Savage Love Dec 13, 2016 at 4:00 am

Slouching Toward 2017

Comments

2
Bless you, Dan. I am still reeling from the upcoming nightmare of January 2017, and this week's column provides ample ways to deal with the insanity. Thank you and the LWs for offering good, productive suggestions.
3
I'm sorry, I'm just having a really hard time seeing how politics affect people's sexual feelings towards their partners...I can understand feeling down or worried or pissed might make "sexy time" thoughts less prevalent but come on! People commit horrible acts every minute of every day - the world will never be perfect why waste time with things you quite literally have no say or control over?
4
LW DONE...

Straight cis white woman here.

It's not that we didn't try. We did. It's not that we didn't offer logical well-reasoned arguments and not that we didn't go for emotional hooks. You can't logic a person into a position they didn't logic themselves into. Look at the woman in this story: http://www.vox.com/2016/12/13/13901874/o… She didn't logic and reason herself into a vote, but voted for someone who promised to repeal the Affordable Care Act even though it's the reason her husband is able to get medical treatment now...because she didn't believe he'd really repeal the law. Even though he said he would. Even though the person he's nominated for Secretary of Health not only wants to repeal the ACA, but essentially dismantle Medicare. Even though the R's in Congress have voted for almost a decade to repeal the ACA.

And if you can't logic someone into a position they didn't logic themselves into, you sure as hell can't emotion them into emotions they can't or won't process. Why are Black Lives Matter not peacefully protesting? Except when they do, or when they take a knee at a football game, or wear a t-shirt and nothing else, etc, etc.

None of the above excuses what happened. None of the above makes your reaction any less valid.

None of what I wrote, however well reasoned, will be any comfort to you at all, because there's nothing that can comfort the pain of feeling that a huge chunk of the people who you live with don't actually see you as human.

I have only one suggestion: when you tell your white partners that you need to not be intimate with them for a while (however you define intimate), tell them to have the grace to let you lick your wounds in private. We're all wounded, but it's fair to say that your wounds (a queer woman of colour in a world that kills people like you) run closer to the bone your white partners'. By telling them to give you space and privacy, you draw a big bright line that they are not allowed to use you to process their emotions for them. They can find somebody else.

I am so fucking sorry.
5
Parkerg @3, it's the feeling or the dread that the people you're fucking, deep down inside, don't actually think of you as human.

Political outcomes are a crucible in which one's true views of society become known.
6
I like the "party every 100 days" idea... and re the dildos - is it illegal to send dick pics (or dildo pics) over Twitter? Can't we flood Trump's twitter feed - whether realdonaldtrump or potus - with dick pics? maybe it will make him realize how getting bullied on social media feels....
7
Maybe if people want to send real dildos to Trump this can solve the problem that sometimes appears in this column of what to do with old, used sex toys that can't be recycled.
8
Yeah, got some problems with the math there though. January 20, 2020 is still a year out from Trump's last day in office. He'll be in office until January 20, 2021, unfortunately.

Also 365*4+1 = 1461

Two days ago would've been the day for Trump Minus 1500, so we've already missed that. Next date is March 22.
9
Does LW1 seriously think that white folks could change the minds of family members who were still going to vote for Trump after so much dirt came out about him? If grabbing women by the pussies, if having no policies whatsoever, if acting like a 6-year-old, if having filed for bankruptcy multiple times, if running a scam school, if being a giant narcissist, if promising to build a wall were not enough to get people to vote against him (even if they weren't voting for HRC) then I have a hard time figuring out how a phone call from a relative would have done the trick. [Sorry, I know that borders on a run-on.]

The reality is that HRC was not a strong candidate. Like many who were going to vote Democrat, I feel like I misjudged Bernie. I didn't think he could win but perhaps some people who are sick and tired of politicians for life (I include myself in that group) would have gone with Bernie instead of Trump. Anyway, I stand by my run-on: a phone call wasn't going to do anything. The info. was there for everyone to see and a large minority--since HRC won the popular vote--didn't care.
10
@3: "I'm sorry, I'm just having a really hard time seeing how politics affect people's sexual feelings towards their partners"

You don't talk to your partner about reproductive rights, obviously.
11
LW1, imagine how the whole world feels about America. You picked that guy as your President?
Your emotional response hopefully will be short lived. It is a form of racism you have been stricken with.
12
1. Do you know if your queer partners even had any Trump-voting relatives?

2. It's entirely possible that your queer partners had about as much chance of persuading their Trump-loving relatives to vote Hilary and said relatives would have had in persuading your queer partner to vote Trump: none. Think about it - since when has something a relative said affected your basic politics?
13
Can we please stop with HRC wasn't a strong candidate? She won the popular vote by a number equal to the population of Chicago, for goodness' sake. The reason we're not talking about her transition team now is because of about 80,000 votes in three states that nobody ever thinks of when you talk about where to go on a week-long holiday and a legal construct that was put in place to convince white male slaveowners to sign on to this idea of a United States (and if you don't believe me on that, then tell me why for 32 of the first 36 years of the republic the president was a white slaveholding man from Virginia).

All the way through the general races, the standard Clinton was held to was utter perfection. Anything less meant that she was a failure and should step aside. The standard that Trump was held to was, "show up and have a pulse." Holy flying piece of crap, Batman...if you ever wanted to see clear double standards to men and to women, look right at that and don't look away. Remember all the hand-wringing about how he "didn't look presidential?" Oh dear, he doesn't look the way he should....maybe next time he'll be able to string two coherent sentences together!

By the way, once again all of the above is more proof you can't logic someone into a position they didn't logic themselves into.
15
I respect DONE's feelings on this one, but I'm not sure if she really understands exactly what is going on out here with a lot of us cis white folks. We HAVE been talking to our idiot relatives... for years now. I, for one, have had every Christmas visit end in three days of silence and tears for the last decade. At some point, you realize you will just never convince them, never reach them. Am I still furious? Yes. I haven't spoken to my mother since the election. But could I have done any better? I'm really not sure I could have.

