I voted for Sen. (ret.) Hillary. I did not vote for her because I liked her, but because the choice to vote for President-elect Trump was not a live choice for me for many reasons. I wanted Sen. Bernie so badly! This post is not about those reasons for my vote. This post is about the post-election reaction by all too many people who also voted for Hillary. And, here is my advice for you. Stop, please just stop. The reactions you are displaying not only mimic the very complaints you had about Republicans, but also are sowing the same reaction among Republicans that they sowed among you when they did the exact same thing. Here is a list of some of the things make me want to facepalm myself when I read about them or see them on TV. May I beg you to please make it your New Year’s Resolution to stop doing things like those listed below?
- I get it that we were disappointed that Trump was elected. But, some of you are talking as though the Apocalypse is around the corner. Before he even takes office, cities are already declaring themselves to not be subject to the entering administration, etc. “Resistance” groups are being started, and–God help us all–safe spaces are being created in various universities in which students need not hear about real life, or to put it another way, in which conservatives can be kept from speaking out. Here is the thing. This is exactly what happened eight years ago. Back then groups like Oathkeepers and the Guardians were started to “protect” the Republic from the incoming “Kenyan socialist usurper.” When I have pointed this out, I have been told that the difference is that President Obama was innocent of all that was charged against him, while President-elect Trump really is all the things you fear. Please, can you hear the sophistry and casuistic argumentation in your argument? There is NO difference between what you are doing now and what extreme conservatives did back then. Stop, please just stop.
- You were upset back then that President Obama was called a liar during a Congressional session. You were even more upset when people talked about how Michelle must really be a trans-gendered individual while making disrespectful comments about her arm muscles and her baring her shoulders. Yet, you consider it appropriate when the daughter of the President-elect, who was traveling with CHILDREN, is confronted by a gay couple angry about her father. I got to watch TV commentary in which various liberals supported the action as an appropriate act of political protest and/or political theater. Can you see the contradiction? Stop, please just stop.
- Many of you lined up to whale on the couple who owned a family bakery because they did not want to make a cake for a gay wedding. You argued that people in public venues had to respect any and all civil rights laws, even if it went against religious beliefs. Now from the Rockettes to fashion designers, you have people saying that they will refuse to work for the President-elect and his family, even if they place an order. All of a sudden, this is a principled belief that must be protected. All of a sudden, it does not matter that these are people in a public venue who either provide entertainment or serve the public. You hypocrites. I could almost wish that some in Trump’s family would place a fashion order with you and then sue you because you refused. Stop, please just stop.
- When Democrats had the Presidency (though technically they still do for 3 1/2 more weeks) you fought hard against the judicial doctrine of originalism. You rightly pointed out that the twenty-seven amendments to the Constitution show that either issues or changes in culture meant that the Constitution, as originally written, was simply not perfect and was deliberately written to be open to improvement. In fact, the Constitution did not even make it out of Congress without having the Bill of Rights added because of the lacks it had. But, after Trump had won sufficient electoral votes, you suddenly discovered “Hamiltonian democracy.” You discovered an originalism which allowed you to argue that the electors should all go faithless and vote for Hillary, or at least for almost any other Republican but Trump. In a worst case, you hoped to throw the election into the House of Representatives, thus delegitimizing Trump, to some extent, even if the House chose him. In the process, you have shot your arguments against originalism because you will not be believed on this subject again. (Except that I suspect that if you need to, you will quickly turn on a dime and pretend that you never supported originalism when you found it ever so convenient.) So, stop, please just stop.
- Various Democrats in Congress are essentially pledging to stop every bill and every presidential nominee that requires more than a 50% plus one vote. But, you have been arguing for cooperation for eight years, and blaming the Republicans for the years of government shut-downs, brinksmanship, etc. Democrats have just lost an election in a slap-on-the-face moment, and you want to go to a tactic that had much of the nation seething? You are most certainly trying to lose the Congressionals in two years, are you not? Stop, please just stop.
I could go on. Sadly, I could go on for quite a while. The incredible list of 180 degree turn-arounds makes my head spin. Giving up your principles just because you lost the election is not the way to go. Taking up every tactic you derided simply because Trump is wrong and Obama has been right is not a logically winning argument, nor one that will be believed by moderates and independents. Stop, please just stop.
I agree with pretty much everything that you say in this article with the exception of the implication that this is not the Apocalypse. Politically speaking, I suspect it is. It’s Berlin 1933, and Hindenburg has just handed over the chancellorship to Adolf Hitler, and the only thing standing in his way, in our case, is the feckless and politically cowardly and not particularly inclined to stand for anything Democratic Party.
