When you stay home or vote third party, THIS is what happens. Make a different choice next time.

[RBInMaine]

We've got a mega narcissist ultra unqualified psycho weirdo freak coming into the White House, and he and the mega corrupt Republicans in Congress are burning the country and all we believe in to the ground. And they are about to the load the Supreme Court and the lower federal courts with right wingers. They are also going to give us the most corrupt and unqualified swamp monster cabinet ever.

So, to all those who voted for Dems and Clinton, thanks. Your consciences are clear. To those who didn't, this is what you get when you stay home because you "don't like the candidate" or "aren't excited" enough to bother to vote, or you vote third party because your candidate didn't get nominated or decide crazily that there is some kind of equivalency between the Dem and the RePuke. Simple as that. Enough of all the emails from Dems and Dem organizations or Progressive organizations talking about "fighting back" and all the rest. Try this instead: GET THE HELL OFF YOUR ASS AND GO VOTE FOR DEMOCRATS IN THE FIRST FUCKING PLACE! Elections have consequences. Not happy about what is happening when you were TOLD a thousand times that this is what was going to happen? Then make a different choice next time. I don't want to hear a single syllable of complaining. GO VOTE NEXT TIME AND/OR VOTE THE RIGHT WAY!

Until then, it's BURN BABY BURN! Right to the fucking ground! Hope you're enjoying it.

[lindysalsagal]

2. There's winning and there's everything else.

The party isn't perfect, but it's always more on your side that the GOP.

Can't be overstated.

Get. Out. The. Vote.

[Coolest Ranger]

3. we tried to warn you

but we kept seeing the same message over and over again. I'm too pure. I don't like her. I'll never trust a woman unless that woman thinks like I do.

At least the republicans all unite behind their candidate even if they don't like them.

If you can't stand our party, its time for you to either leave or start crafting a message for all of us cause I sure as hell won't leave the party that gave me the right to marry any man I want

[liberalmike27]

19. Oh

At first I thought you were a Sanders voter, who tried to warn Democrats Hillary wasn't right for our time, and would have trouble in rust belt states. It made sense, then.

I'd agree with the basic premise, get out and vote, in every election, including and in particular State elections.

Pushing the candidate onto Democrats that was literally polling ten points less than Sanders wasn't the only way DWS was doing a bad job. She's literally given away the statehouses of more and more states, lost governorship's, has not even bothered to muster a candidate--there wasn't one here in 2014. We literally did not have a Democratic Senate candidate to vote for.

I should just say, I never heard a Sanders' voter say anything about "not trusting a woman....blah, blah." Policy was always the important thing, the divergence of the Democratic Party from workers and the poor, was what we had a problem with. You're the ones that kept making it all about sexism and racism.

Honestly, the worst thing about "everything Russian," that we're seeing flooding the media is that we're not discussing the "internal" problems with the Democratic Party, or the need to shore up our State operations. That's a problem--no, that's "the" problem.

[ehrnst]

24. I heard numerous Stein and Sanders supporters tell me "If you MUST vote for a woman,...."

vote for Jill, who was a "Real Woman." As though that's the reason I was voting for Hillary. As though that comment wasn't sexist.

Going down the path that somehow Trump's election validates what Bernie said about the Democratic party and why Hillary lost is equally foolish when you have the weight of evidence that Russia did indeed alter the election.

I find Bernie's statements after the election about being "ashamed of the Democratic party" more opportunistic than concerned, and his silence on the new election revelations rather telling.

You cannot do an accurate postmortem if you aren't sure exactly what killed the election....

[liberalmike27]

25. No

It just validates the fact Sanders was ten points ahead, while Hillary regularly polled either even, or one point up, of Trump. Sanders was regularly polling ten points up, on Trump.

There is always a lot of "external" noise, and I'm willing to accept maybe Russians, or old Soviet States, and a lot of other things were out there. The candidate's job is to cut through the noise. All you can really change is your internal policies, which she tried to do, switching to "public" policy positions very close to Sander's platform. So, with all of the bashing of Sanders for his legitimate issues with how our party has strayed from its mark, according to Hillary at the end, his platform was indeed, the correct one. She essentially agreed, we need to shift back left, to push some new (or really old) ideas. She agreed, the Party had gotten too distant from the people.

Far as accusations about why people were voting, I must've heard "first woman president" about a thousand times, usually as a response completely unrelated to what issue we were talking about. It is true, I made the point Stein was a woman too, but usually as a response to someone calling me a sexist. I know how the EC works, apparently unlike a lot of Democrats, who seem to keep running around citing the "3 million more votes." Sadly the middle states, have way more power in the EC, much like the Super Delegates do in the Established Democratic Party, than the people.