I know this affect you so much more directly than it does me. But so many of us tried, and talked, and campaigned, and protested, not only Trump but every step and issue up until then.
16
The fact that we "aren't sure how to feel about this election" and that our first instincts on responding are "send him dildos!" and "party every 100 days" is a great explanation for why the right is running the country (into the apocalypse). We should know exactly how to feel - outraged - and we should be organizing, not making stupid, childish gestures like mailing dildos to the president. Trump's right on this one: it's "Sad!"
17
DONE and others: we’re all in it together; please don’t abandon your white friends just yet. Unless you know for sure, it is very possible that they did talk to their families, and that their coming out in-any-way-shape-or-form made other members of their families to be more aware of yours and theirs plight.
I also urge you to work in your community. When the California same sex marriage referendum was struck down by the popular vote few years ago it was clear that many black voters followed their churches leaders and voted against.

Keep on living your lives, including fucking and kinking. One of the main trump strategies is to devastate and shame any opponent. It even worked with 16 other barking fellow candidates, don’t let it happen to you!

Budget your energy and resources. This is not a race to earn your immediate liberal credentials. It’s a marathon, a tough sweaty one where people throw up and stop to pee and cry once they realize they have to go up hill for the next 3.2 miles. And yet you can’t afford to just stop and wait for the slow moving bus behind to pick you up.

It will be ugly, very ugly, often frustrating and very dirty. Put on your parka to block the mud and the rotten tomatoes and remind people time after time after time that diversity is good for our economy, good education means better jobs, clean air and water mean less kids getting sick.
18
DONE I get it I really do. But don't fall in the Tumblr SJW trap of taking things out on your allies because it's easier and they'll put up with it. Lashing out at your lovers for things they really have no control over isn't going to help. As others have pointed out we HAVE been trying to change minds. but if 'grab them by the pussy' and his humiliation in the debates couldn't do it I really doubt anything we could say would change their minds.

If you need time to process that's fine but put your energy towards anti-Trump groups, not ragging on your friends.
19
I was raised by a mysoginist narcissist (as I'm sure many girls were, since there seem to be so many mysoginist narcissists alive and well out there). So, I complety understand why the election results would mess with your head, sexually. But, I'm not going to let these creeps mess with my relationships any longer. Let's go with the 100 days parties! Which Seattle venues will be participating? I can't wait!!!
20
Thank you Slinky@13. Yes, the Electoral College has got to be sorted.
Clinton should be President-elect.
21
Though the Demicrats were piss weak standing up to trump. Even now. Where are they?
Not loudly insisting the Electors read the intel on Russian interference.
Trump is not even hiding that he admires Asad and Putin and their brutal killings of civilians, hospitals where new borns are.
22
DONE: Ironically, I'm blaming women and non-cis-whites for not voting in large enough numbers to defeat Trump.

There are a lot of cis white guys in the US (and ~%40 of them voted Hillary) but they are the minority when you count women and non-white Americans. Hispanics and Asians especially had a weak turnout.

Since you now have more personal time not fucking you may want to think back on your own get-out-the-vote efforts and ask if you did everything you could?

I mean what do you think is an easier task; convincing a Trump-supporter to switch their vote or convincing a Hillary supporter to get off her ass and head to the polling place?

I agree with Dan, feel how you're going to feel about it, but realize feelings can be based on stupid assumptions and biases.

Do we really want to go through the next four years pointing fingers at each other or should we start figuring out how to win in 2020?
23
Am I the only one who finds 1461 days more depressing than four years? Fuck, that's a long time to live under the boot of Trump's wannabe brownshirts.
24
To add to what slinky @4 said, Buzzfeed interviewed some Florida Latino voters to ask why they voted for Trump: https://www.buzzfeed.com/leticiamiranda/… Some of those voters, especially the ones who escaped Cuba and South American dictatorships, were wary of what they perceived as "Democrat = socialist" and voted for Trump because they saw what socialism did to their own countries. It doesn't matter what the facts are, if "socialist = bad and dictators stripping away rights" in someone's mind, you'll never be able to logic them out of it. After all, their experience is going to matter to them more than what anyone - especially someone who didn't go through what they went through - could possibly tell them.
25
Hey, don't insult Julius Caesar, Dan!
26
So wait... LW1 is blaming her white partners for not being able to change the minds of their Trump-supporting families? WTF? That's unfair AF. How do you change the mind of hardcore Catholics who will never vote for another Dem because of ABORTION? Of old people who've been brainwashed for 20 years by Fox News? Of dumbasses who believe Hilary ran a sex trafficking ring out of a fucking pizza joint? How are your partners responsible for changing the free will of their relatives? Jesus. Have YOU ever had a discussion with a Trump supporter? How many minds did YOU change?
27
@26: Have YOU ever had a discussion with a Trump supporter? How many minds did YOU change?

But we have all that cis white privilege that enables us to bend other cis white people to our will. They take us more seriously and hear out what we have to say because we are fellow cis whites. /s
28
I have absolutely zero doubt that the incoming administration will be every flavor of fail for all Americans. But I wonder if the argument from dehum/literal genocide? isn't hyperbole, of the very sort that pushes people to the right.
29
@26...and LW1 recognizes that it's not okay to blame her white partners, and wrote in asking how to deal.

There is a world of difference between being in pain and asking for help on how to deal with that pain, and being in pain and lashing out at anything and everything in the way.

It is totally fair and justified for LW1 to feel like her life is at the whim of white people because in many cases, it is. Certainly the election of Trump is a whitelash. The whole thing about All Lives Matter and Blue Lives Matter is that it's white people not owning up to the fact that black people are treated very differently...over something as heartbreakingly simple as not wanting people like them to be killed by police. I don't know where LW1 lives, but if she's in Baltimore or Cleveland or Baton Rouge or New Orleans, she's justified in feeling like she's living in a place where people hate her for who she is, because some people do.

