You can’t count votes that never got a chance to be cast
December 9, 2016 10:00 AM Subscribe

With six weeks to the inauguration of the current President-elect, the son of a Hebridean continues to make the press. Across a smorgasbord of controversy, Boeing and China and a union leader are tweet-called out, Taiwan are on the phone, Ben Carson has (awkward) a top job, Flynn jnr is out but Flynn snr stays in while Goldman Sachs is further in, Mr Coal is given the EPA, Coulter wavers, his wall may not be built after all, and conflicts of interests (one picked at random). Problems with the recent election such as interference and voter suppression (post title) (also, game) continue to be discussed while Jill et al continue with their recount battle. Elsewhere, think pieces about the Democratic party abound, and Hillary continues to stack up the votes. Also California, Biden for 2020, a large bipartisan bill heads Obama's way, some Federal bureaucrats are waiting to see what happens and a prophecy.

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MetaTalk
* MeFi in the time of Trump - managing news.
* What are YOU doing?
* MeFites offering refuge for the holidays and Friendsmas.
* 123: NOT ME THAT DAY (monthly podcast).

For legacy content see the many posts tagged with election2016. The election reference wiki explains some of the terminology used in comments on these threads.

On the Blue
* Donald Trump is Time's 2016 Person of the Year.
* “A new president, new justice appointees changed the dynamic".
* What your social-media news feed could look like if things go wrong (not the new election thread).

A few of Andy Borowitz's recent short pieces: Taxes, Chris Christie, Obama and Trump, Ben Carson, and a poll.

posted by Wordshore (2648 comments total) 92 users marked this as a favorite

and a reminder to concentrate on yrrr breathing ...
posted by philip-random at 10:02 AM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

A lot of polls have been making the rounds, and I worry that they won't have as much of an effect in disciplining the Trump people or the Republicans in legislature because they will think that Trump has some special magic such that polls just don't matter, on the theory that the polls got the election outcome wrong. Another check on power weakened. There are also people coming into power now who openly dismiss the need for the consent of the governed. So that's what's on my mind today, happy Friday!
posted by prefpara at 10:05 AM on December 9, 2016

Obama orders review of Russian hacking in 2016 election
posted by Clustercuss at 10:06 AM on December 9, 2016 [35 favorites]

Yaaay! New election threa*uncontrollable vomiting*
posted by mrjohnmuller at 10:07 AM on December 9, 2016 [83 favorites]

Give it a chance.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:09 AM on December 9, 2016 [16 favorites]

Also, now that the election is over, can I propose that the new shared tag for political posts be #dissolutionoftheempire?
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:10 AM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

Some updates on the Wisconsin recount from local reporter Jessica Arp:
Judge will deny request by Super PACs to stop #WIrecount.

Peterson: there's no question I have to deny request for injunction.

Peterson: Everybody acknowledges there's virtually no chance this will change the outcome of the election.

Judge Peterson says @realDonaldTrump has made claims of voter fraud and a "mandate" in elections "so the count matters".
posted by melissasaurus at 10:10 AM on December 9, 2016 [15 favorites]

See also: Permit won't be issued for the Jan 21 protest event. Women's March on Washington Won't Happen at Lincoln Memorial (Warning autoplay video)
posted by yoga at 10:15 AM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Surprise! Obamacare Repeal Includes a Stealth Tax Cut for Top Earners

Republican plans to repeal the Affordable Care Act without a replacement — which health care policy experts predict could cost 30 million people their health insurance — will also bring a major tax break for high-income Americans.

Two taxes that will be presumably axed with the law affect only those making $200,000 or more. The break the ACA repeal will bring to those taxpayers will amount to a $346 billion tax cut in total over 10 years, according to the CBO report on the 2015 repeal legislation GOP lawmakers say they’ll be using as their model next year.

posted by kirkaracha at 10:15 AM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

With six weeks to the inauguration of the current President-elect

Fuck.

Gonna be a really, really long four years, isn't it?
posted by zarq at 10:16 AM on December 9, 2016 [32 favorites]

This may have been in the last thread, but I'm trying to wean myself off of these so I don't know. But if you haven't seen this, enjoy or scream, whatever works for you: corrupt.af -- a new website compiling all of Trump's conficts of interest.
posted by not that mimi at 10:16 AM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

The Dutch Uphold Law on Trumpspeak, Convict Wilders for Preaching Hate.
posted by Pendragon at 10:17 AM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

Possibly the most disturbing story yet from the transition phase: Trump transition team for Energy Department seeks names of employees involved in climate meetings

Spoiler: Probably not to give them holiday bonuses.
posted by martin q blank at 10:17 AM on December 9, 2016 [50 favorites]

Give him a chance
posted by Mayor West at 10:17 AM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

Inauguration Day is shaping up to be a potential nightmare in so many different ways, isn't it?
posted by yellowbinder at 10:18 AM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Gonna be a really, really long four years, isn't it?

come on yellowstone caldera
posted by poffin boffin at 10:21 AM on December 9, 2016 [74 favorites]

the son of a Hebridean

I've noticed a lot of people using various ways to avoid saying Donald Trump's name, and it reminds me a lot of how in Harry Potter people didn't say "Voldemort". And then I remembered how Dumbledore said "Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself" so you should just say his name. Then I remembered that everyone was right not to say "Voldemort" because they'd cast a curse on the name so they could find and imprison anyone who said it so it was good not to say the name! Then I remembered that we're not wizards so we're okay because you can't put a curse on words like that! Then I remembered how our civil liberties are under attack and how maybe it will indeed become illegal to criticize Donald Trump! Then I remembered about the NSA tracking all of our phone calls and emails and stuff so maybe they'll actually know exactly when anyone says "Donald Trump"! Then I got super depressed! Boy this is all really effing terrible!
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 10:22 AM on December 9, 2016 [178 favorites]

Obama orders review of Russian hacking in 2016 election

How shitty that I literally checked to see if this was from the Onion. I'm glad it's not!
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 10:24 AM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

A link of despair:

Thank one group of companies for the stock market's climb to record highs

The stock market's dramatic surge to record highs can largely be attributed to the leap in bank stocks. . . . Goldman Sachs has accounted for nearly a third of the Dow Jones industrial average's gains since the election.

And a link of hope:

'Miracles Are Happening': Photos of the Tireless Women of Standing Rock

I'm here also because my children can't be here. I'm going to go home and tell them everything I've seen, so that when my time of not-travelling comes they will be able to go out and do that for me. Even though I'm a great grandmother, I took my own pension [from being a] retired teacher and made the journey. It's all worth it, being here and sharing with the women our songs and the water prayers. ~ Beatrice Menasekwe Jackson

posted by melissasaurus at 10:25 AM on December 9, 2016 [15 favorites]

The only polls that matter to the GOP are the ones taken on the second Tuesday in November in years divisible by two or four. What people think about what they do is completely irrelevant to them- what matters is only whether they have the power to do it.
posted by Pope Guilty at 10:25 AM on December 9, 2016 [32 favorites]

Show up on the 21st anyway. Go ahead and arrest a million cell phones
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 10:26 AM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

I need these threads like I need air to breathe. I understand that outrage and despair are not everyone's cup of tea (nor necessarily the healthiest use of everybody's time) but to me they're a constant reminder that THIS. IS. NOT. NORMAL. and sanity still exists in the world.

So thank you, metafilter.
posted by lydhre at 10:28 AM on December 9, 2016 [86 favorites]

ahhh, I love to read the posts of David "Axis of Evil" Frum in these trying time's
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 10:29 AM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

i couldn't figure out why i was feeling nauseated every morning lately and then i realized it was from seeing the disgusting bloated vile face of the rapist-in-chief elect on the news every morning.
posted by poffin boffin at 10:32 AM on December 9, 2016 [41 favorites]

"I need these threads like I need air to breathe."

Agreed. When the election threads stop, the bass solo begins.
posted by klarck at 10:34 AM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

Ohio Politician Who Lobbied for ‘Heartbeat Bill’ Has ‘Never Thought About’ Why a Woman Would Want an Abortion

Buchy is a longtime proponent of restricting women’s access to abortion — in 2012, he told Al Jazeera that his ultimate goal is to ban abortion completely in the State of Ohio. Then, the reporter asked him an interesting question: “What do you think makes a woman want to have an abortion?”

He pauses. Then he says, “Well, there’s probably a lot of reas— I’m not a woman.” He laughs. “I’m thinking now if I’m a woman why would I want to get … Some of it has to do with economics. A lot of it has to do with economics. I don’t know. It’s a question I’ve never even thought about.”

If you were looking for a mind at work, this isn't it.
posted by zachlipton at 10:34 AM on December 9, 2016 [222 favorites]

poffin boffin, and that is exactly why I stopped watching the news the evening of November 8th. It's going to be a long, long four years.
posted by lydhre at 10:34 AM on December 9, 2016 [16 favorites]

19 Things We Learned from the 2016 Election
Goldman Sachs rules the world. The ground game is over-rated. The Electoral College is a ticking time bomb. A significant segment of the American electorate has always been waiting for an authoritarian champion and finally one came along. “Whenever it starts to seem like there’s no more room for Americans to polarize, something new comes up — in this case saturation of social media by fake news, along with a decline of the traditional TV networks and continuing distrust of the press”
posted by robbyrobs at 10:34 AM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

10 Crucial Decisions That Reshaped America

Together, these choices, combined with lightning flashes of luck and happenstance, added up to the biggest surprise in a year of shocks. Here, then, are 10 decisions that defined the 2016 campaign—and changed the course of American history

posted by kirkaracha at 10:35 AM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

I remember Obama's inauguration committee opening the mall up for bystanders in 2008 and 2012, not sure if anyone can recall if protestors were allowed? Or if anyone even tried to show up to protest.
posted by Slackermagee at 10:35 AM on December 9, 2016

i couldn't figure out why i was feeling nauseated every morning lately and then i realized it was from seeing the disgusting bloated vile face of the rapist-in-chief elect on the news every morning.

Huh. I thought my motion sickness was just getting more frequent and severe but the same place I feel sick (on the Metro) is also the same place I read the newspaper (well, the Express) so upon reflection this is a very real possibility for me as well. Thanks for mentioning it?
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 10:37 AM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

I've noticed a lot of people using various ways to avoid saying Donald Trump's name

We tried to avoid it in my house because we've got a four year old and I didn't want to hear him jabber about it. Alas, the environment at large eventually had its way with his brain. Even before the election, the four year old knew the name and the face. Didn't know who Clinton was, though. That says something about the media's balance.

Upside: without any prompting or hints from any older people, as far as we can tell, the four year old did perch a plush weasel on his head and declare that he "looked like Donald Trump now." I was sniggering, proud, and horrified all at once.
posted by Western Infidels at 10:41 AM on December 9, 2016 [42 favorites]

come on yellowstone caldera

~~BIG MONEY NO WHAMM-~~

BIG WHAMMIES, NO MONEY

That really doesn't work, either.
posted by zarq at 10:42 AM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

GOP Chair of the House subcommittee on Social Security just introduced a new bill to massively cut SS benefits: [tweets below from this thread]

--Most workers would see their benefits cut by more than 10 percent.

--Many would suffer even deeper cuts. For example, benefits to workers making about 50k would shrink by between 11 and 35%! 35 percent!!

--Some very low income workers get held harmless, but not all. Worker at $12k who only has 14 years of work history gets cut up to ~50%!!
posted by melissasaurus at 10:43 AM on December 9, 2016 [20 favorites]

I haven't watched the news since it happened. Even Parks and Rec reruns make too sad, at this point. The election arcs are...rough.

Otoh I'm reading a lot more books, so.
posted by schadenfrau at 10:43 AM on December 9, 2016 [18 favorites]

Obama orders review of Russian hacking in 2016 election

Next up: Trump sues to prevent the publication of the Russian election hacking report.

Or just to hold it up until the 21st, when he can cast it down the memory hole.
posted by acb at 10:45 AM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

I understand that outrage and despair are not everyone's cup of tea (nor necessarily the healthiest use of everybody's time) but to me they're a constant reminder that THIS. IS. NOT. NORMAL. and sanity still exists in the world.

Is it a bad idea to make "THIS. IS. NOT. NORMAL." into a thread tag?
posted by ZeusHumms at 10:48 AM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

Also I had a hard time with the last thread title because I kept rewriting it in my head as "He has neither the temperament nor the crayons ..."
posted by ZeusHumms at 10:50 AM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

"I haven't watched the news since it happened."

This. I've stopped reading the NY Times, The Guardian, Washington Post - papers I used to read online non-stop all day. Now, I can only take the news in small bites. Everyday there is a new dose of unpleasantness with each deplorable appointee. I search now for non-news and humor sites.

And so I'm reading more books too. I highly recommend A Man Called Ove. Also, I'm Judging You.

It's hard not to feel powerless.
posted by shoesietart at 10:55 AM on December 9, 2016 [19 favorites]

Six donors that Trump appointed gave almost $12 million with their families to back his campaign and the party

Together with their families, Trump's nominees gave $11.6 million to support his presidential bid, his allied super PACs and the Republican National Committee, according to a Washington Post analysis of federal campaign filings. One single appointee — WWE co-founder Linda McMahon — contributed $7.5 million to back his White House run before Trump selected her to run the Small Business Administration this week. She and her husband Vince were also the top outside donors to Trump's private foundation.
...
But longtime watchers of money in politics cannot recall any president in recent history who has filled a Cabinet with so many major donors. “In the past, they were a little hidden — they were sent overseas to be ambassadors,” said David Donnelly, president of Every Voice, an advocacy group that seeks to reduce the influence of wealthy donors on politics. “In this administration, they are going to be front and center making policy.”

posted by zachlipton at 10:56 AM on December 9, 2016 [23 favorites]

From the Trump transition team for Energy Department seeks names of employees involved in climate meetings WaPo story that martin q blank posted above:

The questionnaire also appeared to take aim at the national laboratories, which operate with a high degree of independence but which are part of the Energy Department. The questionnaire asked for a list of the top 20 salaried employees of the labs, the labs’ peer-reviewed publications over the past three years, a list of their professional society memberships, affiliations, and the websites they maintain or contribute to “during work hours.”

DoE national labs include Argonne, Brookhaven, Fermilab, LLBL, SLAC [Stanford linear accelerator], &c. -- all the major high-energy physics labs. What the fuck.

I want to see the APS & AIP scream about this.
posted by Westringia F. at 10:57 AM on December 9, 2016 [58 favorites]

...it reminds me a lot of how in Harry Potter people didn't say "Voldemort". And then I remembered how Dumbledore said "Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself" so you should just say his name.

A colleague of mine mentioned how That Name was being to justify and bolster the vilest statements of hate. He said, it's basically a racial slur.
posted by BrashTech at 10:58 AM on December 9, 2016 [12 favorites]

After another surreal week of things happening that I did not want to happen, here are some things I would like to see happen:

1. California serves as a model of progressive American governance.

The good new here is that Democrats regained their 2/3 super majority. I'll reiterate my earlier wish that California, together with other blue states, make good on their vows to stand up to Trump and offset any Trump tax cuts at the federal level with raises in state taxes. Disrupt another massive transfer of resources from the public coffers to the wealthy and their investment advisors by redirecting them to state governments where they can fund state-run health care programs, public education, public sector jobs, and other programs which benefit society as a whole.

2. Protest marches erupt around Inauguration Day.

And unify in a simple chant that echoes across the nation: TRUMP IS A CLOWN. It will get under his thin skin. It will flummox his supporters. And it is already becoming prophecy fulfilled. There was a pretty good On The Media interview with George Lakoff where he talks about the power of rhetorical framing. Keep Trump abnormal!

3. Democratic Party organizes for 2018.

To repeat something SecretAgentSockpuppet once said: the leftish party needs to find and train candidates. I hope Democrats are working on this.

I want Democrats to stand up fiercely against Republican hypocrisy in Congress and tie every Republican congressman to the Trump administration. I'm not sure they can do much else in Washington. Keep pushing the swamp creature talk. Make sure Republicans are held accountable for their failures.

And I want Democrats to aim to match or exceed their 2016 turnout in 2018. Impossible, yes. But make that the goal. Focus on that number. They've got a great ground game from everything I hear. Hillary did win the popular vote. Still, I think it would help rally the electorate to frame the problem around some big simple important number, like it was a high score in Pacman or something.

What will I be doing?

1. Keep following these threads.
2. Get at least one extra person who didn't vote in 2016 to vote in 2018 (and make sure the ones that did do). I'm in California so it may not make much difference nationally, but it could make a big difference locally with the super-majority on the line.
3. Contribute to organizations that work to counter the forces of Trumpness: Planned Parenthood, the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Sierra Club, my local NPR stations, the Democratic Party.

I'd like to think it'd be enough in a well-functioning democracy. So, yeah, probably not enough.
posted by bunbury at 10:59 AM on December 9, 2016 [41 favorites]

Here's my plan for revolution:

1. Get legislation passed which says votes are people.
2. Get further legislation passed which says votes become people at the point of conception.
3. Get further legislation passed which equates voter suppression with state-induced abortion.
4. Wait for life to imitate the end of Logan's Run.
posted by grumpybear69 at 10:59 AM on December 9, 2016 [16 favorites]

the son of a Hebridean

I've noticed a lot of people using various ways to avoid saying Donald Trump's name

Aye. I'm fed up of typing it in posts and seeing it everywhere, hence a minor aim of this post was to have his name as few times as possible.

The Hebridean thing is also because An Asal has been, is, and probably will remain a frequent talking point amongst Hebrideans; or at least the ones I chat with online (some of them old neighbors, and a few distant relatives). Knocking him is fine; there aren't many who have a kind word for him, especially after his disrespectful visit last decade. He isn't viewed as "one of us", and the general feeling seems to be one of mild embarrassment.

However, his mother is a different matter. His cousins are still getting harassed by journalists making the trip to Lewis on a frequent basis, as are the people in the local shops. While it's a small financial benefit for the local accommodation, car hire and taxi businesses, Hebrideans are extremely wise to the ways of the print media, after generations of being stung and stereotyped in the press. A confident prediction for 2017 is that at least one journalist sniffing around Leòdhas for a sleazy angle on Mary MacLeod (mother of the US President-Elect) is going to get the shit beaten out of him one night. It happens.
posted by Wordshore at 11:00 AM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

A little good news:

States Are Decoupling Their Emissions From Economic Growth—Federal Policy Be Damned

In other words: Our next president does matter, but the trend toward decarbonization will likely happen with or without his explicit support.

Analysis: What global emissions in 2016 mean for climate change goals

The Global Carbon Project’s results tentatively suggest CO2 emissions from fossil fuels may be showing signs of peaking. But in this tumultuous political climate, is it a trend we’re likely to see continue?

posted by Existential Dread at 11:00 AM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

DoE national labs include Argonne, Brookhaven, Fermilab, LLBL, SLAC [Stanford linear accelerator], &c. -- all the major high-energy physics labs. What the fuck.

Trump is probably working out a plan to achieve that coal fusion he's heard we're twenty years away from.
posted by peeedro at 11:02 AM on December 9, 2016 [16 favorites]

Six donors that Trump appointed gave almost $12 million with their families to back his campaign and the party

After all the nonsense Clinton dealt with about the supposed "pay-to-play" arrangements at the Clinton Foundation, this is just infuriating. People literally bought Cabinet positions with donations.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 11:03 AM on December 9, 2016 [101 favorites]

Well, this post puts me in the holiday spirit. *sigh*
posted by terrapin at 11:04 AM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

Yes but money is speech so they're actually just vocal supporters
posted by beerperson at 11:05 AM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

> The Hebridean thing is also because An Asal has been, is, and probably will remain a frequent talking point amongst Hebrideans

An Asal. That's absolutely class, that is how I will refer to him from now on. :)
posted by LN at 11:08 AM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

Tess Rafferty, ladies and gentlemen.
posted by pxe2000 at 11:14 AM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

If Dems/libs can't win on the Social Security cuts, I don't see any hope for anything else. Literally the fucking third rail of American politics.
posted by longdaysjourney at 11:16 AM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

Here's the report of the Social Security Chief Actuary on H.R. 6489, the bill the Chairman of the Social Security Subcommittee introduced today.

One of the most significant things about this bill is that it doesn't follow the normal pattern of "nothing will change for older folks, but young people will get screwed" that normally applies to such efforts. It starts phasing in a "new benefit formula" in just seven years from now. It would also keep increasing the retirement age, eventually to 69, and provide 0 cost of living adjustment for those with incomes above a threshold, and a lower cost of living adjustment for those below that threshold, starting in 2018!

And it would reduce taxes on high income earners, because why not?

This is fucked up.
posted by zachlipton at 11:17 AM on December 9, 2016 [59 favorites]

Josh Marshall has some initial analysis as well.
posted by zachlipton at 11:18 AM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Soon it will be remarkable when a bill DOESN'T include a tax cut on high income earners.
posted by Pope Guilty at 11:19 AM on December 9, 2016 [15 favorites]

One from Naked Capitalism:

"There is, in fact, some historical precedent for a president surrounding himself with such a group of self-interested power-grabbers, but you’d have to return to Warren G. Harding’s administration in the early 1920s to find it. The “Roaring Twenties” that ended explosively in a stock market collapse in 1929 began, ominously enough, with a presidency filled with similar figures, as well as policies remarkably similar to those now being promised under Trump, including major tax cuts and giveaways for corporations and the deregulation of Wall Street."
posted by Coda Tronca at 11:20 AM on December 9, 2016 [70 favorites]

Mainstream Media Puts Out the Call for Pro-Trump Columnists [are we still doing "real" tags? because believe it or not, this is real]

“We struggled to find voices that could advocate for Donald Trump’s ideas,” said James Bennet, the Times’ editorial-page editor. “It was really unusual. It didn’t help that the conservative intelligentsia lined up against him.” But Bennet says Trump’s campaign contributed to the imbalance: “He didn’t have the people around him who were prepared to put together his arguments” for publication.

Lynn Hicks, the Des Moines Register’s opinion editor, found a parallel at his newspaper, the largest in the swing state that wound up going for Trump. “Given that almost all of our Republican leadership in Iowa supported Trump, I kept waiting for [supportive op-ed] pieces to arrive,” Hicks said. “I’m still waiting.”

The problem is not, as NYT editor James Bennet suggests, that the papers "owe it to [their] readers to help them hear the voices that were supportive of Trump", but that our free press owes us a critical and objective reporting and analysis of the news. Anything else is propaganda.
posted by Doktor Zed at 11:22 AM on December 9, 2016 [33 favorites]

“He didn’t have the people around him who were prepared to put together his arguments”

I'm sure David Duke would be ready and willing.
posted by dis_integration at 11:26 AM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Any paper publishing fascist apologia framed as anything other than "look what these evil shits believe" should be shuttered and burned.
posted by Pope Guilty at 11:28 AM on December 9, 2016 [62 favorites]

Michigan Tries to Rush Voter ID Law through Lame-Duck Session (Project Vote)

Something to call about, if you are so inclined. I will probably call the governor's office if it passes, despite being from California, because yolo
posted by sunset in snow country at 11:30 AM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

I'd take some grim satisfaction in my near-retirement-age Trump-loving relatives getting screwed on their SS/Medicaid/Medicare, if it weren't for all the nice people getting hurt at the same time.
posted by emjaybee at 11:32 AM on December 9, 2016 [18 favorites]

Leopard-eaten faces for the members of the Leopards Eating People's Faces party, bleachers and popcorn for others!
posted by Pope Guilty at 11:33 AM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

are we still doing 'real' tags? because believe it or not, this is real
Regret to inform that "real" died on November 8, 2016, after a long illness.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:34 AM on December 9, 2016 [50 favorites]

"There is, in fact, some historical precedent for a president surrounding himself with such a group of self-interested power-grabbers, but you’d have to return to Warren G. Harding’s administration in the early 1920s to find it. The “Roaring Twenties” that ended explosively in a stock market collapse in 1929 began, ominously enough, with a presidency filled with similar figures, as well as policies remarkably similar to those now being promised under Trump, including major tax cuts and giveaways for corporations and the deregulation of Wall Street."

I'm surprised that more people aren't looking back to the Harding administration for what a Trump presidency will look like. I'm pretty sure this is the first I've read.
posted by indubitable at 11:34 AM on December 9, 2016 [15 favorites]

Also, some of the "saved" Carrier jobs likely to be automated away, the company admits.

Like all []'s deals, this one gets worse by the day.
posted by emjaybee at 11:34 AM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

I'd take some grim satisfaction in my near-retirement-age Trump-loving relatives getting screwed on their SS/Medicaid/Medicare, if it weren't for all the nice people getting hurt at the same time.

Hee hee. I called my dad's representative (Michelle Lujan Grisham, D-Albuquerque) to ask her to fight Medicare cuts. It was quite a different experience from calling Nancy Pelosi (my rep) - I talked to a human, gave her my name, and then she asked for my dad's name (!). I gave it and did not mention that he's a Republican who would be extremely annoyed if he knew I was calling.
posted by sunset in snow country at 11:36 AM on December 9, 2016 [22 favorites]

Last week Dozens of Members of Congress Met With Religious Right Pastors to Drive Satan out of Power in the Capitol.
posted by adamvasco at 11:38 AM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Mainstream Media Puts Out the Call for Pro-Trump Columnists

I was just going to post on this, because Brian Beutler has it right here. Early in the campaign, the networks, especially CNN, discovered that their normal panel of conservative pundits all despised Trump, probably because he doesn't believe in conservatism or something. Instead of putting that basic truth on air, the reality that many prominent conservatives opposed Trump and could frame that opposition in a conservative way, they went out and hired truly crazy people like Jeffrey Lord to show "balance" and pretend it was normal that basically their entire stable of commentators wouldn't defend their party's nominee.

And now print publications are doing the same thing, dragging far right voices into the mainstream.
posted by zachlipton at 11:39 AM on December 9, 2016 [59 favorites]

I thought we were all about choice?

Solution: Make the SS cuts voluntary and let the populace know that any money cut will be going to the rich for job creation and growth.

See how many Republicans willingly give up a sixth to half their retirement income then.
posted by Talez at 11:39 AM on December 9, 2016 [25 favorites]

"I'm surprised that more people aren't looking back to the Harding administration for what a Trump presidency will look like. I'm pretty sure this is the first I've read."

On my facebook page, somewhere around November 9th, I gave my predictions for a Trump administration:

1. Best Case Scenario: Warren G. Harding the Second
2. Worst Case Scenario: Greg Stillson from The Dead Zone

I'm actually shocked it took the actual pundit class so long to make the connection, because to me (as a professional history guy) it was glaringly obvious, but honestly I think most of the punditocracy considers any history that went down before their own lifetimes to be totally irrelevant. (It's not.)
posted by absalom at 11:43 AM on December 9, 2016 [29 favorites]

SSI already is too low. The current base rate is 733 dollars, with an upcoming COLA increase of 0.3 PERCENT which is an increase of 2 dollars and 19 cents per month. That starts Jan 1 2017. (Note in 2016 there was no increase)
Base benefits are what people with no work history get: your developmentally disabled and people born or end up with disabilities that can never work. On top of that people may earn retirement or SSDI which is based in the income you take in/what you paid in. Note MAX benefit is 2500 a month.

Most people with work histories get probably between 850 and 1200 per month.

This prices disabled individuals and seniors out of major cities already, which is where the medical care is. Its already a nightmare, COLA is already underestimated, and SSDI is taxed as income if the household income is above a certain amount.

Seriously, there has not been a significant increase in SSI in decades, and they want to decrease it?!
posted by AlexiaSky at 11:46 AM on December 9, 2016 [42 favorites]

Dozens of Members of Congress Met With Religious Right Pastors to Drive Satan out of Power in the Capitol

Didn't work. Trump is still President-Elect.
posted by Servo5678 at 11:46 AM on December 9, 2016 [29 favorites]

Interesting bit on Wikipedia regarding ~~Goldman Sachs~~ Trump's pick for National Economic Council Director, Gary Cohn's personality:

Critics of Cohn attribute to him an arrogant, aggressive, abrasive and risk-prone work style. They see his "6-foot 3-inch & 320lbs" as intimidating, as he might "sometimes hike up one leg, plant his foot on a trader's desk, his thigh close to the employee's face and ask how markets were doing" According to former Bear Stearns Asset Management CEO Richard Marin, Cohn's arrogance is at the root of the problem.

When you become arrogant, in a trading sense, you begin to think that everybody's a counterparty, not a customer, not a client.
posted by bodywithoutorgans at 11:46 AM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

I mean, as Farhi points out, the Times dragged in Glenn Beck and Erick Erickson in the name of balance and truly the best they could get is "is not Hitler." That's enormously meaningful. Shifting to even more right wing commentators hides the great big middle of those who are uneasy with the President-elect and don't stand for all this nonsense. If Glenn Beck won't say crazy enough things for your op-eds, why the rush to find someone who will?
posted by zachlipton at 11:48 AM on December 9, 2016 [16 favorites]

Mainstream Media Puts Out the Call for Pro-Trump Columnists

Have they tried looking in the Wall Street Journal editorial page?
posted by acb at 11:49 AM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Sad California politics news: the Field Poll, which started in 1947 and garnered great respect for their polls of California, is shutting down.
posted by zachlipton at 11:50 AM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

On a tangent: the spirit of our age is now available in plush toy form.
posted by acb at 11:51 AM on December 9, 2016 [14 favorites]

I don't know who these people are meeting with Trump, but they all have the same heads.
posted by zachlipton at 11:52 AM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

And now print publications are doing the same thing, dragging far right voices into the mainstream.

It's utterly amazing to me that pretty much no one in the American media is familiar with something Daniel Okrent (first public editor for the NYT, also the guy who created fantasy baseball) once pointed out : As Wikipedia put it in its entry on Mr. Orkent, it's called Okrent's Law and it states that "'the pursuit of balance can create imbalance because sometimes something is true,' referring to the phenomenon of the press providing legitimacy to fringe or minority viewpoints in an effort to appear even-handed. (link)

Notice that the news media only makes this extra effort in order to bring in voices from the right. Funny how that happens.
posted by lord_wolf at 11:53 AM on December 9, 2016 [54 favorites]

Yep, but now the darkest timeline has given us the worst public editor who says the truth usually in "the grays" and embraces "open[ing] doors to understanding" with white supremacists.
posted by zachlipton at 11:58 AM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

If only there were a way to raise the cap on SS taxes so if you made more than 118,500 dollars a year you had to continue to contribute to social security. If only! But as we know, that is a violation of the laws of physics itself, so we must not even deign consider it for else the Earth itself would crack in twain! Mathematics itself would be transformed into mac and cheese, and the human ability to comprehend sound would be perverted in such a way that at all times one would hear a never-ending loop of Fran Drescher's laugh beneath all other audible stimulus.

IT'S JUST SCIENCE PEOPLE! 118,500 is the highest available number to be taxed. You ignore this piece of natural law at your own peril.
posted by tittergrrl at 11:59 AM on December 9, 2016 [95 favorites]

An Asal. That's absolutely class, that is how I will refer to him from now on. :)

Tha e cho duaichnidh ri èarr àirde de a' coisich deas damh.
posted by Wordshore at 12:00 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Notice that the news media only makes this extra effort in order to bring in voices from the right. Funny how that happens.

You can see the geologic layers of conservative thought at the Washington Post. Their editorial section keeps bringing on new conservative voices while keeping the old ones aboard. They carry the entire spectrum of conservative thought from the '70s up to recently, from George Will to Jennifer Rubin, and will probably be adding someone simpatico with Trump without paying much mind to any strong progressive opinion writers anywhere.
posted by peeedro at 12:00 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

Good grief, even the guy who wrote Clinton Cash thinks Trump should divest himself of his businesses.
posted by zachlipton at 12:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

I don't know who these people are meeting with Trump, but they all have the same heads.

Blue Man Group's day job.
posted by kirkaracha at 12:04 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

I don't know who these people are meeting with Trump, but they all have the same heads.

I was in Team Gorgon, but having seen this, it makes a ton more sense that Trump is a hydra. Which only strengthens my resolve to kill it with fire.
posted by Mayor West at 12:13 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

I liked that tweet which suggested that Trump is assembling a council of Luthors.
posted by Pope Guilty at 12:15 PM on December 9, 2016 [16 favorites]

I'm actually shocked it took the actual pundit class so long to make the connection (with the Harding administration)

In fact the article making the connection is from Naked Capitalism, not the pundit class but one of the sites 'exposed' as Russian propaganda in the McCarthyite 'fake news' fake news story in the Washington Post etc.
posted by Coda Tronca at 12:16 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

> I don't know who these people are meeting with Trump,

Oh, just some skinheads, by the look of it. So, you know, nothing unusual.
posted by Westringia F. at 12:19 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

DON'T. NORMALIZE. HAIR
posted by beerperson at 12:21 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

On the lighter/stupider side of the news, Trumpists are promoting the Twitter hashtag #DumpStarWars because, they falsely claim, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story was rewritten and reshot specifically to "add in anti Trump {sic} scenes calling him a racist."
posted by Doktor Zed at 12:21 PM on December 9, 2016

ACLU just tweeted: ACLU National ‏@ACLU 17m17 minutes ago
While govt may choose public spaces for inaugural events, it cannot use permit delays to block access to all meaningful protest areas in DC!
posted by yoga at 12:23 PM on December 9, 2016 [19 favorites]

On the lighter/stupider side of the news, Trumpists are promoting the Twitter hashtag #DumpStarWars because, they falsely claim, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story was rewritten and reshot specifically to "add in anti Trump {sic} scenes calling him a racist."

@saladinahmed: reminder that STAR WARS is about a kid converting to a bearded foreigner's religion, joining insurgents, and blowing things up #dumpstarwars
posted by zombieflanders at 12:24 PM on December 9, 2016 [26 favorites]

Star Wars: Our evil space wizard bureaucrats are an allegory for how Nazis are evil.
[] voters: HOW DARE YOU
posted by emjaybee at 12:26 PM on December 9, 2016 [40 favorites]

I feel like we're all stuck somewhere between the mindset that once the facts of how horrible the Trump administration is start to become clear people will come to their senses and the still-dawning understanding that the people who supported him don't give a rat's ass about facts and may well live through his entire presidency in their own personal alternate reality, never seeing anything wrong that they can't blame on someone else.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 12:33 PM on December 9, 2016 [47 favorites]

Labor Secretary Pick Is Fourth Top Trump Figure Who’s Been Accused of Assaulting Women

And on that note:

The pastor at Trump's rally in LA tells the audience that Trump's WH will be a place "where men know who men are, women know who women are."

--@danmericaCNN

Just to put all the hate and awfulness in one comment, ESPN: Giants FB Nikita Whitlock: Burglars left swastika, 'KKK'
posted by zachlipton at 12:34 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

So let's see here:

- won't divest himself of his business interests which are mostly in direct conflict with his job description
- destabilized diplomatic relations with two countries
- his best cabinet choice thus far (mind you, best is subjective, but I stand by the characterization) can't legally hold the position he may be nominated for
- made racism mainstream again
- lies and lies and lies an lies so often that reporting that he lied is non-news

...aaand we're still six weeks out from him actually taking power.

When I try to imagine how the four years after January 20, 2017 will be, I'm honestly drawing a blank, because all I can come up with sounds like the first five minutes of a bad dystopian movie.
posted by Mooski at 12:35 PM on December 9, 2016 [45 favorites]

They're coming for Social Security too.
posted by T.D. Strange at 12:36 PM on December 9, 2016

Upside: dystopian authors and filmmakers now have a really obvious visual shorthand for "when everything started going to shit" and that's a picture of president Trump.

Historians, too, if there will be any left.
posted by lydhre at 12:39 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

dystopian authors and filmmakers now have a really obvious visual shorthand...

I have an inkling that selling visions of dystopia is going to be a bit like a futurist trying to make money predicting the existence of cellphones and laptops.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 12:45 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

God damn it, we should've let these fuckers go when we had the chance. How Trump and the GOP will try to turn the entire country into Dixie

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live in Mississippi or Alabama? Well if the GOP has its way, you’ll get the chance to find out.

That’s because Donald Trump and congressional Republicans, through the executive branch leadership now being assembled and the legislative priorities they have laid out, are preparing to take the economic, political, and social arrangements of the South and spread them across the country.

posted by kirkaracha at 12:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [14 favorites]

The big picture is that the current Social Security Trust Fund is predicted to be exhausted in the mid-late 2030s. So roughly in 20 years. People often refer to this as 'bankruptcy'. But that's not really accurate. At that point Social Security would only be able to pay 79% of benefits recipients will be entitled to in those years.

I wonder how many people even know that Social Security benefits are funded entirely by SSA revenues,not from the general fund, and that "bankruptcy" refers to the point where changes to either financing or benefits are forced, in order to remain in that position? The game is, of course, to appeal to the idea that "everybody knows" that the system is about to collapse, and that radical changes are needed at once.
posted by thelonius at 12:49 PM on December 9, 2016 [32 favorites]

On the lighter/stupider side of the news, Trumpists are promoting the Twitter hashtag #DumpStarWars because, they falsely claim, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story was rewritten and reshot specifically to "add in anti Trump {sic} scenes calling him a racist."

I thought we'd already established that people who refer to themselves as nerds are actually horrible fascistic trolls to whom the dominant culture caters endlessly regardless
posted by beerperson at 12:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

In fact the article making the connection is from Naked Capitalism, not the pundit class but one of the sites 'exposed' as Russian propaganda in the McCarthyite 'fake news' fake news story in the Washington Post etc.

Oh, is Naked Capitalism critical of Trump now? Because they certainly weren't during the election.
posted by maggiemaggie at 12:52 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

DoE national labs include Argonne, Brookhaven, Fermilab, LLBL, SLAC [Stanford linear accelerator], &c. -- all the major high-energy physics labs. What the fuck.

DOE labs also include Los Alamos and Oak Ridge, which, among other things, have a hand in doing environmental research apart from and in partnership with the EPA.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 1:00 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

that is exactly why I stopped watching the news the evening of November 8th

QFFT. RIP generalized belief of some good at all in corporate media. Can't even watch my Sam Bee and I loves me some Sam Bee.

Loved. . . . Argh. SO! *clap* "books" you say, eh? Where might one find a "books"?
posted by petebest at 1:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

I'm sure I'm being willfully naive, but I have to think trying to slash Social Security and Medicare is pretty much the one thing that could get old white people to turn against the GOP.

In every previous year of my life, I would agree with you, but considering that old white people (of whom I am one) were, many of them, just too fucking stupid, gullible, and hateful to vote against Trump, all bets are off.
posted by FelliniBlank at 1:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [20 favorites]

I'm not clever enough to write the full lyrics like some others here, but "son of a Hebridean" has me humming Dusty Springfield. So on balance that's a plus.
posted by Quindar Beep at 1:03 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

Upside: dystopian authors and filmmakers now have a really obvious visual shorthand for "when everything started going to shit" and that's a picture of president Trump.

MeFi's own cstross has taken a hiatus from near term fiction..
posted by ocschwar at 1:05 PM on December 9, 2016

Oh, is Naked Capitalism critical of Trump now? Because they certainly weren't during the election.

They're critical of everything. Which is fair enough if you write about politics and economics.
posted by Coda Tronca at 1:05 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

I have to think trying to slash Social Security and Medicare is pretty much the one thing that could get old white people to turn against the GOP.

And yet, here we are. Maybe it's the Lipitor. That stuff can not be good for anyone.
posted by petebest at 1:08 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

DOE labs also include Los Alamos and Oak Ridge, which, among other things, have a hand in doing environmental research apart from and in partnership with the EPA.

Also the JGI and NREL, which explicitly do research pertaining to biofuel.
posted by en forme de poire at 1:10 PM on December 9, 2016

Where might one find a "books"?

I thinks they has thems books at thems food library?
posted by radicalawyer at 1:11 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Angry T voters are going to turn away from him.
posted by stonepharisee at 1:17 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

So, I've been thinking a lot lately about the uniforms for the upcoming Patriot Corps - just brainstorming, really - and want to float a few questions:

- Confederate grey, or dark brown? The former is a logical choice, but the latter will hide blood stains better.
- I don't think we can pull off frock coats, but I hope tapered mandarin collars aren't too throwback. Neoreactionary cat fanboys will love it.
- Armbands! Can we get away with that? I'm thinking horizontal red/white stripes overlaid with a blue circle enclosing a single large white star - Would that be too busy? Limiting it to two stripes would be cleaner but that might look too Czech.
- Belts definitely, but no need to standardize on holsters or shoulder straps as I assume it'll be BYOW.
- Totally undecided on the cap, open to any ideas.
posted by CynicalKnight at 1:24 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Trump transition team: Rudy Giuliani "removed his name from consideration for a position" in the Trump admin.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 1:25 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

I'm sure I'm being willfully naive, but I have to think trying to slash Social Security and Medicare is pretty much the one thing that could get old white people to turn against the GOP.

Not if the GOP can convince old white people that the cuts have something to do with benefits being siphoned off by the Two Million Illegals Who Voted For Clinton.
posted by Fish, fish, are you doing your duty? at 1:26 PM on December 9, 2016 [15 favorites]

Trump transition team: Rudy Giuliani "removed his name from consideration for a position" in the Trump admin.

That is one impressively weaselly euphemism for "got the bum's rush." [golf clap]
posted by FelliniBlank at 1:30 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

and oh god I even hate the previously-totally-fine word "trump" now too.

I'm really nervous to play euchre next time with my Michigan friends; it sure is going to sort the good ones from the never-talking-to-you-again ones right quick.

I suppose bridge players have the same issue but with less geographical association. Way easier in that game to insist on "NO TRUMP!!" however.
posted by Joey Buttafoucault at 1:34 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

From the Trump transition team for Energy Department seeks names of employees involved in climate meetings WaPo story that martin q blank posted above [...] I want to see the APS & AIP scream about this.

...welp, this is professionally pretty concerning. I'd actually been worrying more about the NIH and NSF, since Argonne/Brookhaven/SSRL, the JGI, and the bits of the DOE that directly fund academic biochemical research (or biochemical ARPA-E initiatives) seemed comparatively small and esoteric for the incoming administration to notice, at least initially, but yay, another front to be terrified about.
posted by ubersturm at 1:34 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

The last time I turned on NPR was 11/8
posted by angrycat at 1:34 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

- Totally undecided on the cap, open to any ideas.

Completely misread that as "capes" and was starting to wonder what direction these uniforms were going to take.
posted by nubs at 1:35 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

I'm sure I'm being willfully naive, but I have to think trying to slash Social Security and Medicare is pretty much the one thing that could get old white people to turn against the GOP.

Not if the GOP can convince old white people that the cuts have something to do with benefits being siphoned off by the Two Million Illegals Who Voted For Clinton.

I'm expecting the GOP to turn it into a pity play, as sociopaths typically do: "It's time for us older, Real Americans (tm), to do the right thing for our kids and grandkids and accept small reductions to our own benefits to preserve these programs for the younger generation."

It won't be enough for them to just blame the "problem" on someone else, they need to also be thanked for "fixing it" and look like martyrs in the process. (also adds to their narrative of millennials being ungrateful whiners)
posted by melissasaurus at 1:36 PM on December 9, 2016 [12 favorites]

Notice that the news media only makes this extra effort in order to bring in voices from the right. Funny how that happens.

It's also so bizarre to me how pubs like the NYT seems to think that, what, they're going to lose readership if it's actually doing it's fucking job? The people who would clench their fists and froth over the NYT being "soooo biased I am DONE with them" are not reading the NYT, they're hate-jerkin' to Breitbart and TruePatriotz.falseflag.lizardpeople.us and reading about the rise in black on black crime and check out this ***SHOCKING*** video of a muslim teen beating up a christian teen for wishing him merry christmas instead of happy holidays. Like make no mistake they are not reading fucking David Brooks thoughts on trade policy.
posted by windbox at 1:38 PM on December 9, 2016 [43 favorites]

@jonathanalter
Giuliani withdraws from State contention. Note to press: Not his biz ties but that Rand Paul had the 2 other votes needed to block him.
posted by chris24 at 1:44 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

I dunno, [] being able to say "let's make a sacrifice" with a straight face seems out of character for him.

I would lean toward "I have no choice but to do this because of Democrats" because that's their standard line. And while Memaw and PopPop are always up for some hippie-punching, the fact that their SS checks are going to get trimmed while [] is at the helm might give them pause.

I mean, while it's wrong to underestimate the damage Republicans want to do and the mendacity they will employ, one defining characteristic of [] is that he, unapologetically and openly, screws over anyone he can. It's his thing. It feeds his desire to dominate.
posted by emjaybee at 1:45 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

Trump transition team: Rudy Giuliani "removed his name from consideration for a position" in the Trump admin.

Further details: The transition team released a statement saying that during their meeting with Trump on November 29, he said that Rudolph "The Fascist Asshole" Giuliani had "removed his name from consideration of a position in the new administration." CBS is reporting that the position was Secretary of State.

The transition team only got around to breaking the news today.

They may have accidentally left off Giuliani's nickname, tho. I helpfully filled it in.
posted by zarq at 1:45 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

and oh god I even hate the previously-totally-fine word "trump" now too.

In my wife's family's town in Japan there is a pachinko place with a gigantic towering sign that says "TRUMP! TRUMP! TRUMP!". It's not owned by or related to Donald Trump in any way, but its still weird /unpleasant to see now.
posted by thefoxgod at 1:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

The Electoral College is a ticking time bomb.

I thought it already exploded twice.
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 1:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

So, I heard this episode of BBC Trending [18m] that described how Duterte's social media campaign ran, and I found it informative and oddly inspiring.

The positive part of this story starts at around 10m40s. The whole thing is good, though.
posted by Coventry at 1:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

In my mind I'm not even sure what from the right means anymore. Like where are the sensible conservatives who want fiscal responsibility but not damage public service? They use to be around, and make decent arguments. You can be on the right and want tax increases, want to keep Medicare funded ect.

Those are the voices that need to be published and heard right now.
posted by AlexiaSky at 1:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

Not his biz ties but that Rand Paul had the 2 other votes needed to block him.

There is an ever growing list of people I never, ever, ever, ever thought would save us from ourselves, and Rand Paul is pretty high up on that list.
posted by anastasiav at 1:48 PM on December 9, 2016 [19 favorites]

Like where are the sensible conservatives who want fiscal responsibility but not damage public service? They use to be around, and make decent arguments. You can be on the right and want tax increases, want to keep Medicare funded ect.

Those are the voices that need to be published and heard right now.

They're in charge of the Democratic Party, and have been since the 90's.
posted by Pope Guilty at 1:51 PM on December 9, 2016 [52 favorites]

"Harding plus nukes plus Twitter" has been my working model for the past month.

Can't wait for "we're saving Social Security from a time where it may need to cut benefits by promising to slash benefits, also look at this tax cut for the millionaire you might be if you have magic bootstraps."
posted by holgate at 1:52 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

In my mind I'm not even sure what from the right means anymore. Like where are the sensible conservatives who want fiscal responsibility but not damage public service? They use to be around, and make decent arguments. You can be on the right and want tax increases, want to keep Medicare funded ect.

They were purged in 1994 when the Nixon coalition put a bullet in the brain of the remaining Rockefeller Republicans and fully took over the asylum. Then, as PG said, they became Democrats (see: Kirsten Gillbirand).
posted by Talez at 1:53 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

jesus christ people can we please just get over ourselves and refer to Trump by his goddam fucking name
posted by beerperson at 1:54 PM on December 9, 2016 [37 favorites]

jesus christ people can we please just get over ourselves and refer to Trump by his goddam fucking name

But that gives him power over my soy latte!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 1:55 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

Donald Trump’s Shiny Marxism
posted by T.D. Strange at 1:55 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

On my facebook page, somewhere around November 9th, I gave my predictions for a [Harding-like] Trump administration

Yeah, the parallels to Harding were clear even before the election. At least Harding eventually had the self-awareness to recognize that he was not fit for the job. I doubt Trump could do that, no matter how bad it gets.
posted by Coventry at 1:57 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

jesus christ people can we please just get over ourselves and refer to Trump by his goddam fucking name

Everybody has their own coping mechanisms. Cope.
posted by Mooski at 1:58 PM on December 9, 2016 [18 favorites]

Trump blasts early voting: ‘Many things can go wrong’

“They had that long early voting in Florida. It’s so long, and so many things can go wrong when you have that long period of time, right?” Trump told the Baton Rouge crowd. “That long, long, long period. Used to be you’d have a day, you vote. Now you’re going forever. Weeks and weeks.”

Trump said he was in Florida when he asked, “Wow, what’s happening over there?” at the sight of one line.

“I thought it was like a big movie,” he told the crowd. “They said: ‘No, sir, that’s voting. They’re voting.’”

Trump said they were “voting like really early.” “And we have to discuss that early thing,” he continued. “That’s sort of — so many things are going on. So many things.”

The president-elect, who continually suggested throughout his campaign that the election was rigged against him, added that he’s curious about what occurs when early voting precincts are “locked.”

“I wonder what happens during the evenings when those places are ‘locked,’ right?” Trump said, using air quotes. “But the Democrats were the people who’d say, ‘Donald Trump is criticizing the foundations of our country.’ Give me a break. Give me a break. Give me a break.”

Donald Trump is criticizing the foundations of our country. There, I said it.
posted by zachlipton at 1:58 PM on December 9, 2016 [49 favorites]

About Medicare... roughly 10,000 Baby Boomers turn 65 today. Tomorrow, another 10,000 turn 65. The day after that, another 10,000 turn 65.

That's going to happen every single day for the next 13 years. Nearly all of them are eligible for Social Security and Medicare (average 96%). If they receive Social Security, they get Medicare A coverage for free.

My mother relies on Social Security and Medicare to survive. I worry about her every time those assholes threaten to defund either program.

But I'm also almost hoping the GOP makes a concerted effort to attack it. Her generation has been promised that entitlement for their entire lives and many of them probably wholeheartedly believe it's owed to them. There is no way in hell they'll allow it to be taken away.
posted by zarq at 1:58 PM on December 9, 2016 [22 favorites]

(I mean, he's really not, because one of the foundations of our country was keeping as many people from voting as possible, but anyway...)
posted by zachlipton at 1:59 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

> In my mind I'm not even sure what from the right means anymore.

The American system works when there is a rational right and a rational left. It's assumed that those are given. That is no longer the case, so we should stop referring to them as the right at all. We should rebuild the right with rational people willing to argue a case.
posted by stonepharisee at 1:59 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

"Who would rather have it be Man of the Year?"
posted by nickmark at 1:59 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

There is an ever growing list of people I never, ever, ever, ever thought would save us from ourselves, and Rand Paul is pretty high up on that list.

I know exactly what you mean, that how I felt when I heard Orrin Hatch is going to stop the GOP from killing the Senate filibuster.
posted by joedan at 2:00 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

I've noticed a lot of people using various ways to avoid saying Donald Trump's name...

I call him Donald. I know he'd be irritated by an uppity woman using his first name and it feels good.
posted by apricot at 2:01 PM on December 9, 2016 [33 favorites]

jesus christ people can we please just get over ourselves and refer to Trump by his goddam fucking name

I'm waiting for someone to give him the ol' Frothy Santorum treatment.

What's the most disgusting sexually-transmitted disease on the planet? Ånything that makes your junk shrivel up and fall off?
posted by zarq at 2:01 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

and many of them probably wholeheartedly believe it's owed to them.

It is owed to them. And us. They (and we) paid the premiums on it our entire goddam working lives.

"We can never insure one hundred percent of the population against one hundred percent of the hazards and vicissitudes of life, but we have tried to frame a law which will give some measure of protection to the average citizen and to his family against the loss of a job and against poverty-ridden old age.

This law, too, represents a cornerstone in a structure which is being built but is by no means complete. It is a structure intended to lessen the force of possible future depressions. It will act as a protection to future Administrations against the necessity of going deeply into debt to furnish relief to the needy. The law will flatten out the peaks and valleys of deflation and of inflation. It is, in short, a law that will take care of human needs and at the same time provide for the United States an economic structure of vastly greater soundness."

- FDR, August 14, 1935
posted by anastasiav at 2:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [38 favorites]

This "Person of the Year" thing has him seriously tweaked, and it's horrifying that he's doing a damn applause-o-meter that basically asks people to stand in a crowd of Trump supporters and publicly shout out if they believe in being "politically correct," because there's no way their safety could be threatened by doing that.
posted by zachlipton at 2:03 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

There is an ever growing list of people I never, ever, ever, ever thought would save us from ourselves, and Rand Paul is pretty high up on that list.

Along those lines, I think Evan McMullin has earned the retirement of 'McMuffin'.
posted by ghharr at 2:04 PM on December 9, 2016 [21 favorites]

I don't know about the perfect nickname for Trump. Me and some friends have been trying out Orange World Leader Pretend but it's too long. But Sam Bee has labeled Pence forever with "Homophobic Race Bannon".
posted by Ber at 2:07 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

@chrislhayes: I try to recall individual parts of the Trump campaign, but it's all been replaced in my memory with this
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 2:07 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

@ShaunKing: Thank you to the brave hotel guest who filmed this hate crime taking place as masked white men terrorized indigenous men in North Dakota.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 2:08 PM on December 9, 2016 [16 favorites]

> The questionnaire also appeared to take aim at the national laboratories, which operate with a high degree of independence but which are part of the Energy Department.

My employer, like the DOE national labs, is a Federally-Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC). I expected the incoming administration to have an effect on our research sponsors, and potentially on my willingness to remain in this job, but I didn't think it would start before the guy's even taken the oath of office. Trump's shown almost no inclination to fill many of the positions beneath the secretaries that would normally be involved in this sort of low-level thing, so I figured maybe there would be some executive orders at some point that would change things...

But here we have the Heritage Foundation basically using the transition team as a proxy to shake down people who aren't even government employees. I've worked at my FFRDC for 12 years now, and I've never seen anything like this. We don't do anything related to environmental science, so we're probably not in the line of fire right now, but who knows what the next thing will be? Might be time to update the resume just to keep options open.
posted by tonycpsu at 2:14 PM on December 9, 2016 [15 favorites]

So BuzzFeed News posted a comment on Facebook from their official account telling Infowars/Alex Jones they're sharing a hoax: "Hey! We’re not sure what your corrections policy is…but this story doesn't appear to be true. Here's our reporting: http://bzfd.it/2ho3PA2." This could be interesting.
posted by zachlipton at 2:17 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Please save your outrage for the people responsible for the burning garbage fire that is our country, don't waste it on people just trying to survive said goddamn fire.

Oh and Giuliani is out because [] is looking at an Exxon executive for SOS.
posted by emjaybee at 2:18 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

There is an ever growing list of people I never, ever, ever, ever thought would save us from ourselves, and Rand Paul is pretty high up on that list.

Along those lines, I think Evan McMullin has earned the retirement of 'McMuffin'.

For all the problems I have with Lindsey Graham, he's another one of the few who seems to be sticking by his principles in the face of Trump.
posted by jason_steakums at 2:21 PM on December 9, 2016 [13 favorites]

But I'm also almost hoping the GOP makes a concerted effort to attack it. Her generation has been promised that entitlement for their entire lives and many of them probably wholeheartedly believe it's owed to them. There is no way in hell they'll allow it to be taken away.

Yes, they absolutely will, if the last thirty years of successful Republican hoodwinking and sleight of hand is any indication. You just find a way to blame it on the standard bogeymen: terrorism and brown skin and sinister foreign powers. It's stupendously easy.

It's tempting to think, okay, LET the Republicans make such a miserable fucking mess for the next four years that no one in the middle class could possibly mistake them for allies. It's tempting to think that the gutted middle class will begin to notice who's gutting them and where the money is going. But after 8 Nov 2016 I've made a little vow to myself that I will never, ever let myself be surprised by what happens to American political discourse.
posted by Vic Morrow's Personal Vietnam at 2:23 PM on December 9, 2016 [17 favorites]

beerperson: "jesus christ people can we please just get over ourselves and refer to Trump by his goddam fucking name"

Fine. President-Elect Asshole it is then.
posted by double block and bleed at 2:25 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

I wonder who they voted for???
In Depressed Rural Kentucky, Worries Mount Over Medicaid Cutbacks
posted by robbyrobs at 2:25 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

There is an ever growing list of people I never, ever, ever, ever thought would save us from ourselves, and Rand Paul is pretty high up on that list.

I know exactly what you mean, that how I felt when I heard Orrin Hatch is going to stop the GOP from killing the Senate filibuster.

Let us not forget the "Sarah Palin said something sensible" moment.
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:25 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

Along those lines, I think Evan McMullin has earned the retirement of 'McMuffin'.

Well I, for one, have always said it with affection, but alright, if you insist. I guess I can let that go for a goddamn patriot (in a good way).
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:28 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

"Hey! We’re not sure what your corrections policy is…but this story doesn't appear to be true.

It appears that the comment was deleted.
posted by Coventry at 2:30 PM on December 9, 2016

On coping with the results and what to do next: Chris Kluwe, former NFL Punter, Social Justice Advocate via the podcast, A Science Enthusiast.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 2:31 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Egg, I dreamed that we won the Electoral College.
posted by asteria at 2:31 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

Hillary Clinton won the popular vote: but they gave it to the Republican.
Al Gore won the popular vote: but they gave it to the Republican.
Grover Cleveland won the popular vote: but they gave it to the Republican.
Samuel Tilden won the popular vote: but they gave it to the Republican.

This is fun, but the 19th century Democratic and Republican parties don't map particularly well to the 21st century versions.
posted by Chrysostom at 2:33 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

(In my heart, he will always remain MeFi's Own Honorary Egg.)
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:34 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

It appears that the comment was deleted.

I still see it here. One negative reply so far.
posted by zachlipton at 2:35 PM on December 9, 2016

Along those lines, I think Evan McMullin has earned the retirement of 'McMuffin'.

Except he seems to be into it. The key to a good nickname is that someone else has to coin it and the subject has to embrace it, once that happens, it sticks.
posted by VTX at 2:37 PM on December 9, 2016 [13 favorites]

I just realized the last four times the electoral vote went to the loser in the popular vote.

Hillary Clinton won the popular vote: but they gave it to the Republican.
Al Gore won the popular vote: but they gave it to the Republican.
Grover Cleveland won the popular vote: but they gave it to the Republican.
Samuel Tilden won the popular vote: but they gave it to the Republican.

Mmmm. This comment makes me uncomfortable. Being a "Republican" meant something very different before the Dixiecrats split off in light of the civil rights legislation.

Benjamin Harrison (who beat Cleveland) fought on the Union side, alongside William T. Sherman, in the Civil War.

Rutherford B. Hayes (who beat Tilden) also fought on the Union side in the Civil War, and participated in the second Battle of Bull Run.

Cleveland and Tilden, in turn, were "Bourbon Democrats" in favor of big business, the gold standard, lower tariffs, etc.

The way you are using the term "Republican" is rather deceptive in context.
posted by Joey Buttafoucault at 2:38 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

To be clear, Harrison and Hayes were the republicans. And I don't mean to valorize them based on their military service; it's just that, at that time, if you supported the Union, you served in the Union army.
posted by Joey Buttafoucault at 2:41 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

I had no idea we had built our society so close to the edge of the abyss. I really had no idea.

I'm close to a number of people who have a significantly high level of clearance. And while they never even hint to the specifics of drama in any way, they very clearly have a level of knowledge about the precipice that we are on that I do not want to have. More than one of them indicated that most sane people, once they get the first briefing, have to go home and have a quiet freak out. Then it becomes everyday to you, and then when you realize that the high level stuff has become normal, you have another freak out.
posted by teleri025 at 2:41 PM on December 9, 2016 [44 favorites]

the uniforms for the upcoming Patriot Corps

Chaps, or it just ain't freedom, baby.

Awwww yeaaah
posted by petebest at 2:42 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

Trump said he was in Florida when he asked, “Wow, what’s happening over there?” at the sight of one line. “I thought it was like a big movie,” he told the crowd. “They said: ‘No, sir, that’s voting. They’re voting.’”...The president-elect, who continually suggested throughout his campaign that the election was rigged against him, added that he’s curious about what occurs when early voting precincts are “locked.”

“I wonder what happens during the evenings when those places are ‘locked,’ right?” Trump said, using air quotes.

Well, if someone in Florida actually did sneak into the locked polling places and rig the presidential election, then they either rigged it for you, sir, in which case your election was fraudulent, or they rigged it for Hillary Clinton, in which case they did a REALLY SHITTY JOB.
posted by Snarl Furillo at 2:42 PM on December 9, 2016 [36 favorites]

Fine, let's ban mail-in voting as well, especially for US military personnel posted overseas.
posted by holgate at 2:45 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

I had no idea we had built our society so close to the edge of the abyss. I really had no idea.

I get the sense that a lot of Americans are going to be waking up to this realization over the next few years.
posted by joedan at 2:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

Like where are the sensible conservatives who want fiscal responsibility but not damage public service?

Sensible conservatives of all stripes are busy drinking ourselves into early graves because we thought there were more of us.
posted by corb at 2:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [55 favorites]

Playing bridge is a bitch at this point.

"Two no-fucks."
posted by petebest at 2:51 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Are all our checks and balances really this partisan, that if the right monster comes at the right time, he's invincible?

Yes.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:55 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

I had no idea we had built our society so close to the edge of the abyss. I really had no idea.

This is the perfect time to revive my one-person musical about the Reagan years: "Bonzo Bigtime"!

The year was 1980, a young Caspar Weinberger is shooting pool with James Watt when suddenly- a song breaks out! "Hey ho Ronnie, I think it's gonna look sunny . . . "
posted by petebest at 2:58 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Making Sense of Mike Flynn

How does a man like retired Lieutenant General Mike Flynn—who spent his life sifting through information and parsing reports, separating rumor and innuendo from actionable intelligence—come to promote conspiracy theories on social media?
...
But the question isn’t whether Flynn is the right choice, but whether Trump will scope and define his job in the right way—enabling him to succeed. At JSOC, he reported to a commander who apparently demanded that he discipline his outbursts and empowered his subordinates to rigorously test his ideas. He performed brilliantly. At the DIA, by contrast, he ran his own show, and reportedly demanded that his subordinates validate his ideas. He was promptly forced out.

posted by zachlipton at 2:58 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

> Like where are the sensible conservatives who want fiscal responsibility

Serious question: what does "fiscal responsibility" mean here? Does it mean reducing the deficit? Does it mean not raising taxes? Does it mean significantly reducing government spending (second chart, spending as % of GDP)? When have Republicans shown on any of these measures that they deserve this label that they've chosen for themselves?
posted by tonycpsu at 2:59 PM on December 9, 2016 [24 favorites]

Oh, and Infowars has a story (no link to them) claiming that Hillary Clinton keeps wearing purple in public as part of an effort to start a Soros-backed Purple Revolution in America.

Come to think of it, that's not such an awful idea. Thanks Infowars!
posted by zachlipton at 3:01 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

personally I avoid saying the orange fuckwad's name because I don't think he deserves that level of respect, not because I'm afraid of it
posted by Gymnopedist at 3:01 PM on December 9, 2016 [14 favorites]

When have Republicans shown on any of these measures that they deserve this label that they've chosen for themselves?

On TV.
posted by petebest at 3:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Republicans, at the federal level, have never been "fiscally responsible." It's propaganda all the way down.
posted by melissasaurus at 3:03 PM on December 9, 2016 [20 favorites]

Ha, there are 7 likes on that Buzzfeed comment, and I'd bet at least 6 of them are MeFites.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 3:03 PM on December 9, 2016

jesus christ people can we please just get over ourselves and refer to Trump by his goddam fucking name

Yeah, damnatio memoriae comes after the tyrant has been overthrown, not before he's even taken office.
posted by Doktor Zed at 3:03 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

I'm sure I'm being willfully naive, but I have to think trying to slash Social Security and Medicare is pretty much the one thing that could get old white people to turn against the GOP.

Yup. That's why they need to do this before 2018. It's as urgent for them as ACA was for Obama, and they are going to use as desperate measures.
posted by mumimor at 3:05 PM on December 9, 2016

Fine. President-Elect Asshole it is then.

C'mon now, that's not very respectful. It's polite to refer to people the way they've asked you to. So President-Elect Pussygrabber, please.
posted by kirkaracha at 3:08 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

People, I have finally managed to connect to the phonebank tool for Foster Campbell (Democratic candidate for Senator of Louisiana). Turns out the script was in the tool the whole time (I didn't know! I've never done this before). It's daunting. I need you all to yell at me so that I am able to make some calls tomorrow. PLEASE.
posted by sunset in snow country at 3:09 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

Her generation has been promised that entitlement for their entire lives and many of them probably wholeheartedly believe it's owed to them.

its not an entitlement. and it is owed to us.
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 3:12 PM on December 9, 2016 [36 favorites]

{taps away on screen} Working title of the next election2016 post is currently

"Five weeks till the inauguration of President-Elect his goddam fucking name"

It may stay like that.
posted by Wordshore at 3:15 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

Yeah, how the fuck did stuff like SSI come to be known as "entitlements"?! Like I get why the right started calling them that, because they are fucking assholes, but why the hell do I see anyone else calling things like SSI or pensions or any other thing that you paid for an "entitlement"? Fucks sake, language matters.
posted by supercrayon at 3:16 PM on December 9, 2016 [26 favorites]

zarq What's the most disgusting sexually-transmitted disease on the planet?

You turned your memail off, and this is completely inappropriate to post here, so here's [pastebin] a possible answer. NSFAnyone/anything.
posted by porpoise at 3:19 PM on December 9, 2016

Yeah, damnatio memoriae comes after the tyrant has been overthrown

I was thinking recently that the Trumpreich may impose its own damnatio memoriæ on Obama. What's to stop official materials, schoolbooks and so on being changed to list Trump as the 44th president, directly following Bush II, with Obama relegated to “the occupant of the Whitehouse” during the “disputed years”?
posted by acb at 3:19 PM on December 9, 2016

"Five weeks till the inauguration of President-Elect [his goddam fucking name]" if you please
posted by rabbitrabbit at 3:19 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

C'mon now, that's not very respectful. It's polite to refer to people the way they've asked you to. So President-Elect Pussygrabber, please.

Herr Sexmonster Horrorclown.
posted by acb at 3:20 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

NY Mag: All the Terrifying Things That Donald Trump Did Last Week

Need a week in review? Are you not yet horribly sick to your stomach? Here's a summary of all the awful in one place. Please read slowly and take breaks; this article may be hazardous to your health.
posted by zachlipton at 3:21 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

President Shitgibbon
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 3:21 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

Is there any way not to do a derail of name calling?
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 3:23 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

President Shitgibbon

Alright, yeah, but that's too damn funny to be used on him. I can't even say that shit without snickering, and I don't want my id to associate smiling with that ridiculous taint biscuit.
posted by Mooski at 3:23 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

The Women’s March on D.C. Won’t Be Allowed to Protest Trump’s Inauguration at the Lincoln Memorial - Lisa Ryan, NYMag.com
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 3:24 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

personally I avoid saying the orange fuckwad's name because I don't think he deserves that level of respect, not because I'm afraid of it

Yup. I find myself using Mr. Leibowitz's name for the guy, Fuckface Von Clownstick.
posted by longdaysjourney at 3:24 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

So, Sam Johnson, the sponsor of the end-Social-Security bill "wrote" an op-ed in the Dallas News that just went online, in case you want to see how they're spinning this:

Here's how we can fix Social Security without raising taxes [warning: propaganda]
posted by melissasaurus at 3:26 PM on December 9, 2016

SSI is an entitlement, SSDI is not.
Regardless of what you pay in, if you are a disabled US citizen, you can get SSI.
SSDI and Medicare you pay into and have to pay into for ten years to get the benefit.
posted by AlexiaSky at 3:38 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

Yeah, how the fuck did stuff like SSI come to be known as "entitlements"?! Like I get why the right started calling them that, because they are fucking assholes, but why the hell do I see anyone else calling things like SSI or pensions or any other thing that you paid for an "entitlement"? Fucks sake, language matters.

Er, because they are literally things people are entitled to receive?
posted by dilettante at 3:40 PM on December 9, 2016 [12 favorites]

One deleted. Sorry, AskMe isn't the place to take side discussions you don't want to have happen here. And, some folks are annoyed by the "make up names for Trump" thing, so maybe let's not go a ton further in that direction -- chat's open if folks really want to riff.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 3:40 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Trump’s pick for Interior Secretary wants to sell off public lands: Rep. McMorris Rodgers’ nomination is more bad news in an administration that will be terrible on climate.

Donald Trump's Interior Secretary Doesn't Want to Combat Climate Change. Uh-oh.

FFS.
posted by homunculus at 3:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Zarc- only part A (hospitalization) and Part B (doctors visits) are free, for original Medicare which is an 80/20 plan.

Part D is pretty much never free.

Some people do get it paid for by state programs and such.

AlexiaSky, I'm intimately aware of all the numbers, thanks. My mom is on Medicare A, B, has just signed up for a D prescription plan and was recently hospitalized. I'm handling her paperwork and forms. Her only income is social security. She gets A free. She pays $104.90 monthly for B. It is not free.

We just signed her up for a "D" prescription plan this past Wednesday, for which she will pay a monthly premium starting in January. There is a cap and a donut hole gap on that plan. There were D plans available to her here in NY that had a very low monthly premium but offered limited coverage, a high deductible and low prescription cap. Not ideal, but within reach for some. In certain states, social security's Extra Help program allows access to zero premium D plans. Yes, you're right that there are a number of programs in various states that will cover the cost of B premiums or other medical costs. In NYC or state, they include medicaid and/or EPIC and/or Access NYC. Low income and limited to no resources are typical qualifications for those programs. Social Security offers "Extra Help" to cover some costs as well. NYC has an "Rx" discount card that offers virtually no help.

It is extremely difficult for people to live on social security in NYC with no savings or other income unless one is living in a facility. I assume that's true for most cities.
posted by zarq at 3:49 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

Yeah, how the fuck did stuff like SSI come to be known as "entitlements"

I heard it derives from something that's an old usage in common law. In an entitlement, one does not have to qualify for the benefit after entering a well-defined class (like being over 65). This is different from some benefit, say, unemployment, that you have to have an affirmative case for; not everyone who loses their job gets it. Unemployment benefits are not an entitlement.

So re-framing of what was basically a technical term to connote the negative sense of people who act "entitled" or who think they are, people who think the rules don't count for them, or that the world owes them a living, was done. Just by repeating it as much as possible. Entitlements. It's classic Atwater/Rove stuff.
posted by thelonius at 3:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [19 favorites]

Official policy of the United States of America is that science isn't real and everything works better if you privatize it. I can't imagine this will be reversed in our lifetimes. We'd best start adopting the Checkovian attitude of "we do things now so future generations can be happy" as we make our decisions because the current group in charge is only concerned about the bottom line right at this moment and screw the future.
posted by Joey Michaels at 3:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

Yeah, entitlement is something you are ENTITLED to receive as fair return on your paying in. It's something you are literally OWED. The fact that the right has apparently made entitlement a bad word is the REAL linguistic fuckery here.
posted by threeturtles at 3:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [59 favorites]

"Fuck you, future me, I've got mine now."
posted by Joey Michaels at 3:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [12 favorites]

Most government services you aren't required to pay for in order to receive. "Entitlements" are specific government payments that Congress doesn't have to appropriate for each year in order to be paid ... as long as the authorizing legislation hasn't repealed (or sunset, although no major entitlement program of which I am aware has a sunset), and there's enough money by way of tax collections and debt ceiling room, the government pays them automatically.
posted by MattD at 3:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

And, quite to the contrary of what some people are saying, an "entitlement" can be reduced or eliminated if its authorizing legislation is amended to that effect or repealed altogether, and there's no recourse at all.
posted by MattD at 3:51 PM on December 9, 2016

Sorry to break this up .... in theory, but not wholly in practice, the gross dollar amount of most entitlement spending is unlimited, because the authorizing legislation requires anyone who meets the criteria to have the benefit, and will often have benefit cost escalators based upon inflation, or just a requirement that services or goods of a specific character and quality be rendered (and thus implicitly requiring that spending rise to the cost of the goods or services).
posted by MattD at 3:54 PM on December 9, 2016

You turned your memail off, and this is completely inappropriate to post here, so here's [pastebin] a possible answer. NSFAnyone/anything.

THANKS FOR THE NIGHTMARES
posted by zarq at 3:55 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Henry Rollins on trump (starts at around the 23 min mark) also, THE RAWLINS!
I swear these threads are like being able to break surface after sinking deeper and deeper into a body of water.
posted by xcasex at 3:56 PM on December 9, 2016 [15 favorites]

"fiscally responsible" is just dog whistle for "won't spend your tax dollars on helping the poor or the marginalized"
posted by Gymnopedist at 3:56 PM on December 9, 2016 [27 favorites]

I'm not talking about technical legal definitions, I'm talking about the word's meaning. "The amount to which a person has a right." "A right to benefits specified by law or contract." Like most laws or contracts you probably find a way to nullify or change them, but that doesn't change the fact that one party met the conditions and now the other party is trying to back out.
posted by threeturtles at 3:56 PM on December 9, 2016

Zarq- you are right. Part b is only free if you are dual eligible for Medicare and Medicaid (the population I work with the most)
posted by AlexiaSky at 3:59 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Fiscally responsible" is just dog whistle for "won't spend your tax dollars on helping the poor or the marginalized"

Fiscally responsible is not wanting to spend my tax dollars* to help "those" people. But when my party's in power and can slide those dollars my way, spend away.

* Though this category includes lots who actually take out more than they put in. But they're not takers like "those" people.
posted by chris24 at 4:12 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

Yaaay! New election threa*uncontrollable vomiting*

You only have 75 more to go
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 4:13 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Amani Al-Khatahtbeh, founder of muslimgirl.com, was detained at JFK today for refusing to remove her headscarf "for identification purposes" (she's a US citizen and all of her photo ID is with her headscarf on). Story in this screenshot on Twitter. Separately, she shared her experiences of anti-Muslim bigotry in a video posted yesterday as part of Project Nur's The Secret Life of Muslims.
posted by melissasaurus at 4:15 PM on December 9, 2016 [21 favorites]

No Government Shutdown: Senate Democrats Drop Objections To Funding Bill

That means Congress will adjourn for the year with a final, familiar act: passing a short-term funding bill that will keep the government running for a few more months. This measure's funding runs out in April.

...With House lawmakers already back home for the holidays on Friday — and zero interest from GOP leaders to re-open negotiations — Democrats backed down in time to avert a midnight Friday shutdown.
posted by futz at 4:22 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Along those lines, I think Evan McMullin has earned the retirement of 'McMuffin'.
Except he seems to be into it.

You might even say he's lovin' it.
posted by indubitable at 4:26 PM on December 9, 2016 [36 favorites]

And that means they just passed the waiver for Mattis without a debate too. Great courage guys.
posted by zachlipton at 4:27 PM on December 9, 2016 [13 favorites]

This is fun, but the 19th century Democratic and Republican parties don't map particularly well to the 21st century versions.

That's true in more ways than not, especially socially, but they always and consistently been the party of finance and industry. In terms of economic policy, the Republicans have gone from "government should stay out of business except to subsidize it" in the 1870s all the way to "government should stay out of business except to subsidize it" in the 2010s!
posted by absalom at 4:31 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

I guess the upside of all this is that the immediate post-election suspense of "oh shit, what terrible things is this guy going to try to do?" is dispelled now that we know the answer is apparently "all of them." So there's still dread and, for too many, suffering and harm, but hey, no pesky uncertainty.
posted by FelliniBlank at 4:32 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

And, some folks are annoyed by the "make up names for Trump" thing, so maybe let's not go a ton further in that direction

Yeah, okay, but I'm keeping shitgibbon for myself, 'cause that's funny.

*cackle*
posted by Mooski at 4:35 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Like many here on MetaFilter I've pretty much given up on a show of force from any of the Democrats but I cannot understand why. There are plenty on the Right who act with passion and determination.

My personal head canon is the left is more susceptible to impostor syndrome. This also tends to explain why so many of us accept false equivalency; we're much more willing to consider the possibility we're wrong and we don't know what the hell we're talking about.
posted by Mooski at 4:39 PM on December 9, 2016 [30 favorites]

can we please just get over ourselves and refer to Trump by his goddam fucking name

Yes yes. Millionaire Sex Predator Donald Trump.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 4:41 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

I wish I had time to read this thread. Unfortunately, my wife's home-cooked posole stew and a late-night jazz gig are fast approaching. I had lunch today with an old friend, also an artist and a musician, and he said he went to bed thinking about a Trumpian future and woke up thinking about the same. Damn. It is increasingly true, that despite what Slavoj Zizek and other leftists say--and have been saying for-fucking-ever--that there is a revolutionary silver lining to this cloud...that this is not the case. With each tweet and cabinet appointment The Trump makes, I get more discouraged. What form our protest makes is up to the Magic 8-Ball, but if there is massive protest (and I promise that my body will be on the streets: prison is my retirement plan), I'll be there. I don't let this mini-dystopian future dominate my body-mind, but it sure is fucking discouraging.
posted by kozad at 4:42 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

that means they just passed the waiver for Mattis without a debate too.

No, they passed a pre waiver to the waiver. Essentially they passed a measure limiting debate on the waiver to 10 hours. It will still be debated and voted on.
posted by corb at 4:43 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

@PoliticsWolf Amazingly, GOP argued MI didn't need a recount because there was no evidence of fraud, while they push a new voter ID law to combat fraud...

Yes this has been a weird election cycle in that respect. There have been a number of different Republican leaders, including our own dear PEOTUS,crying voter fraud while other Republican leaders, including many Republican Governors, claiming there was no voter fraud. Yet somehow even thought the Republicans won this Presidential election, the idea that there was widespread voter fraud is being cited as the reason more voter restrictions need to be implemented. It's is just as though they want to have their cake but eat it too.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:43 PM on December 9, 2016 [13 favorites]

Mike Hot-Pence, the gay Mike Pence impersonator who wears only hot pants.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 4:44 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

Like many here on MetaFilter I've pretty much given up on a show of force from any of the Democrats but I cannot understand why. There are plenty on the Right who act with passion and determination.

I agree that this does seem like a worrying pattern in general but this case illustrates how tricky it can be, because I think the GOP would probably actually prefer to walk away for the break with the government shut down, gleeful to let it remain closed until congress reopens, consequences be damned if not outright anticipated. You can't really play chicken when the other side wants the head on collision.
posted by feloniousmonk at 4:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

If the Democrats in Congress put forth 1% of the effort Mike Hot-Pence is displaying and actually started building a broad public movement to defend Social Security, Medicare, and the ACA, I'd feel a whole lot better right now.
posted by zachlipton at 4:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [13 favorites]

Not that there will be any repercussions...Also, there are so many violations that it is almost impossible to pull a snippet from the article and do it justice.

Pro-Trump Group Blew by Basic Campaign Finance Laws. The America Comes First PAC did not disclose its donors before Election Day. And its top funder is banned from the securities industry.

“Basically they’re not obeying any campaign finance law whatsoever,” Weiner said. “That’s why we have disclosure requirements, because we want to see who is influencing the election and we want that disclosed in a timely manner so voters can make an informed choice.”
posted by futz at 4:54 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

And so now we can be clear: the Senate will just roll over on every Trump appointee without a challenge. Yay! *fuck*

Not far above these comments, there are reports from non-crazy people that it was sufficiently obvious that Giuliani would not be able to be confirmed that there was no point even nominating him.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 4:54 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

No, they passed a pre waiver to the waiver.

Yes, this is being spun on DailyKos as an actual example of Democratic spine. Apparently the Republicans intended to put the Mattis waiver in the bill, but the Dems said "go ahead and make our day." Realizing that they own all their own shit now the Republicans blinked and put in the pre waiver thing which makes it look like they did something, but actually makes no realistic difference, so they wouldn't have to follow through on their own threat.
posted by Bringer Tom at 4:55 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

Meanwhile in Arkansas....

A third newly re-elected Democratic state representative has announced himself a Republican, leaving the Dems with 24 in a hundred.

@PoliticoCharlie When Bill Clinton was first elected governor there, there were 94 Democrats in the Arkansas House, and just 6 Republicans

So what the hell is going on? Are people running as Democrats and then once they get elected tearing off their masks to show their true colors or are Democrats throwing their hands up in the air and joining the winning side? Any Razorbacks want to fill me in?
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:57 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

and oh god I even hate the previously-totally-fine word "trump" now too.

I'm playing in a D&D Amber Diceless Roleplaying game campaign at the moment (based on Roger Zelazny's novels.) One of the important fictional items in the game are cards with people and places on them, which characters can use to contact those people telepathically or to teleport to the places. These are known as trumps. So like 90 times per game session someone says, "I trump so-and-so" or "I trump to such-a-place" or "do you have your trumps?" or "Do we have a trump for that?"

We are in Australia, and it still got so that our dungeon master's wife asked us to play in a different room because she couldn't stand hearing that word anymore.
posted by lollusc at 4:57 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

Trump is now trying to sell "Inaugural Membership Cards" for $35+. But hurry--vote on the design by "11:59pm TONIGHT." There's always another scam.
posted by zachlipton at 5:01 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

The CIA has concluded that Russia intervened in the election to help Donald Trump win.
posted by EarBucket at 5:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [53 favorites]

Where's the shadow government when you need it...
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 5:04 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

So what the hell is going on?

Most of those 94 Democrats from the 80's would have been very conservative. Arkansas lagged the rest of the south by a few years in having their Democrats switch to being Republican without changing much of their ideology.
posted by honestcoyote at 5:05 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

The CIA has concluded that Russia intervened in the election to help Donald Trump win.

Some of the Republicans in the briefing also seemed opposed to the idea of going public with such explosive allegations in the final stages of an election, a move that they argued would only rattle public confidence and play into Moscow’s hands.

Why? Did Republicans actually think it would be improper for a government agency to make statements in the final stages of an election that could influence people's votes? That's crazy talk!
posted by zachlipton at 5:09 PM on December 9, 2016 [43 favorites]

OMG are the next four years going to be just a long string of late night advertisement money-raking opportunities?

But wait, there's more!
posted by Servo5678 at 5:10 PM on December 9, 2016 [13 favorites]

Why are Democrats such limp noodles when they get elected to Congress? I don't understand. Like many here on MetaFilter I've pretty much given up on a show of force from any of the Democrats but I cannot understand why. There are plenty on the Right who act with passion and determination.

This is an effect of the liberal filter-bubble. Having spent a good chuck of time over the last 8 years listening to AM talk radio and reading conservative websites, I've seen the other side say this about the GOP as well. They often complain about having circular firing squads and GOP weakness in the face of the discipline of the left.
posted by joedan at 5:15 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

The CIA has concluded that Russia intervened in the election to help Donald Trump win posted by EarBucket is worth a read.

Apparently, even when 17 intelligence agencies tell lawmakers that Russia is involved in messing with our electoral process in some manner it isn't enough to convince the Repubs. I guess interpreting Intel is now partisan too. Of course trump chooses to dismiss it out of hand because that would mean that he was not a clean Winner.
Fuck 'em all.
posted by futz at 5:19 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

>This is an effect of the liberal filter-bubble. Having spent a good chuck of time over the last 8 years listening to AM talk radio and reading conservative websites, I've seen the other side say this about the GOP as well. They often complain about having circular firing squads and GOP weakness in the face of the discipline of the left.

You really think so? Republicans have been really good since 2008 at moving in lockstep - they all seem to vote the same way on all important legislation, and they did a great job of keeping Obama from being able to accomplish many of his election promises. We'll see how the democrats do the next 4 years, but I have a hard time seeing them becoming nearly as unified in opposition to Trump as republicans were to Obama, and Trump is by any measure the far more controversial president. Where are Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi announcing how we're going to stand up to Trump?

Don't get me wrong, I kind of like that democrats in congress aren't all in lockstep - the behavior of the republican party has led to major dysfunction in congress, and I see no reason not to work with Trump if he proposes things that will truly help people, but you can't say they aren't damned good at it.
posted by zug at 5:22 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

Or, in other words, “liberals fall in love, conservatives fall in line”
posted by acb at 5:28 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

I think that we all tend to play closer attention to the day-to-day machinations of our party and as a result we tend to see our side as being chaotic and the other side as being a uniform bloc. For instance, Breitbart is currently losing it's shit about Trump nominating a pro-immigration Labor Secretary and right-wing Twitter is trying to get #NeverPuzder trending. But that sort of thing is usually invisible to us.
posted by joedan at 5:30 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

So Obama knew of Russian interference before Nov 8th and said nothing beyond a vague and unsupported accusation. No public pushback.

He knew of Comey's machinations and did nothing. And did nothing in response when it proved decisive.

It looks more and more like the post-WW2 world order has fallen, and it was due to a Russian information war where the US declined to fight back.

How long before Republicans openly acknowledge our new alliance/subservience to Russia?
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:31 PM on December 9, 2016 [12 favorites]

According to several officials, McConnell raised doubts about the underlying intelligence and made clear to the administration that he would consider any effort by the White House to challenge the Russians publicly an act of partisan politics.

I swear to g-d, Mitch you are the dickiest shitbag of fuck to ever pretend to be sentient. You are a fuckin' test man.
posted by petebest at 5:34 PM on December 9, 2016 [25 favorites]

So Obama knew of Russian interference before Nov 8th and said nothing beyond a vague and unsupported accusation. No public pushback.

Well, you have to admit that this is pretty scary. NOT

According to several officials, McConnell raised doubts about the underlying intelligence and made clear to the administration that he would consider any effort by the White House to challenge the Russians publicly an act of partisan politics.
posted by futz at 5:36 PM on December 9, 2016

What happened to No Fucks Given Obama?
posted by futz at 5:37 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

CNN Donald Trump's 'Celebrity Apprentice' deal may include money from brands

President-elect Donald Trump's financial arrangement with "Celebrity Apprentice" could provide him with a cut of the money generated by NBC's product integration deals for the show, a Hollywood source with direct knowledge of the arrangement told CNNMoney.

For years, Trump has received a portion of the revenue from the show's product integration deals, the source said. If that arrangement is still in place, it is now a potential avenue of influence for companies that want to get the ear of Trump and his administration, and presents a thorny situation for Comcast/NBCUniversal, which controls the deals.

TPM Maybe the Answer Is That He Can't Divest

Maybe he can't divest because he's too underwater to do so or more likely he's too dependent on current and expanding cash flow to divest or even turn the reins over to someone else.

Late this afternoon we got news that Trump will remain as executive producer of The Apprentice, now starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. That is, quite simply, weird. The presidency is time consuming and complicated, even for the lazier presidents. Does Trump really need to do this? Can he do it, just in terms of hours in the day? Of course, it may simply be a title that entitles him to draw a check. But does he need the check that bad?

Josh Marshall speculates in that second link that perhaps the reason Trump sold all of his stock in June (and did not tell anyone) was NOT because he thought he was going to be president (he clearly thought he wasn't) but because he had loaned $50 million to his campaign and could not get any major donors to contribute until he forgave that loan. His stock portfolio was estimated to be worth around $38 million.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:39 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

Whoa—chant of "lock her up!" from the crowd, Trump replies: "That plays great before the election – now we don’t care"

The Leopards Eating People's Faces party bit gets ever more accurate every day with this guy. Part of eschewing political correctness apparently includes telling us exactly in what ways he's a hypocrite, and nobody cares.
posted by zachlipton at 5:39 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

The difference between the Dems and Repubs is the Repubs fight dirty. The Dems don't want to fuck people over all the way-- they'll blink.
posted by blnkfrnk at 5:40 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

According to several officials, McConnell raised doubts about the underlying intelligence and made clear to the administration that he would consider any effort by the White House to challenge the Russians publicly an act of partisan politics.

[...]

McConnell’s office did not respond to a request for comment. After the election, Trump chose McConnell’s wife, Elaine Chao, as his nominee for transportation secretary.

This is fine.
posted by jason_steakums at 5:41 PM on December 9, 2016 [14 favorites]

He backed down from Mitch McConnell, that makes it worse. He could've released the underlying intelligence. Could've trotted out Brennan and Carter and Kerry to make the case. Fired Comey on the spot.

This was a choice between Trump/Russia executing regime change in the US, and Mitch McConnell whining on FOX News.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:41 PM on December 9, 2016 [12 favorites]

The CIA shared its latest assessment with key senators in a closed-door briefing on Capitol Hill last week, in which agency officials cited a growing body of intelligence from multiple sources. Agency briefers told the senators it was now “quite clear” that electing Trump was Russia’s goal, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters.

Миссия выполнена.

Some of the Republicans in the briefing also seemed opposed to the idea of going public with such explosive allegations in the final stages of an election . . .

DID THEY.
posted by petebest at 5:44 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

An interesting observation from Gelman's 19 things post:

Republicans have done better among rich voters than among poor voters in every election since the dawn of polling, with the only exceptions being 1952, 1956, and 1960, which featured moderate Republican Dwight Eisenhower and then moderate Democrat John Kennedy. Typically the upper third of income votes 10 to 20 percentage points more Republican than the lower third. This was such a big deal that my colleagues and I wrote a book about it! (http://press.princeton.edu/titles/9030.html) But 2016 was different. For example, here are the exit polls (http://www.cnn.com/election/results/exit-polls): Clinton won 53 percent of the under-$30,000 vote and 47 percent of those making over $100,000, a difference of only 6 percentage points, much less than the usual income gap. And we found similar minimal income-voting gradients when looking at other surveys. Will the partisan income divide return in future years?

posted by Coventry at 5:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Besides the Congressional aspects, one of the important things in the WaPo story is the CIA's conclusion that Russia sought to elect Trump, rather than merely spread FUD and cast doubt on the integrity of the process. Both are certainly plausible goals, but the former is even more alarming.
posted by zachlipton at 5:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Whoa—chant of "lock her up!" from the crowd, Trump replies: "That plays great before the election – now we don’t care"

The Leopards Eating People's Faces party bit gets ever more accurate every day with this guy. Part of eschewing political correctness apparently includes telling us exactly in what ways he's a hypocrite, and nobody cares.

i mean ideally he'll be torn to pieces by his own furious screaming former supporters and we can get on with life and sanity
posted by poffin boffin at 5:49 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

In the 60s people though Red Dawn would come from airships and troop carriers landing on the beaches of California.

It actually came from the Republican Party deciding en mass to hand over control of the country to a puppet president in exchange for tax cuts.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:49 PM on December 9, 2016 [47 favorites]

I still looking forward with some interest to DJT's next press conference which is supposed to be held December 15. Back when he first talked about it the agenda was going to be his big announcement that he was turning his entire business over to his children to run. Only things have changed quickly in Trumpland. Ivanka appears to be moving to Washington DC and taking on the role of First Lady which means she will not have time to run his business. Also he has this new side gig as Executive Producer on the Apprentice. I wonder if he will cancel the press conference or make some other announcement-- like naming his SOS nominee or talking up his big plans for Inauguration Day.

Yeah it is alarming that Russia wants Trump to be President because we have to ask ourselves, why? Is it because Putin has outstanding loans he can hold over Trump's head? Blackmail material? Or simply because he believes that Trump is way over his head and clueless?
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:49 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Surely this? I mean, I know the football is going to inevitably be yanked away from me, but surely? this?

Or is this the republican master plan? Trump gets elected, Russian ties get traction, they impeach him? Come on. Throw me a fucking bone.
posted by lydhre at 5:50 PM on December 9, 2016

This was a choice between Trump/Russia executing regime change in the US, and Mitch McConnell whining on FOX News.

To be fair, this was a proper and right attempt to face a perceived threat to our democracy with bipartisan consultation and support. It was of the utmost importance to Obama that the situation be handled in an orderly, considered and united fashion, because to blow it up so close to election day would be seen to be unfairly supporting Clinton, leading to somewhat more based accusations of rigging from the candidate with - at best - a 23% chance of winning.

Okay. He haz a regret.
posted by petebest at 5:52 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

There is no bone.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 5:53 PM on December 9, 2016

'I never thought the leopard might NOT really care about eating her face,' sobs woman who voted for the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party.
posted by zachlipton at 5:57 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

The 18 year old Muslim woman who was harassed on the subway last week has been missing for two days. :(
posted by melissasaurus at 5:57 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

Donald Trump's still talking about Evan McMullin...
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 5:58 PM on December 9, 2016

Keep in mind that the Congressional briefing was in September, before the race tightened in the great October shift to Trump. President Obama and everyone else were looking at the same polls as the Clinton campaign and surely thought Trump had little chance at that point.
posted by zachlipton at 6:00 PM on December 9, 2016

Yeah it is alarming that Russia wants Trump to be President

Ahh bupbupbup bup- hold on. That's not what's being said in that article. What's being said is: Russian state-sponsored hackers deliberately broke into state voter registration systems and the DNC servers to ensure victory for Donald Turdfungus.

The link to the hacks is clear. The link from the Kremlin to WikiLeaks is clear. The intent is clear. And GOP complicity is clear.

Yes, they do want him to be elected - AND . . . They made it happen. That's what the article is saying.
posted by petebest at 6:01 PM on December 9, 2016 [18 favorites]

@JuddLegum 3. If you are a corp or foreign gov't seeking to send $ to Trump, you can 1. Stay at his hotel 2. Buy ad on Apprentice 3. Rent office space

This is what happens when you elect a business opportunist (I won't call him a businessman) with no experience in government. I have no doubt that DJT thinks all these things are fine and the President can do no wrong because he is the Boss of Everything. I'm sure he sees absolutely no problem with the Bahraini monarchy renting rooms at the Old Post Office to throw a birthday party for their country. Why shouldn't they spend money at his place of business?!

The 18 year old Muslim woman who was harassed on the subway last week has been missing for two days.

Jesus. I'm hoping she is hiding out at a friend's house ("She was wearing a black jacket, black head scarf, black yoga pants and was carrying a bag of clothes, police said.")
I've been thinking that maybe it is time for a National Scarf Day.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

Or is this the republican master plan? Trump gets elected, Russian ties get traction, they impeach him? Come on. Throw me a fucking bone.

It certainly makes the transition clusterfuck make a more sense... no "draining the swamp", no divesting, weird shit like meeting with Al Gore on climate change and then turning around and nominating a lump of coal to head the EPA (in the words of Keeping it 1600), Pence taking more security briefings than Trump... if Reince and the traditional Republican faction are sitting back and not even bothering to stop Trump from doing all this ridiculous shit while they load up appointments because they know the plan, it all makes a lot more sense.
posted by jason_steakums at 6:04 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

Why are Democrats such limp noodles when they get elected to Congress? I don't understand. Like many here on MetaFilter I've pretty much given up on a show of force from any of the Democrats but I cannot understand why.

I think what chris24 was trying to tell me yesterday in the argument about George McGovern is that they think they're not going to be electable if they seem too progressive. Whether the "McGovern lost because he was a progressive" narrative is true or not, if the mainstream Democrats of the time believed that it does explain their seemingly cowardly betrayal of progressive values.
posted by Coventry at 6:07 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Keep in mind that the Congressional briefing was in September, before the race tightened in the great October shift to Trump.

That's when there were public calls for information including Harry Reid's letter to Comey. This is based on what that information was, which was presented last week.

The CIA shared its latest assessment with key senators in a closed-door briefing on Capitol Hill last week, in which agency officials cited a growing body of intelligence from multiple sources.
posted by petebest at 6:11 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

@SopanDeb Trump in MI: "We’re gonna start saying Merry Christmas again...I think [department stores] are gonna start putting up Merry Christmas."

From the transcript of his speech: How about those Department stores? They have the bells and they have the red walls and they have the snow but they don't have Merry Christmas. I think they are going to start putting up Merry Christmas.

I'm sure this makes perfect sense to his fans but to me it sounds like gibberish. They have red walls but they don't have Merry Christmas? Is he talking about signs? Is he talking about greeters? Then he says he thinks they are going to start putting up Merry Christmas presumably because he got elected. You know what I think? I think the next time his fans are in a store they are going to look around and see signs that say "Merry Christmas" and think it was due to Donald Trump being made President.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:12 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

I think it's a clusterfuck of complicity

Agreed. The GOP leadership is complicit in the Russian scheme to steal the election for Trump. That is Clusterfucked-Up. And almost certainly unethical. Possibly illegal. Maybe damnable.
posted by petebest at 6:18 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

I overheard two Trump voting coworkers, one of whom has let slip with some nasty casual racism before, talking privately today about how they want to make a point to say happy holidays and find a respectful alternative to a stocking on the office door for a third coworker who doesn't celebrate Christmas... If the War on Christmas shit doesn't get traction with them in private that really makes it seem even more like a social signaling thing intended to piss off liberals than a deeply held belief.
posted by jason_steakums at 6:19 PM on December 9, 2016 [12 favorites]

I don't buy the "master plan" argument. I think it's a clusterfuck of complicity: the GOP congressional leadership has its tax cuts / fuck-the-poor promised land in sight, and the means justify the end, even if the means were supplied by a charlatan and a foreign power.

People want to believe in the GOP master plan for the same reason people believe in the Illuminati and what not -- otherwise our world is a horrifying, meandering shitshow that would be hilarious if it were a cinematic satire. But, it is not a cinematic satire.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 6:20 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

That's when there were public calls for information including Harry Reid's letter to Comey. This is based on what that information was which was presented last week.

Sorry, I didn't make my point very clearly. What I meant was that people, President Obama, Congressional Dems, etc..., thought they didn't need to make a giant public outcry about Russian interference because they thought the election was essentially over anyway, and based on the polls it was. It was only as a result of the October shift that things changed.

Or as I see @nycsouthpaw just sort of made my point for me:

The thing no one will say--from NBC to the WH--is they didn't tell the people what they knew bc they thought the election was in the bag.
A whole lot of people didn't take risks to make disclosures about Trump because it was easier not to and every model said Clinton would win.
charitable read of Comey's conduct: Trump was gonna lose and he didn't want to catch a bunch of shit from his oversight committees after.

posted by zachlipton at 6:20 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

So Obama knew of Russian interference before Nov 8th and said nothing beyond a vague and unsupported accusation.

In fairness to him, pretty much everyone had stopped believing CIA intelligence was worth the paper it was written on by the turn of the century, but they have a pretty good track record when it comes to manipulating elections. If it had come out that Obama had discredited Trump on the basis of a CIA claim, it would have further damaged the legitimacy of the US ruling elite, including Clinton.

I mean, I still don't believe it. The publicly available evidence shows only that someone with access to the earlier fancy/cozy/whatever-bear hacking artifacts was involved. That is at least as plausibly explained by the same Russian hackers moonlighting independently of Russia-the-state, or someone who's forensically examined the earlier hacks who wants to pin it on the Russians.
posted by Coventry at 6:20 PM on December 9, 2016

Large business are going to stay with the generic "Happy Holidays". The election of Dumbfuck isn't going to change this. The businesses who always used Merry Xmas (mom and pops who benefit from pro 'Murika consumers will continue on doing so as is their right) will crow this as a victory but larger stores are not going to alienate any potential customer by insisting their employees use Merry Xmas. Sorry trump voters who care about stupid shit like this, almost everywhere you go, Happy Holidays will prevail and I hope that it gets on your last nerve.
posted by futz at 6:26 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

The other interesting question is who gave this story to the Post. Seems like it's either intelligence folks, the White House, or Congressional Democrats. It's a pretty huge leak.

The problem is that it's reasonably likely much of the intelligence relies on intercepted communications we'll never ever see, so there simply won't be enough publicly available evidence, whether the classified evidence is the real deal or Iraq-level nonsense.
posted by zachlipton at 6:28 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

In Neo-Soviet Russia, election fucks you?
posted by vrakatar at 6:29 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

If there were clear evidence of Russian interference to the point that it was like, impeach or face electoral backlash in the next non-fucked-with election, Republicans will go even harder on ramming a Ryan agenda through for fear that they've already lost the confidence of the electorate anyways so why not.
posted by jason_steakums at 6:30 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

Yeah it is alarming that Russia wants Trump to be President because we have to ask ourselves, why? Is it because Putin has outstanding loans he can hold over Trump's head? Blackmail material? Or simply because he believes that Trump is way over his head and clueless?

That's the million dollar question. You're Russia, your wildest plan improbably succeeded, and you now have a direct line to, if not outright control over the incoming POTUS. What now? They can't move too overtly and risk a big enough public outcry to trigger impeachment, so a nuclear launch of our own weapons against us probably not a concern, but Trump will leave them free to reconquer all of Syria for Assad, and he may redirect our forces to help them. And more "fights against terrorism" in the Middle East will come at Russia's direction and serve their interests, not whatever ours were before 11/8/16.

More broadly, they're clearly trying to engineer the breakup of NATO and the EU, supporting and hacking on behalf of similarly aligned right wing parties in at least France, Italy, Germany, Hungary, Poland and possibly the UK. The most logical immediate goal is to regain control of territory lost in the breakup of the USSR. They're poised for a broader invasion of Ukraine. They could easily move to retake the Baltic states and Georgia once the NATO guarantee is gone. Then what? What does Putin want if all his immediate plans come to fruition, because they're well on track to do so.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:32 PM on December 9, 2016 [15 favorites]

Blackmail material?
member Kompromat? Sure, I member.
posted by vrakatar at 6:38 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

More Americans Look to Congressional Democrats Than to Trump for Solutions

The headline is a bit misleading: Republicans split their choice between Congressional Republicans and Trump, while Dems didn't split. But:

Finally, a resounding 80 percent said Washington should prioritize “protecting Medicare and Social Security from any reductions to ensure those who paid a contribution receive their promised benefits,” while just 16 percent wanted greater emphasis on “reducing Medicare and Social Security benefits for upper-income seniors to help reduce the federal deficit.” Those numbers varied little across any demographic group—though Trump voters were even more resistant than Clinton supporters to cuts in the giant entitlement programs for the elderly, the poll found.

The most logical immediate goal is to regain control of territory lost in the breakup of the USSR.

. . . After destroying the dollar and maybe some military horsie games. First things first. The market's up, the Western banks are back - and Trump's love, money, is held in Ghina anyway. He won't care when the banks take it in the nuts to start the show.

Did we mention he's easily manipulated and an idiot?

2017 is gonna make 2016 look like 2011, man!
/Flashback®
posted by petebest at 6:42 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Oh my (my transcription, blame me for typos):

Transition Statement On Claims Of Foreign Interference In U.S. Elections

(New York, NY) - These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. The election ended a long time ago in one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history. It's now time to move on and "Make America Great Again."

Anyone want to bet we'll see some tweets tonight? It's Friday night...
posted by zachlipton at 6:44 PM on December 9, 2016

This is why he's not taking intelligence briefings.

He's getting them from Russia.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [20 favorites]

The failure of Democrats to successfully brand Republicans as "the party dedicated to cutting Social Security and Medicare" this election cycle is an enormous failure. That should have been a national message throughout the entire campaign. If we had run on that, even if the election results didn't change at all, we could have forced every Republican up for re-election to state a position on protecting these programs, and we could have gotten more Republicans in close races to promise no cuts.

I'm sorry but were you in a coma through 2016, zach? Paul Ryan was trying to hawk the Congressional Republican plans to rip the guts out of every entitlement program that exists. Nobody gave a flying fuck. Ryan couldn't even get it out to the base little alone anyone with someone in the media noticing and being able to give it some traction. There was just a veritable firehouse of sewage coming out of this election campaign. A turd like that is just another part of the stream.
posted by Talez at 6:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

Oh we'll definitely get some tweets tonight, but I wonder what ridiculous 3 am Sunday morning tweets we'll get to distract the Sunday talk shows and set this week's news agenda!
posted by jason_steakums at 6:48 PM on December 9, 2016

Think about this, Trump can now harness the NSA's complete information awareness, with known hacking of German politicians including Merkel for example, to help Russia influence German and French elections next year.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:50 PM on December 9, 2016

I mean, I'm not sitting here thinking there's a GOP master plan but I find myself sitting here hoping that the GOP has a master plan. Because I have not yet become numb to the fact that Trump might actually be inaugurated. Trump! Inaugurated! This is the fucking Upside Down.
posted by lydhre at 6:51 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

Oh we'll definitely get some tweets tonight, but I wonder what ridiculous 3 am Sunday morning tweets we'll get to distract the Sunday talk shows and set this week's news agenda

Is there a website that saves all his tweets?
posted by futz at 6:51 PM on December 9, 2016

We're so fucked.
posted by Talez at 6:51 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

This is the fucking Upside Down.

Keep an eye on christmas lights this year. They might be trying to tell us something!
posted by futz at 6:54 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

futz: @RealRealDonaldT replicates all the tweets which are presumed to come from him personally.
posted by Coventry at 6:55 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

From tonight's speech in Grand Rapids -

@nwarikoo: Trump thanks blacks for not voting: "We've forgotten about the inner cities. No longer. And the African American community was great to us. They came though bigly, bigly. And frankly, if they had any doubt, the didn't vote, and that was almost as good. Because a lot of people didn't show up, because they felt good about me."

He is such a fucking cretin. Evil, yes, but mind-blowingly stupid to boot.
posted by bibliowench at 6:57 PM on December 9, 2016 [52 favorites]

Transition Statement On Claims Of Foreign Interference In U.S. Elections

(New York, NY) - These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. The election ended a long time ago in one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history. It's now time to move on and "Make America Great Again."

There's no actual denial in here at all.
posted by theodolite at 6:58 PM on December 9, 2016 [26 favorites]

I guess that I should have specified that I am interested in a non twitter platform; a good old fashioned website. Maybe corrupt.af does this.
posted by futz at 6:59 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Make America Russian again for the first time? Is this enough to sway some electors maybe?
posted by vrakatar at 7:00 PM on December 9, 2016

The election ended a long time ago

The election hasn't actually ended. Or, in strictly constitutional terms, begun.
posted by holgate at 7:00 PM on December 9, 2016 [20 favorites]

Who but the Trump transition would protect Russia by attacking our own government?
posted by zachlipton at 7:01 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

The election ended a long time ago in one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history

Trump's Victory Ranks 46 of 58 in Electoral College Share
posted by kirkaracha at 7:03 PM on December 9, 2016 [19 favorites]

On Friday, the White House said President Obama had ordered a “full review” of Russian hacking during the election campaign, as pressure from Congress has grown for greater public understanding of exactly what Moscow did to influence the electoral process.

Whatever it is, has been known by some people for months. Many who no doubt expected the intelligence would become essentially academic after the election.

Within the administration, top officials from different agencies sparred over whether and how to respond. White House officials were concerned that covert retaliatory measures might risk an escalation in which Russia, with sophisticated cyber capabilities, might have less to lose than the United States, with its vast and vulnerable digital infrastructure.

What retaliatory measures?! The Turdfungus was elected! What, we're gonna blow up a bridge or photoshop Putin shirtless on horseback or something?! WTELF.

Holy shit we am become the Russian people being pandered to with shirtless leader photo shoots. Ours have bad weaves and terrible ties but - damn
posted by petebest at 7:06 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

And the CIA never said Saddam had WMD. That was the Bush administration's justification to the public and manipulation of the intelligence.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:06 PM on December 9, 2016 [24 favorites]

At this point I wouldn't be surprised if Alaska was a part of Russia by 2019. we had to do it, the Democrats gave us no option!
posted by localhuman at 7:11 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

Really the only thing that gives me pause on thinking Russia interfered is the presence of Mattis. I don't think he'd sign on if he knew about that and he doesn't seem easily fooled. But who knows? I don't know the guy, just his public image.
posted by jason_steakums at 7:13 PM on December 9, 2016

Trump names Dow Chemical CEO Liveris to head Manufacturing Council
posted by futz at 7:15 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

I do think there's some question about the timing of this report on the same day that President Obama ordered a full consensus report on Russian involvement. Somebody wanted to get the CIA's version of the report out now.

(Sort of cribbed from emptywheel, but he's more conspiratorial.)
posted by zachlipton at 7:16 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Isn't Obama giving Trump suggestions on cabinet appointments? Mattis could be one of his.

I don't care for him just because of the waiver thing but we're already living in one of the more convoluted seasons of 24 so sure why not?
posted by asteria at 7:17 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Really the only thing that gives me pause on thinking Russia interfered is the presence of Mattis.

What, fight to get himself out of power? But he's the best man for the job! No, there's got to be a better way. . . . He's got it! We'll invade Iran!
posted by petebest at 7:17 PM on December 9, 2016

Trump names Dow Chemical CEO Liveris to head Manufacturing Council

Because for too many years Americans haven't had the pleasure of their own Bhopal disaster. #MAGA
posted by Talez at 7:18 PM on December 9, 2016 [12 favorites]

Keep an eye on christmas lights this year. They might be trying to tell us something!

G-E-T O-U-T N-O-W
posted by tivalasvegas at 7:19 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

The Mattis thing in light of the Russian thing really terrifies me if the CIA report is true because I would believe "Mattis thinks he can mitigate the damage himself" or "Mattis is fine with it" long before I'd believe that Mattis is dumb. He's a smart guy and he's got to have people he trusts in the intelligence community that he's talked to about this.
posted by jason_steakums at 7:23 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

I do think there's some question about the timing of this report

Yeah, it's an interesting leak. Pussygate was on a Friday.
posted by petebest at 7:25 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

New chant at Trump Rally: Get on the train or feel the pain.

I. . . don't think they're talking about amtrak?
posted by dinty_moore at 7:26 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

I. . . don't think they're talking about amtrak?

but they love infrastructure investment so much
posted by tivalasvegas at 7:28 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

But seriously, I can't be the only one whose mind went straight to concentration camps when talking about forcing people on trains, right? Holy fuck.
posted by dinty_moore at 7:29 PM on December 9, 2016 [47 favorites]

the CIA never said Saddam had WMD.

Oh, they said it all right. It looks as though google is not going to let me link directly to it, but Timothy Weiner's outline of their reasoning starts on p 564 of Legacy of Ashes. He's a very respected journalist who's spent most of his career following the IC.

It ends by justifying Powell's famous speech on p 568 with

This was not a selective use of intelligence. It was not "cherry-picking." It was not fixing the facts to fit the war plans. It was what the intelligence said, the best intelligence the agency had to offer. Powell had spent days and nights with [CIA director] Tenet, checking and re-checking the CIA's reporting. Tenet looked him in the eye and told him it was rock solid.

BTW, if you're looking for something to read instead of watching the ongoing Trumpwreck, the whole book is great.

From the PDF document the article you linked is based on:

We judge Iraq has continued its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs in defiance of UN resolutions and restrictions. Baghdad has chemical and biological weapons as well as missiles with ranges in excess of UN restrictions; if left unchecked, it probably will have a nuclear weapon during this decade. (See INR alternative view at the end of these Key Judgments.)

We judge that we are seeing only a portion of Iraq's WM efforts, owing to Baghdad's vigorous denial and deception efforts. Revelations after the Gulf war starkly demonstrate the extensive efforts undertaken by Iraq to deny information. We lack specific information on many key aspects of Iraq's WMD programs.

posted by Coventry at 7:33 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

Clinton's popular vote margin passed 2.1% today.
posted by Justinian at 7:35 PM on December 9, 2016 [23 favorites]

i am going to stop pretending that i have any idea what is going to happen between now and inauguration day.
posted by murphy slaw at 7:41 PM on December 9, 2016 [34 favorites]

like, we are in 'something has gone wrong at the Large Hadron Collider and quantum uncertainty is starting to manifest at the macro scale' territory
posted by murphy slaw at 7:42 PM on December 9, 2016 [77 favorites]

From the link to emptywheel that zachlipton posted above, what seems an opinion considered:

Here’s the big takeaway. The language “a formal US assessment produced by all 17 intelligence agencies” is, like “a consensus view,” a term of art. It’s an opportunity for agencies which may have differing theories of what happened here to submit their footnotes.

That may be what Obama called for today: the formal assessment from all agencies (though admittedly, the White House purposely left the scope and intent of it vague).

Whatever that review is intended to be, what happened as soon as Obama announced it is that the CIA and/or Democratic Senators started leaking their conclusion. That’s what this story is.

According to that link, all the pieces were in place for the story of Russian interference, but until recently they didn't have a direct link between the GRU and WikiLeaks, which they think they have now. Some in the breifing apparently disagreed that it's airtight. Mitch, for one, presumably.
posted by petebest at 7:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Russian hackers could steal Podesta's emails but it took an ideologically diverse set of American writers to misrepresent what they said.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [19 favorites]

June 3, 2015: The LHC started delivering physics data for the first time in 27 months today, after almost two years offline for re-commissioning. This new LHC run "is a bit special," says elementary particle physicist Stephane Willocq, "because it's not every day that we get to start an accelerator that runs at the highest energy ever achieved. In 2009 we started at 7 and now we're going up to 13 teraelectronvolts. This jump in energy opens up the opportunity to discover heavy new particles. This is probably the last time in our careers for us to have this chance."

June 16, 2015: The real estate mogul and TV reality star launched his presidential campaign Tuesday, ending more than two decades of persistent flirtation with the idea of running for the Oval Office.
posted by theodolite at 7:48 PM on December 9, 2016 [30 favorites]

Well Well Well
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 7:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

I keep wondering, what would a sane and decent congressional majority even do in a situation where their own party's candidate for President got elected due to foreign government manipulation? Instruct the electoral college to vote for the second place finisher and hope they listen? What if they don't? Impeach even though the VP rode into office due to the same manipulations? Impeach both the prez and VP and have someone nobody cast a presidential vote for take the position? It's a seriously hard problem even under the best imaginary circumstances.
posted by jason_steakums at 7:50 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

We'll have to do the whole thing over again. Primaries start in a week.
posted by petebest at 7:55 PM on December 9, 2016 [14 favorites]

I told you, we're going to keep reliving 2016 until we get it right. Like Groundhog Day. Except it will be a year.
posted by asteria at 7:57 PM on December 9, 2016 [18 favorites]

According to that link, all the pieces were in place for the story of Russian interference, but until recently they didn't have a direct link between the GRU and WikiLeaks, which they think they have now.

Cue all the Redditors on the "Assange was secretly captured" conspiracy train freaking out in 3, 2, 1...
posted by jason_steakums at 8:01 PM on December 9, 2016

From GOP electoral college voter @TheChrisSuprun
…It isn't my place to announce other people's intentions.
I do not think I will be alone Dec 19 as GOP voting against Trump.
7:43 PM - 9 Dec 2016
posted by standardasparagus at 8:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [27 favorites]

Hillary clearly went to Ecuador and got him. You didn't really think she was in the woods talking selfies did you? Oh, my sweet summer children.
posted by asteria at 8:03 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

I just can't stop thinking about that night on ye olde election thread when the Mother Jones story about the Russian server and related investigation broke and the NY Times came right out with an FBI-sourced story disputing it that punctured the balloon. [overview of the various stories at that time.] That plus Comey...tens of thousands of votes in a handful of states and we wouldn't have to be thinking about any of this. Fuck.
posted by sallybrown at 8:04 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

WHO IS DRIVING?
OH MY GOD BEAR IS DRIVING!
HOW CAN THAT BE!?!?!
posted by murphy slaw at 8:05 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

And just think there are still 21 days left in 2016! That's 21 more days of twists and turns!
posted by asteria at 8:07 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

NYT and CBS News both also running with versions of the story.
posted by zachlipton at 8:08 PM on December 9, 2016

New article from WaPo.

The CIA concluded Russia worked to elect Trump. Republicans now face an impossible choice.

“I’m going after Russia in every way you can go after Russia,” Graham said. “I think they’re one of the most destabilizing influences on the world stage. I think they did interfere with our elections, and I want [Russian President Vladimir] Putin personally to pay the price.”

In addition, any GOP effort to dig into the matter risks antagonizing the president-elect, who has said flatly that he doesn’t believe Russia interfered with the election, despite receiving intelligence briefings to the contrary. And he's proven more than willing to go after fellow Republicans who run afoul of him.

...Compounding the dilemma for these Republicans is the fact that many GOP and Trump voters are disinclined to believe Russia meddled in the election. A poll released Friday by Democratic pollster Democracy Corps showed 55 percent of Trump voters and Republicans who didn’t vote for Trump say it’s probably true that stories alleging Russian interference in the election are conspiracy theories pushed by Clinton.

Expect more seismic twitter activity from the Tower tonight. WaPo put the gloves on in this article.
posted by futz at 8:10 PM on December 9, 2016 [17 favorites]

Republicans ready to launch wide-ranging probe of Russia, despite Trump’s stance

The CIA concluded that Russia worked to elect Trump. Republicans now face an impossible choice.

on post - missed it by *that* much!
posted by petebest at 8:10 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

So many times in these discussions words fail to capture the stakes of the issue. When we speak of 20 million, or 23 million people who may "lose their health insurance" if the ACA is repealed, I suspect most of your readers absorb that as a useful data point and then, quite naturally, move on. Their eyes slide to the sentence that follows.

I am writing in the hope that I can get your readers to pause for a moment and consider what this loss truly means, behind the abstractions.

posted by tivalasvegas at 8:11 PM on December 9, 2016 [17 favorites]

I am getting the uncomfortable feeling we are starting to sail into coup territory.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:12 PM on December 9, 2016 [34 favorites]

The Times story has some interesting bits:

Sourced to "senior administration officials," which would at least kind of indicate their sources aren't in Congress (because honestly, I could imagine Harry Reid having a hand in the WaPo story)

The CIA concluded that Russians hacked the RNC's computers too, but didn't release any documents from them. Another official says the FBI concluded that the RNC's systems weren't widely compromised.

Question as to whether Russia's original intent was to help Trump or just stir up FUD and gather documents that would undercut a President Clinton.
posted by zachlipton at 8:13 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

zarq: I'm waiting for someone to give him the ol' Frothy Santorum treatment.

What's the most disgusting sexually-transmitted disease on the planet? Ånything that makes your junk shrivel up and fall off?

Fun(?) fact: There are cases of autoamputation of the penis due to granuloma inguinale (Donovanosis). Wouldn't be much of a stretch, is all I'm saying.
posted by smangosbubbles at 8:14 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Let's Not Pretend We Didn't Know This
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:15 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

I don't think it will be a coup. Either the electors will flip and we'll get Kasich/Kaine or this will be part of the eventual impeachment to pave way for Pence.
posted by asteria at 8:15 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

...Compounding the dilemma for these Republicans is the fact that many GOP and Trump voters are disinclined to believe Russia meddled in the election. A poll released Friday by Democratic pollster Democracy Corps showed 55 percent of Trump voters and Republicans who didn’t vote for Trump say it’s probably true that stories alleging Russian interference in the election are conspiracy theories pushed by Clinton.

If this drags on until Ryan starts going after social security and medicare and the people get a look at this clusterfuck cabinet in action, watch those numbers change.
posted by jason_steakums at 8:18 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

I don't think it will be a coup. Either the electors will flip and we'll get Kasich/Kaine or this will be part of the eventual impeachment to pave way for Pence.

Either of these scenarios would make me giddy with happiness at this point. And yes, I know all about Pence and how evil he is.
posted by sallybrown at 8:19 PM on December 9, 2016 [12 favorites]

because honestly, I could imagine Harry Reid having a hand in the WaPo story)

Heck, I could see Lindsey Graham having a hand in it. 2016 is a bizarro year for sure...
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 8:20 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

Republicans will never impeach, can we please stop this fantasy. They covered up Russian interference, they don't give two fucks about anything other than tax cuts and ending what's left of the welfare state. Trump was right when he said he could kill someone on 5th Avenue, if it wasn't true then, it sure as hell is now.

Beyond their sheer DGAF, they'd never impeach because Pence is a turd who could never win reelection. Trump's personality cult is required, and they won't do a damn thing to reign him in or bring him down.

I really don't understand why we're putting any stock in Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan allowing an impeachment to move forward under any conceivable set of circumstances.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:22 PM on December 9, 2016 [55 favorites]

Maybe not a coup, maybe a walling off of the big "sanctuary" cities. Like escape from ny in reverse.
posted by vrakatar at 8:23 PM on December 9, 2016

ExxonMobil CEO Tillerson takes the lead in the Secretary of State sweepstakes. Tillerson has ties to Putin, "having negotiated a 2011 energy partnership deal with Russia that Mr. Putin said could eventually be worth as much as $500 billion. In 2012, the Kremlin bestowed the country’s Order of Friendship decoration on Mr. Tillerson."
posted by sallybrown at 8:24 PM on December 9, 2016 [14 favorites]

The weirdest thing about this Russian hacking issue to me is that I can't shake the feeling that most people just... don't care. And I also feel like Trump is aware of this, just like he knew most people didn't care whether or not he released his tax returns. So of course he's going to act like it's not a big deal.

I mean, I hope I'm wrong about this, but it's not like anyone's saying he won because Russia hacked the votes. Right? It's not like anyone is saying Russia hacked all the major American media outlets and caused them to repeatedly harp on Hillary's email server in ways that actually damaged her campaign, while they allowed all of the negative stuff in Trump's past and present to just be reported on a couple times and then forgotten about.
posted by wondermouse at 8:25 PM on December 9, 2016 [17 favorites]

allowing an impeachment to move forward under any conceivable set of circumstances.
I think there are several sets. For starters the big chair is not a part time gig, and appointing Carson to Hud is like appointing me to Sobriety and ChurchGoing. Dereliction and Incompetence.
posted by vrakatar at 8:29 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

but it's not like anyone's saying he won because Russia hacked the votes.

In the first place, we wouldn't know because no one's going to do a manual recount, much less an audit. More votes for Trump than votes cast? Huh. Weird, oh well.

In the second place, they don't have to. Amerikanski are morons who beleive anything the tv tells them to. Hacking votes is risky but cybernetic models of information-sharing in dumbfuck racist swing states never lie.
posted by petebest at 8:32 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

I think impeachment moves forward when Trump becomes an electoral liability to the party. Given the way he's going around pretty explicitly saying that all his campaign promises were bullshit, I can't completely rule that scenario out.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:34 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

You're assuming a) fair elections; b) elections. Those feel like over-assumptions.
posted by holgate at 8:36 PM on December 9, 2016 [20 favorites]

I think there are several sets. For starters the big chair is not a part time gig, and appointing Carson to Hud is like appointing me to Sobriety and ChurchGoing. Dereliction and Incompetence.

I completely disagree that those are things that Republicans care about. At all. Even remotely. Carson will be confirmed. Most of these cabinet picks will all be confirmed, Dems will be overperforming to stop any of them.

They need Trump to sign their tax cuts. That is all. They'd be perfectly happy for HUD to be run into the ground, or better yet, eliminated entirely.

85% of Republicans think they were elected to eliminate as many functions of the federal government as they can possibly eliminate. Incompetence is perfectly in line with their goals, and they've proven over and over again they're not going to care about Trump's corruption.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:38 PM on December 9, 2016 [25 favorites]

Back to the NY Times FBI-sourced story from 11/1 (only a month ago?!?!) disputing the Mother Jones claims about Russian interference: Adam Jentleson, who is Harry Reid's Deputy Chief of Staff, just tweeted: "I'll say it: NYT interviewed Reid for this story. He said things contrary to the story. NYT discarded the interview."
posted by sallybrown at 8:38 PM on December 9, 2016 [50 favorites]

I don't think impeachment is necessarily likely, but Trump isn't a normal Republican and that opens lots of doors which would otherwise be tightly shut. I don't know what it'd take, and it's almost definitely well beyond whatever standards I'd like to see, but there is a line somewhere beyond which his damage to the GOP's electoral brand outweighs default party loyalty and a true believer can step up to point out that hey, Trump's actually pretty liberal... and at that point they're pretty much clear to refocus the rhetoric on "thank god for real conservatives like Mike Pence" while Fox News switches into full blown Trump (D) mode and Ivanka struggles to spin a resignation as preferable to an impeachment conviction.
posted by feloniousmonk at 8:39 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

If Sens. Graham, McCain and Burr genuinely believe that "they did interfere with our elections", then let them put country before party and say openly that they will not caucus with a party whose leader's election has been compromised by foreign and possibly hostile powers.

A "congressional probe" is something you do to produce some gotcha material to take down a minor Cabinet secretary, not to address something of this urgency. What do they think will happen to the report that comes out of their little inquest on some Friday next August?

If they don't actually act in a way that's appropriate to the threat they're claiming, their shuffling uncomfortably in the WaPo is about as meaningful as a Glenn Beck pie chart.
posted by tivalasvegas at 8:44 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

Just found this on https://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-college/key-dates.html:

December 19, 2016

The Electors meet in their state and vote for President and Vice President on separate ballots. The electors record their votes on six “Certificates of Vote,” which are paired with the six remaining Certificates of Ascertainment.

December 19th.
posted by bunbury at 8:45 PM on December 9, 2016

next up: cyber-terrorism!
posted by fingers_of_fire at 8:45 PM on December 9, 2016

idk if I were a congressional Republican I'd be thinking we could throw Ryan, McConnell and Trump to the wolves, be the people that put America over party and bask in all that cred, still have Pence rubber stamp everything we want so we can have our cake and eat it too, and look to rebrand with the 2012 RNC post mortem in mind and a combo of new RNC leadership and a new American distrust of every extreme right school of thought you can tie to Trump helping ward off Tea Party style primary challenges from the right.

I don't believe for a second they'll do that, but holy shit the opportunity is there for the taking. Look at Kansas, you can run more moderate Republicans once the people sour on the Brownbacks of the world and they'll seem like a breath of fresh air to the voters even though you'd think the R by the name would be a liability. Everyone who believed the false equivalence "oh they both ran such nasty campaigns" narratives this election will be loving a platform of moderate stability.
posted by jason_steakums at 8:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

The electors record their votes on six “Certificates of Vote,” which are paired with the six remaining Certificates of Ascertainment.

Are they electing a President or playing The Cones of Dunshire?
posted by zachlipton at 8:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [41 favorites]

I've been away from the computer for a while. Just to be clear, this is where we're at?

Trump Transition Team:
Russia, run by a dictator who was a KGB agent for 16 years, tried to influence our election - preposterous!
PizzaGate - TOTALLY BELIEVABLE

cool, cool, cool. totally cool.
posted by bluecore at 8:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [47 favorites]

then let them put country before party

That's a good one.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:48 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

Dereliction and Incompetence.

Like ginning up a fake WMD reason to invade a country with no ties to 9/11 that cost trillions and blood, initiating taxpayer-funded torture and ubiquitous illegal surveillance while vacationing into the biggest financial meltdown since the widespread use of the light bulb? Like that level of Dereliction and Incompetence?

