President-elect Trump
 

....


no, I just can't do it.


I tried, I'm trying. . .

We'll see.

The Donald would like to thank all the people who didn't vote for collectively making this win possible.

Especially the ones who also put the GOP on track for a Senate majority with a Pennsylvania win.

Now they have NO excuses left.

I am thrilled! I just got in from an election party despite having to work in the morning. What an historic election! What a turnout! It's truly amazing. This must be what it was like in 1980 when Reagan was elected President.

President Trump.... I love the sound of it!

We Trumpeteers weren't about to let those Brexiteers upstage us in shocking the world.

Congratulations. I feel like this kind of thing was inevitable. Rural whites were being left out of the decision making. My only concern is that this doesn't turn into a big roll back of civil rights instead of an adjustment in economic policy.

This will be interesting.

Which Trump will show up to be President? How many campaign promises will he keep? Will Washington cooperate with him or fight him? Lots of unknowns right now.

Strange days, indeed. Hillary about to give her concession speech.

I give him six days from inauguration to put his in his mouth.

Who am I kidding? He won't make it through his Inaugural Address.

We do live in interesting times

Bernie explains it in 1992...

Very, very similar.

Also I believe I called this election way back when.

Yep. I remember that. You did call this all along.

Me too, me too! Except I put it in terms of whose fault it was. (Everybody.)

http://cellar.org/showthread.php?p=966216

So, it's 3foots fault. Be careful what you wish for because you reap what you sow. :lol2:
To be fair, it's the Gary Johnson voters that handed this to Trump.

For what it's worth, the electoral college places the REAL, truly official vote on December 19th. A revolt won't happen, but if it makes anyone feel better to hold out hope...

Yeah, not much hope for the Electoral College to revolt. Gore won the popular vote too.

Plus, if there are any upsets, it will be the two Washington State electors who said they won't vote for Clinton even if she wins their state (which she did).

The pendulum has swung back the other way. Nothing more, nothing less.
We'll see if its for four or eight years over time.

Have you reckoned with the possibility that it will be more than 8? And if that's not realistic in your estimation, is it because he wouldn't dare, or the system is strong enough to refute him?

His potential Attorney General, Rudy Giuliani, attempted to get a "2-3 month extension" on his final term as Mayor of NYC, after first proposing the repeal of term limits altogether, stating that it was his "obligation" to do so in the aftermath of 9-11.

Some apparently do not realize the scope of this change.

Both houses and the president are now controlled by an extremist wing of the Republican party. This time by people whose power comes from insulting others; and without even basic economic or military comprehension. With knowledge based only in rhetoric. Many benchmark Republicans (ie George Wills, Paul Ryan) have resigned from this party, have been marginalized, or are under direct attack for not endorsing extremist rhetoric. Similarities to 1930 Germany are scary.

Supreme Court will have three justices replaced by extremists. All branches of government will not just be controlled - will be dominated by people who are popular because they are bullies. Again, similarities to 1930 Germany.

Laws that resulted in a massive economic meltdown will be restored. Other laws and regulations that have slowly improved the American economy, that protected consumers, that averted a great depression, and that obstructed monopolies will be rescinded. Any hope at averting environmental disasters and encouraging innovation will be quashed in the name of profits and centralized power.

A Democratic party is now completely toothless. And has no hope of recovery for at least 10 years - barring some major military or economic disaster. If history is any judge, even longer. In part because Democrats do not have a brainwashing machine (Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Fox News, Drudge Report, etc) that even took a Republican party away from its benchmark and moderate leaders.

Massive destruction to the economy, open trade, a united stand again China's Nine Dash Line, protection of the Baltics, international prosecution of major world criminals, increased respect from allies, human rights, innovation to prevent environmental disasters, a united front against Putin, preventing nuclear proliferation, and averting an impending disaster centered around S Korea - just some of the ongoing solutions that we know (from history and comments) will terminate - partly or fully. Even Republican moderates can no longer keep their party extremists in line.

You thought George Jr was an anomaly? He at least had a Democratic party to keep him somewhat honest. A new and unrestricted power structure exists With people who even said we want to subvert government. And who may change their tune now that their power is almost unlimited. They will control all three branches of government with healthy margins.

How it plays out will be interesting - and may take major warfare or economic depression to finally restore sanity.

The difference - we did not see what was coming with George Jr's administration. We know (from history and promises) what can happen with no other power to regulate or temper those unrestrained changes. I cannot think back to an America where so much power was concentrated in but one group with an extremist agenda. Americans have not seen this before.

[Kruge] Yes, exhilarating, isn't it? [/Kruge]

Meh. Y'all are a lil bent it seems. That will surely make things better.
Lets chill and see what happens.

Tommy Notone You mean that guy that was a Democrat till last year?

Trump has no ideology, but he got to where he is by using the Republican Party, which was already being taken over by the extremists (Boehner was ousted for being too liberal). The extremists are his power base in Congress, and some of the remaining relative moderates are now on his enemies list for denouncing him.

I wouldn't put it past him to drop them without a second thought if they were no longer useful, but I think they will continue to be useful to him. And why wouldn't he sign whatever they give him, if it keeps them on his side?

Which also makes it interesting. Especially when Trump has a long history of screwing his counterparties.

When is a trump card also a wild card?

More potential appointments: (rumors from Trump transition team vetting process)

For the second time in 16 years the popular vote is discarded in favor of the electoral college vote.

Add Kris Kobach to the mix. The architect of the law allowing police to jail anyone who looks like an illegal immigrant if they aren't carrying proof of citizenship.

