
Donald Trump Is Elected President - koolba
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/09/us/politics/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-president.html
======
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SolaceQuantum
Now that the voices of the disenfranchised blue collar workers have been
heard, what actually can be done to help them? I'm less worried about the
accusations of racism, etc. because it appears to me a majority are voting
because their livelihoods have been lost and, despite economics saying
globalization will bring new jobs, they aren't showing up in the critical
areas where they are needed.

So, what policies can be put in place specifically to help this demographic? I
genuinely don't know.

~~~
jernfrost
You can do what the democrats have talked about, which we have successfully
done in Nordic countries which is to spend a lot of money on re-educating the
workforce and making sure those at the bottom get decent skills.

I grew up in a rustbelt like industrial town in Norway. We has shipyards,
glass factory, paper mill, textile industry, lock systems etc. Almost all of
it got closed down and moved overseas as I grew up.

But we never ended up in the deep pit blue collar America ended up in, because
government took a very active stance early to fight this with active policies.
In towns where factories died, they moved public sector jobs from the capital.

People got a lot of retraining for new jobs. There is a strong system for
vocational training in technical jobs like Germany so people could get skills
for more advance jobs which was easier to keep when competing against asian
industrial giants.

Our government offers free university education, so even less well off blue
collar families could send their kids to good schools. And when economic times
got harder it never hit blue collar works as hard as in America because we
have free universal health care, heavily subsidized childcare, good pensions
for everybody.

Basically the welfare system we built up saved our blue collar workers. Yet
Americans pretend that there is no solution to this problem except attacking
minorities, Mexico, China etc.

It is rich people like Trump and their agenda, which has made sure that blue
collar workers in America have felt the influence of globalization harder than
many other blue collar workers in the west.

~~~
IMTDb
USA does not have an oil fund that amounts do $150k per capita to pay for
"free everything" (university education, universal health care, childcare) and
good pensions for everybody. Norway generates more revenue with oil than the
entires US of A, for 5 million people, and is third worldwide exporter for
Natural Gas just behind Qatar and Russia, again with only 5 million people to
serve (less than the population of New York)

The policies you enjoy are paid for by those revenue, and are not applicable
to "regular" countries.

I admit tho that your politician did a good job at ensuring that those revenue
are used for the good of the general population and are managed with the
future in mind.

~~~
run4yourlives2
That's utter nonsense. I live in Canada, and there is no way someone like
Trump could be elected here. The message simply wouldn't resonate. Harper was
considered extreme and he was left of Hilary.

You know what goes a long way to eliminating blue collar angst? Healthcare.
There's a policy that the US would have no issue implementing if the will
existed. Hell it would be cheaper than what you currently spend.

You know another policy that would help? Subsidized maternity leaves.

Do you want a third? A government run pension program.

A forth? Controlled college tuition.

All of these are well within the US's power to implement, provided the will is
there. But the will not being there has nothing to do with the ability of a
nation to implement these things.

~~~
ygjb-dupe
Yeah buddy, I don't know where you live, but I grew up in northern Manitoba,
lived in Winnipeg, and in other parts of rural southern Manitoba. I have
family throughout Alberta and Saskatchewan, and on the east coast. They have
been following, promoting and loving Trumps message. If you don't think Trumps
message resonated with blue collar folks in Canada, you better break out your
filter bubble and take a look around, and think about what you want the
political landscape of the country to look like after the next election.

~~~
run4yourlives2
All three Prairie provinces have a combined total of 49 seats in our
Parliament.

ON and QC can each double that amount.

I hate to say it, but what people in Manitoba and Sask. think is entirely
irrelevant to the country.

(Also, let's just put aside for a second that SK is a traditional NDP
stronghold)

~~~
jonahrd
A lot of QC is made of run down blue collar workers who are on hard economic
times, and somewhat xenophobic. I'm wouldn't be so quick to say Trumps policy
would fail here.

~~~
run4yourlives2
The problem for them though is that they are also French, so things like the
ADQ are tied to the inevitable "we'd be better on our own" and don't ever
leave the province.

------
AdmiralAsshat
My takeaway from this is that our strategy of "shaming" people into voting a
certain way doesn't work. Exit polls seem to suggest that plenty of people
understated their support for Trump because they were _embarrassed_ to admit
they voted for him. But they still did.

In effect, you don't stop people from supporting racism, homophobia, or
misogyny by calling attention to it. That only makes them support it quietly.
You have to counter it with something. We failed to adequately counter his
arguments, content to simply point at them and say that they were racist,
sexist, or Islamophobic, because we (naively) assumed that drawing attention
to it would be enough.

~~~
advantark2
>they were racist, sexist, or Islamophobic

This is a big issue here, and something that I don't feel that many democrats
seem to understand. It wasn't a race issue, it was an immigration issue since
many illegal immigrants have taken American jobs. It isn't sexist to
acknowledge differences in the genders. It isn't islamophobic to see cultural
issues with Islam that would cause integration issues, especially with a large
influx of Islamic immigration.

Much of the issue here is because of lack of understanding of the perspective
of the other side.

~~~
knz
> It wasn't a race issue, it was an immigration issue since many illegal
> immigrants have taken American jobs.

I don't disagree with your point but how many "hard working" Americans want to
work the fields and kitchens of the country for low wages? What impact is the
removal of cheap labour going to have on the cost of food?

~~~
advantark2
It looks like food prices would go up by about 16%[0], which I would be happy
with if I knew that people were getting a fair wage for the labor. If there's
a shortage of workers willing to work at such a low wage, then they need to
raise wages.

[0][http://www.businessinsider.com/cost-deporting-
undocumented-i...](http://www.businessinsider.com/cost-deporting-undocumented-
immigrants-study-2016-5)

~~~
pc86
And it's better for something to cost $11.60 and you have a minimum wage job
than for that thing to cost $10 and you don't have any job. The difference is
astronomical.

------
nickbauman
I think we learned that fake news (used to pump up fake issues) is now a
legitimate campaign strategy that works even on people who should know better.

Trump won on a mountain of fake issues:

Immigration: both conservative and liberal economists agree that immigration
(illegal or otherwise) does not suppress wages and does not suppress job
growth.

[https://www.cato.org/research/immigration](https://www.cato.org/research/immigration)
[http://business.time.com/2013/01/30/the-economics-of-
immigra...](http://business.time.com/2013/01/30/the-economics-of-immigration-
who-wins-who-loses-and-why/)

Terrorism: more toddlers killed Americans than terrorists in 2015. For every
terrorist killing someone on US soil, more than 4000 Americans killed each
other.

[http://www.snopes.com/toddlers-killed-americans-
terrorists/](http://www.snopes.com/toddlers-killed-americans-terrorists/)
[http://tinyurl.com/q3fqk69](http://tinyurl.com/q3fqk69)

Gay marriage: All it does is extend the same legal protections to people of
the same sex that was already available to people of opposite sex. It doesn't
take away any rights from anybody.

Who is using the bathroom: Historically virtually no jurisdictions have had
laws in place to prevent men from entering ladies rooms or vice versa. There
have been male registered sex offenders entering the bathroom with yours sons
since time immemorial. Transgendered people are no more likely to be sex
offenders than the general population.

Obamacare: While the program has its problems, the Trump administration will
do nothing to address them and has said it will double-down on aspects that
will make our health care system worse.

I could go on but this is plenty. Welcome to the post-factual political
America.

~~~
mitochondrion
Immigration isn't a fake issue. Take a walk around Miami or San Diego. Or New
York. Or London. Or Paris. Or Malmö.

Gay marriage is just the final nail in the coffin of marriage, which was
already basically dead. It's a mind-bogglingly stupid hill to die on, but
nobody ever accused conservatives of brilliance.

Obamacare is a disaster because it enables still more people to suck still
more dollars out of the system than there are people putting dollars into the
system. The people getting more than they put in are parasites; the people
getting less than they put in are suckers. When you don't pay for your own
healthcare, you don't care how much it costs. Go to any veterinarian's office
to see the cost of medicine in a free market.

~~~
achompas
> Immigration isn't a fake issue. Take a walk around Miami or San Diego. Or
> New York. Or London. Or Paris. Or Malmö.

I'm the son of Cuban immigrants, born in Miami, living in New York, and have
walked Paris many times.

I don't understand your claim. Are you suggesting immigration is an issue
because these places are diverse? Or have you somehow tapped into swaths of
illegal immigrants in these areas that I've never seen or heard of?

~~~
Kephael
> Are you suggesting immigration is an issue because these places are diverse?

I think the issue is that no one voted for these sorts of changes, the
situation in parts of Paris with groups of people sleeping and congregating on
the streets and what is occurring in Calais are unacceptable to people
accustomed to a "Western" society. I think we will see Marine Le Pen perform
very well in the upcoming election in France.

~~~
erikpukinskis
America was founded on immigration and has always been a country of
immigrants.

Saying we didn't vote for that is like saying we didn't vote to have a country
based on commerce.

~~~
bluthru
>America was founded on immigration and has always been a country of
immigrants.

 _From Europe._

It's not like the US started out as some mix of every idea/race/culture from
every corner of the earth. Every country has people who originally came from
somewhere and an identity grows from that. It's disingenuous to claim that
Arab immigrants would assimilate as well as the Germans and the British did.

------
user837387
He got elected on all these promises.

1- Build the wall and make Mexico pay for it

2- Deportation Force on day one

3- Repeal obamacare

4- Renegotiate NAFTA

5- Bring back coal

6- Reduce taxes for the rich

7- Ban muslims

8- Prosecuting Hillary Clinton

9- Bring back American companies to the USA

10- Etc.

The Senate and the House are Republicans and the Supreme court will lean
republican after his appointment.

What do you guys think he is going to follow through on and the effects if he
does or doesn't?