HUD. I wish! Nah, if some person(s) don't do the terrible then hello four years of Turdfungus because they ain't gonna impeach nobody. The GOP are ecocidal goons hell bent on locking up a woman's body stripping the 99% of wealth and rigging all laws against notthem. Watch.
posted by petebest at 8:48 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

Impeachment? I am beginning to question whether he'll make it past the electoral college vote. Do we have a list of the so-called "faithless," yet faithful, electors?
posted by standardasparagus at 8:48 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Yes, one guy. That's a bit shy of what would be needed.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:51 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

Either the electors will flip and we'll get Kasich/Kaine

Under what possible scenario would Kaine get on the ticket?
posted by Justinian at 8:57 PM on December 9, 2016

Lawrence Lessig has started the Electors Trust, "which will provide free legal advice to wavering electors. Lessig, like Suprun, has no idea if an Electoral College revolt could actually happen, but thinks that given the danger Trump poses to democratic norms and his decisive popular vote defeat, it’s worth a try. " Perhaps there will be more. Not quite business as usual.
posted by standardasparagus at 8:57 PM on December 9, 2016 [13 favorites]

Impeachment would be meaningless as a response to Russian interference- any outcome ending with the GOP in control of the Presidency is a validation of Russian work.
posted by Pope Guilty at 8:58 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

IIRC the electors are typically die hard party faithfuls so I don't see them breaking away from Trump.

I do absolutely think that the electors should be cleared to see all the intel reports on Russian election interference though. They likely won't change their votes but they should at least know very clearly what they're voting for.
posted by jason_steakums at 8:58 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

Under what possible scenario would Kaine get on the ticket?

By being a VP candidate. If Trump fails to get to 270 Electoral votes it goes to Congress. House decides president between Kasich (or whoever), Trump, and Clinton. Senate chooses between Kaine and Pence.
posted by asteria at 9:01 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Are they electing a President or playing The Cones of Dunshire?

What? Cones of Dunshire is about the cones. Never forget that.
posted by Talez at 9:01 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

A few comments deleted. Let's keep it cool in here please.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 9:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

"Fact: Trump has criticized FBI and CIA way more than he's criticized InfoWars on veracity of intel."

It's astonishing that the transition team's statement isn't even remotely accurate about the electoral college vote count, in a statement that's supposed to be about accuracy in intelligence reports.

The Dallas Morning News had this story the other day too: Russia ties complicate Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson's prospects for secretary of state gig
posted by zachlipton at 9:04 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

I don't think they'll impeach without very very serious public backlash against Trump among their own base but the Republicans are masterful at pretending their own bad decisions didn't happen and don't matter even if they did, and their base and a ton of undecideds going "we're actually fine with that answer, these guys sound like straight shooters" so fuck if I know, they could impeach him day one and say it was Hillary's fault somehow and be rewarded for it among Trump voters and I wouldn't even be surprised.
posted by jason_steakums at 9:12 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

They could make Putin literally Secretary of State and 24.6% of America will be okiefuckindokie. Dems would make a show of resistance of course, but would ultimately trade confirmation for the choice parking behind Dunkin' Doughnuts.
posted by petebest at 9:15 PM on December 9, 2016 [31 favorites]

>then let them put country before party

That's a good one.

It was a recommendation more than a prediction. Oh, add Sen. Sasse to the list, too, and Sen. Snowe.

There is, though rapidly closing, a window yet for conservatives to carve out an anti-Trump bloc on the center-right. Ball's in their court.
posted by tivalasvegas at 9:17 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

The electors record their votes on six “Certificates of Vote,” which are paired with the six remaining Certificates of Ascertainment.

So this led me to look at WTF a Certificate of Ascertainment looks like, and I found California's from 2012. This document brings up a very important question. Write-In Candidate Sheila "Samm" Tittle received a grand total of six votes from California in 2012, but is listed on the Certificate with a full slate of pledged electors. Who are all these people who pledged to be her electors in the Electoral College yet didn't even vote for her in the general? I want an investigation into this.
posted by zachlipton at 9:17 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Chrysostom: "Yes, one guy. That's a bit shy of what would be needed."

Yep. You'd need at least 38 Republican electors -- die-hard party-faithful types appointed to reward their slavish loyalty -- to vote for Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump. That's almost a fifth of his electoral vote haul.

Alternatively, you'd need at least one to vote for a dark horse conservative candidate, and 37 others to vote for that candidate (or Clinton) over Trump. Then nobody would have a majority, and it would get kicked to the incoming House, where you'd need a majority of state delegations to vote for the third option (or Clinton) over Trump. Recall that Republicans will control 32 delegations and only need 26 to elect the next president. You'd need all 18 Democratic delegations plus eight Republican ones to back Clinton or the dark horse to stop Trump.
posted by Rhaomi at 9:22 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Given that the CIA, the FBI, the US Congress and even the fucking White House managed to engender this catastrophe, out of a mistaken collective belief that we'd all get through this and breathe a long sigh... institutions will not save you. Do not even hope for institutions to save you.
posted by holgate at 9:26 PM on December 9, 2016 [49 favorites]

By being a VP candidate. If Trump fails to get to 270 Electoral votes it goes to Congress. House decides president between Kasich (or whoever), Trump, and Clinton. Senate chooses between Kaine and Pence.

... right, and they'd pick Pence. Under what plausible scenario would they pick Kaine?
posted by Justinian at 9:29 PM on December 9, 2016

October 7, 2016, Joint Statement from the Department of Homeland Security and Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security:

The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations. The recent disclosures of alleged hacked e-mails on sites like DCLeaks.com and WikiLeaks and by the Guccifer 2.0 online persona are consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts. These thefts and disclosures are intended to interfere with the US election process. Such activity is not new to Moscow—the Russians have used similar tactics and techniques across Europe and Eurasia, for example, to influence public opinion there. We believe, based on the scope and sensitivity of these efforts, that only Russia's senior-most officials could have authorized these activities.

posted by kirkaracha at 9:30 PM on December 9, 2016 [16 favorites]

... right, and they'd pick Pence. Under what plausible scenario would they pick Kaine?

States get one vote and they need Dem cooperation to get someone chosen before January 20th.
posted by asteria at 9:31 PM on December 9, 2016

Yep; they issued that statement and then Trump opened his mouth and said something outrageous and everyone moved on within a day or two.
posted by zachlipton at 9:32 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

States get one vote and they need Dem cooperation to get someone chosen before January 20th.

States get one vote in the House not the Senate. AFAIK it's simple majority vote in the Senate.
posted by Justinian at 9:35 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Yep; they issued that statement and then Trump opened his mouth and said something outrageous and everyone moved on within a day or two.

That was like the same day as the Billy Bush video
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 9:36 PM on December 9, 2016 [6 favorites]

> ... right, and they'd pick Pence. Under what plausible scenario would they pick Kaine?

States get one vote and they need Dem cooperation to get someone chosen before January 20th.

I think it's assuming a deal is made: Dems in the House agree to support Kasich in exchange for a handful of GOP Senators breaking for Kaine. Then Kasich and Kaine have a very awkward four years.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 9:39 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Gotcha. Also we could wish for a flying telepathic pony.
posted by Justinian at 9:40 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

That was like the same day as the Billy Bush video

Good catch, so it was. That'd do it. Unless of course our news media were tough and relentless in pursuing these important stories.

Pussygate was fun too, I guess. In a way.
posted by petebest at 9:41 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

If no candidate receives a majority of Electoral votes, the House of Representatives elects the President from the 3 Presidential candidates who received the most Electoral votes. Each state delegation has one vote. The Senate would elect the Vice President from the 2 Vice Presidential candidates with the most Electoral votes. Each Senator would cast one vote for Vice President.

Guess so.

Then Dems could argue Pence was complicit in this mess and needs to be booted too.

I might wish for some people to switch to decaf.
posted by asteria at 9:41 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Note that this story breaks late on a Friday night.

Gone by Monday.
posted by standardasparagus at 9:42 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Haven't said this in a while, but... America sucks more every day.
posted by quarter waters and a bag of chips at 9:42 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Note that this story breaks late on a Friday night.

Gone by Monday.

What story?
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 9:43 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

And here's a response from Sean Spicer, RNC Communications Director (and liar):

Don't miss tomorrow's @SangerNYT exclusive interview with Elvis riding his unicorn on a rainbow with Santa

Charming.
posted by zachlipton at 9:44 PM on December 9, 2016

Gotcha. Also we could wish for a flying telepathic pony.

If the last two weeks of 2016 involve a flying pony who tells everyone everyone else's secrets, it will be your fault! Don't give 2016 ideas!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 9:45 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

i'm calling it now: emergency powers on or before 9/30/17. no midterm election in '18.

any takers?
posted by j_curiouser at 9:46 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

I'd wager basically everything I own against that proposition.
posted by Justinian at 9:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [9 favorites]

What story?

The one you've just been playing! *konk* The one you're carrying inside your rusty innards!
posted by petebest at 9:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

The weirdest thing about this Russian hacking issue to me is that I can't shake the feeling that most people just... don't care.

I mentioned something about this briefly in the run up to the election, and what I was seeing was a lot of people on the left not wanting to believe it, largely by suggesting it was all some throwback to the cold war that was being brought up for political ends. The mentions seemed to be pointed towards not wishing for any renewed confrontational stance against Russia and relied on Clinton reputation as a "hawk" as justification for doubt. Even now, I notice some of my more left friends preferring to explicitly point to the electorate for believing anything Trump said as being more important than any Russian connection. It seems clearly to be something a lot of people don't want to think about given what the consequences could potentially be.

Those who were leaning Trump at the time also called it political but went more with it being a partisan trickery thing like the Republicans have done before, while justifying Trump's many favorable remarks about Putin by agreement with the stance, particularly when Putin was compared to Obama. Given how many Trump supporters don't believe Obama is a real American, that hardly surprised. Republican lawmakers were much more reserved during the election, so I don't think they were complicit or had any plan around this, other than McConnell and Ryan perhaps. They seem more to be playing it by ear than following a score at this point, so if things get serious and more damning info comes out, I wouldn't be entirely surprised to see them dump McConnell, at the least, if they thought they could make a good showing and still run things.

If it somehow went to the house and they had a shot at getting Kasich as president, I think they might take it and dump the McConnell and Trump and go for a clean slate rule that would still give them plenty of chances to enact favorable legislation, especially if they could make the deal to dump Trump to seem contingent on some Democratic support for some initiatives of theirs, or at least give them some cover for making the move. The reaction from Trump hardcore supporters would be fierce though so that would definitely give some Republicans pause in states that went hard for Trump, so a lot would depend on how reliable the info seemed and if it was listened to and at least believed enough to calm some of the herd that might stampede in a defection to Kasich.

That said, I still doubt it'll get that far, but, really, after everything else that's happened this year, who knows?
posted by gusottertrout at 9:52 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

Twitter to NY Times:

They based that conclusion, in part, on another finding — which they say was also reached with high confidence — that the Russians hacked the Republican National Committee’s computer systems in addition to their attacks on Democratic organizations, but did not release whatever information they gleaned from the Republican networks.

I assumed GOP IT wasn't running circles around Dems'. Nice to have it confirmed, I guess.
posted by bunbury at 9:53 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

I'm with Justinian: the extent to which the deplorables will embrace -- have already embraced -- the idea that Putin saved the republic from Hillary carries its own weight and momentum, and there'll be no need for special powers: the several states under GOP control will decide how elections will be carried out.
posted by holgate at 9:57 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

>> i'm calling it now: emergency powers on or before 9/30/17. no midterm election in '18.
>> any takers?

> I'd wager basically everything I own against that proposition.

And if j_curiouser is right, at that point, what do you have to lose?
posted by bunbury at 10:01 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

Heh. That was part of my thinking. I'm certain it won't happen but if it did what do I care if I wagered my stuff?
posted by Justinian at 10:02 PM on December 9, 2016 [5 favorites]

At this point I have to imagine pretty much every intelligence service in the world will be tripping over each other trying to find and monitor any possible Trump>Russia communication channels all weekend.
posted by jason_steakums at 10:03 PM on December 9, 2016

2018 is already a built in Republican landslide. There's no manipulation needed there. By 2020 America will be unrecognizable, and fair elections a long shot.
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:10 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

The weirdest thing about this Russian hacking issue to me is that I can't shake the feeling that most people just... don't care.

Y'know, the only things stopping the American people (to quote eddie pepitone) are: genetics, lack of will, income, brain chemistry and external events.

Man, why do I have to keep being ashamed of being an American?

I get why people get bummed out by talking about the Kennedy assassination. Or Nixon prolonging the Vietnam war. Or Reagan torpedoing Carter's rescue attempt and trading weapons for hostages.
It's treason, but it's old treason.

This...well, shit, it's happening right now. It's not f'ing reality T.V. it's OUR LIVES.

I got a strong sense of irony and a sawed off Mosin Nagant right here pal. Want a demonstration?
Anyone?
Anyone?
No?

So when do we get the horse named as senator?

TMZ: Incitatus caught on a sex tape - find out with who!"

emergency powers on or before 9/30/17
I'm fine with Obama playing Augustus.
(Weird how we skipped Tiberius tho)

Anyone gonna fault me for just going for money? I'm tired of the "we're in this together" crap. Maybe the Carthaginians...er, Russians, are hiring.

Seriously, you think P.K. Dick was a brilliant writer but nuts when he says the Roman Empire never ended, but... damn.

"To fight the Empire is to be infected by its derangement. This is a paradox; whoever defeats a segment of the Empire becomes the Empire; it proliferates like a virus, imposing its form on its enemies. Thereby it becomes its enemies." - Philip K. Dick

The more things change....
posted by Smedleyman at 10:11 PM on December 9, 2016 [11 favorites]

What's it called when you make a deal with the devil, but you don't get power and riches but just get to be a lickspittle for Millionaire Sex Predator Donald Trump
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 10:12 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

What's it called when you make a deal with the devil, but you don't get power and riches but just get to be a lickspittle for Millionaire Sex Predator Donald Trump

The Christie Crawl
posted by jason_steakums at 10:15 PM on December 9, 2016 [32 favorites]

On my commute home I suddenly remembered a conversation I'd had the day before with my friends, the parents of a young toddler, about how Trump's administration was canceling funding to public television, and by extension, Sesame Street. "Yeah, it had a good run, but we all knew this was coming," they said. Me: "Damn. I remember hearing about their HBO deal, but I guess that was just a stopgap - that's horrible!" And then I paused, and truly could not remember if the conversation, and by extension, the forthcoming end of Sesame Street, had been a dream or not, because the rest of the (dream!, I eventually realized, after another mile down the road) conversation had just been us grimly joking that honestly, maybe there wasn't much sense in teaching preschoolers to manage their emotions and be kind to each other and share in the future, anyway.

OT1H, I'm relieved to realize this was [fake], but scared I thought it was plausible enough to be [real] for a good 20 minutes.
posted by deludingmyself at 10:18 PM on December 9, 2016 [10 favorites]

i'm calling it now: emergency powers on or before 9/30/17. no midterm election in '18.

I'd take that action.

As long as Trump can hold it together personally to the extent the has so far, the most likely outcome is a winning fraction of the electorate thinks the most of the next four years have been terrific for them. There will be more focused oppression than that, and other more terrible consequences later, but not until after he's left office.

It's not going to be that hard for him to get the adulation he craves in the short term:

print money, use it to provide millions of jobs
sign the tax cuts
refuse to sign the medicare/ssi/etc. cuts
sign the regulatory rollbacks
terrify the rest of the world by throwing the US military around.

posted by Coventry at 10:49 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Putin won fair and square. We have to give him a chance…
posted by mazola at 10:52 PM on December 9, 2016 [22 favorites]

I'm with Justinian: the extent to which the deplorables will embrace -- have already embraced -- the idea that Putin saved the republic from Hillary carries its own weight and momentum, and there'll be no need for special powers: the several states under GOP control will decide how elections will be carried out.

I wish I could disagree with this. But:
posted by rp at 10:52 PM on December 9, 2016

The evidence is really piling up that this election was completely illegitimate. Forget the fact that Trump lost the popular vote by a huge amount that makes it very clear that Americans do not want a Republican president; it is now obvious that Trump didn't actually win the electoral college vote either. The Republican party's desperate attempts to stop the recounts, especially in light of the fact that recount efforts have already uncovered massive amounts of fraud (ballot boxes containing far fewer ballots than they are recorded to contain, etc.), have made it clear that they have no interest in democracy of any kind, even the rigged game that we already thought they were playing. We need recounts in every single county in this country now, because I'd put good money on the fact that we're going to find out that this isn't something that just occurred in a couple of places in a couple of states. The Republicans have done away with democracy entirely.

THERE WAS NO ELECTION. That has to be the takeaway here. That is the thing the news outlets and frankly everybody else should be screaming. THERE WAS NO ELECTION. A LOT OF THE TRUMP VOTES DO NOT ACTUALLY EXIST. THIS OUTCOME IS FRAUDULENT. THIS IS A COUP.

THIS IS A COUP.
posted by IAmUnaware at 11:17 PM on December 9, 2016 [37 favorites]

Oh, and it's undoubtedly true of the Senate races too. Do you think the Republican party would figure out a workable way of rigging elections and just use it the one time?

None of the results in the 2016 election can be taken as legitimate. None of these people were actually provably elected.
posted by IAmUnaware at 11:21 PM on December 9, 2016 [1 favorite]

Have another election. Maybe let Canada oversee it…
posted by mazola at 11:24 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

Kellyanne Conway alarmingly advocates “consequences” for criticizing Trump

In yet another extraordinary pronouncement which has gone virtually unnoticed, senior adviser Kellyanne Conway lamented the fact that people like labor leader Chuck Jones think they can criticize President-elect Donald Trump without suffering consequences.

Yes, she actually said “consequences:”

"People feel like with Donald Trump, they have license to say whatever the heck they want about this guy, with no consequences, with no blowback. The guy has a right to defend himself. And he rarely draws first blood. It’s when he is attacked, he likes to set the record straight."

Those words are chilling enough on their own. But it is remarkable that this sentiment is coming not from Trump, a political novice with a hair-trigger, but rather from an experienced political pro. This is messaging.

And it is messaging that works to conceal the profound power differential between a president-elect and the average citizen.

Later in the interview, Conway also complained about criticisms like those made by the Clinton campaign’s Jen Palmieri:

"Anytime I try to respond, I’m seen as ungracious. Why are we sore winners? I’m not a sore winner, I’m a winner. My guy’s a winner. He’s the next president of the United States. This has to stop, Chris, this incendiary rhetoric of people who just can’t admit that they lost. It has to stop, because it’s costing a lot of angst."

Article has video of the interview.
posted by futz at 11:24 PM on December 9, 2016 [29 favorites]

"Anytime I try to respond, I’m seen as ungracious. Why are we sore winners? I’m not a sore winner, I’m a winner. My guy’s a winner. He’s the next president of the United States. This has to stop, Chris, this incendiary rhetoric of people who just can’t admit that they lost. It has to stop, because it’s costing a lot of angst."

"Look, when Republicans lost the White House eight years ago, all we did was suggest that the President was not an American but was DEFINITELY a Muslim, hit 'forward' on every racist email chain letter about him that crossed our inbox, hold 60 futile votes to take away health care from 22 million Americans, and refuse to do any work for 6 years. And now we're supposed to just move on when a steel worker in Ohio makes a factually correct criticism of the President-elect? I mean that is practically censorship and I, personally, am offended." [fake]
posted by Snarl Furillo at 11:41 PM on December 9, 2016 [67 favorites]

For me the interesting thing is that the CIA is leaking bigly to damage Trump. If we have any hope of containing/getting rid of him, the deep state is probably the best bet. Nixon was taken down by a career FBI associate director who hated him. It may very well be the same for Trump.
posted by chris24 at 11:45 PM on December 9, 2016 [32 favorites]

how tight is the ecuadorian government with russia anyway? any chance that assange will become so publically toxic that they'll boot his ass out of the embassy?
posted by murphy slaw at 12:04 AM on December 10, 2016

What's it called when you make a deal with the devil, but you don't get power and riches but just get to be a lickspittle for Millionaire Sex Predator Donald Trump

Tuesday.
posted by Archelaus at 12:04 AM on December 10, 2016 [16 favorites]

And it is messaging that works to conceal the profound power differential between a president-elect and the average citizen.

For me, that was the most striking thing about Trump's beef with McMullin. Not that he had one, thin-skinned as he is, that was no surprise, but that Trump's big knock on McMullin was that he is an "unkown person", meaning not famous, not worthy of recognition, not a big deal like him and his cronies. That Trump views people that way too isn't really surprising as such, but it is no less chilling for being so perfectly fitting for him. That's how Trump views everyone not on TV or worth a billion dollars, unknown, vague, barely real. You aren't going to lose much sleep destroying the lives of those who aren't even real people to you, heck you won't even know it happened given how "unknown" all of us are to guys like Trump.
posted by gusottertrout at 12:31 AM on December 10, 2016 [33 favorites]

THERE WAS NO ELECTION. A LOT OF THE TRUMP VOTES DO NOT ACTUALLY EXIST. THIS OUTCOME IS FRAUDULENT. THIS IS A COUP.

I don't think so, at least not in the way you mean, and I think taking this tack will just discredit the anti-Trump movement. Russia helped elect Trump. The FBI leaked like a sieve to help elect Trump. The Republicans did everything in their power to suppress the vote in racially motivated ways. Taking all of that together one could reasonably make the case for a de facto if not a de jure coup.

But what I don't think happened was the sort of voter fraud you claim. I mean, even the Trump folks and the RNC didn't think Trump would win (until he did). I don't think that was a show put on to cover cheating. I think they really, truly thought Clinton was going to win.

The Trump camp opposes the recounts not because they think it would uncover massive cheating but because they oppose everything "the other side" supports reflexively. If the blue side wants it they oppose it.
posted by Justinian at 12:38 AM on December 10, 2016 [46 favorites]

For me the interesting thing is that the CIA is leaking bigly to damage Trump. If we have any hope of containing/getting rid of him, the deep state is probably the best bet.

Sure, the CIA has around seven decades' experience of interfering in elections and democracy. Not, however, in the interests of the people.
posted by Coda Tronca at 1:51 AM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

Sure, the CIA has around seven decades' experience of interfering in elections and democracy. Not, however, in the interests of the people.

I guess it was bound to happen. You invent a better mousetrap and sooner or later you're going to get your own mouse trapped. Or something, I dunno I'm not too good with idioms.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 2:53 AM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

I just woke up after an 11-month coma. Hey, folks, anything happen?
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 4:18 AM on December 10, 2016 [5 favorites]

A post about the CIA saying that Russia intervened to help Trump win the US election is live. Thanks, Sleeper.

Wait, Sleeper? Eponysterical?
posted by Wordshore at 4:23 AM on December 10, 2016 [5 favorites]

Remember when Trump instructed Russia to hack Clinton right I front of us all: “I will tell you this, Russia: If you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” the Republican nominee said at a news conference in Florida. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
posted by madamjujujive at 4:51 AM on December 10, 2016 [33 favorites]

[Obama] knew of Comey's machinations and did nothing. And did nothing in response when it proved decisive.

Among all the craziness since the election, this fact continues to baffle me. Obama should fire Comey immediately. What possible advantage is there to him not doing so, or price he'd pay that makes such an action undesirable? Obama has the power to signal that interfering in an election is unacceptable, and I can't understand why he tacitly condones Comey's actions.
posted by Gelatin at 5:15 AM on December 10, 2016 [8 favorites]

[Obama] knew of Comey's machinations

Comey knew about the Russia thing, knew it was not being revealed so as to not influence the election, and then still decided to go influence the election. Didn't know it was possible to wish more ill on him, but 2016.
posted by chris24 at 5:27 AM on December 10, 2016 [33 favorites]

"Arise, Sleeper, wake from the dead and let the light shine upon you."
posted by EarBucket at 5:27 AM on December 10, 2016

In the real world, it was Conway who said he'd be doing it in his spare time and and that it was no different than Obama golfing. Rediculous!

@realDonaldTrump:
Reports by @CNN that I will be working on The Apprentice during my Presidency, even part time, are rediculous & untrue - FAKE NEWS!
posted by chris24 at 5:39 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

May I draw your attention to The PE is Corrupt AF?
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:05 AM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

Rediculous is a Russia/USSR reference, right?
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 6:23 AM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

I was thinking it was some sort of diphallism.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 6:29 AM on December 10, 2016

Reference to Trump misspelling it in his tweet, but I like your reason better.
posted by chris24 at 6:29 AM on December 10, 2016

chris24, my thought was that Trump was making the red reference. But that would actually be clever.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 6:35 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

I told you, we're going to keep reliving 2016 until we get it right.

Well that will probably end up with all of us dead then, given the other thing 2016 is notable for.
posted by Bringer Tom at 6:36 AM on December 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

There are certain things that [politically metaphorical] strict fathers cannot be: A Loser, Corrupt, and especially not a Betrayer of Trust.

He's a loser because he lost the popular vote.
He's corrupt because he won't divest and oh yeah is a puppet to Putin.
He's a betrayer of trust because he won't fulfill any of his promises.

If mainstream news was not a roiling hellpit of incompetent preening twits we might dare hope they pick up any one of those sticks and beat about the bush with it.

They won't, because they're managed by the same narcissistic evil that created Turdfungus, but there's at least instructions on how to defuck ourselves if any 'big six' media cared to try for any reason.
posted by petebest at 6:36 AM on December 10, 2016 [18 favorites]

chris24, my thought was that Trump was making the red reference. But that would actually be clever.

Ha. Yeah I didn't even consider Trump being the clever one.
posted by chris24 at 6:45 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

There are certain things that [politically metaphorical] strict fathers cannot be: A Loser, Corrupt, and especially not a Betrayer of Trust.

That works two ways: strictness can make it impossible to see someone as one of these things even with all the evidence in place. Which is why autocrats love “traditional values” and war/survival narratives. (See also: massively corrupt Putin, former election loser Erdoğan, and any third-world kleptocrat who makes war against “foreign influences” and “moral decadence” a smokescreen away from their depredations)
posted by acb at 6:49 AM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

Rediculous is a Russia/USSR reference, right?

oh my god, you kremlinologists.

no, it's a common misspelling of "ridiculous".
posted by indubitable at 6:50 AM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

From "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall" to "Mr. Putin, help me win this election" is a helluva final act for the party of Reagan.
posted by chris24 at 6:51 AM on December 10, 2016 [44 favorites]

Egg calling out the craven treason of the Republican Party.

@Evan_McMullin
It's deeply saddening to me that only now are we accepting what has been self-evident for months.

Our nation has been the target of hostile Russian intelligence efforts for decades. That's nothing new.

What's new is that our leaders have become so self-serving that they're willing to sacrifice our national security for their own power.

Republican leaders knew Russia was undermining our democracy during the election and they chose to ignore it.

Their willingness to put party before country & power before principle has resulted in one of the worst compromises of US security ever.

We the people must now seek out and promote into office principled leaders who will put the interests of the country ahead of their own!
posted by chris24 at 7:20 AM on December 10, 2016 [70 favorites]

This morning DJT tweeted A very interesting read. Unfortunately, so much is true. and linked to the Washington Post. Nope, not the story about the Russian interference with the election, but the story about the waste in the Pentagon that was covered up. Very odd that he would choose to congratulate the paper on the morning after an article is published that lends suspicion to his election.

About the Russian interference, nothing will happen until the Republicans get outraged. Right now Democrats are outraged by everything about Trump; his corruption, his cronyism, his apparent lack of interest in undertaking the full time job of being President, so there is a whole lot of noise and now we have to add his unseen and unknowable connections to Putin. Because of partisanship this all fits under the umbrella of being anti-Trump. I used to think that the sadness of this election was discovering how much of the country turned out to be racist, sexiest, xenophobes but now I'm feeling that the deepest cut is realizing how quickly the Republican leaders were willing to sell their country for a bag of silver.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 7:22 AM on December 10, 2016 [16 favorites]

The 18 year old Muslim woman who was harassed on the subway last week has been missing for two days. :(
posted by melissasaurus at 8:57 PM

Muslim girl who was harassed on subway has been found: police No details other than the police said "she has been found."
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 7:32 AM on December 10, 2016 [16 favorites]

That works two ways: strictness can make it impossible to see someone as one of these things even with all the evidence in place.

Nothing's impossible when it's subjected to the grinding wheels of all shows and all papers. They put Turdfungus in the position to win, they can take him out.

They won't of course, because owners and presidents are cowardly millionaires who will have more money, America be damned.

No different than the 60 years before, just writ yuuge.
posted by petebest at 7:35 AM on December 10, 2016

This morning DJT tweeted A very interesting read. Unfortunately, so much is true. and linked to the Washington Post.

Not from Android. So maybe he dictated it or more likely it's a staff tweet.
posted by chris24 at 7:40 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

In early 2015 a golden phone rings at Trump Tower:

The woods are lovely, dark and deep
But I have promises to keep
And miles to go before I sleep
And miles to go before I sleep

posted by kirkaracha at 7:41 AM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

@jonathanweisman
At 2.1 percentage points, @HillaryClinton pop vote lead now exceeds Carter's over Ford. Larger than 11 elected presidents, including Trump.
posted by chris24 at 7:56 AM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

I remember the cold war. I cannot wrap my head around republicans choosing Putin over America. This fucking year man. This fucking year.
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 8:01 AM on December 10, 2016 [28 favorites]

what about this: on 12/15 donald has a press conference which will have the same result that everything he does has - he will dominate lots of news cycles and say lots of controversial stuff but ultimately will solidify his hold on power. the electoral college votes on 12/19. so what needs to happen is something even more controversial between 12/15 and 12/19. what is that?

hillary on 12/16 holds a press conference officially announcing that she is going to lobby electors to vote their conscience and that she is replacing tim kaine with a moderate republican (if such a thing exists, and if s/he will agree to it) - maybe even marco rubio (who i realize isn't moderate, but...). maybe susan collins, or olympia snowe. pipe dream, but that's all i got.
posted by fingers_of_fire at 8:07 AM on December 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

At 2.1 percentage points, @HillaryClinton pop vote lead now exceeds Carter's over Ford. Larger than 11 elected presidents, including Trump.

Clinton has a bigger popular vote lead than 11 presidents. Trump has a bigger electoral college lead than only 10 presidents.
posted by chris24 at 8:08 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

what about this:

Ah, the Bargaining stage.

I've found alcohol helps with the next part, if that's your thing.
posted by Mooski at 8:28 AM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

What Hillary does before 12/19 is less important than what congressional Democrats do. They need to be getting out in front of every microphone they see between now and then talking about the serious questions this raises, and how they're going to formally object to the recording of every single electoral vote Trump gets:

That's what Democrats should do this year, at a minimum: They should formally challenge Trump electoral votes in every Republican state, citing the Russian hack. They should talk about this in every media forum. They should say that they'll reluctantly accept Trump's presidency if the Electoral College chooses him, but they don't consider this a legitimate election. I don't think that there's much more a minority party in Congress can do.

The chance of this strategy actually changing the minds of electors is minuscule, but Republicans never missed an opportunity to use nothingburger scandals to try to damage Obama and Clinton, so the Democrats should not pass on making political hay out of this actual scandal. If we're going to have to live with Trump -- and we probably are -- we may as well try to wound him politically before he takes office.
posted by tonycpsu at 8:31 AM on December 10, 2016 [42 favorites]

McCain advisor.

@MarkSalter55:
Tillerson would sell out NATO for Sakhalin oil and his pal, Vlad. Should be a rough confirmation hearing, and a no vote on the Senate floor.
posted by chris24 at 8:49 AM on December 10, 2016 [7 favorites]

Harry Reid was on AM Joy this morning suggesting that Lindsey Graham take an active role in an investigation into Russia's involvement. His credibility as a Republican who led the Bill Clinton impeachment proceedings could help with the perception that this is a partisan effort. Of course, when the chips are down, Graham usually rolls over and goes with his party, so I'm not holding my breath. </SurelyThis>
posted by tonycpsu at 8:50 AM on December 10, 2016 [18 favorites]

I remember the cold war. I cannot wrap my head around republicans choosing Putin over America. This fucking year man. This fucking year.

You have to remember that the animating principal of the Republican party is not America.

It's tax cuts for the global rich who happen to be based in America, and dismantling the federal government so that those taxes can never be reinstated. Putin shares the same goals. The only inconsistency here is that they still pretend otherwise while in front of a camera.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:56 AM on December 10, 2016 [32 favorites]

Of course, when the chips are down, Graham usually rolls over and goes with his party

I dunno, he's been a pretty consistent critic of Trump for about a year now. I have no love for Graham but there's reason to believe that on issues related to the election he might well be a reliable ally.
posted by jackbishop at 9:09 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

Well I'm phonebanking for Foster Campbell right now, which is like... LOL? I feel like the situation keeps getting out from under me so that as soon as I decide to do something big and outside my comfort zone, it's like, joke's on you Russia influenced our election and everything is fucked your gesture is futile. But idk what else I'm gonna do right now so, onward.
posted by sunset in snow country at 9:09 AM on December 10, 2016 [21 favorites]

@politicalmiller
Hamilton in Federalist 68:
The Electoral College should stop the “desire in foreign powers to gain an improper ascendant in our councils.”
posted by chris24 at 9:11 AM on December 10, 2016 [35 favorites]

we may as well try to wound him politically before he takes office.

Trump can't be wounded politically because he gives no fucks about the political reality.
posted by Talez at 9:12 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

These charts showing what Republican voters believe about the 2016 election are depressing — and telling

Fully 73 percent said that they believe it's at least “probably true” that the media intentionally misled the public about the polls in an effort to hurt Trump; 36 percent say this is definitely true.
posted by futz at 9:20 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

Trump can't be wounded politically because he gives no fucks about the political reality.

I give no fucks what Trump or Trumpsters think, I care what the majority of Americans who voted against him, the few sane Republicans, those in danger of oppression, and the rest of the world thinks. Standing up to him and trying to bring him down, make him as toxic as possible with more people is the best way to help prevent maximal damage.

And he can be wounded politically. Khans, Curiel, Machado all did major damage. A minority of Americans voted for him, located conveniently to edge him an EC win, but even among Republicans he's unpopular. We need to do to him what the GOP did to Clinton and Obama, fight to make every thought, word and story about him be about Russia, corruption, racism.
posted by chris24 at 9:23 AM on December 10, 2016 [44 favorites]

2018 is already a built in Republican landslide. There's no manipulation needed there. By 2020 America will be unrecognizable, and fair elections a long shot.

I understand the impulse to talk like this, believe me I do. But it's incredibly harmful. A lot of people use justifications like this to convince themselves that there's no point in fighting. To assuage their guilt at giving up.

I see it kind of like Pascal's Wager. If it's true that we're fucked and our democracy is over well then pouring my energy into fighting it isn't going to make things worse. And if there is a chance for us to fix all of this -- even a small one - then I'm damned well going to try. I think we all have a moral obligation to try.

I, personally, would bet money on a Democratic wave election in 2018. We don't need that many seats in the House at least -- only 24 have to flip parties. Dems won more than that (30) as recently as 2006. Compare this to the largest midterm wave election in US history, in 1894. The Republicans gained 130 seats. With the smaller House then, that's over a third of house seats changing hands - 36%. By comparison, we only need to flip 5.5% of the House in 2018.

This is not over. We have not lost. Anyone who says that we have is just buying into what Trump and Pence want them to believe.
posted by galaxy rise at 9:32 AM on December 10, 2016 [67 favorites]

And he can be wounded politically. Khans, Curiel, Machado all did major damage. A minority of Americans voted for him, located conveniently to edge him an EC win, but even among Republicans he's unpopular. We need to do to him what the GOP did to Clinton and Obama, fight to make every thought, word and story about him be about Russia, corruption, racism.

All that shit happened, he still WON the election, and you think he can be wounded politically? No offense but when the guy can do all the shit he did and remain a winning candidate he might as well be made of titanium.

America has become so partisan that it's not about the candidate anymore. It's about your tribe. It's absolutely heartbreaking to watch democracy denigrate into a year long football game. 1964 the voters stopped Goldwater. This time they went full steam ahead with him.
posted by Talez at 9:33 AM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

only 24 have to flip parties

The problem is that there's only 20-something competitive districts and Democrats already control 8. Without a massive swing to the Democrats (I think D+6 was about the time it started to flip) we're not going to see the house come back. 2012 was D+1 and ended up down by 33.
posted by Talez at 9:38 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

All that shit happened, he still WON the election, and you think he can be wounded politically? No offense but when the guy can do all the shit he did and remain a winning candidate he might as well be made of titanium.

He lost the popular vote by 2.1% and 2.8 million votes. And that's with the FBI and Russia working for him, misogyny, etc. Squeaking an EC win doesn't make him invincible. And acting like he is just leads to people giving up and not trying. Which leads to worse outcomes for those at risk. Yes, the electorate is sadly extremely partisan but he's a minority president and we need to be an opposition party and fight back for our ideals, our country and the endangered.
posted by chris24 at 9:42 AM on December 10, 2016 [46 favorites]

Without a massive swing to the Democrats (I think D+6 was about the time it started to flip) we're not going to see the house come back.

Yeah, I agree that we need a massive swing -- a realignment. But I think that's possible, with enough change at the party leadership level and a lot of good candidates in previously uncompetitive districts.
posted by galaxy rise at 9:43 AM on December 10, 2016 [5 favorites]

He lost the popular vote by 2.1% and 2.8 million votes.

This is a comforting story, but all those votes were in California and New York. To retake the House, we need those 2.8 million people to move to the midwest, and a magic unicorn to undo gerrymandering.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:45 AM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

An open letter to the Human Rights Campaign: You rank Wall Street firms on equality. Where do they stand on bigotry in the White House?
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:50 AM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

This is a comforting story, but all those votes were in California and New York. To retake the House, we need those 2.8 million people to move to the midwest, and a magic unicorn to undo gerrymandering.

First, in 2017 we need to win the NJ and VA governor races and try to win enough seats in the special election of the ungerrymandered NC legislature to sustain Cooper's vetoes. All very possible.

Then yes, we need to do better in 2018. Which is a tough fight in the House and Senate, but a great opportunity for Dems in the governor races. 36 races will be up for election and many will be in states were Republicans will be running in states Obama or Clinton won. Plus with term limits, Republicans will be defending 14 empty seats.
posted by chris24 at 9:52 AM on December 10, 2016 [20 favorites]

I understand the impulse to talk like this, believe me I do. But it's incredibly harmful. A lot of people use justifications like this to convince themselves that there's no point in fighting. To assuage their guilt at giving up. [...] This is not over. We have not lost. Anyone who says that we have is just buying into what Trump and Pence want them to believe.

I feel similarly about some of the catastrophizing on the left. I mean, sure, a future may come to pass where we all get rounded up and loaded onto rockets and shot into the sun (or, y'know, a lower-hyperbole version of the same). But there are meaningful things we can focus our energy on instead, like elections in 2017 and 2018, prodding our Congresspeople, and an awful lot of low level boring stuff like person-to-person interactions that only have an effect in cumulative form over time.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 10:02 AM on December 10, 2016 [7 favorites]

Andrea Mitchell on MSNBC just now reporting that her contacts in the transition team say Rex Tillerson will be nominated as SoS.
posted by XMLicious at 10:04 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

Yeah, I mean, talking about what's "realistic" at this stage in the game and what districts are competitive and which ones aren't seems like playing by a set of old-school rules that are so far in the dust at this point that frankly it's willful blindness to keep playing by them, especially if the takeaway is: "oh, we're definitely going to lose, so why even try."

Like, it's true, people usually don't bother to pay attention to mid-term elections, which gives incumbents a huge advantage, but usually we aren't all sitting here obsessively watching political coverage 24/7 as a deranged reality TV star tweets psychotic nonsense and everyone wonders if he may in fact be some kind of Russian Manchurian candidate! That is an unusual situation! So unusual that, in comparison, "a mid-term election with higher-than-average voter turnout that results in unexpected upsets of incumbents" doesn't seem thaaaat crazy to me.
posted by pretentious illiterate at 10:13 AM on December 10, 2016 [44 favorites]

An open letter to the Human Rights Campaign: You rank Wall Street firms on equality. Where do they stand on bigotry in the White House?

This is one area where having the Wall Street guys in the Cabinet is a good thing (I mean, relatively. Not a lot of full-on "good" options these days). The finance industry can be surprisingly ok on LGBT issues. They're robber barons who want to pick our pockets, and they're not going to actively fight for us because they could spend that time pocket-picking, but they're also not going to bother wasting time picking fights against us because, hey, pockets to pick!

"But I've never been a politician before" is only a titanium force-field riiiiiiiight up to the point where you have to be a politician.

I think this is a great angle for the Dems to help drive a wedge between Trump and Ryan/McConnell. Trump has no clue how Congress is supposed to work, and he's going to get mad when he has to deal with the realities of parliamentary procedure. Ryan will respond by pushing his own agenda, Trump will respond by publicly firing McConnell's wife, and if we're lucky we can limp along to 2020 without anything too terrible happening, and swap in a qualified president.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 10:20 AM on December 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

I was just thinking that people seem to be radicalized now to an extent I've never seen before. I always used to be one of the leftier and more politically aware people I knew, but know they seem to be zooming past me. I don't think this will end soon. Not only did Trump lose the popular vote, his favorable ratings are really low.

Friends of mine are already making plans to canvas in 2018, and these are people who maybe canvassed once or twice for Obama and Clinton. I think lefties and Democrats have come to understand that they need to vote in their local elections.

NJ and VA governorships are totally winnable next year.

I am really tired and dispirited after this election, but somehow knowing the deck is stacked against me makes me want to fight harder.
posted by maggiemaggie at 10:26 AM on December 10, 2016 [32 favorites]

Was it worth it, Mitt?
posted by Wordshore at 10:36 AM on December 10, 2016 [7 favorites]

FBI covered up Russian influence on Trump's election win, Harry Reid claims

Harry Reid, outgoing Senate minority leader, compared FBI director James Comey to the agency’s notorious founder, J Edgar Hoover, and called for his resignation.

...Pressed on whether he believed Comey had information on Russia’s influence and sat on it, Reid replied: “That’s right, that is true.”

“I am so disappointed in Comey. He has let the country down for partisan purposes and that’s why I call him the new J Edgar Hoover, because I believe that,” Reid added, calling for the director’s resignation.

“I think he should be investigated by the Senate. He should be investigated by other agencies of the government including the security agencies because if ever there was a matter of security it’s this … I don’t think any of us understood how partisan Comey was.”

...Senior Democrats demanded a congressional investigation next year. “Reports of the CIA’s conclusion that Russia actively sought to help elect Donald Trump are simultaneously stunning and not surprising, given Russia’s disdain for democracy and admiration for autocracy,” said Chuck Schumer, Reid’s successor as Senate minority leader.

“The silence from WikiLeaks and others since election day has been deafening. That any country could be meddling in our elections should shake both political parties to their core.”
posted by futz at 10:45 AM on December 10, 2016 [32 favorites]

Was it worth it, Mitt?

"I sold out my core principals, again, and all I got was this MAGA hat"
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:46 AM on December 10, 2016 [8 favorites]

Typically, midterm elections do tend to swing against the party in charge, so I actually think there's some chance of leftward momentum in 2018 if people start hammering now.
posted by en forme de poire at 10:46 AM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

Typically, midterm elections do tend to swing against the party in charge, so I actually think there's some chance of leftward momentum in 2018 if people start hammering now.

I suspect some red districts with depressed economies might be surprisingly vulnerable to Democratic pickups from economic-red-meat Bernie style progressives, if America Isn't Great Again Yet By November 2018. (And I'm not particularly a Bernie fan.) Like, someone who's willing to really go after the Carrier deal.

(Plus, with dozens of them criticizing Trump all over the country, Trump may spend so much time freaking out on Twitter that he forgets to sign Paul Ryan's bills. We need candidates who thrive on Trump attacks rather than fearing them.)

I'm hoping likely-DNC-chair Keith Ellison focuses on really tailoring candidates to districts, and focusing them on the slice of the progressive platform with the most appeal in each particular place.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 10:57 AM on December 10, 2016 [9 favorites]

For the NJ governor's election, Phil Murphy is the Democrat frontrunner, he's raised a ridiculous amount of money for the race, has a ridiculous number of endorsements including Jon Bon Jovi, and there's a very real chance that nominating him will be throwing away the governorship. He's a Goldman Sachs guy with zero charisma. He's already being compared to Jon Corzine, another Democratic CEO politician who was legitimately a horrible governor and lost his re-election to Chris Christie.

I will be backing John Wisniewski in the primary, but I don't expect him to win.
posted by Rainbo Vagrant at 11:04 AM on December 10, 2016

October 29 vs. December 10: A Lesson in Editorial Judgment
posted by T.D. Strange at 11:19 AM on December 10, 2016 [7 favorites]

I suspect some red districts with depressed economies might be surprisingly vulnerable to Democratic pickups from economic-red-meat Bernie style progressives, if America Isn't Great Again Yet By November 2018.

On the last Keepin It 1600 podcast, Missouri Secretary of State Jason Kander had some really good thoughts on how to do this effectively, that in his experience policy doesn't matter as much as authenticity and sticking to your values even if you think the voters you're talking to will disagree with them, because even if you differ on values they'll surprisingly reward you just for showing up and listening and being straight with them and you don't have to compromise progressive values to do that - in fact it sounds like throwing your values under the bus to court red state voters is more distasteful to those voters than holding progressive values in the first place. I hope Kander will be involved with helping red state Dems in 2018.
posted by jason_steakums at 11:32 AM on December 10, 2016 [39 favorites]

It's absolutely heartbreaking to watch democracy denigrate into a year long football game.

especially when we're the football.
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 11:38 AM on December 10, 2016 [5 favorites]

I've found alcohol helps with the next part, if that's your thing.

There are better ways.
posted by Coventry at 11:48 AM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

CIA: Russia definitely interfered in the election to help elect Trump
DEPLORABLES: Obama's a seekrit Muslim!

CIA: No we're saying they broke into voter records and coordinated with the Trump campaign to cheat the voters.
DEPLORABLES: Lock her up!

FBI: *wild-eyed shit-eating grin*
posted by petebest at 11:49 AM on December 10, 2016 [13 favorites]

I only recently heard Megyn Kelly on NPR promoting her book with a cautionary tale of crossing Trump. She sounded so much like an abused wife who went back I wanted to puke. "Well, he put my and my family's life in danger for over a year, but after I went to meet him as a supplicant and agreed to do a softball interview, he was very magnanimous."
posted by benzenedream at 11:50 AM on December 10, 2016 [11 favorites]

I am dumbfounded by this choice of Tillerson at this time. Either Trump is under strict orders from Putin or else Trump does not give a single flying fuck and believes he can slip this one past the Senate. I think he loses Graham's vote for sure but as for the rest of the Republicans who can tell.

Speaking of which, the Louisiana Senate race is today, is it not?
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 12:20 PM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

Teen Vogue (yes, really!) Donald Trump Is Gaslighting America

As a candidate, Trump's gas lighting was manipulative, as President-elect it is a deliberate attempt to destabilize journalism as a check on the power of government.

To be clear, the "us" here is everyone living under Trump. It's radical progressives, hardline Republicans, and Jill Stein's weird cousin. The President of the United States cannot be lying to the American electorate with zero accountability. The threat of deception is not a partisan issue. Trump took advantage of the things that divide this country, pitting us against one another, while lying his way to the Oval Office. Yes, everything is painfully clear in hindsight, but let’s make sure Trump’s win was the Lasik eye surgery we all so desperately needed.

It's a good essay. You should read the whole thing. She doesn't reveal any new information but she uses the facts to make a point with a clarity and sharpness that is lacking in MSM.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 12:34 PM on December 10, 2016 [78 favorites]

I haven't exactly been reading much, as I'm really not the target audience, but Teen Vogue under Elaine Welteroth has been utterly kicking ass.
posted by zachlipton at 12:39 PM on December 10, 2016 [13 favorites]

This is like a fight-the-aliens movie where the burnt out pilot who nobody thought anything of steps up to be the hero, but in this case it's Cracked and Teen Vogue.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 12:42 PM on December 10, 2016 [49 favorites]

Speaking of which, the Louisiana Senate race is today, is it not?

Yes it is. I voted. The crazy Republican dingbat will win anyway. If it's by less than five points I'll be amazed.
posted by Bringer Tom at 12:45 PM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

Jason Kander is really impressive, he only lost by 3 to Blunt in Missouri where Trump won by 22. And he mainly did it running on unabashed liberal policies.

Just think where we could've been as a party with more Jason Kanders instead of Schumer's warmed over crap salad of dead on arrival Wall St friendly Senate picks in Iowa, Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Arizona. Maybe exactly the same place with no more Senate pickups, but maybe not. But there'd be something of a Democratic bench to build on.
posted by T.D. Strange at 12:47 PM on December 10, 2016 [19 favorites]

This is like a fight-the-aliens movie where the burnt out pilot who nobody thought anything of steps up to be the hero, but in this case it's Cracked and Teen Vogue.

It sure as hell wasn't gonna be CBS. I hope they get bought and looted by our new Russian media overlo- oh, no wait that's what they are now. Well . . . a pox on their prime-time lineup then.
posted by petebest at 12:48 PM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

Teen Vogue (yes, really!)

A user’s guide to Teen Vogue, which is quietly doing very good journalism
posted by PenDevil at 12:58 PM on December 10, 2016 [24 favorites]

Either Trump is under strict orders from Putin or else Trump does not give a single flying fuck and believes he can slip this one past the Senate.

You really think that one or the other is what's going on here, and not both?

And yes, he will "slip this one" and any others he wants past a majority Republican Senate with a comatose zombified Democratic minority that would rather whine and shiver than do anything that takes conviction and courage.
posted by blucevalo at 1:02 PM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

To retake the House, we need those 2.8 million people to move to the midwest, and a magic unicorn to undo gerrymandering.

Google and Facebook should just relocate to the Midwest for 10 years or so. I feel like it's their patriotic duty at this point. I'm not totally serious, but, I dunno, about 80%?
posted by Jon Mitchell at 1:26 PM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

Since I wasn't doing anything else useful unless you count refreshing Metafilter and Twitter, I just called my senators and left a short voicemail, inspired by this script. Specifically asked the [R] Senator to support his Republican colleagues in probing into Russian interference. Asked them both to investigate the PEOTUS's ties to foreign governments. I have little hope this will do anything, but y'know. Full inboxes, empty hearts.
posted by deludingmyself at 1:48 PM on December 10, 2016 [9 favorites]

Good analysis of the Trump Time cover: Why Time's Trump Cover Is A Work of Subversive Political Art

I found the details of the chair particularly interesting. It warms my heart that Trump proudly sat for this portrait with no clue what was being conveyed. Hubris and ignorance will get you every time, Donnie.
posted by lydhre at 1:50 PM on December 10, 2016 [18 favorites]

This period between the election and inauguration is the calm before what is likely to be a very wild storm.

If that one DKos diary I saw is to be believed, we have already seen the beginnings of a seismic shift in how Congress will operate. Apparently the know-nothing branch of the R's wanted to put the Mattis waiver in the continuing resolution to keep the government funded, threatening a shutdown if the D's voted it down -- and the D's said "make our day." Realizing that they own this shit now the R's backed down and instead put in the "limited debate" squib which really doesn't mean anything but makes it look like they got something.

The thing is, it is only about a third of the Republican House caucus that wants to burn the country down. That's a lot for members of the body that are supposed to be running said country, but it's not a majority. They have been depending on the Republicans' habitual long-honed lockstep march to keep the rest of the party in line; even if the burndowners aren't a majority they can threaten the rest of their caucus with the kind of split Reagan warned them was intolerable.

But I think some of them, particularly the old guard who actually remember Reagan, are losing their taste for the game in this form. The burndowners didn't get what they wanted this time. That has to mean a split within the Republican caucus. This may very well be like that fissure on an ice sheet that portends a major iceberg calving. I suspect a lot of the older Republican guard are about at the limit of what they will tolerate and it won't take much more to use up their lifetime supply of fucks-to-give. I certainly don't see those guys switching to D, but kind of like the first realignment when a new iceberg splits in half and the halves overturn. The D's have their own split between the progressives and corporatists, and the interplay of four or five more or less independent subparties realigning will almost certainly be the kind of thing they teach in history classes a hundred years from now, assuming the country still exists and the Earth is still habitable.
posted by Bringer Tom at 1:58 PM on December 10, 2016 [15 favorites]

NYT says it's Tillerson for State

But hey, all his dignity and $25 got Mitt Romney a Make America Great Again hat, so I hope he feels satisfied now.
posted by zachlipton at 2:02 PM on December 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

But hey, all his dignity and $25 got Mitt Romney a Make America Great Again hat

That dinner at Jean Georges was pretty delicious though.
posted by PenDevil at 2:05 PM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

I hear the sauteed Mittballs are to die for.
posted by kirkaracha at 2:07 PM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

Republicans who came out of this thing with their integrity and dignity intact:

1) Evan McMullin
2) John Kasich
3) ?
posted by Justinian at 2:08 PM on December 10, 2016 [11 favorites]

I found the details of the chair particularly interesting.

It's not like they went looking for that chair; the picture was taken in Trump's Trump Tower home. It's Trump's chair. That it is gaudy and yet in poor repair is just perfectly in character with its owner.
posted by Bringer Tom at 2:08 PM on December 10, 2016 [20 favorites]

I find the glee at Romney's not getting the position pretty baffling. You'd rather an oil company CEO with deep ties to Russia, because it lets you get one more dig at a pretty normal career politician you don't like?

Agreed. I kind of see it as Romney being willing to let Trump humiliate him if there was even a chance he could get the SoS job and then use it to push back against Russian influence.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 2:09 PM on December 10, 2016 [12 favorites]

I'd be doing handsprings if Romney were SoS. There was no chance Trump would pick him.
posted by Justinian at 2:11 PM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

I find the glee at Romney's not getting the position pretty baffling.

I would prefer Romney as well. But he kissed ass and failed. I didn't post anything gleeful or otherwise, but I can understand those who did post snark. Because now my reaction to him isn't based on whether he can become SoS, it's based on his past actions. And his past actions include seeking and accepting Trump's endorsement in 2012 and appearing with him touting it. An action that validated Trump's birtherism and his position as a power broker in the party. Trump doesn't win in 2016 without Romney's cravenness in 2012. So it's fucking wonderful that he prostrated himself to try to get SoS and be a sane choice, but it didn't work. So fuck any sympathy for him now, because a lot of this is on him.
posted by chris24 at 2:14 PM on December 10, 2016 [12 favorites]

That dinner at Jean Georges was pretty delicious though.

I wouldn't have expected Trump's ass to be that tasty, but it takes all kinds I guess.
posted by Coventry at 2:15 PM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

It was pretty obvious Romney was only there to humiliate NeverTrumpers, just like Patreus was there to show Hilary supporters emails didn't actually mean anything other than to the New York Times and The Intercept. Trump is spiking the ball, he's showing he won, he gets to dominate and humiliate everyone. He was never picking Romney, and Romney could've done some good maintaining himself as a vocal critic.

The charitable interpretation of Romney stepping up for the good of the country had no basis in his entire self-serving career.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:16 PM on December 10, 2016 [12 favorites]

I think Romney had zero chance. Trump brought him to showcase how previous enemies now love him. That's the only reason he was "considered."
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 2:16 PM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

For me anyway, it's not glee at Romney not getting the position. I surely would have preferred Romney to virtually anyone else who Trump might have considered for the job. And hey, if you want to tell me that Romney sold out the last shred of his dignity in a valiant effort to save the republic, I can somewhat understand that. But at the end of the day, Trump dragged Romney to that restaurant and publicly humiliated him as retribution, and now we're down another reasonably-respected Republican voice on team "this is not normal, this is not ok."

Remember, it wasn't just Romney going to dinner. Here's what Romney said after the meal:

And he said Trump had promoted "a message of inclusion and bringing people together," just hours after the president-elect threatened to jail or revoke the citizenship of anyone burning American flags.
...
“I happen to think that America's best days are ahead of us,” he said. “And what I've seen through these discussions I've had with President-elect Trump, as well as what we've seen in his speech the night of his victory, as well as the people he's selected as part of his transition, all of those things combined give me increasing hope that President-elect Trump is the very man who can lead us to that better future.”

Early this year, Romney called Trump a "con man" and said that he would be the end of the "shining city on a hill."

So no, I'm not celebrating any of it, but it's hard not to say that Romney didn't completely sell out, perhaps with noble intentions, yet accomplished precisely nothing.
posted by zachlipton at 2:17 PM on December 10, 2016 [29 favorites]

romney had no chance in the face of tillerson. nothing mixes better than cheetohs, big oil and russia.
posted by localhuman at 2:18 PM on December 10, 2016

It's not like they went looking for that chair; the picture was taken in Trump's Trump Tower home. It's Trump's chair. That it is gaudy and yet in poor repair is just perfectly in character with its owner.

I didn't know that! And it's virtually identical to the chair Hitler is sitting on in this cover.
posted by maggiemaggie at 2:20 PM on December 10, 2016 [5 favorites]

Agreed. I kind of see it as Romney being willing to let Trump humiliate him...

Sure, and that was admirable, but you can appreciate the humor of the situation without taking glee in it.
posted by Coventry at 2:20 PM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

Tillerson very likely will be paired with John Bolton as Deputy Secretary of State, per @mitchellreports

Exxon CEO and John Bolton at State. We're going to bomb whoever Russia says.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:29 PM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

And it's virtually identical to the chair Hitler is sitting on

From the time of Louis XIV until the 1950's, that was pretty much the ultimate style of luxury chair you sat in if you were a powerful person lounging. It's a complete stereotype.
posted by Bringer Tom at 2:29 PM on December 10, 2016 [8 favorites]

And honestly, a longer look at Romney's record paints a bit less charitable of a picture. It's hard for me to square the circle on the fact that the same guy who was responsible for Romneycare in Massachusetts would turn around and embrace Paul Ryan and his Medicare and Social Security plans, including their past endorsements of outright privatization, and campaign forcefully for the repeal of the ACA.

You can certainly frame Romney's efforts as a noble effort to save the country and the world from Trump, but I think a simpler explanation, based on Romney's past, is that he really wanted some kind of cabinet position and publicly debasing himself was his only shot at getting one.
posted by zachlipton at 2:34 PM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

So, there's a pretty good chance that the President-Elect of the United States is going to get in a twitter war with Teen Vogue soon.

Ladies and gentlemen...2016!
posted by Cookiebastard at 2:43 PM on December 10, 2016 [24 favorites]

Republicans who came out of this thing with their integrity and dignity intact:

1) Evan McMullin
2) John Kasich
3) ?

I really don't like him for 100 reasons plus 100 more, but if we're filling out the box score, I think we have to give Lindsey Graham a solid single.
posted by petebest at 2:43 PM on December 10, 2016 [38 favorites]

Tillerson very likely will be paired with John Bolton as Deputy Secretary of State, per @mitchellreports

Good god. We're not going to survive this, are we?
posted by photo guy at 2:45 PM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

Even crazy Joe gets it.

@WalshFreedom:
If there was evidence that the Russians helped Hillary win, my fellow conservatives would be yelling for an investigation.
#RussianHackers

@WalshFreedom:
So wait...the CIA says Russia messed with our election to help Trump win and Trump attacks...the CIA?
Not Russia? He goes after the CIA?
posted by chris24 at 2:53 PM on December 10, 2016 [14 favorites]

The primary thing Trump accomplished with Romney is that he silenced a potentially effective critic who might have been able to coalesce some future resistance. Plus the dominance/humiliation factor but under the phony cloak of magnanimity, inclusiveness.
posted by madamjujujive at 2:54 PM on December 10, 2016 [14 favorites]

@WalshFreedom:
Republican silence will be tantamount to treason.
Call 4 an investigation. Foreign governments can't pick our President.
#RussianHackers
posted by chris24 at 3:00 PM on December 10, 2016 [9 favorites]

@BraddJaffy:
McCain: "Putin is a thug and a bully and a murderer ... the relationship between Mr. Tillerson and Vladimir Putin needs to be examined." [video]
posted by chris24 at 3:03 PM on December 10, 2016 [7 favorites]

i should very much like it if the high viz lefty blogs (kos, tpm, lgm, digby, etc) would freeze out nyt and wapo in favor of teen vogue quotes. taibbi, pierce, and borowitz are handling the snark. i want the t-v journos names out ther too, because journalism.
posted by j_curiouser at 3:04 PM on December 10, 2016 [10 favorites]

I mean, if the establishment Republicans wanted a figurehead to coalesce around, I am sure they could find someone. I think the question is whether they have the guts to do anything. I'm going to guess they don't, but maybe they'll discover their conscience and develop some courage at this late date.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 3:10 PM on December 10, 2016

Teen Vogue (yes, really!)

That sounds like what was happening in Iceland during the financial crisis, when an English-language newspaper aimed largely at tourists was the only outfit doing investigative journalism because the Icelandic-language press was all owned by people with their snouts in the trough.
posted by acb at 3:38 PM on December 10, 2016 [23 favorites]

We're going to bomb whoever Russia says.

We'll be providing Reaper drones and Hellfire missiles to help pacify the Finnish insurgency. In return, the FSB will be sharing its SORM mass-surveillance expertise with the FBI.
posted by acb at 3:40 PM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

You can subscribe to Teen Vogue for $5 btw. Five dollars to support this kind of good journalism.
posted by everybody had matching towels at 3:50 PM on December 10, 2016 [32 favorites]

2018: "Donald Trump was impeached and removed from office on the basis of a series of investigative reports in Highlights magazine..."
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 4:10 PM on December 10, 2016 [65 favorites]

2018: "Donald Trump was impeached and removed from office on the basis of a series of investigative reports in Highlights magazine..."

"I only get it for the picture find!"
posted by Talez at 4:17 PM on December 10, 2016 [18 favorites]

2018: "Donald Trump was impeached and removed from office on the basis of a series of investigative reports in Highlights magazine..."

Goofus attempts to run the country by tweeting from a New York penthouse, farming the real work out to neo-Nazis.

Gallant has a transition plan and a strategic team to build a cabinet of knowledgeable specialists to enact her policies as she helms the organization from the White House.
posted by jackbishop at 4:18 PM on December 10, 2016 [56 favorites]

So that's why Goofus and Gallant was recently about the embodiment clause.
posted by drezdn at 4:18 PM on December 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

"Goofus provokes conflict between two nuclear-armed nations. Gallant carefully studies the region and plans carefully and methodically before deciding to upend decades of carefully-established policy."

"Goofus grabs women without their permission and brags about it. Gallant cultivates a healthy relationship based on mutual respect and consent."
posted by zachlipton at 4:19 PM on December 10, 2016 [16 favorites]

When I was a kid, most of my white, male, Baby Boomer classmates said they liked Goofus better. They still do.
posted by oneswellfoop at 4:28 PM on December 10, 2016 [9 favorites]

i'm subscribing. it would be so fucking balls if teen vogue could get a pulitzer for political coverage.
posted by j_curiouser at 4:30 PM on December 10, 2016 [27 favorites]

From the time of Louis XIV until the 1950's, that was pretty much the ultimate style of luxury chair you sat in if you were a powerful person lounging. It's a complete stereotype.

Yes, but Nadav Kander, the photographer who is Jewish and from Israel, picked that one torn chair out of the pile of luxury garbage at Trump Tower. It's not exactly a coincidence.

Compare with what Kander said after photographing Obama as the Person of the Year winner in 2012: “When photographing such a high profile individual, it’s a huge challenge to not let their high profile take over the process,” Kander says. “I wanted to make a meaningful photograph that reflected pause in a person’s life and reflect his humanity.” You think this year's portrait reflects Trump's humanity as Trump wants us to see it?
posted by lydhre at 4:33 PM on December 10, 2016 [7 favorites]

I really, truly get why people here are mad at the NYT and WaPo and NPR. Their uneven and occasionally dangerously biased story weighting is reprehensible in light of Trump's plans moving forward.

But that's the thing. Trump and the right are already full-forward on message that the MSM are irrelevant and untrustworthy. I am seeing my right-wing friends who didn't vote Trump echoing the message that the MSM is the literal equivalent of the fake news people.

And meanwhile the alt right is setting up their own 24-hour news network. It will have full press access to Trump. There are also rumblings across the right that maybe the NYT and MSNBC and the like should not have access to his briefings. That is how you create a State Press that people have to rely on. That is how you undermine the First Amendment. We already know they will have mainstream advertisers, because of Trump's ties with NBC/Universal and their sponsors.

I don't know what the answer is, but helping undermine media that actually fact-checks and values investigative journalism is not a good long-term strategy when we're dealing with people who not only would be thrilled for them to go away, but are currently laying groundwork to bury them completely.
posted by Mchelly at 4:36 PM on December 10, 2016 [27 favorites]

I watched part of Trump's Louisiana rally yesterday and boggled to see a huge crowd of working stiffs screaming their approval of his pledge to slash business taxes by 20%. This man for the working people has the little guys rooting for their corporate overlords now. Up is now down.

Business owners should stop salivating over the prospect of a 15% tax rate and should start worrying about the approach he is taking, modeled after the leadership style of his mentor Putin:

Yashar ‏@yashar
Trump says he will talk to CEOs directly to keep jobs in US. It appears that Putin believes in the same approach. Wait for the pen moment.

Another notable thing in his LA rally, when people chanted "Lock her up, check out his response.
posted by madamjujujive at 4:40 PM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

I don't know what the answer is, but helping undermine media that actually fact-checks and values investigative journalism is not a good long-term strategy when we're dealing with people who not only would be thrilled for them to go away, but are currently laying groundwork to bury them completely.

Yeah, I have to wonder if we'd be better off subscribing to NYT/WaPo and then complaining when they report things that are provably untrue ("Donald tweeted that he had the biggest electoral vote victory in history" with no indication that it's a lie), or present facts as matters of opinion ("Democrats say sky is blue; Republicans counter that sky is green with orange polka dots.").
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 4:41 PM on December 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

The thing is though, the news we really need, the stories that need to be told about a Trump administration, they're not coming out of the press briefing room. Playing shenanigans with press access would be deeply damaging to be sure and a bad sign for freedom, but whether the New York Times gets to sit in that room and ask the occasional question of whatever sycophant gets to be press secretary is largely irrelevant. The real stories will involve buying some 35-year EPA staffer a couple drinks and letting them spill. The real stories will involve FOIA requests and lawsuits and whistleblowers. Nothing of substance will come from having "access."
posted by zachlipton at 4:45 PM on December 10, 2016 [50 favorites]

You think this year's portrait reflects Trump's humanity as Trump wants us to see it?

Well of course now that we see the flaw it's not, but at the time Trump thought it was. It is after all a Trump chair, meaning it's the best chair ever for seating his gold-plated bottom. I'm sure the photographer was subtle in letting Trump think hewas picking the chair. That's how you do it with a monumental egoist like Trump. They have to think they have made all the decisions.
posted by Bringer Tom at 4:46 PM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

Remember that Biden gaffe about Russia from 2009? "'Russia has to make some very difficult, calculated decisions,' Mr. Biden said. 'They have a shrinking population base, they have a withering economy, they have a banking sector and structure that is not likely to be able to withstand the next 15 years, they’re in a situation where the world is changing before them and they’re clinging to something in the past that is not sustainable.'" Similar things could be said about the US rust belt or Brexit-voting rural England or the neglected parts of Germany and France that support their far-right parties.

The difficult, calculated decisions were made.
posted by Luminiferous Ether at 4:47 PM on December 10, 2016 [17 favorites]

I have to wonder if we'd be better off subscribing to NYT/WaPo and then complaining when they report things that are provably untrue

The problem is liberals have been saying these things at least since 2000, and nothing ever changes. If anything the NYT has become even more entrenched in the Church of Broderism "both sides do it" coverage than ever before. Complaining has done dickall. The rise of blogs and online media as alternatives has done dickall to improve their reporting. They literally won't even acknowledge the issue, see the tone deaf responses from the Public editor.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:47 PM on December 10, 2016 [7 favorites]

The real stories will involve FOIA requests and lawsuits and whistleblowers. Nothing of substance will come from having "access."

Word. Big stories don't come from questions asked at press conferences; they come from digging through the boring day-to-day material generated by the government, and from running down seemingly unrelated leads. Like, say, the arrest of a couple of guys for an office building burglary...

Farenthold at WaPo has been able to do world-class investigative reporting this election without any "access" at all.

We know that Trump & his people will lie to the press. So the press shouldn't waste their time asking them questions. And, frankly, I wish the mainstream press would stop catering to them. If they're going to lie, and you know they're going to lie, don't give them a platform!

WHY do they keep putting Conway on, for instance, when everyone knows everything she says is bullshit?
posted by suelac at 4:49 PM on December 10, 2016 [47 favorites]

How to get back into the White House press corps:

Publish one headline saying "Trump lies, saying ..."
(Trump will provide the lie.)

Then promise to downgrade future headlines with "Trump states, offering no evidence, ..."

Presto, access restored.
posted by ocschwar at 4:53 PM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

This takes on extra significance in hindsight.

[Sept. 5, 2016] U.S. investigating potential covert Russian plan to disrupt November elections

Some congressional leaders briefed recently by the intelligence agencies on Russian influence operations in Europe, and how they may serve as a template for activities in the United States, were disturbed by what they heard.

After Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) ended a secure 30-minute phone briefing given by a top intelligence official recently, he was “deeply shaken,” according to an aide who was with Reid when he left the secure room at the FBI’s Las Vegas office.
posted by futz at 4:54 PM on December 10, 2016 [13 favorites]

Well, Kellogg's stopped advertising on Breitbart*, so the Big B is trying to organize a boycott of the Big K. Me, I have made a major purchase of Eggo Waffles (I've done stranger things) and cookies from multiple Kellogg-owned brands (Keebler, Mother's, Famous Amos). And yes, cookies baked by elves is a more credible claim than anything Breitbart is selling.

*why did they put ads on Breitbart in the first place? Did market surveys show alt-righters eat more cereal? Or just a "this audience will buy anything" strategy?
posted by oneswellfoop at 4:55 PM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

It is unlikely that either your Kellogg purchases or Breitbart's boycott will be noticed until Kellogg actuaries point an electron microscope at their figures for the year.
posted by Bringer Tom at 4:58 PM on December 10, 2016

Kellogg owns Kashi too, btw.
posted by wondermouse at 5:01 PM on December 10, 2016

MetaFilter: some things will be surprisingly sensible, while many others will be an interminable shitshower
posted by kirkaracha at 5:09 PM on December 10, 2016 [5 favorites]

But... I like cereal...
posted by Justinian at 5:21 PM on December 10, 2016

Tim Cook, Larry Page, Sheryl Sandberg — and maybe even Jeff Bezos — are going to Trump’s tech summit next week

“I plan to tell the President-elect that we are with him and will help in any way we can,” said [Oracle CEO Safra] Catz in a statement. “If he can reform the tax code, reduce regulation and negotiate better trade deals, the U.S. technology industry will be stronger and more competitive than ever.”

This is not ok. Would it be wrong to mail Catz a copy of IBM and the Holocaust?
posted by zachlipton at 5:44 PM on December 10, 2016 [19 favorites]

This is not ok. Would it be wrong to mail Catz a copy of IBM and the Holocaust?

Did you not see the words "Oracle CEO"?
posted by ocschwar at 5:46 PM on December 10, 2016 [17 favorites]

In other news: "Foes of Russia Say Child Pornography Is Planted to Ruin Them"

Parallels to "Pizzagate" are sadly obvious. Countdown to The Donald declaring a crusade against child porn...

It looks like we're about to enter a dark age for the world. Short of obliterating your DEK once a day, I'm kind of afraid of how this can be used against people.
posted by Talez at 5:53 PM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

Yeah, Oracle would be delighted to sell the licenses for the back-office systems to run the internment camps.
posted by Devonian at 5:56 PM on December 10, 2016 [6 favorites]

from the 'tech summit' article:
“Look, this is obviously a circus,” said one person close to the situation. “Everyone in tech just wants to be invisible right now when it comes to this administration, but has to participate since we have done it before.”

Another prominent techie, Jack Dorsey, CEO and inventor of Twitter, Trump’s favorite method of digital communication, told me last week he was not invited and later said he was not sure if he was.

Meanwhile, with Obama...
posted by oneswellfoop at 5:57 PM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

“Everyone in tech just wants to be invisible right now when it comes to this administration, but has to participate since we have done it before.”

Say it with me, everybody: "N-O-R-M-A-L-I-Z-A-T-I-O-N!"
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:00 PM on December 10, 2016 [10 favorites]

Say it with me, everybody: "N-O-R-M-A-L-I-Z-A-T-I-O-N!"

seriously if even a few of these pandering assweasels had just said no, this is not normal, i'm not attending any meeting with the shitgibbon - but no wait, capitalists can't do that. they have to think of the stockholders. sigh.
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 6:07 PM on December 10, 2016 [12 favorites]

Short of obliterating your DEK once a day

Do you mean deliberately forgetting data every 24 hours, or some kind of re-keying?
posted by Coventry at 6:17 PM on December 10, 2016

Has anyone commented on this yet?

Shutdown Averted, Senate Backs Stop-Gap Spending Bill

With less than hour to spare, the Senate late Friday backed legislation averting a government shutdown as coal-state Democrats retreated on long-term health care benefits for retired miners and promised a renewed fight for the working class next year.

[...]

The votes came hours after Democrats dropped threats to block the spending measure in hopes of using the shutdown deadline to try to win a one-year respite for 16,500 miners facing the loss of health care benefits at year's end. Instead, the legislation provides benefits at a cost of $45 million for four months.

Democrats invoked President-elect Donald Trump's promises to coal country as they pressed to continue the benefits. Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., a potential member of the Trump Cabinet, led the fight of coal-state Democrats.

But House Republicans were unrelenting and had already vacated the Capitol for a three-week holiday, forcing Democrats to concede. Manchin acknowledged Friday night that he did not have the votes to block the bill, but said "the fight will continue" next year.

"I'm born into a family of coal miners. If I'm not going to stand up for them, who is?" he asked reporters.

Manchin was meeting with Trump on Monday.

The fight gave Democrats, who suffered devastating election losses a month ago at the hands of working-class voters, a chance to cast themselves and not the GOP as the champions of the common man. Manchin was joined by other coal-state Democrats who face re-election in 2018 in states Trump won last month, including Pennsylvania and Ohio.

"We're just getting warmed up," said Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., vowing a fight next year. "These miners and their families kept their promise, put their lives at risk. ... It's not too difficult for a senator or House member to keep a promise."

We're just getting warmed up... you won't believe how quickly we'll fold next year once we're all stretched and limber!
posted by indubitable at 6:23 PM on December 10, 2016 [11 favorites]

Do you mean deliberately forgetting data every 24 hours, or some kind of re-keying?

Wiping the drive every day.
posted by Talez at 6:25 PM on December 10, 2016

We know that Trump & his people will lie to the press. So the press shouldn't waste their time asking them questions. And, frankly, I wish the mainstream press would stop catering to them. If they're going to lie, and you know they're going to lie, don't give them a platform!

This ^_x10^{^₉₉}

And you don't have to know that they're going to lie, either. It's enough to know that they have no compunction about lying. They don't have any fidelity to the truth - to them, it's just a whore to use or discard as they please, like every other thing they interact with in the pursuit of power.

It seems so obvious, but it's absolutely despair-inducing that by and large people and institutions alike fail to employ the zeroth rule of transcending malinformation.

See the Koolaid? Recognize it? Had it before? Didn't like it? Made you sick? Then, how about, DON'T DRINK IT!

Malinformation must be a drug, and there are a whole lot of people with an inescapable attraction to it.
posted by perspicio at 6:32 PM on December 10, 2016 [12 favorites]

You can subscribe to Teen Vogue for $5 btw. Five dollars to support this kind of good journalism.

And right now, MetaFilter is running a special holiday offer of supporting your sanity in this facacta sewage spill of history for the low low price of nothing at all! Or - $5, sure why not. Mmmmmbetter make it $10.

But wait - there's more! Are you a long-time lurker, no-time commenter? Well how much would you pay to score your own login? Act now and receive the first day's favorites for free! And the scond day's! Yes, for less than the cost of the fruit you let go bad in the fridge again, you can join the blue community where the elite meet to get beat by a cheat! All for only five frickin' bucks!

Add an additional sockpuppet account today for free ($5 shipping and handling) and receive the classic theme at no extra charge! Don't wait, click nooowwwww!
posted by petebest at 6:53 PM on December 10, 2016 [15 favorites]

It seems so obvious, but it's absolutely despair-inducing that by and large people and institutions alike fail to employ the zeroth rule of transcending malinformation.

All I can think is a lot of people just aren't ready to believe he can possibly be that bad. The idea that America just went and elected someone who is truly very dangerous to this country, as opposed to the typical politician of recent decades who makes a lot of promises to get elected and then fails to deliver on most of them while we all just go about our business, like we didn't really expect anything to get done anyway.

Many Americans take everything that makes America "America" completely for granted. We really don't know how to handle something like this.
posted by wondermouse at 6:54 PM on December 10, 2016 [10 favorites]

Harry Reid: "I don’t think any of us understood how partisan Comey was."

Really! Comey contributed to both the McCain/Palin campaigns and the Romney/Ryan campaigns. And in spite of that, Obama appointed him FBI director in 2013, the guy who wanted to put Sarah fucking Palin in the White House. And now Comey has put Trump in the White House, thereby destroying Obama's signature accomplishment of Obamacare.

Stop putting Republicans in defense and law enforcement positions. Get a fucking clue, Democrats.
posted by JackFlash at 7:00 PM on December 10, 2016 [60 favorites]

the typical politician of recent decades who makes a lot of promises to get elected and then fails to deliver on most of them

Today’s authoritarians have benefited from the emergence of middle classes that have grown disdainful of democratic politics. ... In large part, this is because democratically elected politicians have overpromised what electoral politics could deliver, vowing that leaders voted into office can almost magically ensure economic growth.

In America, elected politicians have repeatedly made the same mistake of linking democracy to growth, though there’s no evidence that over the short term free politics produces higher growth rates. (Over the long term, many studies have shown that democracy is better for health, welfare, and human development.) And when middle classes and working classes see that economic expansion has stagnated under democratic systems or that growth has come with widening income inequality, they begin to wonder whether an autocratic leader might oversee higher growth rates. They begin to believe an autocrat could cut through political gridlock or take steps such as reducing immigration that, they hope, could somehow lead to greater economic gains for them.

--from Bloomberg

oneswellfoop linked to this article several threads ago (in June! were we ever so innocent?), but it bears revisiting now.
posted by Fish, fish, are you doing your duty? at 7:18 PM on December 10, 2016 [11 favorites]

Wait til you hear about the explosive details of Bingbabi! Ohho! She's - They've really . . . got the goods on her for that one. Plus she sent emails about child pizza which is so corrupt.

Well that's nice work Comey, I guess you can put the mystery of duplicate calendar invites to bed.
posted by petebest at 7:18 PM on December 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

All I can think is a lot of people just aren't ready to believe he can possibly be that bad.

We really don't know how to handle something like this.

Truth.

This is, in fact, the critical flaw of leftism: the failure to discern and/or accept that not all people may be reasonably seen as equal. Namely: those whose morality is antithetical to the greater good, or is absent altogether.

High-minded principles, Enlightenment principles...you know, the principles upon which our nation was founded? They are and always have been aspirational. Living as though they are fully actualized and appropriate to implement in all situations utterly and tragically misapprehends their purpose and significance. It's a lot like walking through the world playing Pokemon Go. What you're doing might make sense to you, but to people living in unaugmented reality, you are a sign of the zombie apocalypse.

Sometimes I just want to shake people until they wake the fuck up.
posted by perspicio at 7:22 PM on December 10, 2016 [11 favorites]

Yknow they already write tv news at a fourth-grade level. Maybe, i dunno, more - colors? Shapes?
posted by petebest at 7:34 PM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

FBI: We need to double check a few more emails.
America: SCANDAL! What if Hillary has secret ties to foreign powers? We can't risk making her president!
CIA: We have extensive proof the Russian government used hacking to help Trump win the election. He knew. So did the GOP.
America: That's probably fine. I'm sure we're fine.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:36 PM on December 10, 2016 [46 favorites]

Saw my first "The Democrats are actually responsible for Trump!" argument today. It's gonna be a long four years. Gonna take up sniffing glue. Or perhaps huffing paint.
posted by Justinian at 7:41 PM on December 10, 2016 [8 favorites]

Say it with me, everybody: "N-O-R-M-A-L-I-Z-A-T-I-O-N!"

I'll repeat what I've said all along. Donald Trump was declared "normal" by the Media when he got "The Art of the Deal" published over 30 years ago. And the Media hates to have to admit they've screwed up (especially for 30 years). Still, he was the Very Model of a Modern Real Estate Mogul whose Lying, Cheating, Lawbreaking and Failing were not worth reporting on as long as he was Entertaining. And his one identifiable skill was building his personal brand. He had to be qualified for any job, including President, otherwise he couldn't have gotten his own TV show. Reagan had "Death Valley Days"... what did either of the Clintons have? Nothin. Which is why, if anything is left of the American Republic by 2020, the only person truly qualified to challenge him will be Alec Baldwin.
posted by oneswellfoop at 7:46 PM on December 10, 2016 [8 favorites]

Foster Campbell lost

I hear Antarctica is nice this time of year.
posted by petebest at 7:51 PM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

How's Sen. Al Franken's health? What is he, about 65? A youngster! Maybe he could attack Trump in a 2020 campaign effectively.
posted by thelonius at 8:02 PM on December 10, 2016 [8 favorites]

James Burke was on Dan Carlin's last Common Sense podcast, and he was going on about this inevitable future in 20-30 years where we'll all have personal avatars that compile our political views for governing algorithms that enact the consensus and I'm simultaneously thinking, holy shit this is a ridiculous implausible Kurzweil-esque idea that would be bad for a million reasons and also, uh, could we just have it now please? I'd at least prefer to be fucked over by a cold unthinking machine with no self-interest.
posted by jason_steakums at 8:07 PM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

Washington state presidential electors file third lawsuit in anti-Trump effort

It is a hail mary but it is nice to see some spines.
posted by futz at 8:13 PM on December 10, 2016 [12 favorites]

It is a hail mary but it is nice to see some spines.

Slate had the same opinion: "Finally, liberals are taking a page from the conservative playbook with these extreme long-shot lawsuits."
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 8:22 PM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

Justinian: "Republicans who came out of this thing with their integrity and dignity intact:

1) Evan McMullin
2) John Kasich
3) ?"

Rep. Justin Amash is a frothing Tea Partier whom I agree on absolutely zero with in terms of policy, but to his credit has been aggressively calling out Trump.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:25 PM on December 10, 2016 [18 favorites]

In four years from now we reset the clock to 1929. We'll need a new FDR in eight. We may not be given the chance. This is the no-kidding end of American democracy.
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:32 PM on December 10, 2016 [8 favorites]

Rep. Justin Amash is a frothing Tea Partier whom I agree on absolutely zero with in terms of policy, but to his credit has been aggressively calling out Trump.

It appears his relatively libertarian views aren't just cover for a craven relationship with power when it is held by the right people. Like the renowned taste of Egg McMuffin, I can admire what's being provided without wanting to eat at McDonalds myself.
posted by jaduncan at 8:55 PM on December 10, 2016 [10 favorites]

Harry Reid: "I don’t think any of us understood how partisan Comey was."

He was deputy special council under Ken Starr investigating Whitewater and the lead FBI investigator of the Clinton pardon of Marc Rich. Maybe just maybe he's got a bugaboo about the Clintons?
posted by chris24 at 9:05 PM on December 10, 2016 [10 favorites]

SNL tonight: Walter White Shows Up to SNL as a Trump Cabinet Appointee: ‘I Know the DEA Better Than Anyone’

(I'm actually pretty disappointed the cold open wasn't about Trump tweeting about SNL)
posted by zachlipton at 9:09 PM on December 10, 2016 [4 favorites]

New normal: NYC will cease retaining data that Trump could use for mass deportations
posted by Joe in Australia at 9:17 PM on December 10, 2016 [17 favorites]

How Democracies Fall Apart: Why Populism Is a Pathway to Autocracy, cf. Why We're Living in the Age of Fear, viz. The Power of Nightmares

also btw...
-Researchers Baffled by Nationalist Surge
-Varieties of Popular American Nationalism
-The clock is ticking on a global shift to the far-right
-"white supremacism is an international movement that masquerades as nationalism in each country it invades"
posted by kliuless at 9:19 PM on December 10, 2016 [44 favorites]

Researchers Baffled by Nationalist Surge

Relevant graph.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 9:26 PM on December 10, 2016 [3 favorites]

And relevant article with respect to why uneducated white Americans in particular would be drawn to an authoritarian xenophobe like Trump.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 9:28 PM on December 10, 2016

The 'through Donald's eyes' sketch was brutal!
posted by ian1977 at 9:46 PM on December 10, 2016

@glitter4goals:
Teen Vogue is headed by a WOC. You know, if you were wondering why they have more guts than most outlets right now.
posted by chris24 at 9:47 PM on December 10, 2016 [35 favorites]

oh and linked previously, but fwiw...
Frightened by Donald Trump? You don’t know the half of it - "Many of his staffers are from an opaque corporate misinformation network. We must understand this if we are to have any hope of fighting back against them."
posted by kliuless at 9:56 PM on December 10, 2016 [9 favorites]

I hate that the general discourse (nationally) has skipped right over GOP electors putting country first by voting for Clinton and gone to how many Dem electors can be counted on to vote for someone who is still fucking bad.
posted by Slackermagee at 10:00 PM on December 10, 2016 [7 favorites]

In further SNL news, it turns out Kate McKinnon can do Angela Merkel too. There's a bunch of pretty stupid stereotypes in there, but this, which I can't fully believe they said: "Ah yes in America you call it the alt-right. In Germany we call it, "why grandpapa lives in Argentina now."
posted by zachlipton at 10:07 PM on December 10, 2016 [33 favorites]

It appears his relatively libertarian views aren't just cover for a craven relationship with power when it is held by the right people

Honestly, I think one of the illuminating things about this election for both sides has been how the split breaks down on people genuinely concerned about abuse of power and people who are concerned when it impacts their team.

I've long had serious concerns about government information gathering and expansion of executive power, as have others, but our views were joined by people who talked a good game while Obama was in office, but shut the hell up when Trump got elected. Prior to this election, it was hard to tell which was which: are you opposing registries because you think they have danger in the wrong hands, or because you think Obama is a Sekrit Muslim?

People like me saw deep danger in Obama using executive orders and other executive powers as an end run around Congress not because he was the worst person ever to make an executive order, but because we saw it as a deeply dangerous precedent and had no confidence the Oval Office would always be populated by wise stewards of the nation. That belief has been borne out. Trump will take office in a time when we have already become accustomed to extralegal measures, including drone assassination of American citizens.

Our polarization meant those warnings couldn't be taken seriously then, but I truly hope they can be taken seriously now. And I hope that Democrats can act with libertarian Republicans to limit executive power overall - not just against Trump, but against all Presidents. We are not a monarchist nation and it is time our separation of powers was enforced.
posted by corb at 10:10 PM on December 10, 2016 [50 favorites]

kliuless,

Thanks for all links. That last one is distressing to say the least. Ugh.
posted by futz at 10:11 PM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]

People like me saw deep danger in Obama using executive orders and other executive powers as an end run around Congress not because he was the worst person ever to make an executive order, but because we saw it as a deeply dangerous precedent and had no confidence the Oval Office would always be populated by wise stewards of the nation.

True, that.

We are not a monarchist nation and it is time our separation of powers was enforced.

As a prerequisite to that happening, Congress' affirmative duty to uphold their end of the bargain must be enforced.
posted by perspicio at 10:22 PM on December 10, 2016 [7 favorites]

I have made a major purchase of Eggo Waffles (I've done stranger things)

Ahh, I see what you did there. Well played.
posted by Ruki at 10:40 PM on December 10, 2016 [5 favorites]

As a prerequisite to that happening, Congress' affirmative duty to uphold their end of the bargain must be enforced.

I definitely hear what you're saying there! But this election has made me look at America like a much loved beater car that's gotten pretty battered over the years. The windshield is broken, the brakes are going, the transmission is acting up, the steering is a bit off, there's no heat, and the fender is smashed in. Do we need to fix all of them? Absolutely, we do. But we only have the money for one or two right now. And that means we need to fix the things that will cause our car to have a catastrophic crash. We need to fix the brakes. We need to fix the fascist. Once the brakes are fixed and we have prevented our country from switching to fascism, then we can begin dismantling the rest of the damage. But if we don't save ourselves now, we won't have a country left to fix up. Not as we recognize it, anyway.
posted by corb at 10:56 PM on December 10, 2016 [16 favorites]

Congress' affirmative duty to uphold their end of the bargain must be enforced.

Except that Congress is fucked because the House is gerrymandered and the Senate treats Idaho as if it matters as much as California. I'm with you on the immediate course of action: make the fucking thing roadworthy. But maybe it's been a beater democracy for too long.
posted by holgate at 11:00 PM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

Uh, way longer than intended post incoming. The McMullin/Kasich/Amash/Graham thing has been on my mind a lot the past couple days and is really proving to me that Jason Kander had the right of it in that Keepin' it 1600 interview, that authenticity and sticking to your principles really does cut across party lines. I won't vote for someone like Kasich but the thing that sets these particular Republicans apart for me is that I can tangibly feel how much more I'm willing to listen to what they have to say than I am their fellow party members who are clearly cravenly going against their own professed principles for easy policy wins. Graham is looking to me these days like the Republican McCain wishes he was (see this 2014 story of how he handled Tea Party challengers). I'm really starting to believe that if you run Democrats in 2018 who can do what Kander and Graham can do, talk to frustrated and potentially ideologically opposed constituents without sacrificing your own values to pander to them, you'll see results.

Idk, I'm freaked the hell out by what is happening to our democracy and I've got that voice in the back of my head going "all of this is contingent on there being more elections" BUT I feel like there's this shape forming in the middle - not ideologically middle of the road, but kind of encompassing both right and left - where things like the principled Republicans taking a stand right now, Kander punching way above his weight even if he didn't win, the Save Kansas Coalition rebuking Brownback's policies, Trump coming in with crazy low approval ratings, and the likelihood of people wanting stable and sane candidates after a few years of this, all these things are starting to make this vague outline of a hunger for sane, authentic, principled candidates.

Obama exuded authenticity. Dean did too, and though it didn't get him the brass ring it's why his loss hurt for a lot of us and why his 50 State Strategy was absolutely on point. Kerry didn't - a lot of that was a forced flip-flopper narrative but it's easy to hang that narrative on an establishment politician who communicates in the language of establishment politicians. Romney didn't have it and he just recently proved that again. In the primaries, Rubio was inauthentic and laughably proved it with his weird short-circuiting talking point loop, but even he was able to land some blows on Trump when he went after Trump's lack of principles. Jeb, I think, was actually a principled guy, but just the worst communicator to get that across. Kasich had principles but got lost in the noise, but hell, he's still the name that keeps popping up among Republicans with Trump regrets. Bernie's whole shtick was deep authenticity, toe to tip, and he's a guy who wore Democratic Socialism with pride in the era of Democrats fleeing from the insinuation of socialism, and I've personally heard a lot of midwestern Republicans express at least admiration for him. Trump's biggest asset was a loud tactless snarl that successfully masqueraded as authenticity to a lot of people - they were conned, but that whole obnoxious "he's a straight shooter" thing was getting at that, just like that whole "W is the guy you'd have a beer with" thing.

Oh, and I don't think it's just sadistic gloating that had Trump humiliating Cruz, Christie and Romney, because the one thread in all of it was him showing the public clearly and embarrassingly that these rivals of his were inauthentic before he tossed them aside. It's his go-to move, always attack someone's authenticity because they'll reply like a career politician and Trump will seem right to anyone biased against the establishment, and make up for a lack of your own solid policy by painting the opponent's policies as being based in inauthentically held beliefs. He dangled the same threat around Ryan to keep him in line, Ryan and Trump both knew that Ryan's support of Trump was dependent upon how Trump was polling and if Ryan staked out a hard position against him when he was polling low it would be thrown in his face if the polling changed. But he could not successfully land that blow against the Khans. He could not do it to Chuck Jones. They are genuinely authentic and principled people who carry themselves like it and his attacks gained no traction. When he goes after common people as if they're politicians it backfires. I think loud, brave, principled individual voices from outside of politics and journalism will be the most effective thing in tanking any remaining favorable public opinion on him. This is why that's exactly what authoritarians crack down on. You want people to take a long and serious look at the possibility that maybe we need the electoral college to do their job? One honest and upright swing voter who went for Trump talking on CNN about regretting their choice and hoping the electors don't regret theirs is worth a hundred pundits.

Even though I don't believe for a second in the image that's been pushed about Hillary for years about her being inauthentic and unprincipled, I recognize that way way too many people did believe it and I don't think she ever figured out how to communicate a message to counter it, and I think it's the biggest thing that hurt her - and yet, she was still able to carry the most progressive Democratic platform ever to within a hair of the finish line. Democrats who can effectively communicate that they are authentic and principled and their opponents are not can absolutely pick that up and take it the rest of the way. It's not the policies that are the problem, it's the perception of the candidates as being unwilling to stand up on their own to defend them, because it makes them look like they have an ulterior motive.
posted by jason_steakums at 11:00 PM on December 10, 2016 [102 favorites]

Long but worth it, jason_steakums.
posted by jaduncan at 11:10 PM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

this election has made me look at America like a much loved beater car that's gotten pretty battered over the years ... we need to fix the things that will cause our car to have a catastrophic crash. We need to fix the brakes. We need to fix the fascist ... if we don't save ourselves now, we won't have a country left to fix up. Not as we recognize it, anyway.

The metaphor falls apart on the fact that the fascist is not a malfunctioning system of the vehicle itself, but the would-be driver of said vehicle. The system that ostensibly exists to prevent that eventuality is intact, and may yet work -- we'll know soon enough! -- but it was a crudely conceived scheme at best in the first place, as evidenced by the fact that, without that very system, the prevention would be a fait accompli. Nevertheless, it's currently our best hope of aborting the nascent fascist regime.

Sadly, it doesn't look as though massive direct action is a tool that will be deployed in order to influence the electoral college. So, what other means do we have to "fix the fascist"?
posted by perspicio at 11:36 PM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

I've noticed a lot of people using various ways to avoid saying Donald Trump's name

I prefer T.J. Lubinsky.
posted by y2karl at 11:39 PM on December 10, 2016

I know this is old stuff by now but guys I swear to god I will never get over the fact that I live in a universe in which Donald Trump is going to be President of the United States of America because Anthony fucking Weiner couldn't refrain from sexting underage girls for six goddamn months.

This is not what I signed up for.
posted by Justinian at 11:58 PM on December 10, 2016 [36 favorites]

i just woke up and this thing popped into my head: "President Trump Action Figure, Complete with Removable Hairpiece and Emoluments Clause Action!"

it's not clear how "taking cash payoffs from foreign agents" translates into springloaded movement but i'm pretty sure it's kickass.
posted by indubitable at 12:12 AM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

Have journalists given much airtime to criticizing the Dominionism (aka fundamentalist Christian theocracy) that unifies most of Trump's picks? This is one angle on Bannon, for example, that I haven't seen hammered on. Maybe that's because I'm not as plugged in to news as you all. Or maybe is it just a nonstarter as an angle of critique, because there's a lot of Christians who think "Christian" supremacy is good? I did some searching and didn't find much besides this article from an Indigenous perspective:

More than 520 clergy people from throughout the United States convened at Standing Rock. They directly challenged the dominionist Doctrine of Christian Discovery. Some were even arrested. In an act of protest, the clergy burned copies of the Vatican papal decrees of 1493, and challenged the U.S.'s use of the doctrine to engage in militarized actions against Standing Rock and the Oceti Sakowin.

It is ironic, to say the least, that this powerful historic event, by Christians, against a system of Christian dominionism, took place on the eve of a U.S. election which handed the power of the executive branch of the United States to Christian dominionists. We are indeed on the other side of the Looking Glass. Now it’s a matter of being all the more determined to increase our resolve and our efforts against the doctrine of Christian discovery and domination.

posted by cybercoitus interruptus at 12:24 AM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

Have journalists given much airtime to criticizing the Dominionism (aka fundamentalist Christian theocracy) that unifies most of Trump's picks?

No, and it's very unlikely that the mainstream media will, as building an argument against Christian Dominionism is too dangerously close to being seen as being against Christianity and right-wing Christian leaders already have a demonstrated track record of successfully portraying criticism directed against them as criticism of Christianity in general. In short, I don't think that the American mass media is capable of clearly making the distinction they'd need to to make their case and their targets would hit back, hard. Conservative Christian leaders have spent many very productive years inculcating a belief in their followers that they are already the targets of persecution in America, despite any substantial basis for such a belief. It would be incredibly easy to mobilize that belief in opposition to any discussion of the wisdom of handing temporal power over to individuals whose motivations are primarily religious.

That said, as we rush headlong towards giving many of these people extraordinary amounts of power I do wish there was some way of having a national conversation about the wisdom of this, or at least of making it clear to many of the component groups supporting this effort that they may be being used (e.g. conservative Catholics and Mormons who may be along for the ride need to realize that a not insignificant portion of the Evangelicals who they consider Christian allies don't necessarily have reciprocal beliefs.)
posted by Nerd of the North at 12:52 AM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

And Twitter just restored Richard Spencer's account and verified him. What the everlasting hell?
posted by zachlipton at 1:28 AM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Twitter is the worst social media platform on the planet.

Luckily it's user numbers continue to plummet, and possible suitors have walked away from the negotiation table.
posted by Yowser at 2:02 AM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

I think one thing that is powering my anxiety, beyond the fact that I am an anxious person by nature, is that I just don't see the model for this. I think about the fact that a) Trump only receives security briefings once a week and b) He rejects the findings of these briefings based on nothing, and my breathing gets funny. I mean when, in the history of the planet, has one person had such power and was just so fucking certifiable?

I'm keeping a wary eye on the DC protests. I have medical issues that would make an arrest highly difficult, and I am now getting serious about the question of whether I should put myself in that situation.

I tell myself, *self, you are fucking stoned, fascism takes longer than a day or two to set up* but guys, I honestly don't know. This feels like an elongated 9/11-moment, where any number of scenarios that would be implausible could happen. And because it's not just attack-response, it's well, maybe the unraveling of democratic tradition, it's just so fucking scary. What is the model for this?
posted by angrycat at 2:57 AM on December 11, 2016 [12 favorites]

I mean when, in the history of the planet, has one person had such power and was just so fucking certifiable?

Nero, playing his fiddle while Rome was burning? (Yeah, I know, this didn't actually happen).
posted by mumimor at 3:04 AM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

If you want to get a glimpse at the near future of the US, have at look at this link posted by oneswellfoop above.

So here's my next prediction: In the next six months, we will see a public figure that has publicly criticized the government who will become utterly disgraced by compromising material, such as child porn on their laptop or similar.

The public figure might be a union leader, a judge assigned to one of Trump's trials, or even someone from the inner circle, like Bannon. Or the yet-to-emerge Democrat leader who might have a chance to challenge the regime in 2020.

It will be obvious that there's nothing to the charges and the material was planted, but after two or three of such incidents, the public humiliation of those involved will be enough for self-censorship to develop: Public people will think twice about saying anything negative about Trump; judges will dismiss suits rather than risk the ire of the regime; even the opposition will become risk-averse.

If you think about it, it's really quite obvious and possibly unavoidable at this point: It's the tactic employed and honed by Putin for decades, and Russia will be more than happy to provide the necessary know-how.

In spite of all the chanting during the election, there will be no locking up the enemy. In fact, locking up people will only create martyrs. No, you have to destroy the opposition by making them pariahs even to their own people. Looking on the bright side, this means probably no internment camps for Americans. Or at least not for Americans that matter.
posted by sour cream at 4:51 AM on December 11, 2016 [19 favorites]

Something that popped up on my 'Facebook' - easy, and possibly fruitful

If you want to support Senator Warren's request to audit President-Elect Trump's finances for conflicts of interest, the woman who answered the phone at the Comptroller General of the Government Accountability Office said the most effective way to be sure my support counted was to email two administrators, Katherine Siggerud and Timothy Minnelli. Their email addresses are siggerudk@gao.gov and minellit@gao.gov. There is a third email, congrel@gao.gov, through which they are tracking people who were urging support for an audit.
You can send one email addressed to:

siggerudk@gao.gov, minellit@gao.gov, congrel@gao.gov

Subject line:
Re: Audit for President-Elect Trump's financial concerns

Dear Ms. Siggerud and Mr. Minnelli,
I’m writing in support of Senator Elizabeth Warren's request for an audit of our incoming President-Elect Trump's finances, to prohibit conflicts of interest that would prevent him from carrying out the responsibilities of the office without corrupt influence.
Sincerely,
posted by From Bklyn at 5:12 AM on December 11, 2016 [47 favorites]

In my limited exposure to trump voters on social media, they're still just attributing any and all investigations into the PE's finances to sour grapes from the losers. These are not reasonable people.

I hope that these financial investigations are being done because they always should be, not because they're trying to woo the Woo vote.
posted by aspersioncast at 5:32 AM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

Man, I really hope this doesn't become the conventional wisdom. If it does, I think we're boned.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 5:51 AM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

The Women's March Is Still ON.
“People from across the nation will gather at the intersection of Independence Ave and Third Ave SW, near the U.S. Capitol, at 10:00am” on Jan. 21, march organizers said in a statement on Friday.

From the FAQ on the WMW website:
Securing and then announcing a location for the WMW means we've overcome the biggest hurdles in the permit process. We will continue to work closely with all of the relevant police entities, over the coming weeks, to ensure a safe march with all logistics in place to accommodate the number of people we anticipate convening. For security reasons, we will not release any further details about the march route until a later date.

I am hoping it will be a shining example of women's ability to lead, and proof that progress can be civil, peaceful AND effective, not just the usual 2 out of 3.
posted by yoga at 6:07 AM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

principled Republicans taking a stand right now

The context is of elected principled Republicans, of which I think we were able to identify four. Two of whom are in the incoming "administration". So.

(Administration just doesn't seem right. "Junta"?)
posted by petebest at 6:17 AM on December 11, 2016

"Junta"?

Politburo.
posted by chris24 at 6:22 AM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

Trumpreich.
posted by acb at 6:23 AM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Maybe it's nation-state-karma:

Instances of the United States overthrowing, or attempting to overthrow, a foreign government since the Second World War. (* indicates successful ouster of a government)

China 1949 to early 1960s
Albania 1949-53
East Germany 1950s
Iran 1953 *
Guatemala 1954 *
Costa Rica mid-1950s
Syria 1956-7
Egypt 1957
Indonesia 1957-8
British Guiana 1953-64 *
Iraq 1963 *
North Vietnam 1945-73
Cambodia 1955-70 *
Laos 1958 *, 1959 *, 1960 *
Ecuador 1960-63 *
Congo 1960 *
France 1965
Brazil 1962-64 *
Dominican Republic 1963 *
Cuba 1959 to present
Bolivia 1964 *
Indonesia 1965 *
Ghana 1966 *
Chile 1964-73 *
Greece 1967 *
Costa Rica 1970-71
Bolivia 1971 *
Australia 1973-75 *
Angola 1975, 1980s
Zaire 1975
Portugal 1974-76 *
Jamaica 1976-80 *
Seychelles 1979-81
Chad 1981-82 *
Grenada 1983 *
South Yemen 1982-84
Suriname 1982-84
Fiji 1987 *
Libya 1980s
Nicaragua 1981-90 *
Panama 1989 *
Bulgaria 1990 *
Albania 1991 *
Iraq 1991
Afghanistan 1980s *
Somalia 1993
Yugoslavia 1999-2000 *
Ecuador 2000 *
Afghanistan 2001 *
Venezuela 2002 *
Iraq 2003 *
Haiti 2004 *
Somalia 2007 to present
Honduras 2009
Libya 2011 *
Syria 2012
Ukraine 2014 *

[Note: IANAFPE, the Interbits coughed this list up first on "governments overthrown by cia". It's way longer than I anticipated, so any informed commentary would be appreciated.]
posted by petebest at 6:36 AM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

The evidence for Australia belonging on that list is a little thin. In the early 20s the 50-year declassification of related documents may kick in, and we may know more. But more likely they will be kept hidden to protect relationships with an important ally.

Here's a great documentary/interview with the Snowden-like figure who stood up for Australia at that time.
posted by Coventry at 6:43 AM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

I'm not sure the point that's trying to made about Ellison in those tweets. It would be a big change for the Democratic Party to put him as DNC Chairman, and a serious risk given the critical support the Party has received from impassioned supporters of Israel.

Please elaborate. As far as I've seen (and I could well be wrong), the alleged "anti-Semitism" of Rep. Ellison relies on a long-ago connection he has to Louis Farrakhan. I've not seen anything to suggest that he actually holds any problematic views or is inclined to cater to such.

The Democratic Party does need a big change! Yes, if Clinton had won we would not be having this conversation, and she lost basically because of a perfect storm of voter apathy, white nationalist resurgence, misogyny, shitty polling data, false equivalency and (quite possibly) foreign interference. But even if she had won, the Democratic Party is, and has been for at least eight years, a minority party, with huge bases of support in the Northeast and West Coast but little reach in areas that aren't right next to a large body of water.

It doesn't have to be like that. Progressivism is not just for "coastal elites", but the approach national Dems have taken have not worked -- and I include Obama in this indictment. He is a wonderful human being and a talented, devoted and patriotic statesman but his personal popularity did not translate to party loyalty for just enough voters, and that made all the difference.

We do need a new approach. We need leaders on the Left who can clearly, authentically (as jason_steakums has eloquently noted above) and unabashedly lay out an intersectional and progressive vision for the country. Trump won by the force of his personality, and the Opposition needs an equally forceful, unmincing personality to stand against him.

This goes for the leader of the DNC, it also goes for elected leaders in the legislature. I'm a huge politics nerd but honestly, I don't think I can even picture Chuck Schumer let alone imagine what his speaking voice is. Liz Warren, yeah, I know what she looks like -- and just by thinking of it, I can hear her anger at the corporate elites who have unbalanced our economy. And for all his faults, Bernie Sanders is in that column as well. We need people like that to be the outraged, intelligent... impassioned voice of the anti-fascist movement.

That is how we win.

Now, is Ellison up to that job? I don't know. But that's the question we should be asking, not "did he work with the Nation of Islam 20 years ago" or whatever, if there's no actual evidence that he's anti-Semitic.
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:46 AM on December 11, 2016 [23 favorites]

The Kingdom of Hawai'i is missing from that list.
posted by Bringer Tom at 6:46 AM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

Maybe it's nation-state-karma

That (mostly) deplorable list notwithstanding, I don't believe in karma and I don't think we should pretend that it's okay that the people of the US suffer just because we, through our government, have done a lot of shitty things in the past.

And I'm not sure those are all the same. Sometimes intervention is warranted, and it goes badly (Libya, maybe?); sometimes intervention isn't legitimate but it ends okay (Grenada? before my time, to be honest). We have a tendency to read legitimacy back into 'successful' regime changes, and conversely to condemn 'failed' efforts. If we had stopped the genocide in Rwanda by swift and overwhelming military force, would that have been considered a legal intervention? If we'd tried harder but failed, would that be considered in the same way?

Furthermore, when we consider the question of 'karma': the people that are going to be doing the suffering at the hands of our neo-Fascist government are by and large not the people who made those decisions, and in many cases are people who opposed them at the time (or would have, if they'd been alive then).

We can't change the past, though we can and should repent, atone and (even) make reparations for it.
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:58 AM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

tivalegas's comment reminds me, on Monday I'm going to be calling Ellison's office on behalf of the local Our Revolution chapter to ask for recommendations for speakers who could talk to us about ways to support his candidacy for the DNC chair, and also the authors of Get Out the Vote: How to Increase Voter Turnout for people who could talk about research into effective GOTV efforts.

Any recommendations from the Blue for speakers on either of these topics would also be welcome. We're in Cambridge, MA, but skype is always an option.
posted by Coventry at 6:59 AM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

I'm really not feeling the schadenfreude in having a President and administration that are puppets for another government that has an even worse human rights record than we do.
posted by maggiemaggie at 7:00 AM on December 11, 2016 [12 favorites]

Ellison is not an antisemite. I say this as a Jew, as a Minnesotan, and as editor of a Jewish paper that endorsed him. This is a smear campaign rooted in Islamophobia and racism, and it is beneath Democrats to give any weight to it. He's a good man, a smart man, and has my support, as he has the support of most major Minnesota Jewish institutions.
posted by maxsparber at 7:00 AM on December 11, 2016 [81 favorites]

For what it's worth, the stock market surge is on Obama's clock. Two reasons: people have not traditionally counted from the time of the election and we'll see how the stock market reacts when Trump actually tries issuing an order such as adding a tariff to Chinese goods.

It's a bit of a fool's game trying to ascribe most market swings to political news. It looks like a reaction on a short-term timeline, but as you pull out the trends tend to follow seasonal patterns. What looks like a short-term reaction to news is usually not.

The period from November to May is historically bullish. If the indexes start to correct in May-June, remember that they typically do this every year.
posted by krinklyfig at 7:04 AM on December 11, 2016

Thanks maxsparber, that's helpful. It's hard to get a read on what is and isn't bullshit when it comes to political figures that aren't quite at a national level of scrutiny (yet).

In terms of Ellison's ability to do the things we've been talking about -- to develop nationwide outreach; to speak to disaffected moderate voters and liberal POC alike; to be a strong, authentic progressive voice of opposition -- what are your thoughts?
posted by tivalasvegas at 7:06 AM on December 11, 2016

@RandPaul:
I am a no on John Bolton for ANY position in the State Departement and will work to defeat his nomination to any post.
posted by chris24 at 7:17 AM on December 11, 2016 [25 favorites]

Ellison is a fighter, and he believes in going after every single possible vote. I think he'd be a good choice to head the DNC.
posted by maxsparber at 7:23 AM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

The markets, as usual, are a terrible index to what is going on. The kleptocracy is, of course, good for business, and Goldman-Sachs is doing particularly fine. Furthermore, a simplistic "markets up, all is fine" narrative hides all that is important.
posted by stonepharisee at 7:28 AM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

The period from November to May is historically bullish. If the indexes start to correct in May-June, remember that they typically do this every year.

'Sell in May and go away' is an old stock market mantra. Also note that the UK markets have been very mixed since the Brexit vote, with the multinational-dominated top 100 stocks doing well due to the weak pound and the more UK-based top 500 doing less well for the same reason. But because Brexit is still no better defined or understood than it was in June, there's a real sense of being in the phoney war period, with the really big shocks still over the horizon.
posted by Devonian at 7:34 AM on December 11, 2016

I mean I wouldn't associate stock market rallies with general goodness for the people of the US or really any particular meaning, but there have been some pretty clear shifts post-election. I've noticed this more clearly with small cap value indexes (e.g., ticker VBR) shooting up and Treasury bonds have dropped pretty steeply basically the moment it became clear that Trump had won.
posted by indubitable at 7:39 AM on December 11, 2016

DJT was on FOX News Sunday and said 3 things of interest:
1) He does not believe in the CIA about the Russian influence "at all." It is just "another excuse."
2) He will not be divesting himself of any of his business interests because "I don't even know if that’s a conflict. I mean, I have the right to do it."
3) He does not need daily intelligence briefings because "I'm, like, a smart person." Which I guess means he is smarter than Obama, smarter than all the Presidents before him.

The Washington Post has more: Trump denies CIA report that Russia intervened to help him win election
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 7:46 AM on December 11, 2016 [28 favorites]

hisssssing
Lying LIAR
posted by vers at 7:58 AM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

People like me saw deep danger in Obama using executive orders and other executive powers as an end run around Congress.

Again with the Republican bullshit. The Republican myth is that Obama set some sort of precedent in usurping Congress using executive orders.

The fact is that Obama has signed fewer executive orders per term than any president since -- wait for it --Grover Cleveland. Fewer than George Bush, fewer than Saint Reagan, fewer than Richard Nixon, fewer than Eisenhower.
posted by JackFlash at 8:02 AM on December 11, 2016 [68 favorites]

> The fact is that Obama has signed fewer executive orders per term than any president since -- wait for it --Grover Cleveland. Fewer than George Bush, fewer than Saint Reagan, fewer than Richard Nixon, fewer than Eisenhower.

B-b-b-but he used executive power to prioritize which of our 11 million undocumented immigrants were deported, deciding for some reason that children weren't at the top of the list. So, you know, both sides.
posted by tonycpsu at 8:08 AM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

Maybe it's nation-state-karma:

See, the American government has done bad things in the past, so the citizens who will be hurt by Trump's regime change, disproportionately poor, of color, and minority, deserve everything they're going to get. Because they were the ones who choose to overthrow the Shah of Iran in the 50s.

Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children, unto the third and to the fourth generation, right?
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:19 AM on December 11, 2016 [14 favorites]

He does not need daily intelligence briefings because "I'm, like, a smart person."

This dovetails with something I've been saying all along: Trump is a walking demonstration of Dunning-Kruger syndrome. He thinks he is so smart precisely because he is very stupid.

He is also the living embodiment of Stephen Colbert's long-running joke about how it is superior to think with your gut instead of your brain. Trump doesn't think of genius (like his!) as something that has to study and work to come to a solution; to him, genius is seeing the answer fully formed in your head. "I see a tall building over there with my name on it! Make it so!"

And this illuminates some of his more obvious and spectacular business failures. The crown jewel of this collection is, of course, the collapse of his Atlantic City casino empire, because it takes a special kind of stupid to go bankrupt with a casino license. Trump and Wynn both did so mostly by listening to their gut, which was parroting their ego, and spending way more than the finite and well-known market could possibly finance, especially in a down-trending economy with increasing competition from new markets. Everyone knew all those numbers. There was no chance any of them would change in a way to make either the Taj or the Bellagio viable.

I explained this to one of my coworkers, who could not understand why I keep harping on the casinos, and he said "Maybe he just has vision!" I said no, vision is seeing an opportunity that is there that nobody else can see and following it to success. This was failing to see a bunch of obstacles that everyone could see and driving off a cliff. Trump has done this again and again.

It has worked out so far for him because he was born on third base and has some persuasive powers, which he probably studied in his youth to perfect his manipulation of deal ~~victims~~partners. He does not think hard about things, he does not care what is true, he only cares about how the person he is addressing is likely to react to whatever he thinks of saying and there is no brake on the path from his imagination to his mouth, or his twitter account.

It is an absolute certainty that he will make every single decision he makes as CiC the same way, because it's very obviously all he has ever done. He has never listened to experts, or if he listens he then does whatever he wants regardless of their advice. He believes this has always worked for him because he has defined all his failures as brilliant successes, because of his ruthless willingness to shift debt and blame to others and to ignore the terms of contracts when he knows he can get away with it -- and because of that experience, you can bet he thinks that breaking treaties and trade agreements unilaterally when it suits us will be a brilliantly clever move that can't possibly turn pear-shaped on us.

So of course he doesn't think he needs briefings; his gut, which is smarter than those CIA guys, tells him there's no way his bud Putin messed with our shit. So those guys are obviously wrong. And his gut is busy defining the word "conflict" so that he won't have to do something he definitely doesn't want to do. And when he drives the country over a cliff, it will all be someone elses fault for failing to be worthy of his genius vision.
posted by Bringer Tom at 8:21 AM on December 11, 2016 [60 favorites]

Here is the quote about the once a week intelligence briefings:

"I get it when I need it," Trump said of intelligence reports. "I don't have to be told — you know, I'm like, a smart person. I don't have to be told the same thing in the same words every single day for the next eight years. ... But I do say, 'If something should change, let us know.'"
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:21 AM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Also re: executive power, rather than having to debunk the same false claims again, how about we continue the "has Obama expanded executive power" discussion from where we left it before?

As noted in a previous response, numbers and citation included: "Obama has issued significantly fewer executive orders than other modern presidents."

---

Obama has issued fewer executive orders than some presidents, but he has radically expanded executive power with what he has done with those executive orders. He has had far more controversial executive orders than past presidents. How many controversial executive orders of Clinton or Bush can you name?

---

This list is a good start for Dubya, and this Heritage piece has a lot of gripes about Clinton's.

---

Quite a few, but whether or not something was controversial doesn't in any way imply anything about whether or not the controversy was legitimate. It was controversial that Bush II expanded executive power, and while I have some reservations about the way that Obama has continued that, the two things that have ameliorated that somewhat for me are reading more about the structural lack of clear popular legitimacy between the executive and legislative branches (as opposed to how parliamentary systems work), and that I generally agree with his policies. Ultimately, I'd rather see policies I agree with enacted than adhere to the hypocritical and sanctimonious ideal put forth by critics of the executive orders. I recognize that ultimately constitutional law is process oriented, and that by taking these actions, Democrats and liberals lose some of the moral standing to object to future abuses of executive power by Republic presidents, but my hunch is that the shifting mores of political power will lead to a much stronger executive relative to the legislature in the coming century, so those complaints are unlikely to find as much purchase on the left or right.

posted by tonycpsu at 8:22 AM on December 11, 2016 [10 favorites]

MIT’s analysis — which used the social media company’s complete data set — shows that on Twitter, Trump supporters formed a particularly insular group when talking about politics during the general election.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:23 AM on December 11, 2016 [8 favorites]

This interview is his closing argument to be rejected by the EC?
posted by ipe at 8:24 AM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

Some good news: Democrat Anne Sung won in a run-off election yesterday in Houston, Texas for HISD District VII by 27 votes. We are the 4th largest city and this former local teacher with advanced degrees in public service beat conservative lobbyist John Luman by 27 votes. Her win makes the School Board lean left by one.

This run off was discussed at our local packed house Pantsuit Republic meeting last Wednesday. Those 27 votes could have easily been in that room that night. Every vote counted. Local elections y'all!
posted by dog food sugar at 8:44 AM on December 11, 2016 [49 favorites]

@marcorubio:
Being a "friend of Vladimir" is not an attribute I am hoping for from a #SecretaryOfState - MR
posted by chris24 at 8:50 AM on December 11, 2016 [19 favorites]

Trump's Cabinet Transcends the Concept of Parody

Perfect:
Donald Trump has narrowed his search for energy secretary to four people, with former Texas Governor Rick Perry the leading candidate, said people familiar with the president-elect’s selection process.

Two Democratic senators from energy-producing states — Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Joe Manchin of West Virginia — are also in the mix, along with Ray Washburne, a Dallas investor and former chairman of the Republican National Committee.

Heitkamp and Manchin would be shrewd choices, but my guess is that he goes with the most obviously ridiculous selection. That’s been the trend so far. And you can’t get much more ridiculous than an oil company lackey who destroyed his political career in large measure by forgetting the existence of the Department of Energy as the Secretary of Energy.

posted by tonycpsu at 8:57 AM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

2014

@realDonaldTrump:
Fact--Obama does not read his intelligence briefings nor does he get briefed in person by the CIA or DOD. Too busy I guess!
posted by chris24 at 9:00 AM on December 11, 2016 [12 favorites]

In terms of Ellison's ability to do the things we've been talking about -- to develop nationwide outreach; to speak to disaffected moderate voters and liberal POC alike; to be a strong, authentic progressive voice of opposition -- what are your thoughts?

I'm not the person you were asking but here are my thoughts! For context, I was a strong Hillary supporter from the start and thought Howard Dean should get the DNC chair job before he dropped out. So the exact opposite of a hardcore Bernie supporter.

1. Ellison has a good record for increasing turnout in his home district. Hopefully those lessons translate to other districts.

2. He's willing to step down from Congress and do the job full time.

3. He was a strong Bernie supporter during the primary but pivoted to strongly supporting Hillary in the general. No sour grapes or desire to sow divisiveness.

4. He's garnered support for DNC chair from both Bernie Sanders and Chuck Schumer. So he may be on the progressive firebrand side of the scale, but it shows that the man can play politics.

5. He's said the magic words "fifty state strategy" that make me happy. He's actually talked about it at an even more granular level -- a 3,143-county strategy.

6. Finally, there have been a lot of attempts to sow division between the "it's the economy!" wing of the Democrats and the "party of diversity!" wing, and I think Ellison helps bridge that gap and get to the "it's the both!". He's a black man and a Muslim living in Trump's America, so we know that he Gets It™. (2018 and 2020 will actually be great "it's the economy, stupid!" opportunities since Trump is likely to help only the wealthiest -- and if the Trump Economic Bubble pops quickly, not even them.) I think Ellison is uniquely suited to drive that economic message without abandoning any of the rest of the platform (or instilling anxiety that such abandonment might occur).

I'd recommend listening to his Keepin' it 1600 interview. I came away from it much happier with the prospect of him running the show.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 9:05 AM on December 11, 2016 [26 favorites]

This dovetails with something I've been saying all along: Trump is a walking demonstration of Dunning-Kruger syndrome. He thinks he is so smart precisely because he is very stupid.

Yes, I suppose we can all agree on that within this respected society. And generally, I think your analysis has a lot going for it. But with the security briefings, I think there is something else in play, which is denial of liability. It is absolutely another example of the infantile workings of his mind, because of course the president doesn't get to blame Meredith. But to some extent, it is also something that is proven to work within the fields he has engaged with: construction and reality TV. Even for more "normal" big investors in the construction industry, lawsuits are rife. And you learn early on to make sure you can deny liability, by not putting anything in writing, by not being there or answering questions, by lying about absurd stuff, by having two sets of books, by threatening contractors and sub-contractors who claim their rights. I bet his dad taught him all that first thing.

Same in the reality business, as he summed it up in that famous "grab them.." quote. Do whatever you want, deny everything, and then threaten anyone who is bold enough to stand against it.

Bush fatally ignored a security briefing. In Trump's mind, the lesson learned from that failure is not to listen closer to security briefings, but to refuse to participate at all (just like Nixon - I'm beginning more and more to think that he has actually read a book - a Nixon bio which I can't find right now). That way, in his mind, he can claim he didn't know, or didn't believe, or that intelligence are stupid.

That all said, I believe there is also a more profound form of denial: he is a yet another Republican man who very obviously deals emotionally with complex challenges by pretending they don't exist, and instead creates his own reality. We know those guys already. I don't know how to deal with them, but I do know we've tried making sense for more than a generation, and it doesn't work. Maybe another approach is warranted.
posted by mumimor at 9:07 AM on December 11, 2016 [20 favorites]

Utah tea party Sen. Mike Lee confirmed Friday that he plans to reintroduce the "First Amendment Defense Act," or FADA, a sweeping anti-LGBT measure that would allow individuals, businesses and others to discriminate against same-sex couples based on their religious beliefs.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:09 AM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

> Utah tea party Sen. Mike Lee confirmed Friday that he plans to reintroduce the "First Amendment Defense Act," or FADA, a sweeping anti-LGBT measure that would allow individuals, businesses and others to discriminate against same-sex couples based on their religious beliefs.

I can't wait to see where our new "libertarian" friends like Rand Paul and Justin Amash are on this. Paul has previously spoke in favor of striking anti-discrimination laws, and Amash has said they do more harm than good.
posted by tonycpsu at 9:15 AM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

Bush fatally ignored a security briefing.

It was actually much worse than that. There was deliberate, systematic ignorance of the threat of Islamic terrorism by the entire Bush administration as soon as they took office. Until the first planes hit, they were convinced the whole threat was some kind of Clinton grandstanding.
posted by Coventry at 9:16 AM on December 11, 2016 [21 favorites]

Yeah, wag the dog
Sigh..
posted by mumimor at 9:18 AM on December 11, 2016

To get Trump to read the Security Briefings they either need to give them headlines like "Shameful things the liberal media is saying about Trump and also terrorists plan a strike in the American Midwest." Or, they could have a 16 year old tweet at Trump "CNN is a disgrace. ISIS is planning coordinated attacks on US Embassies."
posted by drezdn at 9:20 AM on December 11, 2016 [16 favorites]

It was actually much worse than that.

You mean Cheney's national-security-secret meetings with Exxon on how to rob Iraq of its oil on Day One? Yeah.
posted by petebest at 9:21 AM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Democracy For America is holding a vote asking who they should endorse for DNC chair.
posted by Coventry at 9:32 AM on December 11, 2016

Remember, we know Trump doesn't (and/or can't) read. At least not in any structured or sustained fashion. It's why he's drawn to cable news and twitter, those are digestible pieces of information that fit within his very limited attention span. He's never going to *read* security briefings or policy memos like Obama, and even Bush, did for hours every night. To the extent he consults with the policy people, it will all be orally, and the rest of the time he'll continue getting everything he knows about the world from FOX, CNN, and soon from his own state/TrumpTV.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:39 AM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

NYT Op-Ed: The Dangers of Echo Chambers on Campus: I fear the damage a Trump administration will do, from health care to foreign policy. But this election also underscores that we were out of touch with much of America, and we will fight back more effectively if we are less isolated.

Right, so the problem with this, of course, is that the damage a Trump administration is going to do will very likely isolate way more people than the (white, privileged) people who feel isolated now. And may very well kill people.

I'm really tired of being warned of the danger of the echo chambers anywhere. Did they contribute to the devastating surprise on election night? Yes. But I'm not going to all of the sudden consider Trump supporters as legitimate. If you are still supporting someone who thinks he is too smart for a daily intelligence briefing, I have no reason to consider you as a thoughtful person.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:42 AM on December 11, 2016 [28 favorites]

I don't believe that he's actually illiterate. Lazy and arrogant, sure.
posted by thelonius at 9:47 AM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

I get a little tired of venues like the NYT talking about "campuses" as if that word is equivalent to "faculty at elite universities." I promise you that students on my campus are encountering Republicans. Most colleges don't have a lot in common with Oberlin.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 9:50 AM on December 11, 2016 [25 favorites]

If the evidence for his illiteracy is that deposition where he seems to struggle, I'm pretty sure he was just being obstructionist.
posted by Coventry at 9:50 AM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Gay Mike Pence Doppelgänger Is Collecting Money For LGBTQ Causes
posted by Coventry at 10:01 AM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

I'm really tired of being warned of the danger of the echo chambers anywhere. Did they contribute to the devastating surprise on election night? Yes. But I'm not going to all of the sudden consider Trump supporters as legitimate. If you are still supporting someone who thinks he is too smart for a daily intelligence briefing, I have no reason to consider you as a thoughtful person.

I don't think it's about considering them thoughtful people. It's about the broader left's difficulty in selling our ideas to folks who *aren't* thoughtful people about politics. We get caught up in the fact that we're 100% right about something, while the other side is perfecting their sales pitch for their policies that are 100% wrong.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 10:03 AM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

The Republican myth is that Obama set some sort of precedent in usurping Congress using executive orders.

For the love of Christ, it has to be possible to talk about the expansion of executive power without this partisan blind defensiveness, or we are all fucked.