The argument is that people in the gray areas should have extra voting power because of all the acres?

It's very much like the Game of Risk, isn't it? Some territories are worth more, some are easier to defend. You have to be strategic of what territories you want to concentrate on. Just having more armies won't get you to total world domination.

That's just a map that shows where the people live.

I wanted to see how much of a hit my 401K took when trump got elected, so I checked.

Turns out it went up 1.36 percent that day. If it did that every day for a year, I could retire next fall.

I wonder if Obama is going to give Clinton a presidential pardon before Trump is sworn in?

Wouldn't that be some shit. Kablooey

Since there isn't a particular crime, it would have to be a Nixon-style "whatever happened" pardon.

She would be pardoned for official misconduct, which has already been established, to preempt being charged with a crime.

So far her defense for sending sensitive information through nongovernment channels when it should have been classified (it subsequently was) and sent through government channels has been Other people did it too.

The prosecutors are going to use the If other people jumped off the Golden Gate bridge would you do it too? offense.

This has been an interesting week indeed! My wife and I consider ourselves independents, we have always cast a mixed ballot based on research of candidates and their policies and backgrounds. This year we voted with absentee mail in ballots which was great; my wife is 65 and needs no other reason, I claimed disability. For the first time in our lives we just voted a straight D ticket. Never done that but just decided that even if Hillary did not win it would help down the ballot and for our area-Houston and Harris County, TX it did. Quite a few Republicans lost in the local elections.

But we live in an extremely conservative part of the city, probably 90% Republican and leaning towards the Tea Party types. It's been interesting to sit back and observe and listen to what my neighbors say. And I kind of had a feeling this would happen based on what I heard. The funny thing is all the people where I live were clamoring for a Washington outsider yet they hated Jimmy Carter as President and he was an outsider who tried to shake up Washington. Could be interesting.

Not sure how this will all turn out. It's very easy to shout from the sidelines during a campaign but once Trump is in the driver's seat it will be a whole different thing. And one side of me wonders if he can make it for 4 years. He will find out really fast that you can't fire folks you don't like except maybe members of your cabinet. And you can't declare bankruptcy when financial issues go south. I really wonder if he will make it or will he just resign when he gets tired of it or maybe be impeached over something. Hard to predict but he really only cares about himself so he is likely to self destruct. That would put Pence in the driver's seat and I'm not sure if I like him less than Trump!

My own family is kind of like the voters of this nation. I have 5 kids. The older 2 sons are both conservative. One is a born again hard core evangelical. He and his wife even stopped at the Creation Museum in Kentucky at the end of their honeymoon! Second son is a big fan of Breitbart news and all the right wing talking heads. My next 2 kids are my daughters who are both very liberal. And my youngest son is a Reagan Republican who always votes party line. So I guess it sort of mirrors the country right now, leaning right to hard right.

I figure that I have lived through 8 years of Nixon, then Reagan and even 8 years of GW Bush. I think this will be the worst but the nation is a big ship and it won't sink easily.

Looking at the result from the UK, I'm completely baffled on how your system works Clinton gets more votes than Trump but loses the election because of the electoral colleges ?
I've tried to read how it works perhaps someone could explain in layman's terms the way the system works.
Does anyone think that Trump didn't think he would really win and now he's thinking WTF do I do now

Say you have a sport league and North plays against South in a best-of-five series for the championship.

Game one North with 55-3.
Game two South wins 20-17.
Game three South wins 30-24.
Game four North wins 33-0.
Game five South wins 22-19.

South wins the series, despite having been dramatically outscored, because it's the games that count; and the strategy is oriented around winning games and not just getting a lot of points.

And despite seeming anti-democratic, it is thought that one should not rule the entire country without having broad appeal. Just winning the cities, for example, is not enough; nor is it enough to broadly win just the East or something.

Our Executive, Legislative and Judicial branches of government provide a system of checks and balances for political power.

The Electoral College does much the same for the power of the popular vote.

Without it, the people in high density population areas could collectively control the Presidency even though their geographical area is diminutive (see post #32). That would not work so well for such a large and diverse country.

I saw it simplistically explained this way - The states elect the president, not the people. FTR - Trump won 32-18, I believe.

Vision of the future (twitter link). The tweet is difficult to quote, but it includes quotes from both Trump and Bannon suggesting deliberately destroying the US government so it can be remade in their image. Trump, as a hypothetical, and Bannon as a deliberate goal.

Trump will put a stop to this shit.. unless he can find a way to profit from it.

1979 ... wonder about those numbers today.

I'll bet they're worse.

The Washington Post reported the CIA briefed the Congressional security people back in September on the Russians fucking with the election.

What? 17 fucking intelligence agencies? Who are they? Have we ever heard of them? 17 agencies? :rolleyes:

NSA?
Oh what a tangled web we weave...

You don't hear much about the PIA (Peripheral Intelligence Agency). The other agencies don't like to mention them; because, the PIA's only job is to spy on the other intelligence agencies to find their security weaknesses before foreign powers can find and exploit them. The PIA is headquartered Las Vegas and their budget is classified.

Do other agencies call PIA, pain in the ass? :lol:

You catch on quick.

Shockingly, they went on to tell the senators that this is how this has always worked, in every election, ever; and that not only Russia, but every nation on earth has interests and tries to influence every election on their own behalf.

I'm particularly appalled that they used the actual words of Clinton's supporters to create the picture of her people not giving a flying fuck for white working class America.

That lends credence to the argument that Clinton supporters should be seen and not heard.