And what we can do, and what her white partners can do, is recognize that while we're all wounded by this, there are some people who are wounded more deeply than others and the kindest thing we can do for our more deeply wounded friends is get the hell out of the way.
30
So, Democrats just lost (the EC) to a proud bigot, a dangerous authoritarian, Putin's butt boy. And what's their solution to fix this? Send dildos, have parties every 100 days, alienate other Hillary supporters. This is why the left keeps losing! What does any of this accomplish? How does this convince anyone to vote for Democrats? How does this influence policy or win voters or communicate how horrible Trump is?

The right gets it. The right played such a good media game that white supremacists are now getting fawning profiles in serious magazines. They are working social media. They are getting the MSM to parrot their talking points. They are shaping the debate. Meanwhile, all the left does is subdivide into smaller and smaller groups, lack any coherent message, and apparently doesn't even have the desire to reach out to ANYONE if you're alienating queer Hillary supporters who may or may not have Trump-voting relatives.

I thought this would be enough to shake the left out of their purity tests, Tumblr, label-obsessed insular little world, where being anti-racist and caring about social justice is just another indie band you have to let everyone know you liked before they were cool.
31
@4: DONE's partners aren't asking to use DONE to process their emotions for them. DONE is using them to process her own emotions about the election, by irrationally blaming them for something they had no real control over. At least she seems to recognize this is unfair. If she wants to reset her feelings toward her partners, she could try acknowledging that she's judging her partners because of their ethnicity (something else they have no control over).
32
The women's march on Washington is the day AFTER the inauguration. Trump will not be affected by it.

And to the writer who doesn't understand why his wife lost her sexual desire over Trump - did you ask her if she's ever been sexually assaulted? I have, as have most women. That tape where he's talking about grabbing pussys made me nauseous as hell as he described assaulting women in the exact manner in which I have been assaulted. His win was a repudiation to all women that they don't matter, that men can do anything they want. I promise, your wife was not the only woman to have a drop in libido for a while there.
33
DONE is making the same mistake the Democratic Party leadership and lots of Clinton voters are making: blaming the outcome of the election on the wrong people and the wrong things.

For instance, the Electoral College. Yes, it's obsolete undemocratic bullshit and should be abolished. But complaining that Clinton should be President because she won the popular vote is like saying you should have won that chess match because you took the most pieces even though your opponent checkmated your king. The Clinton campaign knew the rules of the game going in and in fact seemed pretty sure the electoral college math was in their favor (remember the 242-vote "Blue Wall" and Trump's "narrow path to victory"?) Clinton barely paid attention to Michigan and never even campaigned in Wisconsin, but late in the election the DNC spent millions in Chicago and New Orleans just because they were worried they might win the EC but lose the popular vote.

You can't change the rules after the game is played (if it had been a national popular vote contest, I guarantee you turnout in Texas and rural California would have been a lot higher). If it had gone the way the Clinton campaign expected, it would've been the Trump voters crying about the popular vote. But Clinton's judgement was wrong, and that's the real reason Clinton lost.
34
So, Mx Obvious @30, if it's so obvious, then how do we fix it?
35
If you're a liberal white queer person, the odds that you have meaningful interactions with Trump supporters is pretty small.

@30 We didn't lose because of 'purity tests' and because we were too busy trying to be 'cool'. That view of liberal America is beyond infantile. Buying into (and voicing) Rush Limbaugh's vision of progressive America doesn't exactly make you an ally.
36
@35 Except it's also true. Hell DONE and #29 are great examples of the 'I'm more tolerant than you bullshit' that pushes people away.

Maybe we should trying to point fingers at who's the most racist and instead work on stemming Trump's damage.
37
The "Let's send dildos and party" plan is an excellent illustration of why the more liberal parts of the left have no actual power. Much more concerned with empty and narcissistic gestures that feel good, not interested in doing what it takes to actually win consistently.

Do you think all those white devils want to mail dildos around, or do you think they want to go vote and canvass again in 2018? Because all of those evil cis-het whites are going to go vote in 2018, even though you don't get a bunch of up-votes and likes for it. Are you?
38
BDF @34, your question wasn't for me, but I'm sad to say that as a lifelong Democrat, I agree with almost everything Obvious @30 had to say - and I do have a few ideas for "fixing it."

Firstly, take all the time, energy, and money that you want to throw into symbolic protests - things like dildo campaigns, 100-day parties, and yes, even the Women's March on Washington - and channel those resources into loving, tangible actions to help people in our society who are already struggling, even before Trump takes office. If you have time, volunteer; if you have energy, organize and build; if you have money, donate. Surely there is a cause in your community that you have both the desire and the personal resources to support, and strengthening your own community (however you define it) at the grass-roots level is the first step in fighting back against those who wish to dismantle our existing social, legal, and economic support systems.

Secondly, take all your navel-gazing angst and overwrought hand-wringing about the End of the World As We Know It, and transform that huge flow of negativity into an equal and opposite force for positive change. This is best done by deliberately reaching out to people who are very different than you. LW1's instincts to blame and avoid "The Other" are perfectly natural to all humans when we are in panicking lizard-brain mode, but as humans we are also blessed with well-developed cerebrums that can overpower and transform the fight-or-flight impulse of the amygdala. Make a determined effort to embrace "The Other" even (especially!) when it is emotionally and psychologically difficult for you; this is key to overcoming the divisive societal forces that contributed to Trump's victory at the polls. Cultivating diverse friendships will help you learn to view the world from someone else's perspective, and as more and more of us seek out diverse allies, we will be better equipped to stand together and fight back against whatever President-elect Trump and his minions might try to throw against us.