When I say "Obama expanded executive power", I'm not saying "Obama, alone among presidents, was naughty and increased executive power." I'm saying that I evaluate each and every presidency, including Clinton and Bush, to see if executive power expanded or shrunk under their watch. Executive power expanded under Bush; Obama inherited an expanded executive, which he then used and in his turn expanded.

Nearly every single president sets a precedent on something, so yes, Obama did set precedents, as did Bush before him. Carter set a precedent when he terminated a treaty without Senate approval, and when the Supreme Court failed to hear Goldwater v Carter. Clinton, unintentionally, set a precedent when Clinton v Jones made clear that the President was still liable for pre-presidency actions - a precedent that may be really fucking useful this term. The War Powers Resolution under Bush set a precedent when it granted the President the ability to attack any nation they think aided in 9/11. Precedents are set by actions and by what Presidents get away with.
posted by corb at 10:14 AM on December 11, 2016 [21 favorites]

He doesn't want briefings because there will be a baseline assumption that he absorbs at least their generalities, and he either can't or won't. He really is a null array.
posted by holgate at 10:17 AM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

McCain, Graham, Schumer & Reed just released a joint statement on Russian interference in the election:

“While protecting classified material, we have an obligation to inform the public about recent cyberattacks that have cut to the heart of our free society. Democrats and republicans must work together, and across the jurisdictional lines of the Congress, to examine these recent incidents thoroughly and devise comprehensive solutions to deter and defend against further cyberattacks.

This cannot become a partisan issue. The states are too high for our country[…]”

IMO: It's time to put the heat on every other Congresscritter to pick a side, here.
posted by deludingmyself at 10:21 AM on December 11, 2016 [49 favorites]

Facing pressure to cut special education, Texas schools shut out English Language Learners: Districts have used a range of tactics, from refusing to conduct eligibility evaluations in other languages or accept medical records from other countries to blaming language barriers for problems caused by disabilities, according to data and interviews with dozens of current and former educators. Some have eliminated special education altogether from schools for international students.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 10:24 AM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

> Executive power expanded under Bush; Obama inherited an expanded executive, which he then used and in his turn expanded.

Missing: any facts to support this claim.

Obama has certainly used every bit of executive power given to him, but once authority is ceded, using it more often is not an expansion. Congress has for a long time been ceding ground on foreign policy, and certainly Obama's done nothing to give any of that power back to force Congress to do their job. Still, an escalating number of drone attacks isn't an expansion of the authority to conduct drone attacks that Bush set the precedent for, it's just using that authority more often. If Obama used his pardon power one more time than Bush did, would we say he's expanded executive power, or just used the same power that was always there?
posted by tonycpsu at 10:31 AM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

Facing pressure to cut special education, Texas schools shut out English Language Learners: Districts have used a range of tactics, from refusing to conduct eligibility evaluations in other languages or accept medical records from other countries to blaming language barriers for problems caused by disabilities, according to data and interviews with dozens of current and former educators. Some have eliminated special education altogether from schools for international students.

There's a special place in hell for people like these. They better hope that God isn't real.
posted by Talez at 10:32 AM on December 11, 2016 [18 favorites]

For the love of Christ, it has to be possible to talk about the expansion of executive power without this partisan blind defensiveness, or we are all fucked.

For the love of Christ, we have to call out Republican bullshit for being bullshit or we are all fucked. No we don't have to be polite. Bullshit is bullshit.

As Frankfurt said "Bullshit can be neither true nor false; hence, the bullshitter is someone whose principal aim—when uttering or publishing bullshit—is to impress the listener and the reader with words that communicate an impression that something is being or has been done, words that are neither true nor false, and so obscure the facts of the matter being discussed."

In your original accusation, you didn't cite Clinton or Bush or Carter, or the Supreme Court?? or Congress about precedent. You accused Obama, the president who has issued fewer executive orders than any president in the last 100 years. And you did that because the hysteria about executive orders was something whipped up by the Republican noise machine by the likes of Hannity and Ingraham and Limbaugh and McConnell etc. only when Obama took office.

That's bullshit because it's truth or falsity is irrelevant. It's simply an accusation thrown out by Republicans to advance their agenda.
posted by JackFlash at 10:34 AM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

McCain, Graham, Schumer & Reed just released a joint statement on Russian interference in the election:

McCain and Graham promise hearings without the support of the Majority Leader, who controls whether or not there are hearings.
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:37 AM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

McCain and Graham promise hearings without the support of the Majority Leader, who controls whether or not there are hearings.

On the Senate floor: yes. In the Armed Services Committee (which McCain chairs): ??
posted by deludingmyself at 10:45 AM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

I don't think it's about considering them thoughtful people. It's about the broader left's difficulty in selling our ideas to folks who *aren't* thoughtful people about politics. We get caught up in the fact that we're 100% right about something, while the other side is perfecting their sales pitch for their policies that are 100% wrong.

Yeah, effective communication is a huge deal. It's tempting and efficient to talk about issues as settled and solutions as obvious - and in many cases that may true! But we need to take things back to base principles and frame the discussion in ways that engage the audience's empathy to talk about them. I scrapped another big ol' comment last night about framing jobs, automation, and income inequality this way as a way to get people receptive to hearing Hillary's infrastructure jobs plan, the gist being that you go back to base American principles, frame the partisan political fighting on the topic as politicians on both sides being afraid of owning the fact that the world has changed and their solutions didn't help, show an understanding and admiration that American workers have long been trying to square their own conflicting principles of supporting American entrepreneurship and wanting jobs to support their families with dignity, but that it's time to acknowledge that pit in all our guts that says the workers have been standing up for the so-called job creators while those creators have been hiring one person to do the work of ten and pocketing the difference. Simple truths like that are how you get traction but you need to go back to base concepts and walk people through, while acknowledging that their principles might make them skeptical of an approach but all the old approaches didn't work. It takes patience and it takes simplifying your message in a way that might feel tedious but I think you could straight up sell a plan directly from Hillary's platform to a skeptical audience that way.
posted by jason_steakums at 10:52 AM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

McCain, Graham, Schumer & Reed just released a joint statement on Russian interference in the election:

Yeah funny thing about that list of names:

On August 12, 2016, DC Leaks released roughly 300 emails from Republican targets, including the 2016 campaign staff of Arizona Senator John McCain, South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, and 2012 presidential candidate and former Minnesota Representative Michele Bachmann.[9]

posted by zachlipton at 11:19 AM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Also, in Trump's interview today, he told Wallace that just last week he turned down seven business deals because he thought it could be perceived as a conflict of interest. Turning down deals is a conflict of interest too. Discussing business deals is a conflict of interest. Why was he even having these meetings?
posted by zachlipton at 11:21 AM on December 11, 2016 [37 favorites]

Unless they plan to act before the EC votes, it will end up just being circusy crap. And Obama will get the blame.

Good on you for releasing a bipartisan statement that the Russian state destroyed democracy for a generation but.

"Your parents have agreed to discuss the cause of the fire currently enveloping the kitchen and expect to reach some agreed-upon resolution in time for the return to school next Fall."
posted by petebest at 11:27 AM on December 11, 2016 [18 favorites]

Facing pressure to cut special education, Texas schools shut out English Language Learners: Districts have used a range of tactics, from refusing to conduct eligibility evaluations in other languages or accept medical records from other countries to blaming language barriers for problems caused by disabilities, according to data and interviews with dozens of current and former educators. Some have eliminated special education altogether from schools for international students.

There's a special place in hell for people like these. They better hope that God isn't real.

"I was a foreigner, and you did not welcome me."
posted by EarBucket at 11:29 AM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

I think painting these campaigns as quixotic and pointless is counterproductive. No, I don't believe we'll actually prevent the inauguration. But narratives matter and beliefs matter, and though states have a momentum and a life of their own, they are, at the bottom, ultimately made up by individuals whose perceptions mold the state. And shaping those perceptions is important.

The Republicans were good at this. They exploited a widespread belief in Obama's illegitimacy to win elections and maintain public support for their obstructionism. And we are well-primed to do the same now, because there is a sweet shitload of evidence for delegitimization. The narrative that the presumptive electee lost the popular vote by a historic margin is good. The narrative of Russian interference and general dirty tricks is good. If there is significant electoral college defection, that's good too. Every recorded instance of the American body politic rebelling against this conclusion serves to delegitimize the administration. That's important. That is important even if the momentum of the state continues to hurtle it towards its doom.
posted by jackbishop at 11:40 AM on December 11, 2016 [37 favorites]

Greenwald quotes himself in his latest piece:

"Back in August, after Democrats decided to smear Jill Stein as a Putin stooge, here’s how I defined the McCarthyite atmosphere that Democrats have deliberately cultivated this year:

So that’s the Democratic Party’s approach to the 2016 election. Those who question, criticize or are perceived to impede Hillary Clinton’s smooth, entitled path to the White House are vilified as stooges, sympathizers and/or agents of Russia: Trump, WikiLeaks, Sanders, The Intercept, Jill Stein. Other than loyal Clinton supporters, is there anyone left who is not covertly controlled by or in service to The Ruskies?"
posted by Coda Tronca at 11:46 AM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

I've never read any Clinton supporter calling Sanders a Russian sympathizer.
posted by PenDevil at 11:51 AM on December 11, 2016 [30 favorites]

I feel like "blaming the Russians is all hysteria" would be a better argument if the Russians hadn't been messing around in our election?

On preview: what lydhre said!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 11:57 AM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

Jill Stein appeared to me to be a Russian stooge when I saw that picture of her at the dinner table with Putin and Flynn, looking extremely pleased with herself.
posted by maggiemaggie at 11:57 AM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

I'm sure the Green Party was very pleased when Russia Today paid for their primary debate.
posted by Yowser at 11:59 AM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

if not for the fact that Russia did, in fact, hack the DNC and give material to Wikileaks to help Trump's campaign. For starters.

Wikileaks says they did not.
posted by Coda Tronca at 12:00 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

Stooge or useful idiot? Her grip on political reality seems tenuous at best.
posted by acb at 12:00 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Wikileaks is authorities on two things.

Jack, and his brother.
posted by Yowser at 12:00 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

Greenwald seems to think that it's worse to accuse someone of being a russian stooge than it is to actually be one.
posted by octothorpe at 12:02 PM on December 11, 2016 [21 favorites]

I mean, it's all well and good to accuse the Democrats of stirring up some old fashioned Red Panic if not for the fact that Russia did, in fact, hack the DNC and give material to Wikileaks to help Trump's campaign. For starters.

I'd also point out that the Democrats are talking about something that seems to actually have happened, while the Trump campaign was putting out stuff like this:

CLINTON’S CLOSE TIES TO PUTIN DESERVE SCRUTINY
Four Times When Hillary Clinton And Her Allies Sold Out American Interests To Putin In Exchange For Political And Financial Favors
OCTOBER 04, 2016

(note: still on his official website)

So was Trump stirring up Red Panic too? Or just muddying the waters for his own protection?
posted by bluecore at 12:09 PM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

Wikileaks says they did not.

How is that worth anything? I am sure that a guy didn't show up wearing a KGB dress uniform and hand them the files. So what? Cutouts are one of the oldest pieces of tradecraft in existence. Wikileaks would have no idea if the Russians were behind the stuff.
posted by Justinian at 12:16 PM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

So was Trump stirring up Red Panic too? Or just muddying the waters for his own protection?

trump's mirror etc etc
posted by entropicamericana at 12:16 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

Also, stating the CIA's conclusions based on widespread reporting in the WaPo among others is not "a random insult".
posted by Justinian at 12:17 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

I discussed Craig Murray's article a bit over here in the other thread. He's seriously claiming that these were insider leaks, not hacks, which basically requires believing that Podesta leaked his own emails. Why should anything he says be taken seriously after that?

There is no reason to believe Assange, Murray, or anyone else at WikiLeaks actually knows the true origin of the material they leaked.

Anyway, Jason Kander makes a good point about Trump's refusal to receive intelligence briefings: "As someone who used to risk my life to collect this type of info, I can't imagine how I'd feel if Pres Bush had said it didn't interest him."

I mean, I can imagine, because we have a document that says "Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US," but yeah, people die for the stuff that's in those briefings, and even if you think there should be a heck of a lot less spying going on, ignoring that is malpractice.
posted by zachlipton at 12:18 PM on December 11, 2016 [34 favorites]

'authenticity' in the sense Murray is using it is 'are really DNC emails,' not 'were or weren't obtained by Russian and provided to Wikileaks.'

So you've got every right to read them. That's all Wikileaks says.

Also, stating the CIA's conclusions based on widespread reporting in the WaPo among others is not "a random insult".

I trust Wikileaks more than the CIA or the WaPo based on everything we know about either organisation.
posted by Coda Tronca at 12:19 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

So does Trump. So you guys have that in common at least.!
posted by Justinian at 12:19 PM on December 11, 2016 [20 favorites]

"in 10 years not one of the tens of thousands of documents WikiLeaks has released has had its authenticity successfully challenged."

That's a worthless metric, because classified information stays classified even after being leaked. No one with enough access to challenge any of the documents will do so for that reason. The classic neither confirm nor deny thing.

Wikileaks says they did not.

If Wikileaks is doing their job correctly, they have no idea who is giving them information, right? The public forensics on the DNC hack have been linked to repeatedly here and the CIA/FBI/NSA are going to have quite a bit more information that is not public.

No, you just issued a random insult in their direction.

It's feeling like you're not approaching this discussion in good faith, given that you seem to be only hurling one liners into it.
posted by Candleman at 12:20 PM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

It was actually much worse than that. There was deliberate, systematic ignorance of the threat of Islamic terrorism by the entire Bush administration as soon as they took office.

Bush Received More Warnings About 9/11 Than We Realized

On May 1 the CIA said that a terrorist group in the U.S. was planning an attack.

On June 22 it warned that this attack was "imminent."

On June 29 the brief warned of near-term attacks with "dramatic consequences" including major casualties.

On July 1, the briefing said that the terrorist attack had been delayed but "will occur soon."

On July 24, the president was told again that the attack had been delayed but would occur within months.

On July 10, in an in-person meeting at the White House, Condoleeza Rice was told:

There will be significant terrorist attacks against the United States in the coming weeks or months. The attacks will be spectacular. They may be multiple. Al Qaeda’s intention is the destruction of the United States.

When President Bush was given the notorious PDB Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S., he was on vacation from August 3 to September 3, tying "one of Richard Nixon's as the longest that any president had ever taken."

...up until Sept. 11, 2001, Bush had spent 54 days at the ranch, 38 days at Camp David, and four days at the Bush compound in Kennebunkport—a total of 96 days, or about 40 percent of his presidency, outside of Washington.

And when he got the August 4 PDB he stayed on vacation. Something to keep in mind when people bitch about Obama playing golf.

You might think dire warnings of an imminent terrorist attack might've made Bush break his vacation short, but he only did that for something really important: rushing back to DC "to sign a bill that could restore [Terri] Schiavo's feeding tube."
posted by kirkaracha at 12:21 PM on December 11, 2016 [68 favorites]

As Craig Murray factually points out, "in 10 years not one of the tens of thousands of documents WikiLeaks has released has had its authenticity successfully challenged."

That's factually irrelevant to the authenticity of Wikileaks' claims regarding how it obtains those documents.
posted by holgate at 12:22 PM on December 11, 2016 [12 favorites]

I'm still stuck on who is claiming that Bernie Sanders is in league with the Russians. Because I'm not a big fan of Bernie Sanders, but that suggestion strikes me as totally preposterous. And it's not something I've heard from anyone, which is not to deny that there could be someone, somewhere who has said it.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 12:23 PM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

Sander was accused of 'honeymooning in the Soviet Union' on CNN. Not sure if any Dems picked up on it.
posted by Coda Tronca at 12:23 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

Republicans in Congress prepare obscure tactic to gut Obama regulations

Twenty years ago, Newt Gingrich and allies pushing the self-styled Contract with America created an obscure but potent legislative weapon to help Republicans combat what they deemed to be out-of-control regulatory overreach in Washington.

...Republicans are readying an onslaught under what’s known asthe Congressional Review Act to cast aside a raft ofObama administration edicts, including rules designed to make it harder for US corporations to avoid taxes; environmental rules aimed at curbing earth-warming emissions; and sweeping changes to overtime regulations that were set to guarantee extra pay for an estimated 4 million Americans.

But, as a practical matter, for this to actually happen requires a particular set of circumstances: Both chambers of a new Congress need to be controlled by the same party; a newly elected president must be of the same party; and everyone agrees that rules issued by the previous White House occupant, from the opposite party, need to be tossed.

And, under time limits in the act, they have a period of just a few months in the new Congress to get it all done.

As Curtis Copeland, one of Washington's foremost experts on the CRA, put it, this is a legislative tool that salts the earth behind it.

welp.
posted by futz at 12:26 PM on December 11, 2016 [19 favorites]

Yeah, the allegation was that he visited the USSR back when it was the USSR, thereby showing that he was a fringe radical back in the day. It's not an allegation that he is currently working for the Russians. And it got surprisingly little traction, all things considered. In general, nobody talked much about Bernie's radical past, although I'm sure they would have if he'd received the nomination.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 12:26 PM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

The Wikileaks story is not whether the emails are real. Nothing could matter less.

It's who gave them the hacked documents, and was that Russia.

And the even bigger story is why did Russia only give them the DNC and Podesta emails, when they apparently had RNC emails too.

Why did a state sponsored intelligence agency leak only one party's communications if not to influence the election? And did they coordinate with the Trump campaign or the Republican party?

Because if so, that's treason.
posted by T.D. Strange at 12:28 PM on December 11, 2016 [46 favorites]

...if not for the fact that Russia did, in fact, hack the DNC and give material to Wikileaks to help Trump's campaign.

His point is that the publicly available evidence that it was Russia is unconvincing, so you're just begging the question.
posted by Coventry at 12:33 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

Trump's statements on almost anything even vaguely connected to Russian interests have been favorable to those interests in ways that are unprecedented breaks with US norms. You can decide if that makes him a "stooge" or not when added to the possibility of Russian interference in the election process and a cabinet and associates and family with ties to Russia.

Wikileaks released documents harming Clinton, and not Trump, thus acting, coincidentally or otherwise, to further Trump and Russian interests. There is some considerable belief they obtained those documents with Russian assistance. The Intercept helped wikileaks, and Greenwald is still spending time spreading dissension among Democrats,even though they have little real power in the US government at the moment, certainly not enough for McCarthyite actions. That this might be out of spite or simply ease of reach rather than direct Russian influence hardly makes it beneficial other than to those favoring his attitude towards Clinton supporters.

Stein is a virtual non-entity who enjoyed some brief contact with Putin and worked to harm Clinton's chances for the presidency, something people who supported Clinton disagreed with strongly, for reasons that should be obvious right now even aside from Russia.

Sanders harmed Clinton's chances with the drawn out and acrimonious primary, but that was his right as a candidate and had he won the same might have been said about Clinton. There is nothing really objectionable to Sanders outside of the desire for the primaries to have gone better, and I've personally not heard complaints about him being tied to Russia, though to be sure there were ill-founded complaints beyond that. Many of his supporters, however, were and continue to be aggressively seeking to make the party in their image or not have it work at all through whatever means necessary including minimizing Russian influence and threat to the world, a threat which the US has now seemingly sided with.

Categorizing the objection to these actors as McCarthyism is relying on an outdated standard of thinking about a non-communist Russia and a pro-Russian US government, that is close to the opposite of what McCarthyism actually was. Seeking to invalidate objections to actively trying to hurt Clinton's chances and install Trump as a president by using that outdated reference denies the actual harm of a Trump presidency and those actors' roles in helping secure one including how a Trump Putin relationship will affect the vulnerable here is the US and perhaps more damningly in the rest of the world for those who felt they could otherwise bask in the karma of the US having an election interfered with.

To what extent the Russians did interfere is unclear, the entirety of US intelligence agencies state they did, though they differ on the intent and extent in some areas and numerous other events and statement around the presidency have at the least make those claims seem likely in some regards. That Trump's presidency is a huge benefit for Russia is certainly hard to argue against, and that Putin and Trump both made it clear they were thinking along the same lines is also hard to deny. Paint the rest as you will, nonetheless its all dangerous in ways that could completely rework power alliances the world has depended on for many decades. So, yeah, worries about Greenwald feeling upset about being lumped with the those others doesn't really cause me enormous concern at the moment even as I don't think he was actually working for Putin in any direct fashion.

The stuff that keeps coming up causing division in the left isn't primarily from Clinton supporters, but those wanting to discredit Clinton and their support. Now that she's gone they should get over themselves and cut that shit out if they really do believe in working for unity, and that would be unity around any future Sandersesque or Clintonesque candidate, not for a party purity test one way or the other.
posted by gusottertrout at 12:33 PM on December 11, 2016 [35 favorites]

It's possible that some Democrats are too eager to red-bait and that there are serious questions about Russian interference in the election. Both can be true. Setting aside the question of who they got the leaked materials from, Wikileaks was not a disinterested party in the 2016 election. They have their own agenda that includes but does not stop at transparency.
posted by tonycpsu at 12:35 PM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

Republicans are readying an onslaught under what’s known asthe Congressional Review Act to cast aside a raft ofObama administration edicts,

In the interest of reining in unjustified fear and focusing on justified fear, it is worth noting this can only apply to regulatory guidance issued since May 2016.
posted by corb at 12:36 PM on December 11, 2016 [10 favorites]

All of this is like that scene in The Wire where that dude who works for Marlowe punches a guy to death, and even the sociopathic sidekick is like *whoa dude*. It's like, I expected a Trump administration to take the country back to one of the vacants and dispose of it, but the SoS pick and the trashing of the CIA and everything else, it's like, *whoa don't punch his face off man--well, too late, I guess*

If Obama is working behind the scenes to stop this travesty, I say, Godspeed, Sir, Godspeed.
posted by angrycat at 12:38 PM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

Is anyone working behind the scenes to stop this travesty? What could even be done??
posted by armacy at 12:41 PM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

Is anyone working behind the scenes to stop this travesty? What could even be done??

Well, technically I posted this in the wrong thread, so I might as well repost it here:

The question is, are we scared enough, but not too scared, to act?

If you feel the system has quit you, have you considered quitting the system?

For example:

How many people can afford to walk out of their secure jobs on the 18th, leaving a note that they will not be back if the electoral college elects Trump, and show up at their state capitol to demonstrate in support of a sane decision on the 19th?

-vs-

Can a conscientious citizen afford not to?

As individual citizens, our main power is the power of "No." And exercising that power carries costs. The costs differs according to the individual, and the manner of the "No." But be assured, there are costs.

Collectively, the calculus changes a bit, but our main power is still the power of "No," and there are still costs.

Are we willing to bear the costs as individuals?
Will we band together and bear the costs together?
Or will we hide and hope others bear them for us?
posted by perspicio at 12:47 PM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

What could even be done??

Voting in 2018 and 2020.
posted by Justinian at 12:48 PM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

Coventry: His point is that the publicly available evidence that it was Russia is unconvincing, so you're just begging the question.

The ODNI, DHS, NSA, and now the CIA says it was Russia. Even the German BfV says it was Russia, as the same staging computer that was used to hack the DNC was also used to hack the German Parliament in 2015. The Russians sat on that hacked info for over a year before releasing it, ostensibly so it would be close to the German election so they might unseat Merkel. That hacked info was also released on wikileaks.

The likely difference in certainty is that organizations like the NSA or the DHS can only speak to the computer evidence here. Only the CIA would have human assets in place in Russia to confirm the direct links from the FSB & GRU, assets they wouldn't want to expose to other agencies, particularly with the NY office of the FBI apparently going rogue, plus an incoming administration hostile to the intelligence community.
posted by bluecore at 12:50 PM on December 11, 2016 [26 favorites]

zachlipton: I discussed Craig Murray's article a bit over here in the other thread. He's seriously claiming that these were insider leaks, not hacks, which basically requires believing that Podesta leaked his own emails.

It's quite plausible that an insider took his emails.
posted by Coventry at 12:50 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

What could even be done??

Voting in 2018 and 2020.

And helping to get out the vote.
Even if you are in a blue state. The more difference there is between the popular and the electoral vote, the better arguments there are for changing the system. (This applies for gerrymandered districts as well)
posted by mumimor at 12:51 PM on December 11, 2016 [8 favorites]

Justinian, you have more faith that our system of government can withstand a concerted assault from within its highest office for two years than I do.

I know of zero reasons to believe that our institutions will still be operating under Constitutional authority in 2018.
posted by perspicio at 12:52 PM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

What is the motive for the CIA and other intelligence agencies to make up that Russia was responsible for the hacks?
posted by FJT at 12:56 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

It's quite plausible that an insider took his emails.
posted by Coventry at 12:50 PM on December 11 [+] [!]

Seriously? What kind of insider would that be? And how would that happen?
Most people use laptops which they carry around with them. It's not like a stealthy Bernie-Bro could easily get to Podesta's keyboard. Abedin's mails were found because her husband is under criminal investigation, not because her laptop was lying about in Washington.
posted by mumimor at 12:59 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

FJT: They fear and despise Trump as much as we do.

mumimor: Unless you know Podesta managed his online life that way, it's unreasonable to dismiss Murray's claims out of hand as impossible. I use desktops all the time, and I don't often check the cables on them.
posted by Coventry at 1:04 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

Remember how we got details of the transition team's plans from someone simply zooming in on a random press photo where the front page of a document was visible? Someone could easily just watch him type his password in, or set up a video camera that would record it, if all he's using is a password, without any keylogger or sophisticated knowledge of computers or surveillance being involved.
posted by XMLicious at 1:10 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

I find all this hair-splitting around "but maybe it wasn't Russians" ridiculous when Trump has well-documented ties to Russia in business, in his advisors, in his proposed Cabinet. It's not just the CIA throwing stuff out there; it's the CIA plus facts already known, statements Trump himself has made.

I don't give a shit about "communists" or reds, I care about a hostile, nuclear-armed, kleptocratic, oppressive nation being super-involved and chummy with the PEOTUS. They have a history of meddling in elections, there is zero reason to believe they wouldn't try to meddle in ours if they thought it worthwhile. In what universe is that not a thing we should worry about????

Yeah, the CIA is shitty, but when what they say matches up with other facts, it's ok to think maybe they know something. It won't compromise our liberal credentials to say that.
posted by emjaybee at 1:11 PM on December 11, 2016 [60 favorites]

It's quite plausible that an insider took his emails.

Except that's not how it happened.
posted by un petit cadeau at 1:12 PM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

Isn't there a another post to discuss russia/hacking?
posted by futz at 1:13 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

We know precisely how they got access to his emails. It wasn't a video camera watching him type his password.

(er, what un petit cadeau said.)
posted by zachlipton at 1:14 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

Yeah. *Rolls eyes till they almost fall out of their sockets*

But even in that other post, this is just a major derail and in spite of falling for it, I hope the mods will end it soon
posted by mumimor at 1:15 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

Except that's not how it happened.
precisely how they got access to his emails

Read the article. It says that among Podesta's emails they found phishing attempts from the same source as they believe to have been used in the DNC attack. It does not follow that he was phished that way.
posted by Coventry at 1:16 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

Derail from what, exactly? Seems pertinent, to me.
posted by Coventry at 1:18 PM on December 11, 2016

Someone being targeted by a spear phishing attack, demonstrated by the email appearing in the archive, is hardly conclusive evidence that the attack was successful. My antivirus software will find virus attachments in spam folders but it doesn't mean my computer is infected with that virus.
posted by XMLicious at 1:21 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

They fear and despise Trump as much as we do.

Hmm, I didn't know the CIA was staffed with so many women and POC.

But more seriously, that's possible. But my counter is wouldn't a paranoid/America First style presidency also be a boon to the CIA?
posted by FJT at 1:22 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

The Motherboard article, which goes into much more detail, is pretty clear that Podesta clicked the link and was successfully phished that way, and that the phishing email Podesta received is directly linked to the phishing emails that successfully lead to the compromises of other accounts like Colin Powell's and William Rinehart's, thanks to a bitly account that the hackers didn't set to private.

If you want to argue about attribution, actually linking the hack to the Russian Government, that seems much more reasonable than arguing this was all some kind of whistleblowing insider.
posted by zachlipton at 1:27 PM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

Someone being targeted by a spear phishing attack, demonstrated by the email appearing in the archive, is hardly conclusive evidence that the attack was successful. My antivirus software will find virus attachments in spam folders but it doesn't mean my computer is infected with that virus.

However, we do know that the spear phishing link sent to Podesta was clicked on. Assuming Occam's Razor, the most likely explanation that fits what's come out so far is that Podesta's emails were obtained via these Russian spear phishing attacks, and not via some sort of insider operation, which we have absolutely no evidence for.

BTW, Podesta and other staffers would be difficult to target with a physical keylogger or cameras, considering that they have no fixed offices (they have to travel with the candidate) and conduct almost all of their business on laptops and smartphones.
posted by un petit cadeau at 1:29 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

But my counter is wouldn't a paranoid/America First style presidency also be a boon to the CIA?

whatever trump's agenda might gain them has to be balanced against the likelihood that he will out active intelligence assets by bragging about them publicly

"we have the best agents working as clerical staff at the Duma, just really tremendous spies."
posted by murphy slaw at 1:29 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

The problem is this, if you want to distrust US intelligence sources so completely as to deny them any credibility in what they say, fine, go ahead, but any president will be listening to those same sources, save for Trump, the guy who was actually elected. With even some major Republicans questioning Russia's role in the election and interference generally, the belief in the US government as a whole, and in its western allies, is that Russia represents a real threat to western democracies. Now maybe they're all wrong and Murray and Greenwald are right, in which case, you're in luck, Trump is just the guy you want to keep those intelligence services in line by ignoring them.

There really isn't much else to go on right now, so it's kinda a take your choice option. Either we, in general terms, accept the working of the government in this matter or we accept throwing the whole thing out. Trying to nuance the options to discredit just your least favorites is going to require a lot of info no one has access to, or you're relying on trust from opaque sources using the best estimates of all surrounding evidence one can find. If you're siding with Murray, what's your argument other than Murray said so? History? As the reference to 9/11 above suggests US intelligence was trying to inform and was ignored there, unless you don't want to believe that either. These hypotheticals extend indefinitely and have no absolutely clear answer, so be skeptical, that's fine, but doing so to the point of permanent inaction only benefits those who would abuse power.
posted by gusottertrout at 1:30 PM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

Someone being targeted by a spear phishing attack, demonstrated by the email appearing in the archive, is hardly conclusive evidence that the attack was successful. My antivirus software will find virus attachments in spam folders but it doesn't mean my computer is infected with that virus.

Multiple people being targeted by the same spear phishing attack, which we know came from the same Bitly account, when we know that several of them fell for it, and we know that archives of their emails later turned up on various websites, is fairly darn good evidence that they were all phished, and phished by the same or closely connected hackers, yes.
posted by zachlipton at 1:31 PM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

To put it another way, we don't need to jump to video camera theories when we can just ask someone: "hey, did you get this email and click on it and put in your password?" and they say "yeah I totally did that thing, was that wrong?" And we know that happened in at least a couple of cases. And thanks to the failure to secure their Bitly account, we know that the same person or group of people, state-backed or not, sent similar phishing emails to "almost 4,000 individuals from October 2015 to May 2016."

None of that conclusively points to Russia, but it does seem to rule out an insider leak as Murray claims according to any reasonable definition of the term.
posted by zachlipton at 1:39 PM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

Thanks for posting the Motherboard article, Zach. The bit.ly data is new information to me. I'm still not convinced, but it's suggestive. Also, it led me to Thomas Rid's article, which has a lot of interesting stuff, including the (to me) new information that Guccifer leaked a document which he claimed was the DNC's opposition research on Trump. A lot of interesting reading there.
posted by Coventry at 1:47 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

What is more scary is that so many other democratic governments are falling one by one.
The UK is in disarray (with Russia as a very probable actor)
France may well fall next year (with Russia as a know financer of le Pen)
Germany is vulnerable.
The entire eastern part of Europe is now in mortal danger
Italy is in disarray - maybe of it's own undoing, though Berlusconi was known to be a Putin puppet.
Japan has its own problems and its own border conflicts with Russia.
South Korea is impeaching their president, with good reason.
I should go on but this is depressing me. Feel free to add on.

I don't want to be a scaremonger, actually I think all of this is the last death-throes of a global culture dependent and also profiting from fossil fuels and imperialism. As alternatives rise and gain power, the bad guys become increasingly desperate and do increasingly abhorrent and illegal stuff. They are dying out and they know it.
Anecdotically, I read today in a tabloid that a locally famous real-estate "mogul" (not so much) had mortgaged everything to the chimneys and eventually left nothing to his family. I expect the same to be literally true of Trump, but maybe more figuratively of people like Putin, Berlusconi and the Kochs. Their heirs will be rich enough, but the values and the world they imagined will be gone. It's obviously a bit scary to not know what will replace them, or what will happen during those violent death-throes. But there will be something very different out there.
posted by mumimor at 1:48 PM on December 11, 2016 [14 favorites]

we can just ask someone: "hey, did you get this email and click on it and put in your password?"

Has Podesta said publicly?
posted by Coventry at 1:48 PM on December 11, 2016

The problem is this, if you want to distrust US intelligence sources so completely as to deny them any credibility in what they say

What they say to presidents/elites/each other and what they say for public consumption are two totally different things. Nothing they say is transparent or without ulterior motive. That's why some of us are insistent on reserving judgement until we see the kind of legal action/evidence that seems pretty easily forthcoming when it comes to other hackers.
posted by Coda Tronca at 1:54 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

I haven't read this Murray article, I was only responding to the idea presented here that an insider being involved would of necessity require Podesta himself to have leaked his own emails. These spear phishing emails appearing in the archives are good evidence of the same actor having targeted the same group, but it's entirely plausible that they would have used more than one approach; more plausible than Podesta moving around and using laptops and phones being a successful measure that would prevent anyone but himself from having access to his account.

It also seems kind of unlikely to me that Podesta would have confessed to a VICE reporter that he was fooled by a phishing email, and so I would think that's just a narrative device used by the writer. I mean there aren't any quotes from Podesta in that article. (Or maybe there are bit.ly server logs showing it was clicked on? Still an odd thing to leave out of the article.)

In any case, though, for my part I'm only disagreeing with the apparent notion that there can't have been any insiders involved, rather than saying anything more general than that.
posted by XMLicious at 1:56 PM on December 11, 2016

The motherboard article does say the bit.ly records indicate it was clicked twice in March.
posted by Coventry at 1:59 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

If the “other hackers” are FSB employees inside Russia, then exactly what legal action do you expect Coda Tronca?

There isn’t going to be any, because there wouldn’t be any point.
posted by pharm at 2:01 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

The motherboard article does say the bit.ly records indicate it was clicked twice in March.

Well, yeah, my bad then; I suppose the attacker could have been testing his or her links, but that's a much stronger suggestion of Podesta being compromised by that particular method out of the thousands targeted the same way, if the bit.ly URL specific to him was definitely followed by someone.
posted by XMLicious at 2:07 PM on December 11, 2016

What they say to presidents/elites/each other and what they say for public consumption are two totally different things.

That's fine, but we're getting info on this from both Republicans and Democrats and, other than Trump and some of his team, there has been no denial I know of about the interference from any agency or member of government, there has only been some questions on the extent and the intent of the hacking. There are corresponding reports suggesting agreement with these accounts from outside sources, as linked above, but we aren't ever likely to have full evaluations of it all given the nature of security in intelligence agencies and government.

Right now there is the call for further investigation and full reports, which is the point of all this info we're discussing, not an end state, but one of strong evidence that requires examination. Trump won't do it, so expecting legal action on any foreign actors isn't going to bring much proof of anything, no matter how true, unless there is support for the examination of the evidence and at least some trust in some areas of government to make that happen. If even that level of trust can't exist, then we're pretty much screwed already in that accounting so to those people none of this will matter.
posted by gusottertrout at 2:08 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

The Motherboard article cites "a source close to the investigation into the hack" for the claim that he clicked on the link. We also have, because it was in the WikiLeaks dump, Podesta's email to campaign IT staff where he forwards the phishing email and is told that it is real (great work, team!). And we know that the link was clicked on twice during the relevant time period. And we know other people who received the same phishing email from the same source did fall for it and had emails hacked.

Given all this, not to mention the fact that the actual folks investigating the hack surely talked to Podesta and have Bitly logs showing exactly who clicked on the link and when, the case that Podesta was hacked through this phishing email seems pretty solid to me, and is likely more solid to those who gathered the evidence privately. And since we know that the same attackers, or a closely aligned group of attackers sharing accounts, targeted thousands of people with the same phishing attempts, it's hard to say that the attackers could have been "insiders," because nobody is simultaneously an insider at the DNC, Clinton campaign, Colin Powell, and dozens of other groups targeted by the same attackers over more than a year.

It is, of course, possible that his account was compromised by others during the same time period (see also the whole FSB vs GRU question).
posted by zachlipton at 2:13 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

If the “other hackers” are FSB employees inside Russia, then exactly what legal action do you expect Coda Tronca?

The US filed hacking charges against named state actors from China in 2014.
posted by Coda Tronca at 2:22 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

I love how Teen Vogue insults are like, "Go back to writing about acne treatments!"

I can have flawless skin AND slash the patriarchy, thx.

--@lkherman ("Managing editor at @wayup and @TeenVogue contributor.")
posted by zachlipton at 2:22 PM on December 11, 2016 [58 favorites]

And if they don’t know the individuals responsible within the FSB? What then?
posted by pharm at 2:30 PM on December 11, 2016

Then it sounds like they don't know who did it.
posted by Coda Tronca at 2:37 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

If Russia-the-state really did this, there won't be legal action. It's an act of war and the appropriate US response is military aggression.
posted by Coventry at 2:41 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

Russia behind hack on German parliament, paper reports

...The paper quoted a high-ranking security official as saying: "There is a high plausibility that the files originated from Russia's cyberattack on the Bundestag in early 2015."

...FAS said security sources saw parallels between the German attack and the theft of messages from the server of the US Democratic Party - also published by WikiLeaks...

...Fears were expressed Sunday that Germany's 2017 federal election and three regional elections could be subjected to manipulative attempts by cyberoperators.
posted by futz at 2:42 PM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

If Russia-the-state really did this, there won't be legal action. It's an act of war and the appropriate US response is military aggression.

lolwut.

What would you propose? Provoking a conflict that makes sure that a tampered election is the last election anywhere until the ants finish the Classical tech tree?

There's no limited retaliatory expedition possible against Russia.

Any sane response would have to be severe international economic and political sanctions. Pariah status. Not 'military aggression.'
posted by snuffleupagus at 2:49 PM on December 11, 2016 [30 favorites]

Then it sounds like they don't know who did it.

This is stupid. The CIA doesn't need the exact identity of Russian agents to trace the attack back to Russian controlled servers.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:55 PM on December 11, 2016 [21 favorites]

Didn't the White House threaten hacking retaliation or countermeasures a few months ago?
posted by thelonius at 2:59 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Whatever retaliation they contemplated has to go down before Jan 20th.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:09 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

France may well fall next year (with Russia as a know financer of le Pen)

It's overwhelmingly likely that France will be aligned with Putin's Russia after the next election; both Le Pen and Fillon are strongly pro-Putin. (Fillon's an old Gaullist, and his hostility to liberalism and idea of restoring “traditional values” meshes nicely with Putin's Caesaropapist autocracy.)
posted by acb at 3:09 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

Man stabs worshiper at Simi Valley mosque in hate crime, police allege

After officers arrived and separated the people fighting, they discovered that a man at the scene had been stabbed, Darough said.

“During their investigation, [officers] discovered a suspect had confronted a worshiper from the mosque, and after a verbal altercation, they began to fight,” Darough said. “During the fight, [the suspect] stabbed the victim.”
...
“We’re investigating whether or not this was instigated by [the victim’s] appearance and the association with the mosque,” Darough said. “We’re quite concerned that this occurred. We want to keep people of all faiths safe in the city.”

posted by zachlipton at 3:17 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Trump, Putin, and ExxonMobil team up to destroy the planet
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:20 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

The New Reality of TV: All Trump, All the Time

His cabinet vetting has been as much “The Bachelor” as “The Apprentice,” complete with luxurious backdrops (Trump Tower, Mr. Trump’s club in Bedminster, N.J.), public sniping among associates about the suitors and even a candlelit dinner, at Jean-Georges with the Secretary of State hopeful Mitt Romney.

But beyond a point, the presidency-as-reality-TV analogy breaks down. Reality shows have structure, cohesion. As a reality star, Mr. Trump had producers and editors to retrofit logic onto his decisions.

In an October feature in CineMontage, former “Apprentice” staffers recalled that Mr. Trump would often “fire” contestants for reasons having nothing to do with their performance. Jonathon Braun, a supervising editor, said, “Our first priority on every episode like that was to reverse-engineer the show to make it look like his judgment had some basis in reality.”
posted by futz at 3:26 PM on December 11, 2016 [35 favorites]

Washington Examiner Trump exploring legal options to give Ivanka, Kushner roles in his administration

President-elect Trump has asked his legal team to determine whether his eldest daughter Ivanka and her husband, Jared Kushner, can take on official roles in his administration.

"We're working that out right now," the incoming Republican president told Fox News' Chris Wallace in an interview aired Sunday.

"They're both very talented people [and] I would love to be able to have them involved," Trump said.[...]The billionaire is slated to hold a press conference next Thursday in which he will discuss the role his children will play in running his real estate empire once he takes office. An arrangement that would exclude Ivanka from the Trump Organization could signal that she will instead take on a role in his administration.

So what happened to the nepotism law? Is that just another norm that Trump plans to break?
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 3:31 PM on December 11, 2016 [17 favorites]

The Hill Former ambassador to Russia: Putin wanted 'revenge' against Clinton

Michael McFaul, who served as the U.S. ambassador to Russia from 2012 to 2014, said he thinks Russian President Vladimir Putin wanted to help Donald Trump win the presidency to hurt Clinton.

"Let's remember that Vladimir Putin thinks [Clinton] interfered in his election — the parliamentary election in December 2011 — and has said as much publicly, and I've heard him talk about it privately," McFaul said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 3:34 PM on December 11, 2016 [14 favorites]

The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has said he means to discuss with Donald Trump “various ways” to undo the Iran nuclear deal, after the president-elect moves into the White House next month.
posted by adamvasco at 3:47 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

Politico ‘It’s Like a Powder Keg That’s Going to Explode’

Eisen and Painter happen to be the two ethicists who are actively working to shape the outcome of an election that most voters think has already been decided. For the #stillnevertrump faction, Eisen and Painter represent the last hope of persuading wobbly members of the Electoral College to vote against the president-elect when they convene on Dec. 19. Failing that, the two men are laying the groundwork for a case that Trump’s sprawling financial arrangements—real estate investments, hotels, golf courses and product licenses spread across the U.S. and at least 20 other countries—will inevitably lead him into scandal or worse once he takes office. Trump is set to hold a news conference Dec. 15 in New York to provide more detail on his future financial plans, but the two men have no expectation that Trump will take their advice and sell off his entire business enterprise and put the proceeds into a “blind trust” with no control or knowledge over where the money goes.

posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 3:54 PM on December 11, 2016 [10 favorites]

Shareblue Kellyanne Conway says Trump is “going to put his own people” in the intelligence community

During an interview on Face the Nation, Donald Trump's senior advisor Kellyanne Conway insisted that the President-elect "absolutely respects the intelligence community," even though he refuses to accept their consensus view of Russian interference in the election. She then added chillingly: "He's made very clear he's going to put his own people in there as well"[...]

Trump himself asserted that he does not need intelligence briefings, claiming it is because he is “like a smart person,” but Conway gives away the real reason he is avoiding them: They are providing information he does not want to hear. So, instead, Trump will install people who deliver him “intelligence” more to his liking.

This is totes normal. No reason to be alarmed at all.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:02 PM on December 11, 2016 [37 favorites]

In terms of what to do about Russian interference in the election, this article from Crooks and Liars makes a case that military aggression is not the answer, nor is it actually the most important angle in this situation. There are all kinds of responses that can be taken short of war.

Karoli Kuns argues that from what we are seeing, the major thing that has to happen in this situation is for our elected officials to step up and do the damn job they were elected to do for once. Kuns offers a list of people they need to talk to under oath and proceed with a complete, non-partisan investigation of the election itself (keying on voting machines in five states) as well as people involved in the Republican presidential campaign to ascertain what, if any, evidence exists regarding influence by Russia. What is different about this article is the fact that the author proposes that there be consequences for Americans shown to have cooperated. People like Comey, Manafort, Stone and however far up that chain of command that knowledge of interference goes might face consequences if shown to have knowledge they failed to report.

Since it is clear that the Republican leadership seemingly has no interest in doing what the article suggests, we have to hope that the few legislators who have come out in favor of an investigation can manage to work around their leadershipand get that investigation.

Since I have wondered all along why the Republican leadership seems so accepting of the intelligence reports and yet so unwilling to address them officially, I have to wonder if the "collaborators" term mentioned by Kuns really does apply. I know these people are all party-first, but they should remember that without an independent country, they have no party to speak of, other than as a token. I've given up looking for patriots there, watching all that's happened since the election, but I'll settle for them just doing one job. They need to do this one job first, before they go about dismantling the U. S. government for their playtime entertainment.
posted by Silverstone at 4:04 PM on December 11, 2016 [10 favorites]

I think many of them are fine with being in the token ruling party of a client state.
posted by soren_lorensen at 4:11 PM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

I think many of them are fine with being in the token ruling party of a client state.

It pays very, very well.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:13 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

The left is disintegrating, it's evident in this very thread and elsewhere on Metafilter. Yeats was never more apt than he is right now: the best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.

It's because there is literally nothing practical that we can do at this point (on the national stage) that won't make the situation worse.
posted by Talez at 4:14 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

I will admit that, like many things the Trump administration has done, fucking with the CIA seems like a fairly baffling move. Are they sitting around somewhere saying "what's the one branch of the government which is completely devoid of accountability and scruples? Who doesn't have to answer to pissed of voters or party donors or really anyone? If someone did want to off the president, who might be able to do it and get away with it? Let's find those people and piss them off!"
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 4:17 PM on December 11, 2016 [24 favorites]

I think many of them are fine with being in the token ruling party of a client state.

When you think about it, this makes absolutely no sense. Russia is seriously broken. Has no real prospects for rising again in the near future. The US is still the world's preeminent power. The economy is in good shape. Has a good lead internationally in some competitive industries. Culturally, still vitally important. Still has a huge, well-trained military which can go toe-to-toe with anyone. Dollar is a de facto global currency, especially because of oil.

It makes absolutely no sense for the US, even under a corrupt GOP, to be the client state of anyone. Much less the client state of the broken-down, dead empire of Russia. If this is the route the GOP & Trump are going, then they're even stupider and more venal than I could ever imagine.

When future historians discuss the Fall of the United States, I imagine most of them will have to laugh derisively for 5-10 minutes before they finally catch their breath and discuss how one political party (the supposedly "patriotic party"!) just gave the whole thing away to a much weaker country, and the other party just stood by and watched. And will mention it would have been more dignified to simply let barbarians in and sack the capital a few times.
posted by honestcoyote at 4:34 PM on December 11, 2016 [38 favorites]

Of course Trumo hates the CIA. They know where most of his bodies are buried across all his international dealings. They have power over him, so he must destroy them.

I fon't know when or where the spark will be that sets all this alight, but he's busier stacking the power kegs in the White House cellars with far more alacrity than Guy Fawkes ever managed.
posted by Devonian at 4:34 PM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

The Republicans were good at this. They exploited a widespread belief in Obama's illegitimacy to win elections and maintain public support

Good at lying, cheating, bullying, pandering, and stereotyping. Yeah we could do that but it doesn't work that way.

Framing is what we have to learn, and we're either too ignorant, proud, or unconvinced to do it.
posted by petebest at 4:38 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

If this is the route the GOP & Trump are going, then they're even stupider and more venal than I could ever imagine.

. . . surprise?.
posted by petebest at 4:41 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

Yeah we could do that but it doesn't work that way.

The last 8 years proved it works exactly that way. Republicans are the strongest they've ever been, while Democrats are barely holding on as a national party. All on the strength of lies, blatant anti-reality and anti-science propaganda, demonization, racism, and now unabashed white-nationalism.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:44 PM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

I see this as essentially the only way to save the country: Democrats can stop Trump via the electoral college. But not how you think.

It’s never been tried, it might not work. It’s unthinkable, humiliating, awful, I wish she’d do it. Going on TV with Romney and asking for Trump electors to do their duty is probably the one and only way remaining to stop Trump from being inaugurated.
posted by gerryblog at 4:45 PM on December 11, 2016 [10 favorites]

he's going to put his own people in there

He probably knows a ton of rich dudes who have always wanted to be spies.
posted by EarBucket at 4:46 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

There is a big portion of the conservative movement that loves Putin and sees him as leader of the "western" world. To conservative eyes, Putin is the Great White Hope: anti-muslim, pro-oil, anti-gay, pro-billionaire, militarist white supremacist. Many conservatives see Europe as lost to Islam and too unsafe to visit. They would literally side with Russia over NATO. Conservatives won't deny the Russian help. They'll simply call it a mutually beneficial alliance. It won't bother them.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:46 PM on December 11, 2016 [23 favorites]

I'd say the GOP is winning because they nakedly cheat. 10 years of suppression and bullshit and they win on a loss.

If they hadn't been allowed to fix the game they'd be losing hard across the board. We won the support of the people, they lost it, but we're living in their world for now.
posted by Slackermagee at 4:49 PM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

The last 8 years proved it works exactly that way.

No, I mean a liberal/progressive agenda can't be pushed by lies, anti-science, outlawing people, etc. that work for T-Party/GOP/Fox News. It does work for them, yes, but we can't use those devices, that type of strategy.
posted by petebest at 4:51 PM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

It pains me to realize that these election threads will soon become "presidential" threads.

*vomits into handbag*
posted by _Mona_ at 4:59 PM on December 11, 2016 [8 favorites]

Russia's head of foreign affairs: Trump continues to amaze
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:07 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

Senior editor, National Review...

@jaynordlinger:
Be clear: If a foreign intelligence operation had worked to elect the D, not the R, conservatives would talk of nothing else. Rightly.
posted by chris24 at 5:07 PM on December 11, 2016 [37 favorites]

No, NPR, You Have to Correct Trump's Lies When You Broadcast Them

Who needs Trump TV when you have "even the liberal" NPR catapulting the Trump propaganda?
posted by tonycpsu at 5:10 PM on December 11, 2016 [20 favorites]

Trump shuts down body created to protect Scottish environment

Trump Organisation executive vice-president George Sorial said: "Having successfully completed its scrutiny role for the construction of the championship golf course, Memag was dissolved.

"More than 95% of the site of special scientific interest (SSSI) remains untouched and the ecological diversity of the site remains intact."

Mr Sorial's claims are disputed by the Scottish Wildlife Trust, which says that a third of the SSSI has been damaged.

Memag last met in January 2013, six months after Trump International opened, and in December that year Aberdeenshire Council wrote to the Trump Organisation to remind it that the group remains a legal requirement.

The council did not receive a response and contacted the Trump Organisation again last week, when it was made it clear that Memag had been dissolved.

ALWAYS fucking someone over. Always.
posted by futz at 5:11 PM on December 11, 2016 [15 favorites]

In a year of huge disappointments for me NPR has been a big one. I can't and won't listen or support them any more.
posted by futz at 5:14 PM on December 11, 2016 [29 favorites]

Russia's head of foreign affairs: Trump continues to amaze
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:07 PM on December 11 [2 favorites −] Favorite added! [!]

They can't believe their luck
posted by mumimor at 5:23 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

And they are bragging about it.
posted by mumimor at 5:24 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

>What could even be done??

Voting in 2018 and 2020.

And, since more states are likely to institute onerous voting ID rules, donating to or volunteering with groups that help make sure people get their ID in order and get registered as early as possible.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 5:43 PM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

So what are your thoughts on the January 6th, one Senator/one Rep disagrees with the results thing I've seen floating around?
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 5:49 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

So what are your thoughts on the January 6th, one Senator/one Rep disagrees with the results thing I've seen floating around?

That seems entirely made up to me. I was trying to find any basis for it whatsoever. The Electoral College one above is real, though!
posted by gerryblog at 5:53 PM on December 11, 2016

Democrats can stop Trump via the electoral college. But not how you think.

Actually thought of this myself a couple of weeks ago. Never mentioned it here because it seemed too outlandish. But here we are. I hope the Clinton camp is considering it.
posted by honestcoyote at 5:57 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

And, since more states are likely to institute onerous voting ID rules, donating to or volunteering with groups that help make sure people get their ID in order and get registered as early as possible.

The states imposing these Jim Crow voting laws are also making these groups illegal.
posted by dirigibleman at 5:57 PM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

dirigibleman, where can I read more about that?
posted by Coventry at 5:59 PM on December 11, 2016

Anybody have suggestions for what we can do to push forward the electoral college strategy to defeat Trump? I'd kiss the ground if we could elect Mittens or Kasich (or literally anyone else) instead of Trump. Hillary would probably personally need to get involved to convince her most ardent backers to switch sides. But it's the most realistic longshot we have at this point.
posted by zug at 5:59 PM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

Actually thought of this myself a couple of weeks ago. Never mentioned it here because it seemed too outlandish. But here we are. I hope the Clinton camp is considering it.

I keep blathering on about it on Twitter because it is so elegant and workable, it just requires us to try something that hasn't been done before in a way that seems strange. But it's basically the very last brake before Trump takes the reigns, it's the one thing that can save us. I keep hoping, even as the date gets closer.
posted by gerryblog at 5:59 PM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

Hillary would probably personally need to get involved to convince her most ardent backers to switch sides. But it's the most realistic longshot we have at this point.

I think Hillary would have to go on TV and say these are strange and historic times, but she is releasing her electors to vote for Romney and hope 38 Trump electors do their duty and do the same. If you can get Romney on TV with her, great. Then it's up to the electors in every state to face this one moment where a different, better path is still possible. It's a longshot, obviously, but it seems like game over for American democracy otherwise.
posted by gerryblog at 6:01 PM on December 11, 2016 [19 favorites]

I've kind of wondered if the GOP will let Trump be sworn in, then shortly after suddenly "discover" a major and shocking impeachable offense and get moving. At best in their eyes, they can play it as honorable, upstanding defense of the Republic, or if they have to they can take the short term hit on the scandal and hope voters' memories and outrage fade enough before 2018. They get Trump and his terrifying risks out of the picture, then have their guy Pence in office to do as he's told, but they have to wait until after Trump is inaugurated to move with it. McConnell is a ratbastard but I don't know if he's ratbastard enough to pull it off or who would work with him in the House to make it happen.
posted by dilettante at 6:06 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

From the link Trump shuts down body created to protect Scottish environment

When the billionaire was given permission to build his Aberdeenshire golf course in 2008, the deal included a commitment to fund a team of advisers to oversee the development of the course.

The arrangement was intended to prevent work at Trump International Golf Links from causing unnecessary damage to the area of special scientific interest it was built on.

However, it has now emerged that the Menie Environmental Management Advisory Group (Memag) has been dissolved despite plans to expand facilities at the course.

That sounds a lot like many other deals, including the Old Post Office and Mar-A-Lago, where he buys or leases property that come with commitments but then does not honor all of the commitments. From a BuzzFeed article on the Old Post Office

Trump won the bid largely because of two grand promises, three of the sources said.

Trump promised to employ the architect who had, over decades, championed the building’s careful, historic restoration. And he promised the involvement of a multibillion-dollar real estate investment firm with a rock-solid financial reputation.

After Trump’s team got the nod from the GSA, however, it reversed itself on both these promises.

I know this probably seems very minor in light of the fact that he is about to destroy our country but it really bothers me that he has spent his adult life making deals which he does not honor-- and he never seems to pay a price for that. He is a goddamn cheat.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:07 PM on December 11, 2016 [41 favorites]

Not fond of that WaPo electoral college idea, as much as I'd appreciate a sane person being pushed in. As it stands it's clear that the Republicans made this, that they've bowed down to the billionaires and embraced the white nationalists and sold us all out. Having a bunch of democratic electors wiggle around with backroom vote trading seems like it would help legitimize the right for the left, while simultaneously helping to further undermine our beleaguered electoral process.

luckily(?) this is pure speculation, because there's no way in hell the Dems actually try this.
posted by aspersioncast at 6:10 PM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

JFC

@SopanDeb Whoa. Potential Dep. Sec. of State John Bolton suggests on Fox alleged Russian hacks into RNC/DNC was false flag, committed by Obama admin:
Twitter link goes to a partial transcript from the show.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:15 PM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

I've kind of wondered if the GOP will let Trump be sworn in, then shortly after suddenly "discover" a major and shocking impeachable offense and get moving.

This is by far the most likely scenario (which isn't very likely).

Or Trump figures out that he actually doesn't want to be President for very long (just long enough to make a splash) and arrangements and assurances are made regarding the discovery of a heretofore un-diagnosed medical condition some time in Spring/Fall of 2017 that gives resignation a fig leaf (magnanimous! brave!) and Pence enough time left in the term to get work done.
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:17 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Whoa. Potential Dep. Sec. of State John Bolton suggests on Fox alleged Russian hacks into RNC/DNC was false flag, committed by Obama admin

i think it's pretty obvious that the "John Bolton" entity is a Russian propaganda construct whose TV appearances can be easily accounted for with modern CGI techniques.
posted by indubitable at 6:18 PM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

dirigibleman, where can I read more about that?

Apparenlty, "making it illegal" was an overstatement, but here is an article from 2012 on Florida's third party registration restrictions that drove the League of Women Voters and Rock the Vote out of the state. Here is a PDF from the Brennan Center for Justice on state restrictions on voter registration drives. It's somewhat out of date, as it is from before the gutting of the Voting Rights Act.
posted by dirigibleman at 6:19 PM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

i think it's pretty obvious that the "John Bolton" entity is a Russian propaganda construct whose TV appearances can be easily accounted for with modern CGI techniques.

I thought he was just an angry walrus in a cheap suit with wire rimmed glasses.
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:19 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

yeah, that's what they want you to believe
posted by indubitable at 6:20 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Thanks, dirigibleman.
posted by Coventry at 6:22 PM on December 11, 2016

I keep blathering on about [the suggestion for Clinton to urge her electors to support a Republican] on Twitter because it is so elegant and workable, it just requires us to try something that hasn't been done before in a way that seems strange.

It also would mean that Republicans as a polity would have won by yet again holding a gun to America's collective head, which would undoubtedly encourage them to continue doing so with even more gusto.

Even so, it would be better than a President Trump.
posted by XMLicious at 6:22 PM on December 11, 2016 [29 favorites]

It also would mean that Republicans as a polity would have won by yet again holding a gun to America's collective head, which would undoubtedly encourage them to continue doing so with even more gusto.

Don't conservatives have a word for this kind of thing? Does "moral hazard" ring a bell?
posted by indubitable at 6:26 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

Don't know what was on NBC News but it ticked the Orange One off

@realDonaldTrump Just watched @NBCNightlyNews - So biased, inaccurate and bad, point after point. Just can't get much worse, although @CNN is right up there!
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:33 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

@PoliticoCharlie When Bill Clinton was first elected governor there, there were 94 Democrats in the Arkansas House, and just 6 Republicans

So what the hell is going on?

The long tail of the Civil Rights Act, the rise of the Dixiecrat and the Southern Strategy, and the death of the southern Democrat.
posted by krinklyfig at 6:36 PM on December 11, 2016

Shareblue Kellyanne Conway says Trump is 'going to put his own people' in the intelligence community

Hey, it worked great for George W. Bush:

Kenneth Pollack, a former National Security Council expert on Iraq, whose book “The Threatening Storm” generally supported the use of force to remove Saddam Hussein, told me that what the Bush people did was “dismantle the existing filtering process that for fifty years had been preventing the policymakers from getting bad information. They created stovepipes to get the information they wanted directly to the top leadership. Their position is that the professional bureaucracy is deliberately and maliciously keeping information from them.

posted by kirkaracha at 6:40 PM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

i think it's pretty obvious that the "John Bolton" entity is a Russian propaganda construct whose TV appearances can be easily accounted for with modern CGI techniques.

I remember him as the belligerent UN Ambassador under GW Bush. He would always go on and on about how the UN has no legitimacy, while the US was actively embroiled in an illegal invasion of Iraq and torturing prisoners of war.

*Sigh* It was a simpler time.
posted by krinklyfig at 6:45 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

I'd kiss the ground if we could elect Mittens or Kasich (or literally anyone else) instead of Trump.

I'd be delighted. It won't happen, for any number of reasons, but I'd be delighted. BUT.

Intersectionality wise, you've just pulled out all of the stops (and committed a Constitutionally legal but nevertheless really sketchy manuever) to elect someone who is going to do his best to destroy Roe v Wade. (IIRC, Romney is better on this than Kasich -- which doesn't say anything.)

Remember those lines in the sand? Remember how we weren't going to sell anyone out?

I'm not saying this because it's not preferable. I'm saying it because the election was last month and we're already seeing our coalition fracture.

And, yes: Roe is dead either way. (Maybe Griswald, too.) But so are unions, so is immigration reform, so is Obamacare and Social Security and any hope of police reform.

What will you sacrifice? Where is your line in the sand?

Be honest with yourself here. We all have priorities -- and I think we're all willing to sell each other out if it comes to that. But recognize what you're doing, and realize what you've decided you can sacrifice in exchange for the greater good.
posted by steady-state strawberry at 6:50 PM on December 11, 2016 [8 favorites]

This is what I was referring to about the January 6th thing.

Electoral College but then also January 6th
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 6:51 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

1.) Electoral College meets Dec. 19. If Electors ignore #StateOfEmergency we're in, & Trump gets elected, we can stop him Jan. 6 in Congress
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 6:52 PM on December 11, 2016

I think Hillary would have to go on TV and say these are strange and historic times, but she is releasing her electors to vote for Romney and hope 38 Trump electors do their duty and do the same. If you can get Romney on TV with her, great. Then it's up to the electors in every state to face this one moment where a different, better path is still possible. It's a longshot, obviously, but it seems like game over for American democracy otherwise.

If they could get GWB to show up too, so much the better.

Be honest with yourself here. We all have priorities -- and I think we're all willing to sell each other out if it comes to that. But recognize what you're doing, and realize what you've decided you can sacrifice in exchange for the greater good.

My perspective is that there are awful-but-fixable things, and there are unfixable things. Preventing unfixable things (like handing the nuclear codes to a thin-skinned incompetent beholden to a foreign power) takes priority.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 6:56 PM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

Where is this January 6th thing in the Constitution?
posted by EarBucket at 6:57 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Intersectionality wise, you've just pulled out all of the stops (and committed a Constitutionally legal but nevertheless really sketchy manuever) to elect someone who is going to do his best to destroy Roe v Wade. (IIRC, Romney is better on this than Kasich -- which doesn't say anything.)

We aren't selling out anybody. Trump literally believes in every awful republican policy, plus he's completely unhinged. Trump is already going to destroy Roe v Wade. Finding somebody equally politically odious and not unhinged would be a huge step forward.
posted by zug at 6:58 PM on December 11, 2016 [15 favorites]

Video of members of the House objecting to the election of GWB.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 7:00 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

I think my personal lines in the sand are pretty irrelevant, because no matter what, they're going to plow over every single one of them with a bulldozer. Right now, it's just about keeping the maximum number of people alive and capable of fighting.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 7:02 PM on December 11, 2016 [18 favorites]

I think if there's any danger with the maneuver, it would be if it succeeds and we all breathe a huge sigh of relief because #NeverTrump and fail to properly fight his replacement when he needs to be fought. But I still can't see how that's a worse outcome than having somebody who is going to destroy every rule and norm that allows the core of our system to function in office.

This. I'm also concerned about DJT totally disregarding the rule of law in unprecedented ways. A different GOP president might try to do awful things that we hate, but he or she would respect SCOTUS rulings, etc.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 7:04 PM on December 11, 2016 [10 favorites]

Ah, so objections could be raised to specific states' votes, at whichever point both houses of Congress would have to vote to void those states' electoral votes from the total. We're really into magical thinking territory there.
posted by EarBucket at 7:05 PM on December 11, 2016

Three words: Trump Invades France

I'm about half-joking.
posted by petebest at 7:08 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

or every citizen currently complaining that there's no difference between the parties, that the elites are all in cahoots

There should be no difference between the parties, and they should be in cahoots, on existential matters of fundamental national stability and sovereignty.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 7:10 PM on December 11, 2016 [18 favorites]

Wait a second. Bolton said RNC and DNC hacks. The RNC says they weren't hacked.
posted by zachlipton at 7:13 PM on December 11, 2016 [12 favorites]

Just out of curiosity I looked up what ace reporter Matt Lauer was up to. No luck, he's still broadcasting apparently. Albeit with some kind of grizzled facial hair.

If the Today show’s Matt Lauer was trying to make up for what was widely criticized as a softball interview with Donald Trump two months before Election Day at NBC’s Commander-in-Chief forum, he could have picked a better opening question.

“Last year, when Time did not choose you as Person of the Year and chose Angela Merkel, you said, ‘Time magazine will never pick me as Person of the Year,’” Lauer opened his phone interview with the president-elect Wednesday morning. “They proved you wrong. How do feel about this?

I'm not gonna miss ya, Matt.
posted by petebest at 7:20 PM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

Trump is already going to destroy Roe v Wade.

You're missing my point. What else are you willing to trade in?

Let's say we have a candidate who is going to be fine on everything -- except that they're planning to have a Muslim registry, and they're citing the Japanese internment camps as precident. Or that they're definitely going to implement racial profiling. Or eliminate Social Security and Medicare. Or purge the DOE of people who believe in climate change.

I'm well aware that a stable government is preferable to fascism, but what rails of our shaky liberal coalition are you willing to sacrifice here? I'm honestly ready to accept that Roe is dead -- but I would like to see those consequences be acknowledged.

Incidentally, no one here should ever insist that they have too many principles to vote for a Democratic candidate.
posted by steady-state strawberry at 7:20 PM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

[DEC 9 campaigning for John Kennedy]

Trump began by speaking of how Louisiana first taught him that the system he won was rigged. "So I came down on a Friday night to a massive hangar. The place was absolutely -- thousands and thousands of people. I think 24,000, 25,000 people, and I left and I said, you know, I think I'm going to win this state and I won the state easily, right?" he said. "And then I checked on the delegates, and the delegates were -- I didn't have as many as people I beat, and then I said this system is crooked.”
He went on to praise Kennedy.

“Tomorrow we need you to go to the polls and send John Kennedy to the United States Senate, and that's why I'm down here. That's why I'm here. He's a great guy. He's a great guy. He's a good guy, No. 1, he's a good person. And if he doesn't win, I have got myself a problem in Washington because, you know, we have -- it's pretty close. It's pretty close. We need John in Washington not only for the vote. We need him for leadership and everything else, but if you go there, we're going to win.”

Trump dispelled rumors that he may not run for re-election, intimating that he would run again.

"Hey, I don't need your vote anymore, but I'm telling you I'm very good at that. I don't need your vote. Can you imagine that? Four years I'll need your vote.”

Has anyone analyzed trump's limited vocabulary and repeating of words? It is a very odd way to speak. We all know that the Chief Bloviator loves to hear himself speak but there is something else going on here. I have my own ideas that I will save for a later date.
posted by futz at 7:21 PM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

Tape loop? Loose IC?
posted by petebest at 7:24 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

If we're positing last ditch extra-constitutional hail Marys, could we please settle on a better savior than Mitt Romney.

None of this will happen. He will take office. This is all fan fiction and bargaining.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:34 PM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

Okay, to defeat Trump.

27 of the electoral college members vote for Mike Pence. I realize that Pence is not someone anyone likes, but I still think Trump is exponentially worse with his kleptocracy, his white supremacy, his constant embarrassment of America.

Why Pence? The justification is that Trump has demonstrated that he is unfit for office. His vice president takes over. Second, you can state that Pence received the votes, the same votes as Trump. Trump/Trump didn't win the election (whatever win means if he doesn't get either popular vote of electoral college), Trump/Pence did.

Would Pence accept it? He won't have a choice whether to accept the electoral college votes.

Would the House of Representatives accept it? Probably no, although it might be they are split with some who will not vote Trump.

I believe this is the true Hamilton solution: Trump is unfit, his vice president should be the one.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 7:38 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

Here's some better ideas than handing the not-Trump presidency to Pence or Romney to destroy the country anyway:

1. Democratic electors: Engage in lawful protest
The point is not to stop Trump from taking office, but to protest it, which is different from the appeal to Trump electors to be “faithless,” that is, to change their votes from Trump to Clinton. As Abraham Lincoln said of the Dred Scott case: The point is not to [resist the literal result - to return Dred Scott back then or keep Trump out of office now - but to do all that we can to discredit a law that allows an unconscionable result.

2. Challenge voter suppression
The intent is to question the integrity of the votes cast in the Electoral College, and the model is the aftermath of the 1876 election. The dispute over one electoral vote led to the Compromise of 1877, in which the Republican, Rutherford Hayes, got the White House, while Democrats, who supported Samuel Tilden, got an end to Reconstruction. How wonderful if Democrats let Trump take the White House in return for Merrick Garland getting on the Supreme Court. This is unlikely: It is the kind of hardball that the Left, unlike the Right and alt-Right, never has the nerve to engage in. Still, the Democrats should use the joint session this December to put these states on trial for suppression of the vote.

3. Make the gap too big to ignore
Third, Democrats must institute compulsory voting in California and New York, in particular, and in as many of the other 15 states that Clinton carried as possible. Indeed, universal voting—which states have the authority to require—is the only tool that Democrats have to dismantle not just the Electoral College but the other ways that the GOP is now able to rig the vote. One big state—California or New York—might be enough to set off a constitutional chain reaction. With compulsory voting in place in several states in the next presidential election, it is very likely that the Democrats would pile up a popular majority so immense that, under the weight of these new votes, the Electoral College, even as a half-credible institution, would simply collapse.

4. Create real majority rule—with a counter Constitution,
Let one part of America, at least, be a city on a hill. It is time to press for a country that operates under two different kinds of constitutions, and see which of them prevails.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:46 PM on December 11, 2016 [27 favorites]

Trump's quotes pulled from this Politico article, Trump: China policy not working well.

“I fully understand the One China policy, but I don't know why we have to be bound by a One China policy,” Trump said in the interview, which aired on "Fox News Sunday."

“I don't want China dictating to me," Trump said.

"Why should some other nation be able to say I can't take a call? I think it actually would've been very disrespectful, to be honest with you, not taking it.”

China is “frankly not helping us at all with North Korea,” Trump said. “You have North Korea. You have nuclear weapons, and China could solve that problem, and they're not helping us at all.”
posted by gatorae at 7:48 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Once again, I am so profoundly grateful for Metafilter and the wealth of information curated here. I talked politics with my mom for the first time since the election today. She's fiercely pro-choice (I think it helps that she drove me to the clinic) and she said, "They're not really going to overturn Roe v Wade. They can't." And I (mostly) calmly spouted out facts, including the Texas heartbeat bill, indicating that yes, they really want to, and they will try, they're ALREADY trying. It got through. This one thing got through, and the seeds of doubt about "Let's wait and see with him" were planted. We talked about his cabinet picks, and when I got to Betsy DeVos, she asked "Is that true? Or is that just a liberal attack." No, Ma, it's true, the proposed Secretary of Education literally hates public schools and thinks Christian education is the way to go. That got through, too. I hope those seeds of doubt bloom large in my mom.
posted by Ruki at 7:48 PM on December 11, 2016 [32 favorites]

Regarding Pence over Romney: Pence would make sense after they're sworn in, or in a situation where Trump voluntarily steps down. But otherwise I'm not sold. He's never been a serious presidential candidate and only seems to be on the ticket because Trump has so few friends in the party.

It seems better to tap someone who has already campaigned and given their pitch on the policies and issues they want to bring to the office if the electoral college is to make a case for a best candidate.

Also if Trump really is conspiring with Putin, it probably extends into his circle, and we don't know how far. Better to keep as much distance as possible.
posted by p3t3 at 7:51 PM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

3. Make the gap too big to ignore
Third, Democrats must institute compulsory voting in California and New York, in particular, and in as many of the other 15 states that Clinton carried as possible. Indeed, universal voting—which states have the authority to require—is the only tool that Democrats have to dismantle not just the Electoral College but the other ways that the GOP is now able to rig the vote. One big state—California or New York—might be enough to set off a constitutional chain reaction. With compulsory voting in place in several states in the next presidential election, it is very likely that the Democrats would pile up a popular majority so immense that, under the weight of these new votes, the Electoral College, even as a half-credible institution, would simply collapse.

This might just work.
posted by monospace at 7:55 PM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

how do you enforce compulsory voting?
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 7:57 PM on December 11, 2016

Australia does it with fines. Seems to work.
posted by Coventry at 7:58 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

how do you enforce compulsory voting?

You're sent a ticket in the mail, like running a red light. If you avail yourself of any service in your town or state, they match it up against the voter rolls. Don't vote? Fifty bucks. Plus court fees if you ignore it. Waived if you vote in the next municipal or state election or can prove economic hardship.
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:02 PM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

With carrots and sticks.
posted by monospace at 8:02 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

I don't think the question is if compulsory voting can physically work, of course it can. The question is, is it constitutional? T.D. Strange, I note you say states have the power to compel voting, can you expand or give some cites?
posted by Chrysostom at 8:02 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

> Every horrible right-wing idea implemented over the course of the next four years would be publicly sold as the work of the Good Bipartisan Republican that we all came together to agree on.

We Americans can be stupid and forgetful of our history, but I find it difficult to believe we'll be sitting around in 2019 when the 2020 campaign is starting and be like "hey, why did the Democrats and Republicans come together to elect Mitt Romney? What was that all about? Was it Kanye or something?"
posted by tonycpsu at 8:04 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

The article mentions that it would be constitutional, similar to something like jury duty.
posted by monospace at 8:05 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

If we're positing last ditch extra-constitutional hail Marys, could we please settle on a better savior than Mitt Romney.

Am I missing something? What's extra-constitutional about electors changing their votes? Article II grants states control over the method of choosing electors "in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct" but not control over their actual votes. Per Wikipedia^† SCOTUS found that states can have laws requiring electors to pledge to vote for a certain candidate, and try to attach punishments for not keeping the pledge, but the validity of those punishments is in question, as is a state's ability to directly control the vote.

†The Court ruled in favor of state laws requiring electors to pledge to vote for the winning candidate, as well as removing electors who refuse to pledge. As stated in the ruling, electors are acting as a functionary of the state, not the federal government. Therefore, states have the right to govern the process of choosing electors. The constitutionality of state laws punishing electors for actually casting a faithless vote, rather than refusing to pledge, has never been decided by the Supreme Court. Of course, who knows how often this text has changed in the last few weeks.
posted by XMLicious at 8:05 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

dirigibleman, the Florida laws which drove out the League of Women Voters were permanently enjoined by a Federal Court in Aug 2012. I haven't found any indication that they appealed.

The Brennan link is great! Highly relevant to my interests.
posted by Coventry at 8:07 PM on December 11, 2016

China flies nuclear bomber over South China Sea to 'send a message' to Donald Trump
posted by bluecore at 8:10 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

monospace: "The article mentions that it would be constitutional, similar to something like jury duty."

Shoot, I didn't pay enough attention. Thanks, monospace.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:10 PM on December 11, 2016

Mitt Romney is an old-line conservative, not a radical, who was a popular Gov in a very Blue state, more popular still in very Red states, and is a technocrat who believes in process and precedent.

I will take Mitt in a GODDAMN MINUTE over Pence or Ryan. I will hate him as my president, but I will at least accept him as my president. Trump? Pence? Ryan? Nuh-uh. Not My President. Not now, not ever. Fight. Resist. Remember.

Remember!

Hillary won.
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:10 PM on December 11, 2016 [36 favorites]

Oh great. A big change to U.S. broadcasting is coming — and it’s one Putin might admire. Rather clickbaity headline, but read on:

A radical change to that system is now coming — and it looks like one that Vladimir Putin and Qatar’s emir might well admire. An amendment quietly inserted into the annual National Defense Authorization Act by Republican House leaders would abolish the broadcasting board and place VOA, RFE/RL and other international news and information operations under the direct control of a chief executive appointed by the president. The new executive would hire and fire senior media personnel and manage their budgets.

The relative independence of US foreign broadcasting operations was one of our great strengths. Turning these broadcasters into a tool of the President is deeply alarming.
posted by zachlipton at 8:16 PM on December 11, 2016 [33 favorites]

“I fully understand the One China policy, but I don't know why we have to be bound by a One China policy,” Trump said in the interview, which aired on "Fox News Sunday."

I hate to say it, but in previous instances when Trump has "talked tough", he pretty much folded like a chair: With Carrier he promised heavy penalties if the 2,000 jobs moved to Mexico. They ended up with 800 or so jobs staying and gave Carrier a bunch of tax credits. With Trump University, he boasted he never lost a case and ended up settling for $25 million.

I think with China, he's signaling he's willing to drop or reduce US support of Taiwan in exchange for something from China. There's simply no other reason why he would be talking this much about the One China Policy. He's just fattening Taiwan up for one of his "great deals". It doesn't make sense for him to say NATO, Japan, and South Korea are freeloaders and also leaving the Russian sphere alone, yet then be adamant about Taiwan's defense.
posted by FJT at 8:17 PM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

Hillary won.

I mean, I don't think this is helpful, because she didn't win. Not under any of the rules that make people presidents. Trump being POTUS is awful and scary, and I hope that the electors vote Pence or Romney. But Hillary didn't win.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:18 PM on December 11, 2016 [12 favorites]

China flies nuclear bomber over South China Sea to 'send a message' to Donald Trump

McKittrick: See that sign up there. "Defcon." That indicates our current defense condition. It should read "Defcon 5," which means peace. It's still on 4 because of that little stunt you pulled. Actually, if we hadn't caught it in time, it might have gone to Defcon 1. You know what that means, David?

David Lightman: No. What does that mean?

McKittrick: World War Three.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:18 PM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

The relative independence of US foreign broadcasting operations was one of our great strengths. Turning these broadcasters into a tool of the President is deeply alarming.

Can we call it Gleichschaltung yet?
posted by monospace at 8:24 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

But Hillary didn't win.

She won the popular vote which is a hell of a lot more than Kasich can say about anything this year.
posted by Slackermagee at 8:24 PM on December 11, 2016 [12 favorites]

Soooo....the Hail Mary notion is to ask 232 electors to throw themselves on their swords as a means of swinging 37 other electors...

...instead of just swinging 37 electors.

Evens. Out. Fucking bankrupt. Edifice hollowed out, copper pipes sold as scrap.

Every day I struggle to tamp down on the impulse to shout, Goddamn it, people, either have enough spine to stand up in protest and be counted on the day the deed is done, or just shut up entirely and brace for the fucking crash!

Every. Fucking. Day.

Why? Because people don't want to hear it. They don't want to do it. Even at a moment like this.

But I guess I just said it.

Please tell me I'm wrong. Tell me at least some of you are planning to *gasp!* skip work for one fucking day to participate in a demonstration against an impending atrocity on the 19th that is fucking advertised to directly harm tens of millions of people and savage the core principles upon which our nation is founded.

Please convince me that we aren't a nation of bloodless patriots.
posted by perspicio at 8:27 PM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

There is a big portion of the conservative movement that loves Putin and sees him as leader of the "western" world.
this is fine

A big change to U.S. broadcasting is coming — and it’s one Putin might admire.
i am okay with the events are unfolding currently

China flies nuclear bomber over South China Sea to 'send a message' to Donald Trump
that's okay, things are going to be okay
posted by entropicamericana at 8:28 PM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

I'm well aware that a stable government is preferable to fascism, but what rails of our shaky liberal coalition are you willing to sacrifice here?

There's more than those factors, though—in his attempts to cancel the One China policy, Trump is effectively trying to reinstate the Chinese Civil War, isn't he? In the final phase of the war, with us as allies to the losing side, except now the opponents we're losing to have nuclear weapons and 1,000 times the GDP and industrial capacity.

(At least that will be the default until he uses those totally amazing fabulous negotiation skills that appear to have given up Crimea for free, because he had no idea what the hell was going on, to miraculously produce a better agreement than one China, despite re-negotiating the denouement and end of the Chinese Civil War from a drastically weaker position now.)

So in addition to "not oppressed under fascism" we're also playing for "not incinerated in a nuclear war".
posted by XMLicious at 8:29 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

*gasp!* skip work for one fucking day to participate in a demonstration against an impending atrocity

…a lot of people would lose their jobs for skipping work for "one fucking day". The last thing we need to be now is out of work.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:31 PM on December 11, 2016 [16 favorites]

Trump says Wall Street Journal doesn't "understand business"

"I read the Wall Street Journal the other day," he said in an interview with Fox News. "Honestly, their editorial board doesn't get it. I don't think they understand business."

Has the WSJ ever gone bankrupt?
posted by futz at 8:31 PM on December 11, 2016 [22 favorites]

a lot of people would lose their jobs for skipping work for "one fucking day"

...and a lot of us wouldn't.

As I've said before, the people at least risk should be out front, standing up for those who are less protected. Because that's what this country is supposed to be about.
posted by perspicio at 8:35 PM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

But Hillary didn't win.

She won the popular vote

Yeah, personally I don't think he should be mentioned as president without noting he lost the popular vote bigly. Republicans spent 8 years delegitimizing a man who won a true landslide by 10 million votes, fuck if I'm going to treat Trump any better. The people spoke and chose someone else. A system designed to privilege rural slave states chose him, working as intended centuries after being implemented to reward racists. Constantly reminding people of it is perhaps a minor and immature tactic, but maybe it has a corrosive effect on his perceived legitimacy. Plus it bothers him and his supporters bigly, so even better.
posted by chris24 at 8:37 PM on December 11, 2016 [38 favorites]

I mean, I don't think this is helpful, because she didn't win. Not under any of the rules that make people presidents.

The weasels gerrymandered the Presidency. By any meaningful interpretation of Democracy, Hillary Won. Remember.
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:38 PM on December 11, 2016 [18 favorites]

""Honestly, their editorial board doesn't get it. I don't think they understand business."" "Has the WSJ ever gone bankrupt?"

No, but they were surprised by the West Coast 2002 longshoreman's lockout because they refuse, as a matter of principle, to have a labor-beat reporter, costing any subscribers who relied on them for up-to-date business news billions of dollars in surprise shipping delays including (this is true!) a drastic paperclip shortage.

I feel like that's probably not what Trump meant. But the WSJ is a terrible, terrible business paper because it's not interested in reporting what affects businesses; it's interested in advocating for capitalists, even if said advocacy means capitalists get fucked by labor actions.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:38 PM on December 11, 2016 [37 favorites]

But Hillary didn't win.

Clinton won the contest that Donald Trump, you, me and everyone else voted in last month, as ordinary citizens participating in the popular vote. It's only by sorting all those popular votes a certain perfectly legal and constitutionally required way that you end up with Trump as the winner. The special voters haven't had their special voting day yet, though.

I know it sounds like I'm in denial.
posted by emelenjr at 8:42 PM on December 11, 2016 [18 favorites]

What the successful outcome of a Dec 19 protest look like? Do the electors have any reason to care?
posted by Coventry at 8:43 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

Soooo....the Hail Mary notion is to ask 232 electors to throw themselves on their swords as a means of swinging 37 other electors...

...instead of just swinging 37 electors.

A 269 to 232 result goes to the House, while a 270+ to whatever result does not, or at least isn't supposed to. Though at the point that any of these fairy tale plans happen, I think we're in full-on Constitutional crisis mode, so who the hell knows.
posted by tonycpsu at 8:44 PM on December 11, 2016 [4 favorites]

that it would be constitutional, similar to something like jury duty

or the military draft, /cough
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 8:45 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

i think the mandatory-universal-voting-via-state-law idea has legs. ima look into that.
posted by j_curiouser at 8:58 PM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

Yeah I know there are plans/calls for protests on Dec. 19th, but other than registering unhappiness I can't see how they are supposed to actually effect the Electoral College Vote. Personally I'm pushing HARD this week to get Congress flooded with calls to encourage more Senators and Reps to maybe make statements against Russian interference, Trump, and keep THAT story in the news so maybe some Electors think again before they vote. I don't think this is LIKELY, but yanno, I'm ok with last-ditch efforts.
posted by threeturtles at 8:59 PM on December 11, 2016 [7 favorites]

What the successful outcome of a Dec 19 protest look like?

full-on Constitutional crisis mode

Bingo.

You know, for a while I was disappointed in how Obama has been handling this situation. But I see that I was looking at it wrong. He's doing exactly what he was elected to do. Exactly what the office demands of him.

He's not our savior. He's the president.

The people need to act. He's been saying this himself, for eight years now.

There is a remedy if the people act.
posted by perspicio at 9:01 PM on December 11, 2016 [30 favorites]

I will be home watching my kid but yes my husband will be protesting the 19th. I will be at another protest Inauguration Day. And I'm sure there will be others after that. I will be calling this week about investigating Russia interference. My conservative Reps and Sens might actually give a shit about that.

Today our church message was about the different kinds of social justice actions we can take (without mentioning parties or names) to protect the vulnerable. We know that will be almost our entire mission for at least four years because a lot of voices and a lot of help will be desperately needed.

I am just as frightened as all of you. I have to cry nearly every day. But America has amazing and courageous people in it as well as bad ones. And I love them enough to keep trying instead of just staying really drunk and waiting for the end. Possibly that is foolish and pointless but it's what I have to do.
posted by emjaybee at 9:02 PM on December 11, 2016 [14 favorites]

A 269 to 232 result goes to the House, while a 270+ to whatever result does not, or at least isn't supposed to. Though at the point that any of these fairy tale plans happen, I think we're in full-on Constitutional crisis mode, so who the hell knows.

It would be a political crisis but how is it a Constitutional crisis? The Constitution is perfectly clear what to do if the EC can't pick a President. It has happened two times before. I guess if they DO pick one and Congress says no, that's not who you were supposed to anoint, you'd have the real deal.
posted by thelonius at 9:02 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

...according to the Kasich adviser (who spoke only under the condition that he not be named), Donald Jr. wanted to make him an offer nonetheless: Did he have any interest in being the most powerful vice president in history?

When Kasich’s adviser asked how this would be the case, Donald Jr. explained that his father’s vice president would be in charge of domestic and foreign policy.

Then what, the adviser asked, would Trump be in charge of?

“Making America great again” was the casual reply.

posted by kirkaracha at 9:05 PM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

Not under any of the rules that make people presidents.

Those would be the rules that give electors free rein (and specific direction from Alexander fucking Hamilton) to not choose someone ruinous to the republic. If we're talking about norms, then clearly norms aren't working here, and haven't been working since 2000, it's just that we haven't quite caught to reckoning the ruinous consequences of the norms not working in 2000 because what followed in 2008 felt okay.
posted by holgate at 9:06 PM on December 11, 2016 [13 favorites]

And yes, seriously, the deep deep deep assumption of the fucking republic is that direct action is legitimate to save the fucking republic. "A republic, madam, if you can keep it."
posted by holgate at 9:08 PM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

Why would protests induce electors to change their votes? Why would they care? They're not up for re-election.
posted by Coventry at 9:08 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

I guess if they DO pick one and Congress says no, that's not who you were supposed to anoint, you'd have the real deal.

Yeah, that's what I meant. Though thinking about it some more, I don't see why most of the GOP caucus wouldn't be thrilled to have Mitt, or Kasich. Anyone with an (R) after their name is going to be with the GOP vandals for most of what they want.
posted by tonycpsu at 9:09 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

In 2000 everyone acted like it would be an unimaginable disaster to actually follow the Constitution and have the House decide the election, if the Florida recounts couldn't be resolved or if Florida sent 2 opposing slates of electors or something like that. And the Supreme Court made it so. It was pathetic.
posted by thelonius at 9:14 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

Twitler
posted by chris24 at 9:20 PM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

Let's say we have a candidate who is going to be fine on everything -- except that they're planning to have a Muslim registry, and they're citing the Japanese internment camps as precident. Or that they're definitely going to implement racial profiling. Or eliminate Social Security and Medicare. Or purge the DOE of people who believe in climate change.

Um, but that's not the actual decision in front of the presidential electors. I'm talking about the decision actually in front of the electors, not a made up scenario. Either Mittens or Kasich would be generally acceptable to republicans, better on muslims and climate change than Trump, and probably better on racial profiling. They are probably equally bad on SS/medicare. So that's a net benefit, without throwing anybody new under the bus.

More importantly, neither of them has repeatedly stated that we should be using nuclear weapons or bombing countries whose soldiers do not treat us with respect. There are some things more important than politics, and keeping nuclear weapons out of the hands of madmen is one of them. We're heading for completely uncharted waters if Trump takes office and keeps continuing the behaviors that got him there.
posted by zug at 9:23 PM on December 11, 2016 [11 favorites]

Democratic congressman from Connecticut.

@jahimes:
We're 5 wks from Inauguration & the President Elect is completely unhinged. The electoral college must do what it was designed for.
posted by chris24 at 9:48 PM on December 11, 2016 [35 favorites]

If Clinton released electors for, say, Romney it would be a good show of unity to make bipartisan appointments to cabinet as a show of good faith. This could be an understanding going in.
posted by mazola at 10:15 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

Half of Detroit votes may be ineligible for recount

One-third of precincts in Wayne County could be disqualified from an unprecedented statewide recount of presidential election results because of problems with ballots.

Michigan’s largest county voted overwhelmingly for Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, but officials couldn’t reconcile vote totals for 610 of 1,680 precincts during a countywide canvass of vote results late last month.

Most of those are in heavily Democratic Detroit, where the number of ballots in precinct poll books did not match those of voting machine printout reports in 59 percent of precincts, 392 of 662.

Nearly 1.8 million people live in Wayne County; Trump carried the state by only 10,000 votes.

This whole fiasco is seriously un-fucking-believable.
posted by un petit cadeau at 10:16 PM on December 11, 2016 [42 favorites]

This law in Michigan is crazypants: if they can't reconcile the vote totals in a precinct perfectly, they just give up on a recount? My understand is that most of the counts are off by a ballot or two, and there are fairly reasonable explanations for that (the scanner was being weird so a card got scanned twice or something), but just saying "the numbers don't match, so I guess we'll give up" makes no sense.
posted by zachlipton at 10:26 PM on December 11, 2016 [9 favorites]

If Clinton released electors for, say, Romney it would be a good show of unity to make bipartisan appointments to cabinet as a show of good faith. This could be an understanding going in.

A president chosen in this unusual way could probably only ever be a caretaker. I don't think that would be the worst thing, either; we need some time to figure out a way to pull out of this death spiral of tribalism and distrust without every moment feeling like life or death.

It would be better than Trump for sure. Alas.
posted by gerryblog at 10:26 PM on December 11, 2016 [15 favorites]

Yup
posted by mazola at 10:34 PM on December 11, 2016 [1 favorite]

A Romney or Kasich would sure as shit know they don't have a mandate and would act accordingly.
posted by mazola at 10:36 PM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

just saying "the numbers don't match, so I guess we'll give up" makes no sense.

It's a "fuck you" to urban precincts that, because they are busier, are more likely to have hiccups.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 10:37 PM on December 11, 2016 [2 favorites]

This whole fiasco is seriously un-fucking-believable.

Except it is sort of believable. In a close election, any kind of scrutiny is going to expose why the county-based model of election administration wouldn't pass muster in any new democracy, which is why seasoned election monitors like the Carter Center throw their hands up at the American system. The result of close elections is unknowable if you need to look on a county/precinct level; we've known this since 2000.
posted by holgate at 10:41 PM on December 11, 2016 [5 favorites]

So, Schrödinger's Election, basically.
posted by monospace at 10:44 PM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

An interesting tweetstorm from Matthew Vines, author of God and the Gay Christian (and a gay Christian himself) asking whatever happened to repentance. The money quote is: "If Trump can be a person of strong character without ever repenting of his sins, then seriously, what is the argument against gay people?"
posted by zachlipton at 10:52 PM on December 11, 2016 [26 favorites]

Remember!

Hillary won.

Remember, remember, the eighth of November.
posted by asteria at 11:05 PM on December 11, 2016 [6 favorites]

I question that he wants to be President now. He doesn't want to live in the White House. He doesn't want to get daily intelligence briefings. He doesn't want to give up his businesses or his Executive Producer gig on The Apprentice. I think this Presidential job is not something he wants to be bothered with except he won and it is kind of fun to have people come crawling to his throne. -- posted by Secret Life of Gravy

This. Why do I have this vision of Donald riding in a parade, with a tiara and a bouquet of roses, smiling and waving to the crowd?
That might explain things like not attending to the details of the peaceful transition of power, not divesting himself of possible financial conflicts of interest, releasing the damn tax returns, already....
Is he bought and paid for, ready to spend the next four years rubber-stamping legislation? Is he going to bow out and leave Pence in charge? Will there be a full-blown impeachment?

What I don't see is the hail-Mary pass to stop the inauguration. That sets a president for derailing later elections. Nope on that. But forcing him out of office when the powers-that-be can't fence him in -- that is a strong possibility.

... But according to the Kasich adviser (who spoke only under the condition that he not be named), Donald Jr. wanted to make him an offer nonetheless: Did he have any interest in being the most powerful vice president in history?
When Kasich’s adviser asked how this would be the case, Donald Jr. explained that his father’s vice president would be in charge of domestic and foreign policy.

Then what, the adviser asked, would Trump be in charge of?
“Making America great again” was the casual reply.
posted by kirkaracha, among others
posted by TrishaU at 11:06 PM on December 11, 2016 [3 favorites]

I've been sort of transfixed by the idea that I came across when I was doing Hamlet with my class that one huge allegorical aspect of the play is the anxiety about the successor to Queen Elizabeth.

It helps explain Hamlet's pissy attitude from the get-go. And Hamlet's whole, "and what a falling off, from this to this." That's one thing he's sort of obsessed with, that the guy who is now king is such a shitty ass king compared to Hamlet's dad.

Before I was like *get over who your mom's doing* and now I'm like *I FEEL YOU HAMY*

I don't like this thing in life where I suddenly relate to great literature. I mean it's cool, but I sort of envy the kids who think Lear should just get on Prozac and that would address every issue raised by the play.

In other news, there are fights in my young friend's high school in the restrooms between HRC and Trump supporters.

Also, there is an apparently increasingly "ironic" use of the swastika in high school, so we had to have A Talk about Things You Don't Do/Say, which I could tell annoyed him. God, teenagers.
posted by angrycat at 11:46 PM on December 11, 2016 [16 favorites]

Exxon Has Lost Over $1 Billion From Russian Sanctions

There is absolutely no conflict of interest between the new Secretary of State and his interaction with Russia. None. Nope.
posted by PenDevil at 12:14 AM on December 12, 2016 [36 favorites]

Yeah, but wait until it's John "False Flag" Bolton and Trump can use that to rant about the lying media who simply report on the utterly absurd number of leaks that come out of his administration.
posted by zachlipton at 12:22 AM on December 12, 2016

RSVP for the December 19 protest near you.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 3:23 AM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

Regarding those Detroit votes not being counted, read the link that Two unicycles and some duct tape shared last night. It's no accident that these are the votes being thrown out.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 3:45 AM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

@StephenKing:
Trump's proposed cabinet is the worst in American history: a motley crew of plunder-monkeys.
posted by chris24 at 4:21 AM on December 12, 2016 [21 favorites]

The Republicans are delivering America into Putin's hands

It shouldn’t be surprising that Vladimir Putin would want to interfere in US politics to advance Russia’s foreign policy goals – from curtailing Nato to ending sanctions over the conflict in Ukraine and preserving Bashar Assad’s regime in Syria. And as many critics of US foreign policy have noted, Washington has its own long history of meddling in foreign elections, including in Russia and its closest neighbors. Maybe the turnabout is fair play.

But what should surprise and disturb all Americans is that our political institutions, and above all the Republican party, are so vulnerable to Russian interference. The Republican party, traditionally associated with a hawkish stance toward Moscow, threw its support behind a presidential candidate who openly called on Russia to hack his opponent’s campaign.

According to CIA sources who spoke anonymously to the Washington Post, Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell told Obama and leading Democrats that he would regard any effort to release evidence of Russian interference before the election as partisan. In other words, he put his own party’s interest in electing Trump and gutting the welfare state ahead of the national interest.
posted by mumimor at 4:53 AM on December 12, 2016 [22 favorites]

In a new twist, Mr. Trump will meet on Monday with Carly Fiorina, the former Hewlett-Packard chief executive, to discuss the job of director of national intelligence, a senior transition official said… (NYT)
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:14 AM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

Why would protests induce electors to change their votes? Why would they care? They're not up for re-election.

Electors in many states are people heavily involved with the party apparatus. If you want to influence them, you need to do so directly and tell them you will remember this vote.
posted by corb at 5:17 AM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

President-elect Donald Trump’s senior adviser Kellyanne Conway said Monday morning that her boss “respects the intelligence community,” a claim that comes less than 24 hours after Trump told an interviewer that the intelligence community’s assessment of Russian hacking into the U.S. election process was “ridiculous.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:21 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Do the electors convene in one location, or do they cast from their respective states?
posted by Coventry at 5:23 AM on December 12, 2016

@realDonaldTrump (real)
Can you imagine if the election results were the opposite and WE tried to play the Russia/CIA card. It would be called conspiracy theory! Unless you catch "hackers" in the act, it is very hard to determine who was doing the hacking. Why wasn't this brought up before election?

If it was reversed, the Republicans would be insane as the National Review editor tweeted above and we'd be in danger of civil war. And it was brought up repeatedly before the election.

Oct. 7 - Joint Statement from the Department Of Homeland Security and Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security
posted by chris24 at 5:26 AM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

Coventry, they are in separate locations. Normally, each state's capital, I believe.
posted by Chrysostom at 5:30 AM on December 12, 2016

Chris Arnade photographs the back row kids. He knew they could elect Trump.

Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, he said, “represented the front row” — the smartest students in class, destined to enjoy the money and status that came with silver-spoon success.

For what Arnade calls the “back-row kids,” the frustration, anger and, yes, humiliation had become overwhelming.

posted by corb at 5:36 AM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

@realDonaldTrump (real)
Can you imagine if the election results were the opposite and WE tried to play the Russia/CIA card...

Also, this tweet isn't from Android. It's possible he dictated it, but also very possible it's a Kellyanne or some staffer tweet. The vast majority of his tweets have been Android since the election.
posted by chris24 at 5:36 AM on December 12, 2016

Can you imagine if the election results were the opposite and WE tried to play the Russia/CIA card.

Can you imagine if one of the candidates claimed the election would be rigged months beforehand and also after winning the election?
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 5:38 AM on December 12, 2016 [20 favorites]

Can you imagine if the election results were the opposite and WE tried to play the Russia/CIA card.

Can you imagine if a candidate actually asked Russia to hack the election?
posted by chris24 at 5:41 AM on December 12, 2016 [19 favorites]

the smartest students in class, destined to enjoy the money and status that came with silver-spoon success.

...who all moved out to the burbs and voted for Trump anyway.
posted by hangashore at 5:43 AM on December 12, 2016 [10 favorites]

The weirdest benchmark of Trump's tweets is that he tries to "cover" his worst tweets with other ones. Just after those other tweets, he posted about military costs being out of control. Does he think people don't know how to scroll down and read other tweets?
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:51 AM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

Does he think people don't know how to scroll down and read other tweets?

Well it's worked many times before.
posted by Talez at 5:52 AM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

Just after those other tweets, he posted about military costs being out of control. Does he think people don't know how to scroll down and read other tweets?

And just like that with Trump's tweet on the F-35, Lockheed's stock is down 3%. $2.3b loss in market cap. Lockheed is a member of the S&P500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average. He just cost millions of Americans money out of their retirement savings, 401ks, IRAs and pensions.
posted by chris24 at 5:57 AM on December 12, 2016 [21 favorites]

Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, he said, “represented the front row” — the smartest students in class, destined to enjoy the money and status that came with silver-spoon success.

A nice piece, corb, that speaks to an emotional force at play. But beyond that, fuck this bullshit. That the "back-row kids" believed this does not make it true. She has devoted her life to helping the less fortunate.
posted by perspicio at 6:03 AM on December 12, 2016 [33 favorites]

A nice piece, corb, that speaks to an emotional force at play. But beyond that, fuck this bullshit. That the "back-row kids" believed this does not make it true. She has devoted her life to helping the less privileged.

And the back row kids voted for her. She won the poor and lower middle class by a large margin. He should say white back row kids since that's what he means and who he values. The well-to-do, the actual people with silver spoons, voted for Trump.
posted by chris24 at 6:06 AM on December 12, 2016 [32 favorites]

And just like that with Trump's tweet on the F-35, Lockheed's stock is down 3%.

I find myself again wondering what shade of crimson my always-complaining-about-Obama defense contractor friends would turn had Hillary done this.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 6:06 AM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

And just like that with Trump's tweet on the F-35, Lockheed's stock is down 3%. $2.3b loss in market cap. Lockheed is a member of the S&P500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average. He just cost millions of Americans money out of their retirement savings, 401ks, IRAs and pensions.

The military doesn't even want the F-35, and it's been a vastly over-budget boondoggle for a long time. I'm having difficulty finding the same sympathy you found, perhaps because I'm not enamored of the vast socialist defense contract industry.

If someone made a statement that caused Corrections Corporation of America stock to drop, would you still be aching for the shareholders?
posted by Radiophonic Oddity at 6:08 AM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

> There's a solid chance that any got-in-through-a-wacky-scheme Republican president would rule the exact same way they would if they'd just straight-up won the popular vote.

Sure there is, and if we compare the range of outcomes to a hypothetical Mittens presidency to those of Trump based on what we've seen so far, I'm sure we can imagine scenarios where Romney's no better or worse. But can anyone honestly say that stopping Trump doesn't significantly improve our odds based on what we know about his record?
posted by tonycpsu at 6:09 AM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

> If someone said something that caused Corrections Corporation of America stock to drop, would you still be aching for the shareholders?

If that "someone" was the President-elect of the United States using Twitter as a weapon of war against companies he wants to shake down? Abso-fucking-lutely.
posted by tonycpsu at 6:11 AM on December 12, 2016 [25 favorites]

The military doesn't even want the F-35, and it's been a vastly over-budget boondoggle for a long time. I'm having difficulty finding the same sympathy you found, though I'm not enamored of the vast socialist defense contract industry.

You can think the F-35 is not worthwhile and also think the President Elect tweeting to distract from scandal by damaging a public traded company owned by millions of everyday Americans isn't a good thing.
posted by chris24 at 6:11 AM on December 12, 2016 [25 favorites]

Guys even RuPaul
posted by Hypatia at 6:12 AM on December 12, 2016 [13 favorites]

If someone said something that caused Corrections Corporation of America stock to drop, would you still be aching for the shareholders?

I think it was more about the larger index # dropping as a result.
posted by petebest at 6:13 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

I repeat myself, but I will take Lawful Evil over Chaotic Evil any day of the week.
posted by lydhre at 6:15 AM on December 12, 2016 [16 favorites]

A nice piece, corb, that speaks to an emotional force at play. But beyond that, fuck this bullshit. That the "back-row kids" believed this does not make it true. She has devoted her life to helping the less fortunate.

What the Trump voters want isn't help, fortunate or not. They want to dominate, exploit, and abuse. And that's what Trump promised.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:16 AM on December 12, 2016 [22 favorites]

He should say white back row kids since that's what he means and who he values.

You know, I think his impulse to document this side of Americana is entirely respectable. But yes, due to his words, at least as portrayed in that article, at best I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt that that's not what he means, and that this is a case of unconscious racism/ethnocentrism.

As ridiculous as that may sound, given how stark and obvious the bias is when called out, I know from direct experience, and have had to accept, that racism internalized, like every other toxic element of our culture, is a deviously blinding characteristic.
posted by perspicio at 6:19 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Scott Lemieux, LGM: The Orange Devil’s Theory of the Bully Pulpit

This is a really smart point from Brian Beutler:
In the end, Bush’s Social Security privatization never got a vote in Congress. In the face of intense public and Democratic Party objections, Republicans shelved it and then tried to pretend it never happened. But that was not for lack of effort on the part of privatizers, including Bush himself, who barnstormed the country trying to secure popular support for the plan.

In other words, it was huge news.

Donald Trump, by contrast, is currently barnstorming the country congratulating himself on his victory. He campaigned against privatizing Medicare, and promised to replace Obamacare with “something terrific” that covered everyone. “You cannot let people die on the street, OK?” he famously said. It is unlikely, in other words, that he will make a big Medicare privatization sales pitch that commands daily media attention…

The canonical bully pulpit story involves the president persuading the public to support his policy views through the force of rhetoric. Outside of foreign policy when the country is about to go to war, there is essentially no evidence that this power exists. [...]

Trump, though, might be able to facilitate the passage of Ryan’s agenda simply by getting the press to focus on various shiny objects. One reason it’s absolutely ridiculous to assert that we should ignore the disastrous, nearly-policy free coverage of the 2016 campaign is that it’s not as if the press is suddenly about to start ignoring Trump’s reality show and start informing the public about what a Republican Congress is going to do to the country. [...]

posted by tonycpsu at 6:21 AM on December 12, 2016 [22 favorites]

If that "someone" was the President-elect of the United States using Twitter as a weapon of war against companies he wants to shake down? Abso-fucking-lutely.

It seems plausible that Trump wants to shake these companies down, but is there evidence? Is this like the Carrier shakedown that left them with $7 million in the end?
posted by Radiophonic Oddity at 6:23 AM on December 12, 2016

Brexit derail deleted. Coda Tronca, cut it out.
posted by taz (staff) at 6:27 AM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

> It seems plausible that Trump wants to shake these companies down, but is there evidence? Is this like the Carrier shakedown that left them with $7 million in the end?

I'd say it's more of a base-appeasing move about wanting to be perceived as tough on the pork-barrel aspects of defense spending. Wait until the people in these exurban and rural districts learn how many of their neighbors jobs come from those planes.
posted by tonycpsu at 6:28 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Radiophonic Oddity it doesn't matter a bit what he wants to do.

That would for one imply that he has any fucking clue what he's doing, and isn't essentially an angry Markov chain in an ill-fitting suit, trained on the comments page. The PEOTUS tweets capriciously, and when he names companies the market seems to be reacting. Maybe it's correlation/causation fallacy. But he shouldn't be doing it at all.

This is not normal.
posted by aspersioncast at 6:29 AM on December 12, 2016 [15 favorites]

the back row kids voted for her. She won the poor and lower middle class by a large margin

When you look at the percentage breakdown of where people stand, it looks like more than 90% of America is in the back row, in terms of not making enough money to afford what were once known as the markers of a middle class lifestyle. So we really need to re evaluate where our class differentiation lies, because I don't think those can be fine tuned as easily anymore.

How people are reacting to their increasing lack of access to these things, in my view, often depends on their prior economic status - people who are finding themselves falling are reacting with much more anger than those who are finding themselves rising. But whether falling or rising, the overwhelming majority of Americans are not in the same socioeconomic class as Hillary Clinton.
posted by corb at 6:30 AM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

But whether falling or rising, the overwhelming majority of Americans are not in the same socioeconomic class as Hillary Clinton.

Nor Donald Trump, so what does that matter?
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:31 AM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

As this nightmare unfolds, I wonder if we could work towards somewhat separate threads in the future. In particular, Historical Consideration of Hillary is distinct from How do We (Americans) Organise and Resist Now which is very different from What are the Immediate Ramifications for the Rest of the World. As someone who is not in the USA, but nevertheless shaken to the core by this disaster, I would love some separation.
posted by stonepharisee at 6:40 AM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

to vote for Donald Trump may not be a move that makes sense on any rational in-their-self-interest level, but is like watching some other rich guy key the BMW's door.

Except he's not keying the BMW, he's putting the BMW owner and some Bentley owners in his cabinet to help him steal from Ford owners.
posted by chris24 at 6:41 AM on December 12, 2016 [15 favorites]

Nor Donald Trump, so what does that matter?

But Trump himself walks this weirdly fine line, class wise - despite coming from inherited wealth! - of poor-guy-made-good. Someone said on one of these he reads as "high prole", in terms of class markers. Sure, he has gold plated everything, but he still tapes his tie down with Scotch tape. It's like the Beverly Hillbillies version of rich people. The fact that other rich people seem to hate Trump, to these guys only works to place him more on their level in a bizarre way.
posted by corb at 6:41 AM on December 12, 2016 [28 favorites]

people who are finding themselves falling are reacting with much more anger than those who are finding themselves rising.

This is true, but I think it needs to be stated that oftentimes these people see themselves falling because of their relative distance from the bottom, not their distance from the top. So if other groups are doing marginally better, the groups that think that they're 'falling' think it's bad for them - even if that would just put marginalized groups on the same level as the WWC. But if the rich get richer and marginal groups stay marginal, the WWC seems to think 'well, at least I'm better than those chumps'.

Class is always going to be a relative thing, but I think it might be helpful to try to change it to judge by distance from the top, not from the bottom.
posted by dinty_moore at 6:42 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

How people are reacting to their increasing lack of access to these things, in my view, often depends on their prior economic status - people who are finding themselves falling are reacting with much more anger than those who are finding themselves rising. But whether falling or rising, the overwhelming majority of Americans are not in the same socioeconomic class as Hillary Clinton.

I'm doing my best to understand your point or purpose. Her life story is inspirational. It's a sick and demented faction that has tarred her as elitist, and continues to do so.
posted by perspicio at 6:42 AM on December 12, 2016 [29 favorites]

It's cute that Trump still thinks you can make X go away by saying "playing the X card"
posted by thelonius at 6:44 AM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

And just like that with Trump's tweet on the F-35, Lockheed's stock is down 3%. $2.3b loss in market cap. Lockheed is a member of the S&P500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average. He just cost millions of Americans money out of their retirement savings, 401ks, IRAs and pensions.
- chris24

Boeing is our top exporter, and Lockheed's plan for recouping F-35 costs involve finding more countries willing to buy it. I imagine it makes it much more difficult to sell *anything* when the risk analysis includes the statement "President of United States says product is too expensive and may have personal vendetta against supplier."
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 6:47 AM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

Her life story is inspirational. It's a sick and demented faction that has tarred her as elitist, and continues to do so.

It's really important here to understand I'm not talking about moral rectitude. In a less bad time, I'd think it was a fucking American tragedy that someone who pulled themselves up by their bootstraps so successfully that they catapaulted themselves into the top tier of American society such that they can give the impression of always having been there, was then brought down by that perception and success among people who would have every reason to empathize with her story.

She can be a member of the elite herself without being elitist. It's just where she currently stands, class-wise.
posted by corb at 6:55 AM on December 12, 2016 [10 favorites]

....as if this happens every election "We lost? Better play the Russia/CIA card!"
posted by thelonius at 6:56 AM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

You're missing the bigger picture, chris24, which is that by this reasoning, the S&P 500 is up 4.7% since Trump's election, putting money in the retirement accounts of millions of Americans and Creating Value.

Stock markets go up and down. What they don't do is drop instantly due to the President tweeting attacks on public companies to distract from scandals.
posted by chris24 at 6:56 AM on December 12, 2016 [14 favorites]

What they don't do it drop instantly due to the President tweeting attacks on public companies to distract from scandals.

Who cares? Like you said, stocks go up and down. Wait a week or two and get a different outcome. My point is, Donald Trump: Terrible for America, Great for My Bank Account. Trump 2020!
posted by indubitable at 7:00 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Who cares? Like you said, stocks go up and down. Wait a week or two and get a different outcome.

Yeah, and if you're a retired person who needs to sell to pay a medical bill on a day Trump decides to crash the S&P, or a single parent cashing out a 401k early to pay a tuition bill, tough luck.
posted by chris24 at 7:03 AM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

It's really important here to understand I'm not talking about moral rectitude.

She can be a member of the elite herself without being elitist. It's just where she currently stands, class-wise.

Thank you for clarifying. It appears you have just been making an observation from a particular vantage point, not offering any value judgments or arguments.

In which case I say, it's a valid observation (which has been getting ample play elsewhere as well), but... *shrug* ...the back-row kids are misguided. They chose an anti-hero.

Have you any suggestions or insights on what to do about that?
posted by perspicio at 7:05 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

McConnell: "Let me speak for myself: The Russians are not our friends."
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:08 AM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Let me speak for myself: Neither is McConnell.
posted by perspicio at 7:09 AM on December 12, 2016 [49 favorites]

> That's correct, yes. Trump is 100% awful, and Romney would be somewhere between like 30% and 90% awful. If Democrats help elect Romney, they will gain the animosity of a huge part of their base for collaborating with the party that wants to outlaw abortion and destroy the last bits of the social safety net and allow wealth to flow unimpeded to the rich.

I don't think this follows. It's not like the party's base is going to forget the circumstances of what led them to support a not-Trump option. The people whose lives are directly improved by the 10%-70% difference in awfulness (by your estimate) between Trump and Romney are certainly going to understand.

Your argument, in essence, is that those people must suffer now in exchange for a hypothetical alleviation of suffering later when the Democratic party base rewards Democrats for sticking to their guns and not taking a half-measure (or a quarter-measure, or whatever a Romney-ish candidate might represent.) That may not be how you intend it, but if there's a chance that harm can be reduced now, I believe it must be reduced. We can deal with tomorrow tomorrow, and I find your logic that the base will revolt because Democrats did what they could do to stop Trump unconvincing.
posted by tonycpsu at 7:09 AM on December 12, 2016 [6 favorites]

Yeah, and if your a retired person who needs to sell to pay a medical bill on a day Trump decides to crash the S&P, or a single parent cashing out a 401k early to pay a tuition bill, tough luck.

If you're a disabled veteran or an orphan with brain cancer making a withdrawal to pay their medicals bills the day after Election Day, though, you're probably pretty stoked with Trump, because now you have 1.1% more money, clearly an unambiguous indication that Trump is good for America.
posted by indubitable at 7:10 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

> She can be a member of the elite herself without being elitist. It's just where she currently stands, class-wise.

We really are in a post-truth society when we're being asked to accept the judgement of people who think Donald Trump is working for the common man while Hillary Clinton is just another elite.
posted by tonycpsu at 7:11 AM on December 12, 2016 [31 favorites]

I don't take that to be corb's point, tonycpsu. Yes, that argument has been made. No, I don't think that she's making it.

the back-row kids are misguided. They chose an anti-hero.

Expanding on my own comment:

The back-row kids are making a valid statement of their own. I believe it is narrow and steeped in low-minded self-interest. But that in itself reflects a failure to inculcate higher-minded values, which begs the point: their swath of Americana has fallen into decay.

Should we avert utter catastrophe, we must make common cause with them. They are, after all, our own brethren (and I'm not speaking racially) ... and we need to stand up for them just the same as we must for the much more chronically disenfranchised.
posted by perspicio at 7:17 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Speaking seriously, now, the drive the measure the goodness of any given government policy by how it affects some company's stock price is a terrible way to make decisions. Single payer government healthcare would probably hurt the stock prices of health insurers, but I'd still be massively in favor of putting it in place. Letting stock prices guide your every decision is basically ceding policymaking to the most powerful, most established corporations and the wealthy capitalists who benefit the most from them.
posted by indubitable at 7:19 AM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

This is a really smart point from Brian Beutler:
In the end, Bush’s Social Security privatization never got a vote in Congress. In the face of intense public and Democratic Party objections, Republicans shelved it and then tried to pretend it never happened. But that was not for lack of effort on the part of privatizers, including Bush himself, who barnstormed the country trying to secure popular support for the plan.

In other words, it was huge news.

Donald Trump, by contrast, is currently barnstorming the country congratulating himself on his victory. He campaigned against privatizing Medicare, and promised to replace Obamacare with “something terrific” that covered everyone. “You cannot let people die on the street, OK?” he famously said. It is unlikely, in other words, that he will make a big Medicare privatization sales pitch that commands daily media attention…

Yes, a good point, and subtly underlined by a great choice of illustration!
posted by mumimor at 7:19 AM on December 12, 2016

> the drive the measure the goodness of any given government policy by how it affects some company's stock price is a terrible way to make decisions

This will be the third or fourth time this point has been made this morning:

It's not about the fact that the stock price went down, but how it went down. The right always talks about Big Government picking winners and losers. This is the future President of the United States attacking a company to accomplish a political objective. This. Is. Not. Okay.
posted by tonycpsu at 7:22 AM on December 12, 2016 [28 favorites]

You don't have to think stock market prices, especially day to day, are a great way to measure the well-being of the people to think that the President-elect shooting off his mouth causing stock market volatility is abnormal and shows harm.
posted by R343L at 7:23 AM on December 12, 2016 [16 favorites]

If you're a disabled veteran or an orphan with brain cancer making a withdrawal to pay their medicals bills the day after Election Day, though, you're probably pretty stoked with Trump, because now you have 1.1% more money, clearly an unambiguous indication that Trump is good for America.

Yes, on this particular day it's up since the election. The point I've repeatedly made is it's not always going to be today. And the market is not always going to be up. And even if it is up overall since election, if he tanks a stock, it's down from yesterday and people have lost money they wouldn't have otherwise.
posted by chris24 at 7:32 AM on December 12, 2016

They are, after all, our own brethren (and I'm not speaking racially) ... and we need to stand up for them just the same as we must for the much more chronically disenfranchised.

Why don't you go to them and say they need to start talking to the front row kids, and especially need to stop sending us pictures of our friends in gas chambers.
posted by maxsparber at 7:34 AM on December 12, 2016 [13 favorites]

Okay, here's the thing on the stock market: If the president can attack a company and mess with their stock prices - thereby messing with all kinds of people's retirement accounts, etc - he has one more gun to our heads. Sure, this time the price will rebound and anyone who doesn't need to sell this month will be fine, but he's illustrating that he could make a sustained attack which would permanently depress prices, and that he could make enough attacks to cause market instability. And he's illustrating that he can and will attack companies that cross him, or that he thinks cross him.

This is basically like seventies nuclear policy - give the other side the impression that you're an unstable madman so that they're scared because you might do anything.

That Republicans are not flipping out and doing everything necessary to put the brakes on shows what I've always figured about conservatives - they'd rather reign in hell than serve in heaven, and giving uncontrolled power to a right wing tyrant is just fine even if he crashes the world as long as they can rule from atop the rubble.
posted by Frowner at 7:35 AM on December 12, 2016 [57 favorites]

Why don't you go to them and say they need to start talking to the front row kids, and especially need to stop sending us pictures of our friends in gas chambers.

I agree with that approach, as one step among many.
posted by perspicio at 7:36 AM on December 12, 2016

That Republicans are not flipping out and doing everything necessary to put the brakes on shows what I've always figured about conservatives - they'd rather reign in hell than serve in heaven

Exactly. The rightwing freakout for Obama on Solyndra and the government "choosing winners" shows that except for hypocrisy, Republicans have no true beliefs.
posted by chris24 at 7:39 AM on December 12, 2016 [21 favorites]

Yes, this has certainly been a sieve through which nearly every Republican has fallen, leaving a handful of apparently principled right-wing politicians to speak out against the howling nightmare. Which is how I end up developing a measure of grudging respect for Joe Walsh, Rand Paul, Lindsey Graham... the surprises for me never stop. 2016. Year of what the actual fuck.
posted by prefpara at 7:47 AM on December 12, 2016 [14 favorites]

If there are any Republicans who have ever tried to pretend to be "libertarians" this right here is the litmus test for exactly how much shit they are talking. No libertarian--capital L or small l, should be taking any of this lying down. Not one.
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:57 AM on December 12, 2016 [23 favorites]

Don't you mean "year of what the fake fuck?"
posted by Rykey at 8:05 AM on December 12, 2016

Republicans have no true beliefs

i think "power is good when i have it and bad when anyone else does" is probably in there somewhere
posted by murphy slaw at 8:09 AM on December 12, 2016 [23 favorites]

We still have a month and a half to go before this maniac takes office and already multiple people I know and love have made unprompted "jokes" about quitting their jobs, liquidating their assets and enjoying themselves with what time we have left.

My father told me that if he thought we could get into Canada permanently, he would sell everything up and take my mother, my brother, me and my partner to Canada ASAP. That is not the type of statement he typically makes - he's usually an "it will be bad but not as bad as you're worrying about, so just buckle down" guy.
posted by Frowner at 8:14 AM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

Hooray for engagement. I've had enough of it, and I've had enough of it being dictated to me. Only 20 percent of the country voted for the monster. I'm going to talk to the remaining 80 percent. They don't assault me.

I live in a city and just spent the weekend in New York, and it strikes me on a regular basis and really struck me while I was in NYC, that there's really no place that is less of a "bubble" than a large urban area. Anyone who thinks that I (white Canadian-American from the midwest via Toronto) have much in common, with an 80-year-old immigrant from Guangdong Province, a young Afro-Caribbean service worker, a couple Wall St. bros, and the children of Lower East Side Russian Jews needs to re-calibrate what they mean by "bubble." And yet, there we all were, waiting for a safe moment to jaywalk across 6th Ave together.

Any place where you never meet or talk to someone who is substantially different from you is a bubble. A large city is not that place. (Many rural areas are also not that place, to be sure. But I am pretty much done with insistence that I'm the one that needs to come out of my bubble when my bus ride in in the mornings features almost no one speaking my own native language.)
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:16 AM on December 12, 2016 [59 favorites]

My father told me that if he thought we could get into Canada permanently

Currently I have on my desk the paperwork needed to get myself a Canadian passport (I am a dual citizen but have lived in the US since I was 3), and the paperwork needed to secure Canadian citizenship registration for my son (he derives citizenship through me, despite being born in the US). Never in 40 years have I contemplated this before. I'm American as apple pie. I don't even remember Canada. I have no family left there. But I've done the research on what it will take to get myself, my son and my husband safely and legally into Canada. My inlaws were like, "Uhhhh could you sponsor us, too?" (Answer: yes, with certain stipulations.) My own parents also are keeping their Canadian bonafides in their back pockets (my dad is still a Canadian citizen, my mom would have to go through the same Permanent Resident application process as my husband would).
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:21 AM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

My girlfriend's father is a decent fellow. But he's very opposed to Obamacare. Despite the fact that it gave his daughter healthcare for the first time in her adult life.

He lives in a far suburb of Minneapolis. He drives to and from work, listening to right wing radio. He's in Michele Bachmann's former district, and his house had surrounding houses with Trump signs. He does not participate in social media.

I lived downtown in an apartment building filled with immigrants and people of color. I edit a Jewish newspaper. I attend civic events with my neighbors, many of whom are Muslim refugees. I especially sought out challenging voices from women, people of color, etc. on Twitter, and my Facebook friends come from around the world and represent a wide variety of experiences and ethnicites.

I'm pretty sure he's the one in the bubble.
posted by maxsparber at 8:23 AM on December 12, 2016 [58 favorites]

Any place where you never meet or talk to someone who is substantially different from you is a bubble. A large city is not that place

Yeah but see, we aren't exposed to white factory workers and farmers so city folk are totally sheltered from the real merica and do not understand REAL NEEDS.

Also according to media: Literally every college campus = Oberlin.
posted by windbox at 8:26 AM on December 12, 2016 [18 favorites]

Yeah but see, we aren't exposed to white factory workers and farmers so city folk are totally sheltered from the real merica and do not understand REAL NEEDS.

If you a Minneapolitan, like I am, you can't avoid farmers. We're freakin obsessed with farmers. They come in and sell their stuff on weekends, and are feted at farm to table restaurants, and they have big events every year where they show up how they pick apples or build corn palaces, and the state fair is basically a celebration of farming, which is no surprise in a mill town. Hell, half of the University of Minnesota is called Moo U because of its focus on agricultural sciences.

MY GIRLFRIEND'S FAMILY BUSINESS IS A TREE FARM.
posted by maxsparber at 8:31 AM on December 12, 2016 [14 favorites]

(Turns off farm report on radio, tries to calm down.)
posted by maxsparber at 8:32 AM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

> My father told me that if he thought we could get into Canada permanently, he would sell everything up and take my mother, my brother, me and my partner to Canada ASAP.

We live in Canada. If things really go south in a world where Russia and the U.S. are allies, I would look farther afield for safety.
posted by The Card Cheat at 8:32 AM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

Yeah but see, we aren't exposed to white factory workers and farmers so city folk are totally sheltered from the real merica and do not understand REAL NEEDS.

In a personal set of ironies, I started a government-funded job that is designed to help small-to-medium sized manufacturers right before the election.

I am also pretty much the definition of an urban elitist, according to the people who hate them.
posted by dinty_moore at 8:37 AM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

I think to dismiss the current leaders' failure to lead being due to their lack of principle is to not grant them basic human dignity in taking them at their word. I don't actually believe republicans believe in nothing and they say they have beliefs. It is fair to ask them to stand up for their beliefs even while acting as if they cannot be trusted to do so.
posted by R343L at 8:39 AM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

If I didn't have 3 small kids, I would absolutely be actively working on expatriation plans right now. Like, for real.

I have one small kid and I really want to move to Spain or Mexico. And I work remotely so I'd have a job.
posted by kirkaracha at 8:41 AM on December 12, 2016

we aren't exposed to white factory workers

I live in Pittsburgh so lolololol
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:44 AM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

So, Gawker's @realrealdonaldt Twitter bot has apparently been shut down. Is there any other way of using a web browser to see whether Trump's tweets are coming from iOS or Android?
posted by contraption at 8:50 AM on December 12, 2016

@realrealdonaldtrump

Edit. Oops. Also suspended. Echofon Twitter client gives device.
posted by chris24 at 8:51 AM on December 12, 2016

> My father told me that if he thought we could get into Canada permanently, he would sell everything up and take my mother, my brother, me and my partner to Canada ASAP.

We live in Canada. If things really go south in a world where Russia and the U.S. are allies, I would look farther afield for safety.

Not to spoil your hopes, but I cannot think of a safe place to go during the Trump regime. Russia will be a bit better than it is today if they lift the sanctions, which they will. But that is all relative. Even a wealthier Russia isn't on my list of places to stay.
Australia is really far away from the US, but not so much from SE Asia, and also will be severely affected by global warming. Same with South Africa.

Europe is completely off because of impending wars and racial/religious unrest. As is the Middle East, Central Asia and East Asia. I thought Trump had economic interests in India that would protect South Asia, but given he's already flirting with giving Kashmir to Pakistan, that doesn't seem safe.

North, East, West and Central Africa are already unstable all by them selves, with China moving in at a stronger force than now, they might be ideal sites for proxy wars.

All of the Arctic is at risk, both because of global warming and because of the inevitable division of power between Russia and the US up there. (No more friendly arguments over Hans Island, dear Canadians..)