All we can do is try to get one, of two parties, back to serving workers, and the poor. Rich, professional Democrats, can keep selecting their candidates, and losing. Or you can join us, and fight for the poor, and workers, and unions, and whatever smattering of Manufacturing we can win back--at this point, automation has been increasingly a force, destroying jobs globally. I might even suggest Democrats start experimenting with a whole new paradigm, perhaps a Basic Universal Income concept.

[ehrnst]

28. Ten points ahead when? Before the national campaign? Before the GOP stopped running ads for him?

And yes, I thought that it was historic Hillary was a woman, just as I thought it was historic Obama was black.

You are beginning to sound like the far right in 2008 - they just voted for him because he's black. "I must've hear people say they were voting for him because he's black about a thousand times." Same hyperbole, even.

"Democrats clearly need to focus attention on state and local races, where they have done steadily worse throughout the Obama years. But at the national level, they should resolutely avoid the circular firing squad. They didn't lose because their message was unpopular or because they're out of touch or because they're insufficiently centrist or insufficiently leftist. That just wasn't the problem. The Democratic message was fine; Democrats are perfectly well in touch with their constituencies; and they weren't perceived as too unwilling to shake things up. Even with eight years of Democratic rule acting as a headwind, Hillary Clinton's default performance was a substantial win."

http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2017/01/james-comey-decided-who-our-next-president-would-be

I might even suggest that people who want a "whole new paradigm" do the actual work of starting a party, forming coalitions, and running candidates. But it is so much easier to sit around and bitch about the Democrats not conforming to their user preferences, isn't it? Perhaps you can get Ralph Nader to help you out with that.

All those women and LGBTs sucking the oxygen out of the air with their "identity issues" and help the group that we're all ignoring - white men who think that they have been cut out of the American Dream.

[HoneyBadger]

27. I have not heard a peep from any candidate on the new revelations

Except for Trump. Where is Jill? Where is Hillary? Where is Bernie?

[ehrnst]

31. Hillary spoke about Putin's role in the hacking in December. Jill won't criticize Putin, and Bernie

isn't going to be validated in his claims that if the Democratic party just done like he wanted, we would have won by acknowledging that something else was going on.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/16/us/politics/hillary-clinton-russia-fbi-comey.html?_r=0


"Bernie Sanders was vindicated by last year’s general election. Trump’s victory proved that populism could win a White House race, and suggested the senator would have performed significantly better with the white working-class voters, who contributed to Hillary Clinton’s loss. He’s right to see himself as uniquely positioned to help the left rebuild.

But Sanders’s blind spots on identity politics are real, persistent, and troubling. If the senator can’t find a way to court Trump voters while also standing up to the next president—not to mention defending a broad spectrum of progressive principles—Democrats need to find different leaders who can."

https://newrepublic.com/article/139735/bernie-sanders-big-letdown

[Arazi]

50. That's a lie. Bernie's been speaking out @ the hacks for weeks now

At the town hall most recently. JFC,.the Bernie hate on DU is ridiculous.

http://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2017/01/10/bernie-sanders-town-hall-russia-hacking-sot.cnn

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.romper.com/p/bernie-sanders-calls-trump-a-pathological-liar-discusses-russian-hacking-29214/amp?client=dist-ms-android-sprint-us

During a prime-time CNN Town Hall broadcast on Monday evening, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders called Trump a "pathological liar," a stark label that has prompted vociferous reactions on social media platforms. During the one-hour discussion with Sanders, which was moderated by CNN anchor Chris Cuomo, Sanders said of the president-elect, "We are dealing with a man who in many respects is... how can I phrase this?... you know, a pathological liar." Given that Sanders was assigning a psychological disorder to the former reality television star who will soon be the chief executive of the world's most powerful country, Cuomo interjected to confirm.

"The man was elected by the American people, he's the next president of the United States — and you're comfortable with that description?" Cuomo asked. "Unfortunately, that's a reality," Sanders said.

Snip

Sanders didn't mince words on other topics either, saying that Trump "ran a campaign whose cornerstone was bigotry. It was based on sexism, on racism, on xenophobia." On the topic of Russia's involvement in the 2016 presidential race, Sanders said, "I think the evidence is overwhelming... this was a way for them to help elect the candidate of their choice, Mr. Trump."