And please note that lots of people thought he could not become president and
now he is. So any of these things are possible now. Do not just dismiss any of
these things. They are all possible.

~~~
ajross
In all honesty: almost none. He just wanted to be president. Most of his time
will be spend enriching himself by selling banal access and bloviating on the
world stage. That's pretty awful, but not apocalypse-level awful.

Of your list:

The wall is a technical impossibility that everyone can recognize. There's no
funding for a deportation force and the political optics of goon squads
rounding people up is something congress won't do. No one actually wants to
yank medical coverage from millions of voters (they'll just let the democrats
filibuster it in the senate). There's nothing meaningful to renegotiate in
NAFTA, no serious stakeholders have suggestions there. Coal hasn't really gone
away, and permiting and regulation changes are going to take longer than four
years anyway. "Bring back american companies" is just a fairy tale. Global
economics simply doesn't work like that and there's nothing a chief executive
can do.

That leaves: Muslim ban. Maybe, at least in some symbolic way. Tax cuts for
the rich. Yeah, duh. But that's a republican staple and we've survived it
before. US deficit spending is actually not nearly so serious a problem as
people believe.

~~~
sodafountan
I don't think you understand how ego works. He wants to be more than just
president, he wants to be a great president, that's in his nature. I truly
believe he'll do what it takes to make himself into a great president. Do you
think he wants to be remembered more as a George W. Bush or a Ronald Reagan?

I'm about as worried about a Trump presidency as I am worried that I'll
remember how to breath at night.

Human Nature says he'll strive to be the best and I have faith in that.

~~~
ajross
> He wants to be more than just president, he wants to be a great president,
> that's in his nature.

I'm not sure that I buy that from his history. His life is one of chasing
adulation and attention. He built gaudy hotels in big cities, he never chased
the real estate growth market in housing. He ran a reality show, not a media
network.

He's a narcissist, not a despot. Fill his cabinet with fawning sycophants and
give him a media organization or two at which to direct his rage and I'll bet
anything he just sits on his ass in the oval office and waits out his four
years.

I guess that's what passes for optimism today. But it's the story I'm sticking
to.

~~~
sodafountan
It's interesting.

When you get a new job as a software engineer most people just want to be
considered good at their jobs, while some select few strive to be considered
great. maybe not so much for adulation and attention but to feel like they've
mastered something and can thus offer advice to others, it's what drives us.
In that pursuit of our definition of greatness we study constantly and try to
improve our skills in every area and thus our need to be great drives the
sharpening of our skills and leads to a self fulfilling prophecy (Our desire
to become great leads to us pursuing more knowledge to become better and thus
in time we become great)

Donald Trump's definition of great is clearly being admired and in the spot
light. But I think he also defines greatness as being a leader, I think he
also associates greatness with quality.

I'm not worried about this presidency one bit, his need to be great will drive
him to be great by all definitions.

------
koolba
As someone who's actively vocalized his support for Trump in the past, both
here[1] and in my meat space life, I'm ecstatic with the results of this
election.

Not just the POTUS, but the trifecta of the house and senate as well. That's
as loud of a mandate as can be expected from a strongly divided country. On
top of all that, with the SCOTUS picks that are expected in the next few
years, this election is going to be felt for many years to come.

I just hope that as we move forward with the transition to the new government,
both sides can leave behind the incessant name calling and hate that's plagued
this election. It's done, it's over, and the people have spoken. Now let's
move forward on the direction that's been chosen and go about discussing it
constructively.

[1]:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12728645](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12728645)

~~~
jernfrost
Don't think that is possible. If I was a democrat today I'd do like the
Republicans have been doing the last 8 years and do my outmost to make the
Trump Presidency be a major failure.

The way the republicans have played this game is so dirty, that you can't
expect people to forgive. We can not reward such a divisive character like
Donald Trump with his racism, xenophobia, mysogny, insults and bullying with a
successful presidency.

Honestly I think the democrats should do the best the sabotage him and make
sure everything he does fails. It should teach them a lesson that there is no
reward in playing dirty and confrontational.

If we reward this behavior it will only get worse.

It is sad to say, but for the long term benefit of America it is probably
better if it gets run to the ground over these four years. Then America will
be spared for such leaders in the future.

~~~
buckbova
> It is sad to say, but for the long term benefit of America it is probably
> better if it gets run to the ground over these four years. Then America will
> be spared for such leaders in the future.

I heard this EXACT phrase said about Obama 8 years ago! We always get what we
deserve. Hope, change, make america great again.

> If I was a democrat today I'd do like the Republicans have been doing the
> last 8 years and do my outmost to make the Trump Presidency be a major
> failure.

Good luck with that. GOP now has majorities and will probably pick up more in
2018. So be it.

~~~
TAForObvReasons
Dems started with a majority in both houses back in 2009-2010. Still didn't
stop the GOP from filibustering and pulling out all the stops.

This is a real test of the spine of the democratic party. Will they pull the
same stunts the GOP did back then? Who knows

~~~
buckbova
New rules since then.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filibuster_in_the_United_State...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filibuster_in_the_United_States_Senate#Changes_in_2013)

> The new rules remove the requirement of 60 votes in order to begin debate on
> legislation and allow the minority two amendments to measures that reach the
> Senate floor, a change implemented as a standing order that expires at the
> end of the current term. In the new rules, the amount of time to debate
> following a motion to proceed has been reduced from 30 hours to four.
> Additionally, a filibuster on the motion to proceed will be blocked if a
> petition is signed by eight members of the minority, including the minority
> leader.

------
DavajDavaj
I think the election of Trump is also a backslash against the PC, SJW, safe-
space, trigger-warning, micro aggression tendencies that have been spreading
in the U.S. for the last couple of years. This has become too much and
millions of Americans are fed up with it, they have now spoken out.

~~~
mtaksrud
Could you elaborate on what these things are? PC, SJW, safe-space, trigger-
warning an micro aggression(?)

~~~
citruscomputing
PC means politically correct. According to wikipedia[0], this is defined as
"used to describe language, policies, or measures that are intended primarily
not to offend or disadvantage any particular group of people in society." In
short, thinking before you speak because words have consequences and can make
people feel things.

SJW means social justice warrior. It carries a negative connotation, being
defined[1] as "[carrying] implications of pursuing personal validation rather
than any deep-seated conviction, and being engaged in disingenuous social
justice arguments or activism to raise personal reputation."

A safe space is somewhere "individuals who feel marginalized [can] come
together to communicate regarding their experiences with their perceived
marginalization."[2] This originated so that members of the lgbt+ community
could talk freely and not feel like they would be persecuted for doing so.
People today sometimes use the term to refer to places where they cannot be
openly hateful, citing a violation of free speech.

A trigger is something that can cause someone to recall a previous trauma that
they have experienced. Examples could be descriptions or portrayals of rape,
graphic violence, suicide, or blood. Not all triggers are this directly
connected to what people have experienced, but these are what people usually
use in trigger warnings. Trigger warnings are little things saying "hey,
there's some material following that may potentially trigger memories of
trauma."

Microaggressions refer to actions that are not directly aggressive to a member
of a marginalized group, but are still hurtful. They can be defined[3] as
"rooted in racism, sexism, or discrimination based on nationality or sexual
orientation. [They] can be delivered casually or even unconsciously." Examples
could be sexist jokes, purposeful discrimination based on race, or
misgendering trans people.

Some people use these terms to say that people today are so sensitive, it's
just words, etc. Most of those people are not members of any marginalized
groups.

[0]:[https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Political_correctness](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Political_correctness)
[1]:[https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Social_justice_warrior](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Social_justice_warrior)
[2]:[https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Safe-space](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Safe-
space) [3]:[http://qz.com/787504/what-exactly-is-a-microaggression-
let-t...](http://qz.com/787504/what-exactly-is-a-microaggression-let-these-
examples-from-hollywood-movies-explain/)

~~~
ddorian43
>>Most of those people are not members of any marginalized groups.

Can you give some examples ? Are white "priviledged" marginalized ? Are the
people that voted for Trump, deplorables, marginalized ?

------
tommy_wiseau
The valley need to get over themselves and learn to appreciate the lessons
from the unlikely Trump victory.

Trump is the quintessential startup success story. Jump in the ring, breaks
shit (always easier to ask for forgiveness than permission) then somehow makes
his way to a hit product. He disrupted the business of politics much in the
same way that uber disrupted the business of transportation.

Guess Peter Thiel really is the smartest guy in the valley after all.

Per Mark Cuban tweet (not a sv guy per se but still a voice representative of
the community):

We all need to give President-Elect Trump a chance. Support the good. Lobby
against what we disagree on. No one is bigger than us all

~~~
jernfrost
Having a population of idiots is not something Trump can claim responsibility
for. He is simply an asshole who has exploited this for his own gains.

What exactly is there to learn from this? That democracy doesn't work when to
large fraction of the electorate are ignorant fools.

The lesson should be a better school system for America. But of course that
would not be in the interest of republicans. They rely on large number of
idiots to win elections. So it is not going to happen.

They will make sure that there is an elite which gets good education which can
run companies and create new ones. But there needs to be a large underclass of
simpletons to keep the system going.

~~~
ryanx435
> Having a population of idiots is not something Trump can claim
> responsibility for.

> large fraction of the electorate are ignorant fools.

if you think the roughly half of all American voters that voted for trump are
idiots or ignorant fools, than it is perhaps you that is the idiot. Simply by
the law of large numbers there exists a significant number of them that are
smarter and better educated that you are. Disparaging them as an lesser group
is a dangerous way of thinking.

~~~
pg314
He did not say that all Trump voters are idiots or ignorant fools, he said a
large fraction.