For extra credit, root down deep to discover your own secret prejudices, and then seek out one-on-one opportunities to face and overcome them. "Hey, I'm no racist!" Maybe not, but most of us still have to work to avoid passing judgment and making blanket assumptions about strangers, based only on what we observe from their physical appearance, dress, language or accent, and behavior. Once you can recognize your own prejudicial triggers - obesity, food stamp users, extensive tats and piercings, parents with large broods, people who resemble your ex, whatever - you can take steps to get to know triggering individuals or group on a personal level, and this will help to dissipate your bias.

To promote more love and peace in our nation (and in the world), we can all step up and do our part to foster less hate and divisiveness. Little drops of water, little grains of sand.

39
The election has changed my routine;
I no longer watch the 10 O clock news, because very night there is some prediction of what "President-elect- combover" is going to do (or has already tweeted).
My beloved miss N. has been depressed which has not helped our intimate life.
I finally scheduled a one-hour massage therapy session.
My therapist spent half the time expounding on how great things were going to be with Prez combover in the white house.
Now I have to find a new M-T. sigh.
Perhaps when spring comes and a new bright growing season appears this gray funk will lift.
40
DONE, how do you know that your queer, white partners didn't do enough during the election, or that they could have done more to change the outcome? Dan's right, if the election of Donald Trump makes you not inclined to have sex white partners, that fine, but to lay blame on your friends and sex partners for their failure to do more is unfair to them absent any other details about their political involvement. It also makes me wonder whether you'll be cutting yourself off not just from your sex partners, but certain friends, the kind of people you're going to want around over the next four years. You'll need these people for support and to help build an inclusive political movement that elects the kind of people you want in office.

UNSUB, I have a lot of sympathy for your wife. Like you, I enjoy sex with s-type women, but found myself rather disgusted with kinky thoughts after listening to Donald Trump's comments about grabbing women by the pussy. So I can appreciate how Trump has turned your wife off from kinky play. For me, my interest still hasn't quite rebounded, but getting out and spending time with people consensually engaging in kink has at least reframed these interests away from Trump.
41
@4--"when you tell your white partners that you need to not be intimate with them for a while (however you define intimate), tell them to have the grace to let you lick your wounds in private"

Sorry, that's where I'd tell them not to bother coming back. Get a fucking grip--no one can control what someone else does--if it turned out that one of her relatives voted for Trump would it justify a reverse pout?
42
LW3, UNSUBS - I second Dan's fine advice to turn the tables (so to speak) and encourage your naturally submissive wife spank you for a change, in order to restore the good energy between you that was shattered by Trump's piggy comments and actions on the campaign trail. If you really want to spice things up, don a Donald Trump mask and wig, and say some nasty Trump-like stuff before (or while) she beats your bare behind! Just be sure you agree on a safe word in advance - she may get too carried away, especially if she is a novice on the dom side.

SB53 @39, as the old ersatz-Latin saying goes - illegitimi non carborundum. (Don't let the bastards grind you down.) We have survived horrible Presidents and fractured national consensus in the past, and we will survive this time as well. I just hope the DNC has learned a few bitter but valuable lessons to carry forward into the 2020 Presidential election cycle.
43
I second msanonymous @ 36
We’re often too busy flashing our own liberal credentials instead of getting involved with less glamorous acts and organizations that are much more likely to make a real difference.
44
sb53 @ 39
If the actual massage went well I’d say stick with that therapist, build a rapport and learn where they come from.
Over time you may be able to point at some things that matter to them personally when the future administration is likely to screw up.
45
@36 Sure there are some obnoxious liberals, but every camp has it's annoying members. If being obnoxious and condescending was driving people away from voting for someone, then Trump's victory is pretty hard to explain. Blaming 'PC liberals' for Trump's victory is, for lack of a nicer term, dumb. Trump energized an already existing racist and misogynistic camp of Americans and they voted for him. No amount of being nicer to these assholes would have changed their votes. Trump had Fox News doing infomercials for him years ahead of the election and Putin did his espionage for him. Hilary for her part isn't that great of a candidate to begin with. We all patted ourselves on the backs when Obama got elected but it's been less than 100 years since women had the right to vote. Conservative America's Trump alternative was Ted Cruz. We live in a country where Ted fucking Cruz was the sane alternative to Trump - that's why we lost. We lost because we didn't nominate the white guy, who ironically was much more liberal anyway.
46
@33. Chase. The Electoral College is a farce.
I've only caught up with the mecanics of it this election.
705,454 Californians for one electoral vote.
194,717 Votes from Wyoming for one electoral vote.
Of course Clinton and everyone in America accepted the terms before the contest.
I didn't, because I didn't know the rules.
And I say that this game was rigged, and outcome as is is void.
47
democrats need to get off their butts and go do politics. The old rules obviously no longer apply.
It can be creative politics. Like Randy Rainbow. He is genius, and has fun with it.
48
@3. Parkerg. How can you seperate a person from their politics. Anyway. If you could in the past, it's not going to be possible now.
Do you have any idea what these fuckers are going to get up too? It'll be a multi pronged attack and via Pence, progressive people will start to feel controls creeping in.
Lucky places like California has such a strong politician in Jerry Brown. And Seattle has stood firm as well against the coming tide of old bible white men. There's a battle on, and it's very very real.
Politics is in your face now.
49
Good luck shunning your way to an electoral majority.
50
DONE, let's reverse the situation and pretend HRC won, and there's some conservative white person who's refusing to sleep with other conservatives because Trump didn't get elected, and they feel that their lovers should have done more to make it happen.

Not a perfect match to your situation, admittedly, but still what would you think of that person? Pretty terrible all around, right? Well, you currently have a lot more in common with that person than you're likely to want to believe about yourself. Maybe that can motivate you to change.
51
Maybe your white queer partners got through to at least a few of their relatives after all. In case you forgot, Hillary won the popular vote by an unprecedented margin. And yet the Republican won the office on technical grounds. What that fact should tell you is that Republicans understand the rules of the game, and you don't. While progressives have busied themselves with things like taking over college quads and declaring them "safe spaces" and forcibly ejecting the media, or plotting to mail thousands of dildos to the White House -- nah, there's nothing self-parodying about either of those examples, or about any of the letters this week -- what the Republican machinery has been doing is relentlessly effecting rule after rule to shut you people out of the electoral process entirely. Whether it's ID rules, Cross Check name cancellation, shameless levels of gerrymandering, or taking advantage of the fact that the small-state (read: rural, conservative state) advantage provided by the Electoral College has been allowed to metastasize, everything they are doing is geared towards making your vote as a progressive either impossible to cast, or to count for nothing.

