Should Democrats feel foolish at this point?

I still maintain that the problem lies with the Electoral college.

More liberals live in urban areas, because it’s not 1870, and if your one horse hometown sucks, and you want to live in a place with good schools and jobs, you move away

That is why over half the population lives in primarily liberal urban areas.

When our voting system is set up to unjustly favor the will of uneducated farmhands in Bumfuck, Nebraska over literally anywhere with an educated population, there’s a problem.

Tearing down checks and balances is never going to be a solution. That perception is exactly why the electoral college is still valid.

It’s not balance to give rural votes more weight than others.

Democrats won six out of the past seven presidential elections by popular vote.

The people know Republican policies are disastrous.

Feeling foolish is a waste of time. Obviously many misjudged the electorate and the party has to rethink its policies and candidates. This is already happening with Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren taking the lead.

If the Dems had won, the Republicans would have had to rethink. That’s life.

Interesting question @JLeslie but things in either party are a cluster fu*k and serious soul searching is going to have to take place in order to heal and find clarity and purpose for each respective party. The sad part is this “we know better than you” and “what the other party wants is evil” mentality of each party. Politics has become so polarized by negative confrontational rhetoric that often is inflated beyond any reasonable truths and unfortunately people then believe it to be real and even take to the streets to violently protest.

As far as feeling foolish….no IMO they should not feel foolish for wanting their candidate to win…but I do feel they should examine the reality of the outcome. Half the Democratic constituents wanted Bernie Sanders to be the candidate and there seems to be ample evidence that the fix was in to deny Bernie a fair chance to win. THAT is where I myself would wonder about the true ambitions and goals of the Democratic party are. That is also IMO why Trump won as many Republicans and Independents are fed up of all those in Washington and specifically their own party who are beholden to corporate and outside interests and ignore the needs of ALL voters especially the middle class and small businesses.

It took a movement for Trump to win and that movement was fueled by fed up and determined voters who wanted a White House that paid attention to them and not corporations and these outside interests. Hillary lost because her voters were voting just to have a Democratic candidate no matter who it was as long as they were a Democrat and nothing more. Republican voters had purpose and wanted change, Democratic voters simply wanted more of the same. There was no real message in the Democratic party other than dump Trump. Our country deserves so much more for it’s future and that is IMO where the Democrats need to shift their focus.

@Call_Me_Jay Liberal policies are pretty damaging too. It’s high time for a more centralized party to emerge from the ashes of our political system.

Watch and see. Trump is going to give the Republicans fits. The turmoil to come will be worse than the consternation before the election.

@JLeslie I can see logically how Democrats and/or Republicans might feel silly. The Republican party abandoned Trump. The Democrat party believed their own media and polls.
I see media “rededicating” itself to the “truth”. IMHO How do you start over now and just say “never mind” and have the people believe you?

The Democratic party leadership should certainly be heaped with scorn, ridicule and self-doubt. They virtually assured the current result through their horrific strategies: they promoted a corrupt and criminal candidate at the expense of one who, though also flawed, was the clear choice of at least as many Democratic voters, and who had moved from a place far back of the final candidate to surge near the time of the convention. By that time, of course, as we now know, the fix was in, he was denied the nomination, and Hillary Clinton “won” that.

Then she made the disastrous comment about “deplorables”, and we all know how that backfired.

She covered up everything negative about her past and current conditions, even when it might have benefited her – earned her some sympathy, at least, at the Labor Day weekend near-collapse – if she had admitted to being ill. But no, she attempted to cover that up, as well. It’s like she is constitutionally unable (by her own constitution, that is) to recognize or admit the truth about things.

And she just didn’t energize her likely supporters. (It didn’t help that her willing collaborators, most major media organizations, “journalists”, “reporters” and other notionally “neutral observers” continually called the election as “in the bag” for her. I suspect that several million potential voters for her simply figured “why bother? they don’t need me to win this thing” and stayed home on Tuesday.)

There’s a lot in what @Cruiser says, and there’s also some truth to what @stanleybmanly has observed. We don’t really know yet exactly what platform we have elected to the White House. “Different” isn’t always better if you’re on the wrong road to begin with. (I’m reminded of the joke whose caption is, “Yeah, I know we’re going in the wrong direction, but we’re making great time!”)

“The turmoil to come will be worse than the consternation before the election.“_
@stanleybmanly I have not known you to be clairvoyant.~

IMO any turmoil will be manufactured not by the voters who lost but by the establishment in Washington. The Good Ol’ Boys club is pitching fits right now and scrambling to right their ship.