That leaves the Antarctic. Which may be a possibility for a few of us. But I'm certain McMurdo will be defunded because it's research, guys. And against God's law.
posted by mumimor at 8:52 AM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

That's the one I'm talking about, it appears to be suspended.
posted by contraption at 8:52 AM on December 12, 2016

> Electors demand intelligence briefing on Russia-Trump ties before Electoral College vote.
posted by stonepharisee at 8:54 AM on December 12, 2016 [33 favorites]

Well, that's a bit misleading. The first paragraph says it's only 10 electors, one of whom is Pelosi's daughter.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:57 AM on December 12, 2016

True, but it still is going to generate news - you don't usually hear a peep from the electors on anything.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:01 AM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

Well, that's a bit misleading. The first paragraph says it's only 10 electors, one of whom is Pelosi's daughter.

Yeah, it's nine democrats and a never Trump guy trying to make the other electors see the light by getting them in a briefing where they might better see what kind of guy they're giving their votes too in Trump. Not a great odds maneuver, but what the hell.
posted by gusottertrout at 9:04 AM on December 12, 2016 [16 favorites]

I think the idea with going to Canada is that one is less likely to end up in a prison camp, facing legal discrimination as a GLBTQ person, etc. Not that one would be free from US wars or global warming. Also, Canadian healthcare being normal and available.

I've pretty much accepted the whole global warming/war thing; it's the "it will be legal to fire me for religious reasons" law that's impending, plus what is obviously the construction of a governmental blacklist in the sciences, plus the whole rest of it. And I think that's what my dad is thinking - not that things aren't going to be very bad in general everywhere, but that it would at least be possible to escape the suppression of dissent and state-led attacks on minorities that are probably coming down the pike. If everything is going to be terrible, I would at least like to have only the regular helping of terrible things, not the special queer-person helping.

It makes me feel a bit bad - all my life I've done various activist things. Nothing dramatic or unusual, but I'm sure my name is on a few lists because of friends and associates who are bigger fish. And I feel like that's worrying my parents now, which makes me regret it a little bit.
posted by Frowner at 9:05 AM on December 12, 2016 [19 favorites]

New Yorker: What Taiwan's Leader Sees in Donald Trump

On the surface, Tsai would seem an unlikely ally for Trump. A former World Trade Organization negotiator, she generally supports free trade and was a prominent backer of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. She favors robust American engagement along the Pacific Rim, a strong welfare state, and strict environmental protection. She is also temperamentally Trump’s opposite: a methodical, soft-spoken technocrat who is childless and unmarried, enjoys reading classical Chinese literature, and sometimes seems to shrink under a spotlight. But a land as small and vulnerable as Taiwan cannot afford to be picky about its allies—some of the smallest and most despotic regimes in the world (Swaziland’s, for instance) have received generous aid from Taiwan in exchange for diplomatic recognition and an occasional mention in speeches at the United Nations. By making a phone call to Trump, Tsai saw an opportunity to boost her domestic approval ratings while establishing a rapport with the next American President and, crucially, his hawkish and China-skeptic advisers. For her, geopolitics and Taiwan’s survival come first.

...

But during her campaign Tsai also spoke to economic and cultural themes that in some way echo Trump’s, minus the rhetoric of raw bigotry. Both politicians distrust China’s economic policies and strategic intentions. On the stump last year, Tsai argued that Taiwan had become too economically exposed to mainland China, enriching a politically connected élite at the expense of working people. (In tandem with its ever-present military threat, Beijing encourages broad economic ties with Taiwan as a way to peacefully lure the island back into the fold; the mainland is now Taiwan’s biggest trading partner.)

Unfettered trade with China, Tsai argued, had hollowed out Taiwan’s domestic industries. Manufacturing jobs had disappeared and had not been replaced with adequate employment. A sclerotic and aloof government in Taipei, she charged, was protecting corporate cronies who were too close to China, while ignoring the pocketbooks and dignity of normal Taiwanese.
posted by Apocryphon at 9:07 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

PA recount not happening. Judge ruled against Stein's request.
posted by gusottertrout at 9:10 AM on December 12, 2016

After @AllenWest celebrated the impending EXTERMINATION of Muslims on Saturday, he is back in meetings at Trump Tower Today (Disclaimer, Shaun King, but he has receipts)
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:13 AM on December 12, 2016

Trump to split time between Trump Tower and Kremlin.
posted by Wordshore at 9:13 AM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

If I didn't have 3 small kids, I would absolutely be actively working on expatriation plans right now. Like, for real.

I have two, and I have begin working on expatriation because economic conditions may make it my best option for supporting my family.

Owing to my ancestry, I have residency rights in a non-euro Schengen zone country, and could in theory work for a German company, collect a salary in euros, and spend it in crowns, saving a lot of money by renting a room in a Soviet era block so I can send the rest home to the US.

This isn't just a rhetorical stance. I'm trying to get the math right for this. The hard part will be that I'd be required to pass a test in a Slavic language. Duolingo, fail me not..
posted by ocschwar at 9:13 AM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

The director of a state and federal-funded nonprofit in West Virginia will return to work after she was temporarily removed from her job for calling first lady Michelle Obama an “ape in heels,” the Charleston Gazette-Mail reported.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:21 AM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

This fucking Russia shit is freaking me out more than anything else.

Like almost everyone in the whole govt, current and upcoming, heard "Kneel Before Zod" and were like "you had me at "kneel!"
posted by Cookiebastard at 9:22 AM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

Canada has universal health care and less expensive higher education (I know that Canadians are rightly pissed at how expensive it is, but it still does not hold a candle to US college tuition). If the US really does decide long-term to be a country where health care and education are available only to a select few (and fewer and fewer with every passing year), then I think anyone who can move to a place with fewer barriers to those vital human services should save themselves and vote with their feet.

And that goes double for members of marginalized communities. If I was a person of color, a Muslim, or a visible member of the LGBTQ+ community, I would have cashed in my Canadian citizenship, like, yesterday. I have the luxury of waiting around to see what happens only because I am white and in a straight-appearing marriage. But I'm still getting my papers in order.
posted by soren_lorensen at 9:24 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

This fucking Russia shit is freaking me out more than anything else.

It should, because even if the electors rescue us next week, we're still stuck with an emerging Russian funded alt-right.
posted by ocschwar at 9:27 AM on December 12, 2016 [20 favorites]

If Fiorina is Director of National Intelligence, she can run it like she ran HP and wreck US intelligence forever.

We could also talk about that time when she delayed the vote on the HP-Compaq merger to to bribe/coerce Deutsche Bank into supporting the deal with the promise of future business, resulting in SEC and criminal investigations and a fine for the bank. Deutsche Bank seemingly being the only bank that's willing to work with Trump.
posted by zachlipton at 9:30 AM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

It should, because even if the electors rescue us next week, we're still stuck with an emerging Russian funded alt-right.

You left out "world wide".
posted by gusottertrout at 9:30 AM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

Democrats Have No One to Guide Them on Which Knife to Bring to the Gunfight

Donald Trump is about to become president, and Politico reports that Democrats have no response plan:
[...] In the words of one Democrat who remains a frequent television commentator, but who has noticed the ranks of prominent party surrogates shrinking as the number of talking points and centralized messaging memos wane, “People are afraid to go out there."

I don't want to fall into the trap of assuming that Trump is self-destructing -- a lot of us believed that much of the way through the campaign -- but he's never been across-the-board popular, and he's not becoming more so, the way most newly elected presidents do. This gives Democrats a little time. But not much, because even unpopular presidents can get things done. Democrats need a leader who understands that they weren't in great shape even before the leadership vacuum existed. However, any leader at all would help.

posted by tonycpsu at 9:33 AM on December 12, 2016 [18 favorites]

McConnell calling for bipartisan Congressional investigation of Russia hacking claims.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:33 AM on December 12, 2016 [10 favorites]

The trouble with Canada is that I'm old and don't have a professional job. If I were under forty with a professional degree I'd look very seriously at getting out. As it is, I think there's still the option of going back to China to teach - that would keep a roof over my head, I have a standard accent and I'm willing to work in an inland city. Even with deteriorating relations with China, I have a suitable resume and a work history there, and I'd work for cheap in one of the industrial cities.

That's a real question - should we actually try to leave? I've pretty much assumed that I'd have to ride it out here, but I think we actually could sell up, end up with a little money and work teaching English or writing in English elsewhere.
posted by Frowner at 9:34 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Oh boy, now there's shit floating around that Hossein Dehghan, the Iranian Minister of Defense, is threatening war if Trump fucks with Iran.
posted by Talez at 9:35 AM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

McConnell calling for bipartisan Congressional investigation of Russia hacking claims.

Hey, folks, if I ever get murdered, please do whatever you can to have a Congressional committee try to solve it, because those guys are all really fucking awesome at investigating stuff.
posted by Etrigan at 9:36 AM on December 12, 2016 [20 favorites]

Oh god it was even worse than I imagined. "Fiorina had this to say about her meeting with Trump":

"First I want to say, he has really cool stuff in his office. All of these athletes have given him all this incredible memorabilia. I was particular [sic] taken by Shaq O'Neal shoe, which is huge. I guess it takes a chanpion to know a champion."

They apparently went on to discuss China as our most important adversary and hacking ("whether it's Chinese hacking or reported Russian hacking") and she praised his word and said it was an honor for her to be there.

Two months ago, Fiorina called for Trump to drop out of the race and now she's praising the stuff in his office:

Donald Trump does not represent me or my party,” she said in a Facebook post on Saturday. “I understand the responsibility of Republicans to support their nominee. Our nominee has weighty responsibilities as well. Donald Trump has manifestly failed in these responsibilities.”

posted by zachlipton at 9:36 AM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Donald Trump is employing an interesting spread of tactics to keep CEO's and political rivals inline.
posted by ZeusHumms at 9:42 AM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

So, uh, get ready for more false flag watch: Carter Page went to Russia and now we have this report: U.S. government might have deliberately orchestrated cyberattacks to make it look as though they were coming from Russia, Carter Page says.

Page was skedaddled out of the Trump campaign after reports (broken by Yahoo News!) that he was meeting with top Putin aides inducing "Igor Diveykin. A former Russian security official, Diveykin now serves as deputy chief for internal policy and is believed by U.S. officials to have responsibility for intelligence collected by Russian agencies about the U.S. election, the Western intelligence source said."

Page isn't officially working for the transition anymore, but that's not stopping Sputnik from reporting that he's an advisor to Trump.
posted by zachlipton at 9:45 AM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

So, uh, get ready for more false flag watch: Carter Page went to Russia and now we have this report: U.S. government might have deliberately orchestrated cyberattacks to make it look as though they were coming from Russia, Carter Page says.

So . . . they're saying that the CIA (or whoever) influenced the election so that Trump won? Shouldn't that also be investigated thoroughly?
posted by dinty_moore at 9:47 AM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

I love all the false flag stuff. So Obama committed an impeachable offense by interfering in the election with hacks damaging to Clinton - the person he wanted to win - to preemptively frame Russia for Clinton's loss, a loss that was given a 1-20% chance by most people. Instead of, you know, interfering in the election to help Clinton to actually win.
posted by chris24 at 9:50 AM on December 12, 2016 [40 favorites]

Erik Loomis, LGM: How to Do Something

Don’t listen to what these people are saying. They exist to hear themselves and not accomplish anything. Follow the path of useful people. Such as these Bernie supporters who have just taken over the Democratic Party in Brevard County, Florida.
Bernie Sanders supporters have taken over the leadership of the Brevard County Democratic Executive Committee, pledging to work to turn the county’s political landscape from red to blue.

The new party chair is Stacey Patel of Satellite Beach, who trounced two opponents in committee elections this week. Patel was an elected Sanders delegate to the 2016 Democratic National Convention. [...]

Now, you may look at the last number and say that Democrats have no chance to win here. And you might be right. But to provide the most obvious rebuttal, Florida is a very purple state and driving greater turnout from Brevard County through an agenda that motivates people to be Democrats is something that could actually flip a statewide or presidential election. This is a big county and needs an active Democratic Party committee. Moreover, local races are not that hard to win. [...]

But the larger point is one I have made many, many times. If you think the Democratic Party sucks, and especially at the local level it often does, go take it over yourself. Do what these people in Brevard County are doing. This is how you fight fascism and articulate an alternative agenda that does not cuddle with corporations.

posted by tonycpsu at 9:50 AM on December 12, 2016 [35 favorites]

Politico: Clinton campaign backs call for intelligence briefing before Electoral College vote
posted by Wordshore at 9:55 AM on December 12, 2016 [19 favorites]

Former AIG CEO Maurice (Hank) Greenberg went upstairs in Trump Tower earlier this morning. He is currently being tried for fraud.

--@abbydphillip
posted by zachlipton at 9:59 AM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

I've been trying to figure out since the election what one has to do and who one has to know to get involved in the county Democratic Committee here. The website still has shit from before the election. The Facebook and Twitter accounts are not much better. The events calendar is cryptic and largely empty. This is a huge Dem stronghold, I know shit is happening, but... where? When? With who? It's a complete mystery to an outsider. Which is probably the system working as intended, tbh.
posted by soren_lorensen at 10:00 AM on December 12, 2016 [6 favorites]

If you think the Democratic Party sucks, and especially at the local level it often does, go take it over yourself. Do what these people in Brevard County are doing.

Do you have any suggestions for people who live in a city/state that is already pretty much permanently blue? I want to do something, but working to elect progressive dems in my district in Brooklyn seems a bit fruitless? My state senator is awesome and councilman is also great. I think a lot of people are also clamoring to get involved at the local level here. I am down for the cause but want to be where there is need. At the moment I am trying to just give money to causes, but there must be more options.
posted by windbox at 10:04 AM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

Bernie Sanders supporters have taken over the leadership of the Brevard County Democratic Executive Committee, pledging to work to turn the county’s political landscape from red to blue.

Now those are the kinds of Sanders supporters I respect. Grassroots efforts to get shit done is admirable.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:04 AM on December 12, 2016 [18 favorites]

Soren_lorenson, try starting with your legislative district Democratic Party group? They might have a more useful web presence. (Or might not, but could be a way to start.)
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 10:05 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Soren - have you tried contacting our local state rep and asking them who you should talk to in order to get more involved? I assume they've got to know . . .
posted by dinty_moore at 10:05 AM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Politico: Clinton campaign backs call for intelligence briefing before Electoral College vote

The instant Twitter hot takes on this that I'm seeing seem to be some version of "Politicizing it by party will undermine desperate need for bipartisan oversight and indulge Hillary supporters' fantasies. Ugh. Stay out JP."
posted by zachlipton at 10:11 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

The instant Twitter hot takes on this that I'm seeing seem to be some version of "Politicizing it by party will undermine desperate need for bipartisan oversight and indulge Hillary supporters' fantasies. Ugh. Stay out JP."

Meanwhile if the Dems don't say anything everyone gets mad at them for normalizing.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 10:15 AM on December 12, 2016 [10 favorites]

"Politicizing it by party." What they really mean is "politicizing it by Clinton."
posted by tonycpsu at 10:16 AM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

That's why I'm pleased to see McConnell backing an investigation. We need GOP people calling this out.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:17 AM on December 12, 2016 [13 favorites]

I am simply gobsmacked that both the Pennsylvania and Allegheny County Democratic Committee webpages/web presences are both like LA LA LA HEY EVERYONE DON'T FORGET TO VOTE NOVEMBER 8!!! AND ALSO FILL OUT THIS FORM SO WE CAN SPAM YOU WITH REQUESTS FOR MONEY BUT THEN PROVIDE YOU NO OTHER USEFUL INFORMATION! Yo, it is December 12, we have elected an orange traitor, our party is in disarray, how about some fucking outreach???

I am going to start with what I think is my teensy hyperlocal precinct because the "official" address I dredged up from the bowels of the website is right around the corner from my house, so clearly someone near me knows something. I don't want to, like, ride in with Bernie Sanders and take shit over, I just want to attend some meetings, so what's going on, see what opportunities there are, and also ohai it looks like you're using Wordpress and not updating shit in a timely manner CAN I PROVIDE SOME ASSISTANCE?

I will say: Everyone keep a close, close eye on your local school boards. That's often where right wing whackadoodles start because no one pays attention. And then they get "governing experience" that makes them look like cromulent candidates for city councils and state Houses and become unstoppable. Our local Pantsuit Nation spinoff just had a great post warning people of some very shady characters coming for our city school board (tl;dr: we recently got our very first locally-targeted privatize/charterize all the things! PAC that will of course be attracting money from terrible billionaires from across the land in an attempt to take over the school board. I had no idea that had happened and am now very much sitting at attention, ready to get behind other candidates with money and volunteering, to stop these assholes.)
posted by soren_lorensen at 10:18 AM on December 12, 2016 [28 favorites]

That's why I'm pleased to see McConnell backing an investigation. We need GOP people calling this out.

I suspect McConnell's only doing it to make sure nothing comes from the activity, not to actually investigate given his previous statements and Trump support.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:19 AM on December 12, 2016 [18 favorites]

looks like i picked the wrong week to quit sniffin' glue
posted by entropicamericana at 10:31 AM on December 12, 2016 [6 favorites]

looks like i picked the wrong week to quit sniffin' glue

Still time for the rest of us to pick the right week to start, though!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 10:36 AM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

If you're sniffing glue already, the next two to eight years might be entirely unsuitable for stopping. Eight! Just writing that... sob.
posted by RedOrGreen at 10:39 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

I live in a very red county (Horry County, SC) and our local Democratic Party is small but active. They could do more but need the people to make it happen. My local Action Together (formerly Pantsuit Nation) group has met twice already (50 people!!), and yesterday we talked about what we could do from within the Democratic Party since that's the natural place for political action. I also was asked to do social media stuff for the Dems... mostly it's retirees running the local Party so they really need younger and tech-savvy people to help out. So if your local party doesn't seem to be doing much it's probably because they need people like you to do it. There was a great quote on here that I can't find at the moment but it was something like, become the entryist conspiracy you wish to see in the world. Find friends, go to a meeting, volunteer.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 10:40 AM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

The biggest problem with the next six weeks is that trying to defeat Donald there's a lot of Pandora's boxes that I'm not sure we want to open and if we did we wouldn't have any coherent plan to follow up with once they're open.

It's simpler than that. It's a loud, public, relentless, "NO." Don't waver and don't get confused. Trump is unacceptable, period.
posted by perspicio at 10:50 AM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

The biggest problem with the next six weeks is that trying to defeat Donald there's a lot of Pandora's boxes that I'm not sure we want to open and if we did we wouldn't have any coherent plan to follow up with once they're open.

Any Pandora's box that is nestled inside the currently open Pandora's box that is spewing insanity all over the world would necessarily be smaller and easier to deal with.
posted by Etrigan at 10:51 AM on December 12, 2016 [15 favorites]

I wouldn't trust McConnell further than I could spit, but it does suggest he thinks the Russia stuff has enough legs that he needs to respond to it at least a little. So keep pushing!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 10:52 AM on December 12, 2016 [10 favorites]

Any Pandora's box that is nestled inside the currently open Pandora's box that is spewing insanity all over the world would necessarily be smaller and easier to deal with.

My fear is that in trying to deny Trump the EC it would open the door to some really nasty partisan interference in subsequent elections and there's no realistic path to abolishing the EC either de facto or de jure to short circuit this consequence.
posted by Talez at 10:55 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

maybe that means McConnell is taking this seriously

He felt it necessary to vocally distance himself from the idea that he's okay with Russian influence. Yet, he has colluded, whether he did so willingly our not.

He is beginning to feel the heat and is acting to erect a firewall. Goddamn right he's taking it seriously.

But he's not acting in good faith, and we should not be deceived on that point for a single second.
posted by perspicio at 10:56 AM on December 12, 2016 [15 favorites]

My fear is that in trying to deny Trump the EC it would open the door to some really nasty partisan interference in subsequent elections

Like the FBI director releasing a bullshit memo right before the election, or the Congressional leadership sitting on actual intel at the same time?
posted by Etrigan at 10:58 AM on December 12, 2016 [47 favorites]

U.S. government might have deliberately orchestrated cyberattacks to make it look as though they were coming from Russia, Carter Page says.

Either Page is a foreign asset or is very good at behaving like one.
posted by holgate at 10:59 AM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

Israeli press reporting Trump's team already checking where and how to move embassy to Jerusalem.
posted by melissasaurus at 11:00 AM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Find friends, go to a meeting, volunteer.

Do the Democrats ever do targeted voter registration pushes? It seems like they tend to set up tables at events and try to get passersby to register, but if voter registration info is public data, and we're able to source data about who lives where, we could identify unregistered potential voters more surgically.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 11:01 AM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

Israeli press reporting Trump's team already checking where and how to move embassy to Jerusalem.

If there's an attack on the embassy in Jerusalem and, god forbid, American lives are lost, we can surely expect Republicans to push as hard on Donald as they did on HRC with Benghazi, right?
posted by Talez at 11:04 AM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

President elect Donald Trump in a Norwegian newspaper -- Editorial cartoon
posted by futz at 11:06 AM on December 12, 2016 [16 favorites]

Do the Democrats ever do targeted voter registration pushes?

Definitely. I worked on door-to-door voter registration during the '08 Obama campaign.
posted by octothorpe at 11:08 AM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

A good tweetstorm by a gay Christian author on repentance and how gays are condemned as sinners because they don't truly repent since they continue to sin by being gay. Yet Trump never repents and is embraced. Starts here:

@VinesMatthew
Of all the contradictions on display this year, little bothers me more than the sudden irrelevance of repentance for many Christians.
posted by chris24 at 11:13 AM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

Israeli press reporting Trump's team already checking where and how to move embassy to Jerusalem.

Hard to believe the Embassy Act was passed 21 years ago.

So much for our part in the peace process.
posted by zarq at 11:24 AM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

There are no good tweetstorms.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:25 AM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

There are no good tweetstorms.

Well, if golf is a good walk spoiled, maybe a tweetstorm is a good essay ruined by format.
posted by chris24 at 11:30 AM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

perspicio: "But he's not acting in good faith, and we should not be deceived on that point for a single second."

I get that. I'm not saying I trust him to do what is in the nation's interest. But I think it's of value to have the leader of the Senate saying publicly, "Hey, there is something fishy here." This allows increase of pressure on Ryan, etc.
posted by Chrysostom at 11:36 AM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

(Sheepishly sneaks back in to the election thread after a month.)

Hi. I posted a little update on what I've been up to over here.

tl;dr: I'm blindingly sad, but also angry enough to tell off my entire family of birth and start an activist gathering in Los Angeles.
posted by Sophie1 at 11:36 AM on December 12, 2016 [36 favorites]

‏@realDonaldTrump, 6 Oct 2014: "Obama has missed 58% of his intelligence briefings. But our president does make 100% of his fundraisers."

Trump doesn't attend 85% of his intelligence briefings. Was he criticizing Obama for not missing enough?

And Trump was wrong about Obama missing briefings.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:38 AM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

But I think it's of value to have the leader of the Senate saying publicly, "Hey, there is something fishy here."

I think it's more like "Hey, there might be something fishy here, so let's take a good look at-- nope. Nothing to see here. There. We've investigated it."
posted by Etrigan at 11:39 AM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

If there's an attack on the embassy in Jerusalem and, god forbid, American lives are lost, we can surely expect Republicans to push as hard on Donald as they did on HRC with Benghazi, right?

The GOP certainly wouldn't blame him. They'd blame the Palestinians. Republicans wouldn't need to push against Donald. He'd probably be in favor of airstrikes.

There have been between 50 and 60 (I think) American citizens killed by Palestinian terrorism in the last few decades. The US has for the most part ignored the deaths because a military reaction from us would be a sign that we have chosen a side, jeopardizing the peace process. But a Palestinian attack on an American embassy in Jerusalem would likely be too much of a provocation for us to ignore. It could easily result in a rather short armed conflict with the United States and turn the entire region into a shitstorm of epic proportions. I doubt they'd risk it.
posted by zarq at 11:40 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

I doubt they'd risk it.

Hahahahaahaaaaa sob.
posted by lydhre at 11:42 AM on December 12, 2016 [6 favorites]

hugs and much love to you, Sophie1.
posted by zarq at 11:42 AM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

Brian Beutler: Paul Ryan thinks you’re stupid.

Our tax code really is complicated, but the complexities have nothing to do with the graduated nature of the federal income tax. Thanks to the magic of computers, we could even use a continuous function to determine income tax liability and it wouldn’t really increase the complexity of the tax code, despite creating limitless brackets.

Real tax complexities arise in determining taxable income, and even that’s not terribly hard for millions and millions of individuals and households with predictable sources of income, and few write offs. Citing multiple brackets as evidence that the tax code is too complicated is window dressing for ideologues who support huge, regressive tax cuts, but don’t want to own up to it because huge, regressive tax cuts are very unpopular. They think misleading the public is an easier way to sell tax cuts for the rich, and that the public is easily misled.

posted by zombieflanders at 11:43 AM on December 12, 2016 [26 favorites]

Paul Ryan thinks you’re stupid.

Ryan's campaign for a major tax changes has centered around "there are too many tax brackets," as if the number of brackets is remotely related to why the tax code is complicated. You don't even need to do the math yourself--the tax tables go up to $100,000, and if you're making $100K/year, you can use a damn calculator, TurboTax, or hire an accountant.
posted by zachlipton at 11:44 AM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

Donald Trump’s Campaign Paid $11 Million to Trump Businesses

Over 17 months of stumping for the presidency, the Donald Trump campaign spent an astonishing $11,355,406 patronizing businesses bearing his name, according to a review of filings with the Federal Election Commission conducted by The Daily Beast.

That total includes payments to The Trump Corporation, The Trump Security, Trump Cafe, Trump Grill, Trump Hotel, Doral Golf Resort, Eric Trump Wine Manufacturing LLC, The Mar a Lago Club LLC, Trump Plaza LLC, Trump International Golf Club, Trump National Golf Club, Trump Old Post Office LLC, Trump Park Avenue LLC, Trump International Hotel, Trump Restaurants, Trump SoHo, Trump Tower, TAG Air Inc., Trump Virginia Acquisitions LLC, Trump CPS LLC and Trump ICE LLC.

It includes rent to Trump properties, but not disbursements listed as “in-kind” rent. It also does not include $55,000 paid by the campaign to Barnes and Noble to purchase Trump’s own books at retail cost, which potentially artificially inflated his book sales.

posted by kirkaracha at 11:50 AM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

McConnell, if you recall, was specifically alleged to have be skeptical of the intelligence community's assessment that Russia was attempting to influence the election, when congressional leaders were briefed on the possibility back in September.

I read it as McConnell was skeptical after *last week's* briefing. I agree he's just dicking around now for show. What a bastard.
posted by petebest at 11:51 AM on December 12, 2016

As a tax attorney, nothing drives me crazier than people acting like the rate schedule makes the tax code complicated. It is literally the least complicated part of our tax system.

Getting voter ID: apparently easy-peasy
Reading a table: too hard
posted by melissasaurus at 11:51 AM on December 12, 2016 [47 favorites]

>I doubt they'd risk it.

Hahahahaahaaaaa sob.

It would only take a few people to launch a lone wolf (lone wolf pack?) attack on the US embassy which quite feasibly could result in the carpet-bombing of Gaza, Hebron and Ramallah (I would say nukes but even Donald Trump should be able to look at a map and see that it's probably not great to drop an atomic bomb on what is basically a suburb of Jerusalem. But hey, who fucking knows).
posted by tivalasvegas at 11:52 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Donald Trump Calls on Russia to Find Hillary Clinton’s Missing Emails, July 27, 2016

“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Mr. Trump said during a news conference here in an apparent reference to Mrs. Clinton’s deleted emails. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”

Mr. Trump’s call was another bizarre moment in the mystery of whether Vladimir V. Putin’s government has been seeking to influence the United States’ presidential race.

posted by kirkaracha at 11:55 AM on December 12, 2016

Oh boy, now there's shit floating around that Hossein Dehghan, the Iranian Minister of Defense, is threatening war if Trump fucks with Iran.

All I can find from Dehghan are statements to the effect that if Trump starts a war with Iran, it will lead to retaliation against Israel and likely to spread throughout the region, creating the conditions for a world war. e.g. this Times of Israel article.

That's not exactly threatening war, although it is provocative.
posted by snuffleupagus at 11:55 AM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Dear Trump: Even the Smartest People Alive Are Intimidated by the Presidency. Don't make excuses. Read the briefings.

Trump's Anachronistic 'Toughness' Is an Embarrassment. And our discourse, on both sides, is worse for it.
posted by homunculus at 11:57 AM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

The most astonishing bit today (it's still early) is Trump's "Why wasn't this brought up before election?" re hacking. The statement DHS and ODNI put out in October was basically unprecedented and can only be characterized as "bringing it up before the election." He could, of course, be lying, but the even more disturbing possibility is that he truly had no idea the statement ever happened.
posted by zachlipton at 12:00 PM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

How long is it going to take for Trump to ritually humiliate all the cravens who "betrayed" him

because the government has, y'know, stuff to do
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 12:01 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

Just ten days ago, however, Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman questioned whether it would be wise for Trump to prioritize moving America’s embassy upon taking office.

“It would be a mistake to take the embassy as a focal point,” Liberman told the Saban Forum, listing a host of other critical issues – the stability of the Palestinian Authority and threats from Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran among them – as far more pertinent.
Trump makes Avigdor Liberman sound like a voice of reason.

Well, that's disturbing on so many levels.
posted by zarq at 12:02 PM on December 12, 2016 [19 favorites]

Jeet Heer: The Danger of Politicizing Intelligence: Donald Trump will try to bend the CIA to his will. America is still recovering from the last time a president did that.

Donald Trump’s new party line: The hacking was done by everyone but the Russians.
posted by homunculus at 12:07 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

The most astonishing bit today (it's still early) is Trump's "Why wasn't this brought up before election?" re hacking. The statement DHS and ODNI put out in October was basically unprecedented and can only be characterized as "bringing it up before the election." He could, of course, be lying, but the even more disturbing possibility is that he truly had no idea the statement ever happened.

And of course Russia hacking came up in the third debate. "No, you're the puppet!" 72 million people saw it come up.
posted by chris24 at 12:16 PM on December 12, 2016 [15 favorites]

Any place where you never meet or talk to someone who is substantially different from you is a bubble. A large city is not that place.

Serious question, is there anything ordinary Americans can do, other than support redistricting, to counter the pervasive anti-urban bias baked into the American political process? American cities have the deck stacked against them at numerous levels of government (the Electoral College, the Senate, state government...). It's also a cultural problem, to the point where a lot of rural voters seem to believe that urban voices are actually over-represented and -subsidized by the state, despite all evidence to the exact contrary. I have this feeling that Democrats are going to be tempted to spend the next four-to-eight years apologizing for their urban centers, minimizing them, and otherwise throwing them under an aging, unmaintained city bus to try to appeal to rural voters. I'm more interested in mounting a strong defense of urban centers and values (just ask any of the minorities who gravitate towards cosmopolitan environments, for instance!) and in making sure their inhabitants get more proportional representation.
posted by en forme de poire at 12:19 PM on December 12, 2016 [24 favorites]

Far-right group National Action to be banned under terror laws

A British neo-Nazi movement is to become the first far-right group to be banned under terrorism laws in the UK.

Home Secretary Amber Rudd said National Action was "a racist, anti-Semitic and homophobic organisation".

An order laid in Parliament to proscribe the group - making it a criminal offence to join or support it - is due to come into effect on Friday.
posted by futz at 12:20 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

Brian Beutler: The Democrats Must Stop Ceding the Security State to Republicans. James Comey never should have been FBI director in the first place.
posted by homunculus at 12:25 PM on December 12, 2016 [42 favorites]

Obama won't declassify Senate 'torture report' now, but will preserve it

Sen. Feinstein, among others, have urged the President to declassify the report. He's refusing to do so, but will place a copy of the report in his official presidential records, meaning it could be reviewed for declassification in 2029. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
posted by zachlipton at 12:26 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

The simplest explanation for Trump's uniformly mendacious reactions to the hacking questions - 'nobody can know who did it', 'why did nobody bring this up before?', 'The CIA don't know anything because they're incompetent' and 'I don't bother with intelligence briefings, they don't tell me anything I need to know' is that the CIA knows perfectly well who did it and it's in his briefings, but he is refusing to... well, I would say accept it, but i suspect he refuses to perceive it in the first place - people in strong denial actually do not see things even when presented in unambiguous terms and undeniably true. (They do get very, very angry though.)

This would also tie in with the very strong pressure to release the intelligence more widely. Obama asking for a full report before Jan 20th is extremely unusual and significant; I think it's more than just 'oh well, if we leave it to Trump he'll just bury it and that'll be a shame'; I think it's one of the few levers Obama has to really put the pressure on. But with the aim of what, exactly? Obama must already know what'll be in the report, and he must feel it's going to be materially important.

It's clearly rattling Trump though, so he clearly knows on one level that it's potentially very damaging to him. Given how much other shitty stuff that he's actually revelling in, it could even be resign-or-be-impeached levels of culpability.

If it wasn't, why would he care?
posted by Devonian at 12:27 PM on December 12, 2016 [23 favorites]

"could even be resign-or-be-impeached levels of culpability"

oh please oh please oh please
posted by diogenes at 12:31 PM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

The CIA don't know anything because they're incompetent

The thing is, he's 100% correct about that. The CIA goes around the world manipulating and griefing people in the name of US security because they're absolutely hopeless at Truman's founding remit to provide intelligence and analysis.
posted by Coventry at 12:34 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Nate Silver: I count 15 GOP Senators calling for hacking investigation (1, 2)
posted by Chrysostom at 12:34 PM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

If it wasn't, why would he care?

Because he is a petty, insecure child and a sore winner.
posted by kirkaracha at 12:35 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

The thing is, he's 100% correct about that. The CIA goes around the world manipulating and griefing people in the name of US security because they're absolutely hopeless at Truman's founding remit to provide intelligence and analysis.

Says an average joe with zero insider information.
posted by futz at 12:36 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Well, Timothy Weiner is not an average Joe with zero insider information, and that's his view as laid out in his history Legacy of Ashes.
posted by Coventry at 12:38 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

The CIA don't know anything because they're incompetent

The thing is, he's 100% correct about that.

It's not just the CIA, it's 17 US government intelligence agencies. Plus the intelligence agencies of pretty much every major European ally.
posted by chris24 at 12:40 PM on December 12, 2016 [21 favorites]

Well, Timothy Weiner is not an average Joe with zero insider information, and that's his view as laid out in his history Legacy of Ashes.

a fine book which i am now reading thanks to you mentioning it earlier.
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 12:40 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

listen, the simplest formulation is this:

trump is always lying
because
the truth (about nearly anything) is damaging to donald trump
posted by murphy slaw at 12:42 PM on December 12, 2016 [64 favorites]

The trouble with intelligence agency reputation is that the failures are obvious, the successes remain secret for a long time. I'm fully aware of the CIA's many missteps and history of spectacular fiasco, because they make great reading and the other side is often delighted to let us all know, but I don't know much about what they get right. I have read a fair amount of CIA open-source training and indoctrination material and listened to a number of CIA officials talk about various subjects; these can be excellent, perceptive and surprisingly wise. I would expect an agency able to demonstrate those levels of genuine intelligence to be able to do quite a lot right quite a lot of the time.

And it's not as if in 2016, the West's capabilities with analysing hostile Internet-based actions are limited to running a copy of Norton Anti-Virus and firing off a few traceroutes. We know, thanks to Snowden, how deeply our agencies had infiltrated the net ten years ago: you can't hold that they are simultaneously too competent and too incompetent at the same time.

'The CIA is incompetent, I'm smarter than they are' is not a statement of fact.
posted by Devonian at 12:51 PM on December 12, 2016 [29 favorites]

Barack Obama, one of the smartest people to ever become president, is smart enough to rely on experts who are smarter than him in their subject areas. Donald Trump, one of the stupidest, is too stupid to ask for help, or maybe even realize he needs it.
posted by kirkaracha at 1:04 PM on December 12, 2016 [49 favorites]

It's also a cultural problem, to the point where a lot of rural voters seem to believe that urban voices are actually over-represented and -subsidized by the state, despite all evidence to the exact contrary.

The cultural angle on this is really important, because urban voices are actually over-represented in media. And I say this as one of those urban voices who wants to work in media.
posted by Rainbo Vagrant at 1:06 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

Says an average joe with zero insider information.

Try Phillip Agee's CIA Diary.

Not everyone believes the evidence of Russian hacking is clear and I think it's unfair to dismiss those that do summarily. Craig Murray was in The Guardian again: "I know who leaked them,” Murray said. “I’ve met the person who leaked them, and they are certainly not Russian and it’s an insider. It’s a leak, not a hack; the two are different things." You can choose to believe him or Mr. Anon. from the CIA. Whether or not it finishes off Trump in the end is another matter.
posted by Coda Tronca at 1:12 PM on December 12, 2016

A few comments removed; I'm not interested in an extended yuh-huh/nuh-uh session in here. The general principle that if you're circling back to the same "well I think not x" argument at great length it's probably time to go ahead and trust that your position had been established and just move on is a good one, though.
posted by cortex (staff) at 1:13 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Obama to Throw One Last Basement Party Before Asshole Tenants Take Over Lease
posted by Cookiebastard at 1:15 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

You can choose to believe him or Mr. Anon. from the CIA.

It's this part that I don't get. Why the repeated assertions that these conclusions are coming from random anonymous sources?

This happened:

The Homeland Security Department and Office of the Director of National Intelligence released a joint statement that said, "The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of emails from U.S. persons and institutions, including from U.S. political organizations."
posted by diogenes at 1:16 PM on December 12, 2016 [37 favorites]

I dunno diogenes, I think a random former ambassador to Uzbekistan is clearly a more credible source than those folks.
posted by Justinian at 1:21 PM on December 12, 2016 [13 favorites]

Obama to Throw One Last Basement Party Before Asshole Tenants Take Over Lease

That Angela Merkel (from the centre-right Christian Democratic Union) is considered a “left-leaning head of state” shows how far the Overton window has shifted.
posted by acb at 1:21 PM on December 12, 2016 [15 favorites]

That Craig Murray blog post contains an awful lot of of bluster & very little in the way of hard fact or analysis.
posted by pharm at 1:22 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

By comparison with US politicians Merkel probably is left-leaning. Most of Europe is left-leaning by US standards, even the bits run by soi-disant right wing parties.
posted by pharm at 1:24 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

I don't know how Murray's assertion that this was an insider leak matches in the slightest way with the publicly available forensic evidence of multiple targets being successfully phished by the same source and their emails winding up being publicly posted thereafter. And since the phishing links emails released from different people and organizations, it makes no sense to say it was an insider, because nobody is simultaneously an insider inside the Clinton campaign, Podesta's gmail, Colin Powell's personal email, etc...

The public evidence from the phishing emails is not 100% slam dunk evidence of Russian involvement, though it certainly leads one in that direction, but I don't see how it, in any way, matches with an insider leak.
posted by zachlipton at 1:26 PM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

I get why cortex deleted some of my posts, and I don't have a problem with it, but I don't think this entire topic should be out of bounds. It's freshly relevant based on new events. I'll back off for a while, but I still want to see it discussed.
posted by diogenes at 1:32 PM on December 12, 2016

Far-right group National Action to be banned under terror laws

Proscription for some, cheesecake photos and Twitter verification for others!
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 1:33 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

I don't think the topic is out of bounds, but when the argument is just a repeated version of: "I don't trust anything that comes from US intelligence [for some fairly rational reasons based on past history], and this comes from US intelligence, so I don't trust any of it," I'm not really sure where we can go with that discussion after the 4th or 5th time.
posted by zachlipton at 1:34 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

So, looks like someone started dumping Lockheed stock right before Trump's tweet.
posted by Chrysostom at 1:35 PM on December 12, 2016 [17 favorites]

That, basically, with a soupçon of folks just also showing some longer-term restraint about having the same scrap again and again besides. The one-note thing gets tedious even by election-discussion standards after a while.
posted by cortex at 1:36 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

I guess that's the problem with taking a break from these threads. When you come in and see something factually incorrect just sitting there uncontested, it feels like disinformation, and there's an urge to correct it. You don't realize that it's sitting there uncontested because people are sick of contesting it.
posted by diogenes at 1:41 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Like Diogenes I would also like to see the topic discussed fully and politely. >
posted by Coda Tronca at 1:42 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

So, looks like someone started dumping Lockheed stock right before Trump's tweet.
posted by Chrysostom at 1:35 PM on December 12 [2 favorites +] [!]

This is getting crazier and crazier. I hope you are wrong, but we do have a short on cash "billionaire" with his fingers on the tweets.
posted by mumimor at 1:43 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

Joe Walsh says Trump blocked him on Twitter.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 1:45 PM on December 12, 2016 [14 favorites]

If Trump only knows what he reads on the internet, is he essentially causing himself brain damage when he blocks part of it?
posted by XMLicious at 1:47 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Joe Walsh is the "Are we the baddies?" GIF in human form.
posted by PenDevil at 1:48 PM on December 12, 2016 [18 favorites]

Occam's razor on the Podesta emails: given that there was nothing really, truly damning in them (yes, Donna Brazile confirming that at a debate in Flint someone was going to ask about the water quality in Flint, etc) what insider was like, "I'm gonna blow the lid wide open on this, to great personal risk to myself"? I mean, come the hell on. On the one hand, people get phished all the time (I have the phish@myinstitution.edu email address on autofill I use it so many times a week to send phishing emails to IT Services so they an send out alerts). On the other, someone thought John Podesta's risotto recipe was so scandalous they decided to risk their job to make sure Julian Assange got it in time for that swank dinner party at the Ecuadorian embassy on Friday? Someone explain how this theory makes any sense.
posted by soren_lorensen at 1:49 PM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

Some evidence that someone started dumping Lockheed Martin stock 6 minutes before Trump's tweet.

posted by bluecore at 1:50 PM on December 12, 2016 [6 favorites]

The frustrating thing about the intelligence agency talk is that we went through this yesterday and gave reasons for why this is important and likely to have some merit and the only thing coming back is "You can't trust the CIA", which as was said, is fine, don't, but what is it people who don't want to have happen? The call right now is for further investigation, is that somehow disagreeable and instead we should be content to just trust Wikileaks, Murray, and Trump and move on? What is the alternative here if not listening to the 17 national intelligence agencies? If Republican lawmakers are concerned about this it doesn't strike me as an entirely partisan affair, so what is it people suspect is happening, a really slow motion and ineffective CIA coup that everyone in Washington except Trump is blind to or in on?
posted by gusottertrout at 1:50 PM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

I think the alternative is to shut down all of our intelligence agencies and replace them with Julian Assange, International Man of Misogyny.
posted by Joey Michaels at 1:52 PM on December 12, 2016 [22 favorites]

There;s a basic journalistic principle when you're reporting on a subject that's already in the news - am I moving the story on? Am I adding new facts, a new analysis or a new voice that means readers will appreciate? I try to stick to that here, and it keeps me from being more of an arse than I can potentially be. (The precise amount of arsiness I demonstrate anyway is an exercise left to the reader.)

Not convinced by the Lockheed Martin stock insinuation, if only because what would it benefit Trump to liquidate stock and then bash the company? If you want to manipulate the market, you buy before you put out good news, and sell if you know bad news is coming, but you don't put the bad news out yourself unless you want to pick up the stock again at a lower price in the knowledge that the bad news will wear off. It could be that a Trump insider with LM holdings knew the tweet was coming and nipped in, but that wouldn't be Trump himself.
posted by Devonian at 1:52 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

Shorting is a thing Devonian.
posted by pharm at 1:55 PM on December 12, 2016 [13 favorites]

Not convinced by the Lockheed Martin stock insinuation, if only because what would it benefit Trump to liquidate stock and then bash the company? If you want to manipulate the market, you buy before you put out good news, and sell if you know bad news is coming, but you don't put the bad news out yourself unless you want to pick up the stock again at a lower price in the knowledge that the bad news will wear off.

This is exactly what they wanted.

It could be that a Trump insider with LM holdings knew the tweet was coming and nipped in, but that wouldn't be Trump himself.

It's someone either a family member or inner circle. Trump may not even be aware of it if it's just someone whispering outrageous things in his ear and Trump trying to show the public how shit/crooked/stupid things are.
posted by Talez at 1:56 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

Some evidence that someone started dumping Lockheed Martin stock 6 minutes before Trump's tweet.

Careful with that, it's based on a graph. A reply to that tweet has numbers which don't add up.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 1:59 PM on December 12, 2016

The Lockheed Martin stock isn't a slam dunk at this point. Among other things, there's some question about Twitter timestamps and whether they're even more inaccurate for users with large numbers of followers. It still, and this nicely applies to most topics we're discussing today, cries out for further investigation.
posted by zachlipton at 2:00 PM on December 12, 2016

Okay, I take it back: I am totally dismissing Murray. His claims are bad and he should feel bad for making them. If he's right, he needs to step up and share that evidence at least privately for other people to review and evaluate.

Assuming that Murray is telling the truth about his association with Assange, this is the inherent contradiction at the heart of Wikileaks. It's not internally transparent, so it's at best subject to manipulation and is potentially trying to manipulate things itself. Frankly, Assange has every reason to hate Hillary because of her association with the US government and particularly the State Department; why would we trust his organisation when it tells us to trust it about the non-Russian source of its information? Murray's blustering response just reinforces my view on that.
posted by Joe in Australia at 2:05 PM on December 12, 2016 [6 favorites]

There;s a basic journalistic principle when you're reporting on a subject that's already in the news - am I moving the story on? Am I adding new facts, a new analysis or a new voice that means readers will appreciate? I

I've been a journalist for a quarter century and this is the first I have heard of that very basic principal. I can't even imagine how that would work, since a huge amount of what we publish is rewrites of wire news stories we get, so we're literally just republishing news that is already out there.
posted by maxsparber at 2:06 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Besides, it would be a triviality for the Russians (or any other agency) to use a cut-out who pretended to be a lone warrior hacker when passing the data to Wikileaks. As far as the Russians are concerned, Wikileaks are just another bunch of useful idiots to be taken full advantage of.
posted by pharm at 2:08 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

Well, if Trump himself is dumping shorted stock just minutes before deliberately depressing the price in the most public way possible, I'm a monkey's uncle.

(tl;dr - I may well be a monkey's uncle.)

Maxsparber - it was a constant mantra in my newsroom. It may not apply in the brave new world of churnalism, and this may even explain why I no longer run a newsroom.
posted by Devonian at 2:11 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

NYT: C.I.A. Judgment on Russia Built on Swell of Evidence.

Unfortunately no word on the the former ambassador to Uzbekistan bloc which is so important to Coda Tronca.
posted by Justinian at 2:13 PM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

At this point, I'm like, you know what would be good? It would be good if John Roberts refused to swear Trump into office and we had to go down the line of succession of justices willing to swear him in.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 2:13 PM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

It would only take a few people to launch a lone wolf (lone wolf pack?) attack on the US embassy which quite feasibly could result in the carpet-bombing of Gaza, Hebron and Ramallah (I would say nukes but even Donald Trump should be able to look at a map and see that it's probably not great to drop an atomic bomb on what is basically a suburb of Jerusalem. But hey, who fucking knows).

Dude, don't worry. Ted Cruz, the sane one, was the carpet bomber.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 2:13 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Bloomberg: Tillerson a Frequent White House Visitor Over Russia Sanctions.

He visited the White House at least 20 times during the Obama administration, frequently holding meetings to ensure Exxon wouldn't be harmed as the US sanctioned Russia.
posted by zachlipton at 2:14 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Between the question of timing accuracy and of whether the graph is itself accurate, yeah; but it does highlight why it's a Bad Thing for the President-Elect to be (1) tweeting about specific companies/organizations/people, (2) the potential for fraud or abuse of his tweeting by parties with knowledge of Trump's plans and actions.

Right. This is why traditionally, presidents abided by the Caesar's wife principle.
posted by Chrysostom at 2:15 PM on December 12, 2016

At this point, I'm like, you know what would be good? It would be good if John Roberts refused to swear Trump into office and we had to go down the line of succession of justices willing to swear him in.

Thomas and Alito end up arm-wrestling for the honor...
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 2:15 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

House Benghazi committee files final report and shuts down
posted by PenDevil at 2:16 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Ryan throws a bunch of bafflegab out there.
posted by Chrysostom at 2:16 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

>> I would say nukes but even Donald Trump should be able to look at a map and see that it's probably not great to drop an atomic bomb on what is basically a suburb of Jerusalem. But hey, who fucking knows

> Dude, don't worry. Ted Cruz, the sane one, was the carpet bomber.

That moment when I pine for the competence and professionalism of the Bush era when we went to war against Iraq.
posted by RedOrGreen at 2:16 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

House Benghazi committee files final report and shuts down

And this time, when a Republican said "Mission Accomplished," they really meant it.
posted by zachlipton at 2:19 PM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

Okay, here's a pet peeve. Via Politico:

“One of the sources said Tillerson could be named as the nation’s chief diplomat in the coming days — ‘unless something massive explodes’ in the next 24 hours.”

Nope! You don't get to name cabinet secretaries, you can only place their name in nomination, pending Senate approval. Sure, that's normally routine, but a) you still have to get approval, and b) several Senators have said they're going to be pushing back on this one.

People need to stop saying a president is naming someone, when they are just nominating them! Argh!
posted by Chrysostom at 2:21 PM on December 12, 2016 [14 favorites]

Unfortunately no word on the the former ambassador to Uzbekistan bloc which is so important to Coda Tronca.

Murray has a new post up now in which he reflects on attitudes to whistleblowers such as Manning, Snowden and himself.
posted by Coda Tronca at 2:25 PM on December 12, 2016

Former CIA Acting Director Michael Morell: "This Is the Political Equivalent of 9/11"
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:26 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

House intelligence chairman: There's no need for further investigations into Russian hacking

Rep. Nunes says his committee has got this, already all over it, no point in doing anything more. "Nunes is a member of President-elect Donald Trump's transition team."

Totally doesn't look suspicious between this and the recounts that they're consistently opposed to measures that could clear away misgivings and solidify their legitimacy if they're telling the truth. It's a great look, like a stripey shirt and domino mask.
posted by jason_steakums at 2:26 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

Former CIA Acting Director Michael Morell: "This Is the Political Equivalent of 9/11"

Seen elsewhere: “11/8 WAS AN INSIDE JOB”
posted by acb at 2:29 PM on December 12, 2016 [15 favorites]

Well, this bit on the president's briefings should prove exciting:

The President also wants the briefer, and this is important with regard to the President-elect, it's up to the briefer to figure out how the President best absorbs information, how to best brief him, how to best present information in a way that he may find more effective. You have to figure that out. It’s not their job. You've got to adjust to them, and that’s something that the Intelligence Community has always struggled with during transitions. The briefer has to figure that out.

Evidently all future briefings should happen on Twitter. Finally transparency!
posted by gusottertrout at 2:34 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

Question: Does anybody actually think Trump will get below 300 electoral votes? The idea of an electoral college revolt is just a comforting thought experiment, yes?
posted by Justinian at 2:34 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

The Chinese are not happy at all.

If Trump gave up the One China policy, publicly supported Taiwan independence and wantonly sold weapons to Taiwan, China would have no grounds to partner with Washington on international affairs and contain forces hostile to the US. In response to Trump's provocations, Beijing could offer support, even military assistance to US foes.

The One China policy has maintained peace and prosperity in Taiwan, and, if abandoned, cross-Straits ties would see a real storm. China would introduce a series of new Taiwan polices, and may not prioritize peaceful reunification over a military takeover if Trump insisted on his provocations. The US has no control over the Straits, and Trump is naïve to think he can use the One China policy as a bargaining chip to win economic benefits from China.

The Global Times being the English language mouthpiece of the CCP, this is not very encouraging.
posted by Talez at 2:36 PM on December 12, 2016 [13 favorites]

So Murray’s new version of events is “the NSA did it”.
posted by pharm at 2:41 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Question: Does anybody actually think Trump will get below 300 electoral votes? The idea of an electoral college revolt is just a comforting thought experiment, yes?

Yeeeah, I wouldn't get my hopes up too high on it actually happening.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 2:41 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Yeah but I see people online who apparently think it might actually happen. I am afraid they are setting themselves up for another crushing disappointment.
posted by Justinian at 2:42 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

I've been trying to figure out since the election what one has to do and who one has to know to get involved in the county Democratic Committee here.

It's a bit different for me cause I'm in a small, Republican dominated county, but for me all it took was joining my local Pantsuit FB group and start participating in discussion. The head of my local Democratic Party friended me. But also local groups post information about when the party meetings are happening. I found not only the Pantsuit group but also a Democratic Party of ___County and Democratic Activists of ____ County FB groups. So look around.
posted by threeturtles at 2:42 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

The over/under on number of faithless electors is 1. It's not happening.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:43 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

It’s weird. Nothing the man says is actually *wrong*. It just reads like he’s throwing chaff into the wind, ferociously intent on distracting everyone from the idea that the Russians did it. It’s possible to believe that Clinton is just *the worst* and for the Russians to have hacked the DNC emails & to have taken a serious interest in influencing the US election. Neither position excludes the other.
posted by pharm at 2:44 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

If a candidate were arrested and charged with treason, would they still be in the running for electoral votes?
posted by acb at 2:44 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

The President also wants the briefer, and this is important with regard to the President-elect, it's up to the briefer to figure out how the President best absorbs information, how to best brief him, how to best present information in a way that he may find more effective....

The funny thing is, I basically agree with this when it's put that way. Only to a point - of course the President must also bend his preferences and habits to be most effective in the job - but within that it's fair for the President to ask for the briefings to be formatted, scheduled, presented, etc., in ways that are most convenient.

What is NOT OK is to run around on Twitter and the news shows and wherever else being all "whatever, intelligence briefings are stupid, they're repetitive, I'm already smart enough." Just have a talk about the issue with the responsible staff. I mean Jesus Christ if they can't even manage a petty personnel issue quietly and internally...

BTW this is why I'm permanently on team "Trump is a moron." The evidence suggests absolute incompetence from soup to nuts. Any suggestion that Trump is manipulating the narrative or whatever in some sort of 11 dimensional chess sense is a total fantasy. He's a greedy moron who doesn't know any better, full stop.
posted by Joey Buttafoucault at 2:45 PM on December 12, 2016 [25 favorites]

> Evidently all future briefings should happen on Twitter. Finally transparency!

You know what would actually work? If the CIA/NSA/et al used one of those secret gag orders and took over CNN's feed to the White House, commandeered their sets and anchors, and broadcast the daily intelligence briefing as a highly personal shouting match between two talking heads. The President Elect would be glued to that.
posted by RedOrGreen at 2:45 PM on December 12, 2016 [25 favorites]

For maybe four hours yesterday I had myself convinced that Obama had some secret plan to save us. It was sort of like being on meth, with the adrenaline rush follows by soul crushing despair when the high went away
posted by angrycat at 2:46 PM on December 12, 2016 [13 favorites]

Question: Does anybody actually think Trump will get below 300 electoral votes?

Not I.

The idea of an electoral college revolt is just a comforting thought experiment, yes?

Yes.

Electoral college voters tend to be die-hard party faithful. The idea that 37 of them will not only refuse to vote for Trump but also choose to vote for Clinton instead is a fantasy. Pigs will fly before that happens.

If Trump gets under 270, then the House will elect him President.
posted by zarq at 2:46 PM on December 12, 2016 [6 favorites]

It may not apply in the brave new world of churnalism, and this may even explain why I no longer run a newsroom

I am not a churnalist. I even have an award. Most news for all time has been wire reprints. They date back to the 1830s.
posted by maxsparber at 2:52 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Murray has a new post up now in which he reflects on attitudes to whistleblowers such as Manning, Snowden and himself.

It's customary and helpful to link to stuff you want to discuss. I'll do that here for everyone's convenience: Obama Loses His War on Whistleblowers

He's doing an incredibly obnoxious wink-wink, nudge-nudge way of claiming that "from within the security services" someone "turn[ed] whistleblower" and leaked the emails.

Among other things, that's not what he claimed earlier when he said "they are not hacks, they are insider leaks." If he's now claiming the emails came from an NSA (or whatever) employee, why was he recently claiming they came from an insider? Insider cannot simply mean "not-Russian" for the term to have any meaning. It implies someone inside the Clinton campaign or the DNC blowing the whistle, not an outside spy.

The emails were certainly hacked in the sense that somebody who was not authorized to have access used means, including tricking people into giving up their passwords, to gain access. Whoever that somebody was, I don't know how you characterize that behavior as whistleblowing. What exactly were they blowing the whistle on?
posted by zachlipton at 2:52 PM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

We’ve done it, world. We found a theory Alex Jones is not willing to get behind.

Alex Jones says there's "absolutely no evidence" for Russian involvement and calls it a "conspiracy theory."
posted by zachlipton at 2:54 PM on December 12, 2016 [35 favorites]

Roger Stone: Trump interviewed Romney to "torture" him

In an appearance on InfoWars Sunday, Stone said Trump had been toying with Romney.

"Donald Trump was interviewing Mitt Romney for Secretary of State in order to torture him," Stone said on InfoWars. "To toy with him. And given the history, that’s completely understandable. Mitt Romney crossed a line. He didn’t just oppose Trump, which is his democratic right, he called him a phony and a fraud. And a con man. And that’s not the kind of man you want as Secretary of State."

posted by futz at 2:55 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

> Alex Jones says there's "absolutely no evidence" for Russian involvement and calls it a "conspiracy theory."

GO TO SLEEP, SHEEPLE!
posted by tonycpsu at 2:56 PM on December 12, 2016 [25 favorites]

I am not a churnalist. I even have an award. Most news for all time has been wire reprints. They date back to the 1830s.

There is a difference, as you know, between reprinting a wire report and filing a news story under a byline. I am a publicist. I work with journalists. All of them have specific standards to meet when they file stories about ongoing news stories that are already evolving in the public sphere. Included in those standards are guidelines similar to those Devonian mentioned. Part of my job when pitching story ideas is to make sure they meet certain contextual criteria. If there's nothing new to a given story, then there's no reason why it should be presented to readers.
posted by zarq at 2:58 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

In other news, no less than the LA Times published two letters from readers yesterday that argued that the US government was right to incarcerate Japanese Americans during World War II, in response to an article about concentration camp sites being preserved by the NPS. Here is the subsequent article in which they admit how badly they fucked up.

I am... upset. (Understatement.) This sort of justification of the camps tends to pop up once in a while in good times and fuckers certainly hammered on it after 9/11 but I've never seen so many people so determined to rewrite history in so short a time. Perhaps I should take heart in the fact that our legacy is so threatening to them, that it stands so obviously in the way of what they want to do to civil rights in this country, that they have to resort to this nasty, nasty business of slandering grandmas and grandpas, but boy does it make my blood boil.
posted by sunset in snow country at 2:58 PM on December 12, 2016 [37 favorites]

"Donald Trump was interviewing Mitt Romney for Secretary of State in order to torture him," Stone said on InfoWars. "To toy with him. And given the history, that’s completely understandable. Mitt Romney crossed a line. He didn’t just oppose Trump, which is his democratic right, he called him a phony and a fraud. And a con man. And that’s not the kind of man you want as Secretary of State."

Interior Trump Monologue: "Haha To Prove I'm not a con-man and a phony, I totally conned you with my phony 'I'm thinking of you for Secretary of State' thing. Trump wins again!"
posted by Joey Michaels at 3:01 PM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

The Bully in Chief.
posted by zarq at 3:03 PM on December 12, 2016

Well, they don't call it the bully pulpit for nothing.
posted by acb at 3:05 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

i want to get off this ride now please
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape

OK I don't do this very often but, well, eponysterical.
posted by Bringer Tom at 3:06 PM on December 12, 2016 [19 favorites]

The latest from Harry Reid:

“Someone in the Trump campaign organization was in on the deal. I have no doubt. Now, whether they told [Trump] or not, I don’t know. I assume they did. But there is no question about that,” Reid told the Huffington Post in an interview. “So there is collusion there, clearly.”
posted by diogenes at 3:07 PM on December 12, 2016 [19 favorites]

There is a difference, as you know, between reprinting a wire report and filing a news story under a byline.

Different to the point that there is a deep-set requirement for novelty that I have never heard expressed in the newsroom nor seen demonstrated in the world of professional news? No.
posted by maxsparber at 3:08 PM on December 12, 2016

If a candidate were arrested and charged with treason, would they still be in the running for electoral votes?

Of course. Otherwise any random overzealous sheriff + overzealous prosecutor could prevent any presidential election winner from becoming president.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 3:09 PM on December 12, 2016

Here is the subsequent article in which they admit how badly they fucked up.

This kind of thing is awful anywhere, but even worse in California, where it's a deeply personal matter for a lot of people. Like growing up, I'd go to a friend's house and his grandmother would be around and, yep, she was interned during WWII. And you can drive down the freeway just south of San Francisco and be, yep, the place where this shopping mall stands is where they converted horse stables to hold completely innocent Japanese-Americans until they were shipped father away. The legacy of this crime is all around us here in this state, and a local newspaper ought to do an even better job of recognizing that instead of praising it.
posted by zachlipton at 3:11 PM on December 12, 2016 [23 favorites]

Alex Jones says...conspiracy theory.

son of a bitch
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 3:12 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

@realrealdonaldtrump is back online. Looks like the issue was the fake "verified" image they used; it's now an egg.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 3:13 PM on December 12, 2016

If the CIA/NSA/et al used one of those secret gag orders and took over CNN's feed to the White House, commandeered their sets and anchors, and broadcast the daily intelligence briefing as a highly personal shouting match between two talking heads.

Dog the Wag
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 3:14 PM on December 12, 2016

An Open Letter to Fellow Minority Journalists

Over the next year or two, media — especially prestige print media — will begin thinning out its ranks. The economic forecast, despite temporary spikes in post-election subscriptions, is not good and headcount spots will have to be cleared to make room for all the incoming pro-Trump takes. “Identity politics writers” (read: anyone who isn’t white and who doesn’t spend 99% of their time reporting) will almost certainly be the first to go.

There's a lot in there and it's good stuff.
posted by zachlipton at 3:16 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

I don't think anybody has posted Krugman's op-ed yet.

"So this was a tainted election. It was not, as far as we can tell, stolen in the sense that votes were counted wrong, and the result won’t be overturned. But the result was nonetheless illegitimate in important ways; the victor was rejected by the public, and won the Electoral College only thanks to foreign intervention and grotesquely inappropriate, partisan behavior on the part of domestic law enforcement."
posted by diogenes at 3:16 PM on December 12, 2016 [21 favorites]

sunset in snow country linked to it above, and the content below is distressing hate speech, but I know Mefites will frequently scroll past links while reading a discussion here, and I want casual scrollers to know exactly why this is all the fuck over my heavily-Asian Facebook feed:

I see that writer Carolina A. Miranda has attached herself to the “I feel-good” contingent that feels sorry for the Japanese here in World War I.

and

Japanese have an extremely strong attachment to family, and even more so back then.

and

The interned Japanese were housed, fed, protected and cared for. Many who now complain would not even be alive if the internment had not been done.

and

As the U.S. was putting families into the internment housing and feeding them, the Japanese were slaughtering Filipinos by the tens of thousands and U.S. soldiers after hideous torture.

That's the kind of speech appearing in the LA Times. Welcome to Trump's America, folks.

Go see Allegiance in theaters tomorrow night.
posted by joyceanmachine at 3:17 PM on December 12, 2016 [31 favorites]

He's a greedy moron who doesn't know any better, full stop.

that's the only conclusion that makes any sense.
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 3:18 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

What exactly were they blowing the whistle on?

Right?! What in those emails was actually whistleblow-worthy? Who looked at them as was like, the world must know?
posted by soren_lorensen at 3:18 PM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

Hey, y'all remember that December 15 press conference where Trump was going to explain what's happening with his business and how he'll manage conflicts of interest and all that stuff? I guess December 15th was just a random date he pulled out his ass because it looked far away and he thought he'd have a plan by then, but now that it's close, nevermind: Trump Said to Postpone Announcement on Future of His Businesses

He'll discuss all that boring conflict of interest stuff sometime after the inauguration.
posted by zachlipton at 3:18 PM on December 12, 2016 [18 favorites]

maxsparber: Different to the point that there is a deep-set requirement for novelty that I have never heard expressed in the newsroom nor seen demonstrated in the world of professional news? No.

It's not a "deep-set requirement for novelty." It's a fundamental guideline that says all news stories are written to answer two questions for readers: What is Happening? and Why Does it Matter? To answer those questions, context should be supplied to readers so that they know why what is being reported is important.

If a story is not breaking news but a development on something that has already been reported on, then what is being updated should be explained.

Read the 'Nut Graphs' section in Reuters' Reporting and Writing Basics Handbook. NUT GRAPHS

"Nut graphs" answer the question, so what? What is the significance of this event, speech, development? Why should the reader bother to read on? If we can't answer that question, maybe we don't need the story at all.

To write the nut graph, answer the following questions: Assume the reader is new to the story, what is the context? Is this the first time? Is this a trend change? Is this a change in rank for the players as a result of the election, revolution, merger, takeover, earnings report, bankruptcy? What is at risk politically, economically, financially?
This is journalism 101. It certainly isn't a new concept, and I'm frankly baffled that you are arguing otherwise.
posted by zarq at 3:20 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

The thing about Trump's debts is YUUUuuuge. We know Trump has always been insecure about his net worth, insisting he is a billionaire and loving to add up his assets without subtracting his obligations. The thing is, if he really owes over a billion dollars to various creditors, it's very likely that Trump not only isn't a billionaire or even a millionaire, but that he's actually broke and the whole charade is being propped up by an illusion that continues to persuade people to loan him money he will never, ever be able to repay.

In other words, he's Bernie Madoff 1.1. I would guess that this started with the collapse of his casino empire; at that point his worth was pretty well known and there was no way he could cover the debt he incurred building the Taj, which also took business away from his previously viable pre-existing properties. Since then his finances have been an elaborate shell game, perhaps due to his fondness for deals but perhaps more because of his need to obscure his obligations. He probably thought that as President he could leverage his power to clear some of that debt without paying it off himself.

If this is true Trump is basically just the same as the poor person living on credit cards but racking up an ominously growing and eventually unpayable monthly minimum, except his bill has a few extra zeroes. This would explain the pettiness of ripping off small contractors like his daughter's wedding caterer; that thirty grand he outright stole would be meaningless to a true billionaire, but for Trump it might mean the difference between making the next service payment and having to do some unpleasant groveling.
posted by Bringer Tom at 3:20 PM on December 12, 2016 [46 favorites]

Zarq, I'm not going to argue this with you. It's now entirely beside the point, and what you quoted is not what I was responding to. It's not even a paraphrase.

For fuck's sake.
posted by maxsparber at 3:23 PM on December 12, 2016

What if a domestic intelligence agency has acquired evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia? That doesn't seem impossible. What then?

I can't remember the timeline, but last time Harry Reid hinted at something that intelligence was holding, didn't the announcement about Russian hacking follow shortly after?
posted by diogenes at 3:23 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

He'll discuss all that boring conflict of interest stuff sometime after the inauguration.

Well, it does look like he'd be able to get away with anything with impunity at this stage, and there is no mechanism that could stop him. I imagine that that realisation will embolden him to really push the envelope. Sometime before January 20, expect to see him literally hunting humans for sport.
posted by acb at 3:28 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Cadillac Cancels Neo-Nazi Ad After Online Outrage

Last week I was in a waiting room with a crummy magazine collection and I choose to flip through a months-old car magazine. I found an article complaining about how the current Mercedes lineup is pretty boring to look at, blaming it mostly on a company hedging its bets toward restrained design language acknowledging the realities of austerity and slow growth in the global economy.

I thought at the time that luxury brands will see the narrow minority that voted Trump's as a opening to adopt more aggressive and ostentatious styling. The victory of the poster child of aspirational wealth will signal to brands to bring back the bling.

I didn't expect they'd go straight up Nazi so quickly.
posted by peeedro at 3:29 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

> Trump, Putin, and ExxonMobil team up to destroy the planet

Joe Romm was on Democracy Now today:

Trump's War on Science: Exxon CEO Expected to Head State, While "Enemies List" Alarms Energy Dept.

Could Massive Russian Oil Deal with Exxon Explain Why Putin Appears to Have Meddled in US Election?
posted by homunculus at 3:35 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

I would be fucking thrilled if we were all wrong, but I'm in agreement with all above that there's not a snowball's chance in hell of electors flipping. I'm spending all my energy on creating some structure for the resistance.
posted by Sophie1 at 3:40 PM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

Michigan to audit 'significant mismatches' in Detroit vote

Michigan's elections bureau ordered an investigation Monday into substantial ballot discrepancies in a small portion of Detroit's voting precincts, after the discovery of a polling place where 300 people voted but only 50 ballots were properly sealed in a container.

...It is not uncommon for there to be slight inconsistencies, typically due to human error.

"But when there's a significant mismatch, that's especially concerning," Woodhams [spokesman for Republican Secretary of State Ruth Johnson] said.

The ballots in question will be taken to the state capital, Lansing, for review. The investigation will take about three weeks.

..."It just simply would not have changed the result," Woodhams said of the recount.
posted by futz at 3:41 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

BTW, if I am wrong, and Hillary is sworn in, you will find me hip deep in a pile of donuts and ecstasy.
posted by Sophie1 at 3:42 PM on December 12, 2016 [31 favorites]

He'll discuss all that boring conflict of interest stuff sometime after the inauguration.

Correction: he'll discuss it sometime next month, but before the inauguration. I misread that. We regret the error.
posted by zachlipton at 3:44 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Metafilter: hip deep in a pile of donuts and ecstasy.
posted by Bringer Tom at 3:44 PM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

sometime next month, but before the inauguration

But after the EC votes. Fuckwad.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 3:50 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

He'll discuss all that boring conflict of interest stuff sometime after the inauguration.
Correction: he'll discuss it sometime next month, but before the inauguration. I misread that. We regret the error.
posted by zachlipton
*cough -- tax returns -- cough*
posted by TrishaU at 3:51 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Oil.

It's always about the oil.
posted by Devonian at 3:51 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

Josh Marshall's joke was that Trump's ethics/conflicts plan must be under IRS audit too.
posted by zachlipton at 3:51 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

The thing about Trump's debts is YUUUuuuge

Yup, and he is much more dangerous as a bankrupt fraudster than as an actual billionaire because of his vulnerability.

Imagine if Bloomberg had entered the presidential contest and won. He could easily have put his assets in a blind trust and moved on, because everything is transparent, he has a board of directors and while he might have lost more money doing this than any of us would earn in a lifetime, it would be small change to him. He wouldn't need to change his policies because of some creditor's demands. When his presidency was over, he could have gone back to being an influential billionaire, cashing in.

Trump is not Bloomberg. He is constantly on the brink and at risk, and therefore he is a risk. A lot of his properties are at severe danger of being damaged as a consequence of global warming. If Trump was a master of investment, he'd be ahead of this and fighting politically to prevent this and protect his property. But since he is a gambler and a bullshit artist, his "strategy" is instead to deny the risks and try to convince people that global warming is not real.

He actually knows very well global warming is real and that he is incapable of dealing with it. So don't assume ignorance here. He is living from grift to grift, and the US presidency is the biglyest of them all. It can only go down from here, and that downfall is going to bring a lot with it.
posted by mumimor at 3:53 PM on December 12, 2016 [37 favorites]

Politico: Traders scheme to cash in on Trump tweets

“This is a new type of risk, call it presidential tweet risk,” said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at BMP Private Bank. “And it’s the largest companies that enjoy a global supply chain, relatively low tax rate and have marshaled Washington to their benefit that seem to be at the most risk. But everyone now has to keep their Twitter feed right next to their Bloomberg terminal.”

On Wall Street, a person who can move a stock is called an “axe.” Trump, with his itchy Twitter finger, is quickly emerging as the biggest axe there is. Move quickly after a Trump tweet and there are potentially millions to be made. Miss out on one, or misjudge its impact, and your portfolio could take a surprise hit.

posted by zachlipton at 3:58 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

I mean, good that Cadillac's ad agency cancelled their call for an "Alt-Right/Neo Nazi SAG-AFTRA Principal", but ... I think this is more of the new normal:
Cadillac Cancels Neo-Nazi Ad After Online Outrage

That is simply grotesque. Someone actually thought an alt-Right person should appear in an ad for cars as part of an array of American folks? It's mindboggling. What next? Perhaps a montage of families including darling skinheads and their darling skinhead baby selling cereal? (Not Kelloggs, of course.)

I worked for a man who was interred in a Japanese camp when he was a boy. He was sick when they came for his family so they separated him out and when he was healthy enough they sent him off to a different camp. He didn't see his family for years.

One thing that rarely gets mentioned is that Japanese people had their boats confiscated as well as other property. In my boss's case it was the family store. They were not reimbursed after the war. American citizens lost everything they owned because their government stole it from them and there was no legal recourse. they were treated like traitors because of their race.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 3:59 PM on December 12, 2016 [61 favorites]

mumimor, not just the golf course but mar a lago too!
posted by futz at 3:59 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

He actually knows very well global warming is real and that he is incapable of dealing with it. So don't assume ignorance here. He is living from grift to grift, and the US presidency is the biglyest of them all. It can only go down from here, and that downfall is going to bring a lot with it.

So this is something that’s been worrying me for a while now. If Trump & Co either already secretly believe in climate change (!) or come to do so in the future, my fear is that they will also learn that it somehow fuzzily has to do with overpopulation. Now, overpopulation is easily dealt with if you have no scruples. I’m not gonna lay out my whole train of thought here (which has been keeping me awake since November), but between their willingness to do away with anyone who is remotely vulnerable, the Putin thing, Trump as the leader of the mightiest military of the planet, and automation (which will swiftly do away with the need for people), I really really fear them starting to ‘believe’ climate change is happening.
posted by miorita at 4:05 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

New Line of Trump Condoms Boast Thinnest Skin Possible: NEW YORK — U.S. President-elect Donald J. Trump held a press conference this morning to announce the manufacture of Trump Condoms, his latest namesake business venture, which will feature a gold foil-wrapped contraceptive touted as having the thinnest skin ever to hit the market.

“These condoms are really something, really terrific,” the incoming 45th President told reporters. “The slightest touch, be it real or imagined, will create a sensation that goes way beyond what mainstream condom companies would call ‘appropriate,’ folks, and I mean that — big league.” (fake)
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 4:07 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Kara Swisher says what needs to be said: As Trumplethinskin lets down his hair for tech, shame on Silicon Valley for climbing the Tower in silence

Or you can say no — loudly and in public. You can resist the forces that are against immigrants, because it is immigrants who built America and immigrants who most definitely built tech. You can defend science that says climate change is a big threat and that tech can be a part of fixing it. You can insist we invest in critical technologies that point the way to things like new digital health inventions and transportation revolutions. You can do what made Silicon Valley great again and again.

When I could get no really substantive on-the-record statements from the tech leaders, I pinged investor Chris Sacca, because I knew he would not let me down.

"It's funny, in every tech deal I've ever done, the photo op comes after you've signed the papers,” he said. “If Trump publicly commits to embrace science, stops threatening censorship of the internet, rejects fake news and denounces hate against our diverse employees, only then it would make sense for tech leaders to visit Trump Tower.”

He added: “Short of that, they are being used to legitimize a fascist."

posted by zachlipton at 4:11 PM on December 12, 2016 [35 favorites]

*cough -- tax returns -- cough*

So, there's a law that allows the President to request the tax returns of any citizen for his personal inspection. I hope Obama is taking advantage of it...
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 4:15 PM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

Egg not mincing words.

@Evan_McMullin
Let this sink in: the American President-elect is resolutely aligned with a foreign power that actively works to undermine our democracy.
posted by chris24 at 4:21 PM on December 12, 2016 [56 favorites]

So the last press conference he held was July 27, the third day of the DNC. It would have been natural to hold a press conference after he won the Presidency but since he did not I'm assuming he will never have another press conference. His December 15th announcement would have probably been another ad for his businesses-- just like the day he announced that President Obama was born in America because He, Trump, said so.

The press conference is like releasing your tax forms from previous years-- a norm that is only adhered to by people eager to appear open and honest. DJT doesn't care. Why should he answer questions from hostile journalists when he go on FOX News and have cozy chats? There is no way to make him do anything at this point. His fans are fanatical and blindly trusting. His Republican cohorts are willing to put up with anything as long as they stay in power. There is no way to shame him, no way to coerce him into doing anything he doesn't want to do. If one month into his Presidency he goes back to Trump Tower and never leaves but spends his days watching CNN and going out to eat, there will be no consequences. He can leave Kushner in charge of his cabinet of Horrors and if Congress wants him to sign something, they can send it over by messenger.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:21 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Yeah, I don't agree with a lot of Evan McMullin's policy bullet points, but the man is a hell of patriot.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 4:23 PM on December 12, 2016 [30 favorites]

If Trump gets under 270, then the House will elect him President.

The silver lining being that we can then hang that shit around their necks for the next four years. "YOU could have stopped this, Republicans."
posted by C'est la D.C. at 4:24 PM on December 12, 2016 [10 favorites]

@ddale8 Trump's big press conference wasn't postponed, it went to press conference heaven with Melania's big press conference.

Does anyone else think it is weird how little press Melania gets? Maybe I read the wrong things, maybe she appears in People all the time or Good Housekeeping but she is really kept out of the limelight especially when you compare all the press Hillary got when Bill was running and then elected President. I've had a couple of ideas why but there is no evidence I can point to as proof. I do have the sense that DJT would prefer Ivanka carry out First Lady duties but if it is because he is trying to protect Melania or because he is afraid she will do a poor job, that's hard to say. It is also possible that Melania herself has chosen to keep a low profile. Not important in the grand scheme of things, but odd.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:32 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

There is no way to shame him, no way to coerce him into doing anything he doesn't want to do.

He can't be bargained with. He can't be reasoned with. He doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And he absolutely will not stop...ever, until you are dead! THE TRUMPINATOR
posted by kirkaracha at 4:35 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Oh I forgot to mention the last thing I read about Melania was in this NPR article First Ladies Often Forge Food Trends, But Melania's Menu Is A Mystery which is an interesting look at how First Ladies have directed the menus at the White House. This struck me as so strange I've been puzzling over it for three days

we know little about [Melania's] food preferences – except that she eats seven pieces of fruit a day.

What is a piece? Is it a single cherry, a slice of apple, an orange segment, a grape? Or is it a whole apple, an entire pear, a cup of raspberries?
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:39 PM on December 12, 2016 [6 favorites]

A lot of his properties are at severe danger of being damaged as a consequence of global warming.

Ah but here's the thing -- if Trump really is upside down on a constellation of loans, there's this thing any homeowner knows which is that until you make that last mortgage payment and get the deed from the bank, it's not really your house. So inasmuch as any of Trump's properties are collateral on these loans -- and I'd be very confident guessing that they all are -- Trump doesn't actually have any property of his own. Trump Tower, his airplane, Mar a Lago and all those golf courses -- they belong to various banks and investors. Trump himself might not even own the clothes he is wearing.

In which case, of course, Trump might not be all that concerned with what happens to those properties when the sea level starts creeping up. He probably knows in his heart that when he dies, which will happen before climate change gets rolling bigly, it's all going to blow up and all those properties will revert to the people who have the liens. He might be thinking he has groomed his children to keep the scam going but it's going to be hard doing that through the gauntlet of succession. Everyone is going to want to know who owns what and who owes what.

And Donny may be shrewd enough to realize that at that point, his cooling corpse will no longer be the object of admiration he has demanded in living form. But he probably also knows that, being dead, he won't be caring about that, so fuck it. So protecting all that stuff he doesn't really own may not be all that important to him.

On the other hand if he can clear the debts by swapping Presidential favors, he might have a chance to salvage his post-sentience legacy, which would probably appeal to him bigly. Of course he still wouldn't own all those golf courses, so whatever. But he might actually be able to leave something with a positive number for his kids to try and keep going. And a little schmoozing with Putin would be a small price to pay for that, amirite?
posted by Bringer Tom at 4:40 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

I know most folk in this thread are saying there is no chance in hell enough electors turn faithless, but I think there is a chance. Drip drip drip, as they say, and even without the Russian connection there are plenty of reasons. What I think is important to remember however is IF it happens the electors will not, and ought not, vote for Hillary. That would inflame the alt-right base- like it or not a big chunk of the nation hates her, because she is a woman, and because they think she's into black magic and she personally killed Vince Foster and laughed while Benghazi happened. If we are lucky enough to have enough electors find the courage to be the last line of defense, it will be a republican once the dust, court cases, and deal making settle.

It could very well be Pence, and he is an asshole whose policies will suck, but at this point I'll take it- someone like him will be better than orange shitstain, anyone will, and just to deny orange shitstain and his most rabid supporters...hell I'd redo the W. Bush years for that.
posted by vrakatar at 4:41 PM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

So, there's a law that allows the President to request the tax returns of any citizen for his personal inspection. I hope Obama is taking advantage of it...

OK, so another thought occurred to me about Trump. Would you want to make "business deals" with him or anyone in his family if he could see your tax return or your company's tax return before heading into negotiations?
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 4:41 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

Melania just turned up today at a scheduling hearing in Maryland for her defamation suit against The Daily Mail and a blogger.
posted by zachlipton at 4:42 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Tomorrow on Political Apprentice...

@realDonaldTrump
I will be making my announcement on the next Secretary of State tomorrow morning.
posted by chris24 at 4:42 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

What I think is important to remember however is IF it happens the electors will not, and ought not, vote for Hillary.

Well if the EC is to do its supposed job the Electors need to get their shit together and show some coordination, or it will just be a shitshow that still puts Trump in the White House, either directly or through the House of Representatives. If the idea is to install someone other than Hillary then they need to convince every single Hillary elector to switch to the alternate choice, as well as enough Trump electors to pass 270.
posted by Bringer Tom at 4:45 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

@NickRiccardi

CO electors fail in attempt to suspend law requiring them to vote for state winner, major blow to longshot try to block Trump presidency.

US Judge Wiley Daniel, a Clinton appointee, said the lawsuit was a "stunt" that would put free elections & presidential transition at risk.

That makes zero sense. The one reason we have an EC instead of using the popular vote is so the EVs can use their best judgement and override the popular vote if need be. Going by this judge the EC should not exist at all.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:49 PM on December 12, 2016 [10 favorites]

Going by this judge the EC should not exist at all.

Colorado had a law that bound its electors to its citizens' vote, at the time those citizens went to the polls (and still does).

And if you want to end-run the EC (without needing to amend the Constitution) by something like the popular vote compact then you need laws like this to be enforced.
posted by snuffleupagus at 4:58 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

WaPo Donald Trump likes to promise that details are coming in a couple of weeks. Do they?

Donald Trump has a couple of go-to ways of pushing off questions from voters and the press.

The most obviously dismissive is his tendency to say that his campaign is "looking into" something, like when he promised a voter in North Dakota in May that his campaign was looking into whether or not the Renewable Fuel Standard should be continued. No word on his current position on the ideal ethanol/gasoline blend, suggesting that the campaign's exhaustive review is still underway.

The other, slightly-more-concrete way of putting off a questioner is to say that the campaign would be taking action within a few weeks. We're not talking about his vague pledges like "I will release my taxes when they are no longer under audit." We're talking about a commitment: This is coming in a few weeks.[...]We decided to track other promises Trump and his campaign have made to provide more information in a few weeks.

1. Tax policy promised tomorrow, came out over a month later.
2. How he will cut the Federal Budget to create jobs. Plan was promised this week (Oct. 4th) has yet to appear.
3. Pledge to announce new military advisers made in March, no new names yet.
4. Melania's press conference was to happen in a couple of weeks. Never happened.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:02 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Going by this judge the EC should not exist at all.

Correct.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:04 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

It's funny. I once had an administrator at school who kept promising me and my parents that he would "look into" certain issues. It's been over a decade since I attended that particular institution, and yet, every once and a while, I think about that and figure he's doing a really thorough job of addressing my concerns and he'll surely get back to me one of these days. Maybe that guy should have run for President.
posted by zachlipton at 5:06 PM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

Trump: "Unless you catch them in the act, you can't say who the hackers are"
Security analyst hired by DNC: "We caught them in the act. We watched them for weeks. There were two groups, both associated with Russian intelligence, the GRU Active Measures unit..." (autoplay CNN video)

Note this is not an intelligence agency, this is a private Internet security company speaking with great specificity about a prolonged investigation.
posted by Devonian at 5:11 PM on December 12, 2016 [38 favorites]

Looks like some traders might have a new game to play:

Kurt Eichenwald ‏@kurteichenwald 2h2 hours ago
Wall Street guy: Found what led Trump to F-35. CNN mentioned cost yesterday.They now monitor TV all day 2 short stock Trump might tweet bout

posted by RobotVoodooPower at 5:11 PM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

Trump's Theorem: For every tweet or statement, there is a past tweet refuting it.

@realDonaldTrump
The CIA deserves our praise for taking the fight to the enemy in the dark corners of the world. The CIA perseveres, the politicians whine!

From 2014.
posted by chris24 at 5:15 PM on December 12, 2016 [22 favorites]

That was before he became a politician/whiner.
posted by kirkaracha at 5:16 PM on December 12, 2016

And FYI, here's the detailed report on the DNC hack methods and actors. Which has been out there since June. You know, like before the election.

The many unambiguous and unanimous reports from state intelligence agencies in the US and across the West came later. Whatever's in their internal data that is currently under consideration for declassification must have a great deal more than just who did it and how, because all that's been in the public domain for months.
posted by Devonian at 5:22 PM on December 12, 2016 [6 favorites]

Is anyone else watching Chris Hayes' town hall with Bernie Sanders in Wisconsin? I really can't get over the Trump voters, saying that he was "up front" with everyone.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:23 PM on December 12, 2016

So here are my dark thoughts:

Far from being anti-climate change, Trump and his corporate backers know that climate change is absolutely real and is something we are going to have to deal with very soon, in the form of diminishing resources and internal refugees. Major corporations with skin in the game, like Exxon, as well as countries with the power to take remaining resources, like Russia, have colluded with the Trump campaign to get him elected however they can. Basically his entire candidacy was suggested and funded by oil companies and countries that are big and powerful enough to be the last entities standing when the party's over.

Trump and his strong-arm tactics and willingness to trample on civil rights will be exactly what most Americans want when the internal refugee crisis begins in earnest, when we have several Katrina-sized displacements of people in the US at the same time because Louisiana is perpetually flooded and no one can get insurance or drinking water in South Florida anymore. We'll be glad we have a president who is willing to go to war against whomever to get the last bits of the goody-goody that make life bearable. We'll even be glad to share them with Russia, our old cold-war enemy, because the two of us combined are pretty much unstoppable when it comes to taking the last bits of whatever there is that is left.

In the face of these new realities, Trump will be hailed as our last protector, as the one who protects us from the wolf at the door, as exactly the president America needs at exactly the time we need him. Thank God he built that wall, we'll all say. Can you imagine what would be happening if refugees from the drought and famine in Mexico and South America were fleeing here? We can't even cope with our own displaced people.

Dark thoughts.
posted by staggering termagant at 5:24 PM on December 12, 2016 [10 favorites]

Does anyone know if electoral college votes are done by secret ballot the way normal votes are? Because if I were an "elector" I'd be pretty darn worried about being straight up killed if it were known that I switched my vote from Trump.
posted by uosuaq at 5:25 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Does anyone know if electoral college votes are done by secret ballot the way normal votes are?

EC votes are not anonymous. We know the identity of every faithless elector ever.
posted by Bringer Tom at 5:28 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

It's funny. I once had an administrator at school who kept promising me and my parents that he would "look into" certain issues. It's been over a decade since I attended that particular institution...

Another check in the "Trump is a moron" column. As soon as the Russian interference story broke he ran around and insulted the CIA, said there's no way it's the Russians, etc. Anybody with half a brain hearing that allegation would say something more like "that is a serious allegation, we'd be shocked if the Russians were involved in such a thing, but we will thoroughly investigate." Even if he was going to do nothing. Just say you're going to do the right thing and that will get 95% of the people off your back. Then if someone asks how the investigation is coming along, "we have discovered no evidence to support that allegation."

Seriously. Total amateur hour.
posted by Joey Buttafoucault at 5:37 PM on December 12, 2016 [13 favorites]

Far from being anti-climate change, Trump and his corporate backers know that climate change is absolutely real and is something we are going to have to deal with very soon, in the form of diminishing resources and internal refugees.

Wow, that's really optimistic. You think there is a well thought out plan beyond "Fuck you, got mine! Get more!"
posted by benzenedream at 5:38 PM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

Far from being anti-climate change, Trump and his corporate backers know that climate change is absolutely real

I've been thinking about this and I think you are giving him too much credit. I believe he is the puppet, not the power. I have been amazed at the people he is nominating for cabinet posts and they are usually loyalists and supporters. I can easily see Trump deciding to put Carson at HUD or Linda McMahon at SBA because they are his "friends." Some of these other picks though-- the Big Oil reps and climate deniers-- seem to be the choice of other people and I wonder who is whispering in Trump's ear. DJT would have been fine with Christie or Guiliani as SOS just like Bannon as Chief Adviser-- he is comfortable with them; Tillerson is out of the blue.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:42 PM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

Tillerson is out of the blue.

No, Tillerson is quid pro quo c/o Manafort. Once the sanctions with Russia are gone he's going to make squillions and I'm sure some of it will find its way to Donald & Co.
posted by Talez at 5:44 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

Here's my pitch to electors- imagine a candidate who released his tax returns, never got on that bus with Billy Bush, and never proposed killing the wives and kids of terrorists real or imagined. Now propose a foreign power helped get that candidate elected, with or without collusion. As an elector you have an enormous responsibility and a chance to make history. Be the last line of defense the founders imagined.
posted by vrakatar at 5:51 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Tillerson is out of the blue.

No, Tillerson is quid pro quo c/o Manafort.

No you get my point-- out of the blue as in nobody who was in Trump's circle of loyalists/ people who ran against him in the primaries. I do think he is somebody else's choice though. Could be Putin.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:57 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Charles Pierce: 'Mistakes Were Made' Is Not Good Enough This Time. We need all the answers on the Russian hacking. Period.
posted by homunculus at 6:04 PM on December 12, 2016 [13 favorites]

New Daniel Dale up: 12 lessons from Donald Trump’s eventful transition: Analysis

He remains infuriated by dissent
This is a full-fledged Republican administration
That said, he is malleable
He has a brilliant feel for the show
He isn’t even pretending to keep some promise
He isn’t even pretending to study up
There is discontinuity afoot
He hasn’t stopped lying
This is no working-man’s administration
Who knew, he loves generals
His fondness for Russia is unabated
Unresolved conflicts abound

posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:08 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

AP reporter Lisa Lerer: I’m glad my holocaust-surviving grandparents didn’t live to see the mail their granddaughter now receives.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 6:10 PM on December 12, 2016 [13 favorites]

Clinton is now within 159,000 votes of Obama's 2012 popular vote total.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:12 PM on December 12, 2016 [19 favorites]

He remains infuriated by dissent
This is a full-fledged Republican administration
That said, he is malleable
He has a brilliant feel for the show
He isn’t even pretending to keep some promise
He isn’t even pretending to study up
There is discontinuity afoot
He hasn’t stopped lying
This is no working-man’s administration
Who knew, he loves generals
His fondness for Russia is unabated
Unresolved conflicts abound

and a Partridge in a Pear Tree!
posted by XMLicious at 6:16 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

AP reporter Lisa Lerer: I’m glad my holocaust-surviving grandparents didn’t live to see the mail their granddaughter now receives.

Fucking hell, the comments on that.
posted by dng at 6:17 PM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

We need email addys for all these electors. I say we suggest Kasich.
posted by vrakatar at 6:17 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Just to be clear, I don't really believe what I wrote. Not really. But I do believe Trump is a puppet. A useful puppet. But, I wonder, what's the use?
posted by staggering termagant at 6:21 PM on December 12, 2016

Bill Moyers and Michael Winship: Hillary Clinton’s Inaugural Address: Here's what we'd like to hear her say before Donald Trump takes office — a call for a shadow government that will watchdog everything he and Congress do.
posted by homunculus at 6:21 PM on December 12, 2016 [15 favorites]

One thing I'm curious to see is if TV show runners and movie producers will adapt the "generic male President" archetype, usually analytical and dignified, to conform to the new reality.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 6:25 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

There was a spreadsheet going around for the Trump electors. I checked out a few Facebook pages and got so discouraged. Bunch of proud deplorables.
posted by Ruki at 6:25 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

I don't think the mass outreach to the electors has been effective. My concern is that they will feel harassed and targeted. Some have said that the many identical emails are profoundly unpersuasive, which is frankly what I'd expect. This just doesn't feel like the right situation for a letter-writing campaign, a mass email campaign, or a mass phone call campaign. These are not people with staffs who are wading through this stuff. It just seems unproductive, and likely counterproductive.
posted by prefpara at 6:26 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

Trump is under pressure to keep Obama’s VA secretary

Most of the major veterans groups want McDonald to stay on and won't support Pete Hegseth or Scott Brown.
posted by zachlipton at 6:29 PM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

An Invitation to Vice-President Elect Pence

On behalf of your new neighbors in Chevy Chase, Washington, D.C., we invite you to join us for pizza at Comet Ping Pong. In doing so, we hope that you will help us quell the damaging impact of a bizarre “fake news” story that has put us all in harm’s way.

posted by zachlipton at 6:30 PM on December 12, 2016 [23 favorites]

New Yorker: Thirteen Women Who Should Think About Running for President in 2020

Klobuchar-Gillibrand, you heard it here first.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:31 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Gillibrand

If we didn't finish pissing on the dreams of the left we did now!
posted by Talez at 6:32 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

staggering termagant—I definitely agree with you, that climate change is in some respects tailor-made for authoritarians. I doubt Trump has much of a grasp on what's happening but he would be a great one for handling the flip: "I have always said, climate change is one of the most serious problems facing the country."

And his followers would all take it in stride. I mean it's only because the lying mainstream media were the ones who made it sound like there wasn't scientific consensus that anyone ever doubted it, right?
posted by XMLicious at 6:34 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

I've been trying to figure out since the election what one has to do and who one has to know to get involved in the county Democratic Committee here.

If it's anything like Ohio, you might try calling the State Dem Party. They should have a list of contact info for someone in every county party.
posted by Coventry at 6:36 PM on December 12, 2016

Klobuchar-Gillibrand, you heard it here first.

Nah, I'm calling the 2020 nomination for Kamala Harris!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 6:37 PM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

Not that it matters, by 2020 the voting restrictions and outright intimidation by Trump/GOP means the Democrats won't have any chance regardless of who they run.
posted by thefoxgod at 6:39 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

climate change is in some respects tailor-made for authoritarians.
I thought climate change was tailor-made for real estate moguls whose properties are mostly air-conditioned high-rises.
posted by oneswellfoop at 6:40 PM on December 12, 2016

Booker-Gillibrand, the Clintonites can never fail only be failed edition.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:43 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Not that it matters, by 2020 the voting restrictions and outright intimidation by Trump/GOP means the Democrats won't have any chance regardless of who they run.

Meh, no point in giving up four years ahead of time!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 6:46 PM on December 12, 2016 [9 favorites]

@AliABCNews Retweeted Senator Hatch
Sen. Hatch, ever so nicely, tells Trump to stay the heck away from the F-35

@SenOrrinHatch
Senator Hatch spoke on video today about the indispensable role the F-35 and @HillAFBUtah play in our national defense strategy -- #utpol [video]
posted by chris24 at 6:47 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

Seriously, I'm sick of being told we need to talk to the people who hate us. I talk to them every single day. They're all over social media. And they respond to every attempt to engage with "cuck" and "libtard" and "Killary," and the worst of them respond with actual threats.

Stop telling us to engage without telling us how we might get anything other than sheer abuse as a response.

I would have liked to respond to this much earlier today. I think it's especially worth responding even now, because so many people favorited it.

It certainly sounds like you are engaging directly with the online troll factory. I hope that, as bad as it is, at least you aren't surprised at what you're getting. But I've got to say, it is flat out wrong-headed to believe that sixty million Trump voters hate us. I talk to some of them every single day too. In real life, not online. And the worst I have encountered is veiled contempt, and that seldom. Sharing the same physical space, and being in a position to look people in the eye, garners a different set of responses than the semi-anonymity of online interaction.

So this is engagement. Hours and hours and hours of wasted effort and the best you can hope for is that they grudgingly say they will stop breaking the law, but nothing else will change.

If we aspire to become a better society, then nobody is exempt from emotional labor. These two linked threads speak the language of Woke, in the gender dialect instead of race. But there is further generalizing to be done. In service to the goal of becoming a better society, I think 99.99% of men in particular (and I include myself) could easily immerse themselves for an hour in each of the two linked threads daily, and nothing but good would come of it.

Hooray for engagement. I've had enough of it, and I've had enough of it being dictated to me. Only 20 percent of the country voted for the monster. I'm going to talk to the remaining 80 percent. They don't assault me.

You know who else feels like they've been having their morals dictated to them?

Yeah. You have more in common with them than you may think.
posted by perspicio at 6:50 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

Mitt Romney

It was an honor to have been considered for Secretary of State of our great country. My discussions with President-elect Trump have been both enjoyable and enlightening. I have very high hopes that the new administration will lead the nation to greater strength, prosperity and peace
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 6:51 PM on December 12, 2016

New York City should apply eminent domain and seize Trump Tower.

Oh my god New York do this for me. For America.
posted by emjaybee at 6:52 PM on December 12, 2016 [47 favorites]

Mitt Romney

It was an honor to have been considered for Secretary of State of our great country. My discussions with President-elect Trump have been both enjoyable and enlightening. I have very high hopes that the new administration will lead the nation to greater strength, prosperity and peace

Is that Mormon for "Watch your back, Donald"?
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 6:53 PM on December 12, 2016 [6 favorites]

emjaybee, i realize that opinion piece is tongue-in-cheek but it was the exact tonic for what ails me today
posted by murphy slaw at 6:57 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

Small follow up on Secret Life of Gravy's comment regarding "Donald Trump likes to promise that details are coming in a couple of weeks. Do they?"

Donald Trump Postpones Announcement on Business Conflicts (NYT)

"Transition officials said Monday evening that they were postponing a Dec. 15 news conference at which Mr. Trump had said he would reveal his plans to avoid conflicts of interest with his sprawling business empire.

Now, he will not do so until January — most likely before his inauguration and after a vacation at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, officials said, confirming a report in Bloomberg News."

"Most likely". In other words, he's waiting to get in office before revealing any plans, if indeed there are any. One more quick punt and the grift works.

"The officials said building a cabinet had consumed more of Mr. Trump’s time than expected."

Again, he has no idea what this job requires.

"And they said he needed more time to decide how to deal with the large, iconic real estate holdings that are part of the global Trump business."

There's not enough time in the world. He's stalling, hoping that being "president" gives him leverage.
posted by mrgoat at 7:09 PM on December 12, 2016 [10 favorites]

This is how bad things are: George W. Bush EPA chief slams Trump’s pick

“I don’t recall ever having seen an appointment of someone who is so disdainful of the agency and the science behind what the agency does,” Whitman told Grist. The former governor of New Jersey led the EPA under George W. Bush from 2001 to 2003.

“It doesn’t put us in a good place, in my mind,” Whitman said. “And he’s going to have trouble within the agency if he does convey that kind of disdain to the career staff.”

posted by zachlipton at 7:11 PM on December 12, 2016 [19 favorites]

KellyAnne Conway just claimed @CNN that @AdamSchiffCA (Congressman Adam Schiff) "definitely doesn't have a security clearance." Really? Might want to check that.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:13 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

Oops, Kellyanne was reading from the scripts for after Trump revokes clearances from everyone in Congress. Easy mistake.
posted by tonycpsu at 7:14 PM on December 12, 2016 [11 favorites]

That last NYT article upthread said the intelligence agencies presented no new information last week - what we're seeing is what Reid was whipping Comey about in September. They knew all of this in great detail and no one said much at all.
posted by petebest at 7:15 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Oh, lord, Romney liked his own status.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:17 PM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

Oh, lord, Romney liked his own status.

Oh shit have CNN normalized this yet and does it apply to favourites? I have over 7000 favourites waiting for me if we're normalizing this behaviour!
posted by Talez at 7:18 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

Oh, lord, Romney liked his own status.

Ooh, he's angrier than I thought about that dinner!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 7:19 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

NYT is saying its definitely Tillerson, announcement tomorrow morning.
posted by zachlipton at 7:22 PM on December 12, 2016

NYT is saying its definitely Tillerson, announcement tomorrow morning.

It'll be ~~interesting~~ horrifying to see how Trump handles not getting 50 votes given that Graham, Paul, and McCain are all out to block him on this one.
posted by Talez at 7:23 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

I'm hoping Tillerson talks with Trump about global warming.
posted by misterpatrick at 7:28 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Exclusive: Top U.S. spy agency has not embraced CIA assessment on Russia hacking - sources

While the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) does not dispute the CIA's analysis of Russian hacking operations, it has not endorsed their assessment because of a lack of conclusive evidence that Moscow intended to boost Trump over Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton, said the officials, who declined to be named.

The position of the ODNI, which oversees the 17 agency-strong U.S. intelligence community, could give Trump fresh ammunition to dispute the CIA assessment, which he rejected as "ridiculous" in weekend remarks, and press his assertion that no evidence implicates Russia in the cyber attacks.

..."ODNI is not arguing that the agency (CIA) is wrong, only that they can't prove intent," said one of the three U.S. officials. "Of course they can't, absent agents in on the decision-making in Moscow."

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, whose evidentiary standards require it to make cases that can stand up in court, declined to accept the CIA's analysis - a deductive assessment of the available intelligence - for the same reason, the three officials said.

...The CIA conclusion was a "judgment based on the fact that Russian entities hacked both Democrats and Republicans and only the Democratic information was leaked," one of the three officials said on Monday.

..."(It was) a thin reed upon which to base an analytical judgment," the official added.

What The Ever Loving Fuck. People are going to pounce all over this.
posted by futz at 7:34 PM on December 12, 2016 [8 favorites]

Honestly, I kind of assume that if he doesn't get some pick confirmed for his cabinet, he'll a) post on twitter that he's the president, so he can have whoever he wants, and b) treat his unconfirmed/rejected pick like they're legit, knowing that no one will stop him.

So, uh, out of curiosity, what is the mechanism to stop a president from doing this? Does everyone at the State Department refuse to recognize the person as the SoS? Can Trump fire people at will until they go along with it?
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 7:41 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

The FBI's standard exists to protect innocent Americans from being put in jail. Spooks don't live in the world of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. That's what a full-fledged investigation led by Congress is for. The worst thing that happens if we act on the CIA's preponderance of evidence standard is we spend some time and money on an investigation that may or may not shed more light on the matter. If you believe foreign interference is no big deal, then I guess we can just let this one go and try to stop the interference next time. Bygones!
posted by tonycpsu at 7:44 PM on December 12, 2016 [17 favorites]

Labor Secretary Thomas Perez “has told three senior Democrats that he intends to run for chairman of the Democratic National Committee, challenging the front-running candidate, Rep. Keith Ellison, and inserting an ally of President Obama into the contest to rebuild a bruised party,” the New York Times reports.

“Mr. Perez, who had also been considering a run for Maryland governor, is expected to reveal his plan to seek the D.N.C. chairmanship this week.”

posted by Chrysostom at 7:47 PM on December 12, 2016

So, uh, out of curiosity, what is the mechanism to stop a president from doing this?

Impeachment.
posted by Talez at 7:51 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

Really curious about that, too, Blue Jello Elf. One of my dim hopes is that once Trump realizes he's getting "Yes, Prime Minister"ed by his establishment cabinet, he sets up parallel lines of communication and enforcement in the departmental bureaucracies to see that his plans are beyond carried out. I realize this is probably overestimating him along a couple of dimensions.
posted by Coventry at 7:51 PM on December 12, 2016

So, uh, out of curiosity, what is the mechanism to stop a president from doing this?

Anybody who is harmed by a decision made by this non-secretary can sue to prevent enforcement of that decision.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 7:54 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

Can Trump fire people at will until they go along with it?

Trump's authority to fire anyone in the civil service is basically nil.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 7:55 PM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

So, uh, out of curiosity, what is the mechanism to stop a president from doing this?

In a practical sense though? Someone with standing would probably have to sue and then the court would issue an injunction to stop the nominee in question from performing the role. It would proceed up the chain until the Supreme Court decides who wins that showdown.
posted by Talez at 7:56 PM on December 12, 2016

The career tiers are protected by laws going back to the Chester A. Arthur presidency. If the desire at the top is to return to the spoils system, then it will have to happen in a very public way.
posted by holgate at 7:58 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

except that she eats seven pieces of fruit a day.

Huh? That sounds suspiciously too close to that article that said Obama ate exactly seven almonds each night.
posted by FJT at 8:06 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

Labor Secretary Thomas Perez “has told three senior Democrats that he intends to run for chairman of the Democratic National Committee, challenging the front-running candidate, Rep. Keith Ellison, and inserting an ally of President Obama into the contest to rebuild a bruised party,” the New York Times reports.

Anyone know much about Tom Perez's philosophy of politics? I love me some Obama, but his replacement of Howard Dean with Tim Kaine (sorry, Tim!) was why we stopped with the fifty state strategy and ended up where we are today...
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 8:07 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

Not that it matters, by 2020 the voting restrictions and outright intimidation by Trump/GOP means the Democrats won't have any chance regardless of who they run.

Meh, no point in giving up four years ahead of time!

No. See, this is why we're organizing. In California, we'll still be able to do absentee ballots. If I have to personally find 2000 Californians to go drive 2000 passenger vans in all 50 states, I will fucking personally do it to get souls to the polls. We will make sure that every damn person in Wisconsin and Texas has ID and Alabama too. I have the ability to take time off, and I will if necessary. #resist
posted by Sophie1 at 8:19 PM on December 12, 2016 [34 favorites]

The career tiers are protected by laws going back to the Chester A. Arthur presidency. If the desire at the top is to return to the spoils system, then it will have to happen in a very public way.

Republicans have already started chipping away at civil service protections at the VA and the CR deal showed signs they're expanding that push to the rest of the federal service even before Trump is in office. Trump himself has predictably already signaled further attacks on civil service protections, he does love to fire people. Meanwhile the Ryan budget has consistently proposed increases in retirement contributions comparable to a direct pay cut, as well as broader "reforms" of the civil service system including abolishing the GS pay scale.

So yes, a return to the spoils system for the entirety of the federal service is exactly what they're proposing. In addition to Trump's across the board hiring freeze.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:21 PM on December 12, 2016 [18 favorites]

EC votes are not anonymous. We know the identity of every faithless elector ever.

Some states (not sure which ones) have secret ballots:

2004 election: An anonymous Minnesota elector, pledged for Democrats John Kerry and John Edwards, cast his or her presidential vote for "John Ewards", rather than Kerry, presumably by accident. (All of Minnesota's electors cast their vice presidential ballots for John Edwards.) Minnesota's electors cast secret ballots, so it is unlikely the identity of the faithless elector will ever be known. As a result of this incident, Minnesota Statutes were amended to provide for public balloting of the electors' votes and invalidation of a vote cast for someone other than the candidate to whom the elector is pledged

posted by triggerfinger at 8:21 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

So yes, a return to the spoils system for the entirety of the federal service is exactly what they're proposing. In addition to Trump's across the board hiring freeze.

I wonder what the real life bathtub is in the typical metaphor.
posted by Talez at 8:24 PM on December 12, 2016

Oh, and the Ryan budget ends defined benefit retirement for new federal hires. It's one hit after another for federal employees already bludgeoned by Obama's attempts to show how bipartisan he was.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:25 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

In a practical sense though? Someone with standing would probably have to sue and then the court would issue an injunction to stop the nominee in question from performing the role. It would proceed up the chain until the Supreme Court decides who wins that showdown.

In which case, the president still gets to dare the court to try to enforce their judgement. The fact that this is even being discussed, and that it actually seems possible, (in fact, in my estimation, likely - because what else would trimp do - back down and respect congress?) indicates that we are deep into constitutional crisis mode already. The only question is how obvious it becomes.
posted by mrgoat at 8:25 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

Ending DB pensions would kill the civil service.
posted by Yowser at 8:30 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

Ending DB pensions would kill the civil service.

That's the entire point.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:31 PM on December 12, 2016 [14 favorites]

And the distinction isn't really that meaningful. I honestly don't care a ton whether Russian officials sat in a room and said "let's get Donald Trump elected President of the United States" or whether they sat there and said "let's undermine public confidence in American elections and government, hurt someone who could be their next President, and generally spread FUD and chaos across the land." Understanding their motives is important, sure, but this inter-agency fight over motives could easily lead to people dismissing the actions, which are reportedly not in dispute, and the actions are a heck of a lot more important than the motives right now.

Also the sheer number of appointments and advisors and cronies that are Russian hangers-on absolutely deserves scrutiny. It stretches suspension of disbelief to the breaking point to think there isn't an agenda to advance Russian interests here, and it's unbelievable that there isn't some kind of collusion. There are people Trump surrounds himself with and rewards who take trips to Russia, work closely with Russia, take money from Russia. Trump has bragged about a relationship with Putin that he now denies. Ivanka vacationed with Putin's girlfriend, very shortly after Donald publicly called on Russia to look into Hillary's emails and right on the heels of him blowing up at the Khans, which is reportedly when Russia started having second thoughts about backing him - wonder what they talked about? Nah, that couldn't possibly be a line of communication. And instead of working with the investigations to vindicate himself and emerge with everyone thinking twice before accusing him again, like he absolutely should if he's telling the truth, this guy doubles down on fighting an investigation, just like he fought the recounts that should have vindicated him if he wasn't lying.

And yeah, "get Donald Trump elected" and "create an environment of FUD and distrust in democratic institutions and the media tailor-made for a campaign that - oh, look at that! - is exactly like Donald Trump's" are the exact same fucking thing. There is no breathing room between the two.
posted by jason_steakums at 8:32 PM on December 12, 2016 [30 favorites]

It's not just the CIA, it's 17 US government intelligence agencies. Plus the intelligence agencies of pretty much every major European ally.

I also think that publishing the list in full helps to bring the point home, so here it is:

Air Force Intelligence
Army Intelligence
Central Intelligence Agency
Coast Guard Intelligence
Defense Intelligence Agency
Energy Department
Homeland Security Department
State Department
Treasury Department
Drug Enforcement Administration
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Marine Corps Intelligence
National Geospatial Intelligence Agency
National Reconnaissance Office
National Security Agency
Navy Intelligence
Office of the Director of National Intelligence

And if you have friends on facebook (as I do) who want you to provide credible sources for this claim (big wtf, but okay), here is the official statement from the US Intelligence Community (encompassing all of the above agencies), which states, in part:

The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations. The recent disclosures of alleged hacked e-mails on sites like DCLeaks.com and WikiLeaks and by the Guccifer 2.0 online persona are consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts. These thefts and disclosures are intended to interfere with the US election process. Such activity is not new to Moscow—the Russians have used similar tactics and techniques across Europe and Eurasia, for example, to influence public opinion there. We believe, based on the scope and sensitivity of these efforts, that only Russia's senior-most officials could have authorized these activities.

posted by triggerfinger at 8:34 PM on December 12, 2016 [34 favorites]

NBC News: Trump picks Rick Perry for Energy Secretary. (Perry wanted to eliminate Energy Dept but couldn't remember it during "oops" moment)
posted by lazugod at 8:39 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

You cannot get any more 2016 than picking Rick Perry for Secretary of Energy.
posted by zachlipton at 8:42 PM on December 12, 2016 [35 favorites]

Worth reading: The ADL director and the war against hate in Trump’s America
posted by Joe in Australia at 8:45 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

2016: “I can’t. The third one, I can’t. Sorry. Oops.”
posted by Coventry at 8:46 PM on December 12, 2016 [5 favorites]

Looks like Erdoğan in Turkey has arrested a key business partner of Trump's (mentioned during a phone call between the two), perhaps in an effort to "convince' Trump to extradite Fethullah Gulen to Turkey.
posted by dhens at 8:58 PM on December 12, 2016 [10 favorites]

Gulen needs to find a new country to seek exile and fast.
posted by zachlipton at 9:09 PM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

Looks like Erdoğan in Turkey has arrested a key business partner of Trump's

Hmm. It's like the old question, "what happens when a deplorable force meets an irresponsible object?"

Except the answer is probably going to be awful, whatever it is.
posted by Joe in Australia at 9:11 PM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

Ernest Moniz and Stephen Chu are actual nuclear physicists. The four previous Secretaries had held cabinet level positions prior to becoming Secretary of Energy. You have to go back to early-Reagan to find a Secretary of Energy with questionably relevant experience, James B Edwards was also a term limited governor of South Carolina with no national resume appointed by Reagan in 1981.

But Rick Perry has Smart Guy Glasses now. I'm sure he'll do a great job managing nuclear weapons, waste disposal and our high energy physics labs.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:11 PM on December 12, 2016 [12 favorites]

We're so fucking doomed.
posted by tonycpsu at 9:16 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

How many cabinent positions are left and who would be the absolute worst person to run them? Because they're the odds on favorite for Trump to pick.

Tom Coburn for Social Security.
Hugh Grant for Agriculture.
Stephen Moore for OMB.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:20 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

We're so fucking doomed.

Hey, if Rick Perry bungles the nuclear weapons badly enough, Trump won't be able to launch them!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 9:24 PM on December 12, 2016 [7 favorites]

I mean, once you're appointing the guy to run an agency who previously wanted to eliminate that agency but couldn't remember its name, can you really get any worse?

Is the Big Bad Wolf available for some kind of position on building standards and structural integrity?
posted by zachlipton at 9:29 PM on December 12, 2016 [30 favorites]

Stop the world, I want to get off!
posted by mazola at 9:45 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

I've been waiting for Trump's hatemongering to get someone killed, the comet ping pong thing was a near miss. At this point we can only hope that he gets into a pissing match with a senior republican, who after a series of tweets promising to defend and pardon anyone who "goes after him/her" is then killed by one of Trump's True Believers. This is one of the few things that might actually rattle the Paul Ryans of the world into fighting Trump.

At this point I need something to hope for, and faithless electors are a nice dream but I don't think it's going to work.
posted by benzenedream at 9:56 PM on December 12, 2016 [1 favorite]

If things weren't already bizarre, Obama had a scheduled interview on The Daily Show and directly accused the Trump campaign of having links to Russia.

Obama has never seemed like the kind of guy to act without thinking or out of desperation. As of recently, it seemed like he'd recognized how malleable Trump was, and had decided for the god of the country he was going to play nice with him and influence him as best he can. He may have realized that's a futile effort--or perhaps he sees a light at the end of the tunnel. But this is not a move he'd make just for the sake of insulting Trump, I think. This callout is the closest I've come since Election Day to hoping.
posted by Anonymous at 9:57 PM on December 12, 2016

Kellyanne Conway downplays Rex Tillerson’s ties to Russia: “It’s not like he’s pounding down vodka with Vladimir Putin”

Conway promised that whoever Trump picks will “improve relationships and advance U.S. interests and advance the Trump doctrine.”

She added: “It’s not like he’s pounding down vodka with Vladimir Putin at the local bar, but he’s dealt with him in a business context.”

Tillerson has, indeed, dealt with Putin in a business context — in that the two were wearing business suits when they drank champagne together:

Technically, not a lie! I'd say that's a sign of progress from Ms. Conway.
posted by tonycpsu at 10:01 PM on December 12, 2016 [21 favorites]

The exasperation from President Obama when he's saying basically "we told you all this stuff back in October; where have you been?" is evident: "I will say this though, Trevor. None of this should be a big surprise. This was reported on before the election. I don't think there was any doubt among anybody in the media or among members of Congress as to who was being advantaged or disadvantaged by the political gossip that was being put out in drip drip drip fashion leading up the election."

Here, the President hits on a really important point that's been bugging the heck out of me: "I think what everybody has to reflect on is what is it about our political ecosystem, what is it about the state of our democracy where what were the leaks of what were frankly not very interesting emails, that didn't have any explosive information in them [Noah, unable to help himself: "the risotto was interesting"] ended up being an obsession, and the fact that the Russians were doing this was not an obsession. This was not a secret running up to the election."

Here's a direct accusation schroedinger mentions: "You had what was very clear relationships between members of the President-elect's campaign team and Russians and a professed shared view on a bunch of issues."

And damn is this a sober and reasonably deep interview.
posted by zachlipton at 10:23 PM on December 12, 2016 [47 favorites]

Well, that'll be the end of Trump's "speak nice things about Obama" phase... expect the return of Birtherism in five... four... three...
posted by oneswellfoop at 10:40 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

The Daily Show interview ends with a discussion of how President Obama talked about race and racism during his term that's really worth watching. I'm not going to try to split it up into quotes here because it's not really suited to that, but I highly recommend giving it a watch.
posted by zachlipton at 10:41 PM on December 12, 2016 [3 favorites]

> Is the Big Bad Wolf available for some kind of position on building standards and structural integrity?

WOW WE ARE BASICALLY ELECTING A WOLF IN WOLFS CLOTHING —NOT A WOLF, Nov 8
posted by christopherious at 10:42 PM on December 12, 2016 [4 favorites]

This is too perfect. 50 years ago to the day, this was a NYT headline: "Romney is victim of political hoax. Group backing Governor for Presidency is nonexistent" in which a nonexistent group was offering to back George Romney's campaign.
posted by zachlipton at 11:08 PM on December 12, 2016 [2 favorites]

In the Daily Show interview, Obama mentions that before the election they were concerned about vote tampering by Russia. He adds that we did not see any evidence of this.

Obama's concerns about this were described in one of the NYT or Washington Post stories released over the past few days. The description came from on by an anonymous source present for one of the pre-election briefings.

I'm kind of surprised to see him speaking openly about those concerns. (To be clear: Those concerns were pre-election. No evidence this actually happened.) Obama is a pretty reasonable guy. He does not seem like the type of person to say, "Yeah, we worried that Russia might mess with election systems," without that concern having been well-grounded.

It's something that's been on my mind lately, and Obama's comment makes me feel a little less paranoid.

Last summer I received a letter telling me that I had been moved to the "inactive voter" list as a result of undeliverable mail. Which is strange, because my mail goes straight to a PO box and I've never had any problems with delivery that I've been aware of. After being placed on the inactive list, voters are eventually purged. I am on the permanent early voter list, and don't believe that I would have received a ballot had I not called the county election office to fix the problem. (If anyone here knows Arizona election law better than I do, please correct me.)

I live in a blue county in a red state, but my state is getting less red thanks to demographic changes. If you could suppress voter turnout in a blue county, you could help keep the state red.

When election-related mail gets returned as undeliverable, at some point, some county worker has to process all that mail and, I guess, compile a list of voters that are eventually going to be purged.

This seems like a relatively easy attack point. It's hard to hack an air-gapped state registration database. It seems much easier for a hacker to edit a work-in-progress spreadsheet on a county election worker's PC. And eventually, that county-level voter-purge spreadsheet is somehow going to be incorporated into the state's voter registration database.

When I called the county election office they sounded understaffed. They were unable to fully comply with state election law — I had received the notice months after it should have been sent. If someone tampered with voter registration data at the county level, I'm not confident that county workers would have sufficiently robust safeguards to catch that tampering.

A Washington Post article from last summer mentions that one county election official in Arizona had his username and password stolen by Russian hackers. So they aren't just going after state-level systems. They are targeting county offices.

Anyway. This is just something that's been on my mind, and I apologize for the length of my comment. I mention my personal experience only to say that it's what got me thinking about a potential vulnerability in our system — I do not actually think that my "inactive voter" notice was a result of foul play. Mistakes happen, and in my case this was easily fixed. But it got me thinking about a potential vulnerability.
posted by compartment at 12:39 AM on December 13, 2016 [50 favorites]

Almost immediately after Trump won Putin doubled the number of planes bombing Syria. A month later: Aleppo: Assad forces within 'moments' of retaking city amid reports of atrocities
posted by PenDevil at 1:35 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

I'm hoping Tillerson talks with Trump about global warming.

I was thinking to do a whole FPP on this, but it's been posted here before, and I don't have much time this week.

It was on my radar again from a recent NPR Interview with David Kaiser, 5th gen. Rockefeller and president of the Rockefeller Family Fund (RFF). Good interview, but also includes obligatory "fair and balanced" shorter interview with an Exxon PR guy. Basically the RFF is was funding investigations into Exxon for conspiracy to cover up climate change. Kaiser co-authored recent articles (part 1, part 2) going deep into their findings.

Meanwile, Exxon is all "No conspiracy! You da conspiracy!" and suing the RFF for conspiracy to bring down Exxon.

On top of all their dealings in the Arctic with Russia, I really hope this all gets the attention it desperately deserves and keeps this shitbag billionaire out of the cabinet.
posted by p3t3 at 2:03 AM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

On top of all their dealings in the Arctic with Russia, I really hope this all gets the attention it desperately deserves and keeps this shitbag billionaire out of the cabinet.

Unlikely.

See the current profile of ExxonMobil's Tillerson in The New Yorker
posted by Mister Bijou at 2:18 AM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

> that thirty grand he outright stole would be meaningless to a true billionaire

I'm not contesting the idea that Trump may very well in reality be broke AF, but this caught my eye as... not necessarily true, IME.

Someone close to me spent years working for billionaires (not Trump, but there have been several people precisely of his ilk), and some of the stories of sociopathy and naked narcissism I could tell would seriously boggle your mind. Screwing over the little guy, cutting every possible cost at the expense of people working on the very bottom of the hierarchy, displaying breathtaking greed and pettiness - these were all run of the mill. Sometimes literally for just a couple of thousand euros, and this in luxury projects with budgets of hundreds of millions. I still haven't quite wrapped my head around it.

From the start, I've implicitly assumed Trump to be like this. Everything I've seen about him has supported that assumption. The strange combination of cunning, impulsiveness and Dunning-Kruger-esque stupidity also fits the bill. It's terrifying.

> The Chinese are not happy at all. -- China would introduce a series of new Taiwan polices, and may not prioritize peaceful reunification over a military takeover if Trump insisted on his provocations. (Link)

Oh dear god.

I predict that the rest of the world will come to regard USA under Trump as a potentially volatile factor, but as a super power, also a very ineffective and bumbling one, which will create a particularly unstable global power vacuum. We can expect all kinds of manipulations, skullduggery and downright power moves to start taking place very soon.

Silver lining: your next democratically elected president after Trump will get the Nobel Peace Prize right out of the gate again, won't they...
posted by sively at 2:20 AM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

In Trump's defense, it's hard to find cabinet secretaries whom Putin won't veto.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 3:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

Learning from Carrier, betting on Brexit: I just heard on the radio that SAS is threatening the Scandinavian governments to move out of Scandinavia unless they get significant tax cuts and deregulation. For the workers, moving to London (which was the SAS suggestion) would mean lower pay and higher costs of living. This is of course exactly the elite Brexiteers dream: that the UK outside of EU will be able to attract global companies looking for low taxes and underpaid workers - basically transforming the UK into a third world country, where the top ten percent do very well in their gated communities while the rest live in squalor. Thanks, all you angry white uncles - and aunts.
I wonder how many private companies are going to start threatening governments across the globe after the Carrier deal? It's not even limited to the US.
posted by mumimor at 3:25 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

In terms of the future, I've been thinking of the following:

Right now the Trump win is so overwhelming, both in its unexpected result, the odious nature of the candidate and man, the cabinet picks that are like different seasons of evil, the GOP moves to capitalize on the Trump win.

It's easy to see why people would be tempted to believe in an EC upset. Everything is just SO FUCKED UP that it's really hard to not believe that we would take an opportunity to unfuck ourselves.

So some shit will go down after Trump is inaugurated. Hell, maybe it will go down before. And then somebody on the left, somebody who is credible and charismatic, will use (and hopefully promote) the support of the reality-based word. Some mayor of a city inundated by floods, somebody who is heroically fighting the (earthquake, floods, wildfires) and can make an impassioned plea about things like the need for federal government.

It's hard being in this anxious space of being in a crisis with no power to address it, no person to rally behind (and my heart is still with HRC), and no plan going forward to dealing with what I think can be reasonably called an existential threat to humanity.

Somebody upthread mentioned that they were pleased to see that their Sanders supporter friends are working locally, and that's true for my Sanders supporter friend too, who is fairly evangelistic about the subject, giving me all sorts of local contacts. So that will keep me busy until our hero arrives.

And when that hero comes, boy, is she going to have my mother fucking support. Was I enthused for HRC before? Yep. Will I be savagely, passionately working for whoever will take Trump down? Oh fuck yes.

On the one hand, Trump is a motherfucking disaster. On the other hand, his election, I firmly believe, will activate millions of progressives. I guess that means conflict, but better that than rolling over.
posted by angrycat at 3:53 AM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

In the Daily Show interview, Obama mentions that before the election they were concerned about vote tampering by Russia. He adds that we did not see any evidence of this.

Here's a thing about leadership generally and the Presidency specifically that I don't think the Dilettante-in-Chief-Elect has even the capability to understand: you worry about stuff even when you have no evidence of it. You make plans and contingency plans based not on having the evidence, but on seeing the possibility. Of course people were concerned about tampering by Russia. They were also concerned about hurricanes and tampering by Australia and all kinds of shit that we never even thought of.

The thing is, you don't tweet about that stuff. You don't deploy hundreds of thousands of people halfway around the world because of that stuff. But you damn sure worry about it and have a couple of smart people at a desk somewhere who worry about it all the time.
posted by Etrigan at 4:15 AM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

Senior editor at National Review again.

@jaynordlinger:
America is set to be represented abroad by a man who received a friendship medal from a KGB thug who shot Nemtsov in the back. This matters.
posted by chris24 at 4:44 AM on December 13, 2016 [18 favorites]

Probably could be a FPP, but I made one yesterday, so:

My President Was Black: A history of the first African American White House—and of what came next, by Ta-Nehisi Coates
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 4:50 AM on December 13, 2016 [18 favorites]

2016 makes such strange allies.

@WalshFreedom:
Please America, don't move on from this Russia thing. This is different. This is disturbing.
Call your Congressman. Don't move on.
Not now
posted by chris24 at 5:05 AM on December 13, 2016 [15 favorites]

Old (2006) but still relevent from Dmitry Orlov,
Closing the 'Collapse Gap': the USSR was better prepared for collapse than the US.
posted by adamvasco at 5:14 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

2016 makes such strange allies.