Sanders' comment was in response to a recent declassified intelligence report that drew on findings from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the National Security Agency, and the Central Intelligence Agency. The report concluded with "high confidence" that "Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the U.S. presidential election." The reality of Russia's involvement in the U.S. election has been difficult for many to understand, and Sanders' message seemed to be that action must be taken. "It's something that we've got to deal with," he said.

[ehrnst]

64. Perhaps you meant this as a reply to Honeybadger?

[riderinthestorm]

66. You said in post #24 that Bernie's been silent @ the new election revelations

He hasn't been silent. Not at all

[ehrnst]

68. Thank you for clarifying what post someone else was responding to.

And mea culpa. My news sources are NPR, BBC, NYT and WAPO.

I hear he's on fire when he's on a book tour gig.

[riderinthestorm]

73. Nah, he's been on fire all over the talk shows

@ both town halls, during his holiday events in VT etc

I know its a meme here that he's only on fire when he's on his book tour but that was over ages ago

The Bernie hate here is deranged

[Walk away]

99. I personally can't stand the guy but....

...he is doing a really good thing helping to organize rallies for the ACA on the 15th of January. If he keeps this up I may bury a 20 year old grudge I have against him.
So, whether you're for him, against him or just don't give a shit about him, get out to your local rally and help him stop the repeal of the ACA.
Go find a rally by you and bring every Hillary and Bernie supporter you know.

[Arazi]

49. Bernie's been very outspoken @ the hacks

At the town hall most recently:

http://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2017/01/10/bernie-sanders-town-hall-russia-hacking-sot.cnn


https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.romper.com/p/bernie-sanders-calls-trump-a-pathological-liar-discusses-russian-hacking-29214/amp?client=dist-ms-android-sprint-us

During a prime-time CNN Town Hall broadcast on Monday evening, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders called Trump a "pathological liar," a stark label that has prompted vociferous reactions on social media platforms. During the one-hour discussion with Sanders, which was moderated by CNN anchor Chris Cuomo, Sanders said of the president-elect, "We are dealing with a man who in many respects is... how can I phrase this?... you know, a pathological liar." Given that Sanders was assigning a psychological disorder to the former reality television star who will soon be the chief executive of the world's most powerful country, Cuomo interjected to confirm.

"The man was elected by the American people, he's the next president of the United States — and you're comfortable with that description?" Cuomo asked. "Unfortunately, that's a reality," Sanders said.

Snip

Sanders didn't mince words on other topics either, saying that Trump "ran a campaign whose cornerstone was bigotry. It was based on sexism, on racism, on xenophobia." On the topic of Russia's involvement in the 2016 presidential race, Sanders said, "I think the evidence is overwhelming... this was a way for them to help elect the candidate of their choice, Mr. Trump."

Sanders' comment was in response to a recent declassified intelligence report that drew on findings from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the National Security Agency, and the Central Intelligence Agency. The report concluded with "high confidence" that "Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the U.S. presidential election." The reality of Russia's involvement in the U.S. election has been difficult for many to understand, and Sanders' message seemed to be that action must be taken. "It's something that we've got to deal with," he said.

[LanternWaste]

86. I pretend that which I simply do not hear must not exist as well.

I pretend that which I simply do not hear must not exist as well, also following it up with a disingenuous and absurd question to better allow me to cower behind implication.

It would be so convenient, so easy and so simplistic to find the answers (especially given the speed and databases of the internet) rather than wait for the answers to come to you.

[HoneyBadger]

92. By new revelations, I mean from the last 2 days

[Arazi]

51. I've never heard anyone comment that Stein was a "Real Woman"

The most I heard from anyone leaning her way was that her.positions most closely resembled that person's.

[JHan]

56. Yes, it was a thing. I heard it constantly.

Jill is a "real woman" and HRC is not etc etc etc.

[ehrnst]

63. Here are some examples from FB....

So yes, it was a thing.

I think it may have actually been a stealth campaign slogan - perhaps someone in eastern europe came up with it, now we know that Russia had trolls that were targeting educated white millenials to get them to reject voting for Hillary.

[mcar]

88. I remember it here from the primaries

First, we HRC supporters were castigated because we were "vagina voters," then we were told that if we wanted to vote for a woman, we should vote for the "real" one.

Granted, there weren't too many BoBers that went that far. But there were some.

[Coolest Ranger]

32. I am in no way a Sanders supporter

never have been never will be.

I get tired of people like you saying she wasn't right. She had a great message. How can you compete when a media is given the enemy 2 billion dollars worth of free air time.