If anybody feels foolish, it should be EVERYBODY!
I knew the election was going to be a circus LONG before it started. What I didn’t realize was the that the show wouldn’t end with the election!!!

Maybe. But this Democrat
mainly feels nauseated and afraid.

Anybody the feels “nauseated” at this point in time needs to refocus. Take a look out your window…what do you see around you that any President directly effected on his own? Your life is most affected by your local government, mayor and alderman WAY more than the President ever will. If you are upset, put that energy into expressing your concern locally and to your Congressmen and Senators. Yes Obama pushing to raise my taxes and shoving Obamacare down my throat directly affected me in a very negative way….but he himself didn’t do it….Congress voted his legislation in and THEY are the ones who have made me nauseous.

The Democrats got the match-up they wanted. Hillary vs Trump. They thought that Trump would be an easy win and the Washington elite, the Mainstream Media, and Corp. America all went along. They underestimated the frustration in the country over ‘Business as Usual’. It’s really quite amusing to watch the ‘talking heads’ exploding. They simply can not believe that it had anything to do with their candidate so it must be that America is simply bigoted. They can’t believe that the President has failed so it must be that America is misogynistic.

You have to realize that liberals don’t just believe they are right but believe that they are so right that everybody agrees with them. So if you disagree, it’s not because you have any legitimate position but rather that you are taking the other side for some nefarious purpose. That you are in reality evil and trying to do bad things. Given this mindset, I believe that many Democrats are honestly afraid. To be honest Democrats are always afraid of Republicans. This time however they have had a full court press from the media and most of Washington to heighten their hysteria. It is the media that really lost this time around and it is them that should be doing some soul-searching and reevaluation.

“Not all Trump supporters are racist, misogynist, xenophobes. All Trump supporters saw a racist, misogynist, xenophobe and said ‘this is an acceptable person to lead our country.’

You may not have racist, misogynist, xenophobic intent, but you have had racist, misogynist, xenophobic impact.

Impact > intent.

So when you get called racist, misogynist, and xenophobic—understand that your actions have enabled racism, misogyny, and xenophobia in the highest halls of our federal government, regardless of why you voted for him.

You have to own this. You don’t get to escape it because your feelings are hurt that people are calling you names. You may have felt like you had no other choice; you may have felt like he was genuinely the best choice for reasons that had nothing to do with hate.

But you have to own what you have done: you have enabled racism, misogyny, and xenophobia.

Impact > intent. Always.”

(I found this on Facebook and I can’t take credit for it.)

“Doesn’t it read like a joke? Criticizing the Republicans for splitting apart their own party, but they win, and now scrapping around to try to figure how to pull the Democratic Party back together.”

Yes, and most of US politics reads like a joke. One recurring comedic theme is people continuing to relate to Democrats and Republicans as meaningful opposites to the degree that an observation about one says something true and opposite for the other, as your question sort of seems to do here.

The way your observation resonates for me is, “Yes the Democratic Party ought to feel foolish and disgraceful for unfairly & unwisely selecting Clinton to be their candidate rather than Sanders, and for generally being crony-ist, pro-establishment, and corporate-corrupted, and not representing the whole country’s deep concerns.”

Both parties are thankfully breaking down under the weight of corporate corruption each bears.“Something’s gotta give.” What exactly happens and what breaks next and who suffers how much are more in question.

@AnonymousAccount8 Then since you posted that rant you then should also take ownership that Hillary was a liar, crook, manipulator, enabler of the worst womanizer in the history of men in politics and the argument that “what difference does it matter” is beyond deplorable.

Where proof of Trump’s shittiness and inadequacy as a leader abounds, I have yet to see the same for HRC.

The Republicans won the election, but this may be their last. Their victory will impact the Supreme Court for twenty years. That said, their voters are a dying generation. They are on the wrong side of history. Their elected choice is unskilled and certainly not Conservative.
The Democrats are being smart about saying they will work with the GOP on issues they support, as opposed to the past Republican Senators and Congressmen who vowed to oppose anything the Democrats support, even if it is a traditional Republican position.

I think the Dems thought Hillary would get all the women votes, and most minorities. Maybe just because she was a woman.

The Republicans deployed a similar strategy when choosing Pailen for VP years back.

Had they backed Sanders, a better candidate, this probably wouldn’t be the outcome.

@MrGrimm888 if Hillary was supposed to get all the women’s votes because she’s a woman, then McCain/Palin should have gotten all the women’s votes in 2008.