It is a fact that non-college-educated white voters overwhelmingly voted for
Trump, while college-educated voters preferred Clinton. Not all college-
educated persons are smarter than non-college-educated persons. But combined
with the fact that 370 economists (among which 8 nobel prize winners) said not
to vote for Trump, and newspapers overwhelmingly endorsed Clinton(243-20 [2]),
it might be fair to say that most Trump voters are either not too bright or
not very well-informed.

[1] [http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2016/11/01/prominent-
economis...](http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2016/11/01/prominent-economists-
including-eight-nobel-laureates-do-not-vote-for-donald-trump/)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newspaper_endorsements_in_the_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newspaper_endorsements_in_the_United_States_presidential_election,_2016)

~~~
ryanx435
> the fact that 370 economists (among which 8 nobel prize winners) said not to
> vote for Trump, and newspapers overwhelmingly endorsed Clinton(243-20 [2]),

honestly who cares if 370 economists said not to vote for trump? Economics
isn't a solved field and I'm willing to bet that there are an equal number of
economists who can and have made the argument that voting for trump is better
for the economy. and as for the newspaper endorsements, who cares what they
think? Newspapers are increasingly irrelevant in this society. Why should I
listen to the opinions of a newspaper's editorial board, say, over the
opinions of a tv news network's editorial board? or the opinions of a blog
writer? or a political cartoonist? there is nothing inherent in being a
journalist that makes their recommendations carry more weight than the
recommendations of any other profession.

> it might be fair to say that most Trump voters are either not too bright or
> not very well-informed.

This is absolutely not fair to say and it is intellectually dishonest to come
to this conclusion. what does "not too bright" even mean? are you implying
that half of america is too dumb and their voices should be silenced in the
political sphere? sounds like tyranny to me.

~~~
pg314
> honestly who cares if 370 economists said not to vote for trump?

Maybe people having economical problems might have something to gain by
listening to people who have studied economics?

> Economics isn't a solved field and I'm willing to bet that there are an
> equal number of economists who can and have made the argument that voting
> for trump is better for the economy.

Medicine is not a solved field either, but would you rather go to an MD or put
your faith in witchcraft when you're ill?

If you look into it, I doubt you will find an equivalent group of economists
making the pro-Trump argument. If you do, I would love to read their
arguments.

> and as for the newspaper endorsements, who cares what they think? Newspapers
> are increasingly irrelevant in this society.

Newspapers might be becoming financially unviable, but for now they still do a
reasonably good job of spreading more or less accurate information. They are
not perfect, but they do try to check their sources and most at least try to
give a balanced view. They also have a bit more time to prepare their stories
compared to the relentless pace of cable news.

The fact that such an overwhelming group of well-informed people from across
the political spectrum made a coherent case against Trump, should maybe have
given you some pause.

> Why should I listen to the opinions of a newspaper's editorial board, say,
> over the opinions of a tv news network's editorial board? or the opinions of
> a blog writer? or a political cartoonist? there is nothing inherent in being
> a journalist that makes their recommendations carry more weight than the
> recommendations of any other profession.

Not all opinions are equivalent. Those endorsements by newspapers are made by
a group of people who have discussed and thought about those endorsements for
quite a bit. They have weighed the pros and cons. A lot of conservative papers
knew they were going to lose a lot of subscriptions by not endorsing Trump,
but did so anyway, sometimes braving death threats.

Some blog posts or cartoonists might be insightful, but most are not.

> This is absolutely not fair to say and it is intellectually dishonest to
> come to this conclusion. what does "not too bright" even mean? are you
> implying that half of america is too dumb and their voices should be
> silenced in the political sphere? sounds like tyranny to me.

You are putting words into my mouth. I never advocated for their voices to be
silenced.

I apologise for calling people not too bright. But the fact that such a large
part of the population voted for a person that will solve none of their
economic problems but will exacerbate them, is hard to understand. I jumped to
conclusions about their intelligence, there might be other explanations. I
could be wrong about Trump too. I hope so. We shall see...

------
akiselev
My entire family feels a terrible sadness today. We immigrated here to the
United States from Russia almost 20 years ago (to the day) and after all the
immigration bullshit we were finally eligible for citizenship this year. My
dad took his oath and got his US passport literally weeks before the election
and this is what he gets for his first vote: a divisive demagogue beat a
corrupt career politician. There are no words to describe our disappointment,
both at the choices and the result.

For those that are unhappy with the results of this election, there is
something you can do! I implore you to write, call, and otherwise pester your
state legislators and your governors to pressure them to support the National
Popular Vote Interstate Compact [1]. This is an interstate agreement approved
by the Justice Department that activates when states with 270 or more
electoral college votes sign it (by passing state legislation that implements
the compact). When it activates, all of the states that signed it will, from
that point on, allocate their votes for the presidential candidate that won
the national popular vote, essentially destroying the electoral college.
Already, the states that signed the compact have a total of 160 electoral
college votes and legislation is in the works for Michigan and Pennsylvania,
which would bring the total to over 180. Already a _third_ of all electoral
votes are part of this compact!

Take it from someone who has spent two decades on the sideline: you are not
powerless. So few people make their voices heard that every voice counts when
you're one of 50 or 100 state senators representing a state of a few million.
With Trump's divisiveness front and center _this is it._ For the first time
since the Voting Rights Act we have a chance to fundamentally change American
democracy and we can do so in a way that cannot be obstructed by conservative
states or dismantled by conservative Supreme Court justices.

Even if you are happy with the results of this election, I beg you to support
the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. It's time we started to reform
our electoral system and restore some of the legitimacy it has lost in the
last few decades.

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Inters...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Interstate_Compact)

~~~
wtbob
Destroying the Electoral College would be one more step in destroying the
federal nature of the Unites States. Perhaps you think that's a good thing,
but I think it's a terrible idea: I think that we should be _more_ , not
_less_ , federal. What works for the people of Massachusetts is not what works
for the people of California, or the people of Wyoming.

I'd like to see state legislatures selecting electors again.

Also, the Constitution states, 'No State shall, without the Consent of
Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of
Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a
foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent
Danger as will not admit of delay.' Has Congress consented to this interstate
compact?

~~~
akiselev
_> Destroying the Electoral College would be one more step in destroying the
federal nature of the Unites States. Perhaps you think that's a good thing,
but I think it's a terrible idea: I think that we should be more, not less,
federal. What works for the people of Massachusetts is not what works for the
people of California, or the people of Wyoming._

The electoral college is a net-negative contribution to the federal nature of
the US because it allows a tiny, extremely unrepresentative minority to decide
for the whole country while eroding the legitimacy of the executive branch, a
legitimacy that is a key component of our system. Californians deciding policy
for MA or WY due to sheer size is bad but that's how democracies and republics
are supposed to work. A single precinct deciding for the entire nation is a
perversion of the process that does nothing but destroy faith in our electoral
process.

Besides, the executive branch is largely irrelevant to American federalism. We
can eliminate the top layer of the executive branch _today_ and the US
government would still be as federal as ever because that's how our state and
national legislatures are structured. The president has little power over the
day to day of the average citizen and all of the hierarchies that do have that
power are headed by people confirmed by the Senate.

 _> Also, the Constitution states, 'No State shall, without the Consent of
Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of
Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a
foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent
Danger as will not admit of delay.' Has Congress consented to this interstate
compact?_

This issue is actively being debated by constitutional scholars precisely
because of the popular vote compact. The general consensus is that
Congressional consent is needed only if the interstate agreement is "directed
to the formation of any combination tending to the increase of political power
in the States, which may _encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy
of the United States_ " (emphasis mine), which was a precedent set by the
Supreme Court in the early 1800s. That last part means that Congressional
approval is only necessary if the agreement threatens the superiority of the
federal government. Furthermore, a state's right to choose how its electoral
votes are allocated is a right enumerated in the Constitution and the only
power Congress has is to set how many electoral votes each state gets.

All of that is irrelevant anyway because there is no actual treaty or official
agreement due to how the legislation is structured. Every state that has
joined the compact has legislation to the effect of "All of the electoral
votes for this state will go to the winner of the national popular vote if and
only if similar legislation is active in enough states to tie 270 or more
electoral votes to the national popular vote." No one from the federal
government can stop them from doing this.

Edit: s/appointed/confirmed

~~~
wtbob
> The electoral college is a net-negative contribution to the federal nature
> of the US because it allows a tiny, extremely unrepresentative minority to
> decide for the whole country while eroding the legitimacy of the executive
> branch, a legitimacy that is a key component of our system. Californians
> deciding policy for MA or WY due to sheer size is bad but that's how
> democracies and republics are supposed to work. A single precinct deciding
> for the entire nation is a perversion of the process that does nothing but
> destroy faith in our electoral process.

But that's nonsense: no single precinct determines anything, any more than a
single precinct within a popular-vote election would. Each state votes, and
the states send electors, and those electors as a whole elect the President.
Obama didn't win because one precinct voted for him; he won because thousands
of voters across dozens of states voted for electors pledged to him. Likewise
Trump.

And likewise Bush. Regardless of Ohio or Florida, plenty of people across the
nation voted for electors pledged to him.

~~~
akiselev
Yes saying a single precinct is a bit hyperbolic but claiming that all states
have an equal hand in electing a president is also nonsense. The entire
presidential election is decided by a few states that are poorly
representative of the country. Just look at where presidential candidates
campaign: The vast majority of their time is spent in less than a dozen
states, who have a total population less than that of New York and California
combined, just because the race in those states is neck and neck.