@WalshFreedom:
Please America, don't move on from this Russia thing. This is different. This is disturbing.
Call your Congressman. Don't move on.
Not now.

I'll take "people who regret not endorsing HRC" for $1000, Alex.
posted by steady-state strawberry at 5:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [14 favorites]

And when that hero comes, boy, is she going to have my mother fucking support. Was I enthused for HRC before? Yep. Will I be savagely, passionately working for whoever will take Trump down? Oh fuck yes.

On the one hand, Trump is a motherfucking disaster. On the other hand, his election, I firmly believe, will activate millions of progressives. I guess that means conflict, but better that than rolling over.

Yeah, also, as someone in the Russia thread pointed out: The Russians potentially have compromising information on every single Republican currently in office. The anti-establishment energy that is available to be tapped if this is done right is practically incalculable.

I have a dream where the Democrats take aim at every single Republican incumbent with a single-minded, high-drama, Fake News Worthy, "susceptible to Russian blackmail" scorched-Earth attack. We can't trust any of them! They could all be Russian stooges! Chase them the fuck out, screaming RUSSIAN SPY RUSSIAN SPY RUSSIAN SPY, replace them with a bunch of young, fresh-faced firebrands, and start again.
posted by pretentious illiterate at 5:26 AM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

I'll take "people who regret not endorsing HRC" for $1000, Alex.

Trump's Twitter account actually blocked him.
posted by Talez at 5:28 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

But I've got to say, it is flat out wrong-headed to believe that sixty million Trump voters hate us. I talk to some of them every single day too. In real life, not online. And the worst I have encountered is veiled contempt, and that seldom. Sharing the same physical space, and being in a position to look people in the eye, garners a different set of responses than the semi-anonymity of online interaction.

yeah if you're a dude you're not actually qualified to say this. if you're also straight and white (I don't know if you are or not) you're really not qualified to say this.
posted by winna at 5:29 AM on December 13, 2016 [46 favorites]

Is anyone aware of blogs or, yes, even Tweets (ugh) of insiders who are reporting what's happening "on the ground"? Not reporters as such, but ppl who work in/around these rumbling fault lines?

I, for one, would be an avid reader.
posted by petebest at 5:30 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Further thoughts from Craig Murray, who I know lots of you don't like, but that is not my problem.
Obama/Clinton have perished politically as an example of the ultimate in political hubris. Downed by their own surveillance super state. Obama/Clinton’s War on Whistleblowers resulted in the most humiliating of defeats, and now they are political history. This is karma for their persecution of some of the best people in their nation.
posted by adamvasco at 5:39 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

The Russians potentially have compromising information on every single Republican currently in office.

Unfortunately, the same is true of the Democrats. I'm very certain that anything truly juicy that was obtained from the DNC hack is being held for more interesting uses than fucking with this election.
posted by Candleman at 5:45 AM on December 13, 2016

Further thoughts from Craig Murray, who I know lots of you don't like, but that is not my problem.

=D
posted by ominous_paws at 5:51 AM on December 13, 2016

But wouldn't that "juicy information" have to have been on the DNC servers to start with? How bad could it have been that they'd store it on the DNC servers?
posted by petebest at 5:52 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

>Further thoughts from Craig Murray, who I know lots of you don't like, but that is not my problem.

Obama/Clinton have perished politically as an example of the ultimate in political hubris. Downed by their own surveillance super state. Obama/Clinton’s War on Whistleblowers resulted in the most humiliating of defeats, and now they are political history. This is karma for their persecution of some of the best people in their nation.

I'm not anti-whistle-blower, and I don't agree with the Obama Administration's position on the security/surveillance state -- but I also think if Mr. Murray is going to insinuate that the Podesta emails actually were released because of a disgruntled whistleblower within the US government, he should maybe provide some evidence? Or at least, state his position openly rather than coyly forcing his readers to look between the lines of his blog-rant.
posted by tivalasvegas at 5:55 AM on December 13, 2016 [22 favorites]

Trump working with the Russians to suppress votes and spread fake news virii around makes him smart. If Hillary was so great she would have made that illegal.

/hurl
posted by petebest at 5:58 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Imagine what would have happened if Hillary barely defeated Trump. All of this systemic rot and evil may have been gleefully overlooked. Hillary would have been attacked, destroyed and probably impeached by the Republican Congress.

I think Trump did us a favor in showing us: this is how bad it really is.

In other news: vote Sideshow Bob, he never allowed attempted murderers (like Sideshow Bob) out of jail.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 6:02 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

I also think if Mr. Murray is going to insinuate that the Podesta emails actually were released because of a disgruntled whistleblower within the US government, he should maybe provide some evidence?

He replies in the comments:

"Yes, why don’t I give out all the details so they can arrest them, put them naked in solitary and throw away the key?"
posted by Coda Tronca at 6:05 AM on December 13, 2016

Just Breitbart casually joking about shooting scientists.
posted by zombieflanders at 6:07 AM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

Does he ever say what exactly in the emails would plausibly prompt someone to risk arrest in order to leak them? Is it the risotto?
posted by soren_lorensen at 6:08 AM on December 13, 2016 [22 favorites]

The current line on the nuttier end of the right appears to be to suggest that the DNC leak was carried out by Seth Rich who was then shot by the Clintons.

This particular story doesn’t make a great deal of sense, but it’s chum in the water to distract the sharks.
posted by pharm at 6:08 AM on December 13, 2016

Sarah Kilff, Vox: Why Obamacare enrollees voted for Trump — In Whitley County, Kentucky, the uninsured rate declined 60 percent under Obamacare. So why did 82 percent of voters there support Donald Trump?

This Trump voter didn't think Trump was serious about repealing her health insurance

I don't know, I guess I thought that, you know, he would not do this. That they would not do this, would not take the insurance away. Knowing that it's affecting so many peoples lives. I mean, what are you to do then if you cannot... purchase, cannot pay for the insurance?

posted by tonycpsu at 6:16 AM on December 13, 2016 [46 favorites]

Coda Tronca: "Yes, why don’t I give out all the details so they can arrest them, put them naked in solitary and throw away the key?"

Craig Murray had no problem naming one of Julian Assange's rape accusers by name on national TV, so his defense of whistleblowers seems subject to his whims.
posted by bluecore at 6:19 AM on December 13, 2016 [52 favorites]

what are you to do then if you cannot... purchase, cannot pay for the insurance?

basically, you're fucked.
also leopard/face/etc...
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 6:19 AM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

He replies in the comments:

"Yes, why don’t I give out all the details so they can arrest them, put them naked in solitary and throw away the key?"

Sooo... the vast US surveillance state is scooping up ALL THE EMAILS and all the electronic correspondence and storing it for unending analysis but they will only figure out the identities of the mastermind rebel leakers if this dude accidentally gives out too many details on his blog?

I mean, these purported leakers should already be hiding in Ecuador (at least, definitely should be making plans to leave the US before 1/20, anyway) or they're pretty much dead meat. Meanwhile, if the Podesta leaks and various ratfuckeries are actually coming from the Deep State rather than the (presumably scapegoated) Russians, probably the guy who KNOWS ALL ABOUT IT should make his clear, incontrovertible evidence publicly available ASAP.

Otherwise, what's the point? It's not like Trump & Co. are going to do anything about the stuff that got him in the White House?

(alternative theory, and bear with me here for just a minute... Murray might be full of shit.)
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:20 AM on December 13, 2016 [20 favorites]

I don't know, I guess I thought that, you know, he would not do this. That they would not do this, would not take the insurance away. Knowing that it's affecting so many peoples lives. I mean, what are you to do then if you cannot... purchase, cannot pay for the insurance?

Who was it that said: "Trump's supporters took him seriously, but not literally; the media took him literally, but not seriously"?

I think that's a pretty good analysis.
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

My absolute favorite thing about any of the CLINTONS HAD THIS GUY KILLED conspiracy theories is the way some of them, at their nuttiest fringes, drift into the idea that maybe the Clintons did it themselves, like stepping out of the shadows, clad in sleek black leather gloves holding a walther ppk

That is comforting in a way, it shows even the altest of righters still can recognize Hillary's sheer abundance of talent and ability.
posted by gusottertrout at 6:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [19 favorites]

My absolute favorite thing about any of the CLINTONS HAD THIS GUY KILLED conspiracy theories is the way some of them, at their nuttiest fringes, drift into the idea that maybe the Clintons did it themselves, like stepping out of the shadows, clad in sleek black leather gloves holding a walther ppk

I've had the same thought and in my version the crime is always narrated by the serious TV announcer who used to tell you to stay tuned for a hard-hitting LA Law in which characters bite off more than they can chew and shocking revelations will chill you to the bone... after an all new laugh-out-loud episode of Night Court!
posted by Servo5678 at 6:25 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

tivalasvegas, it was the Peter Thiel who made the literrally/seriously observation.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 6:26 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Yeah, if you voted for Trump and now are facing the loss of your ACA-based insurance, I have zero pity for you.

I have a good amount of pity for them, I don't believe that people deserve to suffer even if they're idiots and assholes who fucked everyone else over on their way down out of a deluded sense of cultural and racial persecution.

Mind you, I'm also spittingly furious at them. But they still deserve genuine and affordable access to medical care because health care is a universal human right.
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:29 AM on December 13, 2016 [36 favorites]

Trump owes at least $700m+ in loans
posted by PenDevil at 6:30 AM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

tivalasvegas, it was the Peter Thiel who made the literrally/seriously observation.

oh shit

is that true

I... I'm trapped in the opposite of an appeal-to-authority fallacy, help!
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:31 AM on December 13, 2016 [15 favorites]

Gosh. I hope those Trump voters who didn't believe him when he said he'd repeal the ACA are calling their representatives regularly to let them know how much they like the ACA...
posted by R343L at 6:33 AM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

But they still deserve genuine and affordable access to medical care because health care is a universal human right.

Which they actively voted to deny themselves and millions of others.

I mean, the Republican house voted how many times to repeal the ACA, without any plan to replace it? How many times did Trump say he would repeal it during his campaign?

I have zero patience or pity for the "I didn't think they'd really *do* the thing they repeatedly said they'd do, and tried to do!" excuse. None. Just seething anger.
posted by Roommate at 6:34 AM on December 13, 2016 [18 favorites]

Energy Dept. rejects Trump’s request to name climate change workers
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:36 AM on December 13, 2016 [78 favorites]

Just Breitbart casually joking about shooting scientists.

And invoking Nazi propaganda at the same time!
posted by Sophie1 at 6:40 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

I mean, yeah, health care is a universal human right, but I think what it's come down to is that I don't have the well of kindness anymore. Given that, at the very least, they're okay with bigotry and are willing to cut off their collective noses to spite their face, I'm at the point where I really don't care if they bleed out.

It's not even anger anymore at what they've done to themselves. You can keep bringing a horse to water, but if they won't drink, after a while, why bring them to water in the first place?

Yeah, I got you. Not mad at anyone who has no fucks to give anymore for those folks.
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:40 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

Yeah, if you voted for Trump and now are facing the loss of your ACA-based insurance, I have zero pity for you.

I'm inclined to feel that way as well. But in the case of the Kentuckians interviewed in that Vox article, some of them had no idea that their health insurance is ACA. Why? Because Congressional Republicans succeeded in making "Obamacare" such a dirty word that the only way Kentucky could get people to sign up is by lying and telling them it wasn't ACA but a "state-run plan."

Jesus wept.
posted by FelliniBlank at 6:41 AM on December 13, 2016 [19 favorites]

The seriously/literally quote was Salena Zito in the Atlantic, not Peter Think, so appeal to authority at will.
posted by notyou at 6:41 AM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

@KatyTurNBC: Sr intelligence source says real concern is antagonism among top Trump picks toward Iran. Says its eerily similar to Bush admin towards Iraq

She also notes that Mattis is on board with this, which shouldn't be surprising to a lot of us. I think that, contrary to the lines we're being fed by his admirers, we'll find out that Mattis is more "warrior" than "monk." Worse, it's probably a good bet that he's just your average Trumpskyite rarin' to bomb Muslims into the Stone Age, regional and global consequences be damned.
posted by zombieflanders at 6:41 AM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

You know, I will say that I feel sorry for Trump voters who thought they wouldn't lose their insurance. I also feel angry at them, of course, but partly I do feel pity because these people are intellectually impoverished and have been made so both by classism and, perversely, by white supremacy. They've been raised to be suckers and they get conned all the time by the government, and their intellectual and cultural resources have been stripped away in favor of "you are the real 'Murricans, take your shitty education and your wasted potential and defend it to the death against anyone who might improve things".
posted by Frowner at 6:43 AM on December 13, 2016 [25 favorites]

because health care is a universal human right.

Supporting transcripts from the same article
"And when they had the Christmas programs, some of the area programs will say to the teachers, “I want a list of your poorest kids,” and get them clothes and toys and stuff. They are not the one that needs help. They are the one that's getting the welfare and the food stamps, the electric bill paid for, everything. It's the ones that’s working and barely scraping by that—"

These people voted for Trump in no small part because others were getting help they didn't feel like they deserved.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:43 AM on December 13, 2016 [59 favorites]

You can keep bringing a horse to water, but if they won't drink, after a while, why bring them to water in the first place?

Because horses need water to live?
posted by petebest at 6:44 AM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

Reading that article ... how did this person have a better health insurance plan before the ACA with no deductible, lower premiums and tiny copays?

She didn't, she would've had non-conforming catastrophic only coverage that barely covered anything at all. Those plans were "affordable", but not really "health insurance" by any reasonable measure. A lot of people were upset that Obamacare "took away" their shitty not-actually-insurance "insurance" plans. This was the whole genesis of the "if you like your plan, you can keep it" attacks.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:45 AM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

Yeah, the Kentucky case is particularly heartbreaking since it was really a shining example of how a deep-red state could do a really good job of implementing the ACA and helping a lot of its poorest citizens, and yeah, they had to totally decouple the branding from anything Obama-related to make it work politically. (It was called Kynect.) I would look up stats but I'm already supposed to be getting ready for work...

Anyway, the deplorable end to the story begins when Kentucky voters booted out their Democratic governor in favor of a Republican who swiftly started to dismantle Kynect, the asshole.
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:46 AM on December 13, 2016 [17 favorites]

A few deleted. Coda Tronca, please drop the Chelsea Manning derail.
posted by taz (staff) at 6:48 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Anyway, the deplorable end to the story begins when Kentucky voters booted out their Democratic governor in favor of a Republican who swiftly started to dismantle Kynect, the asshole.

And they voted for him after he explicitly campaigned on ending Kynect. Not ending "Obamacare", on ending the rebranded Kynect effort by name.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:48 AM on December 13, 2016 [14 favorites]

Reading that article ... how did this person have a better health insurance plan before the ACA with no deductible, lower premiums and tiny copays? I've worked in tech for 15+ years and always have had what I thought were great benefits and there was always a deductible, even if sometimes it was only like $250 or $500. The article appears to let stand the implication that the ACA has something to do with losing that great plan.

Emblem Health (formerly GHI) and Blue Cross Blue Shield always used to offer plans without deductibles and low copays if you used a participating provider. Emblem still does, afaik. In the old days, both companies' premiums often weren't outrageously expensive compared to some others. Don't know what they're like now.
posted by zarq at 6:49 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

Thanks T.D.Strange. I'd of course heard of those plans (I almost bought one myself in college). But no one I knew described them as "better" than a normal health plan. They were at best just "better than nothing" since insurance with real coverage was absurdly expensive on the open market. I should remind myself that we all fool ourselves about something and for this person one thing is this.
posted by R343L at 6:51 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

She didn't, she would've had non-conforming catastrophic only coverage that barely covered anything at all. Those plans were "affordable", but not really "health insurance" by any reasonable measure. A lot of people were upset that Obamacare "took away" their shitty not-actually-insurance "insurance" plans. This was the whole genesis of the "if you like your plan, you can keep it" attacks.

And so, children, the moral of the story* is that health care in the 21st century is expensive, especially if you're insisting on a hyper-fragmented multi-payor private insurance model for payments, so if you want reasonably comprehensive access to health care within those parameters, you have to provide income-based premium and co-insurance subsidies and mandate the purchase of insurance to ensure a well-balanced risk pool, while also implementing longer-term reforms and projects to find ways to bring down the rise in medical costs while maintaining good-quality health outcomes.

*ok, Aesop I'm not.

really going to get ready for work now
posted by tivalasvegas at 6:52 AM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

Kanye (and entourage) arrives for a meeting at Trump Tower. Real life.
posted by PenDevil at 6:53 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Kanye (and entourage) arrives for a meeting at Trump Tower.

Which Cabinet positions haven't been filled yet?
posted by EarBucket at 6:54 AM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

I do not actually think that my "inactive voter" notice was a result of foul play. Mistakes happen, and in my case this was easily fixed.

Just to say, it may well have been foul play but almost certainly not any sort of hacking. Fucking with voters this way is something Republicans have been doing for decades. Either the state or county administrators -- or some Republican group if AZ allows third-party challenges -- might just be lying about undeliverable mail, or pretending that you throwing away a piece of obvious junk mail instead of replying to it meant that you don't live where you live.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 6:56 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

Kanye (and entourage) arrives for a meeting at Trump Tower. Real life.

it's a wonder trump tower can hold so many bloated egos without suffering serious structural damage
posted by entropicamericana at 6:56 AM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

Kanye (and entourage) arrives for a meeting at Trump Tower. Real life.

Good. At least maybe we won't have to worry about idiot Democrats deciding it would be awesome to nominate that jackass in 2020. I've heard "haha, we should run Kanye" more often than I am comfortable with.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 6:58 AM on December 13, 2016 [20 favorites]

trump exploiting the mentally ill to distract the media is … well i'd say a new low but we're talking about donald trump
posted by murphy slaw at 7:01 AM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

Here's a direct accusation schroedinger mentions: "You had what was very clear relationships between members of the President-elect's campaign team and Russians and a professed shared view on a bunch of issues."

I was hoping for something more direct than that. Relationships and shared views aren't going to stop this train. We need clear evidence of collusion, and I think Obama would have spoken more plainly if there was any indication that the intelligence community had that.
posted by diogenes at 7:01 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Which Cabinet positions haven't been filled yet?

Ambassador to Blac Chyna.
posted by drezdn at 7:02 AM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

You’ll no doubt be delighted to know that mefi’s own Scott Adams thinks that Kanye is prepping for a run at the presidency in a decade or two. Dropping in on Trump doesn’t falsify that line of thinking one iota.
posted by pharm at 7:03 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

These people voted for Trump in no small part because others were getting help they didn't feel like they deserved.

Yeah, and this is the heart of the problem. Lots and lots of Trump voters who will lose their insurance coverage probably had a "fuck you, I got mine" mentality. They don't think other people deserve support from the government that they're paying for.

Welp. Hoist on their own fucking petard. What a shame learning their lesson comes at the cost of millions of people.

30 million will lose their insurance. 9.3 million will lose the government subsidies that help them purchase marketplace coverage. Nearly 36,000 people per year will probably die because Obamacare was the only way they were able to have coverage with their pre-existing conditions. Of the 10 leading causes of American deaths annually, only two are not linked to disease: accidents and suicide. The rest are: heart disease, cancer, chronic lower respiratory diseases, strokes, Alzheimer's, Diabetes, the flu and pneumonia, and kidney disease. Repealing the ACA is going to kill Americans. It will also cause a rise in insurance premiums, because healthy people won't be able to pay for coverage..

Universal healthcare helps society. It helps the economy. It helps keep people out of bankruptcy. It supports small businesses who otherwise struggle to cover their employees (or choose not to cover them at all.) The benefits FAR outweigh the costs. No other nation uses our unique private insurance system which penalizes the sick by charging them more, by reducing their benefits, or by denying care altogether.

But hey, they didn't think he'd actually do it.

Not exactly a comfort, is it?
posted by zarq at 7:07 AM on December 13, 2016 [68 favorites]

I've said it before and I will continue saying it.

It's unfortunate, but a lot of people are going to get a wake up call about how you can' t take the social safety net away from some people (you know, those people) without taking it away from everyone.
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:09 AM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

Donald Trump's Meeting With Tech Leaders Will Focus On U.S. Jobs, Forbes reports: "Silicon Valley will hold its collective breath Wednesday afternoon as its leaders ascend a Manhattan skyscraper with golden elevators to meet a man that many in tech had openly opposed during his campaign. Aside from venture capitalist and Facebook board member Thiel, no other influential technology leader voiced their support of Trump prior to the election, leaving the industry and its interests exposed following his victory. One person close to the campaign noted that the meeting was Trump’s way of “asserting dominance” over an industry that had been so cold to his candidacy."

Want to bet it will go about as well as Trump's sitdown with newspaper editors last month (the one that a leaker to the NY Post described as a "a fucking firing squad")? If the tech people are savvy in the ways of dealing with Trump, they'll make sure it's on the record and will release a full transcript afterward for people to read his unredacted blatherings.
posted by Doktor Zed at 7:11 AM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

It seems to be a common theme amongst poorer voters on the right that they don’t really believe that they are recipients of government funded welfare programs (they’re not like *those* people) so attacks on welfare recipients don’t read to them as attacks on people like them. Identification is everything.
posted by pharm at 7:16 AM on December 13, 2016 [16 favorites]

> it is flat out wrong-headed to believe that sixty million Trump voters hate us

yeah if you're a dude you're not actually qualified to say this. if you're also straight and white (I don't know if you are or not) you're really not qualified to say this.

Um. I will point out that "us" in this context was originally invoked by maxsparber, making this "white/straight/male people are not actually qualified to offer a viewpoint" response absurd on its face. I get the intended point. But in this instance it amounts to moving the goalposts.

But let's set that aside that and construe "us" more broadly. The idea is still paranoid-delusional, right? I'm not just throwing words around carelessly. I mean, I understand that emotions are running high, and I absolutely acknowledge that there's a lot of unbridled hatred being thrown around, but do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?
posted by perspicio at 7:17 AM on December 13, 2016

I have about as much faith in Rubio standing for principles as a dingo safely sitting a baby.

Marco Rubio Raises ‘Serious Concerns’ About Rex Tillerson for Secretary of State

“While Rex Tillerson is a respected businessman, I have serious concerns about his nomination,” Rubio said in a statement.

Other Republicans have praised Tillerson, but his close ties to Russia could make for a contentious Senate confirmation hearing, especially amid increasing allegations of Russian interference in the presidential election.

“The next secretary of state must be someone who views the world with moral clarity, is free of potential conflicts of interest, has a clear sense of America’s interests, and will be a forceful advocate for America’s foreign policy goals to the president, within the administration, and on the world stage,” Rubio said. “I look forward to learning more about his record and his views.‎ I will do my part to ensure he receives a full and fair but also thorough hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.”

posted by chris24 at 7:18 AM on December 13, 2016

Also, the people who will likely be affected most be the loss of Obamacare won't be a male demographic group, but women. Women will be inordinately affected if and when the ACA is repealed.

Obamacare specifically targeted women for coverage, because they had been treated unfairly for decades by insurance companies and the medical industry. They were charged more for being women. Their coverage was not equal to men. Maternity coverage was not universal among insurance companies. Some companies would refuse to cover a woman if she'd survived breast or ovarian cancer. Or they'd just charge her more. Under the ACA, mammograms and colonoscopies were FREE if you had private insurance. No co-pay. So were well-woman visits, breastfeeding support, gestational diabetes screenings, HPV screenings and testing and other services that women need to stay safe and healthy.
posted by zarq at 7:19 AM on December 13, 2016 [42 favorites]

Kanye is a distraction from the fact that he delayed his press conference about business conflicts, likely until after the electors vote next Monday.
posted by zombieflanders at 7:19 AM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

We're still at the point where everything he does is a distraction from something else.
posted by Etrigan at 7:21 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

Yes?
posted by rabbitrabbit at 7:21 AM on December 13, 2016 [23 favorites]

Trump on meeting with Kanye at Trump Tower: "We discussed life"
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:22 AM on December 13, 2016

Kanye is a distraction from the fact that he delayed his press conference about business conflicts

Does anybody seriously think Trump has, or will have, any kind of plan to clear up his conflicts of interest? Other than the obvious lolconflictsofinterest? Is there a single person who thinks the "press conference" would be anything but fifteen minutes of puffery about how tremendous and wonderful all of his many holdings are followed by no questions of any substance?
posted by uncleozzy at 7:23 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Define "hate."

Do I think they are going to come throw bricks through my window? Nah, probably not.

Do I think they want to deny me the right to have control over my own body? Yep.
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [55 favorites]

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

I see little difference between the guy who hoists the rope at the lynching and the guy who sold him the rope, knowing full well what it would be used for, but then shrugs and says "Gosh, I wish things were different."
posted by Etrigan at 7:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [62 favorites]

but do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

I don't think there's any of the two-way respect or understanding that would allow us to not hate each other right now because Trumpism is so ideologically abhorrent to a lot of us and social liberalism is so ideologically abhorrent to many conservatives.
posted by Talez at 7:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

It seems to be a common theme amongst poorer voters on the right that they don’t really believe that they are recipients of government funded welfare programs

In fairness, that's hardly unique to poorer voters or Republicans. Ask middle class suburbanites who among them receives housing welfare, and almost none will say yes even though the federal government pays 25 or 28\% of their mortgage interest for them.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 7:27 AM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

If we're taking a poll: I'm a straight white guy, but I'm also a New York Jew who works for the mainstream media. Yes, I absolutely believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate me.
posted by neroli at 7:27 AM on December 13, 2016 [18 favorites]

social liberalism is so ideologically abhorrent to many conservatives

Maybe the problem is that social liberalism is being defined down to "equal rights." Those rights, of course, not actually being equal, just better than they were before.
posted by zombieflanders at 7:27 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

@amyewalter: Guys, Rick Perry was Gov of a state that produces lots of oil - not that crazy to think he could be head of Dept of Energy (via)

That's a NUCLEAR MELTDOWN temperature take right there.
posted by tonycpsu at 7:31 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

I believe that they would if they were aware of several facts about me that I happen to be privileged enough to keep well hidden if I need/choose to do so. I can hide being queer. I can hide being mentally ill (most of the time, when things aren't too bad). I can hide that pretty much everyone I love is some combination of queer, mentally ill, and physically disabled. I could marry my long-term male partner if I wanted to hide how little I value 'traditional' family structures. I'm old enough that I'm mostly no longer expected to have kids if I haven't by now, so I can hide that I never, ever wanted to have them to begin with. I can hide that I'm of Jewish descent, and an atheist. And that pretty much everyone I love is one or more of these things.

I'm white and I have some money and I grew up surrounded by conservatives so if I wanted to, I could talk a good game about states rights and whatever the fuck; I'd probably have to do a quick crash course on the current dogwhistles.

Basically, I can pass for someone that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters don't actively hate.

But I shouldn't have to, and doing so would be a betrayal of myself and pretty much everyone I love, most of whom have fewer options for hiding those things than I do. So assuming I'm not crushing everything important to me down into a tiny little ball at the bottom of my heart - yes, I believe the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate me and everyone I love.
posted by Stacey at 7:32 AM on December 13, 2016 [50 favorites]

Maybe the problem is that social liberalism is being defined down to "equal rights." Those rights, of course, not actually being equal, just better than they were before.

It's not just that. "Sensible" people can bitch about the federal government doing things for people just as well as the nut jobs.
posted by Talez at 7:32 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

I've lived in the southern US all my life and grew up in a fundamentalist church. I've heard the rhetoric they use when they think they're with their own.

My answer is an unqualified yes.
posted by winna at 7:33 AM on December 13, 2016 [62 favorites]

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

I recall huddling in my house near Boston while Sandy raged outside. The Bradford pear tree outside my house bent all the way that its top touched the ground. My wife, daughter, and mother in law were with us. And I was on my laptop checking CNN and other news sites to see if the storm was going to give us a direct hit.

And I read the comments.

Allegedly salt-of-the-earth real Americans wishing my entire town would blow down and drown.

So, well, not the overwhelming majority, necessarily. But active hatred? Active malice towards fellow Americans? It is definitely there.
posted by ocschwar at 7:37 AM on December 13, 2016 [28 favorites]

CDC Transition Memo. (DocumentCloud)
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:38 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Old (2006) but still relevent from Dmitry Orlov,
Closing the 'Collapse Gap': the USSR was better prepared for collapse than the US.

Orlov's Russian chauvinist gloating over recent events is, well, deplorable, but his writings about his experience during the USSR's downfall, and its parallels to the US, are a must-read.
posted by ocschwar at 7:38 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

but do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

They didn't embrace white supremacist fascism for the Reagan or Obama of racist fascism, they did it for an imbecilic unhinged conman. And they didn't do it in 2008 when the economy was truly bad and shit was hitting the fan. They did it with the employment rate at 4.6% after 70+ months of job growth, the stock market up 250%, the uninsured rate down to single digits and taxes near historical lows. That's how easy it was for them to go to the dark side. That takes a lot of tribalism, hate and bigotry.
posted by chris24 at 7:39 AM on December 13, 2016 [62 favorites]

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

Yes.

They voted for a guy who campaigned on hate. In fact, he made it a cornerstone of his candidacy. Those supporters have told us for months whom they hate in interviews. Hate crimes and hate speech against members of groups that Trump vilified are now reaching epic proportions.

Quod erat demonstrandum.
posted by zarq at 7:40 AM on December 13, 2016 [26 favorites]

Basically, I can pass for someone that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters don't actively hate.

But I shouldn't have to, and doing so would be a betrayal of myself and pretty much everyone I love, most of whom have fewer options for hiding those things than I do. So assuming I'm not crushing everything important to me down into a tiny little ball at the bottom of my heart - yes, I believe the overwhelming majority of Trump supports actively hate me and everyone I love.

This. I hear them talk about immigrants. I hear them talking about the poor. I hear them talking about minorities. They do it right in front of me sometimes (like a very awkward Uber ride) where I just nod and go "uh huh".

What scares me though, is knowing that if I were from deep red West Virginia, growing up in these conditions, I'd probably be the person on the other side of the conversation. What inoculates me from this hatred, this fervor, is the people I know. I know people from all over the world, all sorts of ethnicities, all sorts of religions, all sorts of orientations. I know they're just normal decent people for the most part because I interact with them every day. I have empirical, unqualified proof that the racists, the bigots, the white supremacists are wrong. Without that though? I'm absolutely terrified of what I might think because the rhetoric is so seductive.
posted by Talez at 7:40 AM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

There have been news reports that the Trump administration is having trouble finding musicians willing to perform at the inaugural festivities, and Kanye West is a musical performer (of sorts) who has expressed admiration for Trump. So maybe their meeting is about Trump asking West to perform at the inauguration? Seems like quite a publicity opportunity for two people who like publicity very much.
posted by Nat "King" Cole Porter Wagoner at 7:40 AM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

Yeah, define "hate" here. Perfectly pleasant on a non-political one-to-one basis? Sure. At best indifferent, and at worst gleeful about the material damage that their choices inflict upon us as a group, in exchange for feeling good about themselves and fuck all else? Yeah. A lot of them wish that we'd go away -- that they could close their eyes and say a prayer and that when they opened them again everybody who upsets their view of the world has vanished.
posted by holgate at 7:43 AM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

The tonal dissonance of Kanye performing at Trump's inauguration would seem almost...appropriate at this point? Isn't there also typically a poet chosen to speak?
posted by C'est la D.C. at 7:45 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

...and Kanye West is a musical performer (of sorts) who has expressed admiration for Trump. So maybe their meeting is about Trump asking West to perform at the inauguration? Seems like quite a publicity opportunity for two people who like publicity very much.

Kanye "George Bush doesn't care about Black people" West is going to perform for a man who was literally sued by the federal government in 1973 for discrimination because he refused to rent to African Americans?

Does this seem unlikely to anyone else or is it just me?
posted by zarq at 7:49 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Do I believe the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate me?

Trump pushed fearing Muslims. That is hating me.
Trump pushed fearing "illegals." That is hating me.
Trump talked about grabbing women by their pussies. That is hating me.
Trump talked about minorities having too many rights. That is hating me.
Trump has appointed those who would put through an anti-gay agenda. That is hating me.
Trump is seeking to end critical health care to millions. That is hating me.

I belong to the human race.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 7:49 AM on December 13, 2016 [54 favorites]

There have been news reports that the Trump administration is having trouble finding musicians willing to perform at the inaugural festivities...

2017 US Presidential Inauguration music (may not be entirely true)(or it might be).
posted by Wordshore at 7:49 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Does this seem unlikely to anyone else or is it just me?

Kanye West: If I voted, I would have voted for Trump
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:52 AM on December 13, 2016

2017 US Presidential Inauguration music (may not be entirely true)(or it might be).

This seems more likely, no?
posted by zarq at 7:53 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Kanye West: If I voted, I would have voted for Trump

That's appalling.
posted by zarq at 7:56 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Kanye West: If I voted, I would have voted for Trump
That's appalling.
That's Kanye.
posted by oneswellfoop at 7:57 AM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

Is it just me or does Rex Tillerson look like a Powers Boothe character?
posted by drezdn at 8:06 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

That's Kanye.

Despite his foibles, public arrogance and outsized ego, I've always thought of West as a strong advocate against racism. It's a common topic for him in interviews, and he makes a lot of sense on the subject. He's correct that it's not simply a black and white issue and we would be better off with a more complex understanding that it permeates this country, has very deep roots and hurts us all. His support of Trump is disappointing to me.
posted by zarq at 8:07 AM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

"Is it hate?" basically doesn't matter. The operative phrase here is "Intent is not magic."

It doesn't matter how compassionate you are to others, in your deepest heart of hearts, if your actions hurt those same people.

It is easy for human beings to indulge in maudlin feelings about their love of people in a group (Hate the sin not the sinner! Little black babies are just so cute! That Mexican lady who shampoos me at the hairdresser is so nice!) while still taking actions that directly harm that group.

So I absolutely believe that many Trump voters don't think they hate the people they are hurting. But their actions are hateful, and therefore their intent is irrelevant.
posted by emjaybee at 8:07 AM on December 13, 2016 [56 favorites]

Sharing the same physical space, and being in a position to look people in the eye, garners a different set of responses than the semi-anonymity of online interaction.

Why would you believe that what they'll say to your face is a truer representation of what they believe than what they'll say anonymously online, or in the voting booth, where they voted for a man who ran on hatred?
posted by Mavri at 8:08 AM on December 13, 2016 [14 favorites]

So, well, not the overwhelming majority, necessarily. But active hatred? Active malice towards fellow Americans? It is definitely there.

When they've scrapped all climate research and destroyed all copies of records, Stephen Harper-style, and then Middle America gets hammered by rising waters and hurricanes and crop failures, there'll be successful-looking televangelists to explain these events as divine punishment for tolerating the existence of gays and gender-nonconformists and liberalism and miscegenation and general disrespect for God's Law in the decadent coastal Sodoms and Gomorrahs that are supposedly under the divine authority of the United States. And it won't take long for a mob to gather to enact retribution.
posted by acb at 8:09 AM on December 13, 2016 [22 favorites]

Please. Kanye is probably not performing at the inauguration. Trump is merely taking time from his rigorous schedule of intelligence briefing avoidance today to discuss some of the deep cuts on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy and 808s and Heartbreak. And appoint Kanye as Secretary of Agriculture.
posted by Cookiebastard at 8:10 AM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

That makes no sense. Kanye is not against the existence of agriculture.
posted by prefpara at 8:11 AM on December 13, 2016 [29 favorites]

DirtyOldTown: Mike Hot-Pence, the gay Mike Pence impersonator who wears only hot pants.

Man, that guy is a class act. He's putting the vice into vice president-elect, and the fun into christian fundamentalism.

US Americans, I'm very worried about you folks. But let me just say that some of the many faces of your activism are as heartening as they are gorgeous.
posted by Too-Ticky at 8:12 AM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

Does this seem unlikely to anyone else or is it just me?

Kanye West is mentally ill. I don't mean this as a way of saying he's deficient or unethical or stupid. He is genuinely mentally ill and this has been increasingly clear for years now. He's only been recently released from inpatient commitment after a reported breakdown. I think he's a man of great talent who has shown ability in harnessing it for political and social commentary. I also think he's not capable of doing so at the moment, because the media and celebrity machine that has arisen around him and his wife benefit off of instability and scandal, and mental wellness does not breed those.

Also, I think we are absolutely meant to focus on whether Kanye West will be playing at Trump's inauguration rather on whether or not Trump committed treason.
posted by Anonymous at 8:12 AM on December 13, 2016

It's not surprising that Trump and Kanye see eye to eye. Both have an overblown sense of their own superiority and an affinity for ostentation and marrying glamour models.
posted by acb at 8:13 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Probably waiting to see if the head of Monsanto or DOW wants to head Agriculture.
posted by drezdn at 8:13 AM on December 13, 2016

Also, I think we are absolutely meant to focus on whether Kanye West will be playing at Trump's inauguration rather on whether or not Trump committed treason.

If you're implying that I (or we) should shut up about this because there are more important topics to be discussed, then I'm sorry, but no.
posted by zarq at 8:16 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Kanye also hates women. So, who knows. But wasting time talking about him is falling into a familiar trap. Even I'm doing it.
posted by agregoli at 8:17 AM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

Ray Lewis entering Trump Tower even though Sec of Defense has ostensibly been filled.

I guess it's Meet With Black Guy Tuesday.
posted by Etrigan at 8:18 AM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

Is it just me or does Rex Tillerson look like a Powers Boothe character?

Let's hope it doesn't turn out to be Jim Jones.
posted by FelliniBlank at 8:18 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Am I the only one who thinks "Rex Tillerson" might as well be a cardboard cutout of a shady villain in an airport novel? The 2016 writers are really scraping the bottom of the oil barrel at this point.
posted by lydhre at 8:19 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

I don't give a shit about Kanye and honestly I'm so old and square that I wouldn't know him if I tripped over him, or his ugly-ass Derelicte-inspired fashion line.

I want to get back to this hate issue.

Because over and over I've seen Trump supporters claim they don't hate anyone. Next question put to them is "What about [thing that will definitely effect me in a negative way based on my identity]?" Answer: I didn't really think about that/don't think that will happen/it doesn't really matter to me/why do you deserve special consideration?

That's hate, guys. When you don't give a shit about whether a fellow person lives or dies based on an action you took? You can't exactly claim you like that person.
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:20 AM on December 13, 2016 [50 favorites]

Why does every photo of Rex Tillerson look like an aide just told him that Jason Bourne re-surfaced in Prague
posted by Etrigan at 8:21 AM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

I am the only one who thinks "Rex Tillerson" might as well be a cardboard cutout of a shady villain in an airport novel? The 2016 writers are really scraping the bottom of the oil barrel at this point.

Last night Seth Meyers said he sounds like a Jack Russel Terrier that solves crimes
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 8:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

People are sending Hitler-memes to Jewish journalists.

I'm going to go with very strong hatred.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [37 favorites]

Is it just me or does Rex Tillerson look like a Powers Boothe character?

Let's hope it doesn't turn out to be Jim Jones.

Although at this point Cy Tolliver could be an improvement on the man himself.
posted by teleri025 at 8:25 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Trump voters don't think they hate the people they are hurting. But their actions are hateful, and therefore their intent is irrelevant.

posiwid. i think the left might embrace it as a useful framing device.
posted by j_curiouser at 8:25 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

"Craven indifference to the well being of" and "hatred" are frankly interchangeable.

So yes, they hate us and they hate us bigly.
posted by lydhre at 8:27 AM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

Potential Secretary of State Nominee Rex Tillerson Has an SEC Problem: ExxonMobil has been under SEC investigation since August

"Tillerson’s company has been under formal investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission since August for failing to accurately value its proven oil reserves.Those reserves are critical to investors for assessing the future viability of the company. Without the certainty that the company can keep crude oil flowing decades into the future, ExxonMobil stock would plummet. Rewriting the disclosures to investors with lower valuations would cost the company billions of dollars."
posted by chris24 at 8:37 AM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

The NC legislature's emergency session that started today was ostensibly supposed to be about about disaster relief, rather than the court-packing and/or overturning of the NC GOV election. As of yet, disaster relief hasn't even been mentioned. Rev. Barber is leading protests in the building right now.
posted by zombieflanders at 8:37 AM on December 13, 2016 [20 favorites]

I mean, I am a white cisnormative person, and even with those privileges I am still scared to put liberal bumper stickers on my car or wear a BLM shirt when I'm grocery shopping because I live in a county that went 70% for Trump and I don't want to be assaulted. My liberal (mostly white) community here remarks on how brave the people who do these things are, and we're trying to be braver ourselves because we need to stand up against the hate that surrounds us.

There is a LOT of hate from Trump supporters toward ANYONE who challenges their worldview.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 8:37 AM on December 13, 2016 [29 favorites]

That SEC investigation will magically disappear on January 20th. Problem solved.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:42 AM on December 13, 2016

Yes, they hate. See any online comments section about a disaster in California, for example. Wishing death on fellow Americans for being liberal is hatred.
posted by agregoli at 8:44 AM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

Yeah, it's funny that we're even bothering to point out that "craven indifference to someone's well-being, even when covered over by a veil of politeness," ought to count as hate, because at this point it's clear that they actively, unabashedly, vocally, and joyfully hate us, and a huge part of the charge that Trump supporters got from this election was the ability to shout in public about how much they hate us, instead of restricting that behavior to online spaces.

It's like, why do you think the attitudes expressed online aren't real? Just because they refrain from telling you that they hate you to your face doesn't mean that's not truly how they feel.

I remember when, before the election, I used to occasionally dip down into comment streams and I'd think, in this genuinely baffled way, who are these people who hate everyone so much? Like, it was just this endless stream of raw sewage, all this pure and unadulterated hate, directed at any woman or minority who happened to pass through the news cycle. I wanted to believe it was this tiny fragment of basement dwellers, people I'd never be forced to lay eyes on in real life.

But, no! They are co-workers and neighbors! The people who tap out violent rape threats to random teenagers because they don't like something that she tweeted are people I sit beside every day. They are full of hate and wish violence on everyone they perceive has wronged them, and they found in Trump a candidate who was willing to channel that energy, making real life more like an online anonymous message board every single day.

Recently, one of my close friends was standing outside a bar in Ann Arbor with a visiting poet when a bunch of guys in a pickup truck drove by and shouted, "FUCK YOU, CUNTS!" at them. That is hate. That is real life.

That visiting poet happened to be Eileen Myles, and instead of engaging in emotional labor in order to try and convince them to recognize her shared humanity, she threw her cigarette at them and shouted back, "WE ARE GOING TO CASTRATE YOU," but that's beside the point.
posted by pretentious illiterate at 8:57 AM on December 13, 2016 [100 favorites]

Warning: this chart is probably coming your way on social media in the near future. The false equivalence is self-evident, I hope. MSNBC and Fox News equally partisan? OK, Show me the Fox News version of Morning Joe. InfoWars and Addicting Info are mirror images? Right. WSJ is mainstream to slightly leaning right? Sure, if the op-ed section fell out of your copy when it was delivered.

I mean, yeah, the left certainly has some echo chamber content mills that produce very little journalistic value, but this chart really needs a "batshit" axis.
posted by tonycpsu at 8:58 AM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

the kayne thing is the shiny object to distract from from real news:

@kurteichenwald: Trump already on path to extradite a man Turkish president wants and who is using blackmail on Trump biznes to get.

seriously the media and everyone has to start ignoring the shiny objects.
posted by localhuman at 8:59 AM on December 13, 2016 [15 favorites]

On today's Democracy Now! (at about 34:40, alt link, .torrent, transcript), a report by freelance journalist Greg Palast (who has previously reported for Rolling Stone, the BBC, The Guardian, and many other outlets) about voting irregularities uncovered in the course of Jill Stein's campaign to recount the vote in Michigan. Includes an interview with the spokesman for the Michigan Secretary of State's office, Fred Woodhams.

People are looking for Russians but what we had is a real Jim Crow election. Trump, for example, in Michigan won by less than 11,000 votes, it looks like we had about 55,000 voters, mostly minorities, removed by this racist system called "Crosscheck."

In addition, you had a stoppage... even before the courts ordered the complete stop of the vote in Michigan you had the Republican state officials completely sabotage the recount. They said in Detroit, where there were 75,335 supposedly blank ballots for President, 75,000, they said you can't count 59% of the precincts where most of the votes were missing. There were 87 machines in Detroit that didn't function. They were supposed to count about 1,000 ballots each. You're talking about a massive blockade of the black vote in Detroit and Flint, enough votes, undoubtedly, to overturn that election.

And you saw a mirror of this in Wisconsin, where for example there were many, many votes, thousand of votes, lost in the Milwaukee area, another African-American-heavy area. And there, instead of allowing that eyeball count of the votes that are supposedly blank, they said, "Oh, we'll just run them back through the machines!" It's like betting on an instant replay. It's the same game, they just put them through the bad machines again. This is not just a bad way to count the ballots, it's a way to not count African-American ballots.

And I want to emphasize that, Amy, which is that when we use the term "recount" we're actually talking about ballots that were never counted in the first place: way over 75,000 in Michigan. There are enough ballots uncounted that if you looked at them with the human eye, these are terrible machines that can't read your little bubble marks next to the candidate's name on the piece of paper; if the human eye looks at these things it's easy to tell that someone voted for a Presidential candidate. Alot of the machines said that they voted for two candidates. Not many people do that.

The question is where are these ballots not counted: they're not counted in African-American areas, in Dearborn where there's a heavy Arab-American community, in Latino communities. So while we're discussing hacking the machines alot of this was old-fashioned Jim Crow tactics from way back. And by the way alot of this is the result of the destruction and the gutting of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. This is the first election post-The-Voting-Rights-Act and we saw, and Jill Stein said it correct, she expected to see alot of hacking but what she found was, as she said, a Jim Crow election.

Palast is promoting his new film, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, and his book of the same title it's based on.

Elsewhere in the episode is coverage of U.S. Secretary of State nominee Rex Tillerson's conflicts of interest, an interview with Christine Pelosi about the bi-partisan request for a security briefing for her and her fellow Presidential Electors, coverage of the record of General Kelly, nominee for head of the Department of Homeland Security, and several stories related to anti-pipeline protest.
posted by XMLicious at 9:03 AM on December 13, 2016 [54 favorites]

MSNBC’s special forum with Bernie Sanders showed the promise (and limits) of his political appeal

It seems clear that Sanders’s anti-establishment streak is compelling to many voters, especially to electorally crucial white working-class swing voters in the Midwest who feel alienated from the political system. But it was clear from the MSNBC forum that many of these same voters who find a lot to like about Sanders may not completely share his vision of Nordic-style social democracy — at least not yet. And while Sanders certainly can persuade other Democratic Party elected officials to adopt his policy positions — indeed, during the 2016 cycle he was already very successful at shifting the party platform to the left on a number of fronts — he almost by definition can’t turn the Democratic Party establishment into anti-establishment figures.

This is why last night’s forum was so important. As long as Bernie himself is on stage, Sanders and Sandersism can be one and the same. And that’s probably good enough — Sanders is popular and is popular enough in specific ways that appeal to voters who were pivotal in the Electoral College.

But the bigger question is what the Democratic Party does with Sandersism once Sanders himself has exited the stage. Sanders has always maintained that his campaign was more about policy ideas than personality — but it’s precisely the elements of his vision that are most contentious inside the Democratic Party that may also seem least appealing to the very Midwestern voters Democrats are trying to reach.

posted by tonycpsu at 9:06 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

Warning: this chart is probably coming your way on social media in the near future.

I already saw that this morning. All of the "mainstream" sources in the lower and middle circles need kicked to the right, except maybe the Washington Post under Bezos' ownership can stay in the middle. The WSJ needs to be put right next to FOX News. NPR should go right along there too. Frankly CNN needs to be lumped in with Breitbart at this point after happily operating as the TV arm of the Trump campaign with Jeffery Lord and Corey Ledanowski on 14 hours a day, and now giving Kellyanne an unchallenged platform whenever she wants it.

And whatever "Natural News" and "David Waffle" are, they're in no way comparable in influence on the left as Redstate, Breitbart and Daily Caller are to the right.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:08 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Turkey arrests Donald Trump’s business partner to try to force U.S. to turn over dissident
posted by adamvasco at 9:10 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

I mean, again with the Newsweek/Turkey story, it's the same problem I have had with every Newsweek "scoop" that Rachel Maddow has tried to pedal for months now. Nobody understands what the issue is, and they don't care, since it largely doesn't affect them.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:15 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

I guess it's Meet With Black Guy Tuesday.

You are apparently correct. That's what today is.

Apparently he didn't watch Hairspray Live or he didn't get that part of the story where being forced to have a single day for black people and every other day for white people was considered a bad thing.
posted by zachlipton at 9:15 AM on December 13, 2016

What Palast is saying terrifies me. The fact that we're tolerating this is outrageous. Are we a democracy at all?
posted by prefpara at 9:18 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

What Palast is saying terrifies me. The fact that we're tolerating this is outrageous. Are we a democracy at all?

We are not. We are a Republic.
posted by Talez at 9:20 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

But the bigger question is what the Democratic Party does with Sandersism once Sanders himself has exited the stage.

Sanders is not a Dem, though. He might be a leader of the new progressive moment, but he's very strongly not a Dem.
posted by anastasiav at 9:20 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

But I've got to say, it is flat out wrong-headed to believe that sixty million Trump voters hate us. I talk to some of them every single day too. In real life, not online. And the worst I have encountered is veiled contempt, and that seldom.

I talk to them every day too. I work with Trump supporters, I am visibly a woman of color, and I don't encounter even veiled contempt-- they're all nice and friendly, they'll grab me a coffee or help dig my car out of the snow if I need it. But if I get put in an internment camp, they'll shrug and agree that this is a necessary measure for national security, just like the Muslim ban, which they support. Maybe they'll say, "Oh, spaet, we liked her. We hope she's doing well." Not one of them will fight for me.

I've been talking to them, trying to do the hard work of asking questions, reframing arguments, trying to find common ground. I put in that emotional labor in hopes that next time around they'll vote in favor of protecting my basic humanity. But I'm losing hope, and I don't blame a single one of my friends who've decided to fight rather than "engage" endlessly. Sincere question, perspicio-- in your daily talks with Trump supporters, have any of them changed their minds? Really changed their minds, enough that they'll stand up for people like me? Cause surface civility isn't enough when my rights are on the line.
posted by spaet at 9:21 AM on December 13, 2016 [93 favorites]

How much of a slap in the face is it to Energy Department staff to have Rick Perry as Secretary of Energy? I mean, imagine that you come into work one day and find that the new big boss is someone who is nationally famous for that time he said he wants your entire department eliminated and simultaneously couldn't remember that it existed.
posted by zachlipton at 9:21 AM on December 13, 2016 [18 favorites]

Sanders is not a Dem, though. He might be a leader of the new progressive moment, but he's very strongly not a Dem.

It's hard to run as a socialist in the US when red is already taken by the conservatives.
posted by Talez at 9:21 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

We are not. We are a Republic.

Thanks for the glib BS answer. That is a form of democracy.
posted by prefpara at 9:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Scientists are frantically copying U.S. climate data, fearing it might vanish under Trump
posted by zombieflanders at 9:27 AM on December 13, 2016 [34 favorites]

Warning: this chart is probably coming your way on social media in the near future.

What really strikes me about this map is that the main news sources I do consider liberal and see most often aren't even listed - some analytical work coming out of buzzfeed, Mother Jones, Mic.com, and then the stuff I do consider 'fake news' coming out of democracy news x or whatever. Are they so far off to the left that they're off the page?
posted by dinty_moore at 9:27 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Thanks for the glib BS answer. That is a form of democracy.

James Madison would disagree. The US was founded on the notion that "those people" never get a sniff of political power. It was still called a republic.
posted by Talez at 9:27 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

MSNBC’s special forum with Bernie Sanders showed the promise (and limits) of his political appeal

Maybe Trump voters, whose preferred candidate just won, are unwinnable. What about non-voters? Do they see something in Sandersism that they don't see elsewhere, or do they feel the same as the Trump voters? The press's undue focus on winning Trump voters, who voted for an obvious and proud scumbag, as though everyone had voted and the game of winning voters were zero-sum, bugs me.

Sanders is not a Dem, though. He might be a leader of the new progressive moment, but he's very strongly not a Dem.

Sure. "What, if anything, should the Democratic Party do about Sandersism?" is still a fair question.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 9:30 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Union boss who called Trump a liar gets it from all sides
posted by zachlipton at 9:34 AM on December 13, 2016

Politico/Morning Consult poll 12/11: Donald Trump -6% Unfavorable Rating.
posted by futz at 9:34 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

From that climate science article, here's a website where you can submit URLs of federal sites that should be archived/backed up independently in case they're changed or deleted by the incoming administration. This would include scientific stuff, public information/medical info stuff, whatever else comes to mind.

End of Term 2016 web backup project
posted by LobsterMitten at 9:38 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Politico/Morning Consult poll 12/11: Donald Trump -6% Unfavorable Rating.

Never Heard of 3%
Heard Of, No Opinion 1%

lol omg
posted by soren_lorensen at 9:41 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Those lucky people.
posted by Brainy at 9:46 AM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

We are a Republic.

If we can keep it.
posted by EarBucket at 9:46 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Tillerson is out of the blue.

Holy crap! Mefi's own?

Ok, I'm on board with Tillerson being evil n'all. But... doesn't he have the best "GET ME....!" name you've heard in a while?

*punches button on desk* "GET ME Rex Tillerson!" *cut to hard charging slick flying low and fast with Tillerson's scowling face in the window*

And, getting more whimsy out of the way, I don't think there's any question the Clinton's have killed people (not, er, James Bond-style personally, Hillary's hot insertion at Tuzla airport notwithstanding) it's just a question of which people and for what motive.

Would/did they kill for personal gain? I very strongly doubt it. Eh ...Bill maybe.

Would/did they issue orders that would result in people's deaths to protect the U.S. (however they would define that)? Certainly. Ask General Aidid. (and for bonus points: guess who the only Somali speaking Marine was?)

One can argue good/bad/whatever, but the motive was always for the good of the country.

Now Trump? Hell, you think he's going to go out of pocket to protect his overseas holdings when they start getting blowed up? Pfft. He's "smart", right? Not like those dumb bullet sponges who aren't savvy enough to have someone just hand them a purple heart without getting combat wounds.

Anyway, in the same vein, the thing to think about isn't so much Tillerson - but rather "Who Benefits?" from either side. Clinton has ties to certain Russian companies. So does Trump.

So step back - Russian society has always been willing to endure harsh economic policies for ambitious foreign policies. ("In America, you destroy life. In Russia, life destroys you!")
I guess you get less hungry when big missiles are rolled down the street. (Russia imposed a ban on food imports from Western nations in August 2014 but it's always been the case since before Stalin that the military parade of force distracts)

We have some assholes in charge like that here, so not so much on the people themselves for that.

So Clinton - yeah, it looks like she's in bed in a certain way with Putin because she's doing, essentially, what they want her to do in laying sanctions.
But she's doing it because she genuinely wants to kick their asses.
Without, y'know, military confrontation.
Worked? Working? Debatable (ask Ukraine *shrug*), but point being it's a dead ringer for someone who's actually interested in moderation and not recklessly expending American military lives because they're a selfish prick.

Putin - his motivations are obvious. He's outright said he wants to expand the capabilities of national businesses and "we also intend to develop economic ties with other countries and take part in integration processes."
Oil prices went down, they got their asses kicked.

Hmmm...who was running U.S. foreign policy when that happened?

I'm not saying H. Clinton or Kerry are some kind of all-powerful wizards, but sanctions did kick Russia in the huevos when they were trying to cope with their recession and downward spike in oil prices.
So less investment in Russia and less access to western capital markets.

Hmm... who's bloc has got interests in the western capitTRUMP! -

So you need special authorization (in the west) to sell energy producing related equipment to Russia.
That's good for China and domestic Russian producers. (Who's Trump been acrimonious with?) And of course, Iran. And notice how certain people want to torpedo the deal with Iran.
Until that point the Rooskies had assumed (and by the slight 'Rooskies' I mean the folks in charge not the average citizen) the U.S. and Iran would not ever come to terms.
And that was in their interest - making sure the deal was perpetually unresolved.
Does anyone remember What's-his-name? Well, during his "presidency" the Rooskies okayed an embargo on Iran (weapon systems) but prevented its implementation.
That sorta thing for the past 15-odd years.

So Iran’s international isolation ends, the Rooskies lose that as a bargaining chip and as their toe in middle eastern problems, which means their oil companies lose the advantage over western competition.

"The chances that [Tillerson] will view Russia with ExxonMobil DNA are close to 100 percent,"

So yeah, remember Rosneft (referenced in a link from above), why would someone like Putin be ok with someone like Trump/Tillman drilling for oil and lowering prices?

Makes no sense from a foreign policy standpoint.

Makes plenty of sense if you realize Putin gets $11-odd billion put into his pocket.

The climate discussions on increased oil production aside, put yourself in Iran's place looking at Putin's history, Tillman's history and the likelyhood of Trump's Presidency.

What's your move?

Yeah, me too.

You know they're gonna play Iran. Iran knows they're gonna play Iran. We've had "evil Iran" drilled into us since way before Bush II was president.

Think Trump/Tillman will opt for moderation and not recklessly expending lives?

Me neither.
posted by Smedleyman at 9:47 AM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

Dem Senator Chris Murphy bringing the heat on Tillerson:

Rex Tillerson has spent his entire career putting oil company profits first and the interests of his country second. That’s not surprising – it was his job as the head of Exxon. But it’s fantasy to think he will magically change his stripes once in office. The people I represent in Connecticut deserve better.

Most concerning is Mr. Tillerson’s long standing alliance with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. As one of Putin’s closest corporate allies, Tillerson opposed U.S. national security interests by siding with Russia against Europe and the United States. Mr. Tillerson opposed sanctions levied against Russia in the wake of their invasion of Ukraine. When asked by President Obama to refrain from attending a major economic development conference hosted by Putin in the middle of the Ukraine crisis, Tillerson embarrassed America and our allies by sending his deputy and announcing major new contracts with Russia at the forum. It’s not surprising that Tillerson was awarded the Order of Friendship by Putin just three years ago.

For years, I’ve listened to my Republican colleagues in the Senate eviscerate President Obama for being too weak on Russia. No Republican who has called for a tougher line against Russia should ever be taken seriously again if they vote to put a Putin ally at the top of the State Department.

At Exxon, Tillerson also worked against American policy in the Middle East. Most notably, when the United States was trying to build a unified Iraq under the control of a central government in Baghdad, U.S. officials begged Exxon not to sign an oil agreement with the Kurdistan regional government, which would undermine Baghdad’s authority. Tillerson once again put oil company profits over U.S. interests and signed the contract over strong U.S. government objections.

Finally, and most obviously, putting an oil company executive in charge of the State Department dooms our climate. With an oil industry executive at the helm of U.S. climate policy, polluters will be rewarded and all the progress the Obama Administration has made to control global greenhouse gases will be destroyed. Further, putting an oil executive in charge of the State Department will alienate many nations who consider climate policy a priority, making cooperation on non-climate priorities harder.

There is no doubt Rex Tillerson is a successful businessman and a very smart person. But he has proven, many times, his willingness to put oil profits before national interests, and handing him the keys of U.S. foreign policy is a recipe for disaster. Republicans and Democrats must join to oppose his confirmation.

posted by chris24 at 9:48 AM on December 13, 2016 [28 favorites]

If Tillerson can't be confirmed, do we start all over again with another public humiliation ritual for Romney or is it like getting your car serviced: good for 6 months/6,000 miles?
posted by zachlipton at 9:53 AM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

Taco Truck Playhouse, if you haven't finished your Christmas shopping.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:54 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

Taco Truck Playhouse, if you haven't finished your Christmas shopping.

Alas, it is back-ordered, and won't be available again until after Christmas. Also, it looks a little small for me, as I'm over six feet tall, but I've got some ideas about that...
posted by Nat "King" Cole Porter Wagoner at 10:06 AM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

or is it like getting your car serviced: good for 6 months/6,000 miles

More like strapping your dog to the roof of your car for 6,000 miles.
posted by Candleman at 10:06 AM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

If you'd like, there's plenty of research and articles out there which point out Whiteness does not always extend to Jews.

There's that, sure, then there's also all the Trump swastika graffiti sprouting up like toadstools, the open association with vocal anti-Semites and neonazis, the national TV ads calling out a global banking conspiracy consisting of only Jewish names. I don't think you need to do much research to conclude that Jewish people are on Trump's list, and that the feeling is shared by his supporters. We might not be as high a priority as Muslims and Mexicans, but there's plenty of hatred to go around.
posted by contraption at 10:06 AM on December 13, 2016 [14 favorites]

Palast's point (which he explains in this piece) is that in the absence of a transparent federal voting register like the one in Canada, GOP secretaries of state (led by vote suppressor Kris Kobach) have kludged together their own database that takes all of the garbage of state databases and adds some extra opaque garbage to generate matches. Whenever the GOP takes over a state, it's likely to join in and add its own garbage to the system.
posted by holgate at 10:06 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

One thing I haven't seen discussed is Trump's claim that "No new deals will be done during my term(s) in office."

Even if we accept that there will be no major acquisitions, sales, or construction projects planned or executed (and I don't accept that), how can this make any sense? Given the amount of debt involved, it seems likely that keeping the whole thing afloat relies on new deals, renegotiating loans, shifting funds from one property to another, etc... We already know there are loans that come due during the next four years; how will those be managed without a new deal?

And it's abundantly clear that to Trump, everything is a deal. There's no way his business can go four years without needing to buy new air conditioners or carpets or aircraft parts or floor wax or whatever. There's no way it can go four years without renewing a contract for garbage disposal or whatever. Not to mention deals that may not be on his schedule, like the unionization drive in Las Vegas or hundreds of millions of dollars of his debt being sold to who knows.

This promise doesn't pass the most cursory of analysis, yet people seem to have taken it seriously.
posted by zachlipton at 10:13 AM on December 13, 2016 [14 favorites]

but do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

(a) Oh yes. Oh very yes. Super duper very yes.

(b) It's not "belief" when it's written on walls, written in comments, blasted out from media accounts, and proposed by people in the highest offices of the land.

(c) Between "do more emotional labor" and "just take a day off work!", I really have to wonder what privileges you're carting around.
posted by XtinaS at 10:14 AM on December 13, 2016 [35 favorites]

Civil Rights Déjà Vu, Only Worse Samuel Bagenstos, my former law professor and Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights under Obama on what's about to be lost at DOJ.
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:14 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

yes. I mean qcubed and others said it more fully, but. yes.
posted by zutalors! at 10:16 AM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

e might not be as high a priority as Muslims and Mexicans, but there's plenty of hatred to go around.

More than enough. Jews represent 59 percent of the hate crimes committed based on religion.

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

Sort of. I mean, do I think 20 percent of the country found their concerns perfectly aligned with that of white nationalism, and so voted for a man whose only plank was that he was willing to talk about how terrible people of color are? Yes, I think that is undeniable.

I dunno. Maybe they don't actively hate me, but they sure love their privilege more than anything else. In the end, it doesn't matter if they love me or hate me if they behave in a way consistent with hating me.
posted by maxsparber at 10:21 AM on December 13, 2016 [21 favorites]

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

I'm a straight white middle-aged male living in rural PA, so I hear what people say when "they" aren't around. Nearly every person I interact with, plus all my relatives, are Trumpniks. Yes. They hate us. Virulently. I was hoping I just lived in a shit-bubble, but so it goes.
posted by dirigibleman at 10:29 AM on December 13, 2016 [56 favorites]

DFA has endorsed Ellison for DNC chair.
posted by Coventry at 10:35 AM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

I really don't know what to say to anyone who doubts the fervor of the racism, sexism, Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, homophobia, etc. that Trump has whipped up. I'm a straight, middle-class white guy (although probably enough of an "elite" that lots of Trump supporters would happily beat me up if they got to know me), and *I* get paranoid sometimes, wondering who among my white friends, family members, colleagues and co-workers go home, sit in front of the computer, take the mask off and fill message boards and comment sections with an unending vile torrent of hatred and threats of violence, even up here in Canada. I can't even begin to imagine how terrifying the current environment must be for POC, Muslims, LGBTQ people, women, Jews, and everyone else who...isn't straight, white, male, Republican and Christian, basically.
posted by The Card Cheat at 10:48 AM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

Do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

Do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

You believe it too otherwise why did you feel you had to put in so many qualifiers to try and increase the likelihood people would affirm your doubts.
posted by srboisvert at 10:49 AM on December 13, 2016 [43 favorites]

Even if we accept that there will be no major acquisitions, sales, or construction projects planned or executed (and I don't accept that), how can this make any sense?

It's just bullshit. As this Twitter thread makes clear, the Organization has no legal status (at most, it may be trademarked) and instead of a corporate structure, there's a morass of LLCs and closely-held partnerships that all end up on the individual tax return. This is the kind of structure that's familiar to readers of Private Eye, and is usually associated with people who act rich but spend their entire time sluicing funds from one entity to another and setting up new entities to offset existing ones and ensure liquidity. As I said in an earlier thread, it's check kiting on a grand scale.

(To be fair, most higher-end / commercial property investments are now done through some kind of single-purpose "44 Main Street LLC" entity to segregate liability, but not to this degree.)
posted by holgate at 10:56 AM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Yeah. A lot of them wish that we'd go away -- that they could close their eyes and say a prayer and that when they opened them again everybody who upsets their view of the world has vanished.

so rather like some intimate when they refer to "flyover states".
posted by philip-random at 10:57 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

Can we please not have discussion #743,120 about whether "flyover states" is really a thing?
posted by Etrigan at 11:01 AM on December 13, 2016 [19 favorites]

I can't even begin to imagine how terrifying the current environment must be for POC, Muslims, LGBTQ people, women, Jews, and everyone else who...isn't straight, white, male, Republican and Christian, basically.

The people I feel awful for are the kids. Adult minorities, especially those of us in our 30's and 40's, have probably dealt with racism or sexism or antisemitism or some other hatred in our lifetimes. But those of us with young kids have seen so many changes in the last decade which tried to marginalized those hatreds. It left me hopeful for the world they'd be inheriting.

I had hoped that in recent years, between the legalization of same-sex marriage, our African-American president, greater visibility and public acceptance for trans folks and the prospect of our first woman president, that my kids wouldn't be targeted quite so much, wouldn't worry as intensely as I do about their friends, neighbors and other family members. They would know that things were changing for the better. Sometimes, slowly and incrementally, but as a people we were still striving to make progress -- to make the world more just, more kind and more respectful to everyone.

Yet now, ashes.

We adults know what we're dealing with. The fact that we must continue to teach our children to fear and that they have to protect themselves because they can't rely on anyone else to do so is sickening and heartbreaking. It's sad and depressing, on every conceivable level.
posted by zarq at 11:07 AM on December 13, 2016 [49 favorites]

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

I'm Jewish, but I have a very non-Jewish last name (it's an Irish name) and often sing in Christian places of worship; for that reason, people often assume I'm Christian. The things I've heard people say about Jews when think there are none present is, shall we say, interesting. It's not quite at the level of "they drink the blood of Christian babies," but close enough. So do I think Trump supporters actively hate us? Oh hell yes. More than most of us probably realize.
posted by holborne at 11:10 AM on December 13, 2016 [51 favorites]

DFA has endorsed Ellison for DNC chair.

Speaking of DFA, Robert Cruickshank, senior campaign manager at that organization, takes exception to a flippant post on the Daily Kos by Markos Moulitsas.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 11:10 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters don't actively hate them?
posted by DynamiteToast at 11:13 AM on December 13, 2016 [17 favorites]

BREAKING: State Department source tells me Trump considering disgraced ex-Fox News boss Roger Ailes for Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy [real, apparently]
posted by melissasaurus at 11:14 AM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

Speaking of DFA, Robert Cruickshank, senior campaign manager at that organization, takes exception to a flippant post on the Daily Kos by Markos Moulitsas.

Is it literally 2004? Because this feels like exactly the kind of thing people got all excited over in 2004.
posted by zachlipton at 11:17 AM on December 13, 2016

When I read stories about people voting to keep other people from getting benefits, I always think of this Louis CK scene where he explains "fair" to a child.

---

Regarding Rick Perry, he wanted to eliminate the Department of Energy, so presumably he's only coming in to eliminate the department and then he'll retire back to his slur-named summer home, right?

----

Regarding Roger Ailes, there is no bottom. Its turtle-heads all the way down.
posted by Joey Michaels at 11:20 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Its turtle-heads all the way down.

It starts with McConnell and just keeps going.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 11:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

Couple comments deleted. Please don't post violent fantasies in here.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 11:24 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Speaking of violent fantasies, from the article I just linked:

“Let’s say that somehow the American people nominated a guy who had murdered 47 people, carved ’em all up and put ’em in a ditch and hadn’t been caught yet, and he got nominated for president,” Potts said. “Well, you know, then I might change my mind.”

I guess we can check back in with this patriotic elector after DT has murdered 47 people. I'd say this is 100% a joke but it's 2016 so...
posted by prefpara at 11:28 AM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

Is the carving a putting in a ditch important? Because getting rid of the ACA will kill far more than that.
posted by emjaybee at 11:30 AM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

Is it literally 2004?

Nope, it's 1984.
With a splash of Handmaid's Tale.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:31 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Does [Kanye West supporting Trump] seem unlikely to anyone else or is it just me?

Kanye is exactly the same as ninety-seven-point-three percent of all online Trump supporters: a full-time, attention-seeking missile who knows that being controversial or at least contrarian is the quickest way to get people to notice. Believing what he says, or not believing it, probably never enters his calculus.

So in that regard, it would be a little odd if he didn't at least tease the media with this sort of thing, wouldn't it?
posted by rokusan at 11:31 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

With a splash of Handmaid's Tale.

Ewwww.
posted by rokusan at 11:31 AM on December 13, 2016

Ecuador tried to warn us.
posted by vrakatar at 11:33 AM on December 13, 2016

Manchin to stay in the Senate despite Cabinet speculation

Sen. Joe Manchin III said Tuesday that he will remain in the Senate after meeting with President-elect Donald Trump, who was considering the West Virginia Democrat to lead the Energy Department.

Looks like whatever Harry Reid did, it worked, for better or for worse.

In other cabinet news, Giuliani is going around claiming he was offered two cabinet positions that weren't State, but he turned them down.
posted by zachlipton at 11:34 AM on December 13, 2016

Energy Department rejects Donald Trump's request to name climate change workers (sorry for SFGate link; article is originally from WaPo but I don't feel like fucking around with the paywall)

Finally someone shows some damn spine.
posted by sunset in snow country at 11:38 AM on December 13, 2016 [24 favorites]

> Is it literally 2004? Because this feels like exactly the kind of thing people got all excited over in 2004.

I don't know, Kos makes a solid point. These are the counties that swung hardest in favor of Trump, with a 70-80% vote share. There was that long exchange upthread about leading horses to water over and over again and hoping that they'd take a drink - and I'm not opposed to leading those horses to water, but maybe prioritize the other horses who are desperately thirsty and dying to get a sip of water?

Coal country is dying because coal is walking dead. It's not even alternative energy that's killing coal, it's cheap fracking gas (and this wasn't the case in 2004). Those jobs aren't coming back, and that's a huge problem - for them, for WV as a state, and for us as a country. We should come up with solutions to offer them, but maybe we shouldn't prioritize them over the next generations of kids who need clean air and a habitable climate.
posted by RedOrGreen at 11:38 AM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

Yeah. A lot of them wish that we'd go away -- that they could close their eyes and say a prayer and that when they opened them again everybody who upsets their view of the world has vanished.

so rather like some intimate when they refer to "flyover states".

I think this is worth discussing, because there is scorn for rural areas, but what I find is what's most dangerous about it is that it further isolates minorities who live in those areas while masking the issues of white supremacy that still manage to thrive in urban and suburban areas.

A lot of the scorn shows up as "why don't you just leave" when minorities' civil rights are threatened in red states, as if moving cross-country to a new place where the cost of living is probably more expensive and you don't have any ties is easy to do. And yeah, a lot of the scorn does come from people who did manage to make it out, but it's not that easy for everyone.

It also shows up in the DNC's strategy of just giving up on large swathes of the country, whether or not they could win.

How white people in rural bubbles talk about anyone who is not like them is not equivalent to people on the coast talking about flyover states, but that doesn't mean that the so-called urban elites can't do better.
posted by dinty_moore at 11:42 AM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

It's not even alternative energy that's killing coal, it's cheap fracking gas

Also: coal is a finite resource, the easy-to-get-at coal is already gone, and automation has been implemented in mining operations just as much as everywhere else.
posted by soren_lorensen at 11:43 AM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

So I absolutely believe that many Trump voters don't think they hate the people they are hurting. But their actions are hateful, and therefore their intent is irrelevant.

So I think there's a deep disconnect here, and I think the difference is between what is morally relevant, and what is politically relevant.

Reasonable people can disagree on whether or not people are - I'm going to phrase this as neutrally as I can but I do come from a religious background so bear with me - morally damned for not helping as much as they are for hurting, or morally damned for disinterest as much as they are for hate. That is a moral and philosophical argument, and as such, has no right answers. It is not possible to prove or disprove: it's only what you can convince someone of. So in your worldview, it may in fact be morally irrelevant whether people are taking actions or intentions or what have you - but that is very, very different from something being politically irrelevant.

We have found through social science that drawing a moral or political dividing line, where people can put themselves on one side or another, has deep benefits, particularly if you can define that line where some people have to stretch just a liiiiiittle to get over it. So whether someone has actions or intent is absolutely politically relevant, because when you define people such that they can't get over to the other side, they become comfortable on the side they are grouped on.

So talking about, say, racism - there is deep, deep benefit in drawing definitions such that, say, 5% can be "anti-racist allies" and 10% can be "anti-racist activists" and 20% can be "racially progressive" and 30% can be "just not racist" and 20% can be "Racially problematic" and 10% can be "white supremacist supporters" and 5% can be "white supremacists". (I am, in case it's not clear, making up these numbers from the top of my head) It doesn't even matter, in actuality, where you would personally define the numbers. You may believe, in your heart of hearts, that actually 80% of the population is racially problematic. But the problem is, if you define that 80% that way, they're going to fucking stick together as a coherent group, and they're not going to have a lot of motivation to move, if they don't think they can move up a group. It's shitty, but it's just how humans fucking work on a subconscious level.

But if you can allow people to draw a hard dividing line between themselves and, say, actual white supremacists - the kind we may wind up finding ourselves fighting in the goddamn streets - you are denying aid and comfort to the enemy. You're letting people draw a line in the sand that is desperately important we don't cross. And I think there's enormous value and relevance there if we are ever going to bring our country back on track.
posted by corb at 11:43 AM on December 13, 2016 [21 favorites]

My scorn is mostly reserved for my eternal nemeses: suburban and exurban professionals who this time voted Trump (of which there are, as the kids say, hella) and who usually vote in shades of terrible anyway.

As someone who lives in a city with very constrained boundaries but sprawling suburbs and exurbs, this isn't a new glass of haterade for me. This is basically my house brew.
posted by soren_lorensen at 11:46 AM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

But if you can allow people to draw a hard dividing line between themselves and, say, actual white supremacists - the kind we may wind up finding ourselves fighting in the goddamn streets - you are denying aid and comfort to the enemy.

I feel like "definitely already working on gutting the VRA and Social Security and all other forms of anti-discrimination and/or the social safety net" doesn't really balance with "may wind up finding ourselves fighting". YMMV.
posted by Etrigan at 11:47 AM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

But if you can allow people to draw a hard dividing line between themselves and, say, actual white supremacists - the kind we may wind up finding ourselves fighting in the goddamn streets - you are denying aid and comfort to the enemy. You're letting people draw a line in the sand that is desperately important we don't cross. And I think there's enormous value and relevance there if we are ever going to bring our country back on track.

At this point, I feel pretty comfortable saying that the onus is entirely upon those people who are closest in moral and political standing to white supremacists to prove they're worthy and deserving of respect. Not on the minorities they've shit on for generations.
posted by zarq at 11:50 AM on December 13, 2016 [21 favorites]

Is it literally 2004? Because this feels like exactly the kind of thing people got all excited over in 2004.

It's pretty small beer, yeah. I'm still glad to see it.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 11:50 AM on December 13, 2016

How white people in rural bubbles talk about anyone who is not like them is not equivalent to people on the coast talking about flyover states, but that doesn't mean that the so-called urban elites can't do better.

At this point I'm thinking our effort may be better spent setting an underground railroad to get anyone who wants to live in civilization, and can't get out, back to civilization.
posted by Talez at 11:50 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

I feel like "definitely already working on gutting the VRA and Social Security and all other forms of anti-discrimination and/or the social safety net" doesn't really balance with "may wind up finding ourselves fighting".

To clarify, when I said "in the streets" that was not actually a metaphor for many of us who do not fit into the white supremacist "acceptable" mold. I'd give it at least 25% odds if we don't fight successfully we may see open violence from Trumpian brownshirts.
posted by corb at 11:50 AM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

But if you can allow people to draw a hard dividing line between themselves and, say, actual white supremacists - the kind we may wind up finding ourselves fighting in the goddamn streets - you are denying aid and comfort to the enemy.

And sometimes when you do that, you get this: Ku Klux Klan members say they aren’t white supremacists.
posted by melissasaurus at 11:51 AM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

Letter to Ohio electors: Because of my commitment to being, in my professional life, as nonpartisan as possible, and because I am deeply committed to our democracy on principle, I reflected for a long time before writing this letter. I am asking you to honor your obligation as an elector and vote for anyone except Donald Trump. I have students and friends who voted for Trump, and I respect their vote and their views. However, Donald Trump has proven, between the election and now, that he is unfit for office in a way that transcends partisan politics. If that were not the case, I would not be writing you today.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 11:51 AM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

The NYT just went live with a major investigative piece: The Perfect Weapon: How Russian Cyberpower Invaded the U.S.
posted by zachlipton at 11:55 AM on December 13, 2016 [14 favorites]

perspicio: “I absolutely acknowledge that there's a lot of unbridled hatred being thrown around, but do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?”

Many have already answered more eloquently, but I wanted to add my voice to the chorus: I regard a vote for Trump as nothing less than a declaration of War to the Knife against me and mine, all y'all, and all people of goodwill in the world.
posted by ob1quixote at 11:56 AM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

Welp. Hoist on their own fucking petard. What a shame learning their lesson comes at the cost of millions of people.

One of the things that upsets me is that in fact I think many people aren't going to learn their lesson; they'll be upset that their healthcare is gone but, for whatever reason, possibly years of being lied to, they lack the wherewithal to realize that something happened that hurt them, understand that it's their fault, and figure out what to do differently next time. I don't see how to fix a lot of this stuff because I am not sure how to help people who don't already see it make the connection between "this is bad and I'm upset" and "taking these actions will make it better". I don't mean people are dumb, I just think that enough people are dangerously misinformed or too frustrated to listen that I just don't know how one would set about reaching them.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 11:58 AM on December 13, 2016 [17 favorites]

The Republican National Committee is overseeing an expansive whip operation designed to lock down Donald Trump’s Electoral College majority and ensure that the 306 Republican electors cast their votes for the president-elect.

The fact that the RNC and Trump camp are keeping extra close tabs on electors this year indicates at least some nervousness on their part, right?

Letter to Ohio electors

Yes! A North Carolina friend just wrote her electors as well, and I gotta say I see some potential in an EC revolt. I've been watching for news on that over the last couple weeks, and there's been a decent flush of media coverage in the past 24 hours (including this piece yesterday in Time). The attention seems pretty clearly linked to the Russia controversy. Is it too much to imagine that Republican concern in the Senate re: Russia could influence Republican elector attitudes as well?

What's more, even if 270 coherently organized EC "faithless" votes for an alternate candidate is a pipe dream, even a small defection of Republican electors could have a negative impact on Trump's standing as he enters office. It could be one more chip in a progressive chipping away at his power...

In short, I think some form of EC defection is worth promoting. It is, at the very least, an elegant, appropriate, and historically grounded solution. But I do think a lot of citizens would need to make a lot of noise in the next few days in order to have an impact on this - especially in the states that voted Trump. Regarding that, for what it's worth, the Hamilton Electors are looking for volunteers (in all states, but obviously the red states matter most).
posted by marlys at 11:59 AM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

At this point I'm thinking our effort may be better spent setting an underground railroad to get anyone who wants to live in civilization, and can't get out, back to civilization.

Guys. No. A 'great sort' does not work. For one thing, our country really isn't set up with one overwhelmingly liberal area and another overwhelmingly conservative area, and for another - India and Pakistan. People have legitimate reasons to want to live in conservative areas, even when the majority of the people who live there actively hate them. And yes, there are queer people in Kentucky. This really should not be a surprise to anyone, but there's a lot of Black people in the south that seem to be left out of any discussion about the area. When you're condemning large swathes of the country, you're condemning them, too.
posted by dinty_moore at 12:01 PM on December 13, 2016 [35 favorites]

The most open white supremacist I've ever known personally insisted that he was, in fact, not a racist, or a white supremacist at all. He was a racial separatist, you see. Big difference! He just didn't think the races were meant to live together. And of course the White Race, which is totally a thing and not a made-up bunch of pseudoscience, isn't superior per se, but we should definitely get all the good stuff and for some reason not fuck off back to our homelands but stay right where we are now, occupying the land of people who definitely are not white.

He was an Odinist, which will come as a shock to exactly no one.
posted by soren_lorensen at 12:04 PM on December 13, 2016 [26 favorites]

I don't know, Kos makes a solid point. These are the counties that swung hardest in favor of Trump, with a 70-80% vote share. There was that long exchange upthread about leading horses to water over and over again and hoping that they'd take a drink - and I'm not opposed to leading those horses to water, but maybe prioritize the other horses who are desperately thirsty and dying to get a sip of water?

Coal country is dying because coal is walking dead. It's not even alternative energy that's killing coal, it's cheap fracking gas (and this wasn't the case in 2004). Those jobs aren't coming back, and that's a huge problem - for them, for WV as a state, and for us as a country. We should come up with solutions to offer them, but maybe we shouldn't prioritize them over the next generations of kids who need clean air and a habitable climate.

I think it's bad to exult in the certain suffering of West Virginia's poor because West Virginia's voters swung to Trump, and it's even worse when a major progressive writer like Kos does it.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 12:07 PM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

And sometimes when you do that, you get this: Ku Klux Klan members say they aren’t white supremacists.

“We are white separatists, just as Yahweh in the Bible told us to be. Separate yourself from other nations. Do not intermix and mongrelize your seed,” said one of the Klansmen who spoke along the muddy lane.

Their Bible sounds different than the ones I'm familiar with.
Oh, well, separate but equal, I guess.
posted by kirkaracha at 12:16 PM on December 13, 2016

The fact that the RNC and Trump camp are keeping extra close tabs on electors this year indicates at least some nervousness on their part, right?

Yes! And, sadly they appear to be tightening down on that.

I can't be alone I thinking that the shadow government has to/ should be gearing up about now to take back control and, like, you know, send Trump back to NYC. Or like, the mighty CIA who he has totally pissed all over - they're really gonna just let this stand?

This is such a crappy crappy way to end the year.
posted by From Bklyn at 12:17 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Guys. No. A 'great sort' does not work. For one thing, our country really isn't set up with one overwhelmingly liberal area and another overwhelmingly conservative area, and for another - India and Pakistan. People have legitimate reasons to want to live in conservative areas, even when the majority of the people who live there actively hate them. And yes, there are queer people in Kentucky. This really should not be a surprise to anyone, but there's a lot of Black people in the south that seem to be left out of any discussion about the area. When you're condemning large swathes of the country, you're condemning them, too.

Also, this basically already happened. twice.

I know I've said it about poor white folks in disadvantaged rural areas, and the same is true for people of color, sexual minorities and other targets of Trumpism:

People should not be forced to move away from their homes, their hometowns, their families and their support networks to have access to the civil rights to which they are entitled and/or to kowtow to the invisible goddamn hand of the free market.

There is nothing magical or permanent about the suffering of the industrial Midwest or the rural South. We know the solution: robust federal civil rights, labor and environmental protections; massive investment in infrastructure, housing and jobs for people at every skill and educational level; access to good, affordable education and health care.

Now, I fully recognize that we are a long way from there. But a 'big sort' won't get us closer, it would just accelerate the dismembering of American communities and the coming of our brave new Hunger Games-style neo-apartheid future.
posted by tivalasvegas at 12:18 PM on December 13, 2016 [36 favorites]

He was an Odinist, which will come as a shock to exactly no one.

...read that as "Onanist" for a second, was confused.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 12:19 PM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

“We are white separatists, just as Yahweh in the Bible told us to be. Separate yourself from other nations.

O_o

no one tell him that the ancient Hebrews were actually jewish
posted by tivalasvegas at 12:19 PM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

...read that as "Onanist" for a second, was confused.

something something white seed
posted by tivalasvegas at 12:21 PM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

There was a discussion of the term "white supremacist" a few threads back that I wanted to respond to comprehensively but I got diverted in the course of research.

My point was going to be that, as far as I can tell as a casual browser through old books and newspapers, "white supremacy" was a completely mainstream term and concept. This was what many Southern Senators and Congressmen labeled their own beliefs a hundred years ago, talking in reverent tones about the system to future leaders at their alma maters, and the phrase appeared in books written for popular consumption: see either of these those bits of evidence (and alot more probably, if you drill down further than I did) by looking through the Hathi Trust archive or the original Google News Archive.

I often mention that the Democratic Party of Alabama only removed "White Supremacy" from it's logo in 1966.

The people with these views won, maybe not in every detail, but the great disparities that we see, the targeted violence, and the bias inherent throughout society that persist to this day in the 21st century are their handiwork. They set up patterns and practices which ensured white dominance over the commanding heights of society, to borrow a phrase Lenin used about economics.

Someone can be an unknowing cog in the machine on one end, the phrase never passing their lips, and their actions based on completely different rationales with no conscious connection to white supremacy, or at the other end you can have someone completely aware of the system and devoted to its perpetuation. I don't know what the best way is to speak differently to those different cases, but it can't be allowed to go unchallenged when someone makes the assertion that white supremacy is an ideology of fringe groups when in fact it is the basis for much of society.
posted by XMLicious at 12:21 PM on December 13, 2016 [16 favorites]

The fact that the RNC and Trump camp are keeping extra close tabs on electors this year indicates at least some nervousness on their part, right?

I think sadly they've been inoculated by our free-the-delegates activity at the RNC, for which I sort of apologize - I mean I don't regret doing it, but I do regret that they learned lessons from that and seem to be out organizing on the elector side. I'll bet they're paying the same whips, in fact.

We've also been noticing a cracking down in local RNC-elections, too - we were leading a fairly successful resurgence of NeverTrumpers to take over the RNC members, only to find halfway through (since the timing is different for different areas) organized Trump whips appearing and rallying the crazies.

Essentially, I think the RNC is well aware that there's a lot of anger on the organizer level, which is where electors are generally pulled from, and they're trying to stop out and out rebellion. Again. like the fuckers they are.
posted by corb at 12:24 PM on December 13, 2016 [20 favorites]

You may believe, in your heart of hearts, that actually 80% of the population is racially problematic. But the problem is, if you define that 80% that way, they're going to fucking stick together as a coherent group, and they're not going to have a lot of motivation to move, if they don't think they can move up a group. It's shitty, but it's just how humans fucking work on a subconscious level.

I think this framing is pretty poor, though, because 1) you're once again placing the blame for racial animus on the people who are targets of that racial animus, and 2) I don't think I've ever heard someone say '80% (or whatever) of the population has racially problematic views.' People who take this shit seriously always, always say '100% of the population has racially problematic views.'

Here's Hillary Clinton in the first debate with Trump, just for one example:

Lester, I think implicit bias is a problem for everyone. Not just police. I think unfortunately too many of us in our great country, um, jump to conclusions about each other. And therefore I think we need all of us to be asking ourselves hard questions about, you know, why am I feeling this way.

posted by beerperson at 12:25 PM on December 13, 2016 [14 favorites]

I'm gonna pre-emptively ask that everybody, including corb, let the discussion of corb's personal views on racism drop at this point.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 12:29 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

Re: Do you really think they hate you?

Dude, I had to sell my last house, at a hundred thousand dollar loss, because my mother is Lebanese and I made the mistake of bring Arabic food to block parties After 9/11, people in the neighborhood kept planting little American flags, dozens of them, in my yard. When we picked them up to mow, they'd be back overnight. My son wasn't invited to block play dates where he'd gone before. The HOA started fining us every day for things that nobody else got fined for. The final straw was the letter saying we had too many dog toys in the back yard. When confronted about it, the hoa management said that perhaps I'd be happier with my own people. You guys, I'm a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution. There are forts named after my ancestors. But, because I'm also half "ay-rab", I became a pariah.

Do I really think they hate me? Why yes, yes I do.
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 12:30 PM on December 13, 2016 [138 favorites]

We know the solution: robust federal civil rights, labor and environmental protections; massive investment in infrastructure, housing and jobs for people at every skill and educational level; access to good, affordable education and health care.

And yet. Here's President Obama, talking to Ta-Nehisi Coates:

“And so I’m careful not to attribute any particular resistance or slight or opposition to race. But what I do believe is that if somebody didn’t have a problem with their daddy being employed by the federal government, and didn’t have a problem with the Tennessee Valley Authority electrifying certain communities, and didn’t have a problem with the interstate highway system being built, and didn’t have a problem with the GI Bill, and didn’t have a problem with the [Federal Housing Administration] subsidizing the suburbanization of America, and that all helped you build wealth and create a middle class—and then suddenly as soon as African Americans or Latinos are interested in availing themselves of those same mechanisms as ladders into the middle class, you now have a violent opposition to them—then I think you at least have to ask yourself the question of how consistent you are, and what’s different, and what’s changed.”

This feels like the 4623rd iteration of this conversation, but tolerance just had a head-on collision with privilege, even though wage stagnation and poor job prospects clearly do not feel like fucking privilege. Even though demanding a magic eternity of digging coal that pollutes your community and ruins your health does not feel like privilege.

A man who lives in a golden penthouse with a golden toilet has spent a year and a half telling a group of people that their lives have more validity than other people's lives, and since that's what they sort of gut-felt already, now they really believe it and want to see it enacted. The easiest way for it to be enacted isn't by elevating them but by putting others in their "right place", telling them who's in charge, warning them not to feel comfortable ever again. We have seen this daubed on walls, scribbled in bathrooms, yelled from passing cars, intimated in politely passive-aggressive notes.

I wonder if this is what the end of Reconstruction felt like in the south.
posted by holgate at 12:39 PM on December 13, 2016 [49 favorites]

Essentially, I think the RNC is well aware that there's a lot of anger on the organizer level, which is where electors are generally pulled from, and they're trying to stop out and out rebellion. Again. like the fuckers they are.

I'm struggling to understand this. What is driving the RNC to re-orient the party towards this inchoate revanchist dumpster fire of a platform? At this point the only hypothesis I have is Putin has the goods on the higher ups.
posted by ocschwar at 12:49 PM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

I can see what you mean, corb, in terms of leaving a path for people to change. But I think that path is there and has always been there. What penalties are enacted on people trying to leave a racist worldview are done by their conservative peers, not liberals, although of course liberals may be slow to trust them.

In other words, I don't think that triggering that mental change is within the power of liberals to do.

And what conversations can take place need to be between white people; I think those most oppressed have zero obligation to make nice or reach out to those who have oppressed them.

I would like to believe there is a magic conciliatory action I could take that would enlighten my fellow white people as to why continuing down the path of racism is immoral. I would gladly do it. But they are well-armored against the likes of me.

The thing is, racism is very very old, it goes deep in our civilization--to use a religious term, it's one of our original sins. Thanks to slavery it has warped our entire society in very specific ways. One of those ways is the barely spoken white fear that if we grant equality to everyone, we will lose everything we already have; that we can't thrive unless we oppress someone else. The fear that keeping down nonwhite people is the only thing keeping white people from the abyss. It's not true, it's monstrous, but it is there right under the surface.

If those who embrace racism don't value peace, truth, reality itself, the future, compassion or beauty--as the Republicans currently in power certainly appear not to--then on what basis can we persuade them? Right now, my only hopes for reaching the majority of Trump supporters is a. nationalism/fear of Russian power and b. self-interest/loss of benefits.

But of course if people are very very determined not to see the truth, they will find ways to make those things the fault of those they fear.

This is why I think we need to stop focusing on the people with their eyes shut and ears closed, and work on mobilizing and enabling the many many more people who are on the sidelines, not certain, or afraid, who could stand with us. There are a lot of people who could have voted but didn't. They have far more potential than the people deeply invested in Trump.
posted by emjaybee at 12:51 PM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

What is driving the RNC to re-orient the party towards this inchoate revanchist dumpster fire of a platform?

It won.
posted by Etrigan at 12:54 PM on December 13, 2016 [27 favorites]

corb, so it sounds like you see essentially no room for Republican elector wobbling at this point, because they are a thoroughly pro-Trump crew? Well shoot, that significantly changes things, doesn't it. Is there anything that you think would sway them, or do you see Republican participation in an EC revolt as pretty much impossible?

No, no. It's not quite /that/ bad.

So as I said - god, it feels like forever ago - a lot of the various campaigns and anti-Trump efforts organized slates of delegates. When they did, they also organized elector slates. Assuming the representation of original NeverTrump delegates to other delegates is the same representation of original NeverTrump electors to other electors, I would say that probably somewhere around 75 electors started off being, or at some time in the past were, NeverTrump.

Now that gets wibbly, because obviously once Trump actually got elected/nominated we had a lot of defectors from Camp NeverTrump for various reasons - up to and including personal threats. But what it does mean, I would think, is that you have something like 60-70 electors who are or could be persuadable, which would drop things under the 270 threshhold.

However, like I said, those whips are fierce and threatening real consequences, to include punishment of the entire state, future careers, etc. So I do not think there is any circumstance in which you could persuade those electors to throw their future away to, say, bring about a Clinton presidency. And those electors are probably smart enough to know that they are sorely outnumbered, so they can't, alone, toss in, say, McMullin and see if it floats in the House. Whether people morally should do it or not - I know I would - it's just not likely that you're going to have a lot of people chasing what they feel is an impossible dream.

One of the ideas I've seen floated is releasing Clinton's delegates to choose a compromise Republican, and I feel like that's probably the most likely possible scenario - not even really likely, but possible - because those electors would know there was already a solid block for a candidate they could stomach, and that they needed smaller numbers. But as someone noted upthread, it would probably take Clinton coming out and asking her electors to do this, and the Dems may feel it offers too much risk for too little possible reward - they may be betting that it's better to let Trump tank everything on the odds of a 2020 pickup, than to risk losing their base by emplacing a Kasich, which the Dems would then sort of own.

I'm struggling to understand this. What is driving the RNC to re-orient the party towards this inchoate revanchist dumpster fire of a platform? At this point the only hypothesis I have is Putin has the goods on the higher ups

You and me both! I'm pretty sure Priebus was just bought and sold, but what's stopping the rest of them? My bet is that they're trying to perform submission to Trump - he perceived them as not working hard enough for his election, so now they're trying not to be the first to stop clapping, as it were, so that he doesn't choose to punish them.

Because that's the world we live in now. So, blackmail of a sort, but I'm not sure it's Putin-directed.
posted by corb at 12:54 PM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

> I'm struggling to understand this. What is driving the RNC to re-orient the party towards this inchoate revanchist dumpster fire of a platform?

The Racist Yam represents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to ram everything on the Republican Wingnut wishlist down America's throat. When it all backfires and fucks the country up, voters will elect a Democrat as President and the Republicans can kick back and blame everything on him/her. And it'll work, assuming the country still exists at that point.
posted by The Card Cheat at 12:55 PM on December 13, 2016 [15 favorites]

you see essentially no room for Republican elector wobbling at this point, because they are a thoroughly pro-Trump crew?

Not corb, but I see no chance of a significant number of Republican electors voting against Trump because their loyalty is to the RNC and the RNC has made it clear that they back Trump. That's what the party is good at incubating, steadfastly following orders. I think if the RNC were to support a Hail Mary to put some other Republican into the presidency, a significant number of them would do as they were told and abandon Trump (though there'd still be a relatively high number of Trump true believers).
posted by Candleman at 12:55 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

It's not so much that the Civil War ended as much as the South stopped fighting above ground and went underground.
posted by ZeusHumms at 1:03 PM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

Maybe we can say the same thing about the Cold War?
posted by zachlipton at 1:09 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

The cavalry's not coming
There's only one way for us to win this
Provoke outrage, outright
Don't engage, strike by night
Remain relentless 'til their troops take flight
Make it impossible to justify the cost of the fight
Outrun
Outlast
Hit 'em quick, get out fast (Chick-a-plao!)
Stay alive 'til this horror show is past

So, yeah. I recommend chick-a-plao.
posted by rokusan at 1:12 PM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

Kasich just signed a 20-week abortion ban in Ohio, vetoed the heartbeat bill. I don't know if there's other access restrictions bundled in there as well.
posted by zachlipton at 1:15 PM on December 13, 2016

The 20 week ban is terrible.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 1:16 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

This just in: Donald Trump plans to award Ray J. Johnson Jr. a National Medal of the Arts. [fake]
posted by entropicamericana at 1:17 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

On the Tillerson endorsements - Condoleezza Rice and Bob Gates are both paid consultants for Exxon.
posted by T.D. Strange at 1:18 PM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

So actually looking at a 'which electors could flip': I could see Utah, Wyoming, Iowa, Alaska (and that one elector in Maine) as strong possibilities - those are all states which had a strong slate, had a majority sign the roll call petition, and whose votes ultimately went Republican. But that only adds up to 19 votes, and it would take essentially the same number again to flip the whole college. Those would have to be pulled one-by-one and would be a lot harder.
posted by corb at 1:20 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

my assumption at this point is that the Heartbeat Bill was introduced to make the 20 week bill look reasonable by comparison
posted by murphy slaw at 1:21 PM on December 13, 2016 [28 favorites]

Dear Diary,

Today at Metafilter, I learned that there are people who refer to themselves as Odinists. In related but happier news, there is no hope and we're all going to die alone, unmourned, unloved and ultimately forgotten.

Yours, JM
posted by Joey Michaels at 1:40 PM on December 13, 2016 [20 favorites]

Another Google fail. Type in "Did the Holocaust happen." #1 is a link to Stormfront. I'm going to guess that the answer to that query is "No." (The name of the article is "Top 10 Reasons why the Holocaust didn't happen.")

Good to remember when your kids use google for their homework-- popular does not mean historically accurate.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 1:45 PM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

Today at Metafilter, I learned that there are people who refer to themselves as Odinists.

Oh, honey. C'mere, let me give you a great big hug.
posted by soren_lorensen at 1:47 PM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

Another Google fail. Type in "Did the Holocaust happen." #1 is a link to Stormfront. I'm going to guess that the answer to that query is "No." (The name of the article is "Top 10 Reasons why the Holocaust didn't happen.")

Good to remember when your kids use google for their homework-- popular does not mean historically accurate.

It seems you can report this to google and they will react by changing the algorithm.
posted by mumimor at 1:54 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

But as someone noted upthread, it would probably take Clinton coming out and asking her electors to do this, and the Dems may feel it offers too much risk for too little possible reward - they may be betting that it's better to let Trump tank everything on the odds of a 2020 pickup, than to risk losing their base by emplacing a Kasich, which the Dems would then sort of own.

Given that Kasich just signed the 20 week ban, there's a really poor argument he'd be any better for Democratic priorities than Trump. All we'd get would be some slightly less pro-Russia appointments. That's pretty much the extent of the difference. The strategy should be total resistance and rebuilding, with no Democratic buy-in whatsoever, much less constitutional shenanigans to put in a different monster as the official compromise candidate with approval of the Democratic party. Make them own everything. All of it. Draw contrasts and put forth alternatives and better candidates.
posted by T.D. Strange at 1:55 PM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

It seems you can report this to google and they will react by changing the algorithm.

Nope.
posted by zarq at 1:55 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Given that Kasich just signed the 20 week ban, there's a really poor argument he'd be any better for Democratic priorities than Trump.

Kasich is horrible, but I honestly don't think he'll send me and mine into harm's way because of a tweet. There's a gap between "not good for Democratic priorities" and "bad for all of humanity on an existential level".
posted by Etrigan at 1:58 PM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

>> It seems you can report this to google and they will react by changing the algorithm.
> Nope.

Aaaaand of course the first comment thread is a long derail into freedom of speech, and whether Google as a private entity is or isn't bound to respect it, even in case of hate speech.

Sigh.
posted by RedOrGreen at 2:00 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

There's a gap between "not good for Democratic priorities"

Needing an abortion because you were raped is not a Democratic priority. It's a civil right.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 2:00 PM on December 13, 2016 [22 favorites]

Doing something like that would also be suicide for the Democrats, ceding publicly that there's only one Party, and it's not the Democrats. They'd lose all credibility as an independent force never to be viable again. It's the choice between Trump possibly blowing up the world, or allowing an only slightly less crazy and hostile Republican to destroy it slower.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:03 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

There's a gap between "not good for Democratic priorities"

Needing an abortion because you were raped is not a Democratic priority. It's a civil right.

Which party is the one that's saying that, though? Yeah, it hypersucks that we have to make that a political thing, but that's the thing about political things -- it only takes one side to make them that.
posted by Etrigan at 2:03 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Is Friend of Vladimir anything like a Friend of Dorothy
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 2:04 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

As an aside, if you type into the search box "Did the Ho..." Google will helpfully autocomplete the query for you, so it's hot right now. And you can scroll down to the end of the page, click on "Send Feedback", and quickly report incorrect search results.
posted by RedOrGreen at 2:04 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

It seems you can report this to google and they will react by changing the algorithm.

Nope.

Disgusting
posted by mumimor at 2:04 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

This is basically tyranny of the minority. They cheated their way to power and are preparing to enact policies that most Americans don't want (including many who voted for them) because they have seized all of the checks and balances and can no longer be stopped. They are not demonstrating that they have principles, compassion for those who disagree with them, or (frankly) any shame. Our electoral system has failed us. It has been subverted and gutted. Ironically, the electoral college, meant to be a check on majority overreach, has empowered a radical minority to take the "liberal democracy" our of our liberal democracy and replace it with authoritarian kleptocracy. There seems to be no end to the eagerness of those in power to deliver a finishing blow to our most important institutions. I don't know where we go from here. I am having trouble finding my usual small measure of hope.
posted by prefpara at 2:05 PM on December 13, 2016 [62 favorites]

Every single time Kasich's named is mentioned, it takes less than a minute for someone to say that he's literally just as bad as Trump. This is just crazy talk. Kasich may be just as bad as GWB. He may be worse. He's definitely worse than Romney. But unless you think Trump is just as bad as any Republican that had an even vaguely plausible chance to become President this year, then Kasich is better. I would jump at the chance to have 8 guaranteed years of Romney, Jeb, Rubio, or Kasich rather than risk 4 years of Trump and roll the dice on 2020.
posted by skewed at 2:06 PM on December 13, 2016 [15 favorites]

But unless you think Trump is just as bad as any Republican that had an even vaguely plausible chance to become President this year, then Kasich is better.

I watched the Republican debates.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:08 PM on December 13, 2016

This overstates the case a little, and nothing changes 60+ million Americans looking at Trump and seeing somebody even arguably fit for the presidency. Nevertheless, I can't stop screaming:

In March, Podesta received a phishing email that warned him of someone trying to access his account. It instructed him to reset his password by following a hyperlink to a page hosted on myaccount.google.com-securitysettingpage.tk/security. While it might appear that he was visiting google.com, he (or a staffer who managed his email) went to com-securitysettingpage.tk.

Before doing so, however, a Clinton staffer checked to see if the email was legitimate; basic security stuff. She got a response back from another staffer, Charles Delavan, who wrote “This is a legitimate email. John needs to change his password immediately, and ensure that two-factor authentication is turned on his account.” He also explicitly directed them to a site on google.com.

The only problem is that Delavan meant to call the email “illegitimate.”

WHERE THE FUCK IS A TIME MACHINE WHEN YOU NEED ONE
posted by joyceanmachine at 2:08 PM on December 13, 2016 [29 favorites]

holgate: Yeah, define "hate" here. Perfectly pleasant on a non-political one-to-one basis? Sure.

Unless you piss them off, then they now feel free to call you all sorts of terrible things in public, to your face. Or punch you in your face.

See: rise of hate crimes. That's not people being pleasant.
posted by filthy light thief at 2:10 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

The only problem is that Delavan meant to call the email “illegitimate.”

I would also accept "not legitimate', 'fake', 'crazypants' or 'you gotta be kidding me'.
posted by ZeusHumms at 2:12 PM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

It seems you can report this to google and they will react by changing the algorithm.

Nope.

Whatever. This is like when Facebook concluded that "Brock Turner for 2016 Olympics" was not a hate group and then changed their mind when we lit a fire under their asses. Flood them with reports. I was momentarily at a loss for words when asked to type a description of the issue to accompany my screenshot, but eventually went with a simple "Shame on you."
posted by sunset in snow country at 2:12 PM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

I watched the Republican debates.

So is your position that the U.S. is in roughly the same amount of peril now than we would be if we were facing a Kasich administration? I honestly don't know how to respond to this idea, but it seems very wrong to me.
posted by skewed at 2:12 PM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

Today at Metafilter, I learned that there are people who refer to themselves as Odinists.

I'm more of an Onanist myself.
posted by OverlappingElvis at 2:16 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

Yeah, I'm of the opinion that Kasich would be a disaster in many policy areas, women's rights huge among them. But he's not a threat to American democracy or to blow up the world. And we're going to get the deluge of bad policies anyway.
posted by chris24 at 2:16 PM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

What Was James Comey Thinking? A long Esquire profile and account of Comey's actions in the email issue.

A Glimpse at James Comey's Emails to the FBI "Including a never-before-seen message from July."
posted by kirkaracha at 2:20 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

Well, in lighter news, I guess Kanye is going to run for President in 2024 instead of 2020 after his meeting with Donald this morning.

Also I want off this planet.
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 2:21 PM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

When we talk about Kasich or Romney or even Cruz as a better candidate for president than Trump, we are not saying they would be good presidents. We are saying that Donald Trump takes all of the bad qualities, policies and practices they would bring to the office and then bring an entirely different additional set of awful qualities, policies and practices. We're not talking about trying to get Kasich et al into office because they would be good presidents. I believe they'd be shitty presidents. But Trump is so bad that having a shitty president instead is actually a better situation than having Trump.
posted by Joey Michaels at 2:22 PM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

joyceanmachine: WHERE THE FUCK IS A TIME MACHINE WHEN YOU NEED ONE

You'd have to go back before that email exchange, because if it wasn't bullshit email nothingburger turned up to 11, it would be something else to tar Hillary and her campaign as "POSSIBLY CORRUPT, PROBABLY."

In retrospect, the bias against her and in joking/ ironic/ not serious or direct, but still effective support of _rump by the media is blinding and painful. At the time, the pain was dimmed by a hope that enough people would see through the bullshit being spread with a spatula.

Sadly, here we are, with a man elected on a populist platform just to spit in the face of it all

DAVID WESSEL: Well, it’s just wonderfully ironic that Donald Trump, who railed against the elite, lambasted Hillary Clinton for giving paid speeches to Goldman Sachs, turned to a guy who not only was at Goldman Sachs for 17 years, but is the son of a Goldman Sachs lifer and has a brother who is at Goldman Sachs.

And so he’s going — he went to Yale. Wilbur Ross went to Yale. It seems to be a very anti-populist kind of move to pick these rich financiers for these jobs.

THERE IS NOTHING WONDERFUL IN THIS IRONY.

(I could have sworn NPR had a bit on how his various picks also point to a "globalist" path instead of nationalist, as he campaigned. I was shouting a lot, so maybe I misheard someone.)
posted by filthy light thief at 2:22 PM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

If you're willing to sell out women's rights for the "greater good" then you were never really that committed to women's rights.

How many women must be forced to give birth or die in the process in order to "save" the US? Because that's what you're suggesting. That women -- particularly poor women -- must sacrifice themselves through childbirth to "save American democracy."
posted by melissasaurus at 2:24 PM on December 13, 2016 [35 favorites]

Like, seriously. "Oh well, women's rights would have to go" is not anywhere near an acceptable response. Consider the room you're in, for one. Women are HERE.
posted by agregoli at 2:27 PM on December 13, 2016 [24 favorites]

Donald Trump threatening personal career retaliation against electors.

That's, um, hopeful.

If he's scared, that cheers me up.
posted by ocschwar at 2:30 PM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

Maybe we could set aside debating improbable scenarios over which Republicans the electors aren't going to choose anyway will or won't be worse than Trump?
posted by gusottertrout at 2:31 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

If he's threatening people to vote for him, maybe that will make some of them think maybe they shouldn't?
posted by Brainy at 2:32 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

And some of us would literally die without access to safe abortion. It's an existential threat to us either way.
posted by melissasaurus at 2:32 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

If you're willing to sell out women's rights for the "greater good" then you were never really that committed to women's rights.

But Trump is going to do just about everything as president that Kasich would be able to do as president to weaken women's rights, isn't he? That's the reason I'm so confused. Kasich > Trump doesn't signal a willingness to compromise on women's rights, it's a recognition that Trump won't be any better on that one issue, and will almost certainly be worse on many other issues. Is there something about Trump that I'm missing to reassure me that maybe he won't be as bad as I'm thinking?
posted by skewed at 2:34 PM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

Kasich is wishful thinking. The only non-Trump possibility (and it's small) is some sort of legal issue, effectively enough prosecuted making him need to step down and letting Pence take over/appoint a new VP.

We don't have to make a devil's bargain, because the devil is not currently offering us any bargains. And every one we've made up to now (like Comey) backfired, as devil's bargains do, so why bother? We can't win anything by throwing anyone under the bus because we are ALL under the bus and likely to stay there for the foreseeable.

And I want us to learn by this that any victory you gain by betraying your allies will end up worse for you in the long run. We need to be done with that.
posted by emjaybee at 2:34 PM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

The electors are gonna pick Trump. We will have a President Trump. We must figure out how to move forward from here.
posted by Justinian at 2:34 PM on December 13, 2016 [20 favorites]

Today at Metafilter, I learned that there are people who refer to themselves as Odinists.

I'm more of an Onanist myself.

I keep shooting for Obelisk, but then my gym attendance wanes and it's back to Ovalish†.

† Obelus.
posted by rokusan at 2:37 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

From the Salon article linked by ocschwar

One elector tells Salon, Trump affiliates are placing "career pressure" on GOP electors to tow the line on Dec. 19

OFFS. Are the editors blind? Are the journalists too young? I'm so tired of this "tow the line" nonsense. [Sorry for the grammer detail but Salon should be better than this if they want people to take them seriously.]
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 2:37 PM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

Maybe Trump and Kanye agreed a handover for 2024, like Blair and Brown's famous dinner in Islington.
posted by Coda Tronca at 2:39 PM on December 13, 2016

Salon should be better than this if they want people to take them seriously.

Why should they start now?
posted by zarq at 2:40 PM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

It's trimp, he may actually want them to tie ropes to a golden, wheeled throne and tow him around. I wouldn't put it past him, he really does seem to think he was appointed emperor.
posted by mrgoat at 2:41 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

[publication] should be better than this if they want people to take them seriously.

Do you even 2016, bro?
posted by rokusan at 2:41 PM on December 13, 2016 [9 favorites]

But in my view both Kasich (or any generic Republican) and Trump are going to try to deny abortion rights so we're going to be fighting that fight either way.

So why give them the legitimacy of bipartisanship? Democrats need to stop negotiating against themselves and stand for fucking something for once. There's a perfectly qualified candidate who happened to also win the popular vote. If the electors do not think Trump is qualified, they have another option that also happens to actually embrace the basic principles of democracy. Every elected Democrat should be calling for the electors to vote for Clinton if they are legally able to and vowing to defend those who do so even if they are not legally able to. Now is the time to actually stand on our principles, not throw them out with the trash because there's a gun to our heads.
posted by melissasaurus at 2:43 PM on December 13, 2016 [14 favorites]

Anyhow, the [somebody other than Trump as President] fantasies are just fantasies. The only way to get by the next four years is to go through the fire swamp and Trump is the AOUS* that we'll be battling.

*Ass of Unusual Size
posted by Joey Michaels at 2:43 PM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

There's a short SF story by Michael Swanwick called Radiant Doors, which he calls "the single darkest story I've ever written". The premise is that around the world, doors open up and refugees come pouring out - starved, tortured, beaten refugees from some decades in the future. The protagonist is a government aid worker who's trying to hold it all together, despite knowing that that future is advancing towards them at 24-hours per day.

I've thought of the story more and more over the last couple of years, and especially since this election. I think it conveys a truth about lots of events; not just why people do bad things, but why they set events in motion that are inevitably going to end horribly. Anyway, I won't spoil the story, but when I read comments asking why people do things even though they know the likely consequences - that's begging the question.

You can buy Radiant Doors collected in The Best of Michael Swanwick on Amazon for $2.99. It's very much worth it.
posted by Joe in Australia at 2:44 PM on December 13, 2016 [26 favorites]

High five, rokusan, I should be at the gym RIGHT NOW.

Press Release from President Elect Donald J. Trump

President-Elect Donald J. Trump Appoints Stephen Miller as Senior Advisor to the President For Policy

We should have seen that coming. S. Miller has been his warm-up act since he first began his rallies. Loyalty rewarded The fact that S. Miller is a a horror and a nightmare you can take as a given

On torture, for example, Miller writes that criticism of the use of enhanced interrogation techniques by American soldiers made then-senator Ted Kennedy “a traitor”, and that comparing the actions of the US military with those of its enemies means “you have betrayed your nation and are morally guilty of treason”.

Good to know. Don't criticize the use of torture by the incoming administration unless you want to be labeled a traitor.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 2:49 PM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

ArsTechnica has an article up regarding the request for names of DOE employees working on AGM. One of the things I like about Ars is their unequivocal calling out of Trump and his stable of miscreants:

Trump has publicly called climate change a hoax, and just this weekend, he told the Fox Sunday host that “nobody really knows” about climate change. These are blatant lies from Trump, as climate scientists have decades of research showing that climate change is happening.

When they've scrapped all climate research and destroyed all copies of records, Stephen Harper-style, and then Middle America gets hammered by rising waters and hurricanes and crop failures...
posted by acb at 11:09 PM on December 13 [19 favorites +] [!]

They also address this in the article and discuss measures being taken to safeguard the data. Worth a read, including the comments.
posted by michswiss at 2:52 PM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

Politico Trump close to building out senior White House team

Some people close to Trump said that Kellyanne Conway, Trump’s final campaign manager, who has publicly flirted with running a pro-Trump group outside the government and has said she already declined the post of press secretary, is now considered more likely to enter the administration than she was a week ago. Among the titles under discussion would be serving as a senior adviser or assistant to the president or possibly as a deputy chief of staff for communications, they said.[...]

If Priebus, Bannon, Conway and Lewandowski all end up inside the West Wing, it would create an almost unprecedented multitude of competing power centers — all within steps of the Oval Office. And that doesn’t include Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who is expected to exert significant authority in the new administration. Or Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, who has become one of the president-elect’s most important and trusted counselors.

“He’s someone that likes to listen to lots of different opinion, lots of different people, lots of smart people. He will talk to a lot of folks and just say, what do you think about this option?” Priebus said earlier this month on CBS.

I tried to watch West Wing last night. I thought it would be soothing to enter a world where everyone is smart, moral, and trying to do the best thing for the country. Instead I just kept imagining a Trump White House and how they would look inside the Oval Office discussing matters of extreme importance. It was a nightmare.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 3:04 PM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

One thing I haven't seen discussed is Trump's claim that "No new deals will be done during my term(s) in office."

o hai There’s already a big problem with Trump’s ‘no new deals’ pledge

Many of the companies remain a mystery. During Trump's presidential campaign, he filed registrations for eight companies with names suggesting a hotel deal in Jiddah, the second-biggest city in the oil-rich kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which Trump has said he “would want to protect.”

Four of those companies were dissolved last year. The other four remained active until they were dissolved Nov. 15, a week after Trump's electoral victory, according to a state official in Delaware, where the companies were filed. Trump representatives did not respond to requests for more details about the potential deal, or why the companies were dissolved.

Yeah, it's perfectly normal to dissolve "DT Jeddah Technical Services Manager Member Corp" a week after you get elected President.
posted by zachlipton at 3:04 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

I really believe Romney finds Trump despicable, came out prior to the election and said as much in order to do duty by his country, knew that his meetings post-election were a matter of him being punk'd, but went through with eating bowls of shit in hopes that he could prevent Trump from ruining the world.

This year I started reading stuff about the colonization of the West, and boy, Mormons were insanely persecuted. It really sort of makes me sad that Twain was such an asshole about them in Roughing It. I don't get what motivated Mormons to well, be Mormons, because I don't get religion, and I know that Mormons did some bad shit with the indigenous population, but generally speaking, Mormons were kind of bad-ass folks who'd been robbed of their homes who valued community and took community-related duties tremendously seriously. I had not learned about this in school at all, the Mormon persecution. I think 1908s curriculum didn't want to deal with it.

So for the moment I'm on Team Thank You Romney for Eating that Bowl of Shit, because I'm seeing it through that lens of Bad-Ass Mormons who regularly took one for the team.

Now, why Romney picked Ryan as his VP, that's another thing altogether. /spits
posted by angrycat at 3:07 PM on December 13, 2016 [17 favorites]

Steven Miller very nasty..
posted by adamvasco at 3:15 PM on December 13, 2016

I keep thinking about Climate Change in comparison to the carcinogenic properties of smoking. For decades Big Tobacco pretended that science was wrong and smoking did not cause cancer. Mostly thanks to a whistle blower it finally became clear that Big Tobacco was hiding their own research that proved smoking caused cancer which resulted in death for millions of Americans. Gradually state and federal government began to turn away from supporting Big Tobacco and then to actively legislating against smoking.

The only people opposing the evidence that Climate Change is happening and scientifically proven are those who stand to benefit-- Big Oil and the Representatives that are bribed by Big Oil. We just need to figure out how to prove they are willfully collaborating in the death of millions. I think it is going to take lawsuits which means we need a direct correlation between Big Oil --->Climate Change----> death and destruction.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 3:25 PM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

Military Plane Circling Manhattan Part of 'Training' Exercise
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 3:28 PM on December 13, 2016

Secret Life of Gravy, that is a good idea!
posted by mumimor at 3:30 PM on December 13, 2016

If you're willing to sell out women's rights for the "greater good" then you were never really that committed to women's rights.
---
Like, seriously. "Oh well, women's rights would have to go" is not anywhere near an acceptable response. Consider the room you're in, for one. Women are HERE.

My post was certainly not meant to imply "selling out women for the greater good." If my phrasing was too casual or my intent not clear, I apologize. The reason I included the women's rights part was not to sell out women, but to highlight how awful Kasich is despite his supposed moderation and electoral college savior image. My intended meaning was simply that Trump is awful in all those ways and more, plus he's going to threaten democracy and the future of human life on this planet. Between someone who tries to ban abortion and someone who tries to ban abortion, doesn't believe man affects climate change, imposes a Muslim ban, implements mass deportations, establishes a dictatorship and starts WWIII, I basically agree with lalex that the lesser evil is the lesser evil.

My comment was not intended to ignore Clinton being obviously the better choice for the EC and one that I hope Democrats fight for and electors vote for. It was simply commenting on a comparison of Trump and Kasich, not advocating a strategy for the electors since the whole elector thing has no chance of happening anyway.
posted by chris24 at 3:34 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

I tried to watch West Wing last night. I thought it would be soothing to enter a world where everyone is smart, moral, and trying to do the best thing for the country.

Great writing and acting notwithstanding, I could never quite swallow that as realistic.

House of Cards is much more like the Washington I have always imagined.
posted by rokusan at 3:34 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

It's not only people's health, but also their property that is in danger. There must be grounds for class action suits (is this the right term? Not American), both on property and health - heck we might even get Trump to sign on for a sea-level complaint.
And how about disease and life-expectancy in car-only cities?
Is there a community organizer and a lawyer among us?
posted by mumimor at 3:35 PM on December 13, 2016

Official response from the Office of Government Ethics to Thomas Carper, Ranking member of the committee on Homeland Security. Re: Trump's Business.

The answer to question D

Transferring operational control of a company to one' s children would not constitute the establishment of a qualified blind trust, nor would it eliminate conflicts of interest under 18 U.S.C. § 208 if applicable.

posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 3:38 PM on December 13, 2016 [29 favorites]

Instead I just kept imagining a Trump White House and how they would look inside the Oval Office discussing matters of extreme importance.

I had the same feeling watching Trevor Noah interview Barack Obama on The Daily Show. I cannot imagine Trump being able to participate in a fraction of the insight and eloquence Obama demonstrates in this interview, or a Trump interview with any interviewer that would produce anything close to the substance.

Great writing and acting notwithstanding, I could never quite swallow that as realistic.

The West Wing wasn't a documentary. It was a happy fantasyland to live in during the Bush administration.
posted by kirkaracha at 3:41 PM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

I just saw a youtube ad for Hamilton Electors, the group or whatever it is. It makes me very uneasy that this is being celebrated as an escape route.

We should freak out reasonably. Gah.
posted by angrycat at 3:45 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

@JoyAnnReid Apparently at @Heritage today @newtgingrich gave away the game; said goal of Trumpism is to "eradicate FDR government."

That anybody could look back at the 30's and the Dust Bowl and the Depression and think, "Yeah. Good times! I can't wait for the poor to starve to death in the streets."

Secret Life of Gravy, that is a good idea!

If I've thought it, many thousands of better minds must have thought of it but could not make it work. Perhaps because the direct correlation has not been provable yet? I know there was a recent news article that revealed that Exxon knew using fossil fuel had a direct effect on the climate 30 years ago, so the only thing lacking is second part to the equation. It must be too hard to prove that super hurricanes are directly linked to man-made Climate Change.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 3:49 PM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

Yeah, what’s happening with Hamilton Electors is that Dems aren’t going to bother trying, but groundwork has been laid for GOP to do it someday if they ever need to.
posted by gerryblog at 3:52 PM on December 13, 2016 [16 favorites]

Process: a blog for American history Donald Trump and the Anti-New Deal Tradition

If we wish to understand the roots of Trumpism, however, we need to backdate Ornstein and Mann’s argument by half a century—to the era of the Great Depression, when anti-New Dealers developed an enduring language of opposition to government and governing that has played a key but unacknowledged role in Trump’s rise to power. While some critics have pointed to Lindbergh, the first America Firster, Father Charles Coughlin and other proto-fascists from the Depression decade, as precedents for Trump, there has been little attention to the mainstream anti-New Dealers, who indirectly laid the groundwork for Trumpism. Their rhetoric about the dangers of government has been the background music for opposition to liberal reform ever since. This is not to claim that an unchanging template was set during the Depression decade and that all members of the Republican coalition have followed this script in an unvarying way ever since. Yet it is undeniable that many of the political reflexes that Trumpism builds on were first developed not in the 1990s, but by critics of the New Deal in the 1930s and 1940s and have become an enduring part of the language of American conservatism ever since.

I was particularly taken by this sentence:

they spoke in the language of crisis rather than policy, and of absolutes rather than compromise, of hyperbole rather than reality. The New Deal, they claimed, was “worse than two wars,” and more dangerous than chattel slavery,

In short, Trumpism has been with us always.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:01 PM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

All the more reason to get rid of the Electoral College.
posted by asteria at 4:07 PM on December 13, 2016

It was simply commenting on a comparison of Trump and Kasich, not advocating a strategy for the electors since the whole elector thing has no chance of happening anyway.
posted by chris24

That's what was frustrating about it, to me. This fantasy speculation as if either choice is palatable at all.
posted by agregoli at 4:07 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

If I've thought it, many thousands of better minds must have thought of it but could not make it work. Perhaps because the direct correlation has not been provable yet
I'm not certain about that - it may also be that climate activists and scientists are not really into the whole litigation culture in the same way as health people are. Where I live, lawsuits on this scale are not really an option, but I think people across the globe would be able to enter an American class action? We do have local environmental lawsuits and the complainants invariably win. Climate change deniers are really not respected within the scientific communities and I don't think they stand a chance in court.

Things that could be proven:
Car culture leads to diabetes, which is a deadly disease. And in the US, it is deadlier, because you don't have access to free healthcare.
Global warming leads to rising oceans, leading to property loss, which insurance companies will not cover.
Pollution leads to various incurable respiratory diseases - again with a special risk in the US.
I'm not certain about this one but pollution may be what is killing the bees - and without bees several crops will die out

The fishing industry could possibly be engaged in a legal battle against the huge islands of plastic and the oil spills.

I know the Trump administration is going to appoint more conservative judges, but a lot of conservatives are very worried about the environment, and this might be a winning game for progressives.
posted by mumimor at 4:10 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

That's what was frustrating about it, to me. This fantasy speculation as if either choice is palatable at all.

Fair enough. I was too flippant on a serious and sensitive matter. My apologies.
posted by chris24 at 4:13 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

What do Trump, Tillerson, Puzder, and Pumpeo all have in common? They are all inspired by Ayn Rand novels as are several of Trump's advisers.

WaPo The Daily 202: Ayn Rand-acolyte Donald Trump stacks his cabinet with fellow objectivists

-- Remember that scene in “Dirty Dancing” when Baby tries to get that waiter who knocked up Johnny’s dance partner to pay for her abortion? He refuses and instead pulls out a weathered copy of “The Fountainhead,” urging her to read it. “Some people count, and some people don’t,” he tells her. Jennifer Grey’s character responds by pouring a pitcher of water on him. In popular culture, the Rand acolytes are that guy.

The fact that all of these men, so late in life, are such fans of works that celebrate individuals who consistently put themselves before others is therefore deeply revealing. They will now run our government.

posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:17 PM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

@jnthnwwlsn
Whittaker Chambers reviewed Atlas Shrugged for @NRO in 1957: "Any ordinarily sensible head could not possibly take it seriously."
posted by chris24 at 4:19 PM on December 13, 2016

Meanwhile...back in Colorado

@NickRiccardi [Judge Barbara] Starr said there'd be repercussions for failing to vote for Clinton but didn't specify them. CO law calls for up to 1 yr in prison $1k fine

After SoS office says this won't stop faithless electors, Starrs amends her order and now allow their removal if they don't vote HRC

posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:24 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

And yet, my dad, an actualfax Objectivist scholar (don't laugh), despises Trump and Trumpism, and recently I had the misfortune to get an email from him using the term "cuckservative" which he has just learned was being used by the alt-reich to describe people with his political views. (Here's a short list of words I do not ever want to hear my dad utter ever again: 1. Cuckservative.)
posted by soren_lorensen at 4:26 PM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

Meanwhile, in Oklahoma, Oklahoma To Require Anti-Abortion Signs In Public Restrooms

Oklahoma may require public restrooms in restaurants, hospitals, public schools, hotels and nursing homes to post signs with anti-abortion sentiments as part of a drive against the procedure.