@AnonymousAccount8 Since you apparently are the historian of all things political….can you share the monumental political achievements of Mrs. Clinton? Or should we just continue to showcase the shit-piles of each candidate. Please don’t make me remind you who won the election and why

@Cruiser I am under no delusions, and I don’t have the patience to address your straw-man. I’d thank you for leaving me alone, now.

@Cruiser and @AnonymousAccount8 : Stop fighting, guys. Each of these politicians has pros and cons. I happen to feel the President-elect had more cons than his competition had…

But to address the most recent question you posed, Cruiser… Hillary has a long history in politics… And a mostly successful one at that. She has been crucial in expanding health coverage for millions of kids… Also, she worked for the Children’s Defense Fund and helped them for a long time, working with teenagers in adult prisons and families with disabled children. She played a big role in helping the 9/11 responders get the healthcare they needed. She has been center stage at various points, standing up for women’s rights on a global level. I believe the exact phrase used was, “women’s rights are human rights.” She has stood for LGBTQA+ rights at home AND abroad. She helped expand health care and family leave for military families. She negotiated a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. She negotiated the toughest sanctions Iran has ever faced. And as far as political achievements… I see no reason we should forget that she is the FIRST woman to EVER top a presidential ticket for a MAJOR PARTY in the U.S.

At the end of the day, win or lose, this election has been an historic one. I felt like one of the candidates would definitely make a positive contribution to our future history. I do believe there’s a CHANCE the other one might too, but based on the sort of outrageous and divisive campaign that that candidate ran… I’m actually concerned that these coming years might represent dark chapters in our future history.

Not at all. Democrats were united against a Trump presidency. There was a disappointed wing of the party (the die-hard Bernie supporters) who are now, I hope, deeply chagrined.

The Republican Party is in disarray.

I’m wondering where the exciting leaders for the Dems will come from who can take back the White House.

Only to the extent that they let their hubris get the better of them.

To someone like myself, who drifts in the centrist area between Dem and Republican, the raw conceit of the Democratic party was annoying. When a political party imagines that they are morally superior, that they have an entitlement to power, and that their opponents are only opponents because they are stupid bumfucks from rural Nebraska (or whatever one of you said in another post), then in my opinion it is time for them to sit out for a while.

If that is cause for feeling foolish, then so be it. I would figure it would be more cause for reflection.

@JoyousLove I was asking for Hillary’s achievements that were significant….30 years of playing Patty Cake with the rest of the establishment is far from monumental.

@josie With you on that!

Democrats have nothing to be ashamed about. For all of its flaws, the consensus of the party was entirely the same as that of the rest of the world including MOST of the Republican Party.

‘God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble.”
Not that trump was more humble but as a collective thought I do not see but very few who thought he had a chance at winning, many thought voting was a mere formality on the way to a Clinton win. I read articles from supporters and staffers that they believed as much, that the election would happen and the next morning they would go to wherever convention center pop the bubbly and toast a historic win for Hillary. The party of Twiddle Dee should be ashamed and feel foolish, they tried to beat Trump on his terms in a fight in his arena and lost, the ultimate political ”Rope-a-dope”. The party of Twiddle Dee (from the scuttlebutt around here) believed they had the Blacks, Latinos, women and gays in their pocket, sewed up like a silk purse. Because they had the so-called entertainment elite backing them (they forgot prop 8) they were a shoo-in (too bad they don’t have as potent lie to challenge in the High Court as with prop 8). Not only that, they are in control of nothing; not the House, nor the Senate. Their only hope is that the party of Twiddle Dumb doesn’t run roughshod over them because don’t want to piss people off so much as to get them to kick the GOP out of majority in the Senate and the House in the Midterm Elections. Not that I cared that much for Trump, it was humorous to see him take Jezebel Clinton down a peg for being so smug as to ordering the new White House furniture so-to-speak.

@Hypocrisy_Central I agree with your interpretation of the election except for it being humorous to see him take down Clinton. Supporters of Clinton are my neighbors and fellow Jellies here in the pond…it is my hope that the next 4 years holds hope for all of us to feel better and more secure for our individual futures. We all need to embrace the path of hope and steer clear of the path of fear that is now being fed to us all.

Still laughing…a lot

We need to seriously think about what is happening. Trump’s supporters among the white non-college educated are the ones initially most affected by the changes in the economy, but they will not be the last. Manufacturing jobs are going away and they will not be coming back. The jobs are going to robots, not foreigners. Employment has been going up but wages are stagnant. There are people with full time jobs who have to get food stamps. The middle class is disappearing. How is this going to play out?

In true demagogue fashion, Trump is placing the blame on government and immigrants but not on corporations. His proposed solutions will not work because they do not get to the root of the problem.