I am in full support of federalism but its purpose is to strike a balance
between national, regional, and local representation & interests. When the
system elects a candidate who lost the popular vote by hundreds of thousands
that isn't a balance, that's small states getting power they should only have
in the senate. The executive branch isn't bicameral so applying federalism to
it is just depriving the majority of their choice. The national and state
legislatures is where our federalism belongs, not in our executive branch.

~~~
wtbob
> The vast majority of their time is spent in less than a dozen states, who
> have a total population less than that of New York and California combined,
> just because the race in those states is neck and neck.

Those are the swing states, which are the most politically-balanced — this
means that they are the most-centrist states. Campaigning to win them is
campaigning to win the centre.

> The executive branch isn't bicameral so applying federalism to it is just
> depriving the majority of their choice.

Why should 50.01% get their choice and 49.99 suffer? Why not build a system
which encourages centrism and attempting to appeal to all? That's the one we
have.

Note that _no_ candidate got a majority of popular votes in the election.

> The national and state legislatures is where our federalism belongs, not in
> our executive branch.

That makes no sense: the federal executive is the _federal_ executive, and
should be just as federalist as the rest of our federal government (hence my
support for returning to state legislatures appointing electors, and getting
rid of the popular vote altogether).

------
davidw
My optimistic take: he's probably going to be a Berlusconi. Generally bad for
the economy, bad for freedom, but probably won't carry through on the worst of
his bad ideas. I think there's a small chance he'll be more of a Mussolini.
The obvious thing to look for there is if he starts trying to carry out the
threat to deport illegal immigrants, which would require door to door
searches, "papers please" and that kind of thing.

There are also some serious geopolitical things that could go real wrong real
quick: if I were in one of the Baltic states this morning, I would be doing
some serious thinking about defense.

~~~
pg314
I had exactly the same idea: somewhere between Berlusconi and Mussolini.
However, I don't think he is nearly as intelligent as either, so I don't think
he will last more than 4 years.

I agree on the Baltic states. Also, if you're in Aleppo, may god have mercy on
your soul. And Europe should prepare for more refugees and destabilisation
(exactly what Putin wants). It's not going to be a pretty next 4 years...

~~~
tcoppi
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best...

------
curiousgal
Ctrl - F Sanders

0 results. Hadn't Hilary been dishonest and, as much as I hate the word,
_crooked_ _enough_ to not allow Bernie to face Trump, this wouldn't have
happened.

~~~
gthtjtkt
WikiLeaks summed it up pretty well:

> By biasing its internal electoral market the DNC selected the less
> competitive candidate defeating the purpose of running a primary.

Hillary, the DNC, and all their cronies deserved this. I would've voted for
any Democrat who won the primary fair and square, but I couldn't bring myself
to vote for someone who stole an election (and from one of the most well-liked
candidates of all time, no less). Many of my friends felt the same way -- they
either stayed home, voted 3rd party, or voted without selecting a presidential
candidate.

The fact that they tried to bully/guilt everyone into voting for her didn't
help much either.

~~~
lern_too_spel
How did she steal the election, and how was her opponent, who received nearly
4 million fewer votes, one of the most well-liked candidates of all time? The
data does not support your story.

~~~
moosey
He is one of the most well-liked candidates of all time, yes. I believe that
he would have won an honest primary also.

How did he lose 4 million votes? Most of that can be found in the DNC emails,
among other places. There was a huge media campaign smear against him (led by
the DNC itself), massive amounts of donations were funneled in ethically
questionable manners into the Hillary campaign, stealing money from state
tickets. People were hired in a black flag op to discredit his supporters.

I'm sure the list goes further.

However, I do think one of his biggest issues was that he wasn't a member of
the team. I saw it first hand at the caucus; members making references to the
fact that she was a life-long democrat, as if it was actually important.
Republicans certainly got over that quickly.

Still, if the DNC had played fair with Bernie, I think that two million votes
flipping isn't so far fetched.

~~~
lern_too_spel
> There was a huge media campaign smear against him (led by the DNC itself)

There is no evidence of the DNC running a smear campaign against Sanders.

> Massive amounts of donations were funneled in ethically questionable manners
> into the Hillary campaign.

You're presumably referring to the Hillary Victory Fund here. You can see on
the donation page (still up:
[https://www.hillaryclinton.com/donate/go/](https://www.hillaryclinton.com/donate/go/))
that the first $X of contributions goes to the Clinton primary campaign, the
next $Y goes to the Clinton general campaign, the next $Z goes to the DNC, and
the final money gets distributed to the state committees. The issue wasn't
that the money was going into the Clinton campaigns but that it was going to
the DNC instead of the state committees. The DNC's excuse was that they were
using it to build common campaign infrastructure for use by the state
committees.

> People were hired in a black flag op to discredit his supporters.

There is no evidence of a black flag or false flag operation against Sanders.

In summary, there is no evidence that the DNC sabotaged Sanders, yet he still
lost by millions of votes, so the claim that he is one of the most well-liked
candidates of all time goes against the actual voting data.

------
taxicabjesus
Four years ago, I wrote a sort-of tongue-in-cheek story for Kuro5hin.org (RIP)
titled "Humanity's Second-Best Hope" [1]. I pointed out that the Democratic
president had failed to deliver on the Change he had promised, and shared my
faint hope that maybe Mitt Romney was a "political gladiator" who'd flip on
the plutocracy once he was elected.

[1] [http://www.TaxiWars.org/humanitys-second-best-
hope/](http://www.TaxiWars.org/humanitys-second-best-hope/)

Alas, Mitt Romney was no gladiator.

At some point in this election cycle, I noticed dilbert cartoonist Scott
Adams' blog. On August 13, 2015 Scott had a post about Donald Trump titled
"Clown Genius" [2]:

    
    
      Like many of you, I have been entertained by the 
      unstoppable clown car that is Donald Trump. On the 
      surface, and several layers deep as well, Trump appears 
      to be a narcissistic blow-hard with inadequate 
      credentials to lead a country.
    
      The only problem with my analysis is that there is an 
      eerie consistency to his success so far. Is there a 
      method to it? Is there some sort of system at work under 
      the hood?
    
      Probably yes. Allow me to describe some of the hypnosis 
      and persuasion methods Mr. Trump has employed on you. ...
    

[2] [http://blog.dilbert.com/post/126589300371/clown-
genius](http://blog.dilbert.com/post/126589300371/clown-genius)

For the entire election cycle, the political media promoted Hillary Clinton as
the presidential heir-apparent, as if she was The Chosen One. Usually the
plutocracy runs a Chosen candidate against a backup - someone who, even if
fickle voters decided to not select the Chosen candidate, would still be
useful to them.

Donald Trump was not a backup candidate. He was give free coverage during the
primaries because he was considered a clown-candidate that wouldn't be taken
seriously, it was an easy story, and because it was thought that The Chosen
One could beat him. This was covered in one of the Wikileaks emails...

Donald Trump is the Gladiator that Mitt Romney was not. I'm optimistic.

~~~
devopsproject
The "Master persuader" series explains in great detail why and why trump won.
It also explains how and why everyone got it wrong. great series.

~~~
taxicabjesus
_The Trump Master Persuader Index and Reading List_ _Posted February 18th,
2016_

[http://blog.dilbert.com/post/139541975641/the-trump-
master-p...](http://blog.dilbert.com/post/139541975641/the-trump-master-
persuader-index-and-reading-list)

------
guhcampos
Disclaimer: I'm a Brazilian living in Brazil, so merely a watcher in the US
Election.

On times like these, I try very hard to be optimistic, and for this specific
historical moment I'd say the US is in a better place than Brazil - relatively
speaking.

While Brazil has just gone through a major soft-coup, that has the majority of
the nation, guided by media attention, agreeing with it.

For the US election, however, there's a bright side: the actual majority of
the American people (even if for a thing margin) has voted for Hillary
Clinton, or at least voted against Trump.

It really does not matter if you support one or the other, the sad fact is
that, once again, the US will have a president who was not chosen by the
majority of its people. This has significant social and philosophical
implications. Maybe, just maybe, this election will be the one that drives
change, encouraging states to change their laws and provide a better
representative system.

I'm not saying that direct representation is better - I'm not entitled to say
that - but there's a very obvious dissatisfaction among the younger American
people, which are now in position, and willing, to demand changes and come up
with creative solutions for the representative democracy.

------
TulliusCicero
Terrifying, but the dems kind of brought it on themselves. A nominee who was
actually likeable probably would've wiped the floor with Trump.

~~~
CalChris
Again, Republicans did this. Don't blame this on Hillary (hint: she won the
popular vote). Don't blame this on Democrats. Accept responsibility.

As for likable, Hillary has been the most admired woman in America, 14 years
straight. Trump ran the most negative fact free campaign ever to overcome her
likability.

~~~
dhagz
However, in light of the DNC email leaks, the Democrat Party's elite seemed to
sandbag Bernie, who many believe (citing polls from before the primary) would
have given Trump a run for his money. And honestly, this was the Democrats'
election to lose, and they did nothing to win it. So I will blame them. I will
blame them for going with a candidate that is firmly "establishment" when the
general consensus among the public is that the "establishment" has overstayed
their welcome. I will blame them for expecting the appeal of having "the first
X president" to work the same as it did for Obama.

~~~
StillBored
A lot of people like to talk about his race, but I don't think it really
mattered a lot. Obama won, not because he was black and people wanted to vote
for that. Obama won because we had just had 8 years of Bush, the economy was
in the tank, and he was young and charismatic.

The democratic nominee always had an uphill battle against a base of R's
motivated for "Change", for the same reason that the party in power tends to
fall behind during the midterms.

~~~
chillacy
Yes, "change" and "yes we can" won again, just for a different demographic.

------
huac
I have a lot of thoughts, but here's one: Hillary focused her entire campaign
on why people should stop Trump, at the expense of talking about why she
should be president. In general, making the case against someone else rather
than the affirmative case for yourself doesn't work. It's reaction versus
action.

It's undoubtably true now that there was a very real populist anger towards
the existing political order, and as a corollary, the political and economic
elites. Instead of harnessing that energy and attempting to create a movement
(see: Sanders, Bernie), the Democratic party anointed a candidate who is the
definition of establishment.

The results are showing that Hillary lost, at least in large part, due to
lower voter turnout, especially among liberal-leaning populations. With all
else equal, Podesta, DWS, Neera Tanden, and the rest of the DNC cutup squad
ignored the people and ran on the "man, Dangerous Donald, obviously you're not
gonna vote for him!" platform. That, and shaming Bernie/Stein supporters about
their support for a candidate who can't win - rather than explaining how
Clinton's policies would be good. Well, the Democrats and 'moderates' didn't
vote for Trump, but they sure didn't have a reason to vote for Clinton either.