The state’s board of health was due to discuss Tuesday regulations that would force any restrooms in buildings regulated by the Oklahoma Health Department to carry signs that state:

There are many public and private agencies willing and able to help you carry your child to term and assist you and your child after your child is born, whether you choose to keep your child or to place him or her for adoption. The State of Oklahoma strongly urges you to contact them if you are pregnant.

Because that pesky government telling businesses what they have to do is utterly unacceptable if they're making you put safety equipment in your coal mine, but it's swell if they force small business owners to put up generally meaningless signs ["there are agencies; contact them" is not even an actionable message if that's your goal] in their bathrooms.
posted by zachlipton at 4:28 PM on December 13, 2016 [18 favorites]

Lessig claims his Elector's Trust group (offering legal services to faithless electors) has spoken with 20 GOP electors who are considering not voting for Trump.

"We believe there are now at least 20 GOP electors considering a vote of conscience. Last week, there was 1." From this tweet.
posted by antinomia at 4:32 PM on December 13, 2016 [28 favorites]

That is big news, if there's anything to it.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 4:34 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

The Washington Post has a page to bookmark to keep track of 60 promises made by DJT.

Trump Promise Tracker

There are 1,461 days in Donald Trump’s term. We’re tracking the progress of 60 pledges he made during his campaign — and whether he achieved his goals.

During the 2016 campaign, Donald Trump made more than 280 promises, though many were contradictory or just uttered in a single campaign event. But on Oct. 22, Trump issued what he called his “Contract with the American Voter.” This was a specific plan of action that would guide his administration, starting from the first day, and listed 60 promises. He even signed it with his distinctive signature. During Trump’s term, The Washington Post Fact Checker will track the progress of each pledge – and whether Trump has achieved his stated goal.

The first promise is: Create at least 25 million jobs in the first term.

This one was new to me: Cancel billions in payments to U.N. climate change programs and use the money to fix America’s water and environmental infrastructure.

File this one under "Oh wow, I didn't know vouchers could be used for home-schooling, that sounds like a bad idea open to abuse: Redirect education money to give parents the right to send their kid to the public, private, charter, magnet, religious or home school of their choice

Yep! It made the list: Make Mexico reimburse the United States for the full cost of the wall

Private toll roads here we come: Make sure the $1 trillion infrastructure plan will be revenue neutral
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:40 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Seems like the electors have a kind of prisoner's dilemma on their hands. If they don't all follow through, the scheme doesn't work, and they'll look foolish and take heat.
posted by StrawberryPie at 4:42 PM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

That is big news, if there's anything to it

Yeahhhh... over/under on faithless Trump electors is still 1.

Alternatively, expect more faithless Clinton electors than faithless Trump electors.
posted by Justinian at 4:42 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

It's still staggering to me that only 20 of hundreds are concerned enough about this to ask questions.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 4:45 PM on December 13, 2016 [15 favorites]

I think the only consolation from the Electoral College vote may be him setting the all-time record for faithless electors by a yuge margin.
posted by kirkaracha at 4:46 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Presidential succession is now just 12 white dudes
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 4:47 PM on December 13, 2016 [14 favorites]

WaPo Trump taps Montana congressman Ryan Zinke as interior secretary

Zinke, who studied geology as an undergraduate at the University of Oregon and served as a Navy SEAL from 1986 to 2008 before entering politics, campaigned for his House seat on a platform of achieving North American energy independence. He sits on the House Natural Resources Committee as well as the Armed Services Committee.

A lifelong hunter and fisherman, the 55-year-old Zinke has defended public access to federal lands even though he frequently votes against environmentalists on issues ranging from coal extraction to oil and gas drilling. This summer, he quit his post as a member of the GOP platform-writing committee after the group included language that would have transferred federal land ownership to the states.

The first proposed name that doesn't sound like an absolute nightmare. Much better than Palin anyway.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:49 PM on December 13, 2016 [12 favorites]

Trump Promise Tracker

Sweet Pete, at least that'll be entertaining
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 4:50 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

Presidential succession is now just 12 white dudes

Don't scroll down unless you're in the mood for random antisemitism.
posted by zachlipton at 4:50 PM on December 13, 2016

Trump Tracker is tracking 193 promises; Trump Meter is tracking 102
posted by kirkaracha at 4:50 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

During the 2016 campaign, Donald Trump made more than 280 promises, though many were contradictory or just uttered in a single campaign event.

I'm not sure why either of these categories should be excluded, especially "just uttered in a single campaign event." If you're running for president you should be accountable for your lalalaa Iliveindreamland whereismyfluffycloud

But on Oct. 22, Trump issued what he called his 'Contract with the American Voter.' This was a specific plan of action that would guide his administration, starting from the first day, and listed 60 promises.

He also made some promises in his November 21 video, A Message from President-Elect Donald J. Trump
posted by kirkaracha at 4:57 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

@ThePlumLineGS:
Trump's pick for secretary of state repeatedly backed the Paris climate deal in speeches earlier this year: http://wapo.st/2hu8ygR

@danpfeiffer:
Tillerson disagrees with Trump on TPP and the Paris Climate Deal, but is one of the few that agrees with him on Putin, which says it all
posted by chris24 at 4:58 PM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

The only problem is that Delavan meant to call the email “illegitimate.”

I hate to be skeptical but I am not sure that I believe this.
posted by futz at 5:11 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

House of Cards is much more like the Washington I have always imagined.

But is it closer to reality than Veep?
posted by ymgve at 5:16 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

There are many public and private agencies willing and able to help you carry your child to term and assist you and your child after your child is born, whether you choose to keep your child or to place him or her for adoption. The State of Oklahoma strongly urges you to contact them if you are pregnant.

Well, that's just fine (and by "fine," I mean "nauseating") because the Oklahoma HJR1059 LGBTQ bigotry amendment, once passed, would surely allow business owners to toss those signs in the trash if they want.

Gotta give 'em props for oh-so-subtly managing to cram the phrase "your child" into a single sentence four times, though [golf clap].
posted by FelliniBlank at 5:17 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

expect more faithless Clinton electors than faithless Trump electors

"But she'd be just as bad"
"but her emails"
"but her emails"
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:22 PM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

House of Cards is much more like the Washington I have always imagined.

But is it closer to reality than Veep?

My whole professional career, I'd have killed to have one good Gary.
posted by rokusan at 5:26 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Yeah, what’s happening with Hamilton Electors is that Dems aren’t going to bother trying, but groundwork has been laid for GOP to do it someday if they ever need to.

And now I'm terrified this is how he stays in office regardless of the 2020 results.

You can't tell me it's not a legitimate concern. Look at McCrory in North Carolina, they almost invalidated an election this time based on nothing. There's nothing to stop them from turning the electoral college into a de facto politburo except "norms", which no longer exist.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:27 PM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

The fact that all of these men, so late in life, are such fans of works that celebrate individuals who consistently put themselves before others is therefore deeply revealing. They will now run our government.

It's a fundamentalist reboot of 1980's Ronald Reagan/Gordon Gekko Greed is Good feature.
posted by rokusan at 5:32 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Paul Ryan is speaking at the Wisconsin rally tonight. The first time he has appeared at a Trump rally.

Yeah, what’s happening with Hamilton Electors is that Dems aren’t going to bother trying, but groundwork has been laid for GOP to do it someday if they ever need to.

Yes but how would that work? You would have to have a Democrat win the EC vote but be so awful that enough Democratic EVs would refuse to vote for their own party candidate. Are you expecting DJT 2.0 but this time he has a D after his name?
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:32 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Yes but how would that work? You would have to have a Democrat win the EC vote but be so awful that enough Democratic EVs would refuse to vote for their own party candidate. Are you expecting DJT 2.0 but this time he has a D after his name?

If the Dems ever nominate someone as dangerously unstable as Trump and that person wins, I hope the electors save the country from them.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 5:36 PM on December 13, 2016 [11 favorites]

Trump doing his bit where he polls women in the audience on whether it should be Person or Man of the Year chosen by Time Magazine. Why? What possible difference does it make? This is old hash served up cold. Which makes me think his schtick is going to get old, quickly. Without an opponent to run against all he has is a War on the Media and how great, He, Trump is going to make America.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:36 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

[West Wing] was a happy fantasyland to live in during the Bush administration.

I never got into it, but if you like that kind of thing, Designated Survivor is basically trying to be West Wing crossed with 24. (Never got into 24 either.)
posted by Coventry at 5:37 PM on December 13, 2016

Alex Jones Scrubs Pizzagate Content; Complaint Reveals New Tie Connecting Shooter To Jones
posted by futz at 5:54 PM on December 13, 2016 [23 favorites]

This is old hash served up cold. Which makes me think his schtick is going to get old, quickly. Without an opponent to run against all he has is a War on the Media and how great, He, Trump is going to make America.

How long does he get to make America great? And how long will his reluctant voters stick with him without a credible plan of action? Because so far they've got tax cuts, taking away everyone's health care for reasons, and one factory in Indiana that his VP strong armed while still governor but still lost at least half the jobs anyway.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:55 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Beyond the potential for political abuse of Hamilton Electors, suppose the electoral college did break tradition and overturn the election. Since the EC members are not anonymous, and assuming this effectively sets a new precedent, wouldn't they be a target for vote-buying in the future if there is an expectation that their votes are changeable?

It would have to be a one-time only thing or it would be chaos, yes. I support getting rid of the stupid thing anyway but if the EC can be persuaded to mitigate the disaster it has caused the next step would have to be moving to some other system to prevent it from becoming another veto point in the chain.
posted by gerryblog at 6:11 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Yeah, what’s happening with Hamilton Electors is that Dems aren’t going to bother trying, but groundwork has been laid for GOP to do it someday if they ever need to.

Yes but how would that work? You would have to have a Democrat win the EC vote but be so awful that enough Democratic EVs would refuse to vote for their own party candidate. Are you expecting DJT 2.0 but this time he has a D after his name?

Sorry, missed the question. No, what I'm suggesting is that next time the Dems win a close race the GOP will try to hack the Electoral College regardless of the suitability of the Dem President-elect, on the basis that Dems did it first. The EC is a disaster that is likely to only get worse in coming years.
posted by gerryblog at 6:14 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

It would have to be a one-time only thing or it would be chaos, yes. I support getting rid of the stupid thing anyway but if the EC can be persuaded to mitigate the disaster it has caused the next step would have to be moving to some other system to prevent it from becoming another veto point in the chain.

Honestly, if they did defect, the GOP might be angry enough to be agreeable about getting rid of the damn thing.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 6:27 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

the Dems win a close race the GOP will try to hack the Electoral College regardless of the suitability of the Dem President-elect

Or install Trump partisan electors to keep vote him to relection through the EC no matter how badly he lost in 2020.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:45 PM on December 13, 2016

lalex: This was my boyfriend's guilty pleasure show until the election results made it too hard for us to watch a competent, fundamentally decent and humane person manage the responsibilities of being President.

This is exactly what happened to me, too.
posted by Superplin at 6:46 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

They already install partisan electors. But you'd have to be able to install partisan Democratic electors to do what you guys are suggesting. The Democratic party picks its own people.
posted by Justinian at 6:48 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

That anybody could look back at the 30's and the Dust Bowl and the Depression and think, "Yeah. Good times! I can't wait for the poor to starve to death in the streets."

"...In those days I felt and said I would be willing to part with half of what I had if I could be sure of keeping, under law and order, the other half." –Joseph Kennedy Sr.
posted by entropicamericana at 6:53 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

They already install partisan electors. But you'd have to be able to install partisan Democratic electors to do what you guys are suggesting. The Democratic party picks its own people.

I can imagine state legislatures quietly reverting to the old system where they technically nominate the slate of electors...
posted by tivalasvegas at 7:00 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Honestly, if they did defect, the GOP might be angry enough to be agreeable about getting rid of the damn thing.

Look, the 'they' here IS the GOP. Who do you think electors are? It's a plum for loyal Party people. (Insert 'throw your hands in the air' joke here.)

It may be less rank-and-file types talking about it now, but if it happens it will very much be done by the "GOPe" and they won't be angry, they'll be toasting the President Romney delivered (with gratitude) by Democratic electors with a great deal of smug satisfaction AND relief.

But it's not happening, so don't worry about it. Worry about literally everything else.
posted by snuffleupagus at 7:04 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Official response from the Office of Government Ethics to Thomas Carper, Ranking member of the committee on Homeland Security. Re: Trump's Business.

This is actually worth reading in its entirety, especially the "the Office of Government Ethics doesn't apply to the President" bit. That really needs to change.
posted by corb at 7:07 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Look, the 'they' here IS the GOP. Who do you think electors are? It's a plum for loyal Party people. (Insert 'throw your hands in the air' joke here.)

Well, yeah, that's what I mean. In the far-fetched part of the multiverse where their own electors betray them, they might go "fuck the EC" and the Dems'll say "you said it!"
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 7:08 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Honestly, if they did defect, the GOP might be angry enough to be agreeable about getting rid of the damn thing.

I can't see the GOP being on board with getting rid of the electoral college without some other concession that tilts the playing field in their favor. Without the gerrymandering effect of the EC, they can't win based solely on the strength of the die-hard base. They'd have to pick up votes in places like NY and CA, and that would mean policy changes. Changes that would alienate what is currently the base.

W. Lost the popular vote. Trimp lost the popular vote. Republicans need either a) the electoral college, or b) to effectively stop being Republicans.

No, if the EC defected, I would guess the GOP would try to force through laws that would require the EC votes go to the state winner, and cut the actual Electors out of the loop. Constitution and Federalist papers be damned.

But it's academic anyway, the EC is going to install trimp. He could jizz on the actual, literal constitution live on national television, and he'd still take office.
posted by mrgoat at 7:11 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

ArsTechnica has an article up regarding the request for names of DOE employees working on AGM.

One of the things I hammer on is how it's become impossible to be a self-respecting engineer and a republican, even before Trump came along.

Ars Technica's pugilistic writing here is just one but demonstrating it.
posted by ocschwar at 7:19 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

W. Lost the popular vote. Trimp lost the popular vote. Republicans need either a) the electoral college, or b) to effectively stop being Republicans.

W's win over Kerry is the only time the Republicans have won the popular vote since 1988.
posted by kirkaracha at 7:25 PM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

Bill Gates says Trump has the opportunity to be like JFK

"A lot of his message has been about ... where he sees things not as good as he'd like," the billionaire Microsoft co-founder said on "Squawk Box."

"But in the same way President Kennedy talked about the space mission and got the country behind that," Gates continued, "I think whether it's education or stopping epidemics ... [or] in this energy space, there can be a very upbeat message that [Trump's] administration [is] going to organize things, get rid of regulatory barriers, and have American leadership through innovation."

The TF's (trumplefucks) are pretty happy with Bill Gates right now.
posted by futz at 7:33 PM on December 13, 2016

Trump has the opportunity to be like Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, FDR, or Barack Obama as well. He ain't gonna be any of those things.

I think the Gates Foundation is doing great work and should be commended. But that doesn't mean Bill Gates' immense wealth and privilege aren't clouding his judgment here.
posted by Justinian at 7:35 PM on December 13, 2016 [19 favorites]

Bill Gates says Trump has the opportunity to be like JFK

Um. Pence might be even worse.
posted by Joe in Australia at 7:39 PM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

Trump has the opportunity to be like JFK

Are we not doing "phrasing" anymore?
posted by mrgoat at 7:40 PM on December 13, 2016 [10 favorites]

How much of a slap in the face is it to Energy Department staff to have Rick Perry as Secretary of Energy? I mean, imagine that you come into work one day and find that the new big boss is someone who is nationally famous for that time he said he wants your entire department eliminated and simultaneously couldn't remember that it existed.

@SimonMaloy
you won't find a better summation of the Obama-Trump transition than a nuclear physicist being replaced by a Dancing With The Stars washout
posted by chris24 at 7:40 PM on December 13, 2016 [40 favorites]

Bill Gates says Trump has the opportunity to be like JFK
Something something convertible something something "too soon"...
posted by Cookiebastard at 7:41 PM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

Ooh, Egg is on Keepin' It 1600 today.
posted by jason_steakums at 7:45 PM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

I can't see the GOP being on board with getting rid of the electoral college without some other concession that tilts the playing field in their favor.

Exactly. There's nothing big enough to entice them to give up their minority rule.

Whatever you want to call our system of governance, it's not democracy, and it's not really a republic either at this point. It's at best oligarchy, and really closer to apartheid.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:45 PM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

Bill Gates says Trump has the opportunity to be like JFK

Um. Pence might be even worse.
posted by Joe in Australia at 7:39 PM on December 13 [1 favorite −] Favorite added! [!]

That is definitely an Aussie level burn. Ouch.
posted by ocschwar at 7:45 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

It's at best oligarchy, and really closer to apartheid.

I made a post about that right after election. It's where we're heading.
posted by Justinian at 7:48 PM on December 13, 2016 [5 favorites]

a comment about that I mean, not a post. Sorry.
posted by Justinian at 7:48 PM on December 13, 2016

WaPo Trump taps Montana congressman Ryan Zinke as interior secretary

This is actually...not entirely terrible? My understanding is that Zinke is replacement-level bad, not nearly as bad as McMorris Rogers.

Also, he was considered to be the best candidate against Jon Tester in 2018, so that should help solidify a much needed Senate seat. And, I understand the House seat is considered reasonably competitive, so at least a shot at a pickup in a special election there.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:50 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Whatever you want to call our system of governance, it's not democracy, and it's not really a republic either at this point. It's at best oligarchy, and really closer to apartheid.

You end up having to go back to first principles, and what you get is a system of government for propertied white people who couldn't acquire property in their mother countries. As I've said in these threads before -- and President Obama noted it in his comments to Coates -- the federal government has assiduously converted new arrivals into propertied citizens, as long as they're the right sort. We point at vast swathes of red on presidential electoral maps and say "acreage doesn't vote", but actually it does, because if you're sitting on acreage granted to your great-great grandaddy in Nebraska, you have more political power than if you're renting in suburban Atlanta because your grandparents were sharecroppers and your parents couldn't get a FHA loan.

The grotesquely fitting negative apotheosis of the American republic is a property "owner" in hock to foreign lenders.
posted by holgate at 8:02 PM on December 13, 2016 [27 favorites]

Consider; everyone would consider it an unjust system if a minority of citizens were the only ones allowed to vote and thus ruled over the majority. That's what happened in South Africa with the white colonial minority holding power over the black African majority.

Ok, people aren't cool with denying the vote to so many. So you give the majority voting rights. Except you say their votes are only counted as 1/1000th of the value of minority group's votes. Now everyone can vote but the minority still rules. If that's what had happened in South Africa we would correctly still identify it as an unjust continuation of Apartheid by another name.

So at what fraction of the minority's voting power do we say this is unacceptably unjust? And not just lip service about it but actually demanding change by any means necessary as in South Africa? Because right now the voting power of a minority of Americans is increasing while that of a majority is decreasing. When does it become so fundamentally unjust that it is no longer acceptable to say "well of course some votes have more power than others because of the electoral college system but, hey, that's what it says in the Constitution" which is what people do now?

Note that the Constitution can be changed. However, it cannot be changed without the consent of the minority who's power would be curtailed. Do they seem likely to give up that power? Last time we had to significantly curtail the power of rural white racists it took the deaths of a significant fraction of the American population.
posted by Justinian at 8:02 PM on December 13, 2016 [23 favorites]

Also, I don't get where Bill Gates is coming from.

Gates continued, "I think whether it's education
Which trimp clearly hates, at least based on his pick for secretary of education.

or stopping epidemics
Which he doesn't give a shit about, they happen to poor people, and he wants to gut healthcare.

... [or] in this energy space,
Where his policy appears to be "fuck the grandkids, fossil fuels are great". Citation: Rex Tillerson for Secretary of State, Rick Perry for Energy Secretary, and Scott Pruitt for EPA

there can be a very upbeat message that [Trump's] administration [is] going to organize things,
He could start with his cabinet.

get rid of regulatory barriers, and have American leadership through innovation."
Fuckin' weasel words. "Innovation" doesn't mean "double down on the most failed policies you can find".
posted by mrgoat at 8:03 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

It's interesting that Gates also announced he's leading a $1B venture capital fund for reducing greenhouse gases. Bill contains multitudes, I guess.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:06 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

Trump has the opportunity to be like JFK

There's a very dark reading of this comment that I'm not going to unpack because I don't fancy a cozy chat with the Secret Service.
posted by snuffleupagus at 8:07 PM on December 13, 2016 [14 favorites]

Trump has the opportunity to be like Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, FDR, or Barack Obama as well. He ain't gonna be any of those things.

He had the opportunity to be like Abraham Lincoln. Near the end of the Civil War, Lincoln addressed a divided nation with his Second Inaugural Address:

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

With Trump, who unlike Lincoln personally caused a lot of today's divisiveness, gives us "Got mine; fuck you."
posted by kirkaracha at 8:09 PM on December 13, 2016

Joe in Australia beat you to it anyway . . .
posted by aspersioncast at 8:10 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

To be fair, trump doesn't know what most of the words in Lincoln's address mean, nor can he parse a sentence with so many clauses.
posted by mrgoat at 8:11 PM on December 13, 2016

I flagged my comment as offensive for using "who's" instead of "whose".
posted by Justinian at 8:12 PM on December 13, 2016 [13 favorites]

he wants to gut healthcare.

I'd give maybe three-to-one that he's serious about the "replace" bit in "repeal and replace." He's been on about it for decades. If Congress gets in his way, he probably intends to mint the trillion-dollar coin. Not sure how he'll get around his cabinet picks, though.
posted by Coventry at 8:12 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

MSNBC’s special forum with Bernie Sanders showed the promise (and limits) of his political appeal

It also included this tidbit from Sanders, which I'm surprised the Vox article made no mention of.

"One of the arguments as to why Trump won is the belief that most or many of his supporters are sexists or racists or homophobes. I happen not to believe that's the case. I think what he did do is he said, 'You know what, there's a lot of pain in this country, people are scared and people are worried.' People are tired of status quo politics. He broke through that."

Yep, no appeals to racism or bigotry or hate at all. Just to people's pain and fear. White people's pain and fear. Meanwhile, PoC, the biggest and most important part of the democratic coalition, are suffering real fear and frequent pain at the hand of Trump and his supporters.
posted by chris24 at 8:13 PM on December 13, 2016 [38 favorites]

Bernie be wrong.
posted by futz at 8:16 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

Rustic Etruscan: "Maybe Trump voters, whose preferred candidate just won, are unwinnable. What about non-voters? Do they see something in Sandersism that they don't see elsewhere, or do they feel the same as the Trump voters? The press's undue focus on winning Trump voters, who voted for an obvious and proud scumbag, as though everyone had voted and the game of winning voters were zero-sum, bugs me."

I thought this was an interesting related take (yes, it's Yglesias, so apply what ever discount you feel appropriate). Basically, that there's three groups who voted for Trump.

* Hard core frothing Trump voters. They get written up about a lot, but the chances of converting them are zero.

* Boring old Republican voters. If it says (R) after the name, that's who they vote for. Not much to get here, either.

* Actual free floaters. It appears that among the people who disliked both HRC and Trump, most of them broke for Trump (Comey, etc.). But the key is they don't particularly like or trust Trump, so they are fertile targets for Amy Klobuchar or whomever in 2020.

I'd say there's probably a reasonable number of "dislike both" who stayed home or left President blank on their ballot, so probably the same would hold true for them.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:18 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Bernie be wrong.

He has the standard problem of a lot of white socialists in that he sees everything as a class issue. Including racism. So the problem wasn't that Trump voters are racist but rather a reflection of class struggle.

Reminds me of Will Shetterly. Except, you know, better.
posted by Justinian at 8:18 PM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

Bernie needs to talk to my relatives in rural Alabama and scratch that paper-thin veneer of economic anxiety to find the bottomless pit of racism/Christian-superiority-complex underneath.
posted by gatorae at 8:20 PM on December 13, 2016 [34 favorites]

A look at the contemporary discussions in the 1780s and James Madison's notes on the debate in the Constitutional Convention shows...the Electoral College was actually created to both separate the powers and combat corruption from both foreign and domestic sources.
...
[Hamilton's] defense of the Electoral College method was not about fairness, but rather about not 'corrupting the body of the people' or causing '[T]he business of corruption.' Hamilton goes a step further as he states that in creating the Electoral College, a series of bodies that would meet in different states throughout the country, the convention was trying to prevent the desire of 'foreign powers to gain an improper ascendant in our councils. How could they better gratify this, than by raising a creature of their own to the chief magistracy of the Union?'
...
The Electoral College wasn't really intended to replace popular vote; it was put in place instead of election by Congress. And the reason was not to help small states; it was to combat potential corruption in the election of a president.

Stop dreaming. The Electoral College is here to stay
posted by kirkaracha at 8:24 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

The economic anxiety argument falls apart when you look at it. Consider that these white voters swung hard to Trump in, yes, Michigan and PA and WI... but also in Iowa. Which is not coal or auto country, not in Rust Belt decline, and had much lower unemployment. Why would rural white voters in low unemployment Iowa feel the "economic anxiety" of coal country white voters? Or laid off autoworkers in Michigan?

Maybe... it isn't economic anxiety?
posted by Justinian at 8:24 PM on December 13, 2016 [18 favorites]

Last time we had to significantly curtail the power of rural white racists it took the deaths of a significant fraction of the American population.

This isn't quite true, unless you count the Vietnam war and its ~60,000 US deaths (w/ considerably more on the other side) as a kind of necessary offset to the Civil Rights era, which is not an unarguable thesis. Like I suggested upthread, the end of Reconstruction and the imposition of Jim Crow and sundown towns and lynchings was a real fucking thing. The embrace of dixieflag by former slave states in the 1950s was a real fucking thing. Strom Thurmond was a real fucking thing. (There is a lake named for that piece of shit, at least, on the SC side; we call it "Lake Bigot" when we drive by, and appreciate that not even Georgia accepts the name.)

What is new is that "white ethnic" America, the America descended from the "better sorts of immigrant" according to the FHA's redline maps in the 1930s, has apparently decided that it's time to pull up the ladder. (That Gingrich wants to erase FDR is fucking ironic here, since absent FDR that midwestern voting bloc would mostly be paying landlords through the arse instead of treating itself as higher citizenry.)
posted by holgate at 8:31 PM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

It also included this tidbit from Sanders, which I'm surprised the Vox article made no mention of.

"One of the arguments as to why Trump won is the belief that most or many of his supporters are sexists or racists or homophobes. I happen not to believe that's the case. I think what he did do is he said, 'You know what, there's a lot of pain in this country, people are scared and people are worried.' People are tired of status quo politics. He broke through that."

Yep, no appeals to racism or bigotry or hate at all. Just to people's pain and fear. White people's pain and fear. Meanwhile, PoC, the biggest and most important part of the democratic coalition, are suffering real fear and frequent pain at the hand of Trump and his supporters.

Dammit, dammit, dammit, Bernie, why?

I hate that he says stuff like this, because it breaks my heart. I supported Bernie in the primaries, but pivoted to Hillary when it became clear that Bernie wasn't going to happen. FWIW, I'm a well-educated, Northeastern elite US-born male who isn't hurting for money, but of Indian nationality (though I have the "benefit" of looking like I have "ambiguous" ethnicity, what with the light skin and green eyes, so cops give me a wide berth and, between that and my being a business owner, white racists have often assumed I'm "one of them" and said some incredibly dumb shit around me, wrongly assuming I'll be in agreement).

(Mind you, I self-identify as an atheist, socialist, BLM supporter who has been pro-Native American, pro-Black Nationalism since waayyyyyyyyyy before it was fashionable.)

Arrrgggh, Bernie. You're proving my fellow MeFites right. I kinda hate you for that.
posted by CommonSense at 8:32 PM on December 13, 2016 [16 favorites]

Metafilter: You're proving my fellow MeFites right. I hate you for that.
posted by Justinian at 8:33 PM on December 13, 2016 [25 favorites]

"Economic anxiety" and racism are often flip sides of the same coin. It's not an either/or. One gins up the economic anxiety (whether or not actual numbers warrant it) and then says "And it's their fault! Get 'em!"
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 8:42 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

Al Franken Faces Donald Trump and the Next Four Years

I was curious whether Trump’s election would herald a change in Franken’s approach. He was always fierce in what he describes as “the heaping of scorn and ridicule,” first on “S.N.L.” and later as a liberal talk-radio host and author of political commentary with titles like “Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot (And Other Observations).” He heaped abundant scorn and ridicule upon George W. Bush but was not in the Senate at the time. “I think this can be a moment that calls out for Al’s voice,” said Ben Wikler, the head of the Washington office of MoveOn.org and producer of Franken’s show on the defunct progressive radio network Air America. Wikler, who helped Franken write his 2003 book, “Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right,” said there is a great need for “fearless opposition fighters that can cut through the noise.” Franken has established himself as a legislator, he said, and it might be time for him to return to his insurgent comic roots. “Part of Al’s earlier approach to public life was swashbuckling and baiting antagonists into fights they could not win,” Wikler told me. “Humor can be a way of blasting through fear and anxiety and giving people backbone.”

posted by triggerfinger at 8:46 PM on December 13, 2016 [22 favorites]

Energy Dept. rejects Trump’s request to name climate change workers

He can just ask Putin for that list.
posted by srboisvert at 8:52 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

Rick Perry Will Really Run the Department of Nukes, Not Energy
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:53 PM on December 13, 2016 [2 favorites]

"Economic anxiety" and racism are often flip sides of the same coin. It's not an either/or.

Except Bernie wants to ignore one side of the coin and fixates on other side, assuming fixing it will cure the other side. And as we've seen repeatedly, that doesn't work. Fixing economics doesn't cure racism. In fact, it often makes it worse. "Got mine, fuck you." As mentioned by Obama in the TNC article above, white people were brought into the middle class by the GI Bill and FHA subsided home loans, but once they got there, up comes the ladder.

Bernie has it backwards. You have to work on racism first, because in a system designed to create a permanent economic and social underclass, those in the higher class never voluntarily give up their advantages to the perceived lower class. So until that perception of superiority is mitigated, economic progress will not be a source of equality, but of tension and conflict between a rising group that's earned/deserves it and an entrenched group that doesn't want to share it.
posted by chris24 at 8:58 PM on December 13, 2016 [21 favorites]

Campaign for President: The Managers Look at 2016
Audio recordings include;
Roundtable Discussion: The General Election
Opening Roundtable Session
Panel Discussion: The Media and Election 2016
Democratic Primaries and Convention
Republican Primaries and Convention
Interview with David Fahrenthold
Interview with Nate Silver
posted by phoque at 9:03 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

The Electoral College wasn't really intended to replace popular vote; it was put in place instead of election by Congress. And the reason was not to help small states; it was to combat potential corruption in the election of a president.

uh...3/5ths compromise (i.e. bribe slave states into the constitution with jiggered population arithmetic)
posted by j_curiouser at 9:03 PM on December 13, 2016 [4 favorites]

NYT: Democratic House Candidates Were Also Targets of Russian Hacking
posted by Chrysostom at 9:13 PM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]

Maybe... it isn't economic anxiety?

that shithead on the court dying this year (and the GOP refusing to fill the seat) put a lot of social conservative votes in Trump's column. Putting P on the ticket was good signaling to the 25% of the electorate that is white evangelical.

everything has become so goddamn asymmetrical now. We are so fucked going forward.
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 9:36 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

If you look at the home ownership rates [pdf], states like Vermont and WV and Michigan are up towards 75%, when the national average is around 66%. I'm sure that a decent chunk of that is property owned free and clear, a lot of it rural and inherited. Much of it is going to be fairly meagre and not particularly attractive to sell on -- certainly not the sort of stuff that ends up on 'Flippy Flippy House House' on HGTV or whatever the fuck it is -- but it means you're only paying a property tax bill and not a mortgage. That's where you get the rootedness, even if it's sometimes toxic. That's where you get the resistance to local government services, because it means a bigger annual bill. And, of course, non-whites simply do not have generations upon generations of inherited property in the US in the way white people do.
posted by holgate at 9:42 PM on December 13, 2016 [20 favorites]

The grotesquely fitting negative apotheosis of the American republic is a property "owner" in hock to foreign lenders

the first part of your comment was super-great (i.e. I've long thought the same about how easy it is to be a conservative when you're sitting on hundreds of acres of productive ag land courtesy the Homestead Act / contingencies of the great land giveaways of 100+ years ago.)

as for your quoted point, this:

http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/international/intinv/intinvnewsrelease.htm

simply can't be a good thing. Show me happy countries, and I'll show you a positive NIIP.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_international_investment_position
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 9:46 PM on December 13, 2016 [3 favorites]

Not simply homesteads; also Levittowns. It is the belief that your ancestors earned their ticket to property capital through the sweat of their brows, frankly understandable given sufficient time and distance, because the defining characteristic of the ongoing American property giveaway is to mask itself -- and it's still the case with zero-down USDA loans in rural areas, and the mortgage interest tax credit.

I mean, fuck, there is nowhere in America where residents are less likely to own the land under their beds and instead be subject to the rules and whims of others than New York City. Even rich condo owners have to deal with that.
posted by holgate at 10:07 PM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

Hey, what happens if you ask people to estimate the Muslim population in various countries and compare it to the actual population? You get a graph like this.

Americans thought Muslims made up around 1/6th of the US population; they make up around 1%. When asked to predict what it will be in 2020, Americans gave an average answer of 23%; the prediction is for 1.1%.

The study also asked people in various countries what percentage of total household wealth the bottom 70% of the country owns. Americans answered an average of 28%; it is really 7%.

Also from the survey:

The survey, which was conducted in the run-up to the US election, also asked people who they believed would win. Respondents in all but three countries expected Hilary Clinton to win.

Those who plumped for Donald Trump were Russia (where half of respondents said he would win, compared with 29% who thought Clinton would be the victor), Serbia (42% Trump, 29% Clinton) and China (32% Trump, 28% Clinton). The remaining respondents said they didn’t know who would win the election.

In Mexico, just 6% of respondents thought Trump would be elected.

Full data here.
posted by zachlipton at 10:14 PM on December 13, 2016 [42 favorites]

Donald Trump humiliates Paul Ryan at rally while crowd boos house speaker

"Speaker Paul Ryan, I’ve really come to appreciate him," said Mr Trump, and the crowd burst into loud boos.
"He’s terrific. Honestly, he’s like a fine wine. Every day goes by, I get to appreciate his genius more and more. Now, if he ever goes against me I’m not going to say that, ok?"
"We’re going to win so much, you’re going to go to Paul Ryan, you’re going to go, ‘Mr Speaker, please, please, we can’t stand winning this much, we can’t take it," said Mr Trump. "And he’s going to come to see me and say, 'Mr President, the people of Wisconsin are tired of winning so much’."
posted by futz at 10:37 PM on December 13, 2016 [7 favorites]

tired of winning so much

He's gone full Charlie Sheen.
posted by Coda Tronca at 11:24 PM on December 13, 2016 [15 favorites]

Where Were Trump’s Votes? Where the Jobs Weren’t

The racial and ethnic divide is starker among workers in their prime. Whites ages 25 to 54 lost some 6.5 million jobs more than they gained over the period. Hispanics in their prime, by contrast, gained some three million jobs net, Asians 1.5 million and blacks one million.

So, maybe it's actually both, meaning an economic anxiety felt acutely by whites?
posted by FJT at 11:31 PM on December 13, 2016 [6 favorites]

Guardian: "Racism, misogyny, and Islamophobic fearmongering were all fixtures of American political life before Trump came along, but he articulated them with a bluntness seldom seen in conventional politics. Similarly, the neoliberal assumption that government should resemble business is widely held across the political spectrum. Yet Trump has taken it to an extreme, applying the logic of neoliberalism so literally as to be almost parody... But the truth is that Trump is deeply, maximally American. He didn’t import his politics from abroad, but simply followed the governing logic of American society through to its radical conclusion."
posted by Coda Tronca at 11:42 PM on December 13, 2016 [8 favorites]

NYT Op-ed: Betsy DeVos and God’s Plan for Schools

Ms. DeVos is a chip off the old block. At a 2001 gathering of conservative Christian philanthropists, she singled out education reform as a way to “advance God’s kingdom.” In an interview, she and her husband, Richard DeVos Jr., said that school choice would lead to “greater kingdom gain.”
...
There is nothing conservative about this agenda; it is radical. Gutting public education will be just the beginning.

posted by zachlipton at 12:58 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

I wish people would stop using "radical" as a pejorative for dramatic conservative plans. Reactionary is the better choice as it is more clearly associated with the right, zealous conservatism, and doesn't have common usage as "cool" or simply generic "larger than usual" change. If reactionary won't do, how about extremist or "completely nutzoid" or "totally unacceptable for any reasonable working government" or "you gotta be fucking kidding me" levels of change?
posted by gusottertrout at 1:21 AM on December 14, 2016 [13 favorites]

but it means you're only paying a property tax bill and not a mortgage. That's where you get the rootedness, even if it's sometimes toxic. That's where you get the resistance to local government services, because it means a bigger annual bill. And, of course, non-whites simply do not have generations upon generations of inherited property in the US in the way white people do.

Dear god, you've just illuminated something for me in a major way. I've never understood why people don't support local government improvements and infrastructure. I live in an impoverished rural county, we need pretty much everything, but especially basics like road maintenance. I'm the kind of person who doesn't begrudge paying taxes and never has. I also don't have a mortgage anymore and only pay property taxes. And even though I've actually struggled to pay them the last couple years but never stopped to think "so we should cut all the funding for hospitals and cops." I mean, I still think that is a pigheaded way to think, but maybe I kinda get it.

It's like my local water company. It's well water, provided to my neighborhood by a private company. When I moved out here the water was super cheap but also of dubious quality and we had some odor issues. Well eventually the state regulators stepped in and said they weren't properly treating the water. The company sold out to new owners because they were broke. The new company said ok, we're gonna fix the system and make sure everything is done properly, but your bill is going to double. And my neighbors fought back hard against it. There were petitions (which I refused to sign) and meetings and everything. They didn't accomplish anything because water still has to be safe enough and that still costs a certain amount. (The amount was still not large in comparison to a city bill.) And I couldn't understand why my neighbors were fighting to keep their water dangerously untreated. I was happy to pay twice as much if I didn't have to worry about my water being safe to drink, or buildup of deposits in my water heater and pipes.

Some of this is poverty-thinking, the inability to think long-term. But there's a real refusal to think of your own self-interest that runs strong in Republicans. Maybe it's putting money, the bottom line, the amount you're paying above everything else. I guess maybe most people really think Trump is smart for paying no taxes and the idea of paying your fair share is antiquated and quaint.
posted by threeturtles at 2:25 AM on December 14, 2016 [29 favorites]

Been trying to keep up here, you guys, but I have a couple of questions maybe someone can point me upthread to if already answered:

1. Has there been any public statement from Cheney about the election? Links?
2. Can someone explain Emergency Power & whether it is a real option for Obama?

Other thoughts (again, sorry if already discussed or if this is a derail):
What are you guys' thoughts on Snowden's twitter feed content? Also, I've been exploring his Freedom of Press site. Any thoughts on that?
posted by yoga at 4:53 AM on December 14, 2016

my rule of thumb for Snowden is that if he's talking about anything other than stuff that he personally witnessed during his time at the NSA, he's just Some Guy talking out his ass.
posted by murphy slaw at 5:00 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

Metafilter: Some Guy talking out his ass.
posted by Mister Bijou at 5:12 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Per Playbook, Don Jr.—who is supposed to run the Trump Org—was involved in interview process for interior secretary.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:18 AM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

Random aside, but thank you to everyone here. I don't post much these days - or do anything but skulk online like a coward, frankly. It's all too overwhelming and depressing, and I feel paralyzed. But these post-election posts have been keeping me going.
posted by Salieri at 5:23 AM on December 14, 2016 [24 favorites]

NYTimes Twitter Has the Right to Suspend Donald Trump. But It Shouldn’t.

After the president-elect used Twitter last week to criticize Chuck Jones, an Indiana union leader who represents workers at the Carrier company, Mr. Jones reported receiving a series of threatening phone calls from Mr. Trump’s supporters. Similarly, last year, Mr. Trump used Twitter to attack a college student who asked him a critical question at a rally; The Washington Post reported that the woman has been barraged by obscene and deranged threats ever since.

As a corporation, Twitter is under no First Amendment obligation to let Mr. Trump use the service. It gets to make its own set of speech rules within its own walls, and among those rules is a prohibition on using the service to incite harassment.

posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:29 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

yoga, Freedom of the Press Foundation does good work. I know one of their staff members who trains journalists in encryption tools, and I've heard talks at conferences from journalists in support of Secure Drop. I've been helping with cryptoparties* here in NYC and the first thing we have folks do is download Signal, along with setting up a password manager, 2 factor authentication, and safe browsing plugins. The Security Self Defense site they link to by the EFF is a good place to start for securing your own privacy.

I used to think a lot of this stuff was paranoid, but after speaking with so many journalists, well, I'm helping train people now. And if you're wondering about end to end encryption, yes -- it should be implemented as widely as possible and made easier to use. Signal is a good start, but encrypting email needs to be made easier. These efforts need funding because services like Signal and pgp-encryption tools are free so there's no revenue stream outside of donations, and so the UI often falls by the wayside making it difficult for non-computer-professionals (like journalists and their sources) to use these tools.

* Cryptoparties are get-togethers for journalists, activists, and others where you can learn how to set up and use privacy tools and encryption services to protect your communications and browsing from surveillance. You can find local ones at cryptoparty.in, and the one we do here in Haarlem was just featured on Full Frontal with Samantha Bee.
posted by antinomia at 5:29 AM on December 14, 2016 [17 favorites]

just Some Guy talking out his ass.

Amnesty International's assessment of 7 ways the world has changed thanks to Edward Snowden.

Wikipedia's page about the reactions to his disclosures about global surveillance.

I doubt there is more qualified individual on Earth to talk about security service leaks.
posted by Coda Tronca at 5:31 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

aaand fuck me another Dominionist - Rick Perry.
Seven Mountains Dominionism or Apocalypse Now. It's been a long game.
These seven mountains are business, government, media, arts and entertainment, education, the family and religion. There are many subgroups under these main categories. About a month later the Lord showed Francis Schaeffer the same thing. In essence, God was telling these three change agents where the battlefield was. It was here where culture would be won or lost. Their assignment was to raise up change agents to scale the mountains and to help a new generation of change agents understand the larger story.
That makes five and counting: Mike Pence, Jeff Sessions, Elaine Chao, Betsy DeVoss who is married to Mitch McConell.
Now if that isn't an agenda what is?
posted by adamvasco at 5:37 AM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

Elaine Chao is married to Mitch McConnell, not Betsy DeVoss
posted by maggiemaggie at 5:39 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Politico: How Clinton lost Michigan — and blew the election

Michigan operatives relay stories like one about an older woman in Flint who showed up at a Clinton campaign office, asking for a lawn sign and offering to canvass, being told these were not “scientifically” significant ways of increasing the vote, and leaving, never to return. A crew of building trade workers showed up at another office looking to canvass, but, confused after being told there was no literature to hand out like in most campaigns, also left and never looked back.

“There’s this illusion that the Clinton campaign had a ground game. The deal is that the Clinton campaign could have had a ground game,” said a former Obama operative in Michigan. “They had people in the states who were willing to do stuff. But they didn’t provide people anything to do until GOTV.”

The only metric that people involved in the operations say they ever heard headquarters interested in was how many volunteer shifts had been signed up — though the volunteers were never given the now-standard handheld devices to input the responses they got in the field, and Brooklyn mandated that they not worry about data entry. Operatives watched packets of real-time voter information piled up in bins at the coordinated campaign headquarters. The sheets were updated only when they got ripped, or soaked with coffee. Existing packets with notes from the volunteers, including highlighting how much Trump inclination there was among some of the white male union members the Clinton campaign was sure would be with her, were tossed in the garbage.

posted by Rustic Etruscan at 5:42 AM on December 14, 2016 [15 favorites]

adamvasco, that is quite chilling.

WaPo Congress can’t decide how to probe charges Russia aimed to help Trump

Senior Republicans want to channel any investigation through the House and Senate intelligence committees, over which they have greater control. But some Democrats, fearing that the results of such an investigation would never be released to the public, are pushing the formation of an independent body of outsiders modeled on the Sept. 11 commission.

Still other Republicans would like to see a bipartisan investigation in Congress — or better yet, form entirely new congressional committees and subcommittees to dig into the matter. A different group of Democrats would like to see a very unusual bicameral probe into whether Russia allegedly hacked the Democratic National Committee emails and leaked them to WikiLeaks in a concerted effort to damage Hillary Clinton.

posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:43 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

That Michigan piece is stunning, from the opening anecdote where the Clinton camp orders SEIU to stay out of Michigan in the name of psy ops onward. Wow.
posted by gerryblog at 5:45 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Elaine Chao is married to Mitch McConnell, not Betsy DeVoss

I read this as Elaine Chao being perhaps married to Betsy DeVoss, and prefer to keep that.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:47 AM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

Whatever happened with that story about the "rogue" server in Trump tower that was only communicating between a Russian bank and a server connected to the DeVoss group? It was a big deal briefly, some mention of DeVos, but nothing much since one of the family was brought into be a potential part of the administration.
posted by gusottertrout at 5:47 AM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

Snopes has it as unproven.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:51 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Re the recurring class versus race discussion rekindled by Bernie's recent comments, this is bestest reconciliation of the two sides of that coin I've seen:

From @iyad_elbaghdadi Alright man, I will try to explain it via a series of terribly drawn Microsoft Paint diagrams
posted by klarck at 5:51 AM on December 14, 2016 [12 favorites]

Whatever happened with that story about the "rogue" server in Trump tower
the fbi 'investigated' it and there was totes nothing there.
posted by localhuman at 5:52 AM on December 14, 2016

Whatever happened with that story about the "rogue" server
it was most likely related to russian companies he employs to send spam.
posted by andrewcooke at 5:53 AM on December 14, 2016

Little lapsus there sorry. Chau is married to Mitch McConnell.
De Voss of course is the sister of Erk Prince billionaire fundamentalist and war profiteer from a powerful Michigan Republican family - coincidence?
A little more about Erik Prince
Cross posting from the Russia thread: - The Alliance Of US Christian Extremists And Vladimir Putin.
The world is now very fucked as the US Taliban are in power.
posted by adamvasco at 5:56 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

@Ibishblog Divided America, #7:
The mere 472 counties that Hillary Clinton won account for 64% of US economic activity. Trump's 2,584 counties? 36%!

First comment: As Paul Ryan would say, "Makers vs Takers."
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:05 AM on December 14, 2016 [27 favorites]

How Clinton lost Michigan — and blew the election

Even if she did what everyone in hindsight thinks is so obvious and spent more time and effort in MI and WI, she still needed to win PA or FL and she spent a shit ton of money and effort there. And of course, the campaign was making decisions based on the information they had. Which was 30+ straight polls in both WI and MI that had her up an average of 5+ points. The state polls in MI, WI and PA were off by 5-6%.

In a close election lots of things can be the difference, but every campaign is imperfect and makes mistakes. What every campaign doesn't face is Russia, Wikileaks and Comey ratfucking them. Late-breaking voters - after the Comey letters - broke strongly for Trump - enough to cost her PA, WI and MI. She lost WI, MI, PA and FL by less than a point. Without Comey/Russia, she probably wins them all and we're talking about what a great campaign.
posted by chris24 at 6:06 AM on December 14, 2016 [45 favorites]

The 3rd installment of Matthew Sheffield's Salon series on the alt-right is here.
posted by kingless at 6:08 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Reuters Ex-CIA chief says Trump risks blame for an attack if he skips briefings

Panetta, a former Democratic Congressman who served as CIA director and defense secretary in President Barack Obama's first term, told the Arab Strategy Forum, a conference sponsored by the government of Dubai, that Trump's aversion "can't last."

"I've seen presidents who have asked questions about whether that intelligence is verifiable, what are the sources for that intelligence, but I have never seen a president who said, 'I don't want that stuff,'" Panetta said.

"If we endure another attack and the intelligence officials had indications or information regarding that attack and the president did not want to listen to that, for whatever reason, the responsibility for that attack would fall on the president.

posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:09 AM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

Whatever happened with that story about the "rogue" server in Trump tower
the fbi 'investigated' it and there was totes nothing there.

Ah, good, I'm glad to hear it's completely coincidental Betsy DeVos ended up being chosen for Trump's adminstration. I'd hate to think there was anything more to it than that, which there surely isn't now that there's been an FBI investigation. Now, maybe someone could tell me about that letter the head of the FBI released on Clinton emails right before the election...
posted by gusottertrout at 6:19 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

@tomtomorrow
"Right now someone hacking Trump's account could set off a stock market crash or a war. Hope he's using 2-step verification, but I doubt it."

Given this, this tweet from 2013 isn't reassuring.

@realDonaldTrump
"My Twitter has been seriously hacked--- and we are looking for the perpetrators."
posted by chris24 at 6:20 AM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

Politico Trump adviser compares climate change research to belief Earth is flat

What Trump also wants, Scaramucci continued, is energy independence for the U.S., which would allow the country’s “geopolitical footprint” to change, altering national security and the use of the military.

Scaramucci suggested that climate change and humans’ impact on it remains an open question within the scientific community but was corrected by anchor Chris Cuomo, who pointed out that it is the “overwhelming consensus” of climate scientists that human activity is warming the planet. Scaramucci contended that “we did a lot of things wrong in the scientific community,” comparing researched climate change findings to the centuries-old belief that the world was flat.

Did the scientific community once believe that the Earth was flat? I think he is confusing ancient philosophers and poets with scientists. Even if that is true, you might as well say that the scientific community once believed in alchemy therefore we can't trust anything that chemists say.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:21 AM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

Michigan operatives relay stories like one about an older woman in Flint who showed up at a Clinton campaign office, asking for a lawn sign and offering to canvass, being told these were not “scientifically” significant ways of increasing the vote, and leaving, never to return. A crew of building trade workers showed up at another office looking to canvass, but, confused after being told there was no literature to hand out like in most campaigns, also left and never looked back.

Okay, as someone who did canvas a lot in a battleground state...

I am willing to bet the older woman in Flint was told that lawn signs are not significant ways of increasing the vote but please come back on a day we are canvassing. Because, as we discussed quite a bit here, lawn signs have been eschewed by big national campaigns for a long time and at my local field office there weren't any on offer until GOTV started in late October. And they were only for volunteers.

And I do not get the part about the lit. I canvassed with and without lit at various times in the campaign. In September, there was not lit yet. Later during GOTV we had "don't forget to vote" lit to drop. Why would you decide not to canvass if there's no lit? They give you a script, you are supposed to be out making in-person voter contacts because that's what canvassing is. If you just want to drop lit, that's what direct mail is for.

Neither of those anecdotes indicate anything significantly different in MI than in PA.
posted by soren_lorensen at 6:27 AM on December 14, 2016 [19 favorites]

Did the scientific community once believe that the Earth was flat?

Not since the Greeks, no.
posted by soren_lorensen at 6:29 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

Politico Trump adviser compares climate change research to belief Earth is flat

Good to know that the flat Earth group at NASA will still be relied on to send men to flat Mars. By ship off the edge of the Earth no doubt.
posted by gusottertrout at 6:30 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

I should also add that we in PA didn't have handheld devices, we did paper packets, but they were not thrown away, we were encouraged to make notes on them with info from our interactions that might not be recordable with the fields provided on the packets, there were always people at the office doing data entry. So it sounds like some MI field offices were poorly run but I remain skeptical that Brooklyn was telling local operatives to just toss all the data in the bin, no biggie. Because at the office I was working out of, it was a biggie.
posted by soren_lorensen at 6:42 AM on December 14, 2016 [12 favorites]

Not since the Greeks, no.

It was a Greek mathematician who calculated its diameter to within about 10%
posted by thelonius at 6:53 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

I need to get this off my chest before I leave for the morning. I read the WSJ op ed published last night titled The Media Still Don't Get Trump by Jason L. Riley. I don't know who Riley is but he is a putz. The gist is that the Liberal Media Elites are going to give Trump a hard time because they are Liberal Elites but really his cabinet choices are fine, just fine.

His first example is Andy Puzder who is against minimum wage increases but he must be right about this because McDonald's is replacing humans with Kiosks because of minimum wage demands by unions. Mr. Riley apparently does not know that Puzder loves the idea of replacing humans with robots but not because of minimum wage demands but because humans expect to be treated like humans with human needs-- restroom breaks, time off, health insurance, etc.

He goes on to laud several other appointments and brushes aside all criticism as Liberal bias.

The part of the op ed that really drove me crazy however was this: "Ben Carson is knocked for having no experience because apparently running a government agency is more difficult than brain surgery." (my paraphrase.) Really!? Really!? Nobody is saying this. What people are saying is that Ben Carson does not believe in government assistance for the poor so HUD would be a very bad fit. But also what a crappy strawman. Yes, Ben Carson is a brain surgeon but he had a least 11 years of training to be a brain surgeon (4 years of medical school, 1 year of internship, 7 years of residency in his specialization) and he will have 0 years to train for heading up HUD. What part of training for brain surgery allows you to be comparably versed in public housing? You might as well say that he could-- starting right now-- be a concert pianist or an aviator or a civil engineer-- after all surely these things are no more difficult than being a brain surgeon.

AAAAARRRGGGGH OK. I just had to get that off my chest.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:53 AM on December 14, 2016 [31 favorites]

What people are saying is that Ben Carson does not believe in government assistance for the poor so HUD would be a very bad fit.

Not to mention the fact that the last public statement given by Dr. Carson before his HUD appointment was that he was not qualified to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, which he actually knows something about.
posted by Etrigan at 6:56 AM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

I doubt there is more qualified individual on Earth to talk about security service leaks.

Which falls under my exception of "stuff that he personally witnessed during his time at the NSA".

The question was about the content of Snowden's twitter feed, which is also full of proclamations and speculation in areas wildly outside of his area of expertise.
posted by murphy slaw at 7:07 AM on December 14, 2016

What people are saying is that Ben Carson does not believe in government assistance for the poor so HUD would be a very bad fit.

Government. Shrink. Bathtub.
posted by Mister Bijou at 7:09 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

It was a Greek mathematician who calculated its diameter to within about 10%

Eratosthenes, his work was improved by a Muslim scientist, Al-Biruni, his result was within 17 km of the modern accepted value.

Leave it to the Trump team to use a myth to try and discredit a fact. This post-truth era really needs to end.
posted by papercrane at 7:11 AM on December 14, 2016 [12 favorites]

it's unfortunate that the Norquist wing of the republican party's agenda dovetails so nicely with trump's, insofar as the media will be so exhausted documenting the (possibly effective, possibly clownishly futile depending on the cabinet member in question) dismantling of the civil service that he'll be able to spend most of his time in the treasury with hip waders and a big shovel.
posted by murphy slaw at 7:13 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

The Norquist wing IS the Trump wing- or else what did you think Norquist and his buddies want to drown the government for?
posted by Pope Guilty at 7:18 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

Snowden's twitter feed, which is also full of proclamations and speculation in areas wildly outside of his area of expertise.

It all looks like leaks and whistleblowing to me.
posted by Coda Tronca at 7:21 AM on December 14, 2016

Yeah, that Michigan thing.... Does not sound like my experience in Virginia. At all. Data was a BFD, and we could by-god find something for anyone to do that happened to walk in off the street. It's possible that my office was just exceptionally awesome, but I'm not sure.
posted by dogheart at 7:22 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Snowden's twitter feed, which is also full of proclamations and speculation in areas wildly outside of his area of expertise.
---
It all looks like leaks and whistleblowing to me.

These held up well.

@Snowden
2016: a choice between Donald Trump and Goldman Sachs.

@Snowden
There may never be a safer election in which to vote for a third option.
posted by chris24 at 7:23 AM on December 14, 2016 [29 favorites]

The Norquist wing IS the Trump wing- or else what did you think Norquist and his buddies want to drown the government for?

Ascribing intent to Trump is like saying your parrot learned French because it enjoys Luc Besson movies.
posted by Etrigan at 7:23 AM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

I mean, the point of the Politico piece is that "Brooklyn" ignored Michigan because they thought they had it wrapped up. And so there was no oversight into what was happening there. Virginia was an obvious concern.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:23 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

> That anybody could look back at the 30's and the Dust Bowl and the Depression and think, "Yeah. Good times! I can't wait for the poor to starve to death in the streets."

Think of all the people who would have died, but didn't. Who had food in their bellies instead of going hungry. Who were given jobs instead of being unemployed and hopeless. It makes me sick!

/ HAMBURGER
posted by The Card Cheat at 7:24 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Buzzfeed: Loretta Lynch Is Preparing To Hand Over Her Justice Department To Trump: “We will be conveying the importance of this work,” said Lynch. “We will be conveying the pain that it has caused to the victims of any kind of hate crime — whether it is someone who is part of the LGBT community, or Muslim American individuals, or African American. These issues have galvanized attention because they have affected ordinary Americans.”
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:25 AM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

Oh I get it, Snowden is anti-Clinton. Understood.
posted by Coda Tronca at 7:28 AM on December 14, 2016

Oh I get it, Snowden is anti-Clinton. Understood.

You said Snowden posted solely on leaks and whistleblowing, not proclamations and speculation in areas outside of his area of expertise. I posted two off the top of my head that showed you were wrong. If you want to move the goalposts and ignore what your comment was, you be you.
posted by chris24 at 7:31 AM on December 14, 2016 [31 favorites]

Spotted today on the Trump Tower elevator camera: @dmartosko (David Martosko), who is one of the finalists for press secretary, I'm told.

During the Wisconsin primary, Martosko sparred with Ted Cruz and Carly Fiorina, asking Cruz if he had been faithful to his wife
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:31 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Even though I know there is literally no hope, I am still in denial and praying for a miracle to save us from a Trump presidency: faithless electors, giant asteroid, Yellowstone caldera, anything, I'm not picky.
posted by entropicamericana at 7:35 AM on December 14, 2016 [16 favorites]

DC-Area Marching Bands Opt to Sit Out Trump's Inaugural Parade: At least one D.C. public school marching band has participated in the past five inaugural parades, but none applied for consideration this year.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:35 AM on December 14, 2016 [42 favorites]

Yellowstone caldera

Ooh, this was an option I hadn't considered yet!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 7:36 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

David Martosko is the former exec ed of the Tucker Carlson-founded conservative site The Daily Caller and the US political editor for the UK's Daily Mail.

The RNC is probably pushing Sean Spicer on Trump for the press sec'y post. We know he's in the running. He's the RNC's communications director. The Washington Post has an extensive article about how Trump chose to nominate Tillerson as Secretary of State. Looks like he doesn't like being pressured.
posted by zarq at 7:40 AM on December 14, 2016

I assume there must have been studies done about lawn signs being useless, but I can't say I believe them. They seem self-evidently meaningful to me, and to everyone I know, for normalizing candidates as the kind of people your neighbors/friends/relatives/associates are voting for.

Yeah, I live in Red country so this may mean nothing, but I do a lot of driving and saw a shit ton of Trump signs and virtually no Clinton signs.

This idea that yard signs are pointless seems to me to fly in the face of, y'know...the history of advertising.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 7:40 AM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

we could by-god find something for anyone to do that happened to walk in off the street. It's possible that my office was just exceptionally awesome, but I'm not sure.

Your office was exceptionally good.

As an experienced political campaigner (albeit originally from the other side), I offered essentially my services carte blanche to the Clinton campaign, multiple times. They could easily have used me to appeal to weak Republicans. But I was never called back, and only found my way to the call tool through the grace of Mefites.

This isn't a moral failing or anything, but I did get the sense they thought they had it in the bag and didn't think they needed people.
posted by corb at 7:42 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

This idea that yard signs are pointless seems to me to fly in the face of, y'know...the history of advertising.

The primary function of short-burst advertising (e.g., a campaign sign with maybe three words; a billboard by a freeway, a 15-second radio spot) is not to convince, it's to remind: put the word "Coca-Cola" into your head so when you think "I need something to drink", you remember that you should have a Coke. So campaign signs work their magic when Joe Voter gets to the bottom of his ballot and sees four people running for Water District Council. He faintly remembers seeing a Shmedlap For Water Council sign, so he votes for Shmedlap. But President? Joe already marked that one, and he didn't need to be reminded that Trump or Clinton is running.
posted by Etrigan at 7:53 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

The Michigan article is beyond unbelievable. Turning away volunteers on the ground and redirecting funds to Chicago and New Orleans?

The entire Schumer/Clintonite wing of the party has to be disempowered. The same people responsible for 2016s miserable slate of candidates and what can only be described as wholesale malpractice by the Clinton campaign cannot be allowed to dictate Booker or Gillibrand along with another Senate slate full of Patrick Murphys and Katie McGintys.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:56 AM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

But President? Joe already marked that one, and he didn't need to be reminded that Trump or Clinton is running.

I don't think that's correct, though. Because to me, driving around a neighborhood, I think to myself, "Oh, Barney's family is supporting Hillary Clinton. I like Barney a lot." And then maybe there's a discussion, or at least some thought about why Barney's family put the sign up.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:57 AM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

Fine, Snowden tweets about the election or politics, and he got it wrong too. To see him dismissed on here after all he's done is still amazing to me.
posted by Coda Tronca at 7:59 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

DC-Area Marching Bands Opt to Sit Out Trump's Inaugural Parade: At least one D.C. public school marching band has participated in the past five inaugural parades, but none applied for consideration this year.

I'm so proud of my people.
posted by winna at 7:59 AM on December 14, 2016 [21 favorites]

Joe already marked that one, and he didn't need to be reminded that Trump or Clinton is running.

People don't wear Coca Cola branded clothing because they need to remind themselves what to drink, though.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 7:59 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

The thing is, if you wanted a yard sign or a bumper sticker or whatever, you could get one. At hillaryclinton.com. I had a sign and a car magnet and two buttons. But what you couldn't do was rock up to any random field office at any random time post-July and have them give these to you for free.
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:03 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

But what you couldn't do was rock up to any random field office at any random time post-July and have them give these to you for free.

Right, so that's a huge problem.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:05 AM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

As far as I'm aware, you couldn't do that at a Trump office either.
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:06 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

The fact that Brazile was worried about Trump winning the popular vote is just... Has the DNC ever even looked at a population map of the US? A rudimentary reading of 538 or Upshot would've showed that was basically impossible, and Trump's only path was through the Midwest, exactly how he won, and how his campaign repeatedly said they were positioning themselves.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:08 AM on December 14, 2016

Yard signs are great for downballot races. They are for name recognition and everyone already knew the names "Trump" and "Clinton" (and "Obama"--this thinking was in effect in '12 as well). Where I live was awash in Clinton yard signs and I think it's just confirmation of what everyone already knows: I live in a blue/red area and people support $Candidate, as expected.

I think yard signs would have helped this year in at least some circumstances. I'm in an area that trends Republican. So when I did see a Hillary sign, what it said to me was 1) you're not alone, 2) don't be afraid to stand tall even in a place that feels hostile to your values, and 3) it feels fucking refreshing to see support for Hillary that isn't accompanied by a lengthy diatribe about how grudgingly unenthused that support is, because there's this seemingly expected social signaling thing in a lot of red state Dems where they start from the Republican framing and work to justify breaking with it instead of just starting from progressive principles. Tedious "I'm not a socialist but..." stuff. And yard signs aren't wishy-washy like that. I really do believe they help a lot in areas the candidate's supporters feel marginalized, from a morale standpoint if nothing else.
posted by jason_steakums at 8:12 AM on December 14, 2016 [13 favorites]

As far as I'm aware, you couldn't do that at a Trump office either.

I wish that were true, but sadly the Trump offices - or local party offices acting as offices - around here did a "sure but only if you knock on X doors for it."
posted by corb at 8:12 AM on December 14, 2016

Because to me, driving around a neighborhood, I think to myself, "Oh, Barney's family is supporting Hillary Clinton. I like Barney a lot." And then maybe there's a discussion, or at least some thought about why Barney's family put the sign up.

Really? I mean, honestly, your decision of whether to vote for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton was made based on the sign your neighbor Barney had up? Or are you imagining some hypothetical centrist low-information voter?

Because that low-information voter who's so on-the-fence that a sign tips them to a candidate, or even tips them to vote at all, or even tips them to have a conversation with his neighbor Barney -- that guy doesn't really exist. The signs are buried by the ads in every other medium, the news that leaks through that low-information voter's fog of apathy, the discussions around the water cooler.

Believe what you will, but a lot of people have studied this exact question for many, many years, and there is not a single one who thinks signs really matter. There's a reason that Trump was selling so many signs, and it wasn't to tip Barney's neighbor.
posted by Etrigan at 8:15 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

It was the same deal at the Clinton office, once they got the signs in (mid-October). If you showed up to volunteer, you could get a sign. At our big pre-GOTV training meeting, YOU get a sign, and YOU get a sign, and YOU get a sign, EVERYONE gets a sign! But a random Tuesday in September when you had no intention of volunteering? Nope. No sign for you. Order it online like everyone else.
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:15 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Yard signs are about tribal signalling, not persuasion.
posted by EarBucket at 8:16 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

Really? I mean, honestly, your decision of whether to vote for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton was made based on the sign your neighbor Barney had up?

My decision, no. But I bet a lot of people voted the way their friends voted.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:16 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Yard signs? That was then. This is now.

On Monday, members of the Electoral College will vote in Donald J. Trump as president. Though he lost the election by nearly three million votes and almost daily generates headlines about new scandals, the Democratic Party is doing little to stop him. If you’ve been asking yourself “Where are the Democrats?” you’re not alone.

Buck Up, Democrats, and Fight Like Republicans (NYT)
posted by Mister Bijou at 8:18 AM on December 14, 2016 [25 favorites]

But I bet a lot of people voted the way their friends voted.

Sure, but they don't find out how their friends are voting (specifically for President) because of a sign in the front yard.
posted by Etrigan at 8:19 AM on December 14, 2016

Sure, but they don't find out how their friends are voting (specifically for President) because of a sign in the front yard.

I don't think you can say that for sure.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:21 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

Trump’s national security adviser shared secrets without permission, files show

<img src="but_her_emails.png">
posted by tonycpsu at 8:21 AM on December 14, 2016 [24 favorites]

Net favorability of Putin:

Democrats
July 2014: -54
Dec 2016: -62

Republicans
July 2014: -66
Dec 2016: -10

(YouGov/Economist)
Via twitter
posted by melissasaurus at 8:22 AM on December 14, 2016 [24 favorites]

If a sign swayed you to vote for Trump, you're a fucking idiot, and I have no problem saying that. Signs aren't the problem.
posted by agregoli at 8:23 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

I bet a lot of people voted the way their friends voted.

I'll fess up to this. Not on the presidential, obviously, but for some of the local races I had no spoons or time left to research, I voted the way my NeverTrump friends from convention voted. It was a shortcut- I trusted them, they had strong visible feelings, and I didn't care that much about those races.
posted by corb at 8:23 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

Yard signs are about tribal signalling, not persuasion.

And especially so this year. After the frothing masses of hate that were Trump rallies, when seeing a block full of Trump signs those signs might as well say "keep your mouth shut around these parts, liberals". Signaling not just support for one tribe but contempt for the other.
posted by jason_steakums at 8:23 AM on December 14, 2016 [12 favorites]

The authors worked in collaboration with a congressional candidate, a mayoral candidate, an independent expenditure campaign directed against a gubernatorial candidate, and a candidate for county commissioner.

These are all downballot races, where yard signs have always been used to foster name recognition which may be lacking (even in Congressional races--I talked to a lot of strong Clinton supporters who had no idea who Katie McGinty was).
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:27 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

So remember how Trump boasted he could kill someone in Times Square and get away with it? And remember how he's buddies with Duterte now? It doesn't seem like a stretch to think Trump might seriously think he can follow in the same footsteps in broad daylight.

Duterte says he has personally killed drug suspects on his motorcycle to encourage the police to do the same, and his supporters don't care. (WaPo link)

(And just hours before the admission he insisted he isn't a killer.) (BBC, same basic facts, different spin)
posted by alligatorpear at 8:29 AM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

Thanks for posting that article, Mister Bijou. This is the thing that kills me:

The Hillary Clinton campaign, trying to encourage a peaceful transition, has gone almost completely dark, with her most notable appearances coming in selfies with strangers. Nobody deserves downtime more than Mrs. Clinton, but while she is decompressing, the country is moving toward its biggest electoral mistake in history.

We need her to say *something,* she cannot just retreat and disappear. Yes, she deserves a break. But at least issue a statement, or something. Selfies in the woods and speeches to millionaire donors and celebrating Katy Perry...what about the rest of us? We are adrift. The complete lack of Democratic Party leadership right now is bizarre. Not just from HRC, but from everyone. I swing back and forth on Bernie Sanders but he has been vocal has hell in the past month. We need more Bernies to rally around right now.
posted by everybody had matching towels at 8:29 AM on December 14, 2016 [36 favorites]

Yard signs are about tribal signalling, not persuasion.

Tribal signaling can probably expand the tribe, though. I don't know anything about tribes.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 8:31 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Sure, but they don't find out how their friends are voting (specifically for President) because of a sign in the front yard.

I don't think you can say that for sure.

Ugggh, no, of course I can't say that I am absolutely certain that literally zero people out of 330 million made the decision of whether to vote for Trump or Clinton in the narrow way you're imagining.

I feel pretty confident that less than 300,000 in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan made their decision to vote for Trump based on their neighbor Barney.
posted by Etrigan at 8:34 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

I think there might be a belief that at this point HRC is tainted, basically forever now.

I agree, we do need someone or someones to step up, and step up loud and hard, like yesterday. But I am not sure that someone should be Hillary Clinton.

This is the big issue with how shallow of a bench the Democrats have, which is partly the fault of the party and partly the fault of gerrymandering and Republican dirty pool. We have an electorate, but we don't have the elected. We have more infantry than the other side, but no one to command. And, to be fair, our infantry does have a long history of opting for circular firing squads whenever someone does try to lead.
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:34 AM on December 14, 2016 [34 favorites]

If a sign swayed you to vote for Trump, you're a fucking idiot, and I have no problem saying that. Signs aren't the problem.

If Democrats are going to eschew idiots, we'll be a one-party Republican country forever.
posted by dirigibleman at 8:40 AM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

Maybe the thinking of the Democratic leadership goes like this:

Loudly railing against the fact the Trump was elected because of Comey and Russia leads to immediate chaos that probably ends with Trump as president (which probably leads to chaos).

Staying relatively quite about Comey and Russia leads to Trump as president (which probably leads to chaos).
posted by diogenes at 8:41 AM on December 14, 2016

I really don't think HRC has gone quiet because "she needs a break".

I love her. I would love for her to lead the charge RIGHT NOW and potentially even the party. I think she's the bees knees and would be amazing as a standard bearer, just as I thought she would have been an amazing president. She has so many causes she can champion and make a true difference doing so.

Sadly, most of the Democratic/Socialist Left does not agree with me. I think the party is, behind the scenes, trying to pull itself together and find a new face to present to the future electorate and that face is not Hillary Rodham Clinton.
posted by lydhre at 8:41 AM on December 14, 2016 [17 favorites]

Secret Life of Gravy: If Priebus, Bannon, Conway and Lewandowski all end up inside the West Wing, it would create an almost unprecedented multitude of competing power centers — all within steps of the Oval Office. And that doesn’t include Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who is expected to exert significant authority in the new administration.

Why is it expected that Pence will have any power? Because _rump will delegate "boring" tasks to him? SO MUCH media coverage has been on _rump's actions and picks, but Pence's role(s) in this transitional period seem to be absent from the coverage. He doesn't strike me as a mastermind like Cheney, lurking in the shadows and pulling the strings. Speaking of Cheney:

yoga: Has there been any public statement from Cheney about the election? Links?

Dick Cheney voted for _rump, breaking from the Bushes who were not supporting _rump.
posted by filthy light thief at 8:44 AM on December 14, 2016

Is there a timeline on the DNC elections? If we're talking about getting new Dem leadership in place, that seems like something that will likely need to happen first. I can't imagine anyone following Donna Brazile's direction right now.
posted by dinty_moore at 8:45 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

If Democrats are going to eschew idiots, we'll be a one-party Republican country forever.

I think that sentiment is defeatist and frankly, bullshit.
posted by agregoli at 8:45 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Someone is going to have to explain how Russ Feingold, a white male populist with a good reputation, underperformed Clinton by 2.6% in Wisconsin before I'm convinced about yard signs or that Clinton fucked it up in MI and Wi.
posted by chris24 at 8:46 AM on December 14, 2016 [28 favorites]

The electors are gonna pick Trump. We will have a President Trump. We must figure out how to move forward from here.

I see a bunch of comments in this spirit this upthread. But as far as I'm concerned, encouraging electors to vote against Trump is moving forward from here. Far from a sensationalist or illegitimate move, this option is built into our very electoral process. From the Hamilton Electors site (confession: I haven't read Federalist Papers 68 myself - there's only so much time - so I can't speak to exactly how interpretive this is. Perhaps someone better versed in that material will weigh in on this.)

Election of a Qualified Person: As Hamilton stated [in Federalist Papers 68], the purpose was to ensure that “…the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications.”

Preventing Election of a Demagogue or Charlatan: The Founders did not want a person who would play on public fears and temporary passion to hold the office. Hamilton again: “Talent for low intrigue…may alone suffice to elect a man… but it will require other talents and merit to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union.”

Preventing Election of a President under Foreign Influence: The Founders feared attempts by other countries to orchestrate the election of a person under their influence. The Founders believed, as Hamilton put it, that the decentralized, layered electoral college guarded against foreign nations “…raising a creature of their own to the chief magistry” of the United States.

Don't these issues sound awfully familiar at present?
posted by marlys at 8:46 AM on December 14, 2016 [32 favorites]

This is the problem with a big tent. The job of uniting disaffected Bernie Bros, middle aged white feminists, young black folks, organized labor, and young, earnest social justice Tumblrites is not for the faint of heart or butt.
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:47 AM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

We need her to say *something,* she cannot just retreat and disappear. Yes, she deserves a break. But at least issue a statement, or something.

Nah, Clinton doesn't need to say anything, and it would probably be for the best if she didn't since the only possible things that could still matter would likely be made less possible if it were her politicizing it, as if she were still running. Other Dems do need to take leadership, Sanders is stepping into that gap and doing some of the work for the left, but other voices need to be out there too since Sanders doesn't appeal to everyone and is a rather singular figure, by choice, who may not be around to lead the party into 2020. More leadership, minority voices in the party, and support of the left from mainstreamers would be more helpful than Hillary right now.

Most people are uninformed about most political issues. Those people vote on trust. Trust can be built by showing visible support and by noting those who are enthused or believe in a candidate who you trust. In most instances I suspect yard signs have a minimal value, but in some instances I believe that value can change when there is less certainty over who to vote for. This election was more likely to have been in that latter camp than most, in part due to dislike of both candidates and aggressive and sometimes threatening behavior from the Trump side.
posted by gusottertrout at 8:48 AM on December 14, 2016 [13 favorites]

Is there a timeline on the DNC elections?

Not until March.

I think there might be a belief that at this point HRC is tainted, basically forever now.

If she wasn't before, she is now. She really, really needs to just go away. The Democrats need a leader. A new leader. We don't need any more Clinton. The party destroyed itself to pave her way, and lost everything anyway. Her and Bill and basically the entire associated leadership structure cannot be the ones to rebuild it.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:49 AM on December 14, 2016 [13 favorites]

I really don't think HRC has gone quiet because "she needs a break".

I said "deserves a break," which is slightly different, but okay. The face is not nor needs to be HRC, and she probably knows that, but it would be a very good move for her to address her non-millionaire not-in-the-woods-at-the-same-time supporters and encourage us/them to move forward and work with the other factions in the party. Shrug.
posted by everybody had matching towels at 8:49 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

I feel pretty confident that less than 300,000 in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan made their decision to vote for Trump based on their neighbor Barney.

As a lifelong Midwesterner who grew up in a semi-rural area, I'd go so far as to say that easily 300,000 people in those states know basically fuck all about current politics beyond what their neighbor Barney thinks. They don't read newspapers or blogs or watch the news, and most people they know don't either. It seems impossible inside the bubble of People Who Pay Attention, but it's not at all unusual in big parts of the country.
posted by Rykey at 8:49 AM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

I think all the threats from Donald and his mob about "Lock Her Up!" may have had an effect as well.
posted by FJT at 8:50 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

lydhre: Sadly, most of the Democratic/Socialist Left does not agree with me. I think the party is, behind the scenes, trying to pull itself together and find a new face to present to the future electorate and that face is not Hillary Rodham Clinton.

I think the next Dem presidential candidate will have to be very charismatic, if they are to compete against incumbent _rump (barring the chances that he gets impeached, or craters his support that spiked after the election and his party backs someone else).

Sadly, of all the things that HRC is, charismatic is not one of them. Yes, I'm a huge fan of her, but if it came down to winning over someone based on charm and on-stage personality alone, _rump wins over Hillary.
posted by filthy light thief at 8:51 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Speaking of Democratic leadership, I just got a very weird reply from my ward committee chair enquiring about whether there are meetings and if so, can I come?

Can someone who is familiar with local party politics translate this for me?

"Yes we have several meeting a year and usual one sometimes to social type events.

At the moment I do not have an open position for the female member in your district. However I anticipate very soon the current member holding the door is moving and will be resigning.

I'll let you know when that opens and how to proceed as soon as it opens up."

?????????????????????????????????????????????

No, really, whut?
posted by soren_lorensen at 8:52 AM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

Meanwhile, the GSA has addressed the conflict of interest w/r/t the hotel on Pennsylvania Ave NW.
posted by everybody had matching towels at 8:53 AM on December 14, 2016 [15 favorites]

Sadly, of all the things that HRC is, charismatic is not one of them. Yes, I'm a huge fan of her, but if it came down to winning over someone based on charm and on-stage personality alone, _rump wins over Hillary.
posted by filthy light thief

I am sick to death of people stating things like this as fact. I find her charismatic and inspirational as hell and I fucking MISS HER right now.
posted by agregoli at 8:55 AM on December 14, 2016 [69 favorites]

As a lifelong Midwesterner who grew up in a semi-rural area, I'd go so far as to say that easily 300,000 people in those states know basically fuck all about current politics beyond what their neighbor Barney thinks.

Sorry, I forgot to add "and are convinced to vote for Trump based solely on a discussion they had with Barney that they were inspired to start by the TRUMP sign in Barney's front yard." Yes, talking with neighbors is a big motivator to vote and to vote in a particular way, but the signs aren't starting those conversations.
posted by Etrigan at 8:55 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

At the moment I do not have an open position for the female member in your district.

/Secret Ferengi
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 8:57 AM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

Even if she did what everyone in hindsight thinks is so obvious and spent more time and effort in MI and WI, she still needed to win PA or FL and she spent a shit ton of money and effort there. And of course, the campaign was making decisions based on the information they had. Which was 30+ straight polls in both WI and MI that had her up an average of 5+ points. The state polls in MI, WI and PA were off by 5-6%.

In a close election lots of things can be the difference, but every campaign is imperfect and makes mistakes. What every campaign doesn't face is Russia, Wikileaks and Comey ratfucking them. Late-breaking voters - after the Comey letters - broke strongly for Trump - enough to cost her PA, WI and MI. She lost WI, MI, PA and FL by less than a point. Without Comey/Russia, she probably wins them all and we're talking about what a great campaign.

Top aides in Brooklyn write off complaints from battleground state operatives as Monday morning quarterbacking by people who wouldn’t have had much of a case if Clinton had won. They continue to blame the loss on FBI Director James Comey, saying he shifted late deciders, not any tactical failures.

“Now of course, in hindsight, there are any number of steps that we could have taken that may have made the difference in a state as closely decided as Michigan, but the consistent theme across all the battleground states was that we saw our numbers drop in the final week after Jim Comey sent his shocking letter to Congress,” said former Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon.

When top aides to the Trump campaign mapped out the best-case scenarios for election night, they always fell short of 270, and Michigan was always the state that they couldn’t see a way through.

[...]

On the morning of Election Day, internal Clinton campaign numbers had her winning Michigan by 5 points. By 1 p.m., an aide on the ground called headquarters; the voter turnout tracking system they’d built themselves in defiance of orders — Brooklyn had told operatives in the state they didn’t care about those numbers, and specifically told them not to use any resources to get them — showed urban precincts down 25 percent. Maybe they should get worried, the Michigan operatives said.

Nope, they were told. She was going to win by 5. All Brooklyn’s data said so.

posted by Rustic Etruscan at 8:57 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

Meanwhile, the GSA has addressed the conflict of interest w/r/t the hotel on Pennsylvania Ave NW.

Trump's response will be GSA? What's that? Defunded. (With the help of his R buddies.) I mean after his tweetstorm on how unfair and useless the GSA is of course.
posted by gusottertrout at 8:58 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

I think the next Dem presidential candidate will have to be very charismatic, if they are to compete against incumbent _rump... Sadly, of all the things that HRC is, charismatic is not one of them. Yes, I'm a huge fan of her, but if it came down to winning over someone based on charm and on-stage personality alone, _rump wins over Hillary.

Even assuming your opinion of Clinton's charisma is true - which I and others disagree with - not sure it follows that "charisma" is the necessary key to beating Trump. She got 2.9 million more votes, 2.1% more than him.
posted by chris24 at 8:59 AM on December 14, 2016 [16 favorites]

Oh dear, soren-lorensen. Someone is not so much with the words. Here's how I read that:

They have several meetings and some social events every year. The social events are probably fundraisers. I hate these things, but it's considered good form to go, even if you'd rather just give them some money and not have to schmooze.

They may have gender quotas for the central committee. In my state, delegates to the national convention have to be split evenly between men and women. That was originally meant to benefit women, but at this point sometimes more women want to go than men, and it's harder for women to get selected than for men. Anyway, it may be that each district has to have one woman and one man, and they have to wait until a woman resigns for you to be appointed. If they know that a woman is planning to move out of the district, then they probably know that it's likely that a space for a woman will be opening up soon.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 9:01 AM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

She got 2.9 million more votes, 2.1% more than him.

Again, this means nothing. She had a specific deficit with the exact demographic that proved to be outcome controlling in the electoral college. She could've won every vote in California and still lost the same way, by failing to build a winning coalition under the system that actually exists. Charisma in California can be, and actually was, electoral poison in Michigan and Ohio.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:03 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

OMG thank you A&C!

I seriously have no idea how local parties work and my email to him was basically, "Hi, I live around the corner from you, I'd like to get involved somehow in the local committee. How do? Can I come to a meeting?" That reply was like bzuh? What dose my gender have to do with this? Is that English? Is this Russian spam?

I think I kind of get it now, thank you!
posted by soren_lorensen at 9:04 AM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

It's quite likely that a major factor in the popular-vote result was the campaign targeting more states than were needed to win the presidency. If they hadn't been running ads in states like Arizona, they probably wouldn't have gotten as many votes there.
posted by Coventry at 9:04 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Even assuming your opinion on Clinton's charisma is true - which I and others disagree with - not sure it follows that "charisma" is the necessary key to beating Trump. She got 2.9 million more votes, 2.1% more than him.

Good point, but I'm still not sure she could win a crowd over from _rump, and T.D. Strange noted the difference between audiences.

FJT: I think all the threats from Donald and his mob about "Lock Her Up!" may have had an effect as well.

And the fact that "a concerned citizen" can travel 350 miles to "investigate" false claims about her and her colleagues that he read online, only to end up firing a semi-automatic gun in a pizza restaurant. Yeah, I think she might be worried about her safety for a while. At least she gets secret service protection thanks to the Former Presidents Act.

futz: Alex Jones Scrubs Pizzagate Content; Complaint Reveals New Tie Connecting Shooter To Jones

It's all ~~fun and games~~ critical journalism until someone shoots up a pizzeria.
posted by filthy light thief at 9:05 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

One deleted. Talez, and anybody else, please drop the "just evacuate all vulnerable people to the coasts" stuff for good. We've been over this many times, just stop.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 9:06 AM on December 14, 2016 [15 favorites]

Keith Ellison is running for DNC chair and is attracting a lot of attention. He advocates a return to the 50-state strategy and is a Muslim man of color from MN.

Obama is encouraging Labor Sect. Tom Perez to run. Other contenders include New Hampshire Democratic Party Chair Ray Buckley and South Carolina Democratic Party Chair Jaime Harrison.

As for bench, I like a lot of these women who did win this year. I want to see what we can do to build on their wins/bring in more women like them.

If ya'll want to get involved, try applying your precinct's party chair--those almost never seem to be full up and it's not a hard role to fill. If there's already a chair for your precinct, contact and ask how you can help.

Local party websites are run by volunteers and suffer from that in terms of tech and sophistication, but if you just keep calling around/show up at whatever meeting you can, you will find a way to join/contribute/etc.
posted by emjaybee at 9:07 AM on December 14, 2016 [17 favorites]

Meanwhile, the GSA has addressed the conflict of interest w/r/t the hotel on Pennsylvania Ave NW.

To be clear about where this is coming from:

House Democrats State Trump Will be in Breach of Contract Over DC Hotel on Inauguration Day
In a letter sent to the General Services Administration today, four top Congressional Democrats informed the agency that President-elect Donald Trump will be in breach of contract as it relates to his Washington, D.C. hotel unless he completely divests.

Today’s letter is a follow-up on a request made in late November in which the Dems asked how the GSA plans to handle potential conflicts of interest regarding the Trump International Hotel, considering Trump has a lease with the federal government for the building, which utilizes the Old Post Office.

It was noted in the letter that the GSA’s Deputy Commissioner explained earlier this month that Trump would be in breach when he enters office if he continues to have ownership interest.
"Most importantly, the Deputy Commissioner informed our staff that GSA assesses that Mr. Trump will be in breach of the lease agreement the moment he takes office on January 20, 2017, unless he fully divest himself of all financial interests in the lease for the Washington, D.C. hotel,” the lawmakers wrote. The Deputy Commissioner made clear that Mr. Trump must divest himself not only of managerial control but of all ownership interest as well."

posted by zarq at 9:07 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

By "charismatic" I presume people mean "charismatic like male candidates"? Because that's not going to work for a female politician. Her charisma will be used against her. She will be castigated for being shallow and manipulative. It will be sexualized, and she will be demonized for the fact that it has been sexualized.

We talk about Clinton like there isn't a double-standard in this world, in which the very things that work for men are the things that are used to bring down women. She was charismatic enough to win the election by a historic margin. I don't know what sort of charisma you would need to overcome a tectonic-shift in 20 percent of the population toward white nationalism. I don't think that's the sort of thing you can charm people out of.
posted by maxsparber at 9:07 AM on December 14, 2016 [67 favorites]

She had a specific deficit with the exact demographic that proved to be outcome controlling in the electoral college.

No she did not. She had a specific number deficit in those states, not an exact demographic deficit. That deficit could've been filled by any demographic we could get to the polls or to vote D instead of R; WWC, blacks, white college educated women, etc. You and Bernie and others are privileging WWC as the vote you want to fill that gap.
posted by chris24 at 9:07 AM on December 14, 2016 [34 favorites]

Yes, talking with neighbors is a big motivator to vote and to vote in a particular way, but the signs aren't starting those conversations.

The libertarians were out in force in Cleveland, and cheerfully gave out free signs and bumper stickers to anyone who asked them for them. One of the people who asked for one was a key influencer in our delegation with the religious subgroup. When she put a Johnson Weld sticker on her car, it sparked a move within all of them to start talking about Johnson as a potential acceptable candidate. It was an immediate conversation starter. Because she was known as a deeply religious woman, extremely concerned about pro-life issues, the fact that she was displaying a Johnson Weld sticker let them believe that you could be a good, strong moral person, deeply concerned about the issues, and still vote for a pro-choice candidate.

But she didn't volunteer that information, because she felt it was a private choice. People had to ask - and they did. She converted other influencers in the religious community, but it would not have taken place without the sign.
posted by corb at 9:10 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Michael Flynn quietly deletes fake news tweet about Hillary Clinton's involvement in sex crimes: "U decide - NYPD Blows Whistle on New Hillary Emails: Money Laundering, Sex Crimes w Children, etc...MUST READ!" Flynn's tweet read.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:11 AM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

The party destroyed itself to pave her way,

This line of thinking is not based in reality.
posted by asteria at 9:12 AM on December 14, 2016 [18 favorites]

I find Donald Trump to be such a sucking void of charisma that I literally cannot even whenever this topic comes up. He can barely utter a coherent sentence! He makes that pursed-lip sphincter-face that I guess he thinks makes him look super srs but really just makes him look constipated. He interrupts people with monosyllable nonsense and looms behind people uncomfortably when they speak. He's awkward and clearly uncomfortable in his own skin. If I encountered him on a crowded bus, I would inch away as subtly but as quickly as I could.
posted by soren_lorensen at 9:12 AM on December 14, 2016 [70 favorites]

I don't know what sort of charisma you would need to overcome a tectonic-shift in 20 percent of the population toward white nationalism. I don't think that's the sort of thing you can charm people out of.

That's the overarching issue that dares not speak its name in Democratic circles. How deep does the white nationalism go, and how many of the Obama->Trump voters are just looking for economic "change" and giving the outsider a chance, or have been/will be converted to Pepe-followers for good. Because if Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania start voting along racial lines in the same percentages as Alabama, no amount of charisma or policy will translate to a Democratic win. I don't think anyone knows the answer to that yet.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:12 AM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

but this endless debate about how a woman who most Americans preferred 'lacked charisma' is galling.
posted by cjelli

YES. Thank you. After hearing this charisma nonsense for the 1,000th time here, I am exhausted.
posted by agregoli at 9:13 AM on December 14, 2016 [17 favorites]

I don't think we can say categorically that because she won the popular vote, she was charismatic. I think it's equally as likely that most Americans wanted to vote against creeping fascism, sexual assault, and possible nuclear apocalypse.
posted by corb at 9:15 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

By "charismatic" I presume people mean "charismatic like male candidates"? Because that's not going to work for a female politician. Her charisma will be used against her. She will be castigated for being shallow and manipulative. It will be sexualized, and she will be demonized for the fact that it has been sexualized.

I will point out that Sen. Warren has a ton of charisma, which works in her favor. She is certainly castigated, but generally for things other than being shallow, manipulative, or being sexualized. I feel pretty strongly that the next successful female dem candidate will be from the Sen. Warren/Sen. Collins (I realize not a dem)/Ann Richards mold. Middle aged, motherly (in appearance, not attitude), wonky as hell.
posted by anastasiav at 9:16 AM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

Warrensburg Schools superintendent apologizes after students diss basketball team: The Warrensburg High School men’s basketball team was getting ready to tip off against visiting Center High School Monday night, when some students turned their backs on the players as Center’s starting roster was announced. One of the students in the video held up a “TRUMP” campaign sign.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:16 AM on December 14, 2016

At the moment I do not have an open position for the female member in your district. However I anticipate very soon the current member holding the door is moving and will be resigning.

I'll let you know when that opens and how to proceed as soon as it opens up.

Do you mean the "female member in your district" part of the message? If so, many Democratic Parties have some kind of gender-balance requirements in their bylaws. The PA state-committee bylaws I just linked don't mention this as a requirement for county committees, and I can't find any bylaws specifically for Allegheny, but the requirements for the state committee should give you an idea of what "female member in your district" probably means.
posted by Coventry at 9:16 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

She had a specific number deficit in those states, not an exact demographic deficit. That deficit could've been filled by any demographic we could get to the polls or to vote D instead of R; WWC, blacks, white college educated women, etc. You and Bernie and others are privileging WWC as the vote you want to fill that gap.

I don't find this persuasive at all when she hit all her turnout targets in cities like Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Miami. Even where she did underperform in Milwaukee and Detroit. White people came out of the wood work in rural and suburban counties to vote against her or flip to Trump.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:17 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Also, those bylaws I just linked may be out of date. It's worth getting an up to date copy for both state and county.
posted by Coventry at 9:17 AM on December 14, 2016

I will point out that Sen. Warren has a ton of charisma, which works in her favor.

Am I the only one who remember when she first ran for her seat and was considered too boring to win against Brown?

Charisma is what you make it to be.
posted by asteria at 9:19 AM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

I suspect that most of the time when people talk about admiring Trump's "charisma" they're referring to his built-in name recognition, tendency to gleefully insult and threaten people the speaker also does not like, and/or the simple fact that he wasn't Hillary Clinton (i.e. a female Democrat). But it's a subjective attribute, and there must have been many, many people who actually found him inspiring, like Reagan before him.
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:19 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

I wouldn't call it "charisma" I would call it "ability to grab eyeballs." It is not Clinton's fault that she was up against a huge mechanism specifically designed to hate on her personally, against a man whom the media cannot stop paying attention to, plus Russian interference/disinformation.

And she still nearly won. But I don't think it was her charisma that did that; it was her competence and his horrorshow.

So the next candidate, whoever they are, will be looking at a landscape where it has been proven that getting attention, by whatever means necessary, is Trump's strength and therefore an arena you must compete in. Quiet self-effacing competence was Clinton's strength; but when your media is OOH SHINY driven, that puts you at a disadvantage. Whoever comes next will need to be able to get off soundbites and have that sort of attention-getting skill that did not come easy to her. And still be a good candidate.
posted by emjaybee at 9:20 AM on December 14, 2016 [13 favorites]

Yeah, Coventry that was the part that was most confusing to me, and ArbitraryandCapricious also mentioned gender-quotas in local Democratic committees. I'll look up the bylaws but I suspect that's what he meant. I had no idea that was a thing, so mention of my gender (which I guess he inferred from my name) was just a record-scratch moment in what was also a kind of word-salady email otherwise.
posted by soren_lorensen at 9:20 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

I don't think we can say categorically that because she won the popular vote, she was charismatic.

I'm saying the opposite. Even assuming she has no charisma, she beat him. Hence, charisma is may be not crucial to beating Trump.
posted by chris24 at 9:21 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Charisma is subjective. If you didn't know who Hitler or Mussolini were and you saw footage of them, you'd probably think they were failed silent-film comedians. But they mesmerized millions of people.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 9:22 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

Yeah, seriously, this is not Dungeons and Dragons. She did not lose a charisma savings roll against a goblin.

I mean, yes, there was a goblin. But nothing else is true.
posted by maxsparber at 9:29 AM on December 14, 2016 [37 favorites]

she beat him.

Can we stop saying this yet
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:29 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

The reason Clinton shouldn't get involved with any actions against a Trump presidency now have nothing to do with charisma directly, but with diluting the message by making it seem like it's about her and the Dems trying to win by underhanded means rather than it being about Trump being unfit for office. It would confuse the message.

Clinton did have plenty of charisma for many voters, but it's also true that for some voters she had little or none. This is pretty much true of every politician. Some people love Sanders, others don't. Some people, god help them, love Trump, while the rest of us can't stand him. Politicians will be more and less effective communicating their policies and beliefs to different areas depending on how they "read" to different audiences. There is little doubt in my mind that Sanders would have come across better to rust belt WWC types, but I also don't doubt that he would have come across worse to other voters in no small part due to his preference for focusing on the WWC. It's a balancing act all candidates have to go through to determine where their specific best interests are met in trying to win an election.

This election in particular is screwy and much of the Monday morning candidating is bullshit because of it. Talking about what Clinton should have done purely based on knowing what did happen doesn't even remotely explain the events and decisions as they played out in real time. Her reliance on polling that had served other candidates just fine being called into question is a bit much, thinking she should have somehow predicted Comey's historic break with precedent and law isn't realistic at all.

Would Clinton, knowing what she knows now, have done things differently? Of course, in real time though those moves didn't hold the same sort of looming weight. I have no problem with people looking to learn lessons from this election and making reasonable criticisms of the campaign, but so much of this borders on Clinton bashing for the sake of it due to her not being able to read minds or travel through time and is not great analysis or helpful in trying to learn how to do better in future elections.
posted by gusottertrout at 9:29 AM on December 14, 2016 [18 favorites]

I don't find this persuasive at all when she hit all her turnout targets in cities like Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Miami. Even where she did underperform in Milwaukee and Detroit. White people came out of the wood work in rural and suburban counties to vote against her or flip to Trump.

Instead of pandering to/focusing on that rural/suburban racist, you could just as easily focus on what would've changed the minds of 10,000 white college educated women or motivated them to go vote. Or focus on increasing the turnout of blacks by 10,000. We're talking very small numbers here. Focusing on people who came out the woodwork to vote for white nationalism seems a fool's errand for a multi-cultural party.
posted by chris24 at 9:31 AM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

she beat him.

Can we stop saying this yet

Why would be stop saying a true thing?
posted by maxsparber at 9:32 AM on December 14, 2016 [22 favorites]

she beat him.

Wow the media really messed up, I've been hearing for over a month that Trump is going to be president
posted by beerperson at 9:34 AM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

So, what did happen with all the different demographics she could have gotten in a state like Michigan or Wisconsin?...
I feel like in terms of learning and moving forward to the next campaign, the relevant question isn't necessarily about the vote margin of Hillary vs. Trump, but how she managed to underperform Obama so badly in those crucial states.

As I mentioned earlier, I'll be convinced that Clinton did something unforgivable in MI and WI when someone explains why Russ Feingold, a white male populist, underperformed her by 2.6% in Wisconsin. Personally I think that's the more important question going forward in those states. He's representative of what Bernie and others are saying the party needs to be more like going forward to win in those states, yet he did worse.
posted by chris24 at 9:36 AM on December 14, 2016 [15 favorites]

Come on. She beat him in the popular vote. That's what people mean, we know that's what people mean, and there is no point being obtuse about it.
posted by maxsparber at 9:36 AM on December 14, 2016 [40 favorites]

In my view, Trump isn't exactly charismatic. He's not well spoken, doesn't have a "together" look, has no sense of timing, isn't graceful. What he has, though, is an extremely magnetic personality, which is to say that if you're of a certain polarity, he's very attractive, otherwise he's repulsive.
posted by feloniousmonk at 9:37 AM on December 14, 2016 [17 favorites]

she beat him.

Wow the media really messed up, I've been hearing for over a month that Trump is going to be president

Oh FFS, the comment was clearly in reference to the popular vote. And to be honest, the people spoke and did choose her. The system, designed to privilege slave states, worked as intended and rewarded racists and chose Trump.
posted by chris24 at 9:37 AM on December 14, 2016 [18 favorites]

We're talking very small numbers here.

Sure, on the presidential level.

So, what did happen with all the different demographics she could have gotten in a state like Michigan or Wisconsin?

And I'd love to see an explanation here too. Running a flawed candidate with a poorly communicated message (yes, not for lack of trying) fits easily.

Instead of pandering to/focusing on that rural/suburban racist, you could just as easily focus on what would've changed the minds of 10,000 white college educated women or motivated them to go vote.

Which does nothing to address the decimation in the House, Senate and particularly in the states. 100k more Clinton votes in the Rust Belt doesn't win the House, or any more Senate seats. She'd have been facing a united Congressional opposition just like Obama. It has to be a comprehensive message, there's more than one thing at work.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:39 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Meanwhile, the idea that Trump could somehow extract himself from the company was always implausible. You can’t divest from your own surname. The Trump Organization doesn’t really make things, and it hardly even develops properties anymore. It’s a marketing operation: It cuts deals to use Trump’s name and reputation to market everything from condo-hotels to neckties to television shows. The company’s management is lean and heavily focused on the Trump children, who are all executive vice presidents. Remove the Trump family and there’s no Trump organization. If the person running the company isn’t named “Trump,” what’s the point?

What levers are there to force Trump to speak to the press, divest from his company, or release his tax returns? The press is at a disadvantage, and has thus far failed. Congress is another story, but Democrats are a minority and Republicans are still trying to patch up relations with the president-elect after a rocky campaign. Voters, for their part, didn’t care during the election, and in a new Morning Consult/Politico poll, respondents said that they did not expect Trump to separate himself from his businesses, and most also thought Trump’s business decisions would influence his governance. As long as enough people are happy with the switch, Trump has little incentive to give away the bait.

The Bait-and-Switch Presidency

posted by y2karl at 9:39 AM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

Can we stop saying this yet

Why would I stop saying something that contributes to the meme that Trump has no mandate? Because some people don't like hearing it?
posted by asteria at 9:40 AM on December 14, 2016 [21 favorites]

Last night the compaison of food stamp recipients to wild animals meme appeared on my feed. My aunt-in-law had responded to it saying basically how abhorrent and ghastly the sentiment was.

One of the OP's friends stopped by the thread to support her comrade in arms:

X is a friend of mine from all the way back in high school. She is a veteran with a huge heart. I am sure, in retrospect, this would not have been her response.

After sighing and reconsidering becoming a supervillain and destroying humanity, I posted an excerpt of Matthew 25, particularly the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats:

“Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry, and feed you; or thirsty, and give you a drink? When did we see you as a stranger, and take you in; or naked, and clothe you? When did we see you sick, or in prison, and come to you?’

“The King will answer them, ‘Most certainly I tell you, because you did it to one of the least of these my brothers , you did it to me.’ Then he will say also to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire which is prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry, and you didn’t give me food to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me no drink; I was a stranger, and you didn’t take me in; naked, and you didn’t clothe me; sick, and in prison, and you didn’t visit me.’

I hope it changes some of their minds. I don't hold much hope. Most of the red states have forgotten what Jesus was supposed to have taught us seeing only what they can use to punish and oppress.
posted by Talez at 9:41 AM on December 14, 2016 [17 favorites]

Meanwhile, the idea that Trump could somehow extract himself from the company was always implausible. You can’t divest from your own surname.

Remember those fantasies when Hillary would drop Bill's name and become President Rodham?

Just imagine asking a dude to change his (anglo-friendly) name for politics.
posted by dinty_moore at 9:41 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

I mean I'm not a religious guy. I'm a lapsed Anglican. But Jesus said some pretty awesome things I can get behind.
posted by Talez at 9:42 AM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

What he has, though, is an extremely magnetic personality, which is to say that if you're of a certain polarity, he's very attractive, otherwise he's repulsive.

I don't think that is inherent. He possesses a number of things we have repeatedly been told to value, especially money and celebrity, which will make him attractive to people who respond to that regardless of his inherent qualities.

It probably wouldn't have been enough to get him elected, but he tossed some racism on top and it was like a magic trick. A horrible goblin magic trick.
posted by maxsparber at 9:42 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Instead of pandering to/focusing on that rural/suburban racist, you could just as easily focus on what would've changed the minds of 10,000 white college educated women or motivated them to go vote. Or focus on increasing the turnout of blacks by 10,000. We're talking very small numbers here. Focusing on people who came out the woodwork to vote for white nationalism seems a fool's errand for a multi-cultural party.

Yeah, it irks me to hear the griping when Clinton ran an unprecedented campaign putting the focus on minorities and even more particularly on women and children. That she didn't get the amount of support she may have hoped for from white women is unfortunate, and may be due to a number of confounding factors or the same economic/race argument we've had for weeks. I don't care which is the case, I won't criticize her for making that effort and trying to reach out to those people when there were plenty of reasons to suspect that plan could have worked and likely might have worked had some other elements gone a little differently.
posted by gusottertrout at 9:44 AM on December 14, 2016 [12 favorites]

But Jesus said some pretty awesome things I can get behind.

To paraphrase Gandhi, 'I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.'
posted by chris24 at 9:45 AM on December 14, 2016 [19 favorites]

Whatever happened to that group of Obama staffers who were working together and hatching a plan in the weeks after the election? I can't find a link now, but it suggested that there was emerging leadership among younger Democrats, or at least a coalition, ready to act.

If anyone has any information on this, please share it if you can. They can't all have just evaporated. I know that usually during a transition most of them would go be staffers elsewhere, or bail on politics altogether, but under the circumstances I'd bet they're staying together.
posted by Dormant Gorilla at 9:45 AM on December 14, 2016

If anyone has any information on this, please share it if you can.

I actually know a person. I'll get the scoop and report back.
posted by soren_lorensen at 9:46 AM on December 14, 2016 [16 favorites]

These days, most Christians worship Supply Side Jesus.
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:51 AM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

Finally. ADL, Major Jewish Groups Snub Invite to Trump Hotel Hanukkah Party in DC

It is well known that eight of the Conference of Presidents’ left-of-center member organizations, including the Union for Reform Judaism and National Council of Jewish Women, pulled out of the event. They cited reasons ranging from the fact that the party is being co-hosted by the embassy of Azerbaijan, a Muslim-led country with a questionable human rights record, to the fact that it is being held in a new hotel property owned by the president-elect, which raises questions about the appearance of trying to curry favor with him.

What has not been known, until now, is that several of the Conference’s centrist member groups – core constituents including the ADL, the American Jewish Committee, Hadassah and Jewish Federations of North America – are also refusing to attend the party.

This is a big deal. There's been a sort of vague grassroots campaign to pressure groups into not participating, and it seems to have had an effect.
posted by zachlipton at 9:53 AM on December 14, 2016 [42 favorites]

Which does nothing to address the decimation in the House, Senate and particularly in the states. 100k more Clinton votes in the Rust Belt doesn't win the House, or any more Senate seats. She'd have been facing a united Congressional opposition just like Obama. It has to be a comprehensive message, there's more than one thing at work.

True, which is why understanding the Feingold loss is important since that type of candidacy is what many people are saying is the way forward despite the loss. And Dems have it tough in Congress. The House is gerrymandered to give R about an 8% vote advantage. And the Senate is weighted to reward low-population states and there are about 30 red states and only 20 blue states.
posted by chris24 at 9:53 AM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

DailyAction.org might be a good way to keep on top of "who do I call today?" ya'll.
posted by emjaybee at 9:53 AM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

“I guess we can check back in with this patriotic elector after DT has murdered 47 people”
Violent fantasies of hiding out in the woods
notwithstanding - The death of 47 men is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic (to paraphrase).

There’s a pattern to history. “And a lot of them went through this whole litany about how even if Hitler got into a position of power, other German politicians would somehow be able to control him. A lot of German politicians believed this themselves.”

Of course, that’s all in the past. Concentration camps Pft. Not in the modern era.

“Removing visa overstays will be a top priority of my administration.” – Trump.

Yeah. I’m sure everything is going to be juuuust fine. It can’t happen here.

“Do they seem likely to give up that power? Last time we had to significantly curtail the power of rural white racists it took the deaths of a significant fraction of the American population.”

If Trumps presidency doesn’t have at least a low level intensity of domestic armed conflict, I’d be very surprised. It’s obvious. All the elements are there and moving forward as though they’re on rails. Best way to stop it is to pre-empt it. Negotiate for the best, but prepare for the worst.

Si vis pacem, para bellum

I’d write it in letters of fire in the sky if I could. Probably get deleted by mods tho. I’ll tell you what I’m not going to do, watch the country sit their ass on the couch, not organize, network, or do a damn thing until it’s too late like every other time atrocities happen. Paul Rusesabagina STILL gets death threats. Screw that noise.

Yes, paranoia is nothing new in American politics. But it’s not that Trump wants to do stuff like registering Muslims.

(Because maybe he doesn’t (Nov. 18).
Or does he? (Nov. 19) )

The problem is that people agree with it.

This problem, the - IMHO (and I've fucking SEEN active concentration camps) - vulnerability we have in the U.S. to doing something that drastic (and we've already done it on a small scale in the modern era, er, Gitmo? anyone? anyone?) and atrocious hasn't been initiated by Trump. He's just exploiting the vulnerability.

Any question as to whether he actually will do it if it benefits him? He wouldn't be an opportunist and play that to his advantage?

“I agree, we do need someone or someones to step up, and step up loud and hard, like yesterday.”
Superman is a fictional character. You have to get your own back.
Look, it’s a foregone conclusion that Putin hacked DNC servers. And in the smoke and noise of what Putin’s motives were or weren’t, Jill Stein’s recount bid – and the ruling against it – was lost.
People hate you? People marginalize you? Band, the fuck, together. Connect. Not just on the internet.
If it were as easy as killing one man (and really, that can be pretty godamned hard in an unbelievably lucky sorta way) you could do it.

But you can’t fight the tide with a straw, you need an oar.
What needs to be illustrated is that no matter how odious a candidate Trump is, it's our system that is in peril and our social vulnerability to fear (well programmed by the media) that can lead to actual atrocities perpetrated on American soil.

It's ridiculous to think it's a fantasy. On Sept. 10, 2001, terrorists flying planes into buildings in New York was a Michael Bay script. A day later everything people who had been shouting it, and were dismissed out of hand, were proven right.

And of course, it got spun to the Bush Admin's advantage and certain people made lots of profit from a war we didn't need to fight. 4K + of our own dead, and all the civilians.
I'd rather avoid all that this time.

“Can we stop saying this yet
Why would be stop saying a true thing?”

Man, we’ve got this real “Diggstown” attitude in the U.S. Especially about elections.
If you can out-con the con artist, you win!
(in Soviet Russia it's the other way around!)
posted by Smedleyman at 9:55 AM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

Smedleyman: I still can't make sense of your comment.
posted by XtinaS at 9:58 AM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

It's a rant, which is fine, but not actionable.
posted by tivalasvegas at 10:00 AM on December 14, 2016

Man, we’ve got this real “Diggstown” attitude in the U.S. Especially about elections.
If you can out-con the con artist, you win!

That's out-hustle the con artist.
posted by Etrigan at 10:02 AM on December 14, 2016

Wouldn't it be still possible to investigate whether individual Trump electors are qualified to be electors? I wrote out an extended AskMeFi question about this morning (which was deleted for being too chatty). Beyond the federal qualifications, specific states have qualifications. Texas requires the electors to be a qualified voter of the state and an affiliated party member. Missouri requires individuals to be residents of the specific Congressional district. Perhaps some could be challenged or winnowed from the 306.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 10:05 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Tillerson owns $177m in Exxon stock that doesn't vest for years. So either he walks away from a fortune, or he has a $177m conflict of interest as SoS.
posted by chris24 at 10:06 AM on December 14, 2016 [21 favorites]

I’ll tell you what I’m not going to do, watch the country sit their ass on the couch, not organize, network, or do a damn thing until it’s too late like every other time atrocities happen

No, but you're going to scold minorities to "band together" because "people" hate them.
posted by zutalors! at 10:06 AM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

I have no expectation that this Electoral revolt will happen but my friend Joanna put together this holiday-themed message to possible faithless electors: All I Want for Christmas is You.
posted by phearlez at 10:07 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Welp, I'm going to go down the street to see if FedEx can take passport photos to fussy Canadian specifications. Does that count as a damn thing? lolsob
posted by soren_lorensen at 10:10 AM on December 14, 2016

So remember how Trump boasted he could kill someone in Times Square and get away with it? And remember how he's buddies with Duterte now? It doesn't seem like a stretch to think Trump might seriously think he can follow in the same footsteps in broad daylight.

It used to be a big stretch that they'd even meet as leaders of their respective countries. And now, here we are.
posted by ZeusHumms at 10:11 AM on December 14, 2016

True, which is why understanding the Feingold loss is important since that type of candidacy is what many people are saying is the way forward despite the loss.

I don't have a good answer for this and I wish I did. I thought he would win even if Clinton lost. I haven't seen one anywhere else either except the rise of Pepe which I noted above.
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:11 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Also, soren_lorenson, you might consider asking your contact to explain now what you'll need to do to gain a seat on the committee, and where that process is documented, including any deadlines. They sound like they might not be very organized, and it would be a shame if they called to inform you that the Board of Elections needs 100 valid signatures from you five minutes before the deadline for said signatures.
posted by Coventry at 10:11 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Why the Christian Right Is Head Over Heels About Trump Becoming President.
The original FB article I read has been edited to omit this gem: ~
Controversial televangelist Pat Robertson repeatedly defended Trump during the general election, brushing off Trump’s comments in the Access Hollywood tape as “macho talk.” Robertson exclaimed that Trump’s victory means “Jesus will soon return”: “Sure, he’ll massacre all the atheists, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, yoga practitioners, witches, psychologists, Scientologists and alien worshippers, but once that’s done we will have 1,000 years of peace on Earth.”
posted by adamvasco at 10:12 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

soren_lorensen, I'm getting my kids their Italian passports and working on getting my husband citizenship. Because you never fucking know. /hugs
posted by lydhre at 10:12 AM on December 14, 2016

This chart is insane. It's a cult. A traitorous one.

@williamjordann
Here is Republicans and Democrats on Vladimir Putin since July 2014. [chart]
posted by chris24 at 10:14 AM on December 14, 2016 [17 favorites]

This chart is insane. It's a cult. A traitorous one.

I'm amazed it was that low in 2014 -- it seems like the right has been drumming up Putin as a Real Man Of Action as compared to Wimpy College Boy Obama for longer than that.
posted by Etrigan at 10:17 AM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

This is a totally normal President-elect thing, right? Trump company pulls its name off a Brazil hotel caught up in an investigation
posted by zachlipton at 10:19 AM on December 14, 2016

I'm sure that's just Trump divesting! {/}
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 10:25 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

I think one actionable thing people can do over the next few weeks/holidays is to research your local Democratic party operation if you aren't already involved in it -- what is the structure, who are the precinct captains/leaders/whatever, when are the meetings and how are they announced, when are leaders' elections and what are the requirements, etc. Then type up that information into an easy-to-read/understand one-page action document (i.e., "Want to Change the Democratic Party? Here's how to start: (1) The local precinct is X, this is our website, the next meeting is on X day/time in X place. Make a plan to attend." Etc.). Share this on your social media, organize 5 of your friends/neighbors to do the same and attend the meeting with you, print it out and post it in your apartment building, dorm, local bulletin board, send it to the community calendar, buy an ad in the local paper if you can afford it. If you and your friends have kids, consider setting up a kid-watching co-op for attending the meetings. Most places will probably not have meetings until after the first of the year, make a plan to find that next meeting, attend that next meeting, and bring 5 people to that meeting (take a page from MLM scams and get those 5 people to each bring 5 people, and so on).

I've been trying to find out how to get more involved in the local party when I return to NYC in a few weeks, and it's been like pulling teeth to find accurate and helpful information - like, there's various "clubs" of Democrats based on zip code, but also kind of on ideology?, and you have to just figure out, by looking at the addresses, which one covers your neighborhood, and then if you're lucky there's a website with minimal info and a random gmail address but like, what do they even do? Then there's Manhattan Democrats, and NYC Dems, and NYS Dems, but who controls what? Which ones actually have power and which ones are just status orgs? I'd like to be in the room where it happens, but finding that room is proving to be quite difficult. And I'm a generally informed and motivated person who has been involved in campaigns before and knows how laws/regs get passed. If it's hard for me, I can't imagine it's any easier for someone working multiple jobs or dealing with a sick spouse/parent/kid or whatever else. So, I'm going to put in that emotional labor over the next few weeks and establish a good and simple action plan that I can use to organize my community when I get back. Finding the right information is way too hard right now.
posted by melissasaurus at 10:27 AM on December 14, 2016 [33 favorites]

The original FB article I read has been edited to omit this gem: ~

that's because it was copied from a satirical site by the "investigative journalist" who wrote the article.

at this point, maybe you should consider to what extent you're buying into a bubble of fake news?
posted by andrewcooke at 10:30 AM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

buying into a bubble of fake news

THIS IS WHY WE CAN'T HAVE A SANE PRESIDENT-ELECT
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 10:35 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Report: Romney Refused to Apologize to Trump During Secretary of State Bid

Mitt Romney refused to apologize publicly to President-elect Donald Trump for his campaign trail criticism while he was under consideration for secretary of state, according to a report from the Washington Post Wednesday.
...
Trump spokesman Jason Miller told the Post that account was “completely false” and denied Trump wanted any apology from Romney. However, an unnamed “Trump friend” said the President, in the Post’s words, “enjoyed watching his dinner partner grovel” at a highly-publicized dinner at Jean-Gorges in New York, as well as afterwards when Romney complimented Trump to the waiting media gaggle.

posted by kirkaracha at 10:40 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

that's because it was copied from a satirical site by the "investigative journalist" who wrote the article.

Thanks very much for pointing this out.
posted by zarq at 10:42 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

melissasaurus, yes, it's hard, and that's probably partly by design. But I've found that if you go to a few meetings and are vocal about your interests, like-minded, experienced people will connect with you and help connect you with what you need. At the local level, you find a lot of Dems who truly aspire to make it the big-tent party.
posted by Coventry at 10:44 AM on December 14, 2016

The reason Clinton shouldn't get involved with any actions against a Trump presidency now have nothing to do with charisma directly, but with diluting the message by making it seem like it's about her and the Dems trying to win by underhanded means rather than it being about Trump being unfit for office. It would confuse the message.

I can see the reasoning in that, but I don't know if I completely agree. After reading the TNC article on Obama and sitting on it, I think one of the potential blind spots for folks like Obama and Clinton is that they have faith in the American system. And that can serve extremely well in inspiring people and getting them to "go high" when others go low. BUT, we're not in normal circumstances, the floor we thought was the "low" has been broken through and we're now all peering over into a jagged, splinter-edged dark hole, unsure where the new bottom is.

Because of this, I would advise Clinton to absolutely oppose Donald Trump. Yes, she lost, but that just means she's freed from being the standard bearer of the Democratic Party. And she will be accused of getting personal. And she shouldn't shy away from that claim, because Donald Trump threatened her, her friends, and her family. And anyone out there, doesn't matter who they are, fights back when they see their loved ones get threatened. And Donald's been threatening a lot of folks for the last 18 months, so we should all be fighting back.

HRC opposing Trump after the election, going against popular opinion, staking her reputation and legacy on it, and basically becoming a missile pointed straight at the heart of the future Trump administration; I think it might have rallied the opposition and pulled us out of our disarray.

But, that might just be hindsight talking.
posted by FJT at 10:44 AM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

Melissasaurus that's the exact type of stuff I'm trying to suss out too. The guy who wrote me seems to think I actually want to sit on the committee, but do I? I have no idea because I don't know what the committee even does. I'd like to just attend some meetings and check out what is happening and who is a part of it but that doesn't seem to be how it happens in the city. Some of the suburbs seem to have regular $name Democrats meetings but in town the various wards don't seem to advertise their activities. Like NYC I suspect that with a heavily Dem, populous city, there are local Known Entities in the party establishment that kind of slide into available slots (and their kids, and their grandkids, etc). Democratic political families are a Thing here in a big way. So the opacity is by design.
posted by soren_lorensen at 10:50 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

I think Clinton should stay out of it. We don't need to give the media any ammunition to turn this into some sort of sour-grapes narrative, which I know they're just itching to do, instead of the orange-fascist-taking-over-our-country narrative.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 10:51 AM on December 14, 2016 [32 favorites]

Then there's Manhattan Democrats, and NYC Dems, and NYS Dems, but who controls what? Which ones actually have power and which ones are just status orgs? I'd like to be in the room where it happens, but finding that room is proving to be quite difficult. And I'm a generally informed and motivated person who has been involved in campaigns before and knows how laws/regs get passed.

Yeah, see this is why my eyes did a lot of rolling when (and not to start up primary fights again, but) "establishment" Dems kept saying that BernieBro/lefty/disaffected types just needed to grow up and get involved in local politics. It's just not that easy to do, and the onus does need to be on the Party to make things simple and clear for people: "Here is how you get involved in your ward/precinct/town." "Here is the party leadership for Area X, and here's how we choose board members, and here's what that board does". That confusing answer posted upthread: "At the moment I do not have an open position for the female member in your district. However I anticipate very soon the current member holding the door is moving and will be resigning." --it's not acceptable for a party that is supposed to be democratic and inclusive to give that kind of an answer to someone who's trying to get involved.

In big cities, you have to be a part of the organized structure / machine to have even the slightest clue what all the different little party committees and whatnot are or how they function, and I think that in more small-down or rural areas, there may be more transparency simply because the Democratic Party is less powerful, but then there's just that much fewer resources and volunteer strength as well.

Yes, yes, I know; Will Rogers, "I'm not a member of any organized Party, I'm a Democrat." Well Democrats have been lovingly bandying that quote around for far too long. It's unacceptable and if they had had a better strategy for building on the groundswell of progressive energy that's emerged since '08, Occupy and BLM then we would not be facing a fascist takeover next month.

I know there are some great, energetic, talented organizers at the local elected level. My alderperson and the state rep from the next district over are two of them. But there's also a lot of local Dem leadership that really just cares about getting reelected, having people like them and maybe accomplishing some vaguely leftist things, particularly if they're getting enough pushback from people on an issue. They're not leaders, they're just seat-warmers -- but they're good at making sure they get to keep their seats.
posted by tivalasvegas at 10:53 AM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

that's because it was copied from a satirical site by the "investigative journalist" who wrote the article.

That quote isn't in the Alternet story you are criticizing. Pat Robertson is quoted as saying that Trump's rhetoric was "macho talk," which he actually said.

I mean, before you put scare quotes around "investigative journalist," maybe read the article, especially when you then use it as a pretext to lecture people about a bubble of fake news?
posted by maxsparber at 10:53 AM on December 14, 2016

It does seem that quote shows up in a lot of Facebook posts linking to the story. If the story itself has been edited, Alternet does not mention it, though.
posted by maxsparber at 10:56 AM on December 14, 2016

Now GSA is backing off and claiming they have no official position on the Old Post Office lease and they won't have one until he takes office.
posted by zachlipton at 10:57 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

An interesting essay by Jacob Levy.

THE DEFENSE OF LIBERTY CAN’T DO WITHOUT IDENTITY POLITICS

...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....

posted by chris24 at 10:58 AM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

The comments suggest it has been edited from the story. So NOW I AM IN THE BUBBLE.
posted by maxsparber at 10:58 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

God damn you, Alternet. If you're going to change a story online, you need to tell us.
posted by maxsparber at 10:59 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

HRC opposing Trump after the election, going against popular opinion, staking her reputation and legacy on it, and basically becoming a missile pointed straight at the heart of the future Trump administration; I think it might have rallied the opposition and pulled us out of our disarray.

How'd that work for Gore?
posted by asteria at 10:59 AM on December 14, 2016

melissasaurus, I'm totally on the same page about getting involved in the local Democratic Party, and I've been going to some really energizing local meetings in the past month in my city. Here in Massachusetts, the building blocks of the party are ward committees, which feed into the city committees, which interact with the state committee, which in turn interacts with the DNC. I did a quick search for NY info, and it looks like your building blocks might be county committees, but the websites look a bit stale. But I've found that my local party has been really welcoming and happy to get some new people around the table post-election, and we're already talking about what actionable things we can do. I think if you contact the chair of your county party that would be a good place to start to at least find out when the next meeting is. I'm not sure if the opacity is always by design, or a product of people in the know not really understanding how difficult it looks to get involved when you're not in the know, and I'm going to make that something I talk a lot about in my city committee. In my city, there's a certain number of ward committee seats that can be filled, but then anyone else who wants to be involved can be an "associate member" and that's unlimited in number (associate members don't get to vote in city committee meetings).
posted by banjo_and_the_pork at 11:00 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

soren_lorenson, local party committee obligations are generally not onerous, in and of themselves, though it takes discipline to avoid getting sucked into the drama around them.

In Dayton, OH, they were elected positions for each precinct, but most precincts went uncontested. If you lived in an uncontested precinct, all you had to do was submit five valid signatures from your precinct to the Board of Elections, and show up to the election to vote for yourself.
posted by Coventry at 11:01 AM on December 14, 2016

The Michigan article is beyond unbelievable. Turning away volunteers on the ground and redirecting funds to Chicago and New Orleans?

The entire way they seem to have handled things in Michigan and elsewhere seems deeply stupid. Worse, the article says that the diversion of funds to Chicago and New Orleans was done to drive up the popular vote, in case trump won it but lost the electoral college. So the campaign apparently drank his kool-aid or were shaken by his threat that he'd contest the election if he lost, and wanted to build in some insurance to make sure her win was airtight. All while ignoring experts on the ground in a battleground state who were begging them to spend money and change strategies.

We can talk all we like about Clinton's charisma or the fact that she wasn't a racist or wasn't appealing enough to white people or blue / white collar workers, wasn't populist enough or wasn't loud and obnoxious enough. We can blame Bernie or Trump or Stein or our bigoted next-door neighbors or whomever we like. But this article makes clear that there was something fundamentally broken about the way her campaign was being managed and run. Focusing your attention and monies on battleground states and making sure your victories there are assured before shifting to less contested areas is a pretty basic goal for a national campaign. They made assumptions. Some of those assumptions were based on faulty polling. But also they didn't listen to their staffers in the region and ignored tried and true GOTV methods.

So she lost. And Trump won. And all the "but, but, but, but the POPULAR VOTE!!!1!" arguments about a statistic that means nothing (and that hasn't meant a damned thing except in one election in nearly 30 years) aren't going to change that basic, incontrovertible fact. She lost an election that by all rights should have been hers, in part (probably) because her campaign got cocky and lost sight of their goals.
posted by zarq at 11:01 AM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

We don't need to give the media any ammunition to turn this into some sort of sour-grapes narrative, which I know they're just itching to do, instead of the orange-fascist-taking-over-our-country narrative.

The media/social media is happily doing both right now, even without Clinton's involvement. For 18 months Donald Trump has dominated media coverage. He has the narrative, and we'll be waiting for eight years if we expect that somehow he will be hung by his own rope.

Maybe let's try something different.
posted by FJT at 11:03 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

(and that hasn't meant a damned thing except in one election in nearly 30 years)

The other election we allowed ourselves to be steamrolled and let the Republicans create the idea they had a mandate and we were losing losers.

That worked out well.

Seriously, am I the only one who remembers 2000 and 2004? What the actual fuck, people want us to repeat what we tried then and hope somehow the result is different this time?
posted by asteria at 11:03 AM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

What the hell is with all these people being summoned to Trump tower? Is that where they put the slug in your brain?
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 11:07 AM on December 14, 2016 [40 favorites]

Seriously, am I the only one who remembers 2000 and 2004? What the actual fuck, people want us to repeat what we tried then and hope somehow the result is different this time?

When you get around to reading my actual comment and manage to find the place where I said any of those things, feel free to point 'em out. 'til then, don't make up shit wholesale and try to assign it to me, 'kay?
posted by zarq at 11:07 AM on December 14, 2016

I remember Sore Loserman and the recount being about Gore not being able to let go.