You know what, you guys were pushing someone who never changed his status from I to D on us. You all had this idea and this mentality that its either my way or the highway. If you never heard S a sanders voter say that you either didn't see the same posts I saw or you are trying to troll.

My feelings stand, if you hate our party so much go form your own

[Arkansas Granny]

4. The really frustrating thing is that many people who just couldn't bring themselves

to vote for Hillary couldn't tell you why. They knew what we would get if they didn’t vote for her, but let it happen anyway. They are the last people who get any sympathy from me when the shit hits the fan.

[ehrnst]

14. There were so many unsubstantiated stories going around about her

and now we learn that Russia was focusing on "young educated white people" to dislike Hillary, using memes and trolls.

I saw so many "stock photo" young women on Bernie FB pages that were talking about how "anti-feminist" Hillary was.

And they swallowed hook, line and sinker, with no protest whatsoever from Bernie or Jill.

[mreilly]

67. So many goddamn trolls on some of my FB newsgroups

... I liked Boston.com and The Boston Globe on Facebook. The comments section are absolutely riddled with trolls. You can tell they are paid trolls since they post bullshit all day long and repeat talking points, paste endless memes, etc. The angle is always orchestrated; Hillary is a liar, Hillary is corrupt, any guy considering voting for Hillary is effeminate, the election was rigged (back when Trump was braying this shit since he thought he'd lose), etc. etc. etc. Fake profiles, fake names, obviously this was their livelihood.

I simply block the fuckers when I come across them.

[ehrnst]

70. Now we know that many of them were Russian, and they were wildly successful

in whipping up the Hillary hate in the left.

[betsuni]

5. K&R

[pnwmom]

8. She was much more POPULAR than the cheese-head --by almost 3 million more votes.

And her platform was much more popular, too.

But the electoral college was rigged during the slave-era to give more weight to the votes of mostly white voters in rural states. So if lazy or purist progressives stay home, this is what happens.

[Cha]

11. Hillary got almost 3 million more than trumpee.. she

lost the electoral by about 100, 000.

She got more votes than any other presidential candidate except President Obama.

Stop bashing her.

[liberalmike27]

21. Don't You Get Tired

Of saying stuff that doesn't matter?

Al Gore got a half-million more votes too. Guess what, he did not get to be president either.

Like you guys said about Super Delegates--she knew the rules before she went into the race. Do you honestly think Hillary did not know the EC elects the president?

[Cha]

23. I'll ask you the same question

[liberalmike27]

26. I'm Not

It doesn't matter that she got 3 million more votes--it's where she did NOT get the votes, and I might add, why.

You can think of Hillary as a paragon of perfection, but she really seemed oblivious as to why those workers in Rust Belt states, were uncomfortable with the cavalier way she was treating them--it seemed she did not understand how much that $35/hour job meant to them.

Hell, I live in the South. It really isn't as bad here as there, but I'm aware of it.

We can speak incessantly about Russian Hackers, and Golden Showers, but they're not going to get us the real internal change the Democratic Corporate Party needs to make.

[BlueCaliDem]

81. Whether you want to admit it or not (for whatever reasons you hold), fact remains

that Russia targeted the white educated young voter using Jill Stein (his other Putin-patriot) - and those votes were necessary for us to win after the Republican SCOTUS killed the VRA and Republicans in all those States immediately enacted voter suppression laws against PoC in the most blatant ways, preventing them from voting, purging their names, cutting early voting days, cutting polling stations in heavy PoC districts.

I firmly believe, that had President Obama run for a third term, tRump would've won from him, too.

It's sad that you and others like you continue to blame Hillary Clinton and "corporate Democrats" for the theft of the 2016 presidential elections by trying to pooh-pooh the machinations of that theft away. But we're not that gullible. We KNOW why tRump won by 70,000 votes in those crucial battleground States, and if you refuse to see it, you're part of the problem. Period.

[BlueCaliDem]

82. You didn't have to bother, Cha. One ear in, one ear out.

Or maybe someone has a hidden agenda?

Aloha, Cha!

[boston bean]

29. Don't you get tired saying the man who lost to the woman by over 3M votes should have been

the democratic nominee, so nananananaanana?

[Cha]

30. nananananaanana.. Bobanna!

bean

[stonecutter357]

40. Good morning Cha.

[Cha]

42. Good Morning, stonecutter

[stonecutter357]

37. Don't You Get Tired Of saying stuff that doesn't matter?

[ehrnst]

65. Straw man. No one is saying that she didn't know, or that we didn't know.

We're saying that she won more votes than anyone other than Obama.

Is that clearer?