~~~
gthtjtkt
> at the expense of talking about why she should be president.

Hillary couldn't make that argument because it would've drawn more attention
to her most damning flaw: The fact that she's a textbook demagogue who was on
the wrong side of every progressive issue until she found it politically
expedient to "evolve".

That's why so many people were so passionate about Sanders. You could go back
to C-SPAN videos from 1992 and hear him saying _the exact same things_ he said
throughout the whole primary season.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vabeos-F8Kk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vabeos-F8Kk)

~~~
greenshackle2
Having the same opinion for 24 years is not a virtue.

In the (probably apocryphal) words of Keynes:

> When someone persuades me that I am wrong, I change my mind. What do you do?

It's not a sign of vice either; I'm sure he's been believing that the Earth is
round for 24+ years, and that's fine. What matters is accuracy, and updating
in the face of new evidence, not _consistency_. Consistency in the face of new
evidence is called _faith_.

~~~
gthtjtkt
> Having the same opinion for 24 years is not a virtue.

But being right for 24 years is.

She adopted his ideas one by one and then tried to pretend they'd been hers
all along. Unfortunately (for her), Democrats aren't that gullible. It was
clear that she was only saying what voters wanted to hear, while Bernie truly
believed everything he'd been saying for that past 25+ years.

Case in point: [https://wikileaks.org/podesta-
emails/emailid/2631](https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/2631)

~~~
greenshackle2
Correct, but being right is orthogonal to consistency. If you are exposed to
new evidence, and it points in a different direction than your prior belief,
being right means changing your mind; if there is no new evidence, or the
weight of new evidence points in the same direction, being right means keeping
the same belief.

All I'm saying is, you can't tout keeping the same idea for years as an
unqualified good thing, you have to look at the idea and history in detail,
and show that it was a good idea all along.

(I'm not objecting to the object-level argument that Clinton does whatever is
politically expedient, I'm objecting to the line of argument that it's good
for a politician to hold an opinion for a long time, _without_ also showing
that the idea is good, and that it was good all along.)

~~~
darawk
I don't think the OP was criticizing her lack of consistency. (S)He was
criticizing her lack of being on the right side of the issues the first time
(in the way that Bernie has been on many issues). It's easy to switch sides
when everyone does, and nobody should _criticize_ someone for doing that. But
to many people, greatness is being on the right side of the issue before
everyone else, and convincing people of its rightness.

~~~
edko
I think you need both. You need the uncompromising Bernies, to act as
visionaries and point out what the future should be. And, you also need the
unprincipled politicians who can compromise, and adapt, and win elections. If
Bernie had run in all previous elections, you would have probably gotten
presidents Dole, McCain, and Romney. And, who knows, maybe Trump too.

~~~
sqeaky
I am not convinced those presidents would have been bad. Can we say that they
were all acting in the same way as "unprincipled politicians who can
compromise, and adapt, and win elections" or maybe did they believe something
earnestly that is just different from what you believe?

Would you rather have an ethically malleable liberal than a principled
conservative? In most cases I would rather have the principled politician
because they will have some kind of goal to benefit some segment of Americans.
Can we really say that any ethically malleable politician, of any flavor, will
always help some segment of Americans?

Then as a counter to all this. Nixon did found the EPA.

~~~
edko
I agree that maybe those presidents would not have been necessarily bad.
Maybe, if Dole would have won, G.W. Bush would have never been elected, and
the world would now be a very different (and better) place.

I think malleable politicians are malleable because they try to benefit the
largest section of the population that they can. Conservatives, lately, have
focused on benefiting a very small segment of the population directly,
expecting the benefits to trickle down.

However, the trickle down has not worked. I know very little about economics,
but, I remember, headlines in newspapers eight years ago were mainly about
unemployment, and the growth of the National debt. The euro was $1.30 (now it
buoys around $1.10).

I think the American economy is much better now than it was eight years ago,
and a larger section of the population has benefited from that, than when
principled conservatives were in the government. (And this is just from an
economic point of view, which is a small part of the benefits).

------
narrator
I bet Peter Theil is going to have a full schedule holding court over the next
several months as all the Silicon Valley power players are going to want to
know how they can get in the good graces of the Trump administration.

~~~
dopamean
I wonder how he feels as a gay man knowing that he supported a candidate who
ran on the most homophobic platform a major party has ever had.

~~~
narrator
I heard that Trump did not have a bad record, for a republican, on gay rights.
Can you cite anything?

~~~
rak00n
[http://www.lgbtqnation.com/2016/02/the-top-ten-worst-
comment...](http://www.lgbtqnation.com/2016/02/the-top-ten-worst-comments-
donald-trump-has-made-about-lgbtq-people/)

------
Houshalter
I'm not a conspiracy theorist at all. But HN has _story after story_ about how
vulnerable voting machines are:
[https://hn.algolia.com/?utm_source=opensearch&utm_medium=sea...](https://hn.algolia.com/?utm_source=opensearch&utm_medium=search&utm_campaign=opensearch&query=voting%20machines&sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story)
The more I look into the issue the more horrified I am. One place had voting
machines that ran windows XP and sent votes over wifi, and were hacked with a
default administrator password. This computerphile video goes into a number of
problems with the concept:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3_0x6oaDmI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3_0x6oaDmI)

The fact that the polls were off by such a huge amount is concerning to me.
States that weren't supposed to be even close somehow ended up going for
Trump. It's known that Russia supported Donald Trump's campaign and had
targeted voting systems, which is terrifying. Overall the election seems to be
very close in terms of popular vote, and many swing states were won by very
small margins or just a few counties. A small amount of fraud targeted in just
the right places could perhaps have changed the outcome.

How concerned should I be about this? The fact that the election wasn't close
_in terms of electoral votes_ is comforting (if you are rigging an election,
it's best to try not to overdo it and draw suspicion.) It would be nice to
know that results are consistent across states and counties that use different
kinds of voting machines or paper ballots. I don't know if that has been
tested yet.

------
lettergram
For better or worse, Trump's probably the next president... The weird part
about this election, is the electoral college could still pull a fast one on
us and elect someone else.

There are quite a few of electors and governors who _REALLY_ hate Trump.

If anyone's curious, the elector college votes in December[1].

 __Edit __: I don 't think this will happen, but in a world where Trump won,
anything is possible.

[1] [https://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-
college/...](https://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-college/key-
dates.html)

~~~
DamnYuppie
I am not saying this out of anger or angst. If that was done the civility of
the disenfranchised electorate, which showed up in force this election, would
erode and devolve into violence at a pace that would astound those on the
left.

~~~
SketchySeaBeast
You think anything can astound the left after last night?

~~~
LesZedCB
some of us on the left were not surprised at all. a class program is a strong
one, even if it's a right wing program.

------
Animats
Trump's likely cabinet selections are in the press.[1]

Treasury - probably Steven Mnuchin, another Goldman Sachs guy. Trump may not
be as anti Wall Street as he said he was.

State - Bob Corker (Senate foreign relations chair) or Newt Gingrich. Both are
long-time Washington insiders.

Defense - about four candidates, mostly long-time Washington insiders.

Attorney General - Rudy Guilani, probably. As a prosecutor, he took down the
New York Mafia, so he's qualified for the job.

Old, white, Republican insiders, all of them. Mnuchin is the only one below
retirement age.

[1] [http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/who-is-in-president-
tr...](http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/who-is-in-president-trump-
cabinet-231071)

~~~
dopamean
Rudy Giuliani gets way, way too much credit for the decrease in crime in NYC
during his term in office. If he's really going to go after big crime
(corporate things, drug cartels, etc) then I might be able to stomach him as
Attorney General. But if he want's to encourage stop and frisk type bullshit
on a national level (I'm not even sure he can do that) I would be very, very
worried.

------
jernfrost
Sigh, the only think positive I can imagine coming out of this is that now, I
get four years I can make fun of how stupid American's are.

As the country descends into chaos and non of Trump's promises comes truth I
can sit in my couch and keep repeating: "I told you so!"

Good thing Republican's get all the power. Now they fully own all the shit
that is to come. They wont be able to blame that on anybody else.

I think Brexit and the Trump victory has hammered home that democracy in its
current form doesn't work. It has no mechanism to protect itself against
stupidity and ignorance.

Or perhaps it is a warning to every country about what happens when economic
inequality gets too bad. Before you know it the crazies will grab power.

I hope the rich elites are horrified today. Because they have created this
monster, by consistently funding efforts working against the interests of the
middle class and eroding it. Now it has blown up in their face.

I almost feel a slight schadenfreude over the trade wars which will follow
with China and Mexico and all the businesses which will lose money over this.

~~~
ryanx435
> Sigh, the only think positive I can imagine coming out of this is that now,
> I get four years I can make fun of how stupid American's are.

it is this sentiment from the left that propelled trump to victory. Your
elitism is disgusting.

~~~
Erik816
One would hope that an elitist could write a proper sentence.