And now, after getting your ass handed to you by the people who have learned exactly how to run rings around you with the rulebook, your response is to blame your allies for not being allied enough -- no, for their fucking RELATIVES not being allied enough -- and you want to shun them. Again, good luck winning, using divisiveness among your own ranks as your strategy. Republicans have figured out that dividing you up means that they win. Here you are, offering to do their job for them.

52
I was just recently reading about this:
The backfire effect is a name for the finding that, given evidence against their beliefs, people can reject the evidence and believe even more strongly. The phrase was first coined by Brendan Nyhan and Jason Reifler. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmati…

53
in response do DILDO, I have a better idea. You often get people writing in about how to put their old sex toys to good use (people mostly asking about places to donate). Why not send them to Trump? Cleaning before mailing not necessary.
54
Focus on the MIDTERM ELECTIONS. Every month write to your Congressional Reps. and let them know that you're paying attention to their actions. EVERY MONTH. Let them know you're not going away and that you'll be voting on their jobs in 23 months.

If we all send emails regularly, and we get our friends to send emails, it will be more effective than a pile of dildos. Maybe not as much fun...
55
@54. Yes. This. And not just letters, but we find better candidates and we threaten to primary the squishes until the squishes start kissing our collective ass. Our motto should be "Do whatever the NRA does." The NRA has no celebrity spokespeople, no hashtags, no flashmobs wearing pantsuits and yet even Democrats line up to lick Wayne LaPierre's butthole after yet another devastating mass murder.

The Democrats need African-Americans to turn out in high numbers, yet they don't even care enough about that community to stop the blatant gerrymandering. The VRA-gutting ruling was years ago. And no response from the Democratic party. Why didn't Obama and the D Senators have the political will or skill to replace Scalia? Because they're pathetic losers.

@34 We need to be smart. We have to work on voter outreach. To everyone. The young people and minorities that didn't turn out for Hillary (or Kerry or Gore or every midterm election). We need to reach out to working-class whites who share our economic message. We have to constantly think about how we are selling ourselves. We must always have out best face for the public. This sometimes means the most professional. Sometimes it doesn't. Howard Dean was great because he had the balls to be honest about Iraq. Sanders was great because he had the balls to be honest about income inequality. Contrast that with most Iraq war or income inequality "protests". Can you see why they were ineffective? Our messangers were unappealing and our message is incoherent. The short answer is, look at how we won on same-sex marriage. Our messaging was on point. We didn't go around insulting straight people for no reason and calling them all bigots, like the LW did. We focused. We presented happy, stable, same-sex families just like yours. We challenged everything in the courts even when we kept losing. And we won.
56
STO
I agree that Obama wasted his first two years in office attempting to reach out to republicans and some foreign countries despite repeated humiliations. It seems like this period of inaction defined him as ballless ever since.

Now lets say dems regain the house, should they reject any presidential move regardless in order to also regain their balls?
57
Those people with no sympathy for DONE need to kick-start their empathy glands. DONE realises "I'm aware this is the blame stage of processing." She is angry. Directing this anger at her partners is irrational and I believe that on some level she knows it. My reaction would be, I hear you, I am sorry people like me failed people like you so spectacularly, I will give you time and space to process your justified anger. And hope that with time, logic will triumph and DONE will see that her queer white partners did everything they could to no avail, and that while the White Establishment Generally may be the enemy, these white individuals are not.
58
Oh, and not just "I will give you time and space," but "I will get MORE involved now on behalf of people of colour -- Black Lives Matter, immigrant rights." Not just to prove themselves to DONE, but because it's needed so much now.
59
@14 props.
@57, DONE is racist AF. Swap the words out and cis Dan would have shit his butt plug out.

You apologizing and needing to prove yourself to DONE, yeah ef that.

DONE needs a dose of reality. She's racist and needs to stop.
60
@58

Re; DONE. I think that you are for the most part spot on. She's freaking out and has every right to.

Re; getting MORE involved.

I'd like to point out that it is entirely possible that some or all of her friends might not be able to get more involved. I know for me..I'm tired.

I marched at the RNC in NYC back in 2004, I was at Occupy Wall Street when things went to shit in 2011(remember that pic of the crying girl with the grey top? I met her the day it happened), and I volunteered for Hillary(and ended up getting bitten by a dog for my trouble) this year.

Sorry to rant off topic. This just kinda touched a nerve.
61
@13 slinky: Agreed with LavaGirl @20: Spot on, and bless you.
@14 Hunter: Nope. I'm with slinky and LavaGirl in regards to Hillary Rodham Clinton.
The Electoral College should do its job as mounting evidence towards Russian hacking and FBI interference with the election (forget HRC's stupid emails already! How about Orangeman's rants and constant Tweets?!? What about his twittering the President of Taiwan----threatening our sanctions with China??). Hillary won by the popular vote--by over 2 MILLION VOTES. I voted for Hillary and consider her my president. Period.
62
@54 usedtobeotter2: Damn straight! The 2018 midterm elections are crucial. January 2017 is going to be a really rude wake-up call for those who are still clueless about the hostile GOP takeover and its consequences.
63
@39 sb53: My beloved VW & I feel your pain and that of Miss N. The Farmer's Almanac predicts a brutally harsh winter in our part of the country for 2017. We are doing all we can to stay warm and be strong.
64
@34 BiDanFan: Thank you---again!
65
STO @55 -- You're right, we DO need to field strong candidates. As for outreach, watch this link of Bernie S. making a Trump voter think. We all need to keep "stating the obvious"...the obvious to us, but evidently not to them. Bernie makes a great model for this. It's a long YouTube video, but interesting.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOIBwljk…
66
slinky @2: Echo everything.