The progressive wing of the Democrats has a sense of what is going on. Maybe they will be able to lead the way.

@LostInParadise The progressive wing of the Democrats is smothered by the sheer inertia of the system running as it is. The incentive to “feather my own nest” is just too powerful an urge for career politicians.

@JLeslie Don’t make the mistake of thinking the Republicans in the tall clover. Trump is the loose cannon careening through the Republican agenda and a GUARANTEED nightmare for party cohesion. His simplistic views on the working of government, as well as his stated agenda are absolutely counter to the Republican narrative on the way the world works. For those looking to Trump for salvation, disappointment looms menacingly. Both he and the Republicans are up against the sheer impossibility (just as the insurance companies realized when they drew it up) of dismantling Obamacare, and already Trump is backing away from discarding the 2 million folks added to the insurance rolls despite the fact that those additions are driving premiums through the roof. The rigamarole involved with avoiding single payer universal healthcare is coming to an unbearable head on Trump’s watch.

There seems to be a lot of speculation on what will happen over the next 4 years. The answer will be simple and decisive. If the economy improves and job growth returns, Trump will be successful. If not he will have failed. Democrats Ideologically can’t believe in ‘Supply side’ economics. Tax cuts, limited regulation, stuff like that simply won’t fit into their lexicon. All the other crap will continue much as it has and won’t be much of a factor in his success or failure. We won’t be any worse off either way. If it works Democrats should be doing some real introspection. I doubt they will however but we’ll see in 2020.

Both parties, to me, should view this as a loss.

Screw the parties. It’s the country that’s gonna take it in the neck.

Are economic improvement and job growth the only measures of a president’s success?

@AnonymousAccount8 – No it’s not the only measure but it is the significant measure at this time. The economy is and has been the top issue for a long time now and solving that has been deemed impossible by the left. We’ll see.

Oh, it isn’t that we are coming apart but rather there really is no Republican or Democrat Party any longer. I think the nation is splitting into different parts, and the media has played a huge role in it.
You have the White Nationalists groups, and everyone should hug their guns tonight group.

Religious anti abortion, anti gay rights and anti everyone is a sinner group but me.

Then you have your, I don’t want anything to change. Let’s keep right in the middle. Vote, party , always vote party.

Then you have the, I don’t know what the issues are and will never care. Dems good, Repugs bad. Always. Vote Party

Then you have, the liberals. Actually more in line with Dem issues but think its time for a change because nothing is changing. More in tuned with the real issues that plague our nation or will plague our nation.

Then you have the I don’t care about parties. They are all full of it. I won’t ever vote person, the system is rigged, my vote will never matter and I never really look at the issues.

You can find these people in both Dems and Republicans. The Younger generation are more in line with the last two. You also probably won’t find Dems in the White Nationalist party but they do exist in the hug your gun group. They just don’t buy the BS that Republicans put out about someone taking their guns.

@Jaxk hmm, has it? We have had 78 straight months of economic growth. When Obama took office, we were losing 750,000 jobs a month. Unemployment has been cut in half.

The Pentagon has called climate change the most pressing national security threat that we currently face. Mitigating the threat of climate change should be our number one priority as a country and now we have elected a leader who thinks that it is a vast Chinese conspiracy.

@AnonymousAccount8 – I don’t want to re-litigate the election but according to the polls both Democrats and Republicans see the economy as the top issue. We have the lowest workforce participation rate since the 70s, the slowest economic growth after a recession ever, and the lowest median income in 20 years. Talking up the economy is why the Democrats lost. Nobody bought that argument.

The conservatives won’t do any better, because the lackluster economy and job scarcity are the direct repudiation of the conservative argument for the past 30 years that we would do just fine without a manufacturing sector.

I believe people in general are fickle as hell. They’ll hang on one side until the shit gets too deep , then they’ll swing over to the other side saying how bad the old side was. But as soon as the shit gets deep on the new side, they’ll swing right back over to where they first were, spouting the same speech.

^Most are sheep. They go where the heard goes.

Yes. I’ve been around a long time and I’ve never seen such a segment of Americans so easily led…...................just like the pied piper story. The brainwash was effective on young and old. Of course, progressivism has infiltrated the schools which explains some of the young voters inability to even cope with this. Perhaps time, crayons, play dough, cuddling, coddling, counseling, will help. It is dismal to realize how weak about half of Americans are. No thinking for themselves…..............just taking the words of criminals as being the absolute truth and willing to fight and harm anyone who tries to talk to them about their outrageous actions.