------
happytrails
Those factory jobs are not coming back. The wall will not get built and it
would not even work. What we will have is some NYC cronyism and wealth
inequality increases. We may even have a recession if they decided to touch
any trade agreement or increase tariffs ( based on debt load private and
public institutions have). Whomever inherited the white house was going to
have a bad time, this will just have to go on Trumps shoulders. :) 2018 you'll
see a democrat majority in Congress.

~~~
blahi
The only factory people who voted for Trump are the ones who code in Matlab.

[http://i.imgur.com/RAaGDnW.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/RAaGDnW.jpg)

~~~
ones_and_zeros
I don't get it?

~~~
IMcD23
A very flawed argument above. I assume it's to mean that since Clinton won a
majority of votes from lower income people, which factory workers would fall
under, the only factory workers that voted for Trump are high-paid ones, which
would code in MATLAB.

------
happytrails
The sun will rise in the east and set in the west. We will keep moving
forward. We have systemic issues we need to address in the country and if they
don't get addressed in this cycle it'll get worse in the next. We have major
income inequality. We have an issue with tax avoidance and we have a problem
with US Companies dumping workers for foreign labor. We also have a healthcare
issue that needs to be solved. I doubt this Republican majority will be able
to touch any of it but these are still problems and will remain so until we
find a solution.

~~~
webkike
The issue I have is that most of our progress will be undone. The Paris
Climate Accord rejected. Obamacare dismantled. Dodd Frank repealed. It's
easier to destroy the world than it is to save it.

~~~
cmdrfred
As this election shows many in the middle class aren't fans of Obamacare.
Maybe it isn't a boon to them as many people claim. The middle class are
finding high deducable plans that increase in price by 25% each year and when
it becomes too unaffordable for them, they are forced to drop it and they are
fined. You'd be pissed off too.

~~~
webkike
Sure but I don't think the solution is to get rid of Obamacare, the solution
is to fix it. And even getting rid of only Obamacare would be preferable
compared to all the damage he could do.

~~~
cmdrfred
The Democrats passed the ACA essentially without any Republican support. They
had the power to create almost any bill they wanted. Why would anyone
reasonably believe they would fix it? It is functioning exactly as designed
and is enriching their donors as expected.

~~~
webkike
The ACA was passed with a dem majority. They did not have that after the first
two years

~~~
mikeash
They really only had control for a couple of months. Abuse of the filibuster
meant that they needed 60 votes in the Senate to get anything done. With
Kennedy sick and Al Franken's election disputed, they didn't have 60 votes
initially. After Kennedy died, the special election was won by a Republican,
so they really only had 60 votes while Kennedy's interim replacement was in
office. The ACA is what could be haphazardly slapped together and passed in
that brief time.

------
40acres
Trump is going to erase the entire Obama administration, a decent amount of
Obama's impact was felt through executive order, all it takes is a signature
to erase that.

~~~
MrZongle2
Live by the sword, die by the sword. Or pen, in this case.

I'm not excited about a Trump presidency. But from 2009-2011 Democrats held
majorities in both the House and Senate. _Then_ was the time to get the major
work done, legislatively, that could not be undone by another Executive Order.

That's on Obama.

~~~
40acres
Dems spent all their political capital during those days on ACA, and even that
was a struggle to pass.

~~~
CalChris
Lieberman comes to mind. Senate Democrats needed 60 votes to overcome
Republican filibusters on anything. This meant Lieberman, the Senator from
Hartford, had veto power over anything. Obama campaigned for his re-election
and Lieberman campaigned for McCain.

That Lieberman.

------
matthewmacleod
(I'm in the UK, but I think the discussion is broad enough to be applicable)

Given Trump's win, looming Brexit etc., what's the way forward for a
moderately-progressive-mostly-centrist like myself?

I can completely understand where a big chunk of Trump's support has come
from. For a large number of people, globalisation is _shit_. Employment has
become less stable; the gap between rich and poor appears to be growing; there
is a sense of disenfranchisement with politics, and there is rampant
corruption. Generally, people have every right to be _totally pissed off_ with
this situation; they essentially feel ignored by a distant 'elite' or
whatever, and it seems pretty obvious that there will eventually be a reaction
against that.

I certainly don't feel that Trump-ism and Brexiteer-ism is an actual solution
to these problems; they do seem like relatively opportunistic populist
movements that have capitalised on popular resentment. I have basically zero
confidence that these movements will solve any of the problems they claim they
will, and think that they will likely cause lots of damage along the way.

But the big question is – where is the credible centrist or even leftist
alternative to this approach? Was it actually Sanders in the US? (I'm a little
unclear on the extent of his support). In the UK, there's a leftward swing in
the Labour Party, but that's complicated by a lacklustre leader. But is it
actually the same sort of populist rebellion, just expressed in a different
way?

I don't subscribe to old-fashioned Socialist views of the economy – but still,
I'd like to see a world in which corruption is tackled; in which all people
have a fair chance to succeed; in which education and healthcare are widely
available regardless of wealth; in which companies are free to trade but are
responsibly regulated… but I'm now deeply unsure of what the next steps are.

~~~
ookdatnog
The hardest problem of our time is the seemingly unstoppable rise in
inequality, and I think the painful truth is that no one has workable
solutions to this problem.

The establishment probably understands the problem but has no solutions, so
they simply avoid addressing it. Populist politicians then get elected by
simply naming the problem (often with a big dose of scapegoating), no matter
how irrelevant or counterproductive their proposed solutions are.

------
baristaGeek
Just in case anyone is wondering the same thing as I last night:

The USCIS administrative act for the International Entrepreneur Rule (Startup
Visa) won't be affected. First, because it's being passed as an administrative
action, meaning that it doesn't have to be voted in congress in order for it
to start taking an effect. Second, because it's actually aligned with Donald
Trump's 3rd immigration policy driver (the first two have nothing to do with
foreign-born entrepreneurs):

3\. A nation that does not serve its own citizens is not a nation. Any
immigration plan must improve jobs, wages and security for all Americans.

What Trump does believe is that the H1B1 is depressing salaries thus
decreasing job opportunities for american citizens.

Therefore, if you have a startup and want to move it to the US you will have a
better pathway. However, if you want to work as an employee in America, you'll
have an even harder time.

~~~
new_user_name
Do you have any news items or anything that I can read up? I am very hopeful
of this new rule and thinking to bring our startup to US

------
homulilly
People are saying this is about race and while I do think that's a big part of
it, making it the whole story is dangerously counterproductive.

The Clinton camp basically offered nothing to working class people. Working
class people of color turned out to vote for her because at least she wasn't
spouting racist rhetoric but for working class whites who aren't concerned
with race issues, if they're going to be equally neglected under either
candidate, they may as well vote for the one who will be a brick through the
window of the political establishment that has failed them. These are the
voters who cost Clinton the election.

------
ZeroGravitas
On the bright side, does this mean the election wasn't rigged? What will Alex
Jones think now that Trump is in power? Will there be no more school shootings
because Obama/Hillary and the federal government are no longer trying to take
our guns away? Will ISIS no longer attack the US because Trump is being
"tough" on them and the president is no longer refusing to say the words
"radical islamic terrorism"?

So many intriguing questions posed by the victory of someone who, by many
appearences, was happy to lose but rile up a big audience along the way.

~~~
devopsproject
> What will Alex Jones think now that Trump is in power

Alex Jones needs clicks and pageviews so it will be more of the same

> Will there be no more school shootings because Obama/Hillary and the federal
> government are no longer trying to take our guns away?

it will be because of democrats in the senate or house, or at the state or
local level. Plenty of scapegoats to go around

> Will ISIS no longer attack the US because Trump is being "tough" on them and
> the president is no longer refusing to say the words "radical islamic
> terrorism"?

it will still be their fault for letting isis happen in the first place

> So many intriguing questions

Maybe for people who are new to politics. The same script will repeat in 8-16
years

------
unabst
The impeccable insight of Peter Thiel.

[http://gizmodo.com/peter-thiel-goes-all-in-for-donald-
trump-...](http://gizmodo.com/peter-thiel-goes-all-in-for-donald-
trump-1788408461?utm_medium=sharefromsite&utm_source=Gizmodo_twitter)

I didn't realize how "simplified" his convention speech was until I saw this.
In hindsight (of about a week), now he sounds text book.

------
zigzigzag
The stat that explains the election for me is 92% for Hillary in Washington
DC.

Bear in mind that most US law is made by regulators, not Congress, and
regulators live in Washington DC. Angry Republicans who feel it's "us vs the
elite" and "nothing ever changes" are completely correct. If Trump wants to
address the anger his voters feel for real, there's going to have to be a
truly epic _bonfire_ of regulators and regulation.

------
themckman
So, I voted for DJT (I like calling him that, for some reason). I didn't vote
for him because I agreed with any of his policies (as best I can tell he never
actually presented any during the course of his campaign) or because I thought
he was the best representative for the people of this country. I did so for a
couple of reasons:

1\. I like a good underdog story. The people that support him, for a multitude
of reasons, feel neglected by the ruling class in this country. Now I don't
know who started all the name calling, but I personally dislike the way
they're demeaned and patronized by the Democrats/Liberals as racists and
deplorable. There is absolutely no respect from the left given to these people
and their opinions. Yeah, there are some loud one saying some ridiculous
things, but I refuse to believe that close to half the country hates people of
color and wants to completely isolate us from the rest of the world by closing
our borders. It just can't be true. I lived in Germany for the last year and
was just stunned at how quickly the word Xenophobia was used to label anyone
that disagreed with Merkel's policy regarding the refugees. If your opinions
were so immediately dismissed with such a strong word, you're going to start
harboring some pretty strong feelings of animosity towards those who so
quickly judge.

2\. I believed he was the candidate with the biggest chance of winning that
would bring about the biggest amount of disruption and change. (By this
account, I should have voted for Obama in 2007 instead of writing in Ron Paul.
But goddamn if Ron Paul didn't seem to have the most reasonable, compassionate
and "real" voice I've ever heard in politics.) This, I believe, is inline
largely with why Peter Thiel was backing him. I don't know if any of that
change or disruption is going to be good or bad for me or the rest of America,
but things are certainly going to be interesting for the next four years. Both
the Republican and Democratic parties are going to be in complete turmoil as
they scramble to figure out what the hell just happened. I think we were all
ready to talk about the, sort of, civil war that was about to erupt in the
Republican party after this election, but we might end up talking more,
initially, about the same thing happening in the Democratic party. Obviously
things aren't rosy with the Republicans just because they won everything, but
the Democrats really have nothing to do but try and figure out what went wrong
and fix it. I, also, don't believe he can really do anything too awful that we
can't recover from; I have some faith in the checks and balances laid out by
the constitution that will prevent DJT, himself, from doing too much harm.
Unlike the Brexit vote, a DJT presidency isn't permanent. We'll be back in
four years to do it all over again.