"but, but, but, but the POPULAR VOTE!!!1!" arguments about a statistic that means nothing (and that hasn't meant a damned thing except in one election in nearly 30 years) aren't going to change that basic, incontrovertible fact.

Was this not about 2000, zarq? How did Dems abandoning that narrative and leaving Gore to hang out to dry work?
posted by asteria at 11:08 AM on December 14, 2016

But this article makes clear that there was something fundamentally broken about the way her campaign was being managed and run.

It was basically the Obama team that won 2008 and 2012.

She lost an election that bvy all rights should have been hers

The fundamentals favored Republicans. The only thing that favored Dems was Trump's supposed awfulness, but as we now know, that awfulness/racism/nationalism ended up being a plus for him in the places that decided it.

WaPo - Aug '16 : Never forget: The 2016 presidential election is supposed to be one that Republicans can win

Back in January 2014, I wrote a post titled: “The Democratic Party’s uphill battle to 270 electoral votes in 2016.” Ha-ha, right? Silly me, right?

Not at all. At that moment in 2014, given economic growth and President Obama’s popularity and the challenge of winning the White House for a third term, the odds slightly favored the Republicans.

Fast-forward two years and the same is true. In a new article in the Annals, Michael Tesler, Lynn Vavreck and I show that economic and political conditions as of early 2016 slightly favored the Republicans. Not much has changed in the few months since we drafted that piece. Currently, the various statistical forecasting models average out to a narrow Republican lead. At a minimum, the election should be a toss-up. Thus far, it’s not.

posted by chris24 at 11:10 AM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

Regarding the idea that it might be a winning strategy for HRC to lead the charge right now: Podesta's comments are already being spun as an attempt by Clinton to stage a coup via the Electoral College. See this WSJ opinion piece from yesterday: "But now that Mrs. Clinton has lost, her campaign is claiming the election really was rigged, albeit for Mr. Trump by Russian meddling, and it wants the Electoral College to stage what amounts to a coup".

I posted this to the other thread too. I hope that wasn't wrong—the info seems relevant to both threads...
posted by StrawberryPie at 11:11 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

She had Obama's team this time.
posted by asteria at 11:11 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

I would be happy with Clinton staying in the background/focusing on her foundation. There need to be other loud, proud, fiesty Democrats ready to make a stink about everything we need to for the foreseeable future.

The future does not lie in just a Good Candidate though. Or in the Dems already in office.

All of us in the U.S. who want change need to be part of the Dem party--show up, vote, run for party offices, or local offices, call your reps regularly, etc. (I know lots of you are doing this already). Otherwise you're just complaining to yourself in the dark.

This fight will not be won by a Chosen One and we need to let go of that narrative. We need to think of ourselves as a group, a collective, and keep recruiting new members and strengthening our ties.

We outnumber them. But they're cohesive, and we are not. And we can't win if we don't learn from that.

I keep thinking about how life might have felt during WWII. Regular life and smaller concerns are on hold, and we are called to put our resources towards our common goals. It's hard because we have to still have our day jobs and so on, but we have to work to overcome an existential threat.

Someone called this election a "political 9/11" but I think it's closer to a political Battle of Britain. We are under constant, ongoing attack by an enemy who wants to break everything they can. Who wants to destroy everything good (however unrealized and compromised) about our country.
posted by emjaybee at 11:19 AM on December 14, 2016 [20 favorites]

Obama Administration Bars States From Withholding Federal Money From Planned Parenthood

Mindful of the clock ticking down to a Trump presidency, the Obama administration issued a final rule on Wednesday to bar states from withholding federal family-planning funds from Planned Parenthood affiliates and other health clinics that provide abortions. The measure takes effect two days before the Jan. 20 inauguration of Donald J. Trump.
posted by futz at 11:19 AM on December 14, 2016 [32 favorites]

i posted this in the TNC thread, but I'm reposting here because it does not get talked about nearly enough.

BLACK REPRESENTATION IN CONGRESS: A TIMELINE

May 9th, 1865: Civil War Ends

1870-1876 (6 years)
House of Representatives: 14 (all from the South)
Senate: 2 (all from the South)
Eight of these Representatives and one Senator were born into slavery.

1877: Reconstruction ends, Jim Crow begins.

1878-1887 (9 years)
House of Representatives: 3 (all from the South, but only one is a non-incumbent)
Senate: 0

1888-1964 (79 years)
House of Representatives: 13 (none from the South, none elected at all from 1900-1928)
Senate: 0

~1910~1970: The Great Migration. Millions of Black Americans escape from the South to a number of large cities across the USA. One side-effect is the reduction of Black majorities within the South, an effect that is accentuated by redistricting.

1965: Passage of the Voting Rights Act

1966-current (50 years)
House of Representatives: 104 (the bulk are from aforementioned Great Migration targets)
Senate: 7 (also mostly Great Migration targets)

----------------------------------

THE MODERN ERA

2008: Barack Hussein Obama, the Democratic nominee, is elected as President of the United States was elected. He is the first Black president in the country's history.

2010: The Tea Party, a new reactionary conservative movement, sweeps the Republican Party and the USA's midterm elections, taking over national and state legislatures. This new power is used to gerrymander local districts and enact new voter restriction laws.

2010-2012: Six states enact voter restriction laws.
Affected 2016 battlegrounds*: Florida, Iowa (35 EV total)

2012: Barack Obama is re-elected as POTUS, in a considerably closer race than 2008.

2013: Key provisions of the Voting Rights Act are struck down, effectively removing all oversight of states and counties previously identified as engaging in voter discrimination. States no longer require approval for various voter restrictions, as well as bureaucratic choices like moving or reducing polling places, reducing poll hours, and eliminating early voting. Non-VRA states are emboldened to enact their own laws.
Affected 2016 battlegrounds: Florida, North Carolina, Virginia (57 EV total)

2012-2016: An additional fourteen states enact new voter restriction laws that remained active as of November 8th, 2016.
Affected 2016 battlegrounds: Colorado, New Hampshire, Ohio, Wisconsin, Virginia (69 EV total)

By 2016, of the 146 "battleground" electoral votes, 104 are held by states that have implemented voter restrictions and/or were formerly required to seek preclearance under the VRA. 69 of these votes are in states whose policies did not exist in the 2012 election.

2016: Despite his misogynistic and racist views, Donald Trump defeats Hillary Clinton for the presidency of the United States. He loses the popular vote, but ekes out 306 electoral votes. He wins 114/148 swing state votes--78 of those from the voter-restrictions subset.

Everyone is extremely shocked. Analysts conclude Clinton should've focused more on white people.

*Defining the 2016 battlegrounds as Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wisconsin.
posted by Anonymous at 11:20 AM on December 14, 2016

I would be happy with Clinton staying in the background/focusing on her foundation

I don't think she ever did anything with the foundation, it's mostly Bill and Chelsea.
posted by zutalors! at 11:21 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

How'd that work for Gore?

Gore was never threatened to be tossed in prison. And "Sore Loserman" with...the sheer avalanche of terrible shit that people have put on t-shirts and yelled at Trump rallies (before any recount) shows how things have escalated.
posted by FJT at 11:22 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

The measure takes effect two days before the Jan. 20 inauguration of Donald J. Trump.

So it'll be in effect for five days (because we know he won't work on the weekend).
posted by Etrigan at 11:23 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Was this not about 2000, zarq? How did Dems abandoning that narrative and leaving Gore to hang out to dry work?

Whining that she won the popular vote when she lost the election by 36 electoral votes is worse than useless. Democrats were massacred at the polls. Most Americans now live in Republican-controlled states. Two thirds of all state legislatures are Republican-controlled. In 25 states, Republicans now control the entire state legislature (both houses) and the governorship. Republicans now control both houses of Congress. They control the Presidency and very shortly will control the Supreme Court.

These are facts. We can't ignore them. What we can do is fight back in the short term and find better strategies in the future. And no, keeping up a worthless "she won!" narrative ain't it. She didn't win. We didn't win.

What exactly do you think whining about the popular vote narrative is going to get us? Do you think the Republicans -- who have been lock-step obstructionists for the last eight years -- give a flying fuck about whether or not they have a mandate?

She lost. We lost. We were massacred. The sooner we recognize that, shift gears and stop trying to cling bitterly to the idea that Democrats and Progressives and Hillary Clinton somehow magically won the 2016 elections, the better.

So no, I'm not saying that we should repeat the past. I never said that.
posted by zarq at 11:27 AM on December 14, 2016 [20 favorites]

She had Obama's team this time.

Not really. She had Obama's blessing, and I heard in Summer 2015 that Obama For America was devoting its resources to her campaign, but I talked to a lot of people who had been extremely active in OFA but weren't excited at all about HFA.
posted by Coventry at 11:27 AM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

So it'll be in effect for five days (because we know he won't work on the weekend).

FTA: In this case, however, unraveling the new rule would first require a time-consuming process, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.

I don't disagree with you Etrigan but I am hopeful.
posted by futz at 11:30 AM on December 14, 2016

Insiders: Trump Team Dangled Ambassadorships to Lure A-List Inauguration Singers (Exclusive): President-elect Donald Trump’s team is struggling so hard to book A-list performers for his inaugural festivities that it offered ambassadorships to at least two talent bookers if they could deliver marquee names, the bookers told TheWrap.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 11:32 AM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

her campaign got cocky and lost sight of their goals.

Her campaign was putting out fires lit in Moscow and St Petersburg, then stoked in one corner of the Ecuadorian embassy in London, one corner of the the FBI's NYC office, and every fucking media outlet in the US. It was dealing with unprecedented vote suppression on a state level.

What exactly do you think whining about the popular vote narrative is going to get us?

A campaign built upon resistance to the tyranny of the minority and an ongoing process of anti-democratic power grabs. A campaign that says explicitly 'Republicans are cheats, and we'll make sure they can't win next time even if they cheat harder.' If you consider that 'whining', then whatever.
posted by holgate at 11:34 AM on December 14, 2016 [55 favorites]

If the Sanders/Warren factions hadn't come out to jettison identity politics in favor of the WWC the day after the election, I don't think people would be focusing on the popular vote so hard.

It's simply one of our metrics in favor of the idea that most people chose a candidate who has been outspoken on equal rights.
posted by zutalors! at 11:41 AM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

A campaign built upon resistance to the tyranny of the minority and an ongoing process of anti-democratic power grabs. A campaign that says explicitly 'Republicans are cheats, and we'll make sure they can't win next time even if they cheat harder.' If you consider that 'whining', then whatever.

And yet, that's not in evidence here, is it?

Whining that she won the popular vote isn't a campaign. It's a complaint, not a coherent strategy.
posted by zarq at 11:41 AM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

As Barack Obama once said, a president needs to be able to deal with more than one thing at once. You can try and put out the fires and still not commit campaign malpractice in Michigan.

Maybe Congress/FBI/Obama could have helped her out with the Russian espionage thing, just saying. She didn't have the same authority they did.
posted by zutalors! at 11:42 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

I'm about to make a post to my local Pantsuit Nation Spinoff group asking people to post their experiences with their local Democratic committees and groups. I'll be interested in hearing what people have to say because I think it varies wildly depending on location.
posted by soren_lorensen at 11:45 AM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

So the best-disciplined united front against Trump right now is... A-List performers.
posted by klarck at 11:46 AM on December 14, 2016 [15 favorites]

I do not understand the willingness to defend the HRC campaign. I would think that the most staunch HRC supporters would be the most angry. Nothing matters other than the electoral college. Sadly, it's the way our elections work. Winning more votes does not matter, and it never has.

The Left, moving forward, must try another strategy. It's unbelievable that people are sticking up for a failed presidential campaign and the overall electoral failure of the DNC over the past 6 years.

But, hey, at least we have performative #woke white liberalism right guys?

The only hope for the Left is BLM and DSA in that order.
posted by R.F.Simpson at 11:49 AM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

That's moving a goalpost - you said "A President needs to do several things at once" as though campaign mismanagement disqualified her Presidency.

I'm not "contorting" anything, you've moved the lines of what you were talking about.
posted by zutalors! at 11:49 AM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

I think we should have a willingness to defend and criticize the Clinton campaign. There's room for both.
posted by zutalors! at 11:50 AM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

The "he didn't actually win" narrative can be useful in three contexts:

1. Poking at Trump on social media, distracting him, by reminding him how badly he lost the popular vote.

2. As a PR tool; when discussing him, starting with "Donald Trump, who lost the popular vote by 3 million, has once again demonstrated his unfitness for office by doing X.." would be a fine way for any Democratic statement on his actions to begin.

3. Winding ourselves up as Democrats, reminding each other that this shit has happened to us twice now and if we want it to stop, we have to stop bitching and get to work.

None of these mention Clinton, because yes, there's no point in whining about Clinton losing.

We are pointing out the flaws of Trump and the weirdness/unfairness of this election. We are upset not simply that our candidate lost, but that the process was so severely compromised/skewed.
posted by emjaybee at 11:50 AM on December 14, 2016 [42 favorites]

Brand New Congress is also putting together a slate of candidates for 2018 and 2020. They hold regular orientation calls. (Next one is Thursday and then one on Saturday and another next Wednesday.) This is their plan.
posted by zarq at 11:51 AM on December 14, 2016 [18 favorites]

zarq: Whining that she won the popular vote isn't a campaign. It's a complaint, not a coherent strategy.

We're going to whine so much that we're going to get tired of whining. Believe me.

(Sorrynotsorry. It had to be done.)
posted by Too-Ticky at 11:53 AM on December 14, 2016 [13 favorites]

If people want to help to contribute to the 'find your local Democratic Party info hub', memail me, I'll start setting something up after work tonight.
posted by dinty_moore at 11:54 AM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

It seems like Democrats are falling all over themselves to court white rural MI voters, who have been willing to embrace white supremacy and have shown antagonism specifically toward an inclusive society. But there are also cities in MI and POC in MI. Their votes count toward MI's popular vote and therefore electoral college votes; it's not like they get sent to the coasts to be pooled with other city votes or something. If Democrats really care about MI votes, every single leader should be in Flint and talking about Flint. Any Democratic leader who tries to blame the HFA campaign for losing MI, needs to first look at what they did -- or didn't do -- for Flint, particularly after the cameras stopped rolling. It seems like there was attention when there were debates in the area, and then everyone stopped talking about it (at the nat'l level). People remember this stuff (but also, not having clean water makes political engagement that much harder).

There's room to expand our coalition by actually helping the people most in need rather than handing out cookies to white property owners.
posted by melissasaurus at 11:58 AM on December 14, 2016 [50 favorites]

Meanwhile, from the this is fine department, we have our new Pravada:

An amendment quietly inserted into the annual National Defense Authorization Act by Republican House leaders would abolish the broadcasting board and place VOA, RFE/RL and other international news and information operations under the direct control of a chief executive appointed by the president. The new executive would hire and fire senior media personnel and manage their budgets.

I'm worried that every single piece of legislation passed by Congress is going to have poison pills of this nature in them. I don't know if we can afford to do the typical last-minute hastily-put-together extensions to things like, you know, the defense budget without the backstop of the veto pen to stop Republicans from slipping shit like this into must-pass bills.

Maybe everything needs to be fillibustered and shut down. I really, really, really don't believe in accelerationism, but I feel like we're running out of other options.
posted by tivalasvegas at 11:58 AM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

dinty_moore, this sounds like something the Progressive Coders Network would be interested in. Shall I tell them about it?
posted by Coventry at 11:58 AM on December 14, 2016

What exactly do you think whining about the popular vote narrative is going to get us? Do you think the Republicans -- who have been lock-step obstructionists for the last eight years -- give a flying fuck about whether or not they have a mandate?

Well, I don't really see it as "Democrats won!", but more as more people voted against Donald than for him. And that gives us, the opposition, the mandate. People are out there saying we should give Donald a chance, that any opposition is sour grapes, or he won as a populist so everyone supports him.

No, it's in our political system and tradition to have an opposition. And everything that's happened in the last 18 months has proven he will do a terrible job. And it's not sour grapes, it's about acting to protect the country and the people in it. And the opposition are actually the ones with the popular will on our side. I just think anything that may provide succor to anyone who is going to oppose the Trump administration should be said and repeated every time an attempt is made to stamp resistance out.
posted by FJT at 11:59 AM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

local Democratic committees and groups. I'll be interested in hearing what people have to say because I think it varies wildly depending on location.

It does. Two neighboring county Dem partys can have completely different cultures.

ETA: Generally, the more political weight the county/city has, the more insular the party is.
posted by Coventry at 12:01 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

still not commit campaign malpractice in Michigan.

She could've won MI and WI by a bazillion votes and still lost. More was afoot than possible malpractice in Michigan.

And I'm fine with criticizing Clinton. She made mistakes. But that often becomes a trojan horse for people to push their agendas. Hillary sucks! Bernie would've won! WWC! As I linked above, with so close a margin, anything can be the supposed reason, without actually telling us anything about the true nature or mindset of the electorate:

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.

And Clinton is never running again and was basically sui generis with her decades of public life and smears by Republicans, being a woman, etc. Picking it apart doesn't necessarily tell us much about the future.
posted by chris24 at 12:01 PM on December 14, 2016 [18 favorites]

dinty_moore, this sounds like something the Progressive Coders Network would be interested in. Shall I tell them about it?

Please do! I've got a volunteer to set up a website already, but more help would also be nice.
posted by dinty_moore at 12:03 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Will do.
posted by Coventry at 12:04 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Meanwhile, from the this is fine department, we have our new Pravada:
An amendment quietly inserted into the annual National Defense Authorization Act by Republican House leaders would abolish the broadcasting board and place VOA, RFE/RL and other international news and information operations under the direct control of a chief executive appointed by the president. The new executive would hire and fire senior media personnel and manage their budgets.

I'm going to ask my state reps to negotiate an interstate compact organizing a Voice of New England with a board modeled after VOA's.

GOP wants devolution? Let's fucking have it.
posted by ocschwar at 12:05 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

All while ignoring experts on the ground in a battleground state who were begging them to spend money and change strategies.

Thing is, we don't know from the descriptions supplied in the thread whether this was a departure from 2008 and 2012 and 2004 and 2000, or whether local campaigners in MI (or WI or NY or MO) are always begging the national campaign to spend money in their areas and change strategies to favor them.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 12:05 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Elon Musk and the chief executive of Uber are now advising Donald Trump

Travis Kalanick, the chief executive of Uber, and Elon Musk, the chief executive of Tesla, will “meet with the president frequently” and offer their expertise to Trump as part of his Strategic and Policy Forum, Trump officials said.

posted by zachlipton at 12:08 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

it's like uber but for democracy
posted by entropicamericana at 12:09 PM on December 14, 2016 [38 favorites]

I'm getting my kids their Italian passports and working on getting my husband citizenship. Because you never fucking know.

Because the day when Italian government seems more stable and less risky than US government will be a day... oh, wait, that happend a month ago.

As you were, sirs.
posted by rokusan at 12:10 PM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

You know what just occurred to me? So the Trump transition team is willing to pay absurd sums to get top tier talent, and if it's a glittering show, people will think it's because he's a billionaire. But actually the public purse is on the hook for the inauguration, as well as any other glitzy balls he may hold.

What if he did this in part just so he can have a lifestyle above what he could afford?
posted by corb at 12:11 PM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

It seems like Democrats are falling all over themselves to court white rural MI voters, who have been willing to embrace white supremacy and have shown antagonism specifically toward an inclusive society. But there are also cities in MI and POC in MI. Their votes count toward MI's popular vote and therefore electoral college votes; it's not like they get sent to the coasts to be pooled with other city votes or something.

74.57 percent urban as of 2010, says the Census Bureau (.xls) -- slightly less urbanized than the US as a whole at 80.7%.

As is the case everywhere, Trump won on the strength of the segregated white middle classes surrounding our major cities (all of them, not just the ones in the South and Midwest). That's where the typical Trump voter lives -- not in the archetypal small towns which have long since been electorally dwarfed by the suburbs of medium and large cities.
posted by tivalasvegas at 12:11 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

For the record, FedEx only prints passport photos in standard US size, but the UPS Store has a computer that automagically prints your photo out in whatever format you country wants. Go forth, dual citizens!

What if he did this in part just so he can have a lifestyle above what he could afford?

The devil you say!
posted by soren_lorensen at 12:12 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Also, I just had another thought.

So he's threatened to withhold federal funds from cities that are sanctuary or sanctuary like cities, right? Cities that won't cooperate on immigration?

What are the cities least likely to cooperate on that? Dem-run cities with mostly-Dem voters. Already we've had Seattle, NYC, San Francisco, and Chicago declare their defiance.

I'm having trouble finding good statistics for how much federal tax revenue these cities generate, but I know they also receive a good amount of federal funds in grants, supplies, etc.

What if he is able to create infrastructure projects by completely defunding these high revenue cities? And what if said defunding affects people's Maslow priorities such that voting is not a key issue for them so much as staying alive?
posted by corb at 12:23 PM on December 14, 2016

Donald Trump's opening remarks at meeting with top tech executives: "And you'll call my people. You'll call me. It doesn't make any difference. We have no formal chain of command around here."
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 12:23 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

As is the case everywhere, Trump won on the strength of the segregated white middle classes surrounding our major cities (all of them, not just the ones in the South and Midwest). That's where the typical Trump voter lives -- not in the archetypal small towns which have long since been electorally dwarfed by the suburbs of medium and large cities.

Word. Like, here in Allegheny County, Clinton only won the county because of Pittsburgh. Like literally the electoral map turns red immediately as you cross the city boundary. Pittsburgh is a small (geographically) city with a HUGE metro region and that metro region is full of white, middle and upper middle class educated white people. And they vote loyally Republican, right down to Trump. (They also love to get online and criticize the city's mayor and, like, if yinz want to tell the mayor what to do, please by all means move somewhere where you can actually vote for him. Oh wait that would mean your kids would have to go to school with black kids. How silly of me!)
posted by soren_lorensen at 12:24 PM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

(L to R): Steve, Steve, Steve, Steve, Steve, Don, Ivanka, Eric, Steve, Steve, Steve, Steve, Mike, Don, Steve, Steve,
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 12:25 PM on December 14, 2016 [13 favorites]

My anecdata:

I live in Philly. I contacted the Clinton campaign about volunteering, oh, back in June. I even started contacting Democratic Party subgroups trying to find someone to volunteer for. Nobody called me until late July, early August when voter registration efforts started up.

At least where I voted, there was little-to-no coordination between the HFA people (who came in from out-of-town) and the local Democratic Party. In my precinct organizer's defense, she did try. She repeatedly reached out to all the local DNC groups, and they either flaked or didn't get back to her. Actually, one lady got mad at us because we were registering people in "her" territory. The day before the election, a guy who canvassed for us came storming into the office yelling about how our database wasn't in sync with the Philadelphia voter registration list that's put together by a city elections board (or something?) and we were missing people. And then he stormed out.

I don't know what it's like in the Republican Party, but from my interactions with locals (granted, Philly is especially bad), local Democratic leaders are interested in photo ops but are wary of any state or national people intruding on their fiefdoms. But ideally, HFA would've aggressively contacted local leaders ahead of time, gotten them in contact with the organizers they were sending in, and had people up to speed on stuff like that voter registration list. I also think there's a lot that could've been done technology-wise to improve the process--though granted, a lot of our volunteers were older people who struggled to use the phone system so I don't know how well that would've worked out.

So--while that article doesn't reflect my volunteering experience, from what I saw I can totally understand how things would all fall apart if the people running the campaign in Michigan were shit at their jobs. I think there is a lot that needs to be done in terms of being better organized, but it will require more openness between the local and national level, and more willingness to cooperate with campaigns. One thing made an impact on me about corb's election stories (well, aside from the awfulness) was the tight control the state and national party held at the local level. It seemed like everyone was in step. I know liberals are more apt to go off and do their own things, but I think we could do with some of that in the future.

Also, we gave out free stickers but you had to work for signs. If we gave out signs for no work, there wouldn't be enough storage space in Philly to store all the signs we'd be going through. I got the impression that there was a class of person who just liked to collect as much election memorabilia as possible, even if they already had 10 of the same thing.
posted by Anonymous at 12:25 PM on December 14, 2016

I think it is kind of gross to characterize the discussion here as 'whining' and as trying to claim that Clinton 'somehow magically won the 2016 elections' is frustrating, particularly when Trump continues to claim that he 'really' won the popular vote. She lost. We all know she lost. We also know she won the popular vote. The president-elect either disagrees with that fact, or has chosen to lie about.

We won't win future elections by arguing the point. The GOP isn't going to be defeated by rhetoric. We've tried that. It hasn't worked. A certain percentage of their supporters clearly don't give a shit about facts or logic or news reports. People voted for Republicans in part because they felt their government was cheating them, treating them unfairly and/or not representing them properly. That needs to be addressed.

What this means is that the Democratic party needs a ground-based overhaul. The party itself needs to be far more inclusive than it has been, far less corrupt than it has been and much, much less resistant to progressive voices and ideas -- many of which could easily be popular with the public. The party rested on its laurels and look where it got us. And frankly, a lot of Dem politicians should be tossed out of office and replaced because they are clearly ineffective and uninterested in doing anything more than playing nice. FWIW, I donated money to Brand New Congress. I intend to fight for decent alternative candidates. I want to see changes and I'm hoping they can be achieved.

On top of that, there are severe infrastructure problems to our system of governance, such as extensive district gerrymandering and voter suppression that need to be addressed directly on local/regional levels. Voters need to not only know that their rights are being fucked with, but how they can be fixed. Because complaining about the system is useless without figuring out a plan to fix it.

The Electoral College is not going to be changed while Republicans control all three branches of government. Period. They have no incentive to do so. Just as they have no incentive to grant D.C. statehood. We can talk and talk and talk about it until we are blue in our collective faces and that will not change. It's broken, granted. It unfairly weights votes from former slave states, granted. How do you change things? Fight to elect Democratic majorities locally, regionally, on a state level and finally on a national level who will change things. From the ground up. Until that happens, we're pissing into the wind on this issue.

Yes, she lost. People here are arguing that because she won the popular vote, that's what matters. It doesn't. And going 'round and 'round the issue feels like intellectual masturbation at this point.

That is what I am pushing back against.
posted by zarq at 12:30 PM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

There's some shit going down in NC right now:

NC lawmakers call a special session, may now be pushing thru bill that restricts Governor's ability to get a Board of Election majority

NC GOP lawmakers may be mounting a staggering power grab to keep control of election boards. Happening now.
posted by melissasaurus at 12:30 PM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

Smedleyman: I still can't make sense of your comment.

I get that a lot.
Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue.

Probably better if I just post links -

On the 'hate' topic, generally as it relates to trump.

According to new numbers from the FBI, hate crimes were up almost 7 percent in 2015. That includes a 67 percent jump in crimes against Muslims.

Between Wednesday, November 9, the day after the presidential election, and the morning of Monday, November 14, the Southern Poverty Law Center collected 437 reports of hateful intimidation and harassment.

SPLC update
&
Summary

The Ugliness Is New

All worth a read. Draw your own conclusions.
posted by Smedleyman at 12:33 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

Is there anything we can do to help with NC?
posted by pxe2000 at 12:33 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Is there anything we can do to help with NC?

No. They know they can get away with it at this point so long as football team style politics continues.
posted by Talez at 12:36 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

What if he is able to create infrastructure projects by completely defunding these high revenue cities?

I am like 75% sure that [morbo] FEDERAL ACCOUNTING DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY! [/morbo]
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 12:40 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Ben Shapiro is tearing up conservatives kissing the ring.

During the election cycle, one could make the argument — I heard it frequently enough — that all criticism of Trump had to be silenced in order to prevent Hillary’s election. A single word critical of Trump could turn a vote; that vote could prevent Trump from being elected. I didn’t buy that logic because my job wasn’t to get Trump elected; it was to call events and facts according to the dictates of conservatism. If Trump didn’t want my criticism, he had an easy solution: He could stop saying anti-conservative things.

But at least there was a utilitarian argument for “Shut up, cuck.”

Now there isn’t. Trump is the president-elect. Hillary Clinton is off wandering through the woods like Sasquatch. Now would be the time to call out Trump’s heresies, if conservatives weren’t lying when they said they’d hold his feet to the fire.

And yet that’s not what’s happening.

posted by corb at 12:40 PM on December 14, 2016 [23 favorites]

Rep Darren Jackson is calling the special session unconstitutional and promising to sue over it. So maybe call his office to register support for that position? 919-733-5974
posted by melissasaurus at 12:40 PM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

People here are arguing that because she won the popular vote, that's what matters. It doesn't.

I think everyone realises that just fine. Yet, at the same time, it does matter in many ways. Just not with regards to who is going to be president.

Just because people are saying that it matters to them, that doesn't mean they think she's going to be president. I think you can stop pushing.
posted by Too-Ticky at 12:41 PM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

PLEASE stop pushing. We get how you feel.
posted by agregoli at 12:43 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

To be perfectly clear, I do not at all believe that her campaign mismanagement disqualified her from the presidency. I voted for Hillary and I am absolutely devastated that she lost.

Cool, we're in agreement on this.
posted by zutalors! at 12:45 PM on December 14, 2016

Yes, she lost. People here are arguing that because she won the popular vote, that's what matters. It doesn't. And going 'round and 'round the issue feels like intellectual masturbation at this point.

That is what I am pushing back against.

I think the sides are talking past each other here.

On the one hand, it's an important rhetorical tool to say that Clinton did win the support of the majority of Americans. We are not all Trumpists, not even most of us. And to the extent that this delegitimizes him in the eyes of the media, the world and ordinary American citizens, it's a point worth hammering on. It goes to the narrative that Trump is un-American, it may open up ways into the Democratic tent for people who get tired of ~~winning~~ losing, if they ever finally do, and it reminds us who we are -- not an anti-American fringe, but the genuine majority of Americans who want a diverse, welcoming democracy.

On the other hand, Clinton's having won a majority of the votes is meaningless when it comes to the narrow legislative battles ahead. Republicans DGAF, they will not be deferential or bipartisan, and they will bite any outstretched hand. So Dems need to figure out what leverage points we do have (whether through parliamentary maneuvering -- the actually feasible kind, not pipe-dreams that rely on the sudden conversion of closet never-Trump GOP leaders, or through exploiting cracks in the GOP caucus -- between Trumpists and Ryanists, over Medicare and Social Security, etc.). In this light, it does no good to keep talking about how Hillary won the popular vote -- it just sucks oxygen out of the room that could otherwise be used to figure out what the legitimate pressure points are.
posted by tivalasvegas at 12:45 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

I called Rep. Jackson's office and spoke with a woman named Angela who encouraged me to email him my support.

For others horrified at Rep. McCrory's actions, email jacksonla@ncleg.net. I don't know how much of a difference it could make, but it's worth doing.
posted by pxe2000 at 12:49 PM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

Here's a follow-up on my earlier comment identifying county election boards as weak points that could be targeted by hackers to purge voter rolls. The Brennan Center for Justice has a good report on voter purges. This is from 2008 but I believe it is mostly still relevant.

The report cites one example of a county official in Mississippi illegally purging 10,000 voters from her home computer shortly before the 2008 primaries. This was discovered by the county's circuit clerk one week before the election. (Hey, what is a circuit clerk? Are there different types of court clerks? Someone please enlighten me.) The purged voters included a congressional candidate and his family.

The ability to purge voters from a home computer a week before an election doesn't inspire a lot of confidence in county-level security measures.

Here's a PDF of the report that describes the Mississippi voter purge. The report concludes with some sane policy recommendations about how purges can be conducted more fairly.
posted by compartment at 12:56 PM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

Trump says the press mangles his “beautiful flowing sentences.” We asked linguists to weigh in.

But now he has different excuse for avoiding interviews: The press mangles his “beautiful” sentences, and he has had enough of it, Trump told a crowd in West Allis, Wisconsin, at one of his Victory Tour rallies:

For the last month I decided not to do interviews, because they give interviews and they chop up your sentences and cut them short. You will have this beautiful flowing sentence where the back of the sentence reverts to the front and they cut the back of the sentence off, and I say I never said that. So, I said, you know what, I am not going to deal with them. They are very dishonest people, I said.

...Geoffrey Pullum, a linguist at the University of Edinburgh, argues that there’s more going on than just a conversational, I’ll-let-you-fill-in-the-gaps-style. Trump’s unorganized sentences and short snippets might suggest something about how his mind works. "His speech suggests a man with scattered thoughts, a short span of attention, and a lack of intellectual discipline and analytical skills," Pullum says.

...You get no such organized thoughts from Trump. It's bursts of noun phrases, self-interruptions, sudden departures from the theme, flashes of memory, odd side remarks. ... It's the disordered language of a person with a concentration problem."
posted by futz at 12:58 PM on December 14, 2016 [42 favorites]

as well as any other glitzy balls he may hold
Hiyo!
posted by kirkaracha at 1:06 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

What if he is able to create infrastructure projects by completely defunding these high revenue cities?

This would be another potential source of civil conflict. I mean, he can't specifically do that, but he (with the help of others) could put economic pressure on resistant cities.

For the most part, states with high-revenue cities give more to the fed than they get back.
Ignore the graph here - in Illinois we get back $0.45 every dollar we pay in federal income tax, so we're #3 least dependent on the federal govt. for $.
Theoretically we could (taking as a given the governor becomes less crazy and the Chi mayor gets on board) tell the federal government to go to hell.

If that happens, that could become a crisis. Because how would Trump compel Illinois?
It gets more interesting if it's a bloc of states. Because it's mostly blue states that bring money into the federal government and it's mostly red states that are dependent on federal dollars.

At the very least it's a trainwreck waiting to happen. You get (as mentioned by turtles upthread) poverty thinking red states pushing Trump to do something about immigration, he needs that political clout, so that pushes him against blue states who can tell him to F*off and if he cuts federal money, and the state or states in return stop sending their revenue, that could be, y'know, a problem. Economic tensions contribute to political tensions and those could very easily become violent civil conflict, particularly when a principle (in this case immigration) is involved.

Hell, remember what happened in Florida with Gore? Cops and court officers got a little dicey. And sure we found out later that Gore would have won no matter what. And in retrospect one might think hey, maybe he should have pushed it.

But what if he did and we had two different law enforcement departments having to fight it out? And if it escalated? Of course, that's predicated on a Democratic governor in Florida at that time. Or someone sympathetic. No way Gore could have pushed it with Jeb at the helm.

Here though there's a genuine schism and plenty of resistance and interests going different directions. The details are fairly unimportant. Unequal pressure + resistance eventually = explosion. All we need is a little heat from the new CiC.
posted by Smedleyman at 1:09 PM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

Anecdatapoint for "How to get involved in Democrats": very few people on FB seem to be distinguishing between HFA and the Democratic Party. There's a lot of "I volunteered for the campaign but I haven't heard from them since! And now that office isn't even there anymore! So disappointed!" So that needs I think to be explicitly stated up front in any how-to website.
posted by soren_lorensen at 1:10 PM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

People here are arguing that because she won the popular vote, that's what matters. It doesn't.

It does.

How do we figure out how to win in 2020 if we ignore the facts? It's just as foolish to believe Hillary Clinton herself was the sole problem as it would be to say the only problem was Russia or Comey.

Hillary's campaign did things wrong. But going by the popular vote, it did some things right. We need to determine what those things were and replicate them.

We also need to remember that this means Trump does not have a mandate. More importantly, we need to remember that our candidate and our platform are popular and keep fighting for the latter. Sanders is still fighting for the latter - he did a town hall the other night trying to reach out to Trump voters.

Also, maybe I spend too much time on Reddit but the #1 to piss off Trump-supporters is remind them of the popular vote. They know it means something so they brigade. Every time.

Trump knows it means something so he lashes out on Twitter and lies about it at his rallies.

It means something.

(And also I think it means we need to get rid of the EC but I realize that's an uphill battle unless Lessig is right after all.)
posted by asteria at 1:13 PM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

Let's talk about what form the resistance shall take, instead of this ululation of frustrated grief. First, who is going to steal the Death Star plans.
posted by angrycat at 1:14 PM on December 14, 2016 [16 favorites]

zachlipton: Elon Musk and the chief executive of Uber are now advising Donald Trump

Add Pepsi CEO Indra Nooyi, who will also join the President’s Strategic and Policy Forum. (The Hill, 12/14/16)

The transition team's announcement comes in advance of Trump’s Wednesday meeting with top tech leaders, including Musk, at Trump Tower.

Other key tech players expected to be at the meeting include Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg; Eric Schmidt and Larry Page of Alphabet, Google's parent company; and Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon who also owns The Washington Post. A representative from Uber will not be in attendance.

“I look forward to engaging with our incoming President and this group on issues that affect our riders, drivers and the 450+ cities where we operate,” Kalanick said in a statement.

That's a very specific focus, Kalanick. There are around 35,000 cities and towns in the US. Sorry, small town USA, here's another Big Business Elitist who doesn't care about you, and another indication that _rump doesn't really care about you.
posted by filthy light thief at 1:16 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Meanwhile, from the this is fine department, we have our new Pravada:

From that article: The Obama administration — perhaps anticipating a Hillary Clinton presidency — supported these changes.

Good work all around.
posted by beerperson at 1:17 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

First, who is going to steal the Death Star plans.

Princess Leia won those plans fair and square!
posted by asteria at 1:20 PM on December 14, 2016

Trump says the press mangles his “beautiful flowing sentences.” We asked linguists to weigh in.

...

...You get no such organized thoughts from Trump. It's bursts of noun phrases, self-interruptions, sudden departures from the theme, flashes of memory, odd side remarks. ... It's the disordered language of a person with a concentration problem."

We learned that from the Washington Post (annotated) interview back in the optimistic Summer of 2016, where he couldn't not look at the TV in the room, which would result in him breaking the conversation to comment on what was on TV. We laughed and said "oh shit, he really is hopelessly scattered and self-obsessed."

Sadly, no surprises.
posted by filthy light thief at 1:24 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

>> First, who is going to steal the Death Star plans.
> Princess Leia won those plans fair and square!

Oh, is this not the one where many Bothans will have to die for those plans?
posted by RedOrGreen at 1:24 PM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

Trump says the press mangles his “beautiful flowing sentences.”

OK, that's it. I'm done. There are not, have never been, and will never be enough evens in the entire history and future of evens to cover this one.
posted by FelliniBlank at 1:26 PM on December 14, 2016 [26 favorites]

Also part of the big picture: If president-elect Donald Trump keeps his promise, surplus military grenade launchers, bayonets, tracked armored vehicles and high-powered firearms and ammunition will once again be available to state and local U.S. police departments.

The Bothans are not the issue here! The Death Star really tied the Empire together, did it not?
posted by Smedleyman at 1:27 PM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

Another quote FTA I just linked to.

"Leadership is hard; it needs discipline, concentration, and an ability to ignore what's irrelevant or needless or personal or silly," Pullum says. "There is no sign of it from Trump. This man talks honestly enough that you can see what he's like: He's an undisciplined narcissist who craves power but doesn't have the intellectual capacity to exercise it wisely."
posted by futz at 1:29 PM on December 14, 2016 [15 favorites]

I just want to understand this, sir. Every time a Death Star is micturated upon in this fair galaxy, I have to compensate the owner?
posted by kirkaracha at 1:30 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

an emoji version of the hashtag #CrookedHillary

I literally just pushed my chair back from my desk reading this.
posted by soren_lorensen at 1:31 PM on December 14, 2016 [30 favorites]

Tressie McMillan Cottom, The Atlantic: The Problem With Obama's Faith in White America (via)

There’s no other way to explain Obama’s inability to imagine that this nation could elect Donald Trump. Those of us who know our whites know one thing above all else: whiteness defends itself. Against change, against progress, against hope, against black dignity, against black lives, against reason, against truth, against facts, against native claims, against its own laws and customs. Even after Donald Trump was elected, Obama told Coates that all is not lost. He is still hopeful about the soul of white America. He said nothing about the soul of black America. That is where my hope resides. It is where my faith has always resided.

The anger that David Axelrod says was so a part of Harold Washington and that Barack Obama wonderfully did not have is also the hope that defends against America’s worst impulses.* To think Obama is commended for not being angry, for not having the fortitude of deep knowledge about how white identity politics sustains and circumscribes black lives is enough to make me cry.

posted by tonycpsu at 1:31 PM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

Pepsi CEO Indra Nooyi

Oh lord she is that dreadful woman with no boundaries who called someone's mom to pressure them into working for her.

It was such a horrifying story I still remember it years later.
posted by winna at 1:31 PM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

If you want to email Kalanick ('s minions), travis@uber.com is open to hear from you.
posted by zachlipton at 1:33 PM on December 14, 2016

If you're wondering what kind of contact best works with your congressional reps, Steve Israel can help you.
posted by pxe2000 at 1:34 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Oh good, now Priebus is hinting that press conferences will go away, too.

White House Communications Agency responds, I breathe into paper bag.
posted by mynameisluka at 1:35 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Let's not forget...

Trump is by far the worst candidate to ever run for President for a major party.

He is the most unpopular candidate, and now the most unpopular President-elect in modern history.

He has huge blindspots and weaknesses. Huge.

Right now he's bullied his way into this position of immense power, and the people, most of whom are diametrically opposed to him, are still trying to figure it out.

But they (we) will. Yes, we need leadership, and we need help, but we will figure this fucker out and we will run him out of town on rail, because just like every bully, people just don't like him, and as soon as blood is in the water, it will be a feeding frenzy.

The harder they come, they harder they fall.
posted by cell divide at 1:36 PM on December 14, 2016 [35 favorites]

Twitter was told it was "bounced" from Wednesday's meeting between tech executives and President-elect Donald Trump in retribution for refusing during the campaign to allow an emoji version of the hashtag #CrookedHillary, according to a source close to the situation.

Here's the Medium post describing the deal Twitter wouldn't take. This is coming on the record from Trump staffers. They're legit furious because Twitter wouldn't go with a running stick figure with a moneybag.

Meanwhile, two doors down the street, Uber's CEO is joining forces with the guy. I still can't even.
posted by zachlipton at 1:39 PM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

The fact that they thought they'd get that emoji approved is fucking ridiculous. It's not like there was a "Trump is legit Satan" counteremoji out there or even an analog of any kind—the analog they complain about is an elephant for #RNCinCLE which is completely descriptive and inoffensive IHATETHEMAUGHHHHHHHH
posted by mynameisluka at 1:42 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

I wish people would stop saying Trump has won. He didn't win the popular vote and he hasn't won the electoral college - yet.

He will probably, (99+% likely) win the electoral college vote when they vote, but in two instances (out of five total, I believe) when the popular vote winner didn't become president, the electoral college switched (Tilden to Harrison, Jackson to Adams). So why shouldn't it switch to the popular vote? I believe the electoral college format is stupid, but it is stupid and potentially volatile and legally, Constitutionally volatile. Ironically so, for those who think the Constitution is infallible.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 1:43 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

we need leadership, and we need help, but we will figure this fucker out and we will run him out of town on rail, because just like every bully, people just don't like him, and as soon as blood is in the water, it will be a feeding frenzy.

I wish I had faith that Democracy was as self-correcting as we are promised it is. I wish I had faith that America was, in this way at least, exceptional. I wish I had faith in the American experiment.

Many places had democracies and now have dictators. Many places have had awful, mindless man-children rise up through entrenched systems of privilege, seize power, and treat their country as a permanent piggy bank.

The institutions we count on have never proven to be especially effective at blocking totalitarianism. The press? The tore apart Hitler. He did fine without them. Systems of checks and balances? They only work when the people in them care about the country more than they do their party, they privilege, their personal power, and at this moment I am not seeing anything but Congress rolling over and creating the tools to justify their roles as supporters of this maniac Roman-style god king. The will of the people -- we have already seen what that is worth, and there are people in this very thread telling us it is time for us to shut up about the will of the people.

We have a dictator now. It's early, so maybe America is exceptional, as we have always told ourselves, and the supposed self-correcting mechanisms of this democracy will kick in and flush this monster out.

But we shouldn't count on that. And once Trump gets a proper kleptocracy up and running, there will be no reason for him to vacate it, and he'll have an entire corrupt congress to support him. I mean, maybe we have a chance, in two years, if he has outraged enough people, to get enough people into Congress to slow that role, but we're banking on a lot of maybes here.

We don't have the tools to do this, and we need to start looking to other dictatorships to see what sorts of tools they have developed to survive in them. We're going to have to do the work of government now, because the actual government is going to exist primarily to steal from us and demonize those that complain.
posted by maxsparber at 1:47 PM on December 14, 2016 [33 favorites]

The fact that they thought they'd get that emoji approved is fucking ridiculous. It's not like there was a "Trump is legit Satan" counteremoji out there or even an analog of any kind—the analog they complain about is an elephant for #RNCinCLE which is completely descriptive and inoffensive IHATETHEMAUGHHHHHHHH

I can't believe any version of a Crooked Hillary emoji went through rounds of design and legal and policy approval at Twitter.
posted by zutalors! at 1:54 PM on December 14, 2016 [16 favorites]

They're legit furious because Twitter wouldn't go with a running stick figure with a moneybag.

What Twitter is apparently not copping to - if this is true - is that apparently they approved a #CrookedHillary emoji with her hand taking a money bag in the first place. If true, they need to own that shit.
posted by corb at 1:54 PM on December 14, 2016 [23 favorites]

The current ass-kissing the technocrats are doing is such a perfect example of the emptiness of Silicone Valley "liberals".
posted by Anonymous at 1:56 PM on December 14, 2016

You are totally right, corb—and the fact that it had to go all the way to the top to be nixed (as opposed to the ad team or whomever who was apparently glad to oblige or at least string them along) is shocking.
posted by mynameisluka at 2:01 PM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

speaking of politcal emojis, this was pretty much the best $1.99 I've ever spent.
posted by entropicamericana at 2:03 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Uber's CEO is joining forces with the guy. I still can't even.

Well, Uber is run by shitstain libertarians, so. That's to be expected really.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:04 PM on December 14, 2016 [16 favorites]

I can't believe any version of a Crooked Hillary emoji went through rounds of design and legal and policy approval at Twitter.

For me, it's more that I can't believe we're at a place where a company like Twitter is so involved with our political discourse and, ultimately, our election of a president. The emoji itself is hard for me to even come to terms on since it's only a different visual representation of what the Republican candidate was saying about his opponent, so comparing an cartoon image against the words spoken is an odd line to draw, so to speak, when the larger problem is the candidate who is promoting ideas so far from political and social norms about his opponent.

That Twitter got caught in the fray is just another out of place element in a situation that has drifted into realms we are not ready to deal with as to the larger significance they all hold. The entirety of this "issue", from the desire for the emoji, the haggling over it, to the seeming bitterness over its end result is well beyond what should be reasonable in deciding who will run a country as powerful as the US. It's all fucked up basically.
posted by gusottertrout at 2:06 PM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

Trump is expected to invite Jeff Bezos to his advisory team? That should be interesting.
posted by Coventry at 2:06 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Uber's CEO is joining forces with the guy.

Get ready for a massive expansion of 1099 abuse.
posted by melissasaurus at 2:11 PM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

This is Samuel Bodman, Secretary of Energy (2005-2009). He has a doctorate in chemical engineering from MIT, where he worked as a professor.

This is Steven Chu, Secretary of Energy (2009-2013). Dr. Chu has a Nobel Prize in physics and is a professor at Berkeley.

This is Ernest Moniz, Secretary of Energy (2013-2017). Dr. Moniz is a professor of physics at MIT, specializing in nuclear physics.

This is Rick Perry, nominee for Secretary of Energy. In college, he got a D in a class called "Meats."

--via @sambjoyce
posted by DirtyOldTown at 2:11 PM on December 14, 2016 [75 favorites]

For me, it's more that I can't believe we're at a place where a company like Twitter is so involved with our political discourse

That's a really good point. We're at a place where these companies tend to act like broadcast corporations used to - but because of how we structure our laws about electioneering, there's no rules prohibiting these things. Facebook and Twitter are both huge influences in people's lives and as we see with the fake news debacles, definitely influenced this election. But because they're not themselves disseminators, but rather people providing a platform for election related material, there's not much that can be done. They're like a weird combination of television and telephone, with the rules about neither.
posted by corb at 2:21 PM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

FWIW, now the election is over and the trumpcolypse is near, it makes a lot of sense for sane people to try to influence and maybe modify the catastrophe. Everyone knows they can't save everything, but everyone who can will try their best - heck Al Gore met with Ivanka.
IMO politicians in congress should not do this unless they are 100% certain they get credit for it. But private people meeting with the PE to tell him global warming is real and immigration is good for business - bring them on! Specially if they are very rich and have huge businesses, because that is what Trump respects.
That said, a lot of tech people are libertarians, as we all know. They should move out to their artificial islands and figure out how to survive without community and society before they engage in politics.
posted by mumimor at 2:23 PM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

This is Rick Perry, nominee for Secretary of Energy. In college, he got a D in a class called "Meats."

It gets worse—he was once Governor of Texas!
posted by Rykey at 2:25 PM on December 14, 2016 [13 favorites]

Is it terrible that I sort of want to see the syllabus for the class on Meats?
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 2:37 PM on December 14, 2016 [29 favorites]

LeBron James sports safety pin on Sports Illustrated cover
posted by chris24 at 2:41 PM on December 14, 2016 [15 favorites]

Is it terrible that I sort of want to see the syllabus for the class on Meats?

The University of Minnesota has a building called the Andrew Boss School of Meat Science. I figure it's similar to the stuff that goes on there. Which, honestly, some of that sounds intellectually rigorous, if absolutely not a qualification for being the Secretary of Energy.
posted by dinty_moore at 2:46 PM on December 14, 2016

some of that sounds intellectually rigorous

I mean maybe not if you got a D
posted by beerperson at 2:51 PM on December 14, 2016 [12 favorites]

Current syllabus (pdf) for Texas A&M Meats 307. To be honest it looks awesome.

Course Description and Prerequisites
Integrated studies of the meat animal processing sequence regarding the production of meat-type
animals and the science and technology of their conversion to human food

Objectives:
1. To impart knowledge relating the live animal to its ultimate value as a food product...

I'm now worried that we're going to see a program rolled out called "Solyent Green"
posted by nubs at 2:52 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

You know, a class on meat animal production at an agricultural college seems like a pretty legitimate thing and it's classist as hell to mock it.

Mock the man, mock his transcrpit, maybe don't mock farmers?

Is that not a lesson that was learned this past election?
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 3:05 PM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

What is this, MeatFilter?
posted by zeptoweasel at 3:05 PM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

A class on meat animal production sounds great and important. Nobody considered him for Secretary of Agriculture though.
posted by zachlipton at 3:07 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

Maybe don't mock farmers? Is that not a lesson that was learned this past election?

I don't think so. I don't recall a lot of farmer mocking or farmer mocking blowback.
posted by diogenes at 3:08 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

Take it to MeatTalk, folks.
posted by tonycpsu at 3:10 PM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

Oh I see Julia Ioffe was fired from Politico today (she was moving to The Atlantic anyway, wevs) because she Twitter-wondered if Donald was sleeping with his daughter or just shirking nepotism laws. Here is Politico's email, written from a very high horse indeed.

It's even worse because Ioffe has been getting a constant barrage of anti-Semitic threats throughout the course of the campaign, with no response (as far as I'm aware) from Politico. They've made it clear whose speech they're interested in protecting.
posted by melissasaurus at 3:10 PM on December 14, 2016 [22 favorites]

_{this was way upthread, but

If a sign swayed you to voted for Trump, you're a fucking idiot}
posted by aspersioncast at 3:11 PM on December 14, 2016

You know, a class on meat animal production at an agricultural college seems like a pretty legitimate thing and it's classist as hell to mock it.

I'm not mocking! I genuinely think it sounds cool.

I don't recall a lot of farmer mocking or farmer mocking blowback.

You clearly weren't in Iowa in the 2014 election. There was farmer-mocking blowback in spades.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 3:11 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Oh I see Julia Ioffe was fired from Politico today (she was moving to The Atlantic anyway, wevs) because she Twitter-wondered if Donald was sleeping with his daughter or just shirking nepotism laws. Here is Politico's email, written from a very high horse indeed.

I mean, it's not a tweet I would send nor one I particularly endorse, but when the man himself has repeatedly brought it up, is it still a fireable offense? How many times is a man allowed to publicly joke about sleeping with his daughter before other people don't get fired for joking about him sleeping with his daughter? Is there a written rule on this somewhere?
posted by zachlipton at 3:13 PM on December 14, 2016 [23 favorites]

You clearly weren't in Iowa in the 2014 election.

Sorry, I thought we were talking about the 2016 presidential election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.
posted by diogenes at 3:13 PM on December 14, 2016

Let whoever hasn't admitted to being more sexually attracted to their child than their spouse cast the first stone.
posted by asteria at 3:15 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

:I
posted by entropicamericana at 3:16 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Sorry, I thought we were talking about the 2016 presidential election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.

I don't think the mentality of Iowans changed that profoundly between 2014 and 2016, but maybe I'm missing something. And having called hundreds, maybe thousands of Iowa voters during the 2014 election and tried to explain that one dumb remark, I think I can say with some authority that mocking farmers doesn't go over well in Iowa.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 3:18 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

I mean, it's not a tweet I would send nor one I particularly endorse, but when the man himself has repeatedly brought it up, is it still a fireable offense? How many times is a man allowed to publicly joke about sleeping with his daughter before other people don't get fired for joking about him sleeping with his daughter? Is there a written rule on this somewhere?

To be clear, because I sort of made a last-ditch effort not to post this comment entirely, I don't think Ioffe's tweet was particularly fair to Ivanka, who never asked to be the target of her father's public sexual boasts at her expense, and that riffing on that theme does continue a line of discourse that's inappropriate coming from Trump's mouth and should be inappropriate for others to pick up on as well. But I still think the majority of the responsibility remains with the guy who repeated such things over a period of years during broadcast interviews.
posted by zachlipton at 3:21 PM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

Anti-Muslim Hate Group Brags About Influence In Trump’s White House

An anti-Muslim hate group boasted Tuesday that it has a “direct line” to Donald Trump and “has played a fundamental role” in shaping the president-elect’s “views and suggested policies with respect to radical Islam.”

In a fundraising email, ACT for America founder Brigitte Gabriel said her organization is “immeasurably optimistic about the future” of a Trump presidency, and crowed about the ACT for America supporters and advisers getting top positions in Trump’s White House.

“Two of our board of advisors Dr. Walid Phares and General Michael Flynn were, and will continue to be President-elect Donald Trump’s National Security Advisors,” Gabriel wrote in the email, a copy of which was provided to The Huffington Post by Right Wing Watch’s Miranda Blue.

The SPLC calls ACT For America "the largest grassroots anti-Muslim group in America."
posted by zachlipton at 3:24 PM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

Trump’s Team Reportedly Offered Ambassadorships to Talent Bookers in Exchange for Inauguration Singers
posted by chris24 at 3:29 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

The topic of Meat 101 came up here a while back, and one of our own shared their experience with it.

This is interesting stuff. I just finished a course called Animal Science 307: Meats at my college, with an accompanying slaughter laboratory. The very first lab class we slaughtered pigs, with myself both stunning one and cutting the throat of an other (essentially delivering the killing blow). It was an uneasy, eye-opening experience, and yet, I can still eat bacon near-daily with a free conscience. In fact, having seen first-hand how humane the process can be, I feel far less of a hypocrite than I did while eating meat without giving any thought to what lost it's life in the process.

It was also a great comfort for me to find out that there is an economic incentive for humane slaughter. I'm not just talking about fines for improper stunning practices--meat from animals that are stressed in their last hours is very prone to a number of problems ranging from bruising from burst blood vessels (requiring cutting out the ruined meat) to something known as "dark cutting", where the meat is affected by hormones like adrenaline, severely lowering the quality, and thus, the profit.

In fact, the worst part of the entire slaughter process is the way that the carcasses involuntarily keep moving after for up to hours after death. There's nothing like watching a severed cow head blink at you more than half an hour after it's been separated from its body.

(We also slaughtered cattle and then made them into hamburgers, which we then barbecued and ate. Craziest course I've taken yet.)

[...]

notyou: "If you somehow find a course that tops it, please come back and share with the rest of us!"

Well, in my general animal science class's lab, I got to stick my arm up a cow's hiney in a lesson on artificial insemination. And then we, ah, stimulated a ram to ejaculation in the lecture (!!!) using an electrical anal probe. In light of that, and the animal reproduction course I have coming up, I rule out nothing.

To get back on topic, now you may imagine a young, un-bespectacled Rick Perry with his arm up a "cow's hiney." (And, judging from his course grade, doing a poor job of it.)
posted by notyou at 3:30 PM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

A Note To My Fellow White Women About The Barred Inauguration March by Cayce D. Utley for The Establishment

My white women, we need to know our collective power—and I don’t mean the power we get from whiteness. We don’t need the state’s permission to march. Get behind and learn from women of color who already know all this, and follow their lead. Most of us know diddly about fighting for liberation. The organizers I work with in DC have taught me these systems won’t give us an inch. We have to demand it, to take it. We have to identify the ways white supremacy has conditioned us to politely cooperate and unlearn that nonsense. Permits be damned. Let’s not get held up for a moment by white supremacy.

Y’all ready to shut it down? We can do this.

posted by melissasaurus at 3:32 PM on December 14, 2016 [19 favorites]

Also the horse had email problems.
posted by Justinian at 3:37 PM on December 14, 2016 [17 favorites]

Rick Perry with his arm up a "cow's hiney."

Is that why he got a D in class? Unprepared for college because of abstinance-only education in highschool?

Remember kids, in order to successfully inseminate a cow, you have to at least deliver the bull semen up the vaginal canal, not up their "hiney."
posted by porpoise at 3:38 PM on December 14, 2016 [8 favorites]

So Milo Yiannopoulos showed up at UW-Milwaukee and directly attacked, by name and a projected photo, a trans student who had been fighting for bathroom access. That student has some harsh unfiltered words for the Chancellor. It's a long blog post (that is rather painful for some mefites to read, though the author's pain is more than evident), ending with:

Believe me when I say no matter how much you might dislike (or resent) this email, any pain you feel from what I wrote is but a tiny fraction of the pain I felt, and still feel in my chest and throughout my body, when Milo attacked me, and the pain trans folk feel just for existing in this society. You are so, so incredibly blinded by your privilege and place in society. Fuck you.

Milo's tour has been horrible enough, but now he's specifically splashing a student's face on the screen, identifying them by name, and harassing them.
posted by zachlipton at 3:38 PM on December 14, 2016 [36 favorites]

Word. Like, here in Allegheny County, Clinton only won the county because of Pittsburgh. Like literally the electoral map turns red immediately as you cross the city boundary.

You don't even need to cherry-pick to find examples like this. While nobody seems to have a real final total yet (?), it looks like Clinton will end up 'winning' fewer than 500 of the nation's 3000+ counties, vs 2500+ that went to Trump. And dang near all of Clinton's counties are tipped by the big urban centers like your example, which shouldn't surprise anyone.

(Yes, this is even emptier than the popular vote argument, of course, since so many of those counties Trump won have nineteen people in them, unless you're into illustrating the difference between urban and rural in a mappy map way.)

And it's been like this for decades, though the Democratic vote concentrating more and more into the bigger cities seems to be a pretty solid trend, too... as America's overall population does the same.
posted by rokusan at 3:40 PM on December 14, 2016

@Phil_Mattingly:
Lindsey Graham, on Trump's comments about the origin of the Russian hack: "If it was a 400 pound guy, it was a 400 pound Russian guy."
posted by chris24 at 3:48 PM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

ha, you almost tricked me into hoping again
posted by murphy slaw at 3:55 PM on December 14, 2016

So much of the arguments and complaints here just remind me of the broader problems within the Democratic Party.

I mean sure, it would be nice if some Democratic Leader emerged in a shining suit of armor on a white horse and called out "Follow me! We shall trample the enemy!" and we could all fall in behind them and the Republicans would be defeated forevermore.

But in reality what would happen is that as soon as that person appeared there would be a bunch of people showing up to point out that their horse was really more of a grey than a white and that was the wrong kind of armor for facing Republicans and trampling the enemy is kinda evil and what we really need to do isn't march behind a person on a horse but this other thing that would be more effective.

It seems like a big part of the problem the DNC is facing is that they feel like they must embrace one faction in the big tent at the expense of others, and they can see the other factions cutting and running as soon as they choose, but I think that's a false choice and there are better options. What if you can thread the needle and make the Democratic party into a big tent of united caucuses supporting each other instead of a fracturing party if you just lean into the fractures a little but identify those natural factions, embrace their leaders as party leaders, give each of the Dem factions more of a say in running the DNC so they all feel ownership of it (and make damn sure the leaders of the groups work harder than Bernie to promote the fact that they still win by changing the platform even if they didn't win it all omg). Embrace the big tent and make it an asset, don't centralize power within the party but prioritize shared goals and finding common ground on differences without throwing anyone under the bus. I think you can do that and have highly promotable named and identifiably different regional and policy-based caucuses that give different flavors of Dem voters a voice. Learn from the successes and mistakes of factions like the Blue Dogs and Bernie's supporters, learn how to embrace factions in ways that enrich the party and give more people a voice while making it clear that there are lines we as Democrats do not cross, learn how the Republicans can contain ideological differences while whipping their congressional reps to stand as one when they need to.
posted by jason_steakums at 4:01 PM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

It seems like a big part of the problem the DNC is facing is that they feel like they must embrace one faction in the big tent at the expense of others, and they can see the other factions cutting and running as soon as they choose, but I think that's a false choice and there are better options. What if you can thread the needle and make the Democratic party into a big tent of united caucuses supporting each other instead of a fracturing party if you just lean into the fractures a little but identify those natural factions, embrace their leaders as party leaders, give each of the Dem factions more of a say in running the DNC so they all feel ownership of it (and make damn sure the leaders of the groups work harder than Bernie to promote the fact that they still win by changing the platform even if they didn't win it all omg).

mfw reading this
posted by Talez at 4:03 PM on December 14, 2016

Seriously. You basically wrote the political equivalent of "what if we could get pigs to fly if we could just get wings on a pig and teach it to flap".
posted by Talez at 4:07 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

@nc naacp House just approved a Superior Court appointment by @PatMcCroryNC #ncga #respectourvote

The Senate just filed a bill to drastically change the State and County BOEs to favor Republicans. That's just the start #NCGA

This is a copy of SB4 filed today. I would read it and summarize but frankly it is long and my eyes are very tired. Also my soul is a bit tired, ya know?
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:12 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

OH wait, one more tweet from the NC NAACP: 15 bills filed by House and 7 by Senate. At 6:59 they extended the filing deadline to 7:30. There is more to come #ncga #respectourvote

Jesus Christ.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:14 PM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

Oh forgot something:

But in reality what would happen is that as soon as that person appeared there would be a bunch of people showing up to point out that their horse was really more of a grey than a white and that was the wrong kind of armor for facing Republicans and trampling the enemy is kinda evil and what we really need to do isn't march behind a person on a horse but this other thing that would be more effective.

And then everyone would feel good about having stuck it to the man or spoken truth to power and then they would go home in the warm glow of being a rebel.
posted by threeturtles at 4:14 PM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

“Look, the truth is it’s been very obvious for leaders in Washington on the Republican side that the Russians have been undermining our democracy, or did undermine our democracy,” McMullin said at an event hosted by POLITICO Wednesday morning. “I know because I know for a fact that they know this. It was a topic of discussion during the election and they chose not to stand up.”

With that Putin claim out there, let's look at what McMullin is saying about Republican leadership and try not to draw conclusions.
posted by gusottertrout at 4:14 PM on December 14, 2016 [32 favorites]

For those up thread who were wondering about the OFA Alumni ~thing~ my source on the inside says lol no, it's garbage, not doing anything substantive and probably won't.

We're on our own, for the nonce.
posted by soren_lorensen at 4:19 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

Seriously. You basically wrote the political equivalent of "what if we could get pigs to fly if we could just get wings on a pig and teach it to flap".

Trust me, I get the sentiment if not the hostility. But it's evolve or die time for the DNC and while Dem policies are broadly popular they're a lot trickier a sell when you get to the county level, so you need a party that's Bernies, and Kanders, and Ellisons, and yeah, even Clintons, because they have an important bloc as well, but the last things you need are infighting on one end and Joe Lieberman on the other so... it's at least worth saying that resolving that isn't actually a zero sum game unless you want it to be, and picturing alternatives.
posted by jason_steakums at 4:20 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Stressed by seeing the Orange One? Chrome Extension Makes Kittens Great Again instead.
posted by TwoStride at 4:20 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Michael Flynn, Trump's national security adviser, shared secrets without permission, files show.
posted by gusottertrout at 4:21 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

And Ivanka Trump is claimed to be moving into the area reserved for the First Lady.

Interpret that as you will.

Oh and all three of the Trump's most Deplorable kids were at the tech shakedown meeting today.
posted by Yowser at 4:28 PM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

Just for laffs...this bit from a CNN Report on the search for the White House Press Secretary:

Katrina Pierson, a Trump campaign spokesperson who has made multiple visits to Trump Tower this week, has pitched herself for the press secretary position but is not believed to be a top contender, according to transition sources.

"She is looking at a lot of opportunities," one Trump transition source said of Pierson.

Pierson told CNNMoney, "I'm at Trump Tower because I work here. I'm a Senior Advisor for the Trump Transition team. Our meetings are confidential."

I don't know, maybe I'm punch drunk, but the line "I'm at Trump Tower because I work here." cracks me up. She is so obviously pissed at being asked if she has come to TT for an interview. And it was nice of Mr. Unnamed Source to be so kind to Pierson (She is looking at a lot of opportunities) rather than laugh so hard at the idea of her being press secretary that he ended up choking on his own saliva and then have to be pounded on the back.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:34 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

The live stream of Keith Ellison talking to Bernie about his vision for the DNC is here, and starts in 22 minutes.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 4:38 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

I just realized through the power of Google Image that Julia Ioffe is the ballsy Politico reporter who hung out in NeverTrump territory and refused to be intimidating by the greenshirts. I hope the Atlantic treats her right.
posted by corb at 4:38 PM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

I'm ready to shut it down, but I do hope that kids know getting arrested is no fun. It never fails to annoy me when there's never a huge disclaimer *we do not have a permit, you're risking jail, bad shit can happen in jail, jail is super unfun even if bad shit doesn't happen*

I mean when I was arrested in '95 it went from party time with Act Up folks when we were all in a big cell, and then they separated us and put us in a small cell, one girl had a panic attack, another had projectile diarrhea and was absolutely mortified.

It just seems like sometimes the left is all "Dulce et decorum est por patria getting locked up" and it's like no, those heroes of the civil rights were not having fun little parties in their jail cells.
posted by angrycat at 4:41 PM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

More alt-right hate spewing: Milo Yiannopolis spoke last night at UW-Milwaukee as part of his "speaking tour", and during his speech he put the name and photo of a trans student on campus on the screen and proceeded to taunt and threaten them:

"There was a full house for Milo, and his one hour stand-up game of hate charades was live cast on Brietbart. At 49 minutes into his shtick, Milo projected a picture of a UWM trans student (wink, wink, nudge, nudge), who was undergoing conversion, and “outed” them for making an issue of bathroom access. Bathrooms, right? What an outrage! Milo went on to suggest his own interest in having sex with the student, all while assessing them critically in very specific and demeaning ways. The student’s name was prominently displayed, and everyone laughed."

This speech was also simulcast on breitbart.com so now this woman's face and name are out there for everybody to harass.
posted by zug at 4:41 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

i was gonna say that milo is just the worst but in a year like this he'd be lucky to break the top 5
posted by murphy slaw at 4:44 PM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

Why do American Universities allow this guy on campus?

He'd be tarred and feathered and driven out of town, Roosh V style, in Canada.
posted by Yowser at 4:45 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

two things about decorum

I'm the first to participate in crazy derails, but right now the circular firing squad has taken on a dimension so that links that were posted a few hours are coming up again as news. I'm not a flagging type of person, but..

About Ivanka's role: I personally find Ivanka scary and politically wrong. But the incest stuff is really obnoxious if there is no evidence. I've often been with my dad or granddad to events in place of my stepmother or gran, and in some cases I've been involved in their decision-making. I find it extremely offensive if that is seen as an indicator of incest.
posted by mumimor at 4:46 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Well if they're not going to do press briefings then Katrina Pierson is the perfect press secretary.
posted by kirkaracha at 4:47 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

But the incest stuff is really obnoxious if there is no evidence. I've often been with my dad or granddad to events in place of my stepmother or gran, and in some cases I've been involved in their decision-making. I find it extremely offensive if that is seen as an indicator of incest.

Fair, but it's hardly the only indicator in this case.
posted by Bookhouse at 4:51 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

He talks about her boobs and how hot she is, like, all the time. It's.... weird.
posted by Justinian at 4:52 PM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

He talks about her boobs and how hot she is, like, all the time. It's.... weird.

Absolutely. He is creepier than creep, but as far as we know, Ivanka is not a victim of incest.
posted by mumimor at 4:54 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Why do American Universities allow this guy on campus?

"Muh free speech".

There's a group called Turning Point USA that's been infiltrating campuses and basically bringing Trumpism into the younger frat boy generation. They're trying to make a Trumpenjugend and turn Trumpism into a political faction to be reckoned with on campuses as a counterbalance to the heavy left-wing bias usually found in universities. They're the ones that have been securing access for him into universities by putting a reasonable face on it calling him things like "provocative" rather than far more accurate "hateful fuck".

Some universities will stop it dead in its tracks. Some (such as this) fall for the bait.
posted by Talez at 4:57 PM on December 14, 2016 [9 favorites]

The New Civil Rights Movement Trump's Three Children Just Participated in Official Meeting With Top Tech CEO's

This is not normal.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:57 PM on December 14, 2016 [16 favorites]

as far as we know, Ivanka is not a victim of incest.

And if she were, we should treat her as such - a victim, even if she is an adult now and even if she is evil and pillaging the treasury. It's one thing to be concerned that Donald Trump is a sexual predator, but it's quite another to be flippant about someone being a victim of sexual assault.

I disagree with Politico's actions and with Ioffe's statement.
posted by melissasaurus at 5:08 PM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

Oh hey guys, you know how Sheriff Joe was finally ousted at this last election, and in the meantime also charged with criminal contempt for being a horrible racist? We're so done with him!

But he's not done with us. I guess since his favorite dude canceled the press conference scheduled for tomorrow, Arpaio decided he'd fill that void with one of his own, to... relaunch the birther issue. Timely!
posted by Superplin at 5:13 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

Can we circle back to this news for a second?

All this started because a half-decade ago Clinton had the audacity to state the obvious? I assumed Putin didn't like Clinton just out of your ol' garden-variety misogyny. But we seriously have President-Elect Trump because a woman hurt his fee-fees?!

Masculinity so fragile you launch a cyber war?

This is hysterical in every sense of the word. I don't know whether to laugh or cry, but I do know I just fell a little bit in love with Clinton. Because any woman who can puncture a man's ego like that is a goddamn hero.
posted by Anonymous at 5:23 PM on December 14, 2016

Keith Ellison is pretty good so far! Pulling no punches!
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 5:30 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

I assumed Putin didn't like Clinton just out of your ol' garden-variety misogyny. But we seriously have President-Elect Trump because a woman hurt his fee-fees?!

Masculinity so fragile you launch a cyber war?

No wonder all the gamergators love him; he's like their apotheosis.
posted by FelliniBlank at 5:31 PM on December 14, 2016 [15 favorites]

He talks about her boobs and how hot she is, like, all the time. It's.... weird.

I think the most likely answer is the most depressing: Trump simply cannot conceive of a nonsexual way to show regard for a woman.
posted by dinty_moore at 5:36 PM on December 14, 2016 [38 favorites]

a daydream...
- ellison
- a mtg w hrc, bern, warren, podesta, dean, franken
- one agenda item: 50-state mobilization for midterms. this plan probably includes singling out some, pretty, smart, engaged spokesmodels/future contenders..
posted by j_curiouser at 5:44 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

wait...a house strategy for introducing articles of impeachment for emoluments, say, twice a week.
posted by j_curiouser at 5:46 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

There's a group called Turning Point USA that's been infiltrating campuses

they also operate this professor watchlist
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 5:48 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

From the incomparable Sarah Jeong, If we took ‘Gamergate’ harassment seriously, ‘Pizzagate’ might never have happened:

After I wrote a book about online harassment last year, conference organizers began to regularly contact me to speak at their events. I have spoken at the invitation of universities, law schools, technology companies and governmental organizations. At first, I was hopeful that it might spark some change. Over time, I saw that the issue of online harassment was being relegated to a pink ghetto.

Panels about online harassment, stacked with women, became an easy way for conferences to pad their diversity statistics. Too frequently, speakers were not asked what the solutions should be, but simply expected to relive personal trauma for the edification of the audience. Institutions and corporations behaved as though “addressing online harassment” meant the mere act of passively listening to someone recount what had happened to her. But now I wonder if even that happened. If people had listened then, would they be so surprised by Pizzagate now, which follows a pattern uncannily similar to Gamergate?

posted by zachlipton at 5:48 PM on December 14, 2016 [43 favorites]

How Trump's Win Is Changing Stand-Up Comedy: Emboldened by election results, Trump supporters are starting to make working comics nervous
posted by homunculus at 5:49 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

So far in the NC GOPs coup attempt:
- changing the elections boards from 2-1 in favor of the sitting governor to 2-2. This almost sounds fair, but the same law in Indiana allowed Republicans to block early voting and more polling locations, because it requires unanimity. Plus they'll just change it back when they're back in power.
-curtailing the governor's power to appoint trustees to the state's university boards
- newly requiring senate confirmation of executive department appointments (controlled by the GOP)
- limiting the newly democratic Supreme Court's jurisdiction to hear appeals where a lower court finds actions of the general assembly unconstitutional
- changing some 1200 positions from appointed to career, allowing McCrory's appointees to stay on

And they still may try to pack the State Supreme Court. The special session will go till Friday, and several place holder bills were filed tonight to beat the filing deadline.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:50 PM on December 14, 2016 [19 favorites]

limiting the newly democratic Supreme Court's jurisdiction to hear appeals where a lower court finds actions of the general assembly unconstitutional

Isn't the state Supreme Court going to laugh that law out of, er, court?
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 5:54 PM on December 14, 2016

Masha Gessen in the NYRB blog: “The Putin Paradigm”

There is still much we don’t know about how Trump will rule. But in the month since his election, some characteristic patterns have emerged—and they bear some instructive similarities to the style Putin has practiced over many years. Here are a few of them…

posted by Going To Maine at 5:54 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

Trump’s Witch Hunts Are Having a Huge Chilling Effect: His intimidation of journalists, civil servants, and businesses is already doing incalculable harm to the public interest.
posted by homunculus at 5:56 PM on December 14, 2016 [10 favorites]

So far in the NC GOPs coup attempt:
- changing the elections boards from 2-1 in favor of the sitting governor to 2-2. This almost sounds fair, but the same law in Indiana allowed Republicans to block early voting and more polling locations, because it requires unanimity. Plus they'll just change it back when they're back in power.
-curtailing the governor's power to appoint trustees to the state's university boards
- newly requiring senate confirmation of executive department appointments (controlled by the GOP)
- limiting the newly democratic Supreme Court's jurisdiction to hear appeals where a lower court finds actions of the general assembly unconstitutional
- changing some 1200 positions from appointed to career, allowing McCrory's appointees to stay on

This is what happens in tinpot banana republics not in an established liberal democracy.

So this is what it feels like to live through the modern equivalent of the fall of the Roman Empire.
posted by Talez at 5:57 PM on December 14, 2016 [27 favorites]

Just got home and am catching up on the Julia Ioffe situation. Horrible
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:57 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Isn't the state Supreme Court going to laugh that law out of, er, court?

I think it just adds another step in the appeals process? Adding more delays, but I'm not sure.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:58 PM on December 14, 2016

This Trump quote from the tech hootenanny hit me in the face like a ripe trout:

“We’re gonna do fair trade deals and make it a lot easier for you to trade across borders because of a lot of restrictions, a lot of problems and if you have any ideas on that that would be, that would be great because there are a lot of border restrictions and a lot of border problems, you probably have less of a problem than some companies, some companies have — you have some problems,” Trump said.

total incongruity with his previous statements on trade aside, these are the words of a kid who did not do the homework but wants to "compare answers" with one of the smart kids right before class
posted by murphy slaw at 6:01 PM on December 14, 2016 [21 favorites]

On preview I see that TD Strange already posted something about this but I'll go ahead and let this stand

The SB4 bill just filed in an emergency meeting of the NC General Assembly will change the election boards in all 100 counties of North Carolina. Democrats were set to take a 2-1 majority on each election board as we just voted in a Democrat to the Governor's Mansion, but this bill will make each board divided: 2 Ds and 2Rs. Election Boards maintain the voter registration records and administer the election process, for example deciding when and where to open early voting stations. It is a very underhanded and cynical move by the Republicans to keep voter suppression alive in the Tarheel State.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:04 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

And apparently they never stop and think, "What if we just changed our platform so that more people voting favors US too?"

I have more thoughts around this but they can basically be boiled down to: "GAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!"...more screaming, etc.
posted by VTX at 6:09 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

This Trump quote from the tech hootenanny

Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level: 29.4
Gunning-Fog Score: 32.8
Coleman-Liau Index: 8.7
SMOG Index: 17.3
Automated Readability Index: 35.2
Average Grade Level: 24.7
posted by kirkaracha at 6:10 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

I think Trump broke the readability robot thingy.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 6:19 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

I guess those readability indices do in fact make him out to be like a smart person.
posted by Superplin at 6:24 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

The ODNI has put out a new statement:

Intelligence Community Statement on Review of Foreign Influence on U.S. Elections

Senior Administration Officials have regularly provided extensive, detailed classified and unclassified briefings to members and staff from both parties on Capitol Hill since this past summer and have continued to do so after Election Day.

Last week, the President ordered a full Intelligence Community review of foreign efforts to influence recent Presidential elections – from 2008 to present. Once the review is complete in the coming weeks, the Intelligence Community stands ready to brief Congress—and will make those findings available to the public consistent with protecting intelligence sources and methods. We will not offer any comment until the review is complete.

posted by zachlipton at 6:27 PM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

like a smart person

with beautiful, flowing sentences.
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 6:27 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

well, sentence, but who's counting
posted by murphy slaw at 6:30 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

You really can't get more cynical - NC elections bill says that the GOP will chair election boards in all even years. Ie, in all election years.

More on the appeals thing: The state supreme court would be limited in reviewing state constitutional and federal challenges, giving the power instead first to an en banc panel of intermediate appellate court judges (who of course are Republican majority) and limiting appeals as of right
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:33 PM on December 14, 2016 [15 favorites]

The fact that they thought they'd get that emoji approved is fucking ridiculous. It's not like there was a "Trump is legit Satan" counteremoji out there.... I can't believe any version of a Crooked Hillary emoji went through rounds of design and legal and policy approval at Twitter.

I find it funny as heck that Twitter resisted, but let's don't lose track of the fact that the campaign bought a promotional package from Twitter for $5 million that included, as one of many features, custom emoji to help them in their branding/messaging.

There's no journalistic type requirement for balance. It was a paid-for commercial product.

They'd do the same for anyone who bought one, I expect, including anyone who ponied up $5M for an evil devil Trump emoji.

Maybe we can all pool $5 each for something with a doo-doo head.
posted by rokusan at 6:34 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Apparently, the North Carolina bill puts the Republicans in charge of the election boards during even years and the Democrats in odd years. Hey, I wonder what kind of elections they have during even years? I'm sure that's just a coincidence.
posted by zachlipton at 6:34 PM on December 14, 2016 [23 favorites]

i guess the new GOP plan is to mount a massive denial of service attack on judicial review
posted by murphy slaw at 6:37 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Can anyone show an example of promotional Twitter emoji? I don't think I've seen this.
posted by Yowser at 6:40 PM on December 14, 2016

NC elections bill says that the GOP will chair election boards in all even years. Ie, in all election years.

Well, a special legislative election has been ordered next year because the current legislature is so gerrymandered that the judge couldn't let it stand. And municipal elections tend to happen in odd years. But this is a coup, and isn't pretending to be anything other than a coup. And the NC NAACP is going to treat it like a coup.
posted by holgate at 6:41 PM on December 14, 2016 [7 favorites]

NC response: Biden/Garland rules lawyer-ing. Doooooo it. Do. it.
posted by j_curiouser at 6:43 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Right now if you type #RogueOne into the search bar on Twitter, for example, it will bring up tweets auto-tagged with a little icon of the Death Star. They have one for #BlackLivesMatter, too.
posted by mynameisluka at 6:43 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

(Upraised fists, not a Death Star. Ha.)
posted by mynameisluka at 6:43 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

NPR: Trump's Men In Moscow: Trump Disciples Suddenly Showing Up In Russia

On Monday, Jack Kingston, a former Trump surrogate, briefed American businesspeople in Russia on what they might expect from the incoming administration

Lifting Western sanctions that were imposed on Russia because of its armed intervention in Ukraine has become the top priority not only for the Kremlin but for foreign companies working in Moscow.

During the campaign, Trump indicated he would reconsider those sanctions and suggested he would get along fine with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

"Trump can look at sanctions. They've been in place long enough," Kingston told NPR in Moscow. "Has the desired result been reached? He doesn't have to abide by the Obama foreign policy. That gives him a fresh start."

posted by zachlipton at 6:50 PM on December 14, 2016 [6 favorites]

"Trump can look at sanctions. They've been in place long enough," Kingston told NPR in Moscow. "Has the desired result been reached? "

... How did they feel about this argument when it was applied to Cuba? The hypocrisy is staggering.
posted by Justinian at 6:53 PM on December 14, 2016 [14 favorites]

Putin got his man, now it's time to start paying out.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:53 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Muslim girl who was harassed on subway has been found: police No details other than the police said "she has been found."

The New York Daily News (ugh) is now reporting that the police say she made it up and has been charged with filing a police report.

Whether or not any of that is true, I have no doubt that this will be used to discredit every other instance of hate and cause for people to pretend all the swastikas and Islamophobic graffiti are all fake.
posted by zachlipton at 6:53 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

i wasn't expecting the race to the bottom to shift from working conditions to civil rights so quickly
posted by murphy slaw at 6:54 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Hey, talk to an intern or something. There's no formal chain of command. It's all good.

Karen from Finance said I could bomb Lichtenstein
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 7:15 PM on December 14, 2016 [25 favorites]

Super weird derail, I know, but to AI a cow, you do indeed have to stick one of your arms in its rectum, as part of the process.

Yes, I think this wins for weirdest derail in a 2016 Election Thread. Which is really saying something.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 7:16 PM on December 14, 2016 [25 favorites]

It's Steves all the way down. And probably Meredith is in there somewhere.
posted by emjaybee at 7:16 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Oh no. I really hope this isn't true. please please please

Muslim Student Who Said She Was Harassed by Trump Supporters Charged With Filing False Report: Sources

The student was also charged with obstructing government administration, meaning it is alleged police were kept from doing their work through investigating a potentially bogus crime
posted by futz at 7:17 PM on December 14, 2016

now that i know that AI is also an initialism for artificial insemination it suggests a very different path that spielberg/kubrick collaboration could have taken
posted by murphy slaw at 7:19 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

Oh no. I really hope this isn't true. please please please

We can't freak out everytime somebody on "our side" (or who we'd support) does something stupid, ya'll. If she acted like a dumbass that's terrible, but you and I both know the Nazis are gonna Nazi no matter what. Say "wow I wish she hadn't done that" and move on. The whole history of racism/anti-Muslim hate does not depend on one person's story being true.

Here is the lesson I learned during Obama's presidency: you cannot act impeccably enough to escape being blamed by the Republicans for any and all things. It is not possible.

Therefore, stop caring about their opinion and keep holding to what you know is true and pushing ahead.
posted by emjaybee at 7:24 PM on December 14, 2016 [54 favorites]

Pick one up for me, too, while you're there: Anti-Trump Comics From the Spiegelman Family
posted by Joe in Australia at 7:44 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

Vox: After a big uproar, Trump’s team has disavowed its controversial climate questionnaire - The nation’s federal employees appear to have just won their first big clash with Donald Trump’s transition team. Or at least it looks that way.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:54 PM on December 14, 2016 [22 favorites]

Can anyone show an example of promotional Twitter emoji? I don't think I've seen this.

Adweek and TechCrunch both reported on this in the summer, but I think it started almost a year ago with the Superman v Batman stuff. The AdWeek story says Twitter packages that include custom emoji start at only $1M, so the Trump campaign must have sprung for the gold-plated #chandelier version.

At least they have a business plan now.
posted by rokusan at 7:57 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

"BREAKING" to nobody's actual surprise: Putin Personally Involved in U.S. Election Hack

At least the evidence keeps piling up and getting harder for nay-sayers to keep ignoring:

Now the U.S has solid information tying Putin to the operation, the intelligence officials say. Their use of the term "high confidence" implies that the intelligence is nearly incontrovertible.

posted by p3t3 at 8:02 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

I think the most likely answer is the most depressing: Trump simply cannot conceive of a nonsexual way to show regard for a woman.

Reminds me of this OOTS comic. The salient part:

I theorize that the halfling does not possess a true sentient brain, like you or I, but rather a simple lump of nerve tissue that serves as a primitive "proto-brain" that can only process two emotional reactions to people: Hate or Lust.

posted by XtinaS at 8:02 PM on December 14, 2016

Finally getting a chance to sit down and watch the Ellison/Sanders event, and I come to it having only heard Ellison in more low key moments like interviews... and holy shit, he's got the fire in him. He has a more inclusive, intersectional version of Bernie's message. He gets it about the state and county level Democratic bench. He's got Obama's organizing drive but he'll have the time to really get on the ground and make it happen in ways that Obama couldn't while doing the job of President. He's saying a lot of things I've been thinking about providing tools and data to local races. Knows how to speak to Democrats in the Industrial Midwest (he doesn't like "Rust Belt") and also says that Dems shouldn't just treat the coastal strongholds like a "political ATM" to go get a check but we should look to their work as a model on how to organize for victories on climate, criminal justice, etc. Damn, I really hope he gets the job. All my Dean feels are coming back, new and improved.

Also, "Hubert Humphrey's worth an applause, y'all." might be my favorite line of the night.
posted by jason_steakums at 8:06 PM on December 14, 2016 [27 favorites]

Now the U.S has solid information tying Putin to the operation, the intelligence officials say. Their use of the term "high confidence" implies that the intelligence is nearly incontrovertible.

I like living through history a lot less than studying it.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 8:07 PM on December 14, 2016 [26 favorites]

Jerry Brown: 'California will launch its own damn satellite' if Trump stops climate data collection
posted by futz at 8:18 PM on December 14, 2016 [43 favorites]

I really hope we do and that it is named "Moonbeam."
posted by contraption at 8:22 PM on December 14, 2016 [28 favorites]

More Intel:

U.S. Officials: Putin Personally Involved in U.S. Election Hack

U.S. intelligence officials now believe with "a high level of confidence" that Russian President Vladimir Putin became personally involved in the covert Russian campaign to interfere in the U.S. presidential election, senior U.S. intelligence officials told NBC News.

Two senior officials with direct access to the information say new intelligence shows that Putin personally directed how hacked material from Democrats was leaked and otherwise used. The intelligence came from diplomatic sources and spies working for U.S. allies, the officials said.

Putin's objectives were multifaceted, a high-level intelligence source told NBC News. What began as a "vendetta" against Hillary Clinton morphed into an effort to show corruption in American politics and to "split off key American allies by creating the image that [other countries] couldn't depend on the U.S. to be a credible global leader anymore," the official said.
posted by futz at 8:29 PM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

I come to it having only heard Ellison in more low key moments like interviews... and holy shit, he's got the fire in him. He has a more inclusive, intersectional version of Bernie's message.

Yep, I was impressed with his ability to say what I suspect Bernie means when he puts his foot in his mouth!

I liked his bit about intraparty unity too. That we need the new excited people, and also the experienced folks who have played the game before. And that social justice and economic justice are inextricably entwined and each one reinforces the other.

All my Dean feels are coming back, new and improved.

I concur! And frankly after the last month or so, it was nice to hear someone just get up there and boldly articulate a progressive vision.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 8:30 PM on December 14, 2016 [5 favorites]

Well there sure is more coming out every day that might sway an elector. On one hand, the idea that a foreign head of state was personally involved in election tampering may seem far fetched, on the other hand Putin is former KGB, manipulating narrative and parsing information is spook 101. This is almost political sabotage by guerilla advertising. RING THE BELLS ON MONDAY! ALARM ALARM!
posted by vrakatar at 8:41 PM on December 14, 2016

2013: Key provisions of the Voting Rights Act are struck down, effectively removing all oversight of states and counties previously identified as engaging in voter discrimination. States no longer require approval for various voter restrictions, as well as bureaucratic choices like moving or reducing polling places, reducing poll hours, and eliminating early voting. Non-VRA states are emboldened to enact their own laws.
Affected 2016 battlegrounds: Florida, North Carolina, Virginia (57 EV total)

2012-2016: An additional fourteen states enact new voter restriction laws that remained active as of November 8th, 2016.
Affected 2016 battlegrounds: Colorado, New Hampshire, Ohio, Wisconsin, Virginia (69 EV total)

By 2016, of the 146 "battleground" electoral votes, 104 are held by states that have implemented voter restrictions and/or were formerly required to seek preclearance under the VRA. 69 of these votes are in states whose policies did not exist in the 2012 election.

2016: Despite his misogynistic and racist views, Donald Trump defeats Hillary Clinton for the presidency of the United States. He loses the popular vote, but ekes out 306 electoral votes. He wins 114/148 swing state votes--78 of those from the voter-restrictions subset.

Everyone is extremely shocked. Analysts conclude Clinton should've focused more on white people

And:

There's some shit going down in NC right now:

NC lawmakers call a special session, may now be pushing thru bill that restricts Governor's ability to get a Board of Election majority

NC GOP lawmakers may be mounting a staggering power grab to keep control of election boards. Happening now.

This is it. This is everything.

I read that comment and it was like the scale fell from my eyes. It's not about Hillary. It's not about Bernie. It's not that America has suddenly become more racist (we've always been racist.) It's not that we were basically living under fascism the whole time and this is just the natural end point of who we are. This country didn't change drastically between 2008 and 2016. I wasn't wrong to believe that demographics and social progress and the winds of change were moving - fitfully, and imperfectly, but distinctly - in the right direction.

One law changed. Just one.

The Voting Rights Act was the centerpiece and the heart of the civil rights movement, and we let it break on our watch. It was a safeguard against all of this. When we lost it, we tilted the balance to the worst people in the country, the one the original bad, racist system was designed to elevate and empower at the expense of the rest of us. We are not in Germany in the 1930s. We're here, in America, just fifty years in the past. And it is an ugly, ugly place to be. But we can get out of it. We don't have to fix evil or racism or greed. We've had those all along. What we need is a system that adjusts for those realities.

I signed up for Common Cause's email list and I think they're going to get the majority of my donations from here on in. It's hard, but it's not complicated. We've done it before, and we can do it again.
posted by pretentious illiterate at 8:41 PM on December 14, 2016 [92 favorites]

The NC NAACP and Rev. Barber are calling for people to come protest tomorrow, if you're in the area.
posted by zachlipton at 8:55 PM on December 14, 2016 [11 favorites]

In other news, I'll be able to smoke a bowl legally here in Dukes county in five minutes.
posted by vrakatar at 8:56 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

In other news, I'll be able to smoke a bowl legally here in Dukes county in five minutes.

Well, no, you'll be able to do so without violating state law. It's a good thing the proposed incoming Attorney General is expected to continue the (more or less) Laissez-faire approach to legalization that the current one has, yes?
posted by Candleman at 9:01 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

Oh hell yes, the change in the law will not really change that much for me here, but even symbolic wins help me feel better. Cheers!
posted by vrakatar at 9:06 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

On second thought, never mind the bells. I propose a march on the statehouses monday. Find out where the electors meet in each state and march and be loud and make them cast that vote while you beg them to defend the nation. Maybe even a general strike to provide numbers. General strike ring the bells on monday. Going to bed now stay groovy.
posted by vrakatar at 9:19 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Since we've been talking about Harding and deep corruption, there was an interesting Twitter thread that noted a couple of bits of 1920s history that were unfamiliar to me: firstly, the decision by Republicans not to reapportion at all after the 1920 census, because the shift to cities during the 1910s (encompassing the first wave of the Great Migration) would have cost them their seats; secondly, the 1929 Reapportionment Act which fixed the House at 435 seats and gave much greater control to state legislatures to draw district lines.

There have been conversations here about the kind of shit that might come out of a state-driven constitutional convention, but if the US emerges from the pit it has dug itself, I think it will have a different constitution from the pre-industrial one it has been running well past its use-by date.
posted by holgate at 9:26 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

A Message for Electors to Unite For America asking 37 Republican electors to defect and throw the election to the House, featuring Martin Sheen, Debra Messing, James Cromwell, BD Wong, Noah Wyle, Freda Payne, Bob Odenkirk, J. Smith Cameron, Michael Urie, Moby, Mike Farrell, Loretta Swit, Richard Schiff, Christine Lahti, Steven Pasquale, Dominic Fumusa, Emily Tyra, and Talia Balsam.

I mean, all these videos of celebrities didn't get Clinton elected, but it's something.
posted by zachlipton at 9:26 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

Vox: After a big uproar, Trump’s team has disavowed its controversial climate questionnaire - The nation’s federal employees appear to have just won their first big clash with Donald Trump’s transition team. Or at least it looks that way.

It was a balloon float. Expect about 1 million more of them.
posted by srboisvert at 9:30 PM on December 14, 2016 [16 favorites]

I have no earthly idea who United For America are or who's paying for it, nor do they seem to put that on their website, so if you happen to figure any of that out, give a shout.
posted by zachlipton at 9:32 PM on December 14, 2016

Loretta Swit

It would be perfect-for-2016 ridiculousness if some GOP elector was mostly OK with Trump but couldn't bear the notion of disappointing "Hot Lips" Houlihan...
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 9:32 PM on December 14, 2016 [13 favorites]

Super weird derail, I know, but to AI a cow, you do indeed have to stick one of your arms in its rectum, as part of the process. Go ahead and google, read about it, and then ask your meats professor if you can re-take the test.

Will confirm. The shoulder length rubber glove my vet student college roommate brought home was among the treasured 'religious' icons of our rental house. Along with the jar of 25 single doggo sourced gallstones. He really had the best stories.
posted by srboisvert at 9:37 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

It was a balloon float. Expect about 1 million more of them.

To be sure. But still - it was something bad, and they backed off, at least for now.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:37 PM on December 14, 2016 [3 favorites]

I have no earthly idea who United For America are or who's paying for it, nor do they seem to put that on their website, so if you happen to figure any of that out, give a shout.

I'd assume it's the same filmmaking team that made the videos for Joss Whedon's superpac, but that doesn't mean it's the same people funding it.
posted by Rainbo Vagrant at 10:08 PM on December 14, 2016

The Voting Rights Act was the centerpiece and the heart of the civil rights movement, and we let it break on our watch. It was a safeguard against all of this.

Some of the laws I mentioned were in place prior to the dismantling of the VRA, and even if the VRA were reinstated it wouldn't fix non-preclearance states like Wisconsin and Ohio. What we need is a new VRA, one that governs gerrymandering and invalidates voter ID and other restriction laws across the whole country. Ideally provides for early and mail-in voting too, though that would require a massive rehaul of most states' systems.
posted by Anonymous at 10:17 PM on December 14, 2016

and universal mandatory voting.
posted by j_curiouser at 10:59 PM on December 14, 2016 [2 favorites]

For mandatory voting to be workable we'd have to make election day a federal holiday. Which I think is a good idea but would be difficult to pull off.
posted by Justinian at 11:10 PM on December 14, 2016 [4 favorites]

and lots of early/mail-in opportunities. and paper.
posted by j_curiouser at 11:23 PM on December 14, 2016 [1 favorite]

Well, I've been busy since I inadvertently stirred up a shitstorm here two days ago when I asked (based on the initial response, I feel I need to issue a trigger warning),

do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?

Life overtook me for a bit after that, but it also took me some 42 hours to respond because I took all the responses seriously. I've even got a spreadsheet to prove it. I didn't intend to treat the exchange as a poll (and I have no experience with such things), but I ended up approaching it analytically in order to help me first understand the shape of the data that was delivered, and then formulate a cogent response. I thought it would be a responsible thing to respond in this way rather than (or at least prior to) addressing any outlier comments that might be more tempting, since reaching for the outliers first would probably only derail any subsequent attempt to focus on the thrust of the information people felt it was important to convey.

I'm not going to do much more tonight than some high level reporting out.

It's of course worth bearing in mind the almost dead certainty that the vast majority of participants were passive "lurkers", even though a great many of them surely had some sort of feelings on the matter. There are many possible hidden implications in this fact, which can't really be teased out with the info available. For example, we might suppose that the respondents represent the vector who felt the most passionate. But we might also suppose that at least some of the non-respondents represent a vector of individuals who felt passionately, but refrained from expression because they expected that their views would not be popular. So remember to accompany what follows with the requisite grain of salt.

Without further ado, here's some of what I gleaned from 33 people who opted to respond to the question more or less directly:

• More people were focused on the degree of hostility than on the proportion of those who harbored it.

Proportion of haters
23:5 - The ratio of people whose language was strongly consistent with the "overwhelming majority" part, vs. those who were more consistent with "a significant subset".

One person used language that I could not resolve either way.
Four people did not answer that aspect of the question at all.

Degree of hostility
25:8 - The ratio of people whose language was strongly consistent with the "actively hate us" part, vs. those who were more consistent with "callously indifferent about harming us".

Nobody used language that could not be resolved either way.
Everybody answered that aspect of the question.

• Seven people appeared to identify all or most of "us" as the targets of hostility, and these same seven did not subdivide this solidarity by mentioning any specific subgroups.
• Nine people mentioned a single subgroup
• Eight people mentioned multiple subgroups
• Nine people did not identify any targets of hostility

7 - All/Most
7 - Jews
5 - Non-White
5 - LGBTQ
4 - Women
4 - Muslims
3 - Mexicans
2 - Journalists
2 - Mentally Ill/Disabled
2 - Physically Ill/ Disabled
1 - Blacks
1 - "Illegals"
1 - Non-Traditional Families
1 - City-Dwellers
1 - "Elites"
1 - Atheists
0 - Immigrants

• Nineteen people (58%) made at least one "reversible" (or, if you will, "reciprocable") statement of substance, meaning something more involved than a simple binary response that one could easily imagine a Trump supporter saying about "us".
• 26 of 33 people offered some analysis and/or guided judgment to support their conclusions (completely aside from whether or not I agreed with their reasoning); 7 did not.
• 12 people offered personal anecdata to support their views, 21 did not.
• Five people used abusive or callous language (including name-calling) toward general targets.
• Overall there was significant (though not drastic) skew away from the question as asked. Some people directly stated or implied that the question was irrelevant. A few went further, invalidating the views of others or accusing them of acting in bad faith. But the majority communicated in reasonably respectful ways with few lapses, especially considering the strong feelings involved.

Overall...yeah, that happened.
posted by perspicio at 1:03 AM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

Those are shocking stats. Where did you get the group from? I'm curious how much it's likely to more reflect T_D being a bag of dicks than the Trump supporting population in general.
posted by jaduncan at 4:05 AM on December 15, 2016

I did not realize that you were attempting to do statistical analysis of comments. I did not comment previously to avoid a pile-on. However, if your preference is for the tens of thousands of MeFites to all respond personally to you, I will. I too feel that most Trump voters were guided by hate, although for many of them it is implicit bias that they are unaware of. In their minds they don't "hate" all members of these groups, and may indeed have "a black friend", they just resent some horrible stereotype of them and vote based on that stereotype. You can tally one in each of your categories for me. You also might want to go back and tally who responded. I am a white Protestant woman from the south who grew up in a rural area in western NC and now lives in Atlanta. In other words, I am speaking from personal experience about my childhood friends and my family. That part really sucks, and may explain some of the visceral responses you received.
posted by hydropsyche at 4:12 AM on December 15, 2016 [17 favorites]

I'm a liberal elite member and my Trump-voting relatives don't hate me. Then again, I don't participate in social media, and everyone hates everyone on there.
posted by Coda Tronca at 4:32 AM on December 15, 2016

I don't think it's all that great to use people's expressions of their emotions and experiences as material for statistical analysis. It comes across as rather cold and tone-deaf. If I tell you that I'm scared, don't ask me how many percent scared I am, just give me a hug and a cup of tea.
posted by Too-Ticky at 4:35 AM on December 15, 2016 [45 favorites]

The ongoing bullshit in North Carolina is a straight-up attack on democracy. In particular, the way the election board law is written is astonishingly brazen. It doesn't specifically say "Republican" and "Democrat" but instead refers to the party with the most and second-most "registered affiliates" -- a proxy for votes received -- and gives control in federal election years to the second-place party. That's tantamount to saying that the party with fewer votes in an election is the winner.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 4:45 AM on December 15, 2016 [29 favorites]

@realDonaldTrump Has anyone looked at the really poor numbers of @VanityFair Magazine. Way down, big trouble, dead! Graydon Carter, no talent, will be out! [real]

*subscribes to Vanity Fair, I guess*
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:24 AM on December 15, 2016 [10 favorites]

I'm not going to do much more tonight than some high level reporting out.

What categories was my response in?
posted by Talez at 5:41 AM on December 15, 2016

In case you're wondering, as I was, why PEOTUS would be tweeting about Vanity Fair, their top story today suggests that Trump Grill may be the worst restaurant in America.

But that taco bowl!
posted by Superplin at 5:43 AM on December 15, 2016 [19 favorites]

Waite a minute... Pretty sure it came up before Hillary lost. Maybe in a debate. Maybe even in a press conference where someone asked them to hack Hillary.

@realDonaldTrump
If Russia, or some other entity, was hacking, why did the White House waite so long to act? Why did they only complain after Hillary lost?

Love that it's clearly getting to him.
posted by chris24 at 5:49 AM on December 15, 2016 [7 favorites]

Waite, lol.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:51 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Hoyt Waite was a great baseball player.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 5:54 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

In case you're wondering, as I was, why PEOTUS would be tweeting about Vanity Fair, their top story today suggests that Trump Grill may be the worst restaurant in America.

Is there some way we can start planting stories about Putin complaining about Trump's hotels' amenities? I feel like the only way we could reliably convince him to not make the US a puppet state of Russia is if he thinks Russians have said mean things about the quality of the towels at Trump Tower.
posted by tocts at 5:55 AM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

@realDonaldTrump
If Russia, or some other entity, was hacking, why did the White House waite so long to act? Why did they only complain after Hillary lost?

I don't say this to defend the orange shitstain, but in a weird way this may be the most honest statement he's made of late. He might legitimately not understand why the White House waited, because Trump himself never would have. In a similar situation, he would be tweeting about how "people keep telling me ..." about this thing even if there was literally zero proof.

The notion that the President might wait for confirmation, or that he might want to avoid causing a massive panic without being sure, would never occur to Trump.
posted by tocts at 5:57 AM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

I don't say this to defend the orange shitstain, but in a weird way this may be the most honest statement he's made of late. He might legitimately not understand why the White House waited, because Trump himself never would have.

Except he knows that the Administration knew about and was acting on this before the election. He got intelligence briefings on it during the campaign. The DHS released a joint statement from 17 US intelligence agencies before the election.
posted by chris24 at 6:02 AM on December 15, 2016 [12 favorites]

@realDonaldTrump
If Russia, or some other entity, was hacking, why did the White House waite so long to act? Why did they only complain after Hillary lost?

If nothing else, this shows Trump is starting to think like a president, because I'm sure Obama asks himself this same question every damn day.
posted by gusottertrout at 6:03 AM on December 15, 2016 [7 favorites]

I remember when potatoe was enough to ridicule a candidate. Now it's potatoe all the way down.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 6:11 AM on December 15, 2016 [25 favorites]

Let's call the whole thing off?
posted by gusottertrout at 6:14 AM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

So what was the publish-to-tweet time for the VF article?
posted by Etrigan at 6:14 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

So what was the publish-to-tweet time for the VF article?

17 hours, 3 minutes. He's getting sloppy.
posted by chris24 at 6:16 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

I didn't know the President decided who the editor of Vanity Fair was
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 6:21 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Reading over the Vanity Fair article. The Taco Bowl has "Dago's famous guacamole." Seriously? Does the term dago mean anything other than:

n. pl. da·gos or da·goes Offensive Slang
Used as a disparaging term for a person of Italian, Spanish, or Portuguese descent. (American Heritage Dictionary, citation).

Or Collin's dictionary cited at the same source: derogatory a member of a Latin race, esp a Spaniard or Portuguese.

Or Webster's College Dictionary (same source): usage: This term is a slur and should be avoided. It is used with disparaging intent and is perceived as highly insulting.
—n. (a contemptuous term used to refer to a person of Italian or sometimes Spanish origin or descent.)
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 6:28 AM on December 15, 2016 [17 favorites]

I didn't know the President decided who the editor of Vanity Fair was

I bet everyone is going to learn a bunch of new things the President gets to do over the next four years.
posted by Etrigan at 6:47 AM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

That Vanity Fair article just got him another million voters:

Donald Trump is “a poor person’s idea of a rich person,” Fran Lebowitz recently observed at The Vanity Fair New Establishment Summit. “They see him. They think, ‘If I were rich, I’d have a fabulous tie like that.’”
posted by Coda Tronca at 6:47 AM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

How is Trump Grill(e) not a fixture in every suburban factory-outlet shopping park in the country? Complete with a gift shop of course, fully stocked with Team Trump hats, T-shirts, bumper stickers, and an appropriate selection from the Ivanka line of fragrances and fashion accessories. Or go the other way and attach the eatery to the TRUMP big-box store, with the full array of his name-branded cheap crappy crap.
posted by hangashore at 6:47 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Except he knows that the Administration knew about and was acting on this before the election. He got intelligence briefings on it during the campaign. The DHS released a joint statement from 17 US intelligence agencies before the election.

This latest story broke in the context of a report that the CIA gave to the president that Russia was not only interfering in the election, but was interfering in order to get Trump elected. Obama knew if he came out with this on his own he'd be seen as trying to swing the election himself, so he had the CIA present this to a small bipartisan group of Congresspeople in the hopes that the announcement could get the backing of both parties' leaders. But the Republicans--particularly Mitch McConnell--threatened to make a big stink and accuse him of making it all up to get Clinton elected if they went public, so they didn't. And then McConnell's wife got a position in the Trump administration, so . . .

As has been noted, Obama's folly was (A) thinking the Republicans gave a shit about this country and (B) assuming that Clinton would be elected anyway and this could be handled afterwards.

How is Trump Grill(e) not a fixture in every suburban factory-outlet shopping park in the country?

Oh, I'm sure by the end of the next four years it will be. He'll make sure of that.
posted by Anonymous at 6:50 AM on December 15, 2016

mynameisluka: Oh good, now Priebus is hinting that press conferences will go away, too.

President-Elect Trump Breaks With Long History Of Press Conferences (NPR, Dec. 15, 2016)

This was to be the day President-elect Donald Trump would hold his first press conference since winning the presidency last month. It was supposed to be about how he would address his potential business conflicts of interest as president. It isn't happening — postponed, his team says, until January.

Already, no president-elect (dating back to at least Carter) has waited longer to hold a press conference. One irony of Trump's extended run without a press conference is just how critical he and his campaign were of rival Hillary Clinton's choice to go an extended period (276 days in total) without holding a press conference.
...
Unless Trump holds a press conference by Jan. 21, one day after his inauguration, he will hit the very mark for which he ridiculed Clinton on Twitter. We've created this handy widget to track how long it has been since Trump held a formal press conference, and how many times he has tweeted in that time. It will keep counting until he holds one.

It currently reads:
It’s been
140 days
since Donald Trump’s last press conference.
In the meantime, he’s tweeted 1,456 times.

Why does this matter?

Unlike other ways of getting messages out, press conferences hold public officials more accountable to the American people because they have to answer questions in an uncontrolled environment.
Good on NPR for this one. (Now, if they'd only provide code for others to embed the widget in their webpages, too.)
posted by filthy light thief at 7:00 AM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

everybody had matching towels: The Hillary Clinton campaign, trying to encourage a peaceful transition, has gone almost completely dark, with her most notable appearances coming in selfies with strangers. Nobody deserves downtime more than Mrs. Clinton, but while she is decompressing, the country is moving toward its biggest electoral mistake in history.

What if her campaign hasn't gone dark, but is planning on various "what if" strategies? Let's say that somehow, miraculously, 37 "faithless electors" flip and elect HRC on December 19th. That means she has just over a month to plan her transition, which isn't a lot of time to do a complete about-face from the path (vaguely) laid out by _rump.

Or, her team is working on strategies to counter proposals from the _rump camp, possibly even working behind the scenes to gather support to lessen the impacts of _rump and his picks.

I can't believe that HRC just threw in the towel and said "good luck with that chump, I'm going to take care of myself now."

(Also, she's probably keeping safe, given the volatile nature of many _rump supporters, who are also armed.)
posted by filthy light thief at 7:16 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

I also would like to know how a supposed statistical breakdown of Mefite's comments towards a particular statement is illuminating of anything.
posted by agregoli at 7:25 AM on December 15, 2016 [16 favorites]

I can't believe that HRC just threw in the towel and said "good luck with that chump, I'm going to take care of myself now."

Obama's her boss and he made his view crystal clear on day one after the election:

"Because we are now all rooting for [Trump's] success in uniting and leading the country. The peaceful transition of power is one of the hallmarks of our democracy. And over the next few months we are going to show that to the world.
...
Now, everybody is sad when their side loses an election. But the day after, we have to remember that we’re actually all on one team. This is an intramural scrimmage."
posted by Coda Tronca at 7:28 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

My fav bit from the Vanity Fair article, in reference to the Trump Grill(e) cheeseburger:

Presumably, Trump’s Great America tastes like an M.S.G.-flavored kitchen sponge lodged between two other sponges.

posted by Gaz Errant at 7:33 AM on December 15, 2016 [20 favorites]

Graydon Carter dubbed Trump the "short-fingered vulgarian" in the 1980s.

To this day, I receive the occasional envelope from Trump. There is always a photo of him—generally a tear sheet from a magazine. On all of them he has circled his hand in gold Sharpie in a valiant effort to highlight the length of his fingers. I almost feel sorry for the poor fellow because, to me, the fingers still look abnormally stubby. The most recent offering arrived earlier this year, before his decision to go after the Republican presidential nomination. Like the other packages, this one included a circled hand and the words, also written in gold Sharpie: “See, not so short!” I sent the picture back by return mail with a note attached, saying, “Actually, quite short.” Which I can only assume gave him fits.

At the Trump Grill(e) the waiters are clearly coached to rebut this even out of context:

I asked the waiter what Trump’s children eat. He didn’t seem to understand the question, or, like Marco Rubio, appeared unable to depart from his prescribed talking points.“Oh, I’ve shaken hands with him before, and they’re pretty normal-sized hands,” he responded.

posted by kirkaracha at 7:35 AM on December 15, 2016 [21 favorites]

How is Trump Grill(e) not a fixture in every suburban factory-outlet shopping park in the country?

Give it four-to-eight years.
posted by drezdn at 7:40 AM on December 15, 2016

I also would like to know how a supposed statistical breakdown of Mefite's comments towards a particular statement is illuminating of anything.

As for me, I am deeply amused that anyone could be quite that badly afflicted with engineer's disease.

Now I am off to make a radar chart to prove that all our political troubles are due to economic insecurity based on Fanfare comments that I will put into condescending categories.
posted by winna at 7:40 AM on December 15, 2016 [40 favorites]

So, having only a bit of time and less than a lot of sleep, let me just follow up briefly and, hopefully, in a reasonable fashion.

First of all, I am personally alarmed, scared, and angry about what the presumed-president-elect himself and the movement surrounding him is doing. Also what the fact that he got where he is (and how he did it) in the first place underscores about our society. Also, I have encountered and continue to encounter veiled hostility by a small number of Trump-supporters who know something of my beliefs, though these are among a substantially larger set of supporters who exhibit no such hostility. I trust what I perceive from my direct encounters with these people. But I also understand that they don't tell the whole story.

I received a lot of feedback to my question, far more than I expected. I didn't see a responsible way to address it other than carefully, and I had to make my own determination about how to do that. Because I really am interested in people's responses to the actual question I asked, and also because I think there is pertinent and illuminating information worth sharing in the aggregate response, I chose to gather and parse the body of information rather than cherry-picking things I personally felt the most strongly about. If I had done the latter, it would have been hard to avoid a combative form of discussion. If my approach seems too cold and calculating, well, I did explain in my most recent post that it wasn't my intention when I asked the question. The volume and nature of the response prompted me to change my approach.

While I do think the question I asked is a valid one, I understand that many people took me to be challenging their right to be scared, or their lived experiences that drive it. I will stand here and insist that I didn't ever question that right or those experiences. But I will own it if it turns out I was wrong, and I apologize here and now for inadvertently triggering already-triggered people. I reiterate: I'm scared too. If I had known what was to come, I certainly would have been more careful about how I asked the question.

I think that even the most out-of-bounds responses it garnered (and there really were very few of those) are pretty excusable in light of the fact that people personally have been and continue to be on the receiving end of hate by members of extended Team PPEOTUS. So don't think I'm trying to make a personal point about any of that. My question was more about people's sensibilities regarding the shape of the thing that is feared.

I think one of the most notable aspects of the responses that came to light was the breadth of what different people mean by "hate". There was clearly a spectrum of sensibilities that came into play.

Final note, for now:

I'm not seeking thousands of responses. I'm not continuing to collect responses as parsable data. And I'm not going to de-anonymize anything for anyone; I certainly wouldn't do so publicly in the thread, even if asked. I had to make personal determinations about meanings in responses, and while I stand by those determinations, I wouldn't go jumping to conclusions about where any individual landed in the data.
posted by perspicio at 7:43 AM on December 15, 2016

"Now, everybody is sad when their side loses an election. But the day after, we have to remember that we’re actually all on one team. This is an intramural scrimmage." –German Social Democrats in 1933, probably
posted by entropicamericana at 7:44 AM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

I loves me some data science, but Voxsplaining the comments of other community members doesn't seem like the most productive direction for this thread to go. For one thing, it's totally unresponsive to the many comments where people raised substantive objections to the entire line of questioning, noting the positioning of the goalposts and the unusually high number of qualifiers. More importantly, though, it retreats from the original argument entirely. The question was "do people here really believe that the overwhelming majority of Trump supporters actively hate them?" and that question was answered. What is the response to that answer? What was the original question trying to get at? We know nothing more about that than we knew when the question was first asked. What are you trying to prove?
posted by tonycpsu at 7:45 AM on December 15, 2016 [18 favorites]

This latest story broke in the context of a report that the CIA gave to the president that Russia was not only interfering in the election, but was interfering in order to get Trump elected.

Who cares about the subtleties of this latest incarnation in the press. Trump sure as shit doesn't. The Russia hacking story has been out there and obvious that it was to benefit Trump for months. And Trump has been attacking that obvious fact for months, well before the latest leak.

I honestly don't get basically saying "well, if you ignore everything he's said and done in the past, and give him a huge benefit of the doubt, and accept his bullshit framing on this, then he might have said something that kinda maybe could have a shred of truth in it if you look at it the just right way. Maybe."

Meanwhile while we're getting pedantic with semantics, he's dismantling democracy.
posted by chris24 at 7:46 AM on December 15, 2016 [7 favorites]

Ex-Hill Staffers Put a Spin on the Tea Party Playbook in Anti-Trump Guide

A group of former congressional staffers has a message for Democrats dismayed at Donald Trump’s election: act like the tea party.

In an online guide [Indivisible: A Practical Guide for Resisting the Trump Agenda] made public Wednesday night, a number of those onetime Hill staffers say that the best way for individuals to derail the policy agenda of Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) is to organize locally and badger their own congressional representatives to vote against individual pieces of legislation.

posted by kirkaracha at 7:48 AM on December 15, 2016 [23 favorites]

Wow. If I'd known my comment was going to be included in some of the shoddiest statistical analysis I've seen in a long while, I'd've commented differently. Using responses to a generally condescending question as a basis for your charts is at best tone-deaf and at more likely rude as hell.

You weren't asking us to fill out a survey so you could quantify things. You were asking whether we really believed a thing that's pretty damn true. You were questioning our experiences.

I do not consent to my responses being used in your statistical analyses. If you want to try that, (a) use SurveyMonkey, (b) ask better questions, and (c) tell people up-front that that's what you're doing.
posted by XtinaS at 7:51 AM on December 15, 2016 [30 favorites]

I didn't intend to treat the exchange as a poll

And, from both a moderator and a casual data nerd perspective, it seems pretty deeply questionable to have done so after the fact and I wish you hadn't posted that. Divesting it from the thread at this point seems too after-the-fact, but to be clear it makes me pretty actively uncomfortable to see folks do this kind of post-hoc "you didn't know you were taking a survey, but now you were!" thing in general but in particular in response to charged topics.

I'm not assuming any attempt to harm here—I can totally sympathize with the "I'm not sure what to do with this response, so what I'll do is try and analyze it" instinct—but this wasn't cool and has achieved I think basically the opposite of avoiding offense and hurt. Please think twice in the future about whether and how to approach something like this, or check in with the mods about it. If you want to run a survey, design an actual survey and give folks explicit consent to participate. If you don't want to bother with that, don't do it.
posted by cortex at 7:52 AM on December 15, 2016 [39 favorites]

If anyone else is wondering how to save a local copy of the "Indivisible" docucment, you need to page through it in your browser so it downloads every page, then save it like a normal html page.
posted by Coventry at 7:54 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

I think that this kind of behavior deserves more of a response than tut-tutting about not doing it again and a quick sweep under the rug.
posted by zombieflanders at 7:57 AM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

NYT Editorial Board: Donald Trump's Denial About Russia

Mr. Trump’s reaction to the C.I.A.’s findings leaves him isolated, and underscores his dangerous unfamiliarity with the role of intelligence in maintaining national security. There could be no more “useful idiot,” to use Lenin’s term of art, than an American president who doesn’t know he’s being played by a wily foreign power. Or maybe it’s as Mr. Trump says: He’s “a smart person,” and avoids presidential intelligence briefings because they repeat what he already knows. If so, what else does he know about Russia that the intelligence agencies don’t?

posted by melissasaurus at 8:02 AM on December 15, 2016 [10 favorites]

You guys, Trump Grill will never be a mall fixture. The emperor insists it's a fully-dressed "exclusive" spot, and the whole point is to force people to make the pilgrimage to the castle, to pay bags of gold for their sponge sandwiches.

Making it more accessible would defeat the purpose, and make it seem to be about, like, food.
posted by Superplin at 8:03 AM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

Hey, as one of the people who unwittingly got swept into a data-collection project: So happens I'm also professionally a semi-expert in how to collect and use survey data ethically. Which makes me twitch extra hard above and beyond the "well, that was pretty offensive" twitching I'm doing just as a member of the Metafilter community. So, on several levels, from the bottom of my heart: Don't do this sort of thing. If you're going to, ping me for some advice on how to do it right.

I'll be over in the corner twitching if anyone needs me. (Possibly also trying to claim that my time spent on MeFi today is actually time spent doing my work, because I got to observe a real-life case study.)
posted by Stacey at 8:04 AM on December 15, 2016 [24 favorites]

I'm just pissed that I didn't get my own "calls it lynching" category.
posted by Etrigan at 8:05 AM on December 15, 2016 [10 favorites]

LOL, Trump's tweet probably increased exposure of that VF article.
posted by dirigibleman at 8:08 AM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

I posted how many times in this thread and didn't get included at all in the analysis?!
posted by asteria at 8:10 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Ivanka Trump Will Not Fix "Women's Issues." She Will Distract From Them. [Sady Doyle for Elle]

The goal of Trumpism is not to benefit women; it's to benefit one woman, Ivanka, or the one type of woman that she represents. She provides her father with a human credential and downplays his sexism; in exchange, she gains an invaluable boost for her aspirational lifestyle brand (only $10,800 for the bracelet Ivanka wore on 60 Minutes!) and the opportunity to charge strangers $50,000 for a "coffee chat," thus proving that women really can succeed after all. We're not meant to benefit from her; we're meant to look at her, and think about how we can be more like her. We're meant to blame ourselves for falling short, as we have with every other Exceptional Woman to date. Ivanka is the Disney princess; we're the peasant chorus who watches, and serves, and sighs at her pretty hair. Hell, maybe we'll even pitch in some background vocals on a few of the big musical numbers. Peasants always do, in those movies, even though they're probably all starving.

posted by melissasaurus at 8:12 AM on December 15, 2016 [22 favorites]

You guys, Trump Grill will never be a mall fixture. The emperor insists it's a fully-dressed "exclusive" spot...Making it more accessible would defeat the purpose, and make it seem to be about, like, food.

I wonder if it's yet dawned on Trump that he is the most public of public figures now and people can do whatever the hell they like satirizing the Trump brand.
posted by snuffleupagus at 8:12 AM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

You can also use this link to open the “Indivisible” document in the normal Google Docs interface, which gives access to all the settings and tools.
posted by mbrubeck at 8:13 AM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

Trump's unorthodox Cabinet

Larry Schweikart, a conservative history professor and the co-author of “A Patriot’s History of the United States,” said that there were several Trump Cabinet selections who would “not in a million years” have gotten the nod from a more centrist GOP president.

“This goes back to the fact that DeVos and some of these others are people who actually want to effect change. It looks like Rick Perry will be Energy secretary. This is a guy who wanted to abolish the Department of Energy. … These are terrific choices! They are so in-your-face to the media and to the Democrats.”
posted by gusottertrout at 8:13 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Can we get someone out here to sweep up the pile of mics qcubed just dropped?
posted by Etrigan at 8:20 AM on December 15, 2016 [24 favorites]

House conservatives want Trump to undo regulations on climate, FDA, Uber

Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), the incoming chairman of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, used a meeting with Donald Trump to deliver a list of 232 regulations that the incoming president could repeal immediately. “We felt like it was important to put together a real working document,” Meadows told CNN.

The list, shared by Meadows’s office, includes President George W. Bush’s order restricting access to executive branch papers and Federal Aviation Administration regulations that limit overland supersonic flights. The rationale for repealing that last regulation, in its entirety: “Make Sonic Boom Again.”

That’s as frivolous as the document gets. The rest of it, in no particular order, recommends undoing as many of President Obama’s initiatives as possible.
posted by gusottertrout at 8:26 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

@ToluseO
Sen. Lindsey Graham said on Fox News that if Rex Tillerson doesn't acknowledge Russia hacked election and support *new* sanctions, he's a no
posted by chris24 at 8:28 AM on December 15, 2016 [26 favorites]

Naming people without doing background checks. Lol, I'm sure this will go well.

Donald Trump’s Nominees Are Likely to Face Heavy Senate Vetting

"Cabinet picks have been named without extensive reviews of their background and financial records, people familiar with the process say."
posted by chris24 at 8:32 AM on December 15, 2016 [10 favorites]

Cabinet picks have been named without really even a cursory review of their anything whatsoever, people familiar with Trump's entire candidacy safely presume.
posted by cortex at 8:34 AM on December 15, 2016 [38 favorites]

(If you're having trouble downloading the "Indivisible" paper, I put a PDF in my Dropbox: Indivisible: A Practical Guide for Resisting the Trump Agenda)
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 8:36 AM on December 15, 2016 [16 favorites]

Donald Trump’s Nominees Are Likely to Face Heavy Senate Vetting

Can we just come up with a "Surely this..." secret sign to indicate that we don't believe the Republicans as a group are ever going to push back against Trump on anything substantive and that these sorts of articles are laughable at best?
posted by Etrigan at 8:37 AM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

Trump knows the editor of Vanity Fair because he used to be the editor of SPY, and coined the epithet "short-fingered-vulgarian".
posted by murphy slaw at 8:39 AM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

"Cabinet picks have been named without extensive reviews of their background and financial records, people familiar with the process say."

What about the Russian vetting process?
posted by srboisvert at 8:40 AM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

Can we just come up with a "Surely this..." secret sign to indicate that we don't believe the Republicans as a group are ever going to push back against Trump on anything substantive and that these sorts of articles are laughable at best?

Well, Democrats get to ask questions at the hearings as well. And when you stop laughing, let's hope some of them actually stand up for something for once. Or we may be left with Lindsey Graham.
posted by chris24 at 8:41 AM on December 15, 2016 [7 favorites]

Democrats get to ask questions at the hearings as well.

I'll believe it when I see it.
posted by Etrigan at 8:41 AM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

(the "get to" part, that is -- there are plenty who I think will push back, but I hope they get much of a chance)
posted by Etrigan at 8:43 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

When are we expecting these first hearings? I want to know how long we have between "this is probably the horror we are living with" and "yep definitely that horror/horror averted".

Also, when do we know elector votes?
posted by corb at 8:44 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

I'm starting to see the Russian grey propaganda as a relevant but not particularly actionable distraction from the much more immediate problem of what to do about the string of hideous cabinet nominations and various other concerns like helping people make their citizenship official.

It seems pretty clear that your dedicated neo-nazi/alt-rightist/dittohead McCarthy-ite is now somehow totally on board with Putin's Russia. So while Russia's involvement/complicity is certainly worth investigating, in terms of intelligence agencies, congressional investigative committees[barf], etc., I don't think it's doing much to convince future voters one way or another. Maybe I'm wrong, and there are a bunch of crusty waffles for whom "Rooskie Spies!!!" is finally enough to get them to question the legitimacy of the Trumpians. Or maybe that story is meant to do something else. But from here I'm just not seeing what it accomplishes.
posted by aspersioncast at 8:44 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

The weaponized link-checking of emotional labor you did before was vile. This is beyond the pale.

I think that this kind of behavior deserves more of a response than tut-tutting about not doing it again and a quick sweep under the rug.

I would support some sort of MeTa opportunity to respond, or might *set up such*

This was remarkably egregious behavior and of a thread that dismisses minority experience as not having value unless it's in some sort of statistically meaningful aggregate.
posted by zutalors! at 8:44 AM on December 15, 2016 [9 favorites]

Donald Trump’s Nominees Are Likely to Face Heavy Senate Vetting

I assume that the headline writer made a mistake similar to the person that emailed Podesta about the phishing attempt. They surely mean "Unlikely."
posted by drezdn at 8:48 AM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

Sen. Lindsey Graham said on Fox News that if Rex Tillerson doesn't acknowledge Russia hacked election and support *new* sanctions, he's a no

This is going to get interesting. I don't think Tillerson is going to be able to do that.
posted by diogenes at 8:50 AM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

Even with Graham probably being a no, Manchin is probably a yes.