There are a slew of articles about why Bernie would not have been a shoe-in. And a lot of articles about the whole shoulda-coulda-woulda post election thing. Whatever.

Anecdote #1: My Trump-supporting relatives were entirely unreceptive to my attempts to fact-check their beliefs or reason with them in any way. They were gonna vote for the Republican and hate on *any* Democrat put up against their party's candidate. It's called cognitive dissonance. Look it up.

Anecdote #2: In my past, I've been a victim of both a powerful older man's sexual harassment *and* a victim of gas lighting. I've been having nightmares and unwanted thoughts about these things interfering in my "intimate moments" with my partner for months now. It sucks. That said, I can say that since I've been there before (other events have triggered flashbacks) that it does get better with time, and *only* with time. Have patience and practice sensitivity and caring.
67
@slinky #13:
The reason we're not talking about her transition team now is because of about 80,000 votes in three states that nobody ever thinks of when you talk about where to go on a week-long holiday

This dismissive-to-hostile attitude had nothing to do with the outcome, nosiree, nope.

While I personally like being thought of as flyover country, becasue it keeps shitty coastal assholes away (not all coast-dwellers are assholes, obviously, but so many who are stay the fuck away as a result, which is nice) and keeps cost of living relatively low, urban/rural and costal/midwestern resentment had a lot to do with the outcome. And the reason Clinton lost is indeed that she was a weak candidate*: she didn't motivate people in, for example, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania to turn out to vote for her in the same numbers they turned out to vote for Obama. (Her campaign also put relatively little effort into voter turnout in the "purple" states, not only compared to Obama but compared to Sanders during the primary, as well.) They didn't flip to Trump, they just stayed home. (See the numbers here: http://www.forbes.com/sites/omribenshaha… )

As for the double standard, sure, plenty of people held Trump to a much lower standard. Plenty also didn't, and they didn't vote for him. In fact, around 74% of the eligible electorate didn't vote for Donald Trump, but the minority who did were distributed such to deliver an electoral victory under the system we have (I don't disagree with your arguments that it should be changed).

*Some of the reasons she was a weak candidate weren't fair reasons - anything connected to sexism or unjustified conspiracy theories about her - but that they weren't fair didn't make them any less impactful.
68
Obama just defended the EC in his last press conference; before he heads out for his holidays in Hawaii..
Good one, Obama. You have got some great fancy words yet when it comes to making some ballsy moves( to like save your country and the world), you are weak.
Holidays? Do something about Russia Now.
Talk to the Electors, now.
Piss weak democrats.
69
@smajor82 #45:
Trump energized an already existing racist and misogynistic camp of Americans and they voted for him.

No, he objectively didn't, at least as far as voter turnout is concerned and to no greater degree than any standard Republican. Proportionate voter turnout was down compared to the last two elections, and while final tallies are likely to show Trump winning more total votes than McCain or Romney, this is due to increasing population size. Overall, Trump underperformed compared to recent (losing!) Republican candidates, but Clinton underperformed as compared to Obama by more and in places where it mattered more. Comparatively, Trump didn't win so much as Clinton lost, and the reasons for that are obvious (all of her baggage, whether fair or not, from decades in the public spotlight, especially heightened due to sexism but not exclusively due to sexism). And the signs of this were evident in January, nearly a year ago, when one of the best-known, best-funded, best-connected Democrats with the full backing of the DNC was facing a serious challenge from a previously-unknown (to most people) self-proclaimed Democratic socialist running his campaign on crowd-funded small donations.

Clinton supporters love Hillary Clinton; nearly everyone else dislikes to loathes her (as demonstrated by her negative popularity ratings). Given that the DNC (and perhaps even a majority of the Democratic base) was intent on nominating Clinton, her campaign needed to take her flaws much more seriously much earlier and pursue a very different strategy than they did. And this matters a lot moving forward, becasue we need much better strategy to win, but I'm still seeing far too many Democrats blaming everyone but their own incompetent organization and candidate, which suggests they will not change a damn thing. Barack Obama won becasue he was a ridiculously charismatic (and disingenuous) blank slate onto which people projected their hopes. People voted for Trump for similar reasons, though it didn't work quite as well for him (his blank slate status was predicated on constantly and obviously lying, often contradicting himself day to day, so people were able to pick which lies they wanted to believe, but he turned more people off doing so than Obama's less obvious duplicity in promising everyone what they wanted to hear and then governing as Bush Lite - or Bush Plus when it came to assassinations, whistleblower prosecutions, and approving fossil fuel extraction and pipelines).
70
Congrats John. This a first for you maybe? @69.
Though your post isn't very sexy.
71
WTF?? Obama just defended the Electoral College??
His retirement to Hawaii must be nice---until the 50th State
sinks into the Pacific.
72
@69/John Horstman: Clinton won by 2.1 percent, and she did that facing an open, concerted effort by Russia bent on influencing our election; Wikileak, whose founder acknowledged attempting to undermine the election; an FBI Director who knowingly interference (against U.S. law) in the election by publishing a highly misleading letter that suggested wrongdoing when there was none; a news media that allowed itself to be played by all three. To suggest that fault lies with Clinton and her campaign strategy while ignoring this reality is to be played by Russia, Julian Assange, and Comey, just like the media.

If these players shifted the vote by less than a percent. Clinton wins by 3% and wins the Electoral College, it would not have been deemed a close election, and no one would be calling for all this soul searching.
73
Yes Grizelda. He has run out of steam at the last post. What a fucking wimp. Seriously. Every resource should be pointed at giving the Electors as much information as is available, and he should stay in Washington to make sure that's done.
All of America's security forces are now convinced putin oversaw the hack. All of them.
Yeah, whatever Obama. Enjoy the golf.