[Cha]

97. Thank you for that, ehrnst.. I didn't have

the energy.

[mcar]

89. We should never stop pushing this point, Cha

No matter what others say.

[Cha]

98. I know, right.. so much strawman..

so little time.

mcar!

[SammyWinstonJack]

12. ...

[Stellar]

7. I hate all of those self righteous S.O.B.'s!!!

Because of them ...We're all ph#cked!!!

[bowens43]

9. get over it, move on to 2018. chastising people the dems will need won't help.

[RandiFan1290]

15. Some people are only here to bash 'the left'

You will NEVER see these people criticize the republicons.

[liberalmike27]

22. Aside from a few Social Issues

They're too much in agreement with the Republicans.

I argued with a lot of Hillary supporters that were literally quoting Reagan lines. The Economic message of Democrats v. Republicans has become frighteningly close. It is "the" problem. The Russian stuff is all cover, preventing us from talking about the schism in the Democratic Party. And it will remain, unless we fix it.

I can tell you, I am more frustrated than ever with the Party apparatus, and its unwillingness to change toward the party of old. It never should've adopted this neoliberal nonsense, it should've fought for what is right, not given in to corporate dominance.

Bill Clinton, in running around selling globalization, in effect exported manufacturing, where most of the unions were. Unions were a huge support pillar of the Democratic Party. One in four dollars used to be collected from unions. Due to damage done by Trade Agreements, unions now are only able to contribute one of 32 dollars, their power tremendously decreased. Corporations have taken up that slack, which gives them MORE power. The last thing they need, is more power.

Bill Clinton also set about supporting crime bills, that ended up arresting more of the people that voted nine of ten times for him, the minority voters. He literally felonized the Democratic voters most likely to vote for him.

We've got to realize folks--we need change, big change. And part of that change is not idolizing Clinton, Obama, or Clinton, in seeing their flaws, not gushing about how wonderful they are, how flawless they were.

[kcr]

39. Selection bias. Look it up. Or else get out more.

Because a vast majority of Hillary supporters do not quote Reagan lines.

[world wide wally]

45. We are about to get "change. Big change"

That is a fact glaring you smack dab in the face.

[emulatorloo]

84. Bullshit. You obviously never saw a full speech or studied policy positions

Your post is false equivalency after another

- HRC is not WJC

- she's not a "neoliberal" No trickle down economics, no lassez fair capitalism
------you can smear her with buzzword as much as you want. It isn't true

- economic policies of HRC were left and the opposite of GOP
-----increase taxes on wealthy and corps that outsource
-----had policies that addressed income inequality
-----believes in global warming
-----education/retraining of workers (rather than lying that manufacturing was coming back)
-----unions endorsed her because they know she supports them.
-----etc

- your talking points about Russian interference are the same as Trump and the GOP.
-----they are lying and they don't give a shit about free and fair election.
-----I don't think you're "lying'. But you are willing to buy into any false bullshit the GOP pushes as long as it hurts Democrats.
-----and that means you apparently don't care about free and fair elections

WJC crime bill
------My primary candidate actually voted for the crime bill

I finally realized in my mid twenties that voting is a responsibility as well as a right.

No candidate will ever align perfectly with my politics. And very rarely has my choice in the primary gotten the nomination.

I came up reading Marx. I foolishly though Carter and Reagan were the same. I wised up in Reagan's second term

It is my responsibility as a citizen that I vote for the major candidate who will do the best at making the lives of my fellow citizens better.

Clinton lost the EC by 80000 combined in those rust belt states. If 25% of those third party votes had done the responsible thing for their fellow citizen, Clinton would be president.

[Coolest Ranger]

33. and how are we supposed to get over it

when we have people from a certain camp who keep posting the same crap day in and day out. She got cheated, she got robbed, I'll never get over it

[Dream Girl]

10. For some reason, I always flash back to the convention and those disappointed Bernie voters who

Were just fuming. In particular there was one African American woman who blithely stated that she was going to vote for Jill Stein. You could tell she thought she was being real cute. Her attitude was like the shoes I want aren't in stock so I guess I'll buy tat pair. Not a care on her. I wonder how she's feeling today.

[pnwmom]

17. The Democrats nominated someone who won almost 3 million more votes

than the guy who took the rigged electoral college.

And she would have won even an electoral majority if the FBI head hadn't stuck his fist on the scale in the last days of the campaign. That was unprecedented and against all policies and couldn't have been prepared for.

[Hortensis]

18. RBinmaine, imo your post is extremely hostile and offensive

and antithetical to the mission of Democratic Underground.

