So he won. The nation takes a deep breath. Raw ego and proud illiteracy have won out, and a severely learning-disabled man with a real character problem will be president. We are so exhausted from thinking about this election, millions of people will take up leaf-raking and garage cleaning with intense pleasure. We liberal elitists are wrecks. The Trumpers had a whale of a good time, waving their signs, jeering at the media, beating up protesters, chanting “Lock her up” — we elitists just stood and clapped. Nobody chanted “Stronger Together.” It just doesn’t chant.

The Trumpers never expected their guy to actually win the thing, and that’s their problem now. They wanted only to whoop and yell, boo at the H-word, wear profane T-shirts, maybe grab a crotch or two, jump in the RV with a couple of six-packs and go out and shoot some spotted owls. It was pleasure enough for them just to know that they were driving us wild with dismay — by “us,” I mean librarians, children’s authors, yoga practitioners, Unitarians, bird-watchers, people who make their own pasta, opera-goers, the grammar police, people who keep books on their shelves, that bunch. The Trumpers exulted in knowing we were tearing our hair out. They had our number, like a bratty kid who knows exactly how to make you grit your teeth and froth at the mouth.

Alas for the Trump voters, the disasters he will bring on this country will fall more heavily on them than anyone else. The uneducated white males who elected him are the vulnerable ones, and they will not like what happens next.

[How might Trump supporters feel the morning after?]

To all the patronizing B.S. we’ve read about Trump expressing the white working-class’s displacement and loss of the American Dream, I say, “Feh!” — go put your head under cold water. Resentment is no excuse for bald-faced stupidity. America is still the land where the waitress’s kids can grow up to become physicists and novelists and pediatricians, but it helps a lot if the waitress and her husband encourage good habits and the ambition to use your God-given talents and the kids aren’t plugged into electronics day and night. Whooping it up for the candidate of cruelty and ignorance does less than nothing for your kids.

We liberal elitists are now completely in the clear. The government is in Republican hands. Let them deal with him. Democrats can spend four years raising heirloom tomatoes, meditating, reading Jane Austen, traveling around the country, tasting artisan beers, and let the Republicans build the wall and carry on the trade war with China and deport the undocumented and deal with opioids, and we Democrats can go for a long , brisk walk and smell the roses.

I like Republicans. I used to spend Sunday afternoons with a bunch of them, drinking Scotch and soda and trying to care about NFL football. It was fun. I tried to think like them. (Life is what you make it. People are people. When the going gets tough, tough noogies.) But I came back to liberal elitism.

Don’t be cruel. Elvis said it, and it’s true. We all experienced cruelty back in our playground days — boys who beat up on the timid, girls who made fun of the homely and naive — and most of us, to our shame, went along with it, afraid to defend the victims lest we become one of them. But by your 20s, you should be done with cruelty. Mr. Trump was the cruelest candidate since George Wallace. How he won on fear and bile is for political pathologists to study. The country is already tired of his noise, even his own voters. He is likely to become the most intensely disliked president since Herbert Hoover. His children will carry the burden of his name. He will never be happy in his own skin. But the damage he will do to our country — who knows? His supporters voted for change, and boy, are they going to get it.

[The impossible has happened]

Back to real life. I went up to my home town the other day and ran into my gym teacher, Stan Nelson, looking good at 96. He commanded a landing craft at Normandy on June 6, 1944, and never said a word about it back then, just made us do chin-ups whether we wanted to or not. I saw my biology teacher Lyle Bradley, a Marine pilot in the Korean War, still going bird-watching in his 90s. I was not a good student then, but I am studying both of them now. They have seen it all and are still optimistic. The past year of politics has taught us absolutely nothing. Zilch. Zero. Nada. The future is scary. Let the uneducated have their day. I am now going to pay more attention to teachers.

Garrison Keillor November 9 at 8:39 AM

"So he won. The nation takes a deep breath. Raw ego and proud illiteracy have won out, and a severely learning-disabled man with a real character problem will be president. We are so exhausted from thinking about this election, millions of people will take up leaf-raking and garage cleaning with intense pleasure. We liberal elitists are wrecks. The Trumpers had a whale of a good time, waving their signs, jeering at the media, beating up protesters, chanting “Lock her up” — we elitists just stood and clapped. Nobody chanted “Stronger Together.” It just doesn’t chant.