In essence and in what passes for reality you’re 100% right.
However, the argument that’s winning the day for me is the one that say that resistance is necessary when faced with conditions and situations like these.
We’re facing an administration that’s divorced from reality. We’re facing a group of people who are not only oligarchs, but are autarchic oligarchs. Finally, we’re facing a group of individuals who are not afraid to display their white supremacy and Nazi influences.
In the face of such depressing possibilities what else but resistance is available? The last time people cooperated with these ideas, the world was dragged through a World War. So while in principle I agree with you, in practice, only two responses are possible for me. Flee OR fight.
Or, we could simply wait and see what actually happens before we decide that this is a proto-Nazi election. The hardest part for us will be to differentiate the difference between legitimate disagreement about approach and unacceptable policies.
It is one thing to say that you disagree with a laissez faire approach to economics because you favor Keynesian economics. It is another thing to say that laissez faire economics cannot be tolerated and must be resisted. The same is true on several political subjects.
The temptation is to classify everyone who disagrees with you with some pejorative terminology. Once one does that, there is no hope of compromise. And that is precisely what has been happening for eight years. We have confused what is a legitimate disagreement with what must be rejected all too many times. It is no wonder we cannot pass any legislation.
It needs to end. And, I am going to do my part by refusing to pre-classify the next administration. I will wait to first see what is actually proposed. And, I will try to remember that the party that wins the election does have a legitimate right to try and implement their policies and we have a legitimate right to be the loyal opposition.
Yes.
But I have a question:
Hasn’t this party, and this man in particular, already shown us what they are made of?
talk about a duh moment, I just now realized what OrthoCuban meant, and I am not afraid to admit it
Amen.
I read the post, you made some good points however there are real differences between Obama and Trump. Obama (however much some may want to mock this now) ran on hope and change and simply wanted to make life better for people, Trump is unabashed about wanting to go after certain groups or pursue policy that will almost certainly make life very tough for the most vulnerable among us. In those instances we need to give him hell.
Thank you, Ernesto. It’s encouraging to hear someone of your persuasion say these things. The only other place to hear them is Fox News.
I agree with the sentiments and I believe it is important to work with him IF and WHEN he does what he said he wanted to do to protect jobs and rebuild the infrastructure and make people pay their taxes BUT I see nothing of the sort. After all the horror of this election, I see absolutely no attempt to bring the country together unlike Obama who bent over backwards to get the opposition to go along with the plans of the duly elected President….like the ACA. Not one R even listened to him or attempted to fix what they saw as problems.
No, I feel like what Bill Maher said in his last show before the election: Bush, Romney and McCain I disagreed with and maybe overreacted to some of their policy suggestions, but this man is…and has already shown us by his actions and demeanor…a real and present danger to our nation. He shows no signs of moderating his tone or his flying by the seat of his pants Twitter diplomacy. I have no hope he will do anything but make life unbearable for a lot of people. President Obama never did that…they just hated him for what they believed him to be. Not for what they actually saw.
Just discovering this. Thanks for the well-written thoughts. I appreciate your careful, logically sound approach. Three questions:
1) What happened during the Angry Gay Couple – Ivanka incident? I don’t have enough to go on from the post itself to judge whether it was equivalent to the MIchelle-transgender-muscle mass incident.
2) Any change in your position on needs for civil resistance since this first went up? I completely agree that the “fight fire with fire” approach to a republican administration is inappropriate and not in democrats long-term self-interest (good insight on that second point, by the way).
3) What are your thoughts on the Hamiltonian perspective on its own merits? I tend towards that point of view moreso than a Jeffersonian one, and have been that way for quite a long time. Yes, there are a lot of people hopping on that bandwagon (the Broadway musical helps), but I don’t think the bandwagon itself is necessarily bad.
1) An angry gay couple approached Ivanka and her children on an airplane and began to verbally smack down her daddy and to imply that she should also be held to some type of standard.
2) No change on civil resistance until we see actual actions. People do a lot of smack talking that never makes it to real laws. I am beginning to sway toward resistance to certain legal initiatives, but the man is not President yet. On the other side of this, he has said that he wants to see all people medically insured, so that is a point in Trump’s favor.
3) I think the Founding Fathers had a reasonable idea in having a Senate that was appointed. With all that we are seeing about fake news, it shows that we need a body that may not need to be fully beholden to the whims of the public. The judiciary is a good example of that. I am not as negative as Hamilton was, however.