Voting behavior is not the only way one can sabotage a party. Recommend you consider how very differently Hillary, Obama and the party leadership are behaving and try to understand WHY.

[Coolest Ranger]

34. No

he's speaking the truth. There's nothing wrong with what he's written. How is it fair for supporters of a certain candidate to post hundreds of threads praising their guy but the moment a Hillary supporter speaks their mind, its considered hostile and offensive. Stop it either let us have our say or don't respond

[Hortensis]

35. This was an attack. Bad, bad. No. No.

It should be very easy to understand that indulging hostility for the sake of indulging hostility is demeaning to both self and to the high-minded mission merely being used as an excuse.

But it's critical to understand that too much indulgence in what is worst in ourselves both degrades and literally re-forms what are supposed to be our brains' "higher functions."

We see this so clearly in the trumpsters on the right and some who've drifted into left-wing extremistm. Most of them will never again be the persons they once were, much less the persons they could have been. It's too late. They've indulged too much, gone too far for too long.

[Paladin]

20. K&R.

[Javaman]

36. so hillary gets 3 million more votes than the orange menace yet you still believe it was..

a lack of votes that was the problem.

the problem isn't voting, it's the fucked up editorial college.

[eniwetok]

41. Why have Dems refused to push to abolish the EC?

Maybe if Dems started a campaign to abolish the EC back in the 30's we not have had the Bush and Trump Juntas.

Our very federalist system is a straightjacket on reform giving states with as little as 4% of the population the ability to block all reform. It destroys democratic impulses even in the Democratic Party.

[kcr]

43. You're right. Why haven't they fired up that time machine and set it to the 1930s already?

Dems just don't fight hard enough for us! A time machine would surely spark some enthusiasm.

[eniwetok]

46. missing the point...

In a system that's grotesquely antidemocratic therefore ridiculously virtually reformproof to even the most common sense reforms, the ground work for reform has to be a systematic, long term effort... and even then one hopes the stars line up to enact them. We are the victims not just of this antidemocratic system but the refusal of the Democratic Party to push for reforms in the past. And Dems are making the same mistake after 2001 where 16 years have been wasted.

[kcr]

53. I don't think I am, though.

Our political system is not set up for change. It wasn't designed to be changed. Any change will take enormous amounts of political will across the entire country, including the red states. You said it yourself, your own words, "virtually reformproof." So, it's hard for me to understand where the blame lies with the Democratic party, here. They don't have a magic wand. If you think they can create such an enormous wave that it would form that kind of political will, you're sadly mistaken.

[eniwetok]

57. who cares about the will of the dead

Last I heard the Framers were dead. The system was only ratified by 1071 white guys back in 1789. Yet in the age of modern democracies we still feel compelled to be hostage to the politics of 1789? This is curious given that the FRAMERS recognized the Articles Of Confederation could not be salvaged that they worked to abolish what then was the law of the land... a perpetual union which all states had to abide by. It's time we had the same intellectual courage to confront a system that was designed to protect slavery and is failing to provide morally legitimate government. But the reality is we've all been inculcated into the Civic Religion that we mere mortals dare not question or critique the system. So Dems live in constant cognitive dissonance that they believe in democracy even as they seek to thwart it. In this regard even most progressive Dems are ultra conservative.

[Coolest Ranger]

52. Jill Stein and Rob Johnson

took votes from her in states she could have won, fact.

[eniwetok]

55. they have a right to run and voters have a right to vote for them

AGAIN... this is a defect in our system that we have an EC and that states don't have instant runoff voting.

It's pretty obnoxious for Dems to make Progressives like Nader and Stein the enemy and demand they not run or condemn their voters. DEMS should be leading the efforts to reform the defects in our system and they are AWOL on democracy itself.

[zipplewrath]

74. You word choice is telling

"...took votes from her...

Your word choice suggests they were votes that some how "belonged" to her or otherwise owed her. The bottom line is that votes have to be earned. Yes, it is frustrating to see people seemingly vote against their own interests, but that's the system.

The real flaw about the OP is that the problem really wasn't the people that voted knowing full well what they were doing and what risk they were taking. The real problem is the people (and I suspect it was on both sides of the aisle) that decide they can vote for a particular person because the "know" who is going to win "anyway". That is a risky and down right dangerous way to participate in a democracy.

Quite honestly, the primary problem was probably not people who voted for Stein, or stayed home. It was very likely the folks that voted for Trump because they thought he'd never win. If one likes Stein, vote for Stein. But don't ever vote for someone that if they won your first reaction would be "oh, crap, how'd that happen?".

