U.S. Politics 2016 Seasonal Hiring Edition: "You're fired"

[DMC]

9 minutes ago, Ordos said:

Where do you all see yourselves on January 20th/21st (depending on the timezone)? It will be midnight or 1 o'clock where I live (also depending on daylight savings). After watching Drumpf take the oath of office, I will either walk away or turn off the TV because I'm not giving Drumpf the luxury of more attention than necessary. If I'm watching with others, I might need to leave the TV on.

I will mark that moment as the end of the 'good old days' and the 'dark and bleak present'.

I met a girl who sang the blues
And I asked her for some happy news
But she just smiled and turned away
I went down to the sacred store
Where I'd heard the music years before
But the man there said the music wouldn't play

And in the streets, the children screamed
The lovers cried and the poets dreamed
But not a word was spoken
The church bells all were broken

And the three men I admire most
The Father, Son and the Holy Ghost
They caught the last train for the coast
The day the music died

And they were singing bye, bye, Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry
And them good ole boys were drinking whiskey 'n rye
Singin' this'll be the day that I die
This'll be the day that I die

They were singing bye, bye, Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry
Them good ole boys were drinking whiskey 'n rye
And singin' this'll be the day that I die

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

^^^^^^

I hear Anthony Sabato Jr is going to perform that song at the inauguration. 

[DMC]

Ha, well done sir.  Wouldn't put it past them.

[Kalbear]

1 hour ago, mcbigski said:

Never the twain shall meet I suspect. 

What are the political donations of WaPo employees over the last 10 president elections?  

Can you actually think there isn't a bias?

What would you consider a credible source?

[Altherion]

2 hours ago, Kalbear said:

As it stands, the final national polls had Clinton +2 or +3, and she got +2.

Where are you getting this from? FiveThirtyEight has Clinton up 3.6 in the end; Sam Wang has her up 4.

More generally, Silver's statement about Clinton winning without Comey is probably true, but if so, it is only true because of the narrowness of her loss: the election was decided by less than 0.1% of the overall vote (albeit concentrated in a geographical area where it amounted to something closer to 1%). This same feature of the election allows one to plausibly blame the loss on practically anything else that didn't go Clinton's way. 

The counterargument to this is obvious: it should never have been that close. If the race is so close that a small headwind is enough to knock a campaign over, then that campaign has nobody to blame but themselves.

[DMC]

15 minutes ago, Altherion said:

More generally, Silver's statement about Clinton winning without Comey is probably true, but if so, it is only true because of the narrowness of her loss: the election was decided by less than 0.1% of the overall vote (albeit concentrated in a geographical area where it amounted to something closer to 1%). This same feature of the election allows one to plausibly blame the loss on practically anything else that didn't go Clinton's way. 

Yeah, Trump actually has a valid point with the counter-argument:  he would have had an entirely different strategy if the rules of the game were the popular vote.  Problem is, the more he loses by millions and millions of votes, the more such a claim looks like desperation - especially when it's couched in outright lies about the amount of illegal voters.

[ThinkerX]

I would point out, that at least in the 'comments' sections of the political articles I read in the months before the election, Clinton had very, very few enthusiastic supporters.  Most of her supporters were lukewarm at best.

 

The Trump crowd, though, while crude and often challenged by basic grammar rules, were most definitely enthusiastic.

 

That, right there, told me last spring that Clinton was in deep trouble. 

 

Sanders, on the other hand, enjoyed a measure of internet comment popularity comparable to that of Trump.

 

Another thing I had issues with was 'Clinton being a good candidate' while being cozy with a blatantly corrupt and incompetent Democratic leadership.

 

Yet, here and elsewhere, people put on industrial strength blinders to Clinton's issues here and expressed active loathing for the Democratic contender (Sanders) who pointed them out.  Self-deception.