~~~
Delmania
> . Yeah, there are some loud one saying some ridiculous things, but I refuse
> to believe that close to half the country hates people of color and wants to
> completely isolate us from the rest of the world by closing our borders. It
> just can't be true.

You've never been to the deep south, much the south, have you?

> 2\. I believed he was the candidate with the biggest chance of winning that
> would bring about the biggest amount of disruption and change

Anyone who believes Trump can change things is delusional and has very little,
if any grasp, of how power works. Obama was voted in on the promise of change,
as all we got was a watered down health care bill and the ability for gays to
get married. The ACA probably won't be repealed any time because the
Republicans do not have complete control. He will do a few things, and non-
White, nonchristian people will suffer, but by in large things will stay the
same. The simple fact is that the people who get you elected are not the same
people you need to work with to enact legislation.

~~~
themckman
> You've never been to the deep south, much the south, have you?

I have been to the south (maybe not the "deep south") but your general
assumption that I don't have a great understanding of the people that reside
there is accurate. I do understand that there actually are people who truly
hate people of color. What I was really taking issue with is the label of
bigotry being so readily applied to anyone who supports Trump. I just find it
unfair.

Regarding your last point, I wasn't necessarily trying to say that the change
and disruption would happen specifically within government or by way of the
laws we might pass. I apologize if that wasn't entirely clear. The most
obvious place, as I mentioned, where we might see some of this is within both
of the major parties themselves and how they operate outside of government.
The Democrats will start that process immediately as they were the biggest
losers and the Republicans will put that on hold as they do have some control
over government, but clearly their party isn't in great shape either.

~~~
Delmania
> I have been to the south (maybe not the "deep south") but your general
> assumption that I don't have a great understanding of the people that reside
> there is accurate. I do understand that there actually are people who truly
> hate people of color. What I was really taking issue with is the label of
> bigotry being so readily applied to anyone who supports Trump. I just find
> it unfair.

Talk is cheap, actions are what define you. If you vote for someone who wages
a racist, xenophobic campaign, someone who was endorsed by KKK and has riled
up white supremacist views, you implicitly support them.

~~~
grzm
_" If you vote for someone who wages a racist, xenophobic campaign, someone
who was endorsed by KKK and has riled up white supremacist views, you
implicitly support them."_

This cuts both ways. Voters had effectively a binary choice. Given the dismal
favorability ratings of both major party candidates, I think we do everyone a
disservice by assuming they subscribe to every view or position either
candidate has ever taken or changed. People have different values and
different priorities for the values that they do share with others. We don't
get to mix and match our candidates.

Given how split the country is, we likely have a lot of things we can find
agreement on. We need to work on finding our common goals so we can move
forward and make progress.

Edit to add: I myself struggle with determining where to draw the line. What
views and/or actions are intolerable? Are they context dependent? At what
point do our associations taint us? Too much for this thread perhaps, but
worth keeping in mind when working with people who don't hold exactly the same
views as we do; in other words, living in the real world.

------
rukittenme
I unapologetically voted for DJT. My issues are listed from the most to least
important (whether they are logical or not).

\- I didn't want to intervene in Syria and wanted peace with Russia over
Crimea. \- The multiple FBI investigations into Clinton gave an air of
illegitimacy. \- Ethics reform. \- Repeal of ACA. \- Lower corp tax rate and
more lenient corporate tax laws. \- Lower income tax rate (would be nice) \-
Tighter restrictions on H1B visas. \- The wall. \- An audit of the federal
reserve.

------
Delmania
The election of Trump isn't the real problem here. The real issue is that the
Republican party now has control of the government, with only the fact that
they don't have a supermajority in the Senate as the only check on their
power.

This is an organization that openly admits to voter suppression and harbors
some of the most virulent racists, misogynists, and homophobes. An
organization that has launched an attack on education and science. An
organization that publicly claims to call for smaller government but then
enacts some of the most intrusive surveillance we've seen.

It's going to get a lot worse very quickly before it gets better.

~~~
pcunite
> harbors some of the most virulent racists, misogynists, and homophobes.

Like those at the Chicago rally?

------
sndean
I wonder how long this populist wave that's spreading over the west [0] is
going to continue?

[0]
[https://research.hks.harvard.edu/publications/getFile.aspx?I...](https://research.hks.harvard.edu/publications/getFile.aspx?Id=1401)
[pdf]

~~~
snowwrestler
Until the generation that is driving it dies off, so probably ~20 years.

I'm being flippant, but--look at the vote splits by age. Young voters in the
UK overwhelmingly voted against Brexit. Young voters in the U.S.
overwhelmingly voted against Trump.

The voice of populism today is the voice of economic and cultural
disenfranchisement. It is difficult to re-employ millions of 60-year-old folks
whose skills are out of date. It is difficult to get 60-year-old folks who
have spent their lives in a homogeneous town, to accept multicultural
diversity.

They are crying out for help and success again, and we'll continue down this
course as a society until we either give it to them, or they leave us.

~~~
devopsproject
> Young voters in the U.S. overwhelmingly voted against Trump

don't people get more conservative as they age?

~~~
snowwrestler
Yes, in terms of financial conservatism (they have more to lose), and in terms
of not keeping up with social progress (fearing young activists). That's them
getting _relatively_ more conservative, compared to the moving society around
them.

But people don't generally slide back from what they experienced as kids. A
LOT of 18- to 25-year-olds today grew up as a kid in a society where it is
acceptable to have friends from lots of ethnic backgrounds, to have friends
who are gay or trans, to believe that women should be equal to men in society,
etc. They're not going to lose that as they age. That's their base concept of
"normal."

------
bcit-cst
I am still not sure what are Donald Trumps foreign policy positions are .

1) ON Syria/ISIS . All he as said is that he will hit them very very hard.
okay going from that , does it mean a) he plans on putting 100K US troop on
the ground and engage in an all-out war. b) or just put 100's of drones in the
Air and just start bombing shit.

How does he plan on bringing on board our Allies like Jordan and Iraqi
government on our side with this plan?

2) What is his plan regarding South China Sea. Does he plan on confronting the
Chinese government . From what I have heard he wants to bring back troops from
South Korea and Japan.

3) What are his plans for Ukraine civil war and Russian Aggression?

4) Finally, I am trying to imagine what would Trump do if he was the president
during the Cuban missile crisis. Would he be able to enforce the blockade?
Does he understand the the MAD doctrine ?

so many questions .

~~~
ryanx435
do YOU understand the MAD doctrine?

it only works if your enemy believes that you will use nuclear weapons. If
they don't think you will use nukes, than the threat of mutually assured
destruction isn't a real threat, so MAD doesn't work.

purely in terms of MAD, it is actually good that everyone thinks that trump is
eager to launch the nukes.

~~~
greenshackle2
He doesn't seem to understand NATO though. He made every security expert shit
their pants by stating he wouldn't necessarily defend NATO countries.

It makes me question his understanding of the strategic value of unconditional
retaliation, which underpins MAD.

(Alternatively, he understands, but doesn't care if Europe gets stomped by
Russia.)

~~~
ryanx435
He negotiated a better deal. The majority of countries that were not
contributing to NATO in accordance with the treaty are now doing so.

He very clearly explained his thought process for this type of thing in the
Art of the deal. To paraphrase, he started with an extreme position
(disbanding NATO) so that he can meet the other party somewhere in the middle
(they pay their fair share and do their part militarily).

Overall it would seem he was very successful with this.

~~~
greenshackle2
NATO is not a business deal. That's a very dangerous game to play when Russia
is waiting for an opening to stomp the baltic countries. It's not worth
risking the integrity of NATO over 2% of the GDP of 3 broke-ass (but
strategically important) countries.

~~~
zo1
Do you seriously believe that Russia will invade Europe the moment that USA
stops supporting NATO?

~~~
monodeldiablo
I live in Croatia. As of last month, there was an attempted coup in Montenegro
(our neighbors to the south). In Serbia (our neighbors to the east), the
president is currently in hiding because of a series of assassination
attempts, as well as the discovery of a large weapons cache indicative of a
coup attempt. Both sets of conspirators were Russian-trained operatives, fresh
from fighting in Ukraine for Mother Russia. Some were caught. Most fled back
to Russia.

Meanwhile, in Bosnia (our next-door neighbors, sharing the overwhelming
majority of our eastern border), the president of Republika Srpska (which
controls half of Bosnia) has been in talks with Putin directly for months. The
content of those discussions is undisclosed, but just this month he called a
referendum on statehood -- a direct violation of the Dayton Agreement and a
prelude to yet another Balkan War.

If you think Russia hasn't _already_ begun invading Europe, you've really not
been paying attention. With Ukraine looking likely to fall, I'd tremble if I
lived in a Baltic state. Hell, I'm trembling over here and -- to give you an
idea of how close to Western Europe the threat is coming -- I can see Italy on
a clear day.

------
phreack
As an outsider, it is painfully clear that I should not try to move my
business to the US at this point. Europe's looking better than ever now for
tech startups.