[Coolest Ranger]

76. I am not going to apologize

for my choice of words either

[zipplewrath]

85. It's not about apologizing

It just puts your point in a different light.

[eniwetok]

38. Sorry... the voters DID turn out.

There are hundreds of variables in a campaign. When someone does some retrospective and picks just one, it often says more about them than history. Why aren't you blaming GOP voter suppression? Why aren't you blaming our antidemocratic system for installing Trump after he was rejected by 3 million votes? Given the margin, it SOUNDS as if voters did their job.

[ecstatic]

48. That's true too. So many things went wrong. The media didn't report

on the massive suppression (at least not daily, which should have been the standard).

Then you had Comey, Russsia, etc...

[Coolest Ranger]

54. Because and I'm going to keep screaming this

until I'm blue in the face.

Jill Stein Voters, Gary Johnson voters took votes from her in states that she could have won. Bernie even urged his supporters to do the right thing and vote for her but they didn't and because of that we're fucked with Trump

[HughBeaumont]

62. Jill Stein voters, maybe.

Gary Johnson voters . . . that's a bit of a leap. Libertarians are in no way, shape or form down with our side of the fence. I very much doubt any of those votes would have gone to Hillary.

I think it's more the people who couldn't be bothered to vote and Trump voters themselves that are at fault for Trump.

[MineralMan]

44. Thanks for that. You're exactly right.

K&R

[ecstatic]

47. Good luck. They never take responsibility. They'll remain

smug in their belief that they somehow taught Hillary a lesson; meanwhile, we're all trapped in this nightmare.

[H2O Man]

58. Agree & respectfully disagree.

I think that "staying home" should never be considered an option. The uncast vote is truly the only wasted vote.

However, I heard that 14% of registered democrats voted for Trump. I think that the responsibility for his victory lies therein. It strikes me as similar to the effect of democrats voting for Nixon in 1972, and for Bush in 2000. Rather than blame Nader or Stein, it would make far better sense to identify what state outcomes were impacted by democrats actually voting for Trump, and what their reasoning was.

[Initech]

59. Amen! The GOP will undo a century of progress in a few weeks.

Everything we care about, everything that separates America from the rest of the world, will be gone. And it's all because they hate us. Things are going to get fucking scary.

[Aristus]

60. You're not going to reach the Bernie-Bots.

They can't hear you through the smugness...

[Greybnk48]

71. I was a hard-core Bernie supporter

until Clinton got the nomination. Then I dutifully voted for our candidate.

What's a Bernie Bot? Is this a tactic to divide us?

[Aristus]

72. We were already divided. It's too late to do anything about it.

I had to listen to months of people calling Hillary corrupt, untrustworthy, unlikable, and unfit to be President.

I expected that from the brain-dead, blockheaded, gun-crazed, war-mongering alt-right.

But I heard it over and over, in the most fevered tones, from people calling themselves liberals and progressives, and swearing loyalty to Bernie Sanders over country.

Ideologically, I was closest to Senator Sanders. But I voted for Hillary Clinton in the election. Anyone on the left who didn't, or who stayed home on Election Day, helped Trump get where he is. Bottom line.

[Greybnk48]

96. The people who stayed home or didn't vote

are ALWAYS there. In the past they're were the core group of the Deaniacs, Ross Perot supporters, Ralph Nader supporters that can never go "mainstream."

But not EVERY person who voted for these people, or Bernie, then refused to vote in the general or were what you are calling a Bernie Bot, which sounds repulsive. Hillary WON by millions of votes and many, many Bernie supporters voted for her. Probably the majority of us did.

[GliderGuider]

61. Large institutions face a common problem. The larger they are, the more common it is.

An institution in this case can be either economic (a company) or political (a country).

The common problem I see is complacency. The fewer threats an institution faces, regardless of whether they are external or internal, the greater the complacency becomes. Complacency can only be overcome by being aware of threats and taking them seriously.

Looking in at the USA from the outside, over the last 60 years I've seen complacency growing in lockstep with your power on the world stage. I see economic complacency, social complacency, technological complacency, military complacency, environmental complacency and especially political complacency. The underlying message, whether spoken or unspoken, is that the way you're doing things in any of these arenas is so obviously the right way to do them that there is no need to stress out about reform. This feeling compounds the normal operational inertia of any large system, and in the end the combination produces stasis.