 

 

 

 

[Altherion]

The electoral vote is finally over. The people urging electors to defect failed in their quest to stop Donald Trump, but their accomplishment is nevertheless quite historic: 2016 has more faithless electors than we've had in any election for over a century and more Presidential faithless votes since... as far as I can tell, 1796. The wiki article is being considered for deletion so I'll just copy the list with newspaper links directly:

----------

Washington (defecting Clinton/Kaine electors):

President: Colin Powell (3), Faith Spotted Eagle (1)

Vice President: Winona LaDuke (1), Elizabeth Warren (1), Susan Collins (1), Maria Cantwell (1)

----------

Texas (defecting Trump/Pence electors):

President: John Kasich (1), Ron Paul (1)

Vice President: Carly Fiorina (1)

----------

Hawaii (defecting Clinton/Caine elector):

President: Bernie Sanders (1)

Vice President: Elizabeth Warren (1)

----------

In addition, electors in Maine, Colorado and Minnesota tried to defect by voting for Sanders or Kasich, but they were either replaced or forced to change their votes. That would have made it even more interesting, but even as it stands, if we consider only the current iteration of the electoral college (i.e. after the Twelfth Amendment), the result is unprecedented. Seven different people got Presidential electoral votes:

----------

Trump: 304

Clinton: 227

Powell: 3

Sanders: 1

Kasich: 1

Paul: 1

Spotted Eagle: 1

----------

Interesting times, are they not?

[OldGimletEye]

1 hour ago, mcbigski said:

We won't find a mutually credible site to measure by.  WaPo is just lefty fake news like NYT.

 

Just now, Kalbear said:

What would you consider a credible source?

I too am curious about what is considered a credible news source or source of information,

Would it be:

1. Wing Nut Daily?

2. Faux News?

3. Rush Limbaugh?

4. Sean Hannity?

5. News Max?

6. Info Wars?

7. Brietbart?

[butterbumps!]

 

12 hours ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

That describes me to a T, but I made it a point to vote anyway because the alternative was so distasteful. I really don't understand how a (D) voter could stay home this election if they were paying attention.

I'm wondering if a lot of those who were paying attention, who weren't excited for Clinton, but really hated Trump, felt at ease not voting.  And not in the "Democrats must fall love" way, which, for the record, I do think is a good way of characterizing Dems broadly.   Rather, I've been wondering how many Dem-leaning-but-unthrilled-with-Clinton people out there didn't bother voting simply because they thought Trump was just so singularly unqualified and ludicrous that their fellow Americans wouldn't vote for him in significant numbers.  A viewpoint that was very much corroborated by nearly all polls and aggregate analysis leading up to the election.   I'd hazard the guess that some Stein (and perhaps even some Johnson) voters in those wretched 3 states are regretting their choices too, having believed Clinton was such a sure bet.    So I think that being lukewarm for Clinton, or not recognizing Trump as a singular threat is a fair part of this, but might not be the whole story.   I think some damage was done by lukewarm Dems who basically underestimated Americans' tolerance for charlatan demagogues hawking bigotry.

 

[Martell Spy]

The Vampire Squid Occupies Trump's White House
After running against Goldman as a candidate, Donald Trump licks the boots of the world's largest investment bank

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/the-vampire-squid-occupies-trumps-white-house-w456225

[LongRider]

2 hours ago, OldGimletEye said:

 

I too am curious about what is considered a credible news source or source of information,

Would it be:

1. Wing Nut Daily?

2. Faux News?

3. Rush Limbaugh?

4. Sean Hannity?

5. News Max?

6. Info Wars?

7. Brietbart?

You forgot a few; clickbait posted on Facebook, links to fascinating articles sent around in that email chain from your Hannity lovin' uncle, links in links in links so you don't know where the hell you're at and wikipedia, just to name a few.  The 'credible' news sources on the web are endless!  Plus why try to separate fact from opinion anyway? That's for libertard sissies to do.

[TrackerNeil]

bad post

[LongRider]

7 hours ago, Ordos said:

Where do you all see yourselves on January 20th/21st (depending on the timezone)? It will be midnight or 1 o'clock where I live (also depending on daylight savings). After watching Drumpf take the oath of office, I will either walk away or turn off the TV because I'm not giving Drumpf the luxury of more attention than necessary. If I'm watching with others, I might need to leave the TV on.

I will mark that moment as the end of the 'good old days' and the 'dark and bleak present'.

I think I'll be hiding under the bed sobbing.  Too bad I gave up drinking so long ago, because going on a bender sounds like it might have it's merits as well. 

[OldGimletEye]

Just now, LongRider said:

You forgot a few; clickbait posted on Facebook, links to fascinating articles sent around in that email chain from your Hannity lovin' uncle, links in links in links so you don't where the hell you're at and wikipedia, just to name a few.  The 'credible' news sources on the web are endless!  Plus why try to separate fact from opinion anyway? That's for libertard sissies to do.