I'm sort of understanding where the first LW is coming from. Peoples attitudes can be changed, if it's taken carefully. Arguments over thanksgiving meals once a year or so, no real exchange can happen. Too much pressure and alcohol.
It has to be done now, talking with trump supporters. Trump will do most of the work himself, once his policies happen and his voters feel the pinch. They will start hurting hard, the poor trump supporters. The rich ones, have to deal with them later. Nothing illegal.
The poor ones will suffer and talking to them then may be possible. Pointing out how trump conned them with his lies and easy target practice on whole groups of people. And now it was their turn to be treated like a non person.
Until the bs structures around politics are changed and made more democratic, you've got to work with what is.
Democrats have got to learn to talk with trump supporters, the working class ones.
74
@73: LavaGirl: That's exactly my problem, Lava--I don't know how to talk to a Trump supporter. Or at least not sensibly. The vast majority of raging Trumpists sounds either hypnotized and / or in deep denial--- i.e.: "He's promised us jobs! Jobs!" / "War stimulates the economy"/ "Greed is good"/ "He's a businessman (as if THAT ends all arguments right there)", etc., etc. And they're the ones who will be thrown out into the cold head first.
My beaming landlady is so thrilled he's in the White House, because now she can say, "Merry Christmas!" without worrying about being PC anymore. This whole benighted country has gone batshit crazy.
75
And why am I so sure that as of January 1st, 2017 my rent's going to get jacked up to an unsustainably extortionist level?
76
@73 LavaGirl: Working class blue collar whites---- reclassified by Orangeman as non-humans.
How long do you think it'll be before they wake up to it?
77
And I just sit here sweltering.
Grizelda. Yes, many people have been brainwashed by a clever manipulator of people and his hate speech has exposed their own dark hearts.
When the shit hits the fan and they start to see his promises were all lies, then they might hear you.
78
@72, which is why it's SO, SO, frustrating that Clinton abandoned the "blue wall" states n favour of some pie in the sky fantasies about Georgia and Arizona. She ran a campaign like in was 2008 and she was Obama. That was stupid and arrogant.
79
Trump is not officiially in office YET.
I have been doing everything I possibly can to keep Trump and his very worrisome roster of appointments from taking office.
I took monday off work and am going to drive 7 hours to my State Capitol Building on Sunday (Dec. 18) to attend the Hamilton Elector's Candlelight Vigil there in the evening. We are trying to support the Electors to vote with their conscience.
I will go back to the Capitol Building in the morning from 9 AM-Noon, when the Electoral College casts their votes. I know it is a long shot but the stakes are way too high to not pull out all the stops. I have heard that there are already 20 Trump defectors, and we only need 17 more. If we get 37, the decision goes to the House of Representatives. I would hope that the majority of them realize what a danger Trump is and will not elect him POTUS, and select a respected, qualified, Comprmise Candidate.
My vote goes for Bernie, but I would be grateful for anyone but Trump.
If anyone is interested, please check out
hamiltonelectors.com for events in your area.
Also google Michael Moore's recent interviews (on msnbc, I believe), and Martin Sheen's message to the Electoral College video on YouTube.
80
I've seen stories in other magazines about "cool" people trying to get the message to their bat shit crazy relations well their is NO reaching these idiots. Trust me, when he doesn't bring their good paying jobs back he'll be more disgraced than Jimmy Carter. Hey, Hunter 78, RU the guy who ran for TX governor a while back?
81
@72: Clinton didn't "win by 2.1 percent", because the election was NOT DECIDED BY THE NATIONAL POPULAR VOTE. And I am willing to bet that if Clinton had won the electoral college and lost the popular vote you would not be claiming that Trump had won, would you?

@57: You didn't "fail" DONE, so there's no need to encourage her childish behavior. Clinton failed, and the Clinton campaign failed, and the DNC failed, because they were arrogant and stupid and unwilling to listen to anyone else. If DONE really wants to be mad at someone, that's who she should be mad at.
82
Sorry to have missed such a large chunk of time. I spend so much time in December dodging holiday schlock that the month actually speeds by.

Continuing where I left off, the obvious thing would be to leave FTWL to Ms Cute as the creme de la creme, but, in the end, I decided it would do her more good to have the Sartre Award instead. FTWL I think will do extremely well in the hands of Mx Wanna, who perhaps best exemplifies it. As Mx Wanna enjoys going in for non-canonical additions, I recommend sticking close to something like Prime's addition for the film of Miss Mackay's brief turn an an opera critic, "Och, nonsense! Violetta did not expire for love of Alfredo. Violetta was a thoroughly silly woman with diseased lungs. If she'd been properly brought up, she'd have been out on the hockey field, breathing deeply."

Next will be the Gertrude Award, which I also decided - reluctantly - against leaving to Ms Cute (as I recalled her thinking Gertrude's being included only as the Queen in the list of characters made the whole concept rather suspect).
83
@81 Chase. And the people who voted for Jill because they just couldn't stomach Hillary,
also failed, because they were warned over and over again trump was hell on wheels.
83
Chase @81. you don't think those who voted for Jill because they rejected Hillary also failed, they were too arrogant and wouldn't heed the warnings about trump. And the guy and his mad mind was staring them in the face.
84
Whoops. The mobile told me there was an error.
86
What to do about the new Administration?
Everyone who lives in a State with a republican Senator or Congressperson must be on the alert for every legislative action the republicans attempt. When they try to gut health care, call your republican Senator's office and your republican Congressperson's office. Tell them the proposed action is unacceptable. Follow up with correspondence, either email or snailmail (a handwritten letter). Do this every day for every issue.