The Trumpers never expected their guy to actually win the thing, and that’s their problem now. They wanted only to whoop and yell, boo at the H-word, wear profane T-shirts, maybe grab a crotch or two, jump in the RV with a couple of six-packs and go out and shoot some spotted owls. It was pleasure enough for them just to know that they were driving us wild with dismay — by “us,” I mean librarians, children’s authors, yoga practitioners, Unitarians, bird-watchers, people who make their own pasta, opera-goers, the grammar police, people who keep books on their shelves, that bunch. The Trumpers exulted in knowing we were tearing our hair out. They had our number, like a bratty kid who knows exactly how to make you grit your teeth and froth at the mouth.

Alas for the Trump voters, the disasters he will bring on this country will fall more heavily on them than anyone else. The uneducated white males who elected him are the vulnerable ones, and they will not like what happens next."

Lots of foreigners are eating the "uneducated white males" lunches...

I must admit that Bernie has a good point to make city and state colleges free so more Americans can acquire knowledge and compete...

Sometimes I think Republicans wanna keep their supporters stupid, take a look at Baseman

RiffRaff posted:

Resentment is no excuse for stupidity

Some white people who supported trump thinks his assertion to the presidency is a permission to be racist and vile openly.

RiffRaff posted:

...

Sometimes I think Republicans wanna keep their supporters stupid, take a look at Baseman

Trump boasted that if he wanted to run for president he would do so as a GOP because their supporters are stupid.

He did so and he was right.   The same man who builds housing ONLY for the ultra rich. He ships his jobs overseas, and who refuses to pay income tax, which is used to fund programs much used by the Trumpers.

But they bought his reality show scam. Poor things will learn that this will be a bonanza for the ultra rich. Wealthy developers in NYC are already rubbing their hands, anticipating boom times.

RiffRaff posted:

Lots of foreigners are eating the "uneducated white males" lunches...

I must admit that Bernie has a good point to make city and state colleges free so more Americans can acquire knowledge and compete...

Sometimes I think Republicans wanna keep their supporters stupid

I live among white people so I am used to them stopping and asking me if I live in the neighborhood or directly suggesting I am not supposed to be here. I have lived here long enough for most to know I live here but some are still vile. 

Once a cop who was working in full gear after work at the whole food walked around me a few times looking intently. I ask what he was doing. He said checking for my tattoos.

I asked what for; he said that gangs are moving in so he would like to know. Get this, no latin folks are in the neighbor hood except if they are with a lawn mower. Racism is always there but we will see it expressed more openly now. 

RiffRaff posted:

Sometimes I think Republicans wanna keep their supporters stupid, take a look at Baseman

LOL

Django posted:

RiffRaff posted:

Sometimes I think Republicans wanna keep their supporters stupid, take a look at Baseman

LOL

Actually, this is not funny.  I think the Republicans strive by having dumb supporters.  They do not believe in funding for PBS and education and their dumb ass supporters agree with this!

Being big into sport shooting I have many Republican friends.  They are piss poor but still support the Republican because the "Democrats will take away their guns."

Poor people will really feel it in the coming years.

Django posted:

RiffRaff posted:

Sometimes I think Republicans wanna keep their supporters stupid, take a look at Baseman

LOL

If Al YUh two have a quarter of the Education Base has, this world could have been a better place.

RiffRaff posted:

Sometimes I think Republicans wanna keep their supporters stupid, take a look at Baseman 

Correct. correct, corrrrreeeeect.       

RiffRaff posted:

Mr. Trump was the cruelest candidate since George Wallace. How he won on fear and bile is for political pathologists to study. The country is already tired of his noise, even his own voters. He is likely to become the most intensely disliked president since Herbert Hoover. His children will carry the burden of his name. He will never be happy in his own skin. But the damage he will do to our country — who knows? His supporters voted for change, and boy, are they going to get it.

Indeed an excellent view.

Most likely, he will be a one-term-serving president.

Danyael posted:

RiffRaff posted:

Resentment is no excuse for stupidity

Some white people who supported trump thinks his assertion to the presidency is a permission to be racist and vile openly.

Some of them racist post on here