LOL.

Right now there is a sixteen year old sitting somewhere in Macedonia. Now this sixteen year old probably doesn't speak great American English. And he probably doesn't have a real thorough understanding of American Politics. But, what he does know, is that conservatives really love them some fake news.

[mormont]

2 hours ago, butterbumps! said:

I'm wondering if a lot of those who were paying attention, who weren't excited for Clinton, but really hated Trump, felt at ease not voting.  And not in the "Democrats must fall love" way, which, for the record, I do think is a good way of characterizing Dems broadly.   Rather, I've been wondering how many Dem-leaning-but-unthrilled-with-Clinton people out there didn't bother voting simply because they thought Trump was just so singularly unqualified and ludicrous that their fellow Americans wouldn't vote for him in significant numbers.  A viewpoint that was very much corroborated by nearly all polls and aggregate analysis leading up to the election.   I'd hazard the guess that some Stein (and perhaps even some Johnson) voters in those wretched 3 states are regretting their choices too, having believed Clinton was such a sure bet.    So I think that being lukewarm for Clinton, or not recognizing Trump as a singular threat is a fair part of this, but might not be the whole story.   I think some damage was done by lukewarm Dems who basically underestimated Americans' tolerance for charlatan demagogues hawking bigotry.

Put it this way, I'm sure that if the election were held tomorrow Trump would lose. I'm also pretty sure that if you ran the election again another 100 times, Trump would lose 97 of them. And I think the hand-wringing over the Democrats' future prospects is therefore overdone, at least at Presidential level.

Democrats need to regroup, resist and reinforce their party, not burn it down and start again.

[LongRider]

1 minute ago, OldGimletEye said:

LOL.

Right now there is a sixteen year old sitting somewhere in Macedonia. Now this sixteen year old probably doesn't speak great American English. And he probably doesn't have a real thorough understanding of American Politics. But, what he does know, is that conservatives really love them some fake news.

And all those clicks keep the money rolling in and the pizza joints on high alert.   

[Tywin et al.]

12 hours ago, dmc515 said:

An alternative explanation for Trumps's late surge is very simple: the large amount of undecideds - which could be observed by ANYONE looking at the aggregate polls - broke for him.  Moreover, Hillary had turnout issues and the demos she was relying upon veered too far to third parties.  I know this is an inconvenient narrative, but it's what the data suggests.  And no, it's not 'counterindicated' nor unprecedented - without the benefits of looking anything up on the internet I can say there were significant shifts in 1980 and 1992 in the last few weeks of the campaign.  This cycle, more than any other recent contest, shared the uncertainty in those elections.

The point is why was there a large surge for Trump? The last meta analysis I looked at found that Clinton was +3 among voters who had made up their minds two weeks before the election and Trump was +9 with voters who made up their minds in the final two weeks, after Comey's letter became public knowledge. Obviously there were other factors in play, as I said before, but Comey's letter was the only major change in the political landscape, so it's fair to assume that it played a large role in how late deciding voters behaved. 

[BloodRider]

On 12/17/2016 at 10:01 PM, Tempra said:

For months, liberals told us that the DNC hack yielded nothing of consequence except a good risotto recipe from Podesta.  Now, of course, the hack swayed the election to Trump.  And, per the FBI, Russia perpetrated the hack to get Trump elected.  But can we trust the FBI?  Liberals keep changing their mind to whatever is politically expedient at the moment.

So, did the emails have proof of a child sex trafficking ring?  Or did someone take something of no consequence and turn it into a hostage situation?

[OldGimletEye]

Conservative Intellectual Trash Clean Up: The Gold Standard

http://www.moneyandbanking.com/commentary/2016/12/14/why-a-gold-standard-is-a-very-bad-idea

Quote

The extraordinary monetary easing engineered by central banks in the aftermath of the 2007-09 financial crisis has fueled criticism of discretionary policy that has taken two forms. The first calls for the Federal Reserve to develop a policy rule and to assess policy relative to a specified reference rule. The second aims for a return to the gold standard (see here and here) to promote price and financial stability. We wrote about policy rules recently. In this post, we explain why a restoration of the gold standard is a profoundly bad idea.