When the Cabinet nominees are up for confirmation, do the same. Remind the Senators and Congresspersons that they must stand for reelection in less than two years.
87
As if my shitty relationship with my shitty conservative parents and my personal sense of betrayal at their vote weren't enough, now I get blamed for losing the election. Thanks a bunch.
88
@82/83: People who want to blame Stein for Clinton's failure keep conveniently forgetting that Johnson was running too. And he did about 3x better than she did. Johnson probably pulled more Republican voters than Stein pulled Democratic voters, but I guess third-party candidates are fine as long as they help the Democratic candidate (*cough* Perot *cough*).

Clinton lost 239,000 Obama voters in Wisconsin. That's ten times the number of new Stein voters. Trump did almost exactly the same as Romney, despite the fact that Johnson pulled 100K voters (5x what he did in 2012 and 3x what Stein did).

And Clinton lost almost 64K Obama voters in PA - more than double what Stein gained vs 2012 - while Trump gained almost 300K voters over Romney and Johnson tripled his 2012 results (and once again tripled what Stein got). Even if every single new Stein voter in PA had voted for Clinton this time around instead, Clinton still would have lost.

Trump winning is a fucking nightmare, but Stein voters aren't the reason Clinton lost. Barring proof that Russian hackers changed a significant number of electronic votes, Clinton is the reason Clinton lost. The sooner the Democratic Party admits this, and stops trying to blame someone or something else, the better.
89
For a start Chase, I ain't no democrat.
And you going all round the country to try and avoid the truth ain't going to change a thing.
Johnson and that guy in Utah were for republicans who saw no future with trump.
I was just adding to your wall
of blame/ shame/ fail. And those who voted for Jill, when they could see where trump would take the country and the world, were in my opinion, as arrogant as Hillary and the democrats.
They need to own, with Hillary and the party, that they fucked up too.

90
Amos101 @86 Yes. Yes. Yes. If I could do THAT scene in When Harry Met Sally, I would do it now. The Guide Dan discussed the other day -- Indivisible: A Practical Guide for Resisting the Trump Agenda -- gives lots of powerful, practical advice, but it boils down to what you said:

"Everyone who lives in a State with a republican Senator or Congressperson must be on the alert for every legislative action the republicans attempt. When they try to gut health care, call your republican Senator's office and your republican Congressperson's office. Tell them the proposed action is unacceptable. Follow up with correspondence, either email or snailmail (a handwritten letter). Do this every day for every issue.

When the Cabinet nominees are up for confirmation, do the same. Remind the Senators and Congresspersons that they must stand for reelection in less than two years."

Link to the Guide:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1DzOz…
91
@87...didn't the hildebeest blueprint of "how to attack a woman who accuses your cheating assed husband of sexual harassment and rape" teach you a damned thing??? Alt-Left libs will turn on each other quicker than a dog eating it's own vomit.

Get used to being less than adequate, for any number of reasons, in the near future.
92
@77 LavaGirl: But by then it will be too late! We've got to stop Trump NOW.
93
@82 vennominon: What is my award for, and its meaning / reference? I still haven't heard from you since this year's disastrous election. Getting a nomination for something with initials only and no explanation of significance (to a Downton Abbey character, perhaps?) doesn't mean much to me if I don't understand the connection. Please elaborate.
94
@86 Amos101: I nominate you winner of this week's political commentary thread!
Spot on and Kudos.
@90 usedtobeotter2: Agreed.
95
@86, @90, @92, @94
When you call or write to your Senators or Congresspersons, tell them you voted for Trump (whether you did or not), and he is not doing what he promised to do. (Nobody knows what he actually promised, because the story changed every day.)
Tell them you are disappointed and you want him to keep his promise (to protect social security, Medicare, Medicaid, and to "drain the swamp" not put the swamp dwellers in charge of the economy.) Add any other issue that is important to you.
96
I'm tired of hearing that liberal white people didn't do enough to convince our relatives that Trump's a Putin-loving, sexual assaulting, child-raping fascist with an incestuous fascination with his daughter. It's not like we didn't try. You need to deal with the reality that some people can't be reached. Liberal white people are not some miracle workers who can magically change the minds of our crazy conservative relatives. If we were, we wouldn't have any crazy, conservative relatives, now would we? Sheesh! You don't believe me? How about YOU try arguing with my relatives over Facebook and see how far YOU get!
97
@96 Diagoras: You have a valid point. This is why I avoid actual verbal conversation with my oldest sister: not that she's necessarily a Trumpist, but that there truly is no arguing with an arguer. Some people really can't be reached. I have also been very selective of whom I contact via Facebook lately.
Like I told LavaGirl @74: That's exactly my problem---I don't know how to talk to a Trump supporter. It's like they're a bunch of really stupid, rabid, zombie-like dogs in dire need of being euthanized. I went to the local USPS today to mail off some Christmas presents. Non-violent protesters were outside in favor of dismantling the Electoral College, and some weirdo yells at them that this is the "land of the FREE!" How can U.S. citizens be free when our freedoms stand to be lost? How can we feel safe when those who support Trump are angry, loud, and violent?
@80 jorgegeorge1959: One can only hope the idiot Trumpists see the light before too much irreparable damage is done. And Orangeman says he "digs coal". So, a shitload of blue collar workers in dead coal states REALLY believe those good paying union wage jobs and benefits will all magically return--when there IS no coal market anymore (hel-LO---China has and mines its own coal supplies; they don't need ours! Neither does Canada).
I say, Impeach The Son of a Bitch Already = ITSOABA!
98
Hunter? No SL Week in Review?
99
Venn? You still there?
100
Okay--I hit 100. After a good, productive day of filling out VA forms, collecting needed documentation, and faxing important stuff off to the VA about possibly going after my Master's Degree and /or teaching certification (more on this later---after the first of 2017), running errands, mailing off gifts, and catching up after a bad cold, Griz is calling it a Monday night.
101
ag @93 I posted my understanding of your "award" here:

http://www.thestranger.com/savage-love/2…

103
Well of course retired old white men don't want to talk politics because hey, what's the problem you guys. Sorry if you're black or gay or lesbian or trans or Muslim or Jewish or Latino or a woman, or young ... thems the breaks, eh.

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