Unfortunately, once a very large institution like the USA or a major corporation has become static, the only way to introduce movement is through a shock to the system. The shock is required to force people to accept that there may be better ways of doing things, as well fostering the understanding that agility is the only real defense against stasis. It takes such a shock to restore motion, self-criticism, and a serious exploration of alternatives.

IMO Trump's election is your system's shock. There were previous shocks - like W for example- but they were not severe enough to prompt the degree of change that is needed to restore the system's health. With Trump, it's do-or-die time. (FWIW I expect similar shocks to be occurring shortly in both the economic and environmental arenas.)

I see the lack of voting as a sign of complacency rather than moral turpitude, and I suggest that particular problem will resolve itself once people get a taste of the consequences. Unfortunately, if you avoid the consequences, perhaps by impeaching or assassinating Trump before he has had his full impact, you will simply be setting the stage for an even more severe "lesson from the universe" a bit later.

[okieinpain]

69. +1 n/t.

[ProudProgressiveNow]

75. K&R nt

[HipChick]

77. K&R

[yodermon]

78. There will always be the 3rd party/indy fringe voters. good luck trying to convert them.

That will never, ever happen. The more you try to guilt trip them the more entrenched they become. And there will always be a new batch to take their place.

However: trying to motivate those (registered Dems) who stayed home is very worthwhile.

[KPN]

79. I agree ... to an extent

but we gotta do a better job as a party as well.

[Glitterati]

80. When you keep putting the same candidate voters have said they don't want THIS is what happens.

Make a BETTER choice next time.

[colsohlibgal]

83. She Won By 3 Million Votes

It is the increasingly ridiculous Electoral College that caused her to lose.

I had reservations about Hillary like more than a few....you cannot take all that cash from Wall Street and not be beholden to them. I had a hard time with her Yes vote for the stupid Iraq war.

I did vote for her. But next time- we need to move younger and more progressive. And there are more families in the US than Bushes and Clintons.

I too had a big issue with those who said they just couldn't vote for Hillary......but you had no trouble voting for that reality show buffoon?

Strap in one and all. What George Carlin said is true more than ever .....it's a big effin club and we ain't in it.

[mcar]

87. K&R

[Tatiana]

90. I voted for Hillary. And did my duty by ensuring all voting-age members of my family did too.

My daughter cast her first ballot as an eligible voter for Hillary Clinton. Ironically, I cast my first ballot for her husband, Bill Clinton back in '92.

Nevertheless, the deplorables still refuse to acknowledge that anything is wrong with their guy.

It's going to crash and burn and I hope karma hits all of these Trump voters swiftly.

[Thinkingabout]

101. Hate to say it like this but don't blame me, I voted for Hillary. There will probably be more who

voted for Trump who will grow to regret their vote, he is a wild man, nothing surprises me with him.

[RandiFan1290]

91. Cool story, bro

Not fooling this kid

[Motown_Johnny]

93. Corporatist v. Populist. Populist wins (even a fake Populist).

Blame whatever you want but that is what it boils down to.


We should have nominated a Populist.

[aikoaiko]

94. Yelling at them didn't work for the the GE and it won't work now.

I would have thought you had learned from your mistakes.

[SteamAddict]

95. Hey Everyone!

First post ever. So glad I found this site after wandering around feeling very depressed. I have been trying to stay off the Internet tbh. You don't know how happy I am to be here with so many actually sane people. I saw the title of this thread and thought it would be a good place to start. I ruined a my families Thanksgiving dinner calling out each family member that stayed home because they "weren't inspired". We are looking at some very dark times ahead and it is because of complacency.

[fleabiscuit]

100. I think you went a little easy on the rat fucking hooker pissing whining assholes.

Just my opinion.

[HassleCat]

102. Some people just can't do it.

I can sympathize with them, but I wish they would sick it up and do their duty when required. Many of them voted for Stein because they thought Hillary was a sure thing to win. What we really need to do is make sure registered Democrats don't vote Republican.

[Maru Kitteh]

103. K&R

[NJCher]

104. I feel sorry for you

Wow, just give it up. This is getting you nowhere except emotional misery. Does it really make you feel better to tell other people what they should have done? Really? There must be some reason for you to continue to wallow.

And it's not like anyone is going to put their hand to their forehead--SMACK--and say, "Oh, I am such a bad person. I should have voted for Hillary! Why, this debacle is all MY fault." I mean, seriously, do you think there is one person out there who is going to do that?




Cher

[stollen]

105. High maintenance voters vote like they order their coffee

They need it "tall, with steamed soya, two shots of espresso, a splash of vanilla, and a dash of cinnamon." If it doesn't come that way, then what's the point?