. The D’s do not like that reality as it does not work well with their ‘all power to the masses’ formula (see clenched fist raised overhead).
- “gerrymandering, which is probably one of the most effective ways to warp our elections” – what? You do not think our representative areas are already gerrymandered beyond all belief? I think particularly of those districts in the south where they have connected areas of high concentrations of ‘desired’ voters with long stretches of inter-state highways. My notion – which will never clear Congress for obvious reasons – would be to program all the census data into a computer along with all state, county, municipal, voter precinct boundaries. Tell the computer to draw boundaries based on geographic integrity and defined population. Elbridge Gerry would finally be put to rest. Never happen of course.
- “trade unions, who were enormously successful in securing good wages and working conditions” – really? Ignoring the past 40 years of collapsing union membership and the prior abuses that sent a whole bunch of jobs to cheaper places…
- “Trump is nothing but a showman; his "business success" is largely from licensing and promoting his name…” – He has been an enormously successful businessman, which in recent years has included “licensing and promoting his name” which of course he could not have done had he not built a number of very successful businesses to begin with. Granted he did not start out dirt-floor poor, but somehow diminishing his success because he was not born with a muddy stick in his mouth (versus the silver spoon) seems disingenuous.
- “Trump is refusing to receive intelligence briefings that are prepared for him.” – which is not unusual for Presidents-elect.