I hope Graham can get his bud McCain on board too. As bad as McCain has been since 2008, I hope/pray that now that he'll never have to run for reelection again, we get Maverick McCain back.
posted by chris24 at 8:54 AM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

It never occurred to me that taking an accidentally obtained body of info, trying to make sense of it, and trying to comment meaningfully on it, would be harmful. I sincerely thought and think that there is useful information for reflection in the responses.

persipicio, personally, your "data analysis" felt like a ham-handed attempt to cover up the blind insensitivity of your original comment by pretending your "does anyone really think Trump voters hate them" hypothetical was meant to be taken literally for the purposes of collecting "survey" data. You'd have saved yourself a lot of time and trouble if you just apologized and left it at that.

And if that's not the case, well, then it appears as if you asked a deliberately incendiary question to trick people into providing emotional responses for an experiment.

You don't come off well in either scenario.
posted by Anonymous at 8:55 AM on December 15, 2016

Maybe I'm wrong, and there are a bunch of crusty waffles for whom "Rooskie Spies!!!" is finally enough to get them to question the legitimacy of the Trumpians. Or maybe that story is meant to do something else. But from here I'm just not seeing what it accomplishes.

It's not a "story," it's a frickin' threat to our national security. And what it "accomplishes" is delivering a dire warning about whose interests will be served by any wars we dind ourselves fighting ocer the next few years. This is not just politics, just "optics." I don't care if Joe six pack cares or not, except to the extent that his opinions have influence over the poltical leaders he helps elect to protect our national security. The target audience for these CIA briefings is Republican Congressional leaders, and it's their frickin' JOB to care.
posted by OnceUponATime at 9:03 AM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

I hope/pray that now that he'll never have to run for reelection again, we get Maverick McCain back

I live in Arizona and can confirm that Senator McCain has been spotted in Home Depot with a large supply of dimensional lumber and blueprints for a half-pipe.
posted by compartment at 9:05 AM on December 15, 2016 [14 favorites]

LOL, Trump's tweet probably increased exposure of that VF article.

Hey, if it draws attention away from the CIA/Russia thing, it's all good from his perspective.
posted by Coventry at 9:05 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

You can also use this link to open the “Indivisible” document in the normal Google Docs interface, which gives access to all the settings and tools.

Doesn't seem to work for me. It automatically redirects to the "preview" URL.
posted by Coventry at 9:11 AM on December 15, 2016

emjaybee mentioned DailyAction above. If, like me, you are having trouble getting organized calling your rep, or have trouble with wording your opinions (I tend to just sort of sputter) - you may also find it helpful. They send a text, with a brief text of the issue for the day. You call a toll free number to hear a recording of an issue recap & talking points, and then punch in your zip and they send you to your appropriate Government Person (today I got to talk to Rep. Greg Walden's office again).

Give it a try if you want to start taking action but (like me) don't feel like you know quite how.
posted by hilaryjade at 9:18 AM on December 15, 2016 [9 favorites]

Jonathan Chait, New York Magazine: Why Conservatives Were Wrong About Why Republicans Like Trump

Donald Trump’s intellectual critics on the left and on the right have long viewed him in roughly similar terms — as an ignorant, authoritarian demagogue — but have disagreed on the intellectual tradition from which he has sprung. [...]

The election, and the immediate period that has followed, has provided a good test of the competing theories. If Trump is a progressive or otherwise an impostor on the right, many if not most conservative Republican voters would have withheld support from him. And once elected, he’d have a fractious relationship with mainstream conservatives in his party. Instead, the opposite has happened. Trump endured minimal defections among his base, has filled his administration mostly with standard-issue conservative Republicans, and has worked closely with Paul Ryan and other Republican leaders to pass a domestic agenda not dramatically different from the one any other Republican would have signed. This is indicative of exactly the outcome I predicted should Trump win: Republicans “are willing to give Trump control of the military, the Department of Justice, and the domestic-security apparatus as long as Ryan controls the legislative agenda.”

Read on to point and laugh at National Review hack Kevin Williamson protesting too much about Paul Ryan being described as an Objectivist.
posted by tonycpsu at 9:18 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

I'm not saying it's not a big deal, OnceUponATime. It's enormous, and a total threat to national security. But no one on any of these threads is a Republican Congressional leader.

The point I was trying to make is that for us, many/most of whom are closer to "Joe Six Pack" in your framing, there's nothing particularly actionable about the (again apparently very real and not to be minimized) Russian threat to our national security. We can make a lot of phone calls I guess, but none of us voted for these fuckers, AFAIK. I can call these guys about Russian hacking until I'm blue in the face, but if they've already decided "hey this is fine" I'm just not sure what I can actually do about it, and I know there are other productive things I could be doing to help.
posted by aspersioncast at 9:19 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

And I didn't mean "story" as in "fiction," but as in "narrative framing."
posted by aspersioncast at 9:24 AM on December 15, 2016

Ailes Defender Kimberly Guilfoyle Might be Trump's Press Secretary

Here's the spin on this possible pick:
Some in Trump’s inner circle have argued that Guilfoyle, who is half-Puerto Rican, would be a more sympathetic face when flacking some of Trump’s more divisive stances on immigration and pro-life issues. [...]

Um, Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens, and besides, Guilfoyle was born in San Francisco, which was on the U.S. mainland the last time I looked (though her father is an immigrant -- from Ireland).

Back in July, Guilfoyle defended her then-boss, Roger Ailes, when Gretchen Carlson accused him of sexual harassment: [...]

Yeah, Fox has been a really supportive environment -- a place where Guilfoyle, a lawyer and former prosecutor, can be asked on the air, "If those legs of yours were a foot shorter, do you think you'd be here?" But I think she'd be an ideal Trump press secretary -- she's suggested killing all the Gitmo detainees, she's erroneously asserted that Barack Obama never visited victims of terrorist attacks, and she's claimed that Obama's relationship with the media has been all sweetness and light apart from his fair, balanced treatment at the hands of her employer [...]

So, yes, she'd be a perfect choice.

posted by tonycpsu at 9:34 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

“This goes back to the fact that DeVos and some of these others are people who actually want to effect change. It looks like Rick Perry will be Energy secretary. This is a guy who wanted to abolish the Department of Energy. … These are terrific choices! They are so in-your-face to the media and to the Democrats."

Schweikart has got to know better than to engage in this kind of thinking himself, so I can only assume he's trying to draw some kind of bullshit dichotomy between "in-your-face to the media and to the Democrats" and "only acceptable to those horrible status quo insider elites." There's a whole lot of things that could be horrible for the media and the Dems AND horrible for everybody else, you know, Lar.
posted by Rykey at 9:38 AM on December 15, 2016

I hope/pray that now that he'll never have to run for reelection again, we get Maverick McCain back

"Maverick McCain" was only ever a creation of CNN. It literally started because he went on TV more often than typical Senators. He's voted straight party line every single time it mattered, and played his part to sabotage health care, immigration, the Patriot Act reforms, he even voted for torture. Name the last time he broke with the GOP position on anything that mattered. I'll wait.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:58 AM on December 15, 2016 [15 favorites]

I don't really understand why everyone wants to say "move along from this Russia thing". It strikes me as....well, let's say that we are the neighbors of the boy who cried wolf, and we got really skeptical of people saying that there were wolves, for very good reason. And then one day...there's a tsunami! And we're all "oh yeah, that's got to be bullshit, after all that kid was always claiming that there were wolves and there never were".

We know what Putin's Russia looks like. We know how he governs. Someone who is open in his admiration for Putin and actually appears to have strong political and financial ties to him is extremely, extremely dangerous, particularly at this moment when US institutions are so weak and compromised. If he has such ties to Putin that Putin is actually going to quite a lot of effort to throw the election, we should be extremely worried.

As a queer person, I find it bizarre and disheartening that most people seem to have bracketed homophobia in Russia - it's one of those "there are bad things out there elsewhere in the world, yeah, that's bad" things on most people's lists, but when a Putinist seems to be set to become president, I myself get cold chills. I don't want to live in a Putinist state.

I think that people are going to look back on this in fifty years with the same bafflement with which we look on the last legislative twitchings that gave Hitler the chancellorship. (And the actual deals that he cut are what's really scary - he cozied up to the last people who had the power to stop him and they rolled over.) How did people see all these warning signs and not take them seriously? Why did people believe in the strength of what were obviously collapsing social norms?
posted by Frowner at 9:59 AM on December 15, 2016 [60 favorites]

I don't really understand why everyone wants to say "move along from this Russia thing".

Because they're Republicans, and they wanted the Republican to win, and I am not in the least bit exaggerating when I say that Satan (R) would get 30 percent of the vote against Jesus (D).
posted by Etrigan at 10:04 AM on December 15, 2016 [25 favorites]

These threads are long.

Scene: A tiny dilapidated caravan in a field in rural Ireland. Outside, it is raining. Inside, an exasperated priest sits; in one hand a picture of the US president elect, in the other the start of a printout of this entire thread. He faces another priest.

"Dougal; we'll try this one last time." [holds up picture] "These fingers are SMALL fingers." [holds up start of printout] "But the end of this MetaFilter thread is FAR AWAY..." [gazes out of window at distant rainy horizon]

Disembodied mod voice: "The point and relevance of this comment, Wordshore, is what?"

Ah, sorry, yes. Working on the next post-election thread, which will be in the key of D major. It'll be live in around a day or so.
posted by Wordshore at 10:07 AM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

Sen. Lindsey Graham said on Fox News that if Rex Tillerson doesn't acknowledge Russia hacked election and support *new* sanctions, he's a no

Luckily Joe Manchin is ready and willing to make up for his vote. There's going to have to be more defectors than Graham and Rand Paul on any of these picks. Just consider Manchin as caucusing with the GOP, so for any nominations to get voted down, McCain, Jeff Flake or Olympia Snowe or Ben Sasse is going to have to put their vote where their mouth was pre-11/8. Paul and Graham won't be enough, even assuming there's no other Dem defectors, which is a yuuuuge assumption given the 2018 map. Heitkamp and Tester in particular will probably flip on several nominations too.
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:12 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Because they're Republicans, and they wanted the Republican to win, and I am not in the least bit exaggerating when I say that Satan (R) would get 30 percent of the vote against Jesus (D).

Oh, come on, a (D) get 70 percent of the vote? Please.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:14 AM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

Name the last time he broke with the GOP position on anything that mattered. I'll wait.

Immigration. Campaign finance.
posted by chris24 at 10:16 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Somewhere upthread there was idle talk of end-of-the-world scenarios, and I wanted to chip in mine: Facebook buying Twitter, closing it down or radically altering it.
posted by ZeusHumms at 10:17 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Republicans would probably say: Jesus, sounds like a Mexican name.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 10:18 AM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

> Oh, come on, a (D) get 70 percent of the vote? Please.

"Judge not, that ye be not judged."

Soft on crime.

"Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's."

Sounds like more big government to me.

"Whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also."

What a pussy. Bomb the shit out of them instead #MAGA!
posted by tonycpsu at 10:20 AM on December 15, 2016 [7 favorites]

Graham sets litmus test for Rex Tillerson

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., says he will vote against secretary of state nominee Rex Tillerson's confirmation if the Exxon Mobil CEO fails to pass his litmus test on Russia.

Graham wants Tillerson to support sanctions against Russian President Vladimir Putin and Putin's closest associates in response to Russian cyberattacks on the Democratic National Committee and John Podesta, a top aide to Hillary Clinton. That would mitigate any worry Graham has about Tillerson's acceptance of an Order of Friendship award from Putin.

posted by zachlipton at 10:24 AM on December 15, 2016

Immigration. Campaign finance.

He played his part of Lucy with the football on immigration alright, and McCain-Feingold was 14 years ago. Maverick! He'll save us from Trump!
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:31 AM on December 15, 2016

Ta-Nehisi Coates and Ezra Klein talk politics and writing (soundcloud) for quite a while, 1:40:54. "There's not gonna be a happy ending to this story." Coates is always worth hearing. This time it was particularly interesting to listen to him talking about Obama.
posted by kingless at 10:31 AM on December 15, 2016 [9 favorites]

I have to admit, I'm now judging my past self for being pissy about Livejournal outages around 5-10 years ago, and not because I was worried about the Russian journalists that were targeted.
posted by dinty_moore at 10:32 AM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

Oh, come on, a (D) get 70 percent of the vote? Please.

But Jesus (D) would inspire third-party challengers on the left. Could still be a close race.
posted by stopgap at 10:33 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Jill Stein would call Jesus (D-The Mind of God) an unfit Son.
posted by zachlipton at 10:34 AM on December 15, 2016

He played his part of Lucy with the football on immigration alright, and McCain-Feingold was 14 years ago. Maverick! He'll save us from Trump!

I pretty clearly said prior to 2008. And I didn't say he'd save us, I said it'd be nice if joined with his pal Graham and acted like a responsible Republican.
posted by chris24 at 10:36 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Any sane response would have to be severe international economic and political sanctions. Pariah status. Not 'military aggression.'

At this point I would be pretty excited if they managed to respond with "Let's prevent this from happening ever again" but I am crazy dreamer.
posted by srboisvert at 10:37 AM on December 15, 2016

From the list of regulations the House Freedom Caucus wants immediately repealed:

- Viruses, Serums, Toxins, and Analogus Products; Packing and Labeling: seriously, this ranks high on your list? Labels on viruses? Have these people never read a Michael Crichton book; label that shit.

- They want to repeal the rule that opens all combat positions to women. No reason given, just repeal it.

- Borrower defense to repayment: this is a new rule that would allow student loan borrowers to petition to have debt forgiven if they can prove they were defrauded or the school closed down on them.

- Protections for trans kids in schools, you'd better believe that's on the hit list

- Basically every energy conservation standard.

- Allow employer-provided heath insurance policies to cover whatever preventative care they want, so no birth control if your boss doesn't approve.

- Just random and esoteric nonsense, like demanding the FDA repeal a rule banning certain unsafe or ineffective drugs nobody is even using.

- Repeal anything resembling DACA, DAPA, or anything that might slow the deportation of somebody by a day.

- "Make Sonic Boom Again," what the actual fuck? Are people pro-sonic booms over their house? How did anybody this stupid manage to find their way to their office?

- Throw out all the climate agreements

- "Eliminate the Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights," pretty much because that sounds unimportant and some international organization will take care of that stuff

- "Move the US Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem" - I thought this was all about saving money; ignoring all the policy issues, that sounds expensive.

- Let's kill the regs on stuff like interest rate swaps, because I guess we forgot what caused the recession?

- End the proclamation declaring October 28 as National First Responders Day. Is this some kind of joke? Does it cost anything more than however much the little golden seal sticker they put on the proclamation paper costs?

- And of course: all agencies must freeze all pending rules and regulations until approved by a Trump-appointed agency head.
posted by zachlipton at 10:39 AM on December 15, 2016 [17 favorites]

No use dwelling on the past, guys--we have to look forward. The Vanity Fair debacle has shown us that there's money to be made here. We'll set up an advertising agency whose M.O. is figuring out how to make their clients' products get Under His Orangeness' skin, so that he'll blast them on Twitter and inadvertently give them a ton of free publicity. This has the secondary effect of keeping him busy trying to smite his detractors, rather than ushering in the fiery nuclear death of the world. Proceeds go to Planned Parenthood.
posted by Mayor West at 10:41 AM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

"If you thought 2016 was bad, I'm releasing an album in 2017."
- James Blunt
posted by Coda Tronca at 10:41 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

It is pretty hilarious: the Vanity Fair review was so under the radar yesterday and it didn't even make this thread, but thanks to his tweet, we all know about it now. Will Barbra Streisand be summoned to Trump Tower to explain what just happened?
posted by zachlipton at 10:44 AM on December 15, 2016 [11 favorites]

James Blunt is actually a talented comedian with a questionable sideline in music. I hope his album features his standup work.
posted by pxe2000 at 10:45 AM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

James Blunt is actually a talented comedian with a questionable sideline in music. I hope his album features his standup work.

I hope it features his preventing-World-War-III work too.
posted by Etrigan at 10:46 AM on December 15, 2016 [14 favorites]

I forgot that! Man these threads are long.
posted by pxe2000 at 10:48 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

They want to repeal the rule that opens all combat positions to women. No reason given, just repeal it.

Two of Trump's cabinet generals, Mattis and Kelly, are against women in combat roles.

"Make Sonic Boom Again," what the actual fuck? Are people pro-sonic booms over their house?

In the Norfolk area, there are lots of people with "I ❤️ Jet Noise" bumper stickers as a type of performative patriotism. So yes, it is a thing.
posted by peeedro at 10:52 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

It seems like "Getting loud, Tea Party-style, to scream at your elected representatives until they won't dare think of compromising on a single one of these cabinet nominations" is exactly the kind of work the Indivisible link, posted above, is designed for.
posted by pretentious illiterate at 10:52 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

"Move the US Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem" - I thought this was all about saving money; ignoring all the policy issues, that sounds expensive.

BUT REQUIRED TO SUMMON JEEBUS
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 10:54 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Trump Grill (which is occasionally spelled Grille on various pieces of signage).

The Simpsons were there again with 'Le Grille.'
posted by Coda Tronca at 10:55 AM on December 15, 2016

"Make Sonic Boom Again," what the actual fuck? Are people pro-sonic booms over their house?

Related Vox article from last week (what else?) The audacious plan to bring back supersonic flight — and change air travel forever
posted by zachlipton at 10:57 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

It seems like "Getting loud, Tea Party-style, to scream at your Democratic elected representatives until they won't dare think of compromising on a single one of these cabinet nominations"

And if you're a cis white dude, please take on an extra share of this work if you can. Shouting in public is something that will be read differently when coming from a white man vs white woman vs black man vs black woman etc etc etc. Not everyone can get loud and have it read as sympathetic by the media.
posted by melissasaurus at 10:58 AM on December 15, 2016 [39 favorites]

all agencies must freeze all pending rules and regulations until approved by a Trump-appointed agency head

Which assumes that there WILL be approved agency heads anytime soon. And I can guarantee you, the Department head does NOT personally approve all agency regulations, they have better shit to do with their time.

For instance: when the President goes on vacation in Hawaii, the Coast Guard has to establish a temporary security zone around the beach to protect him, and that zone has to be announced in the Federal Register (like so, although they don't say it's Obama, I'm sure it is because we know he vacations in Kailua). Dozens and dozens of safety zones are determined every year, for things like explosives loading, or bridge construction, or fireworks events, and those have to go through the federal rule-making process.

Huh, I wonder if the long-term goal is just to get rid of the Administrative Procedures Act entirely? That would certainly make it easier to do stuff without all that annoying bit where you give the public information about what the government is doing.
posted by suelac at 10:58 AM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Matt Yglesias, Vox: Fake news is a convenient scapegoat, but the big 2016 problem was the real news
posted by tonycpsu at 11:00 AM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

God yes. Tire the man out. I hope the actual office-holding involves a great many seven-hour things. I am going to cheer anytime Trump has to seven hour anything because God almighty, you know he's going to be fucking miserable. You know he's going to do some childish petulant thing in response and you are going to get people who are like *normally I would never speak to the press but good God, the man is insane*

I wish this upon him: may the presidency be as least as stressful for him as it has for previous much more highly esteemed holders of the office. I think the wheels are just going to fall off the car. I know that means best case scenario we get Pence or Ryan, but I'm fine with going after one fucker at a time.
posted by angrycat at 11:06 AM on December 15, 2016 [34 favorites]

Metafilter: going after one fucker at a time.
posted by Fleebnork at 11:08 AM on December 15, 2016 [21 favorites]

I don't really understand why everyone wants to say "move along from this Russia thing".

Sorry Frowner. Not trying to say that exactly. I was specifically trying to get at the idea that the grey propaganda/hacking part of it isn't something we can actually do anything about, and it's distracting from the parts of it we can do something about (e.g. pushing back against people actually trying to make this country more like Putin's Russia).
posted by aspersioncast at 11:18 AM on December 15, 2016

This article from Daily Kos has a good rundown of the bills being pushed in the NC GOP coup:
North Carolina Republicans plot legislative coup against democracy to usher in a new era of Jim Crow

In sum, a legislature that owes its existence to an unconstitutional gerrymander is trying to usurp the powers of a governor who was fairly elected by the people. Republicans are deeming any attempt at governance by the Democratic Party as illegitimate and are taking extreme actions—any that they can—to prevent Democrats from exercising any political power.

As we noted at the outset, there’s no precedent for this power grab in modern history. But the GOP’s behavior is strongly reminiscent of the reactionary backlash to North Carolina’s populist flourishing in the mid-1890s, when a coalition of white progressives and black voters briefly took power. White supremacists violently overthrew the multi-racial local government of the city of Wilmington in an 1898 coup d’état. The state legislature soon followed up with a raft of measures that prevented African Americans from voting, a bondage they were not released from until the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965.

(more on the Wilmington Coup from wikipedia and the NC NAACP twitter feed)
posted by melissasaurus at 11:18 AM on December 15, 2016 [24 favorites]

I was specifically trying to get at the idea that the grey propaganda/hacking part of it isn't something we can actually do anything about

I'm still more worried about the people who can do something about it. Like, say, give $1B and $5B of weapons to Chechen separatists before Jan 20.
posted by Coventry at 11:24 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

cjelli: Judge Orders Trump To Sit For 7-Hour Deposition In Celebrity Chef Lawsuit

Can he at least get a little portable TV and his phone, so he can live-tweet his responses to news shows and random commercials? If not, that's pretty much inhumane treatment, because media addiction is a real condition.
posted by filthy light thief at 11:24 AM on December 15, 2016

NARAL threatens to pull support from Dems in 2018 and beyond if they go along with GOP plan to repeal Obamacare [link to tweet w/ screenshot]

YES. This is the kind of pushback we need.
posted by melissasaurus at 11:28 AM on December 15, 2016 [56 favorites]

Like, say, give $1B and $5B of weapons to Chechen separatists before Jan 20.

Aaand between that and the new weapons China's popping up in the South China Sea, there goes the needle on my personal JCPL.
posted by aspersioncast at 11:29 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

"Make Sonic Boom Again," what the actual fuck? Are people pro-sonic booms over their house?

I assumed that they wanted Sega to quit their dicking around and release a new Sonic the Hedgehog title that matched the fun and quality of the first three games on Genesis.
posted by Strange Interlude at 11:32 AM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

aspersioncast, I don't mean to imply that's actually happening. But there must be people in the CIA thinking along those lines.
posted by Coventry at 11:35 AM on December 15, 2016

It won't be their houses the planes go sonic over.
posted by Yowser at 11:38 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Also Sega stop trying to make Sonic a thing.
posted by Yowser at 11:39 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

there goes the needle on my personal JCPL.

This made me morbidly curious to check the Doomsday Clock, which is currently still at three minutes to midnight.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 11:41 AM on December 15, 2016

it's always been kind of a thing with him that he's not accepted into the upper echelons of 'polite society'

"Bridge-and-tunnel people" can only make it so far.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:45 AM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

NYT Democrats at Crossroads: Win Back Working-Class Whites, or Let Them Go?

“I mean these are good people, man!” Mr. Biden exclaimed in an interview on CNN. “These aren’t racists. These aren’t sexists.”

With his typically unambiguous assessment, the vice president had thrust himself into a heated debate, already well underway, that has shaped the Democrats’ self-diagnosis since Donald J. Trump won the presidency: Should the party continue tailoring its message to the fast-growing young and nonwhite constituencies that propelled President Obama, or make a more concerted effort to win over the white voters who have drifted away?

I still wish Biden had clarified that somewhat, because some of them most demonstrably are, and all of them voted to enable racism and sexism because they viewed those things as unimportant, or at least less important.

This part is significant though:

Mayor Eric M. Garcetti of Los Angeles said Democrats had not explained to many voters how tolerant social values translated into government action.

“Of course we are for a tolerant, diverse, inclusive, cooperative future,” he said. “It isn’t enough.”

Mr. Garcetti likened the party’s message to the gestures of conciliation proposed by civic leaders in Los Angeles after the Rodney King riots in the 1990s — well intentioned but insufficient.

“If the starting point is: ‘Hey, we are a party and we are a country that stands for blacks and Koreans and people of all stripes liking each other,’ that’s not an agenda,” said Mr. Garcetti, who has not ruled out a run for statewide office. “These values aren’t just about social inclusion. They’re about getting things done.”

I think there was a lot more of an agenda than that, one that largely wasn't reported on very well and arguably wasn't communicated well. The real message of the Clinton campaign wasn't just diversity and inclusion, it was that America's best days have been ones where we've helped everyone succeed, so here are the things we're going to do to help more people succeed now. The thrust of that message was about packaging a variety of programs that help more people succeed (higher minimum wage, child care, college affordability, etc...) with a civil rights agenda (we see trans people, disability rights, pay equity, etc...) into a broader theme of inclusion and America's ongoing struggle to fulfill its founding promises.

That was the vision and there were a couple of times it was clearly expressed, most notably at Clinton's June 7 speech in Brooklyn. My sense though is that the message many people took away from the campaign had little resemblance to this plan, partly because of missteps from the campaign and party because of massive media failure. By the time the General rolled around, Clinton's policy initiatives were a year old and nobody talked about them. I mean, they barely even featured in the debates for crying out loud. The campaign's focus seemed to shift from helping everyone succeed to trying to counter Trump's gloom and doom and the message got muddled.

I do think a number of voters came away with the idea that the Clinton campaign was simply about diversity, not about specific policies to help everyone succeed, and I hope this is treated as a failure of messaging, not a wholesale rejection of the agenda.
posted by zachlipton at 11:45 AM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

Donald J. Trump, полезный дурак
posted by kirkaracha at 11:46 AM on December 15, 2016

Is there any way to reverse a confirmation after the fact short of impeachment?

No. As much as I don't like the idea now, the president is able to pick his own cabinet. The nominees require Senate approval, but they aren't held to standards like keeping promises.
posted by krinklyfig at 11:47 AM on December 15, 2016

Cabinet secretaries can be impeached through the same procedure as the President, for "high crimes and misdemeanors," but Congress gets to decide whatever those things are, so it can be whatever they want them to be.

Beyond that, Congress can't remove a cabinet secretary, but I suppose they can use the power of the purse to mess with them and their agency in various ways. I mean, what happens if Congress removes all travel funds from the Secretary of State's office or orders him to personally sign every passport issued with an ink pen or something suitably ridiculous?
posted by zachlipton at 11:53 AM on December 15, 2016

Here's a Google doc full of info on the cabinet appointments.
posted by pretentious illiterate at 11:56 AM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

No. As much as I don't like the idea now, the president is able to pick his own cabinet. The nominees require Senate approval, but they aren't held to standards like keeping promises.

Historically, pressure can be brought to bear on Cabinet secretaries to force them into resigning if they fuck up something (this norm is stronger in parliamentary democracies, where ministers are always being asked "when will you resign?" over various things from non-scandals on up). However, this is a norm, not a rule and I wouldn't count on norms to save us. NOT ANYMORE.
posted by tivalasvegas at 12:01 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Sarah Kliff
Trump campaigned on repealing Obamacare. Do you think he's going to repeal all these programs that you've been signing people up for?

Kathy Oller
The funny thing is, my husband said, “You know, he’s going to eliminate health care.” But he really can’t totally take it out, because everybody has to have health care. You can't go backward. But I think that he should look at it, come and walk the walk with us … or have his advisers come and see, like in these rural areas.

Kathy, Trump's entire campaign was around going backward. We really can go backward. He wants to go backward.
posted by zachlipton at 12:01 PM on December 15, 2016 [38 favorites]

Trump’s 17 cabinet-level picks have more money than a third of American households combined

The 17 people who US president-elect Donald Trump has selected for his cabinet or for posts with cabinet rank have well over $9.5 billion in combined wealth, with several positions still unfilled. This collection of wealth is greater than that of the 43 million least wealthy American households combined—over one third of the 126 million households total in the US.

posted by zachlipton at 12:02 PM on December 15, 2016 [20 favorites]

it's always been kind of a thing with him that he's not accepted into the upper echelons of 'polite society'

The Vanity Fair article does have a kind of reverse effect. Trump's money-and-power vulgarity is just brazen and ridiculous and presents itself only as what it really is; Vanity Fair's is subtle, constantly mutating, dishonest.
posted by Coda Tronca at 12:02 PM on December 15, 2016

The funny thing is, my husband said, “You know, he’s going to eliminate health care.” But he really can’t totally take it out, because everybody has to have health care.

These people are dumb. I mean dumb in the head. I guess that hurts their feelings and makes them want to vote for Trump even more? Too bad. They're dumb.
posted by Justinian at 12:06 PM on December 15, 2016 [59 favorites]

I wasn't aware that Vanity Fair, a magazine that frequently runs Annie Leibovitz covers of celebrities and supermodels, hosts massive Oscar parties, and features numerous ads for luxury goods, has ever been considered subtle that it's about money and power.
posted by zachlipton at 12:08 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

Well it certainly presented itself as more subtle than Trump's restaurant when it snarked at 'rich-man slop'.
posted by Coda Tronca at 12:11 PM on December 15, 2016

They're dumb.

In the 1990s there was a serial killer in Miami called The Tamiami Strangler. He killed prostitutes. A news station interview a prostitute and asked whether she was scared. She said, no, she always asked her client whether he was the strangler.

In related news, Trump lies. The press asks Trump whether he lies.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 12:20 PM on December 15, 2016 [11 favorites]

The article in VF was snarky and funny and I found it quite entertaining. If you didn't enjoy it, that's fine too.
posted by Too-Ticky at 12:21 PM on December 15, 2016 [9 favorites]

from cjelli's link: The federal judge presiding over a lawsuit Donald Trump brought against a celebrity chef who cancelled plans to open a restaurant in his new Washington, D.C. hotel has ordered the President-elect to sit for a deposition in New York during the first week of January.

Just to add a little context that the article misses, the "celebrity chef" is José Andrés, a Spanish-American immigrant widely beloved in DC for three things: his outstanding, innovative restaurants, his warm embrace of the District, and his passionate advocacy for immigrant's rights.
posted by everybody had matching towels at 12:24 PM on December 15, 2016 [23 favorites]

The press asks Trump whether he lies.

Actually if you ask Trump about his lying, he often admits it.
posted by OnceUponATime at 12:27 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Just to add a little context that the article misses, the "celebrity chef" is José Andrés, a Spanish-American immigrant widely beloved in DC for three things:

1) The cheese at Jaleo
2) The jamon at Jaleo
3) The cheese and jamon at Jaleo
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 12:30 PM on December 15, 2016 [17 favorites]

Kellyanne Conway says Donald Trump’s team found “an exception” in anti-nepotism law

“The anti-nepotism law apparently has an exception if you want to work in the West Wing because the president is able to appoint his own staff” as opposed to the Cabinet, Conway said, adding: “The president does have discretion to choose a staff of his liking. And so, if that actually is true and that legal advice holds, then that will open up a realm of possibilities.”
posted by futz at 12:33 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

So the Donald Trump-Graydon Carter war isn't just about "short-fingered vulgarian." Eater has a story on it: Donald Trump's Restaurant Feud With Vanity Fair Goes Way, Way Back. Carter has had his hands in a couple of NYC restaurants and Trump has been slamming them for years, to the point where Carter put "Waverly Inn - worst food in city" ––Donald Trump" on top of one of his menus.
posted by zachlipton at 12:47 PM on December 15, 2016 [10 favorites]

Larry Kudlow to Chair the White House CEA. What, Art Laffer and Grover Norquist said no?
posted by T.D. Strange at 12:48 PM on December 15, 2016

The article in VF was snarky and funny and I found it quite entertaining. If you didn't enjoy it, that's fine too.

I loved it - who doesn't love a scathing review of an expensive restaurant?

But vulgarity is a moving target. Is it more vulgar to pay someone to come to your wedding (Trump) - or to accept the money (Clintons)?
posted by Coda Tronca at 12:53 PM on December 15, 2016

Consider a Christmas gift, y'all! (Librarians of Metafilter, any further thoughts?)

Hey, I'm a serials librarian. We do appreciate donations, definitely call and ask if your local libraries want a gift subscription.

However, one thing about serials is that they renew every year, and it's a pain to get the bill and ask the donor if they're going reimburse you, or pay the subscription themselves, or what, or maybe the bill goes directly to the donor and we don't know what's up, and sometimes the publisher sends it to their house instead of the library and it's a pain. Especially when the subscription itself is like five bucks and we end up doing like fifty bucks worth of labor on it. I definitely prefer material donations to be monographic and not recurring in nature.

So maybe just suggest a purchase, and make a recurring monetary donation to support it?
posted by rabbitrabbit at 12:55 PM on December 15, 2016 [12 favorites]

But vulgarity is a moving target. Is it more vulgar to pay someone to come to your wedding (Trump) - or to accept the money (Clintons)?

He paid her? Cite?
posted by zutalors! at 12:58 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

But vulgarity is a moving target.

and yet somehow donald trump always manages to stay on the crest of that wave
posted by murphy slaw at 12:58 PM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

Not ready for such intimacy:
[breitbart] ADL’s Greenblatt: Trump Has ‘More Intimate Relationship With Jewish People Than Any Other President’ [breitbart]
posted by Joe in Australia at 1:01 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Seconding rabbitrabbit. The cost of adding an item to a collection—especially a recurring/subscription-based item—isn't obvious, but it often makes it infeasible to accept donations, even ones we'd really like to. I hope it works at your particular school, though.
posted by Rykey at 1:03 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

it's always been kind of a thing with him that he's not accepted into the upper echelons of 'polite society'

Yeah, can't remember if it was here or on Twitter, but someone said in explanation of Trump being such a sore winner, that he so wants to be accepted by New York elites, but even after being elected fucking president he isn't good enough.
posted by chris24 at 1:06 PM on December 15, 2016

Oh that restaurant review is priceless.

The caption on some horrible pictures that look like they were painted with an icing tube:
Generic scenes of pastoral life and cuckoldry inside Trump Grill.
posted by winna at 1:08 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

[breitbart] ADL’s Greenblatt: Trump Has ‘More Intimate Relationship With Jewish People Than Any Other President’ [breitbart]

Hey, only one comment out of 35 saying Jews will burn in hell, so far. That's honestly fewer than I expected.
posted by zachlipton at 1:10 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

ADL’s Greenblatt: Trump Has ‘More Intimate Relationship With Jewish People Than Any Other President’

Can anybody else make out what Greenblatt's exact position on Trump is, based on the article? I sure can't.

They might as well have titled it "ADL's Greenblatt on Trump: 'He's just this guy, you know?'"
posted by Strange Interlude at 1:13 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

He paid her? Cite?

Can't give a cite, but Trump's version is that the Clintons were on the hook to come to his wedding because he was donating to them, just like every other politician who was feeding at his trough.
posted by Coventry at 1:14 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Oh, well, if TRUMP said it, then it must have validity.
posted by agregoli at 1:20 PM on December 15, 2016 [17 favorites]

Donald Trump, my go-to source for Hillary Clinton facts
posted by theodolite at 1:24 PM on December 15, 2016 [34 favorites]

Yeah, I think that explains a lot of your positions here.
posted by neroli at 1:26 PM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

Sylvester Stallone might be Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 1:27 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

NYT: Trump greased the wheels of his relationship with the ex-president and the senator, giving the Clinton Foundation a $100,000 gift from his own foundation. ... The friendship, on both sides, was a transaction. Not personal, as they say in the “The Godfather” — just business....Hillary presents the trip to Trump’s wedding as a lark. “The dates worked,” a friend says. But some of her aides expressed surprise that she was going to such a gaudy affair; they believed Hillary rearranged her schedule because she thought Trump was a more important donor than he was.
posted by Coda Tronca at 1:30 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

I've had no news on since the election, and I confine music to writing time, so I've had MST3K on a lot, and I've just about got Joel's "Oh wow" response down in time and tone, and that's what burst out of my mouth when I read the Sylvester Stallone thing.
posted by angrycat at 1:33 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

Trump Organization Terminates Three Overseas Deals In Brazil, Azerbaijan
posted by zachlipton at 1:34 PM on December 15, 2016

Sylvester Stallone might be Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts.

Okay. Not proud here. But if this would somehow mean NEA support for more and higher-quality remakes and extensions of _Death Race 2000_, a criminally underrated movie with an even more criminally underrated performance by Stallone, I could get behind this appointment after only the required token opposition.

Hail ants!
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 1:35 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

Did Rex Tillerson, oil CEO and secretary of state pick, sue to keep fracking out of own backyard?

Our ruling

Food & Water Watch said Tillerson "sued to keep a fracking project out of his backyard."

Tillerson joined a lawsuit that listed noise nuisance and traffic hazards among the plaintiffs’ many concerns, though he later dropped out of the litigation.

We rate the claim Mostly True.
posted by futz at 1:39 PM on December 15, 2016 [9 favorites]

Plurality Of Fox Poll Respondents: Trump Presidency Will Be 'One Of The Worst'
posted by futz at 1:43 PM on December 15, 2016 [11 favorites]

@ncnaacp
House is overwhelmed by noise and has stopped their meeting. WE HAVE SHUT IT DOWN
posted by melissasaurus at 1:57 PM on December 15, 2016 [44 favorites]

Yeah, I think that explains a lot of your positions here.

Me? A claim from Trump carries no epistemological weight with me, unless it's regarding his state of mind.
posted by Coventry at 2:01 PM on December 15, 2016

Video from the Atlantic on the alt-right ~ 11 minutes
posted by kingless at 2:08 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

cheese and jamon at Jaleo

Surely we can bridge the Republican/Democrat divide by creating a food metaphor based language
posted by Jon Mitchell at 2:17 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

85 year old woman zip-tied and arrested at the NC statehouse.
posted by Justinian at 2:19 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

The man next to me at Trump Grill ordered a vodka martini and this is how it came out.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 2:22 PM on December 15, 2016 [25 favorites]

FCC Boss Tom Wheeler Resigns, Signaling The Beginning Of The End For Net Neutrality
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:24 PM on December 15, 2016

Virginia Nightclub Threatened After Refusing to Host Pro-Trump 'DeploraBall'

A nightclub and event venue outside Washington, D.C. is receiving threatening phone calls and online comments after the small business chose not to host an inauguration party called the DeploraBall, a manager says.
...
The venue's operations director wrote in an email that the club never had a contract with the party's organizer, who they say sold more than 500 tickets to their venue without their knowledge.

So basically, businesses should have a god-given right to refuse to sell to gay people, but woe be upon them if they refuse to sell to white supremacists?
posted by zachlipton at 2:24 PM on December 15, 2016 [40 favorites]

That martini is horrifying.
posted by Justinian at 2:32 PM on December 15, 2016 [14 favorites]

So about this deploreball contract with the event space that never existed. Cernovich lying, then harassing random people?

A neo-nazi GamerGator would never do that.

Never. Ever.

(Fake)
posted by Yowser at 2:34 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Congealed, not stirred
posted by thelonius at 2:34 PM on December 15, 2016 [11 favorites]

The one detail about the martini that I somehow missed (maybe due to that dirty af glass (plastic?)) ... is that it was served in a wine glass.

Classy.
posted by Yowser at 2:35 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

Trump spokesman says corruption is legal if you do it in the open

Hacktacular!
posted by tonycpsu at 2:36 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

if that "martini" has ever even heard rumors of vermouth i will eat my hat
posted by murphy slaw at 2:36 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

The beginning of net neuter-reality.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 2:37 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

my god, the toothpick has floated free of the olive
posted by murphy slaw at 2:37 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

Virginia Nightclub Threatened After Refusing to Host Pro-Trump 'DeploraBall'

Clarendon Ballroom is about the most frat-bro-likely-date-rapey-pro-genital-grabbing place in Northern Virginia. If even they won't host the Trump Victory afterparty, it's going to be tough going for white supremacists and the raft of deplorables moving to DC in Trump's wake to get their drink on for the next 4 years. And it's a long uber ride to Loudon or Frederick.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:37 PM on December 15, 2016 [12 favorites]

Bartender, I take my martini thrown into whatever fucking glass you can find, sure, fine, that one - not stirred.
posted by Joey Buttafoucault at 2:38 PM on December 15, 2016 [14 favorites]

The man next to me at Trump Grill ordered a vodka martini and this is how it came out.

That is the perfect martini glass for drink #5 of your liquid lunch. It's like the epitome of the result of "give me a martini in a glass I won't spill" when the server/bartender hates the patron enough not to just put it in a rocks glass.
posted by feloniousmonk at 2:44 PM on December 15, 2016 [7 favorites]

So basically, businesses should have a god-given right to refuse to sell to gay people, but woe be upon them if they refuse to sell to white supremacists?

Welcome to libertarianism.
posted by zombieflanders at 2:44 PM on December 15, 2016 [34 favorites]

You guys talked about the glass. You talked about the olive*. You talked about the griminess of it all. But I see no mention of Hello! That is half a wine glass of vodka! That can't all be vodka, can it? Is there maybe clam juice or something.

Psst, murphy slaw, the toothpick is on the counter. The person who ordered the martini probably removed the toothpick and dropped the olive back into the briny deep.

I feel a bit sad joking about a nasty looking drink when so many people are getting arrested at the GA in NC. Schoolteachers, a city council member, a historian and "more to come." Meanwhile the House is in session but they have closed the gallery. For shame. This is not the people's business they are undertaking now, but plots and machinations of their own.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 2:50 PM on December 15, 2016 [15 favorites]

That can't all be vodka, can it? Is there maybe clam juice or something

Equal parts vodka and brine.
posted by cortex at 2:51 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

That is the perfect martini glass for drink #5 of your liquid lunch.

Getting thirsty now. If there's just an unlimited amount of 'fuck it' going on in all parts of Trump Tower, this at least is how some of us can get our share.
posted by Coda Tronca at 2:52 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Equal parts vodka and brine.

a rarely seen variant of the dirty martini, the "septic martini"
posted by murphy slaw at 2:53 PM on December 15, 2016 [35 favorites]

If you look closely, it looks like there's a toothpick floating in the drink just a little right of center.

I saw that but I think it is a reflection of the toothpick on the counter.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 2:57 PM on December 15, 2016

Those are full on ice cubes, not just a bad straining job.
posted by zachlipton at 3:00 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

Trying to cleanse my brain of that terrifying martini, I keep coming back to how Trump supporters call Trump a successful businessman. I know some successful businessmen. Trump is nothing like them. He's like a trashy person's idea of a businessman. It's such an obvious con I don't know how they fall for it.

I guess they don't actually know what real successful businessmen are like?
posted by Justinian at 3:04 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

"i ordered a sidecar and i got a pint glass of limoncello with a whisky stone in it'
posted by murphy slaw at 3:04 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

Successful businessmen are so successful they can pay a guy tipped minimum wage (I hope) to hand someone a wine glass full of olive juice with ice and declare it's a martini and expect to get paid $15 or something for it.
posted by zachlipton at 3:10 PM on December 15, 2016

The Trump Grill Screwdriver: Sunny Delight, Tequila
The Trump Grill Bloody Mary: Budweiser, Ketchup, Lemonade, A1 Steak Sauce
The Trump Grill Mojito: Captain Morgan, Wrigley's Spearmint Gum, Sprite
posted by tonycpsu at 3:12 PM on December 15, 2016 [51 favorites]

Successful businessmen are so successful they can pay a guy tipped minimum wage (I hope) to hand someone a wine glass full of olive juice with ice and declare it's a martini and expect to get paid $15 or something for it.

Well if they don't do a good job I believe Donald has given us free reign to not pay the full price.
posted by Talez at 3:13 PM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

I think "successful businessman" is defined kind of like - I don't really know how to explain it other than to say it's like the equivalent of regency romance novels - it's a shiny fantasy that no one is squinting too closely at the mechanics or likelihood of, but everyone who indulges enjoys dreaming they could live like that. The only difference is that the people who read romance novels aren't generally dreaming of ensconscing a new aristocracy in the places of power.
posted by corb at 3:20 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

The Trump Grill Screwdriver: Sunny Delight, Tequila
Surely vodka and Tang©, no?
posted by mon-ma-tron at 3:20 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

Haha this is fun.

The Trump Grill Mimosa: Crush Soda, Franzia Refreshing White
posted by Bringer Tom at 3:23 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

The Trump Grill Screwdriver: Sunny Delight, Tequila

Sunny D? Alright! But which drink uses purple stuff? Wine?
posted by Servo5678 at 3:25 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

So on top of no AAA performers, all of the local marching bands have declined to participate in the inauguration. At this rate the parade is going to be Rudy with a kazoo stomping down the street.
posted by Talez at 3:28 PM on December 15, 2016 [33 favorites]

Trump Grill Margarita: Vodka and sour mix. Served with bricks and a trowel.
posted by mochapickle at 3:29 PM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

the people who read romance novels aren't generally dreaming of ensconscing a new aristocracy in the places of power

You're right, we much prefer the existing aristocracy (in the novels).
posted by cell divide at 3:30 PM on December 15, 2016

Trump Gill(e) Margarita: Green Gatorade, Aristocrat Tequila, crushed potato chips on rim
Trump Grill(e) Brandy Alexander: Coffee creamer, Gallo Brandy, Swiss Miss cocoa mix
Trump Grill(e) Cosmopolitan: Kool Aid Fruit punch, Vodka, lemonhead candy
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 3:36 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

Trump 18 yr Macallan: Johnny Walker Black poured into Macallan 18 bottle. Served with quarter ounce of water.
posted by Justinian at 3:41 PM on December 15, 2016 [15 favorites]

I don't think this Jesus fella is going to play in Poughkeepsie. Or play in Cheboygan. Or wait, Dubuque? Wherever the hell stuff doesn't play.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 3:42 PM on December 15, 2016

So on top of no AAA performers, all of the local marching bands have declined to participate in the inauguration. At this rate the parade is going to be Rudy with a kazoo stomping down the street.

My inauguration prediction is they're going to import from the South.
posted by corb at 3:43 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

Straight from Alabama: The George Wallace Memorial Marching Band.
posted by valkane at 3:46 PM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

Liberty and Regent Universities actually have marching bands. Some of the biggest and best high school marching bands in the country are from Texas.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:48 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Tillerson joined a lawsuit that listed noise nuisance and traffic hazards among the plaintiffs’ many concerns, though he later dropped out of the litigation.

As someone who has been fracked (and no, I don't own the mineral rights to my property) let me tell you the noise is serious. We didn't know what it was, but there was this SOUND 24 hours a day that sounded like a generator running in my yard, but when we went outside and drove around with the car windows down we couldn't locate the source. Turns out it was the fracking pumps miles away. It kept me up at night because it's normally SO SILENT in our little wooded bit of nowhere.

So yeah, fracking sucks. I mean, the noise is the least reason, but it IS a serious annoyance.
posted by threeturtles at 3:50 PM on December 15, 2016 [7 favorites]

Remember when they said Elton John was going to play the inauguration?

Turns out it's going to be Elron John, a Scientology-based Beatles/Wings tribute band. Set list includes Clams Across The Ocean, Hack In The USSR, Tomorrow? Never. No., Here Come The Sons, You've Got To Hide Your Tax Away, Day Twitter, Twist And Shout (The Surrogates Song), Hey! Jews!. and Help!
posted by Devonian at 3:51 PM on December 15, 2016 [22 favorites]

Trump Grill(e) Appletini - 1 part vodka, 1 part GogoSqueeze
posted by Mchelly at 3:52 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

North Carolina’s GOP Is Closing Ranks The Republican Party of North Carolina in 2016 isn’t avowedly white supremacist or openly opposed to the participation of black Americans and other disfavored groups. It isn’t a replica of that older iteration of the Democratic Party. But in this age of backlash, it has been captured by a similar spirit of reaction and illiberalism. And while the aims are different—partisan control for right wing, ideological reasons—the means are very familiar: disenfranchisement of blacks, attacks on the machinery of elections, insinuations of fraud, attempts to usurp the voters themselves.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:54 PM on December 15, 2016

Trump Grille Bullshot - Alpo. And gin.
posted by valkane at 3:54 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

This whole thing about the short-fingered vulgarity of Trump made me realize why he admires and needs Ivanka so much. Unlike her brothers, she can do classy. It's right there in that horrible clip where he says he would date her if she wasn't his daughter. The thing is she firmly puts him in place. That's their dynamic. He is a clueless, vulgar bully from Queens with an inferiority complex, and she has become all that he always aspired to but couldn't ever reach: an elegant, well mannered Upper East Side New Yorker. She's even Jewish, goddammit! Together, they get the presidency.
This is no defense of either or of their family dynamics. Just an observation that makes sense to me.
posted by mumimor at 3:58 PM on December 15, 2016 [23 favorites]

Trump has appointed Monica Crowley to the post of deputy national security adviser for strategic communications. In June, she tweeted, "I guess Putin is going to have to do it." in response to a Daily Caller story about unreleased Clinton emails.

Last year, she also tweeted "walls work" describing her visit to a remaining segment of the Berlin Wall.

The GOP has gone from "tear down this wall" to "walls work" in the past few decades.
posted by zachlipton at 4:03 PM on December 15, 2016 [19 favorites]

@eliasisquith: CNN is reporting that Trump's refusal to acknowledge Russia interference has made White House decide orderly transition isn't main priority
posted by melissasaurus at 4:07 PM on December 15, 2016 [26 favorites]

and David Yankovich is saying

Obama press conference tomorrow will be the biggest event in American history... If he does what it's looking like. I'd watch.

posted by Brainy at 4:09 PM on December 15, 2016 [21 favorites]

@eliasisquith: CNN is reporting that Trump's refusal to acknowledge Russia interference has made White House decide orderly transition isn't main priority

OK, this is good, but it also started my heart beating double time, and my whole body heating up like I'm in a furnace. Interesting times, guys.
posted by mumimor at 4:10 PM on December 15, 2016 [14 favorites]

What does that mean? I mean, seriously, what's Obama going to say that he hasn't already said about the man?
posted by suelac at 4:11 PM on December 15, 2016

Donald Trump Jr. Played a Key Role in Interior Pick

The younger Mr. Trump preferred Mr. Zinke, whose selection was announced Thursday, over Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington, the people said. Ms. McMorris Rodgers, the sole female member of the House Republican leadership, was the front-runner for the interior job last week.

While the Trump team is looking for women to fill cabinet slots, she ultimately couldn’t compete with a connection Mr. Zinke and the younger Mr. Trump had formed last week, the people said.

Mr. Zinke, Montana’s sole House member and a member of the House Natural Resources Committee, resigned as a delegate to the GOP’s convention this past summer because its platform calls for a transfer of federally owned wilderness lands to the states. That is a position favored by most Republicans, including Ms. McMorris Rodgers, but the president-elect and his son, an avid hunter, oppose it.

“The federal government needs to do a much better job of managing our resources, but the sale or transfer of our land is an extreme proposal, and I won’t tolerate it,” Mr. Zinke said at a June congressional hearing.

This is all madness. He's supposed to be running the business, choosing people because both he and your son like hunting, the desperate search for more women, the disagreements with the party platform. Madness.
posted by zachlipton at 4:11 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

Masha Gessen's article The Putin Paradigm has already been linked here, but its such an insightful piece i thought i'd share it a bit more:

Lying is the message. It’s not just that both Putin and Trump lie, it is that they lie in the same way and for the same purpose: blatantly, to assert power over truth itself.

It has baffled me how Trump can claim all the BS he does with a straight face, but looking at in terms of asserting power over truth, it gets to the heart of why its so discomfiting, and why its been so hard for journalists and society as a whole to deal with him. His use of language is not an exercise in facts or reality, its an exercise in power.

Both Trump and Putin use language primarily to communicate not facts or opinions but power: it’s not what the words mean that matters but who says them and when. This makes it impossible to negotiate with them and very difficult for journalists to cover them.

anyways, the whole article is definitely worth a read.
posted by localhuman at 4:12 PM on December 15, 2016 [23 favorites]

What does that mean? I mean, seriously, what's Obama going to say that he hasn't already said about the man?

It's not just about what he could say; if the Obama team stops cooperating on the transition Trump is going to start his Presidency with a completely dysfunctional and sparse staff. More dysfunctional and sparse than otherwise.
posted by Justinian at 4:12 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

Is this like the time when millions of schoolchildren think to themselves "fuck that book report that's due tomorrow, bigger shit is going down!"
posted by valkane at 4:14 PM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

Plus, like, Obama could come right out and call Trump an illegitimate president. Which would be a first in American history. I don't expect that's what he'll do... but I can't rule it out. What if he has ironclad evidence that the Trump team actively cooperated with the Russians?
posted by Justinian at 4:15 PM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

Law Newz BREAKING: Sheriff Joe Arpaio Says Investigation ‘Concludes’ Obama’s Birth Certificate is Forgery

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio held a press conference in Phoenix on Thursday afternoon where he announced, after a five year investigation, his detectives have determined that the birth certificate presented by President Barack Obama was a fraudulently created document which has been represented as an official copy of the original certificate. Arpaio said his investigators have been working this case since August 2011 after the Tea Party asked him to investigate.

“We had to follow the evidence,” Arpaio said during the press briefing. The lead investigator, Mike Zullo, presented a video which claimed to show the Obama birth certificate shows “9 points of forgery.” He claims it was copied from another document. He says they consulted several experts from all across the world including in Italy. We will post the video here as soon as we get it. In the meantime, you can watch the press conference live.

Dang! They even talked to somebody in Italy. That means this is for realz. Of course I remember a certain someone announcing last summer "I, Donald Trump, ended it. I ended it." Does this mean DJT will have to revisit it? I guess it depends on how he is feeling about President Obama that day.

Now I am wondering if there is anyway for DJT and his Cabinet of Horrors and his Congress of Nasties could somehow declare President Obama to be an imposter and strip him of all his Presidential trappings: his SS detail, his pension, and whatever else a retired President gets. Would they dare to put him on trial? No, that's absurd...isn't it? Isn't IT!?
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:19 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Obama press conference tomorrow will be the biggest event in American history... If he does what it's looking like. I'd watch.

Let us hope this is hyperbole.
posted by Justinian at 4:19 PM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

What if he has ironclad evidence that the Trump team actively cooperated with the Russians?

And yet while that may make him culpable under federal law, it still won't prevent him having won the most electoral votes. The DOJ could file charges against him under federal law tomorrow, and he would still take office on January 20th. He has the GOP machine behind him, and almost none of them are going to budge: they don't care.
posted by suelac at 4:20 PM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

Right, but it would push things from "resist by all legal and political means" to "resist by any means necessary".
posted by Justinian at 4:22 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

MeFi Newz BREAKING: entropicamericana Says Investigation ‘Concludes’ Joe Arpaio is a Corrupt, Racist Piece of Shit
posted by entropicamericana at 4:24 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

maybe he's going to appoint Merrick Garland...
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 4:25 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

just fucking declare yourself Emperor Obama

idgaf

just do it JUST FUCKEN DO IT
posted by prize bull octorok at 4:26 PM on December 15, 2016 [11 favorites]

maybe he's going to appoint Merrick Garland...

You can't have Christmas decorations without garland.
posted by Servo5678 at 4:26 PM on December 15, 2016 [10 favorites]

From what I can see on Google, David Yankovich's twitter is the sole source for there being any significance to the press conference tomorrow. Reuters seems to be the only source mentioning it all and they are extremely brief. Is there anything else I'm missing?
posted by feloniousmonk at 4:28 PM on December 15, 2016

you're missing this is 2016 so the worst thing possible is what will happen
posted by Justinian at 4:28 PM on December 15, 2016 [26 favorites]

Obama press conference tomorrow will be the biggest event in American history... If he does what it's looking like. I'd watch.

popcorn futures way up
posted by entropicamericana at 4:29 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

If Obama actually comes out with hard evidence of Trump involvement with the Russians...

I honestly think we're looking at Civil War II.
posted by Gaz Errant at 4:29 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

In that vein, we should probably expect a perfunctory speed run before the Obamas jet off to Hawaii for the holidays.
posted by feloniousmonk at 4:30 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Does David Yankovich have credibility? Because he is indeed the only person hyping the press converence.
posted by Justinian at 4:32 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Full disclosure, that was David Yankovich tweet brought into my timeline. I thought it would be one of many. CNBC is confirming the press conference though.
posted by Brainy at 4:34 PM on December 15, 2016

Masha Gessen's article The Putin Paradigm has already been linked here, but its such an insightful piece i thought i'd share it a bit more..
Lying is the message. It’s not just that both Putin and Trump lie, it is that they lie in the same way and for the same purpose: blatantly, to assert power over truth itself.
It has baffled me how Trump can claim all the BS he does with a straight face, but looking at in terms of asserting power over truth, it gets to the heart of why its so discomfiting, and why its been so hard for journalists and society as a whole to deal with him. His use of language is not an exercise in facts or reality, its an exercise in power.

Yes. It's a pattern familiar to people who have had to deal with a malignant narcissist (and not coincidentally, I am told, also to victims of abuse.)

A couple of the worst years of my life were caused when a person who was a malignant narcissist and prolific, skillful manipulator worked his way into a position of authority over me in the workplace. Over the time that I had to deal with him I came to realize that his lies served a variety of purposes. Some were to court the support or approval of those he sought to please, but others were meant to reinforce his control over those he had come to dominate. The most blatant lies were a way of asserting control over those who were most in his power -- having accepted his less blatant lies at face value, he would escalate until they had staked no small part of their own credibility and their self-image upon the things he had claimed. By the time you reach that point it's very difficult for some people to disagree at all, if it means having to admit how wrong they were, even when the liar is feeding them farcically implausible statements. Which they will do, in my experience, in order to really demonstrate their dominance.

In addition to the countless other reasons that this year has been full of unpleasant surprises for me, this past history of mine has been a complicating factor -- watching Trump exhibit many of the same behavior patterns I saw take place around me during a personally traumatic time, I am very, very afraid for what is coming. Because I've seen this before and I know how destructive such an individual can be and it triggers so much anxiety in me to realize that this is happening on a national scale. Many of the lies coming out of his mouth seem cartoonishly false, but I believe there's a point to them. As silly as they seem, they're no joke. On the contrary they're really very sinister.

The organization that I was working for at the time I had this experience wound up being severely damaged by it. Many of the people there saw what was happening but their attempts to defend truth and rationality by arguing against the narcissist failed -- spectacularly -- as the one thing that he was good at was shifting his failures to other people. In retrospect our organization was like an organism attacked by a pathogen to which we had developed no immunity -- our usual system of reasonable discussion and fact-based evaluation completely failed us when confronted with an individual who could completely disregard the norms of acceptable behavior when it suited him and, worse, use them against us just as easily. I am terrified that that's where we might be on a national scale, because brothers and sisters, let me tell you, we do not know how to fight this. But we had better figure it out fast.
posted by Nerd of the North at 4:34 PM on December 15, 2016 [34 favorites]

It did seem to break at the same time as the "orderly transition is not possible info"
posted by Brainy at 4:35 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Ladies and gentlemen, the new Ambassador to Israel, David Friedman:

Finally, are J Street supporters really as bad as kapos? The answer, actually, is no. They are far worse than kapos – Jews who turned in their fellow Jews in the Nazi death camps. The kapos faced extraordinary cruelty and who knows what any of us would have done under those circumstances to save a loved one? But J Street? They are just smug advocates of Israel’s destruction delivered from the comfort of their secure American sofas – it’s hard to imagine anyone worse.

posted by zachlipton at 4:36 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Somehow, the existence of facebook makes me feel like civil war in america is impossible. I have no real backup for this feeling, but there it is, anyway.
posted by valkane at 4:36 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Reuters seems to be the only source mentioning it all and they are extremely brief.
ABC, CNBC twitter feeds but they appear to be based on Reuters.

LiveNewsCloud says LiveNews.eu will be streaming it. They refer to it as an "end of the year press conference."
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 4:39 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

future Ken Burns will have some fun primary sources for his documentary
posted by prize bull octorok at 4:39 PM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

Eh, unless something else gets leaked I'm going to go with "David Yankovich forgot to take his Xanax this evening."
posted by Justinian at 4:40 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

it is the last weekday before the electors vote on monday
posted by localhuman at 4:42 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Obama will take some questions, make a joke or two and then go on vacation.
posted by drezdn at 4:42 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

NARAL threatens to pull support from Dems in 2018 and beyond if they go along with GOP plan to repeal Obamacare [link to tweet w/ screenshot]

Oooo, NARAL just got an extra $$ cookie from me, and probably a million other people, for doing that.
posted by FelliniBlank at 4:44 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

Obama's going to finally spill the beans about the aliens at Area 51.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 4:46 PM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

Please post links to something other than twitter for this news?
posted by agregoli at 4:49 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

About the press conference tomorrow being a huge deal? There isn't any. It's just one guy speculating on Twitter.
posted by Justinian at 4:52 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Yeah, I might have jumped the gun a bit early on posting that here. He's getting a lot of blowback on Twitter about not citing anything. If it is something, that would be great, but if it isn't — sorry for dumping it here.

To tell you the truth I thought I recognized his name as an Eichenwald or a Farenthold. I thought he was high-ranking press
posted by Brainy at 4:56 PM on December 15, 2016

the existence of facebook makes me feel like civil war in america is impossible.

Sadly, I feel the existence of Facebook makes it much more likely to be hideously terrible, as the location and number of loved ones are more accessible.
posted by corb at 4:56 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

There isn't any. It's just one guy speculating on Twitter.

And one other person attributing something to CNN about the White House deciding "orderly transition isn't main priority" but without any link or details about how/when CNN reported that.
posted by contraption at 4:58 PM on December 15, 2016

To tell you the truth I thought I recognized his name as an Eichenwald or a Farenthold.I thought he was high-ranking press

He is at Huffington Post

Here is Reuters: U.S. President Barack Obama will hold a press conference at the White House on Friday at 2:15 p.m. ET (1915 GMT) before leaving for his annual family vacation in Hawaii, the White House said on Thursday. [my bold]

So not anything too serious because otherwise he would cancel his vacation, no?
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:02 PM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

If there's hard evidence of coordination between the Trump team and Russia, Obama has a duty to release it. We're talking about treason. By the incoming President Elect. Who will be in a position to literally hand Russia our nuclear codes in 36 days. Anything less is complicity to treason.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:02 PM on December 15, 2016 [12 favorites]

Somehow, the existence of facebook makes me feel like civil war in america is impossible.

I'm guessing you haven't spent much time on Facebook lately.
posted by Lyme Drop at 5:06 PM on December 15, 2016 [16 favorites]

If it is treason then the warrants are being written now and hopefully the detail is in on the plan.
posted by vrakatar at 5:07 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

I feel like we've gotten rather ahead of ourselves...
posted by zachlipton at 5:10 PM on December 15, 2016 [15 favorites]

Records: 95 Detroit poll books missing for several days

County clerk officials on Thursday released a memo to State Elections Director Chris Thomas that said 95 poll books from the 662 precincts weren’t available at the start of the canvass, which began the day after the Nov. 8 election. Five of those poll books, which contain the names of voters and ensure the integrity of elections, were never delivered to county canvassers and presumably remain missing.

...The memo from county elections official Jennifer Redmond to the state also shows poll books in 101 Detroit precincts were not delivered in sealed envelopes, as the law requires

Separate county documents obtained by The News show that poll books in 17 precincts were missing seal numbers from ballot boxes, as is required by state law.

...Last week, Baxter [city elections director] placed much of the blame on what he called outdated, decade-old voting machines, saying 87 broke on Election Day. The city had a two-page ballot, and frequent jams led to inaccurate counts when workers failed to reset counters, he said.

A Detroit News analysis of statewide recount tallies, however, found other counties that used the same optical scanner performed just fine.

In fact, the counties that used the machine, the Election Systems & Software M100, had fewer unrecountable precincts than those who used two other voting machines in Michigan.

Very interesting & frustrating read imo.
posted by futz at 5:13 PM on December 15, 2016 [7 favorites]

U.S. President Barack Obama will hold a press conference at the White House on Friday at 2:15 p.m. ET (1915 GMT) before leaving for his annual family vacation in Hawaii

They're going to a lot of effort to stress how normal this is, and that he's not evacuating to a secure location outside the contiguous mainland states! Maybe this is a signal!

Or not.
posted by Joe in Australia at 5:14 PM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

He's going to wish us all a happy holiday season and then go to the beach. Jesus, people.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 5:16 PM on December 15, 2016 [17 favorites]

I feel like we've gotten rather ahead of ourselves...

Whatever evidence Obama has of contacts between Trump and the Russians should be made public. No exceptions. There's no possible justification for keeping it closed, and orderly function of the government has to take a back seat to a full accounting.

Maybe there's no evidence of direct contacts. But that's not been the insinuations by members of the intelligence committees, or by Obama. What evidence that exists needs to be shown so the public can judge.

Benefiting from Russian interfernce, not treason. Coordinating directly with Russian intelligence, that's treason. We need to know which happened.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:16 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

Coordinating directly with Russian intelligence, that's treason

Yeah that is what we are talking about, capitol T.
posted by vrakatar at 5:19 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

> In case you're wondering, as I was, why PEOTUS would be tweeting about Vanity Fair, their top story today suggests that Trump Grill may be the worst restaurant in America.

I wonder if he's seen this one yet: Democrats Are Paving the Way to Impeach Donald Trump. Good luck.
posted by homunculus at 5:26 PM on December 15, 2016

Obama's going to finally spill the beans about the aliens at Area 51.

If there are aliens we will get a Tweet the second Trump finds out.
posted by kirkaracha at 5:27 PM on December 15, 2016

capital T?

I've been rewatching The Music Man recently, and was struck by how much the ginned up fearmongering and manipulation of a crowd for personal gain reminded me of recent events.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 5:27 PM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

Could 2016 get any stupider? Scott Baio: I Was ‘Attacked’ by Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Wife Over Trump

Scott Baio claims he was attacked at an elementary school event by Nancy Mack, wife of Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith, who allegedly shook and pushed him while yelling, ‘Grab ’em by the pussy!”

posted by zachlipton at 5:39 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

From Democrats Paving the Way link

The bill, put forward by Elizabeth Warren, Dick Durbin, Chris Coons, Ben Cardin, and Jeff Merkley, would require the president-elect to put the proceeds of the sale in a blind trust (the true definition of which does not mean merely handing “business operations” to one’s children, despite what Trump has said).

Now I am sure this bill hasn't a hope in hell of passing but let us say it did pass and somehow got passed before Obama left office so that he could sign it. I wonder if DJT would fight it in the courts for all the years of his Presidency or if he would quit. Because one thing is crystal clear, he will never sell off all his businesses.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:43 PM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

As a retired military intelligence analyst, I often get irritated at how lightly people throw around the word "treason" to mean "a thing I don't agree with".

But if - and it must be proven- Donald Trump knowingly collaborated with an enemy government to destroy American democracy, then treason is the only word that applies, and I hope he pays the appropriate price that is generally the reward for such activities.
posted by corb at 5:47 PM on December 15, 2016 [45 favorites]

That's why I hate Twitter, man. It's treated like a news source when it's mostly garbage.
posted by agregoli at 5:49 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

In the (beta) reading list put together by Brown Poly Sci / International & Public affairs professor Jeff Colgan, he writes: “If you only read one thing, you could do worse than this very short piece [on voting in Nicaragua in 2011]: Jay Ulfelder, ‘Dismantling a democracy in the 21st century’”

It’s short, and seems apt to North Carolina in specific and the present in general.
posted by Going To Maine at 5:51 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

NPR: Obama On Russian Hacking: 'We Need To Take Action. And We Will'

In an interview with NPR's Steve Inskeep airing Friday on Morning Edition, Obama said, "I think there is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections, that we need to take action and we will — at a time and place of our own choosing. Some of it may be explicit and publicized, some of it may not be."

posted by zachlipton at 5:56 PM on December 15, 2016 [17 favorites]

Trump is at a rally in Hershey Pa

@SopanDeb Trump, after discussing flag burning: "Patriotism will be celebrated in our cities and taught very, very strongly to our children..."

Ugh. I have a visceral dread at the idea of strongly teaching patriotism to children. That sounds like a demand to love the country, love the flag, without reason.

Trump hits back at WH spox Josh Earnest in PA: "Maybe he’s getting his orders from somebody else?"
I'm not sure what he is getting at here. He claims the spokesperson is not positive and Obama is very positive so maybe the press secretary is "getting his orders from somebody else? Does that make sense? Could that be possible?"
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:58 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

NYTimes Available to the Highest Bidder: Coffee With Ivanka Trump

People were bidding $60,000 to win a coffee date with Ivanka, the proceeds to go to Eric Trump's charity. This sort of 'win a date with a celebrity" are not that unusual but in this case foreign representatives and businessmen wanted to meet her so they could gain access to the incoming President.
“The nature of my business, we talk to a lot of different governments, a lot of politicians and lawmakers across the world,” Mr. Ozkural said in an interview on Thursday, adding that he recently had a conversation with the president of Argentina. “You end up getting a better sense of what the modus operandi will be.”

Mr. Ozkural is one of several high-profile bidders in a feverish competition to win time with one of Mr. Trump’s children. Other bidders include the owner of a Tex-Mex restaurant chain from Houston who wants to press Mr. Trump, through his daughter, about immigration policy, and a real estate executive and fringe presidential candidate from Florida who wants to send a message to Mr. Trump about election fraud.
Because the NYTimes started asking questions, Eric Trump is now thinking about canceling the event. I'm sure the Trump siblings thought this was a brilliant idea and they haven't yet figured out that their Father being POTUS will mean big adjustments.

posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:08 PM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

Trump is at a rally in Hershey PA

I know it's futile to even point out and not an original observation at this point, but imagine Hilary or Obama holding victory rallies in only blue states. The amount of *this is not normal* that has become normal overnight... And he plans to do this as a regular part of his administration, the never ending campaign tour.

"IOKIYAR" taken to the extreme, Trump is invincible, but Hilary was pilloried constantly by the press for nothing remotely as dangerous.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:13 PM on December 15, 2016 [14 favorites]

Trump hits back at WH spox Josh Earnest in PA: "Maybe he’s getting his orders from somebody else?"
I'm not sure what he is getting at here. He claims the spokesperson is not positive and Obama is very positive so maybe the press secretary is "getting his orders from somebody else? Does that make sense? Could that be possible?"

Trump's Mirror, dude.
posted by entropicamericana at 6:14 PM on December 15, 2016 [10 favorites]

New twitter hashtag, apparently inspired by Atul Gawande: #the27percent. That's the percentage of Americans under 65 who have pre-existing conditions and will be screwed if the ACA is repealed.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 6:22 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

You're the puppet.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 6:25 PM on December 15, 2016 [9 favorites]

he plans to do this as a regular part of his administration, the never ending campaign tour.

He's only in it for the adulation. Maybe if we keep him distracted with shiny rallies he won't fuck up the country as much.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 6:35 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Trump is at a rally in Hershey PA

I know it's futile to even point out and not an original observation at this point, but imagine Hilary or Obama holding victory rallies in only blue states.

Perhaps a better point of reference would be a previous Republican president. Imagine George W. Bush holding victory rallies, or publicly feuding with the CIA (as opposed to doing it, uh, privately), or saying that it was fine if black voters stayed home, because it was just as good as if they voted for him…
posted by Going To Maine at 6:35 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

No puppet! No puppet!
posted by asteria at 6:35 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

The tweet that says "CNN is reporting that Trump's refusal to acknowledge Russia interference has made White House decide orderly transition isn't main priority" is very frustrating. Is it just some guy's summary of something he heard on CNN? Did somebody at CNN actually say "orderly transition isn't main priority"? If so, who said it? WTF!
posted by diogenes at 6:36 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

> @eliasisquith: CNN is reporting that Trump's refusal to acknowledge Russia interference has made White House decide orderly transition isn't main priority

They're totally going to get around to that whole transition thing, just like Trump is totally going to get around to that plan to divest of his foreign holdings.
posted by tonycpsu at 6:39 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

I think this is one of those instances when it's not going to be helpful to read Twitter speculation. We'll know what the press conference is about when it happens tomorrow, and all the endless bullshit until then is not going to be useful. And frankly, I'm not expecting much, because nothing has happened over the past month that has made me think I should expect anything.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 6:40 PM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

If so, who said it? WTF!

I don't think that we should be wasting any energy on one person screaming into the void without at least a secondary source/confirmation.
posted by futz at 6:40 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

So that tweet was the guy's summary of today's statements from the White House Press Secretary. His summary skills could use some fine tuning. Fuck Twitter!
posted by diogenes at 6:43 PM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

I think this is one of those instances when it's not going to be helpful to read Twitter speculation.

I think every single moment ever is one of those instances.

It's frustrating because he wrote it as though it was something he actually heard, rather than his own speculation based on what he heard.
posted by diogenes at 6:45 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

NPR: Obama On Russian Hacking: 'We Need To Take Action. And We Will'

A comparable and appropriate response could be something like the Mossack Fonseca Panama Papers hacks releasing a shitload of financial dirt on Putin and his inner circle and Russian allies.

But if there's going to be a concrete response they better have it already queued up and ready to go, because the timeline is like, now.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:46 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

> would somehow mean NEA support for more and higher-quality remakes and extensions of _Death Race 2000_, a criminally underrated movie

I had completely forgotten about the openly Nazi team from out of Milwaukee that was competing.

It came out in '75 so they were predicting 25 years into the future and positing a totalitarian regime using internal combustion automobile death sports as circus, fronted by loud-mouthed talking heads. Calling it early by only 16 years ain't bad.

They were pessimistic about technological advancements, too; real 2000 tech was 1/4 the size they predicted, though.
posted by porpoise at 6:49 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

A comparable and appropriate response could be something like the Mossack Fonseca Panama Papers hacks releasing a shitload of financial dirt on Putin and his inner circle and Russian allies.

A fair question though is whether Putin is actually damageable in that way. The sense I have is that a god chunk of the Russian people already know that he and his crew profit enormously off of the state. If reporters couldn't take down Trump with, say, his billion-dollar tax deduction, why would financial dirt on Putin hurt him domestically?
posted by zachlipton at 6:56 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

Why watch Season 2 of The Man in the High Castle when I can live it?
posted by kirkaracha at 6:59 PM on December 15, 2016 [15 favorites]

Obama is going to reveal all of Putin's Livejournal posts.
posted by drezdn at 6:59 PM on December 15, 2016 [13 favorites]

We have a winner (re the martini):

Looks like someone drained a swamp and poured it into a wine glass.

--@Anthony
posted by zachlipton at 6:59 PM on December 15, 2016 [35 favorites]

If reporters couldn't take down Trump with, say, his billion-dollar tax deduction, why would financial dirt on Putin hurt him domestically?

It probably wouldn't.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 7:00 PM on December 15, 2016

I mean, I'm not sure anything can hurt Putin domestically without a direct coup against him, which I doubt is doable in 35 days. His allies may be another matter. If we have something better, we should hit him with that instead. A 5$ billion overnight shipment of IEDs and Stinger missiles to Chechnya as someone said earlier could work too.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:02 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

So, I don't know who David Yankovich is; could he possibly be on to something or is this just BS?
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:17 PM on December 15, 2016

Trump's Commerce secretary pick backed Romney's '47%' comments

"I assume you are aware that he's correct. About 50% of Americans do not in fact pay any tax -- period," Ross said after the interviewer asked Ross if he agreed with Romney's comments. "Whether it's good politics or not is a different question, I'm not qualified to judge that. But it is an accurate statement."

Ross also argued in the 2012 interview that "a very high percentage of the unemployed people claim disabilities so that they can get more money." He added that "40-some-odd percent of the ones who claim disability claim sudden mental disability."

Ross added: "So there's a lot of nonsense that goes on within the social programs."

posted by chris24 at 7:24 PM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

Trump calls on Pennsylvania crowd to cheer African-Americans who 'didn't come out to vote'

So yeah, that happened.

This Quirky New Viral Video Channel Is Funded By The Russian Government

RT has started a viral video outlet to push videos like "Independent Canadian journo totally crushes MSM reporter on what’s actually going on in Syria" with a Russian propaganda bent.
posted by zachlipton at 7:26 PM on December 15, 2016 [11 favorites]

He seems Eichenwaldesque, so I guess it depends on your feelings about that.

So, basically nothing.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:30 PM on December 15, 2016

And an interesting perspective on Rex Tillerson from the above-mentioned Russian viral video operation:

Putin’s buddy is going to be America’s Secretary of State. Yeah, yeah - handshakes, photos, a medal of friendship, Putin’s lapdog will be ruling America, blah, blah, blah. Let’s be real! This is not about Putin. This is not about Rex. This is about money. If Russia had no oil, the head of one of world’s largest corporations wouldn’t be shaking anything. This guy is a businessman, CEO of Exon mobile, he is THE corporation. Hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of contracts – that’s what he needed from Russia, not a shitty little medal. You think that’s what keeps him warm at night. He would have scored a deal worth $500 billion if the Democrats didn’t slap sanctions on Russia’s oil sector. In business, there are no friends or enemies, there’s only money. And with Rex now at the helm of American diplomacy, it’s now officially what’s running the country.

Or this one just after the election:

What the hell is wrong 2016? Bowie: dead. Prince: dead. The Great Barrier Reef: also dead. Brexit, Bombings, I don’t even know how many mass shootings… And now, President TRUMP! It’s just one thing after another these days! But don’t be duped into dismissing the entire American people as bigoted and stupid – as some would have you think. Instead take a good look at the elites in the DNC, who went to great lengths to sabotage the Democratic candidate who was predicted to win against Trump, hands down. The game has changed, and political operators like Clinton are no longer relevant. If you’re a Democrat, this is the time to reshape your party from the bottom up. Don’t go run and hide. Do something.

If you want to see what else they're putting out, see their YouTube channel. It's all just a little bit off, a Daily Show written by people without a sense of humor, like their video on CNN's "are Jews people?" flap with a bunch of random spittakes.
posted by zachlipton at 7:40 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

A 5$ billion overnight shipment of IEDs and Stinger missiles to Chechnya as someone said earlier could work too.

That's something I fear, not actually a good idea.
posted by Coventry at 7:54 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

That "Canadian Journalist" works for RT.

Scare quotes because I'm Canadian and fuck her and her Syrian crisis actor conspiracy theory. She doesn't believe it, but she'll sell out our country for a few bucks. Revolting excuse for a human being.
posted by Yowser at 7:54 PM on December 15, 2016 [9 favorites]

Mentioned in the article that I linked to above

"Detroit Clerk Janice Winfrey and city elections director Daniel Baxter did not return several messages seeking comment."

I have started down the rabbit hole searching for more information on Janice Winfrey and now I only have more questions.

JUDGE ORDERS DETROIT’S CLERK JANICE WINFREY TO COURT -- May 2016

Tom Barrow, president of Citizen’s for Detroit’s Future told supporters that “This legal battle should really have been unnecessary because all we’re asking is for Detroit Clerk Janice Winfrey to perform her job, but in this undemocratic Detroit environment, citizens are now routinely forced to hire lawyers to fight their own officials to achieve the justice set out in the City’s Charter and in the state law.”

“We fully expect that the people will prevail and once again win against this Clerk’s poor judgement and ill advised effort to stifle democracy in our city” stated Barrow.

You will remember that Barrow last faced Winfrey in court in 2013 when he successfully challenged the residency of then mayoral candidate Mike Duggan, forcing him to wage a write-in vote campaign; despite clear law to the contrary, Winfrey sided with Duggan as the Chairperson of the city’s Elections Commission, but her decision was repeatedly overturned by both the Circuit Court and the Michigan Court of Appeals.

This citizen’s initiative came about following massive irregularities uncovered during election recounts in both 2009 and 2013. In the 2009 contest, court documents show that nearly 54% of the ballots cast for mayor, including ALL of the city’s Absentees, could NOT be recounted following massive irregularities where seals on cases at the recount did not match those placed on those same cases by election night workers.

More recently, in 2013’s unusual write-in campaign for mayor, a handwriting expert, hired by the 11 recount petitioners, stated that nearly 42% of the ballots cast were questionable because they were in similar and identical handwriting. The documented claims led the Michigan Attorney General’s Office to issue a formal rebuke of the Wayne County Board of Canvassers for failing to pursue the petitioner’s fraud complaint allegations as required by state law, even adjourning their meetings before key witness testimony could be heard.

This is all really hinky. She appears to be a Dem? The same issues appear to follow her year after year. Any Michigan folks have insight?
posted by futz at 8:00 PM on December 15, 2016 [15 favorites]

That's something I fear, not actually a good idea.

The problem is any response with further sanctions is going to be undone immediately. If there's going to be any meaningful retaliation it has to be something concrete that can't be unwound by Trump, and isn't subject to congressional stonewalling by Mitch McConnell. Otherwise Putin gets away with it. That leaves only covert options that can be executed by Obama in the next couple weeks.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:08 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

I know.
posted by Coventry at 8:13 PM on December 15, 2016

or ICBMs!
posted by entropicamericana at 8:14 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

John Podesta: Something is deeply broken at the FBI

As the former chair of the Clinton campaign and a direct target of Russian hacking, I understand just how serious this is. So I was surprised to read in the New York Times that when the FBI discovered the Russian attack in September 2015, it failed to send even a single agent to warn senior Democratic National Committee officials. Instead, messages were left with the DNC IT “help desk.” As a former head of the FBI cyber division told the Times, this is a baffling decision: “We are not talking about an office that is in the middle of the woods of Montana.”

What takes this from baffling to downright infuriating is that at nearly the exact same time that no one at the FBI could be bothered to drive 10 minutes to raise the alarm at DNC headquarters, two agents accompanied by attorneys from the Justice Department were in Denver visiting a tech firm that had helped maintain Clinton’s email server.

posted by triggerfinger at 8:21 PM on December 15, 2016 [31 favorites]

overnight shipment of IEDs

Pretty sure we've large stockpiles of well engendered land mines we said we'd quit making two years ago. No need to endanger FedEx employees with half-assed designs.
posted by ridgerunner at 8:41 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

an good article from Sarah Kendzior, Donald Trump, Russia, and the Mystery of “These People”, which tries to answer the question Trump often asks of his audience, 'Who are these people?'

Who are the “vicious, horrible, miserable human beings?” Who are these people awake in the middle of the night – much as Trump is when disturbed by something, tweeting away at three in the morning – because their conscience plagues them so? Who is that poor person that doesn’t have a chance, and why does Trump know that they have none? Who are “these people” – these crazy, angry people that even Trump seems to regret knowing – and why would he want them in control of the United States of America?

Those are the questions you ask yourself, months later, when you try to figure out if your government has been overtaken by a foreign power.
posted by localhuman at 8:43 PM on December 15, 2016 [8 favorites]

The Times has a longer story on David Friedman, the new Ambassador to Israel: Trump Chooses Hard-Liner as Ambassador to Israel

President-elect Donald J. Trump on Thursday named David Friedman, a bankruptcy lawyer aligned with the Israeli far right, as his nominee for ambassador to Israel, elevating a campaign adviser who has questioned the need for a two-state solution and has likened left-leaning Jews in America to the Jews who aided the Nazis in the Holocaust.

Earlier this month at the Saban Forum, Friedman doubled down on his earlier statement calling J Street supporters "kapos," now calling them "not Jewish."

As I see it, this is essentially the end of hoping that there will be a peace process someday.
posted by zachlipton at 8:44 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

This is the sort of thing that that RT-contributing "Canadian Journalist" thinks is acting.
posted by Yowser at 8:55 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

As I see it, this is essentially the end of hoping that there will be a peace process someday.

They're building an apartheid state in America, it's totally consistent with support for the one in Israel.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:58 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

This is a good point (or the skeletal start of one anyway) by Terrell J. Starr (who is often found writing about national security and Russia for Jalopnik, because 2016 is stupid) on the role of race and/or ethnicity in past Russian cyberattacks: "In every country that Russia had hacked, some force of ethnic strife was taking place on the ground." (In fairness, there's ethnic strife in a lot of countries.) It's surely not a coincidence that Russian media outlets like RT have covered BLM and other US racial stories extensively.
posted by zachlipton at 9:07 PM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

What events suggest the US is on a path to apartheid?
posted by Coventry at 9:10 PM on December 15, 2016

Did you see what happened in North Carolina today and yesterday?
posted by Justinian at 9:12 PM on December 15, 2016 [22 favorites]

What events suggest the US is on a path to apartheid?

A white supremacist elected president from a racist party trying to disenfranchise people of color and subvert democracy?
posted by chris24 at 9:13 PM on December 15, 2016 [31 favorites]

No, I haven't been following NC. Thanks.
posted by Coventry at 9:18 PM on December 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

To summarize, Republicans illegally gerrymandered (per the courts) districts along racial lines to give themselves supermajorities despite receiving fewer votes and then, having lost the governorship and the majority on the supreme court, are staging a legislative coup with those illegal supermajorities to usurp power from the governor and court and retain it for the racial and political minority.
posted by Justinian at 9:20 PM on December 15, 2016 [32 favorites]

Oops, elided that a bit too much. White dudes aren't a racial minority there. Yet.
posted by Justinian at 9:21 PM on December 15, 2016

Those illegal supermajorities were also won with voting restrictions later ruled to be illegal.
posted by chris24 at 9:22 PM on December 15, 2016 [19 favorites]

What events suggest the US is on a path to apartheid?

I wouldn't even say we're on the path, it's here now, but not yet irreversible.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:24 PM on December 15, 2016 [5 favorites]

And the NC gerrymandering was so (racistly) bad that they've been ordered to fix it and hold special elections for state legislature, iirc.
posted by Blue Jello Elf at 9:25 PM on December 15, 2016 [7 favorites]

Grab bag catch up responses:

maybe he's going to appoint Merrick Garland...

I don't think Chief Justice Roberts is going to allow an unconfirmed Garland to be seated for the purpose of granting extraordinary relief invalidating the election or delaying the inauguration. Unless maybe he gets briefed into something truly astounding.

I honestly think we're looking at Civil War II.

I really doubt it. If there really is a huge scandal that makes Trump impossible to install, then his voters will be satisfied with whoever the GOP installs.

The big thing for them was winning the election and so being able to tell themselves they're still in charge of the country, be nasty to immigrants, be openly misogynistic, racist, homophobic and etc. Thus their willingness to pick and chose the parts of Trump they like (which vary) and shrug at the rest.

Very few are really huge fans of his personality, but they are all huge fans of the license he's granted them (in their eyes) to air their prejudices.
posted by snuffleupagus at 9:25 PM on December 15, 2016 [4 favorites]

loomis at LGM has a pretty succinct take on the NC disaster/fiasco/debacle.
posted by j_curiouser at 9:31 PM on December 15, 2016 [2 favorites]

Well well well...

Rick Perry Is on the Board of the Company Building the Dakota Access Pipeline

Donald Trump's pick to run the Energy Department also happens to be the favorite politician of the company attempting to build the Dakota Access Pipeline. For the past two years, former Texas Gov. Rick Perry has held a paid position on the board of directors of Texas-based Energy Transfer Partners, the company behind the controversial project.

...Perry's ties to the company proved beneficial to his brief presidential campaign last year. At the same time Perry sat on the board, ETP CEO Kelcy Warren poured millions of dollars into Perry's political ambitions. Warren was involved in both Perry's official and unofficial campaign organizations. He served as the official campaign's finance chairman, and he chipped in $6 million to super-PACs backing Perry....

...The Energy Department plays no formal role in approving pipeline construction. But as a Cabinet-level official, Perry could have a voice in administration decisions on these areas.
posted by futz at 10:30 PM on December 15, 2016 [6 favorites]

Trumpot Dome Scandal
posted by kirkaracha at 11:33 PM on December 15, 2016 [3 favorites]

The Energy Department plays no formal role in approving pipeline construction.

Very true. They are just in charge of helping to pick which forms of energy are selected for internal use, and advising the President on what to ask Congress to encourage and/or subsidise.
posted by jaduncan at 11:46 PM on December 15, 2016

The Man In The High Castle status: completely ruined
posted by zachlipton at 12:21 AM on December 16, 2016 [5 favorites]

I honestly think we're looking at Civil War II.

The situation I'm worried about is more like, e.g., Northern Ireland: decades of shitty paramilitary violence and chronic domestic terrorism.
posted by en forme de poire at 1:10 AM on December 16, 2016 [20 favorites]

So has Trump started campaigning for 2020 already? He's going to have rallies in the borderline states from now until then, isn't he? After all, it's not as if he actually intends to run the country or anything time-consuming like that; he can just carry on whipping up populist fervour for the next four years while the GOP get on with establishing the thosuand-year Reich or whatever it is they plan to do once they've fixed the system.

Ugly.
posted by Devonian at 1:41 AM on December 16, 2016

decades of shitty paramilitary violence and chronic domestic terrorism.

I'm squinting trying to tell how that would be significantly different than what we have now.
posted by threeturtles at 1:47 AM on December 16, 2016

decades of shitty paramilitary violence and chronic domestic terrorism.

I'm squinting trying to tell how that would be significantly different than what we have now.

Ask anybody from Northern Ireland over 40 how it's different.
posted by Rykey at 3:12 AM on December 16, 2016 [40 favorites]

decades of shitty paramilitary violence and chronic domestic terrorism.
I'm squinting trying to tell how that would be significantly different than what we have now.
Try this
posted by adamvasco at 3:27 AM on December 16, 2016 [10 favorites]

TPM: "I think there is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections that we need to take action. And we will — at a time and place of our own choosing. Some of it may be explicit and publicized; some of it may not be," Obama told NPR in an interview set to air in full on Friday when asked if Russia should pay a price for its hacking attempts.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:08 AM on December 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

What events suggest the US is on a path to apartheid?

Everything about Trump's electoral victory and subsequent path, basically.
posted by Archelaus at 5:08 AM on December 16, 2016 [6 favorites]

Family Of Donald Trump’s Inauguration Singer Is Fighting For Transgender Rights: Jackie Evancho’s sister Juliet is one of three transgender students suing a Pennsylvania school district over its rule that students must use the restroom that corresponds with their anatomical or biological sex.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 5:16 AM on December 16, 2016 [2 favorites]

I've been listening to Kenneth Branagh reading Heart of Darkness, first time in years.

I thought I would never get back to the steamer, and imagined myself living alone and unarmed in the woods to an advanced age. Such silly things — you know. And I remember I confounded the beat of the drum with the beating of my heart, and was pleased at its calm regularity.

After Marlow's return to Europe...

Ultimately a journalist anxious to know something of the fate of his "dear colleague" turned up. This visitor informed me Kurtz's proper sphere ought to have been politics "on the popular side".

A little more from the journalist on Kurtz...

He could get himself to believe anything — anything. He would have been a splendid leader of an extreme party.

posted by kingless at 5:29 AM on December 16, 2016 [6 favorites]

"Some of it may be explicit and publicized...."

Let's hope these retaliations are targeted both to foul the deals that man in Whitehouse and his man Tillerson are making with Putin right now and are impossible to be rolled back inconspicuously.
posted by klarck at 5:35 AM on December 16, 2016

More Trump's Theorem. For anything he tweets, a tweet exists that contradicts it.

2014

@realDonaldTrump
.@Mitt Romney strongly stated, in one of the debates with Pres. OBAMA, that Russia is the big problem. Obama scoffed. Mitt was 100% correct!
posted by chris24 at 5:51 AM on December 16, 2016 [7 favorites]

The situation I'm worried about is more like, e.g., Northern Ireland: decades of shitty paramilitary violence and chronic domestic terrorism.

We already have this, we just call it "standoffs" and "mass shootings."
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:51 AM on December 16, 2016

yeah and you also have "apartheid". we get it. you're really really suffering. no one suffers more than you. you win at suffering.
posted by andrewcooke at 6:07 AM on December 16, 2016 [9 favorites]

We already have this, we just call it "standoffs" and "mass shootings."

Look, here is an intellectual move that we on the left need to stop making.

This is how it goes, to use an example:

Person A: "This situation is really homophobic and violent!"
Person B: "A-ha, don't you know that America has always been homophobic and violent?"
Person A: "But [really terrible thing] is happening all the time now and it hardly ever happened between 2000 and 2015"
Person B: "That's just like [infrequent but also terrible thing] - America is this way and you're just denying the violence!"
[silence; Person A, revealed to be a shitty liberal, slinks away; no conversation ensues]

It's important to acknowledge that the United States is a violent, racist, homophobic, misogynist country. But this particular rhetorical turn - where we insist that nothing that happens now can possibly be worse than anything else - is not politically useful. First, it obscures actual political difference. The United States, for instance, is homophobic and violent - but different places and times have different degrees of homophobia and violence. What makes these times and places different from one another? What political strategies might we gather?

And second - well, if the United States has been so uniformly shitty for everyone at all times and in all places that discussing historical difference is useless, why are we even talking politics? Surely the only possible thing to do is to go home and make yourself and your chosen family as safe as possible, since historical change obviously can't happen.

I feel like people take this line of argument from a good place, since very often people are saying things like "everything is terrible now for me, the world is ending" and it's important to push back against the idea that things were just fine for everyone five minutes ago. But I think it's turned into a rhetorical trope that risks shutting down discussion, and I feel like it's one of those "this is what a good left-leaning person says" lines of argumentation that we all learn and pick up and that end up being thought-stoppers.

I say this as someone who has spent their life around activist/left/progressive circles and has - far more often than not - gone right along with whatever we are all "supposed" to say now because I didn't want to rock the boat, or wanted to be "good" or whatever. There's always an orthodoxy, and it always changes, and we always pretend that it doesn't change and is eternal. This is not unique to the left by any means, but it's a real thing.

We're in a real mess right now that is going to realign pretty much every activist/left/progressive group in the next few years. Old alliances will not stand, old orthodoxies will fall away. We're not going to recognize the left political landscape by 2020. (Assuming we're not all scattered to work camps or gone silent.) We need to be subtle and complex now or we're all in the soup.

(In re Northern Ireland and the Troubles: everything I've read about them suggests that this was a very small area where relatively little space was free from violence and paramilitaries, and that in many areas the culture of the Troubles pervaded personal life. This is not true of the United States, a very large place where violence is unevenly distributed. I live on a street where there is visible violence and crime and I have had some of it burst into my personal life over the past three or four years; none the less, this is nothing compared to life in a violent part of Northern Ireland during the Troubles.)
posted by Frowner at 6:12 AM on December 16, 2016 [71 favorites]

I mean, I literally have a friendly acquaintance who had a cop hold a gun to their head and threaten to "blow your head off". I have other friends who have been held at gunpoint by police or assailants. These things are not some kind of unimaginable thing for me. Still, Minneapolis is not like Belfast during the Troubles.
posted by Frowner at 6:15 AM on December 16, 2016 [19 favorites]

yeah and you also have "apartheid". we get it. you're really really suffering. no one suffers more than you. you win at suffering.

That was profoundly not the point of the comment, which was that we've already been sliding into that situation in the current climate. I have no clue what you're talking about, kindly use someone else as the straw man for your resentments.

And second - well, if the United States has been so uniformly shitty for everyone at all times and in all places that discussing historical difference is useless, why are we even talking politics?

If anything, that applies more to describing intensification of the current kind of political violence we experience as 'civil war' which is something entirely different and ought not be diluted.
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:16 AM on December 16, 2016

Lol at illegally (and not head of DNC) and the desperate attempt to distract.

So hacking is ok if it benefits him he's basically implying.

@realDonaldTrump:
Are we talking about the same cyberattack where it was revealed that head of the DNC illegally gave Hillary the questions to the debate?
posted by chris24 at 6:19 AM on December 16, 2016 [3 favorites]

Still, Minneapolis is not like Belfast during the Troubles.

Of course it's not. And I didn't say it was the same thing, I said the political violence we experience now is "more like North Ireland" than, say, Gettysburg.
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:21 AM on December 16, 2016

Damn, Trump really is going to keep digging here. Somebody (in Russia) needs to get him the message that he should start pretending to care.
posted by diogenes at 6:24 AM on December 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

he doesn't have to pretend to care. his republican base is proud of the help from russia, and proud that he so brazenly lies about it.
posted by localhuman at 6:27 AM on December 16, 2016

Damn, Trump really is going to keep digging here. Somebody (in Russia) needs to get him the message that he should start pretending to care.

I dunno, non-caring snark has gotten him this far. It's a hit with his supporters, and the GOP isn't exactly pushing back hard other than Lindsay Graham I guess.
posted by gusottertrout at 6:27 AM on December 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

That was profoundly not the point of the comment

It was profoundly how it came off to at least a few people, however.
posted by Etrigan at 6:28 AM on December 16, 2016 [4 favorites]

I dunno, non-caring snark has gotten him this far. It's a hit with his supporters, and the GOP isn't exactly pushing back hard other than Lindsay Graham I guess.

I'm hoping that there are more Republican Senators that aren't willing to have the American experiment die on their watch. (I know that hope is unwarranted so far.)
posted by diogenes at 6:33 AM on December 16, 2016 [6 favorites]

It was profoundly how it came off to at least a few people, however.

Well, OK. That's clear enough. I think that has more to do with the usual 'move' that Frowner laid out. That that is indeed not a productive thing to do.

But, that's not really in what I wrote, which was to make the narrow point that already we are experiencing, right now, stuff that fits the mold of 'paramilitary violence' and 'chronic domestic terrorism,' and now would be a good time to notice that happening.

I'm not saying everything is already as terrible as it can be, or trying to shut any conversation down.

I am also saying that we shouldn't confuse that with civil war, given that the actual Civil War is sort of relevant to all this....
posted by snuffleupagus at 6:34 AM on December 16, 2016

I'm squinting trying to tell how that would be significantly different than what we have now.

I recognize that this is a rhetorical device, but it's a silly one.

I'm just guessing here based on typical American experiences, so if I'm wrong, sorry. But you know how you've never been in the blast radius of a terrorist bomb? Or gone to funerals for people killed by terrorist bombs? Or had friends or family injured by terrorist bombs? Or walked down a street with debris from a terrorist bomb? Or heard a terrorist bomb explode on the other side of town? Or had a terrorist bomb go off in your town?

Those are hints.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 6:37 AM on December 16, 2016 [25 favorites]

Yes, sorry, I too read the tone as "well, what is happening here in the US isn't as bad as what happened in Northern Ireland." I literally winced at the comment.

I understand you didn't mean it that way but it would be better if the unwarranted comparison is dropped altogether.
posted by Kitteh at 6:40 AM on December 16, 2016 [4 favorites]

So the Donald Trump-Graydon Carter war isn't just about "short-fingered vulgarian." Eater has a story on it: Donald Trump's Restaurant Feud With Vanity Fair Goes Way, Way Back.

Vanity Fair vs Vanity Hair?
posted by Talez at 6:48 AM on December 16, 2016 [5 favorites]

I understand you didn't mean it that way but it would be better if the unwarranted comparison is dropped altogether.

Yes, please, on all sides. Imagining which atrocity is the best analogy for our current situation isn't helping anyone and will only raise anxiety levels. And point-by-point counter analysis of why that pick is the wrongest just takes up even more of the limited oxygen left in the room. Flag shit and move on.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 6:58 AM on December 16, 2016 [6 favorites]

Obama is going to reveal all of Putin's Livejournal posts.

I realize that this is a joke, but LiveJournal was purchased by a Russian company back in the mid 2000's and became the main platform for non-state controlled Russian media, especially for journalists who criticized Putin. Russian hackers started targeting the site, causing constant DDoS outages and made the platform extremely unstable, crippling them. Obama talking about this would actually be a very good warning to the US media.
posted by dinty_moore at 7:01 AM on December 16, 2016 [16 favorites]

Haaretz: David Friedman, Trump's Radical-right Ambassador, Makes Netanyahu Look Like a J Street Lefty

"It’s good he’ll be coming with diplomatic immunity: For some of his articles and statements, Friedman could get arrested by the Israeli police on suspicion of incitement."
posted by chris24 at 7:02 AM on December 16, 2016 [4 favorites]

I'm using Trump's State pick to accuse other Republicans of being cuddly with communists, but really it's just to stave off existential despair.
posted by corb at 7:07 AM on December 16, 2016 [3 favorites]

Jeh Johnson, Obama's Department of Homeland Security secretary, just came into Trump Tower and went upstairs. Did not speak to press. (cite)
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:09 AM on December 16, 2016 [12 favorites]

I realize that this is a joke, but LiveJournal was purchased by a Russian company back in the mid 2000's and became the main platform for non-state controlled Russian media, especially for journalists who criticized Putin. Russian hackers started targeting the site, causing constant DDoS outages and made the platform extremely unstable, crippling them. Obama talking about this would actually be a very good warning to the US media.

Oh man, I'd almost forgotten about this. I was active on LJ circa 2007-2010 and it was just nonstop at times. You could always tell when some shit was going down in Russia or the Baltics because suddenly LJ would go down.

Someone should legit write an article about this because it is a very, very relevant case study in what happens to your website when you piss off the Russian government sufficiently, but LJ was a niche site in the West so a whole lot of people never had a reason to notice.
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:12 AM on December 16, 2016 [9 favorites]

Jeh Johnson, Obama's Department of Homeland Security secretary, just came into Trump Tower and went upstairs. Did not speak to press.

...Ok, that seems weird.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 7:13 AM on December 16, 2016 [12 favorites]

Jeh Johnson, Obama's Department of Homeland Security secretary, just came into Trump Tower and went upstairs. Did not speak to press.

...Ok, that seems weird.

Makes sense. Trump Tower is the headquarters of the current greatest threat to U.S. homeland security.
posted by Etrigan at 7:22 AM on December 16, 2016 [30 favorites]

Just so everyone knows where the report on the HS Secretary came from, it was from Terrence Dopp's twitter account.
posted by winna at 7:24 AM on December 16, 2016

Sorry, roomthreeseventeen! I missed the cite link at the end of your comment.
posted by winna at 7:25 AM on December 16, 2016

I dunno, non-caring snark has gotten him this far. It's a hit with his supporters, and the GOP isn't exactly pushing back hard other than Lindsay Graham I guess.

Thinking about this further, it just doesn't seem sustainable for Republican Senators to support Trump as he publicly makes demonstrably untrue statements that side with Russia and are counter to our government's own intelligence assessments.
posted by diogenes at 7:28 AM on December 16, 2016 [3 favorites]

WaPo Trump has been lying about the Russian hack. He just accidentally admitted it himself.

Friday, Trump send out a new tweet that accidentally reveals that he knows this entire narrative is a lie:
Are we talking about the same cyberattack where it was revealed that head of the DNC illegally gave Hillary the questions to the debate?
And so, by referring to this episode, what Trump is inadvertently revealing here is that, yes, the complaint about Russian hacking to hurt Clinton did in fact precede the election, and this was widely and publicly known. Of course, there is ample other evidence that Trump is fully aware of this. The intel community had publicly declared it weeks before the election. Trump had reportedly been privately briefed on it by U.S. officials. Trump was confronted with evidence of the hack at a debate with Clinton that was watched by tens of millions of people. At the debate, he cast doubt on the notion that Russia had hacked the materials to hurt Clinton. And yet, as Mark Murray points out, Trump himself widely referenced the material dug up in the hacks at rallies, where he used that material to — wait for it — try to damage Clinton.[...]
should more evidence emerge, Trump’s position on it is very likely to grow unsustainable. Confronted with evidence that a foreign power may have tried to swing our election — something that’s being widely condemned by Republicans — Trump continues to refuse to take it seriously (even as his own advisers gamely try to pretend he does). Instead, Trump appears to harbor boundless confidence that he can spin any substitute story line he wants, and that, no matter how deeply absurd it is, his supporters will eagerly buy into the alternate reality he’s concocted for them.

I feel like there is going to be a lot of this in Trump's America. Trump has a lot of plates spinning in the air but when reality crashes against his "stories" some of those plates he is spinning will come crashing down. He might be deft enough to save face for awhile, but there are so many plates spinning and so many ways they can fall, I think he will eventually get laughed off stage. Stay tuned to see how much of a mess he makes.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 7:34 AM on December 16, 2016 [15 favorites]

To put it another way, I believe that people like John McCain really do love this country, and we've reached the point where love of country and support of Trump are incompatible.
posted by diogenes at 7:38 AM on December 16, 2016 [10 favorites]

He might be deft enough to save face for awhile, but there are so many plates spinning and so many ways they can fall, I think he will eventually get laughed off stage.

"Yeah, but Hillary would have dropped all the plates by now!"

There was no rational reason to support him before November 8th; they won't be convinced to stop supporting him by rational reasons now.
posted by Etrigan at 7:40 AM on December 16, 2016 [17 favorites]

He might be deft enough to save face for awhile, but there are so many plates spinning and so many ways they can fall, I think he will eventually get laughed off stage. Stay tuned to see how much of a mess he makes.

This has been the consensus since about, oh, August 2015, and somehow those plates are still spinning!
posted by notyou at 7:40 AM on December 16, 2016 [10 favorites]

and we've reached the point where love of country and support of Trump are incompatible.

Wasn't that, like, several years ago?
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:42 AM on December 16, 2016 [6 favorites]

I'm calling it now: at some point, the Dilettante-in-Chief-Elect will nominate someone who is actually physically in prison at that exact moment.
posted by Etrigan at 7:42 AM on December 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

I don't think this is a plate crashing down (though I really hope it is) -- over the last month, most of the Trump-supporters I know respond to the Russian hacking story with "but Debbie Wasserman Schultz..."

It's basically the same narrative as the Sony hack. Yeah, shouldn't have happened, but the intel (/Jennifer Lawrence nudes) was valuable and therefore the source doesn't matter. They literally can't wrap their heads around the idea that a) The results of the hack are a separate issue - the fact that they were stolen MATTERS, or b) Using stolen information for your own gain knowing the source means you share culpability.
posted by Mchelly at 7:42 AM on December 16, 2016 [3 favorites]

Wasn't that, like, several years ago?

Not like this. Trump wasn't demonstrating an allegiance to Russia several years ago.
posted by diogenes at 7:44 AM on December 16, 2016

So is there proof that trump was colluding with Russia? And if so is that treason?
posted by ian1977 at 7:44 AM on December 16, 2016

So is anything else weird happening today? Because I'm getting the feeling that today has Interesting Times potential.
posted by Slackermagee at 7:47 AM on December 16, 2016 [3 favorites]

well i think if we send kit fisto, mace windu, and a couple of other guys to arrest him, we'll be fine
posted by entropicamericana at 7:48 AM on December 16, 2016 [9 favorites]

And if so is that treason?

...yes? I thought that had been addressed above.
posted by XtinaS at 7:50 AM on December 16, 2016 [4 favorites]

The thing about "but we have known this all along" is that stories build momentum. Something that was NBD a year ago might disappear - or it might build momentum and become a big deal, depending on how it's spun and what new developments occur.

I have mixed feelings about the "Trump is in Putin's pocket" narrative because it's obviously going to feed a lot of old-style US paranoia about spies and Russians that will not reflect the actual situation and will be used to prop up US nationalism, etc. I remember this well in the eighties and things were arguably not so dangerous then because our civil institutions were stronger. "Trump and his people have ties to Putin, which is bad not because Russia is ipso facto bad but because Putin's government is dangerous and corrupt and those ties are basically about Trump's cronies getting richer by catering to Putin's interests" is not the same as "Russian spies are everywhere, Russians are bad, Russia is bad" which is where I think it's apt to go.

But at the same time, a government which cuts a lot of deals with Putinist Russia is obviously a disaster, both in the immediate climate change/collapse of NATO/etc sense and in the "now we are totally normalizing Putinist rule-by-strongman" sense.

It's like, Putinist Russia really is the enemy of democratic practice, but Americans are apt to turn it into "Russia is bad, always, because Russia, and the US is good, always, because the US".
posted by Frowner at 7:51 AM on December 16, 2016 [4 favorites]

is there proof that trump was colluding with Russia?

No, there's no publicly disclosed proof (that tweet the WaPo quotes in no way proves collusion - it doesn't even reference Russia) and I'm not expecting any to come from the classified information (if Obama had it, he would have used it by now). Russia almost certainly fucked with the election but proving it was done in concert with Trump will likely never happen.
posted by Candleman at 7:51 AM on December 16, 2016

You are all forgetting one thing-- he will be in charge when he is President. No more pot shots, no more sneering from the sidelines, no more criticizing and pretending he has a better plan. He will have to show his cards and he hasn't got a winning hand. (Oh god. Is it metaphor Friday? I don't know what's come over me.)

Vox The most common words in Hillary Clinton’s speeches, in one chart

Don't want to bother clicking? 1. Jobs 2. Economy 3. Workers
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 7:53 AM on December 16, 2016 [24 favorites]

To put it another way, I believe that people like John McCain really do love this country, and we've reached the point where love of country and support of Trump are incompatible.

I guess that I stopped believing that about John McCain personally when he picked Sarah Palin, which seemed to suggest that he put personal ambition before concern about what would happen to the country if he were to die in office. But I'd really like to think you're right. I don't have a lot of faith in anything about the American political system right now, but maybe they'll all pull through for us.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 7:53 AM on December 16, 2016 [10 favorites]

It just seems that trump would never be smart enough to cover his tracks. Putin sure. Trump no.
posted by ian1977 at 7:54 AM on December 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

Putting aside everything else, Trump is publicly denying Russia's involvement in the hacks despite being told otherwise by his own intelligence community (with what sounds like near 100% confidence). How are we supposed to work with that?
posted by diogenes at 8:00 AM on December 16, 2016 [11 favorites]

And if so is that treason?

This is an utterly pointless question because of the difference between what "treason" means in common usage and what it's actual legal meaning in the US is. Whatever you think is "treasonous," treason in the US is directly defined by the constitution as levying war against the US or adhering to "its enemies," which is to say countries currently engaged in war against the US.

The US is not at war with Russia, so no behavior or actions taken to benefit Russia, no matter how directly collusive or how unpatriotic or how counter to the interests of the US they are, can possibly be formally treasonous in the US right now. On the flipside, you can go ahead and call anything you want "treason," but at some point you're pointing at a sports car and calling it a cheeseburger.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 8:02 AM on December 16, 2016 [4 favorites]

All the Electoral College members should have to eat at Trump Grill before they vote..
posted by drezdn at 8:04 AM on December 16, 2016 [9 favorites]

Thanks for the clarification ROU Xenophobe. Cyber war doesn't count?
posted by ian1977 at 8:04 AM on December 16, 2016

On the flipside, you can go ahead and call anything you want "treason," but at some point you're pointing at a sports car and calling it a cheeseburger.

And since Trump will be deciding foreign policy, there'll be a lot of cheeseburgers around for the next four years since we'll never here him identify anything in proper context. It's only the chance for impeachment to offset that.
posted by gusottertrout at 8:05 AM on December 16, 2016

directly defined by the constitution as levying war against the US or adhering to "its enemies," which is to say countries currently engaged in war against the US.

I would strongly, strongly dispute that definition of "enemies" - as would the United States. We have executed Soviet spies even when we weren't officially "at war". Russia has been an enemy of the US for the last half-century; I would say treason still applies.
posted by corb at 8:11 AM on December 16, 2016 [4 favorites]

Espionage isn't treason.
posted by Etrigan at 8:12 AM on December 16, 2016

We have executed Soviet spies even when we weren't officially "at war".

Not for treason.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 8:18 AM on December 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

Some morning tidbits from the Washington Post:

Trump considers financial pundit Larry Kudlow for Council of Economic Advisers

Huh, I guess Jim Cramer must have had other plans.

GOP leaders, donors intervene to save Tillerson nomination — and sway Rubio

Doesn't look like Republican leaders are feeling too much heat about those Russian connections at the moment.

Ivanka Trump could be the most powerful first lady ever

I don't even know what to say about this other than, yeah, probably...WTFIWWT?

(WTFIWWT:What the fuck is wrong with Trump)
posted by gusottertrout at 8:21 AM on December 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

"@realdonaldtrump Well, we all did it, together! I hope the "MOVEMENT" fans will go to D.C. on Jan 20th for the swearing in. Let's set the all time record!"

I'm not familiar with his use of the phrase "MOVEMENT" to refer to his followers, but perhaps I haven't been paying attention. I googled it and turned up a Facebook group called Trump Movement that had a good number of followers, but nothing huge. Am I looking in the wrong place or is this a new term that Donald is rolling out? Or am I reading too much into it?
posted by samthemander at 8:31 AM on December 16, 2016

Piping in re the McCain stuff--I really need to call my grandmother, who has been a McCain partisan since very literally before I can remember, and who was campaigning for him in Republican primaries at least since 2000. She's been up to her neck in GOP politics and working in the Dept of Defense since before I was born, and despite our political differences, well, I'm still a particularly beloved grandchild. She keeps saying she'll call me when I post something particularly heartbroken and desperate to Facebook or I email her asking to hear her perspective. (I keep meaning to call, too. My ability to manage private channels of communication has fallen to shit this month.) I am somewhat desperately hoping that the reason I haven't been able to get hold of her is that she's been run off her feet mobilizing people in her local branches of the party to fight back. I know she's no fan of Trump, at least, which is... something.

I'm still trying to work out what I can do to forestall all of this, and part of that seems to be just... loudly phrasing how afraid I am in language of American sovereignty, in the language of keeping my family safe and American scientific progress and how afraid I am for my career. I keep trying to frame my fears as much to mobilize Republicans or people who aren't sure about me as to mobilize other liberals, because I am so afraid I am no longer willing to cling to pride or dignity if I can do something to stop things.

I--sorry. It's not a perspective I feel particularly at home with here on Metafilter, which is a reason I've been quiet and in-and-out on these threads. But these times are horrifying enough that--well, no matter if I trust them to follow up or not, I think there's a lot of value in reaching out to anyone who will listen and begging them to do the right thing for the nation. The hell with ideological purity or whether I can trust anyone to stand with me long term.
posted by sciatrix at 8:33 AM on December 16, 2016 [25 favorites]

How are we supposed to work with that?

We're not. We're supposed to resist it, and make sure the blame is properly attributed when something terrible happens.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:36 AM on December 16, 2016

It's not new. But clearly he's still obsessed with attendance numbers as with viewing figures and will lie about them if they don't suit his narcissism. Oh, and he's now paranoid about the CIA, so that's great.
posted by holgate at 8:37 AM on December 16, 2016

Trump has a lot of plates spinning in the air but when reality crashes against his "stories" some of those plates he is spinning will come crashing down.

People have pointed out in the past that this is a feature, not a bug. By staring you directly in the eye and telling you something you and he both know to be false, he is trying to exert control over the truth. It is bewildering and is complicated a million fold by the sheer number of plates crashing down at any given time.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 8:45 AM on December 16, 2016 [7 favorites]

How's everyone's day so far, good? Great.

China's Navy seizes American underwater drone in South China Sea
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:49 AM on December 16, 2016 [5 favorites]

The man has an endless supply of both plates to spin and sycophants to sweep up the debris. He doesn't care how many crash.
posted by Gaz Errant at 8:50 AM on December 16, 2016 [3 favorites]

I'm not familiar with his use of the phrase "MOVEMENT" to refer to his followers

he's used it at his rallies for quite some time.
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 8:51 AM on December 16, 2016 [3 favorites]

It just seems that trump would never be smart enough to cover his tracks.

I haven't been interpreting any of this colluding with the Russians as Trump actually being smart enough to do fuck-all. Rather, there's a combination of endless gray propaganda, self-interested venality, and manipulability by sycophants who stand to benefit from "deals" with Russia, which benefited the campaign and stands to line a number of (already well-lined) pockets.

The null array may be surrounding himself with treasonous types, but I don't think anyone's claiming he personally hacked anything or traded secrets with Gazprom, even if it seems quite likely that members of his retinue have done such things.
posted by aspersioncast at 8:51 AM on December 16, 2016

China's Navy seizes American underwater drone in South China Sea

Oh fuck. The sabers are rattling. What's the over/under on emergency powers being invoked before Jan. 19?
posted by aspersioncast at 8:56 AM on December 16, 2016 [2 favorites]

The author of that puzzle also comments, saying that it was constructed two years ago, presumably without the Trump reference, because who the fuck knew Trump's kids' names two years ago besides maybe Ivanka.
posted by Etrigan at 8:56 AM on December 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

I'm not familiar with his use of the phrase "MOVEMENT" to refer to his followers

It's not new, it was even the title of one of his campaign ads which begins with "It's a movement, not a campaign..." He started using it at his rallies when Conway and Bannon took over the campaign.
posted by peeedro at 8:58 AM on December 16, 2016

New Facebook ad:

Vanity Fair
Sponsored
Trump doesn't want you to read Vanity Fair. Subscribe today for $5.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:01 AM on December 16, 2016 [24 favorites]

Today's plan of action: Get Trump to tweet angrily about this cat.
posted by Etrigan at 9:05 AM on December 16, 2016 [6 favorites]

China's Navy seizes American underwater drone in South China Sea

Plus they've armed the artificial islands they built to extend their territorial claims in the South China Sea.
posted by ridgerunner at 9:07 AM on December 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

Oh fuck. The sabers are rattling. What's the over/under on emergency powers being invoked before Jan. 19?

Pretty close to zero.
posted by drezdn at 9:11 AM on December 16, 2016 [4 favorites]

I just broke a rib laughing.

@wikileaks:
Obama should submit any Putin documents to WikiLeaks to be authenticated to our standards if he wants them to be seen as credible.
posted by chris24 at 9:11 AM on December 16, 2016 [34 favorites]

Yeah that wikileaks tweet is SOMETHING ELSE.
posted by prefpara at 9:13 AM on December 16, 2016 [11 favorites]

I realize that collaborating with Russia to co-opt an American election doesn't rise to the level of sleeping with Monica Lewinsky.
And Putin is better than the commies. (Tsar-chasm alert)
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 9:13 AM on December 16, 2016 [11 favorites]

I just broke a rib laughing.

@wikileaks:
Obama should submit any Putin documents to WikiLeaks to be authenticated to our standards if he wants them to be seen as credible.

I actually screamed, chris24.

SCREAMED.
posted by lydhre at 9:14 AM on December 16, 2016 [11 favorites]

Somehow I suspect the WikiLeaks authentication standards just got higher than Trump's wall.
posted by zachlipton at 9:21 AM on December 16, 2016 [3 favorites]

That's not how over/unders work?
posted by DynamiteToast at 9:28 AM on December 16, 2016

The over/under is on how many emergency powers will be invoked. Makes sense.
posted by Etrigan at 9:30 AM on December 16, 2016

When is the press conference?
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 9:36 AM on December 16, 2016

When is the press conference?

2:15PM ET.
posted by Talez at 9:38 AM on December 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

Here's the Youtube page for the press conference.
posted by Gaz Errant at 9:40 AM on December 16, 2016 [4 favorites]

Tsar-chasm

slow clap
posted by Joey Buttafoucault at 9:42 AM on December 16, 2016 [7 favorites]

(Is there a separate thread for what's going on in North Carolina? It's gone from bad to worse to horrifying banana republic antics...)
posted by RedOrGreen at 10:03 AM on December 16, 2016 [2 favorites]

Krugman is on the war path
It has long been obvious — except, apparently, to the news media — that the modern G.O.P. is a radical institution that is ready to violate democratic norms in the pursuit of power. Why should the norm of not accepting foreign assistance be any different?

The bigger surprise was the behavior of the news media, and I don’t mean fake news; I mean big, prestigious organizations. Leaked emails, which everyone knew were probably the product of Russian hacking, were breathlessly reported as shocking revelations, even when they mostly revealed nothing more than the fact that Democrats are people.

And then there was the Comey letter. The F.B.I. literally found nothing at all. But the letter dominated front pages and TV coverage, and that coverage — by news organizations that surely knew that they were being used as political weapons — was almost certainly decisive on Election Day.

So as I said, there were a lot of useful idiots this year, and they made the election hack a success.
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:05 AM on December 16, 2016 [24 favorites]

Ding! Divulging that a new post is done and live for your delight and inevitable desecration.
posted by Wordshore at 10:05 AM on December 16, 2016 [8 favorites]

maybe president obama will take advantage of this one last chance to take all our guns
posted by murphy slaw at 10:06 AM on December 16, 2016 [7 favorites]

Link to aforementioned new thread.
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 10:07 AM on December 16, 2016

Another from Sarah Kliff's excellent series on Trump voters and Obamacare: A woman who signs people up for Obamacare explains why she voted for Trump. It's an interview with a woman who's job is literally to sign people up for Obamacare. She wants "change" because she thinks premiums have increased too much.

PSA: it has been nearly 24 hours since this was first posted to the thread AND I AM STILL SCREAMING INTERNALLY
posted by tivalasvegas at 10:13 AM on December 16, 2016 [20 favorites]

That's not how over/unders work?
posted by DynamiteToast

excuse me the plural is overs/under
posted by the phlegmatic king at 10:21 AM on December 16, 2016 [8 favorites]

That's not how over/unders work?

Yeah sorry about that, gambling isn't my strong suit. Although if you substitute "of" for "on" Etrigan's read makes sense.
posted by aspersioncast at 10:36 AM on December 16, 2016

Russian hack almost brought the U.S. military to its knees

Russian hackers struck at the heart of the U.S. military in August 2015 by seizing the e-mail system used by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, CBS News has learned.

Then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Martin Dempsey was alerted to the attack by an early-morning phone call from the Director of the National Security Agency, Admiral Mike Rogers.

Now retired, Dempsey told CBS News in an exclusive interview that the attack was proceeding at an alarming speed. Within an hour, hackers had seized control of the unclassified e-mail system used by the Pentagon’s Joint Staff, the organization of some 3,500 military officers and civilians who work for the Chairman.

In that time, the hackers seized the computer credentials of Dempsey and hundreds of other senior officers -- the passwords and electronic signatures they used to sign on to the network. The only way to stop the attack was to take the network down.
posted by futz at 10:45 AM on December 16, 2016 [6 favorites]

FWIW, the over/under misuse really confused me the first couple of times it came up here. "Odds," "likelihood" or "probability" would be better terms.

I'm not really capable of assessing the odds because the best-case scenario I see at this stage is Obama declaring a benevolent dictatorship for a couple of years to overhaul the constitution and redo the 2016 election. Hard to call odds on something you really want to see happen!
posted by Coventry at 10:50 AM on December 16, 2016

Questioning at press conference is underway, the first one is about whether "Obama is prepared to name Putin as involved" in the hacking of the election to help Trump.
posted by DynamiteToast at 11:50 AM on December 16, 2016

Yeah. No fireworks here. "This is fine" Obama still.
posted by Talez at 11:54 AM on December 16, 2016

(New thread here; link goes to where people start commenting on the conference.)
posted by XtinaS at 11:55 AM on December 16, 2016 [2 favorites]

thanks
posted by DynamiteToast at 11:58 AM on December 16, 2016

"But we seriously have President-Elect Trump because a woman hurt his fee-fees?! Masculinity so fragile you launch a cyber war?"

Well, women get murdered every single day by hurting a man's fee- fees (i.e. not voluntarily fucking him), so yeah, a shitty election and war is just par for the course with that.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:52 PM on December 17, 2016 [4 favorites]

...Trumpism can be understood as a variant of what German leftist August Bebel described a century ago as the “socialism of fools,” his term for certain strains of “populist” anti-Semitism, a current which Hitler ultimately rode to power. The “socialism of fools” gains political mileage by highlighting the destabilizing effects of capitalism and turning its resulting anxieties against ethnic and religious others, rather than against the capitalist system itself.

In fact, those who adopt scapegoating as a political program saw Trump as one of their own and hailed him as such early on. This doesn’t only include white supremacists like David Duke or Stephen Bannon. Silicon Valley venture capitalist Peter Thiel, whose support for Trump earned him a place on the transition team, is a former student of the most significant theorist of scapegoating, the late literary scholar and anthropologist of religion René Girard. Girard built an ambitious theory around the claim that scapegoating pervades social life in an occluded form and plays a foundational role in religion and politics. For Girard, the task of modern thought is to reveal and overcome the scapegoat mechanism–to defuse its immense potency by explaining its operation. Conversely, Thiel’s political agenda and successful career setting up the new pillars of our social world bear the unmistakable traces of someone who believes in the salvationary power of scapegoating as a positive project...

According to Girard, all desire is “the desire of the Other.” That is, humans desire things not out of any intrinsic or autonomous volition, but because others desire those things, and we unconsciously mimic them. By having or seeming to have the object of desire, the Other makes us desire it, but also makes us resent the Other’s having it, instead of us. The model becomes an obstacle. This is why, in Girard’s account, mimetic desire and violence are inextricable...

The solution, according to Girard’s speculative account of cultural origins, was the scapegoat. The first human communities formed themselves around acts of collective violence against arbitrary victims; the reciprocal violence of rivals becomes univocally redirected against a common victim, and mimetic violence, once aligned in a shared act, becomes a unifying factor. Thus, the group’s violence is expelled to the exterior and peace returns...

The Scapegoating Machine
posted by y2karl at 12:41 PM on December 19, 2016 [1 favorite]

Every morning since November 9th, you wake up and read the news and think, This has got to be an issue of The Onion...

Trump’s Daily Bankruptcy and the Ambassador to Israel
posted by y2karl at 1:38 PM on December 19, 2016

Critics see dangers lurking in framing of Clinton search warrant
By JOSH GERSTEIN

Another passage in the affidavit seems to assert that classified information remains the government’s property, no matter where it exists: “There is … probable cause to believe that the correspondence … on the subject laptop contains classified information which was produced by and is owned by the U.S. Government.”

Some experts say the FBI affidavit, which almost certainly was vetted by Justice Department prosecutors, appears to argue that the government has the right to seize any information it deems classified from any place it has reason to think such information may be.

“This has implications that are terrifying and unacceptable,” said Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists. “We haven’t seen this line of argument widely pursued. … Taken literally, this would mean the end of independent reporting on national security policy.”

posted by Golden Eternity at 6:53 PM on December 21, 2016

Trump's National Security Advisor's Twitter Account Shows Extent of Anti-Muslim Beliefs

Flynn follows two individuals who use the hashtag #WhiteGenocide proudly displayed in their Twitter biographies: @ErinBSullivan and @AlbionAwakes.
...
Flynn’s new boss, president-elect Trump retweeted the racist account @whitegenocideTM in January of this year.

Flynn’s activity on Twitter goes much farther. Flynn mentions the anti-Muslim hate group, ACT for America (of whom he is an advisory board member) in dozens of tweets. In one, he calls ACT founder Brigitte Gabriel “a national treasure.”

posted by Golden Eternity at 7:38 PM on December 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

A new post-election post is live.

Wishing readers of, and contributers to, these threads a peaceful Christmas, and a positive, progressive and healthy 2017.
posted by Wordshore at 10:03 AM on December 23, 2016 [3 favorites]

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