By the time you are reading this, we will have, hopefully, chosen a new president of these United States. And it will, please dear God, not be the neo-Hitler we’ve had stoking the fires of xenophobia and bigotry amongst (mostly) disenfranchised white folks. That’s probably an unfair sweeping statement to make, but hey, when half the Republican party turns against you, the actual KKK endorses you, and you don’t appear to have any clue how the country works, I feel like it’s fair to make sweeping statements.
I get off on tangents about Trump so much, you’d think I’ve forgotten the entire circus of crazy that was the 2016 election cycle. I really haven’t. If you remember, I was a fervent, if over-idealistic supporter of Bernie Sanders, to the point where I couldn’t have discussions about politics with my girlfriend without them turning heated. I was stupid, but it was nice to feel like you were a part of something that big. However, couple the size of Bernie’s “political revolution” with total voter apathy amongst his main demographic, and nothing is really ever going to get accomplished.
Clinton has her shortcomings, and I’m not going to deny them. However, they have nothing to do with her damn e-mail, nor what happened in Benghazi. She is, by all accounts, a shrewd tactician and career politician, and while an outsider seemed like a fun idea when that outsider wanted to turn us into Denmark, the idea becomes a lot less appealing when it comes from a guy buddying up to Putin and Kim Jong-Un. At that point, the idea of an outsider in Washington becomes downright Hitler-level scary. Now, no one does Hitler like Hitler, but there’s an undeniable line to be drawn from this campaign to the one in post World War I Germany. At this point, I’m actively wishing we can get back to the way things were. I never thought I’d miss the Bush administration, but damn. So a career politician like Secretary Clinton, no matter how many e-mails she (or Condy Rice, or Colin Powell, or Dubya himself) deleted, sounds damn refreshing at this point.
It’s impossible to look at this campaign without seeing the inherently misogynist, patriarchal way in which our country has been run brought to light. Here we have Hillary, again, a career politician, someone who by most informed arguments does know what the hell she’s doing, going up against someone who barely knows the constitution, much less has any idea how the government’s inner workings go or what the president can actually do, and she’s had to fight bloody tooth and nail to keep an even keel. This is a guy that started out his entire campaign by saying most Mexican immigrants were rapists, and proposing a blanket ban on an entire religion. At least 85 percent of Trump’s campaign is comprised of moments that would have derailed any other campaign.
It’s also hard to look at this election season and have any respect for the media, who have gone for sensationalism over substance so much that the trusted anchors of old (Dan Rather, Ted Koppel, Tom Brokaw, etc.) have all given interviews and statements outright shaming the media for their handling of this election. No one has taken a deep enough look at either candidate’s policy, no one has gone hard enough on the walking deflated basketball, every outlet approaching him with kid gloves and barely touching the hard-hitting questions. I know this because there hasn’t been an occasion of Trump just saying “eff you” and walking out in the middle of an interview, which, by all accounts, is exactly what he would do when actually confronted about his behavior.
So I’m really, truly, blindly hoping that I will not be writing a defeatist column about our new Supreme President For Life Donald Trump, and instead get to write something fluffy, or something about how hard the road has been for Hillary Clinton. Because when she finally does take a seat in the Oval Office, I think she’ll have arguably earned it more than most.
It’s been ugly, it’s been disgusting, our state cut out the one thing that mattered to me (a subject for another day), and I voted at the end of October, so I’ve just been watching this drama with a detached sense of wonder since then. My part is done, my vote is cast. Please let it matter.
Reflections On Insanity
Dane La Born
By the time you are reading this, we will have, hopefully, chosen a new president of these United States. And it will, please dear God, not be the neo-Hitler we’ve had stoking the fires of xenophobia and bigotry amongst (mostly) disenfranchised white folks. That’s probably an unfair sweeping statement to make, but hey, when half the Republican party turns against you, the actual KKK endorses you, and you don’t appear to have any clue how the country works, I feel like it’s fair to make sweeping statements.
I get off on tangents about Trump so much, you’d think I’ve forgotten the entire circus of crazy that was the 2016 election cycle. I really haven’t. If you remember, I was a fervent, if over-idealistic supporter of Bernie Sanders, to the point where I couldn’t have discussions about politics with my girlfriend without them turning heated. I was stupid, but it was nice to feel like you were a part of something that big. However, couple the size of Bernie’s “political revolution” with total voter apathy amongst his main demographic, and nothing is really ever going to get accomplished.
Clinton has her shortcomings, and I’m not going to deny them. However, they have nothing to do with her damn e-mail, nor what happened in Benghazi. She is, by all accounts, a shrewd tactician and career politician, and while an outsider seemed like a fun idea when that outsider wanted to turn us into Denmark, the idea becomes a lot less appealing when it comes from a guy buddying up to Putin and Kim Jong-Un. At that point, the idea of an outsider in Washington becomes downright Hitler-level scary. Now, no one does Hitler like Hitler, but there’s an undeniable line to be drawn from this campaign to the one in post World War I Germany. At this point, I’m actively wishing we can get back to the way things were. I never thought I’d miss the Bush administration, but damn. So a career politician like Secretary Clinton, no matter how many e-mails she (or Condy Rice, or Colin Powell, or Dubya himself) deleted, sounds damn refreshing at this point.
It’s impossible to look at this campaign without seeing the inherently misogynist, patriarchal way in which our country has been run brought to light. Here we have Hillary, again, a career politician, someone who by most informed arguments does know what the hell she’s doing, going up against someone who barely knows the constitution, much less has any idea how the government’s inner workings go or what the president can actually do, and she’s had to fight bloody tooth and nail to keep an even keel. This is a guy that started out his entire campaign by saying most Mexican immigrants were rapists, and proposing a blanket ban on an entire religion. At least 85 percent of Trump’s campaign is comprised of moments that would have derailed any other campaign.
It’s also hard to look at this election season and have any respect for the media, who have gone for sensationalism over substance so much that the trusted anchors of old (Dan Rather, Ted Koppel, Tom Brokaw, etc.) have all given interviews and statements outright shaming the media for their handling of this election. No one has taken a deep enough look at either candidate’s policy, no one has gone hard enough on the walking deflated basketball, every outlet approaching him with kid gloves and barely touching the hard-hitting questions. I know this because there hasn’t been an occasion of Trump just saying “eff you” and walking out in the middle of an interview, which, by all accounts, is exactly what he would do when actually confronted about his behavior.
So I’m really, truly, blindly hoping that I will not be writing a defeatist column about our new Supreme President For Life Donald Trump, and instead get to write something fluffy, or something about how hard the road has been for Hillary Clinton. Because when she finally does take a seat in the Oval Office, I think she’ll have arguably earned it more than most.
It’s been ugly, it’s been disgusting, our state cut out the one thing that mattered to me (a subject for another day), and I voted at the end of October, so I’ve just been watching this drama with a detached sense of wonder since then. My part is done, my vote is cast. Please let it matter.