~~~
_audakel
With the Brexit, many Euro companies near to defaulting and Russia moving
troops to its western boarders, you really think Europe is a better place? USA
has its fair share of problems, but I would not go so far as to say anywhere
else is more ideal for startups (or living). yet.

As much bad emotions as their are going around this election, we don't kill
buissness leaders who oppose us (russia) kill political leaders who dissagre
us (n. korea), have civil wars taking the lives of thousands (many countries
in africa), kill drug users in the streets (PH) or have mass civilaian graves
from cartel wars (mexico)

~~~
chrisper
I'd have agreed with you if you had not included the "(or living)" part. How
can one say living in Europe is not ideal if one's #1 priority is not wealth?

------
hourislate
I can't help but think how this election will look tame in comparison to what
is to come. AI and Automation will continue to savage employment. Environment
will continue to degrade. Millions of more in America and around the world
will feel like they have been left behind.

Where do we go from here?

~~~
commenting
Indeed, and with regards to the environment, it's particularly worrying that
Trump intends to reverse all the progress made so far in the US on addressing
climate change.

(Though to be honest, that's one of my lesser worries concerning a Trump
presidency. Along with increasing discrimination and divisiveness within the
US, it's likely his proposed foreign policy changes will enable Putin to annex
further regions of Eastern Europe.)

~~~
hourislate
Lets hope that it was all talk and he still believes in encouraging Freedom
and Democracy around the world.

It is terrifying to consider the message he would send to Putin and other
Dictators if he carried through on his foreign policy changes.

------
jernfrost
Maybe this could be a golden age for Europe and Canada. We can get all the
intelligent people in the US fleeing to seek more intelligent shores. We could
get some of the bright minds of Silicon valley to come across the pond and
help revitalizing European tech industry.

Not a new phenomenon. The German scientists fleeing Nazi Germany started the
present American scientific lead. The French Hugenots fleeing France caused
economic growth.

~~~
Inthenameofmine
Maybe Canada, however, Europe is doing the same insanity to itself atm.

------
Kazamai
I see a lot of comment saying "the USA cannot do this x,y,z because we don't
have oil money to back it". USA is in the top three oil producers now at 10
million barrels a day. Yes even that won't cover the total cost for free
health care or free education, but that is still a huge amount of money. More
importantly, the amount of money the US government has wasted could have paid
for the above. Trillions of dollars have been burned on Quantitative Easing
and other ridiculous stimulus. And the result was over capacity in oil
production and debt that can never be repaid. Instead of hundreds of billions
burned, the US government could have given every unemployed individual a whole
new education.

------
slg
People always say things like politics doesn't work. It doesn't matter who you
vote for, nothing changes. The president has very little actual power. Most
politicians agree about 95% of things. I have always thought those people were
naive. I wake up this morning hoping that I was the one who was naive and
Trump will be unable to do the damage that many of us are worried he will do.

~~~
_of
The president of the US has quite a lot of powers:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powers_of_the_President_of_the...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powers_of_the_President_of_the_United_States)

------
sparky_
I hope both parties learn something form this result. Establishment
Republicans and the DNC alike have had their asses handed to them handily. I
suspect the Democrats will need to move more towards the progressive wing to
be competitive in the future. Someone like Warren may be able to straddle the
fine line of capturing Bernie enthusiasm without isolating more center leaning
democrats.

------
crivabene
I believe what is hard to understand for us living outside of the US is how is
it possible that the person who is declared President is not the candidate
that the majority of people voted to be President. I tried to explain to my
peers how the US election system works multiple times but I mostly got back
puzzled faces and disbelief.

~~~
snarf21
Part of the problem is how physically big the US is compared to most
countries. Popular vote only would mean that cities (even a small set of them)
would hold such a large percentage of the vote that the farmers and workers
who drive the engines of agriculture and manufacturing could have almost no
voice. Additionally, when this was all created, each state just wanted to
govern themselves and they needed a compromise for what the federal government
would be. So, instead each state was (and is) given a relatively proportional
number of "special" votes to cast for President based on population. These
have caps though so small, rural states get a little more power than they
otherwise would (2 for Idaho instead of probably 0 e.g.) and super large ones
get a little less. (This is not that dissimilar to how our Congress is set
up). Additionally, each state is given the ability to decide how to vote for
president. A state could say that the Governor just picks one or have an in-
state vote that is a popular vote within that state (how most work) or
anything they want.

------
rconti
I guess we'll all just have to take our huge tax cuts and go home. I was
willing to vote against my own economic best interest, but now that the
election is decided, I want to at least get something out of the deal.

------
rayiner
Note that the last chart ("Clinton’s support from minorities fell short")
seems to be erroneous, in that the graphic does not match the text.

I think the NYT article glosses over the real story this election:
[http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/11/09/why-the-
lat...](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/11/09/why-the-latino-vote-
didn-t-save-america.html) ("Hispanic voters were supposed to be one of
Clinton’s blue firewalls—but one in three ended up splitting for Trump.")

~~~
milesskorpen
That was projected, though. It was a big issue that Clinton wasn't driving as
significant African American turnout because they go 95% Democrat, whereas
Hispanics were about 70% Democrat so you'd need a lot more of them to make up
the difference.

------
jliptzin
Everyone seems to be talking about what a strong repudiation this is of the
Obama, Clinton, and liberalism in general, but at the time of this writing
Clinton is actually ahead in the popular vote by a 200,000+ vote margin and it
looks like she'll maintain the lead. Yes this was far closer than many
expected, but Trump's victory is largely an anomaly of a system that heavily
favors rural, geographically distributed voters. So I'd be careful to take
this as a signal that America has been suddenly overtaken by a surge of
populism and anti-minority sentiment.

~~~
irrational
Maybe after this we can get rid of the electoral college and move to popular
vote? That's a joke of course. Politicians would never vote it through.

~~~
tcoppi
You don't need (federal-level) politicians to change this! The constitution is
a wonderful thing. There is a process for amending it that bypasses Washington
completely. Maybe we should put it on the table.

------
tcoppi
First 100 days plan posted, you can see, concretely, what he hopes to
accomplish:
[https://assets.donaldjtrump.com/_landings/contract/O-TRU-102...](https://assets.donaldjtrump.com/_landings/contract/O-TRU-102316-Contractv02.pdf)

~~~
rak00n
"A requirement that for every new federal regulation, two existing regulations
must be eliminated."

This makes me sad.

------
nopinsight
Since the GOP now holds both Congress and the Presidency, with a likelihood of
continued Supreme Court majority, they may enact _some_ protectionist policies
to appease the voters. However, these could in fact make the economic
situations worse and some people would start to blame other things.

Could the backlash spill to the technology and related sectors as well (e.g. a
neo-Luddite movement might get started)?

Note: I did not grow up in the US, so I would like to hear your opinions on
this, especially from Americans.

~~~
hx87
> Since the GOP now holds both Congress and the Presidency, with a likelihood
> of continued Supreme Court majority, they may enact some protectionist
> policies to appease the voters.

That would ignite a civil war in the Republican party between the populists
and the upper-class free-trade establishment, and while the populists have a
good chance of winning, it's not a done deal.

> Could the backlash spill to the technology and related sectors as well (e.g.
> a neo-Luddite movement might get started)?

Unlikely, since anyone who gives up technology will be at a severe competitive
disadvantage and screw themselves over.

------
xorxornop
Many here will recognise the formative childhood experience of having done
something forbidden and getting caught doing it by their parents where, for
the first time, instead of the usual response - their getting angry - you are
taken completely by surprise when they simply say "I am so disappointed in
you" or similar, accompanied by some expression in the realm of abject
futility.

This is one of those.

That this could have had any realistic chance of happening at all says a lot
about the current state of the US populace.

I find reading any political news out of the US to be particularly
distressing: the extent of the echo chamber effect is very prominent and
highly persistent. Admittedly, this is part of a more general phenomenon with
regard to news today, given that people can construct their own echo chambers
much more readily than in any other time of history - but it seems
considerably worse in the US. I'm not quite sure why. Perhaps because the FPTP
political system encourages game-theoretic strategies which unfortunately
effectively optimise for polarisation and related properties..?

~~~
TheGrassyKnoll
[http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/03/technology/how-the-
interne...](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/03/technology/how-the-internet-is-
loosening-our-grip-on-the-truth.html)

------
enlightenedfool
It's French Revolution redux just waiting to happen. And it did. People voted
Obama as a relative outsider to bring change. He failed and became the
insider. People doubled down this time and got a complete outsider.

~~~
maxerickson
_People doubled down this time and got a complete outsider._

People that believe this is what happened are going to be disappointed.

We'll know real soon anyway, based on the hiring that his transition team does
(they are a bunch of political _insiders_ ).

~~~
yourapostasy
The Trump administration and the Republican-dominated legislature probably has
two years to show results consistent with an outsider persona, and if they
don't deliver, other parties will probably get a good shot at breaking the
Republican domination of Congress in the midterms. It's a pretty tall order,
as most of the electorate do not understand how slowly the gears of government
grind, but it seems to be the pattern in history.

------
foob
One of the most notable things about this election has been how strongly
disliked the two main candidates were. They famously have the lowest
favorability ratings of any candidates in recent history. Putting aside any
corruption and favoritism from within the parties for a minute, it seems like
the primary system really sets the parties up to elect poor general election
candidates.

For example, take a look at the states where Clinton performed best in the
primaries. They're Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana,
Arkansas, and Texas. All of these states were decisive victories for Trump in
the general election and from a perspective purely of _wanting to win_ , it
doesn't make sense for them to be so important in the primaries. At the same
time, Bernie won a number of states in the primary that ended up being
important swing states ( _e.g_ Michigan, Wisconsin, New Hampshire, Maine,
Minnesota, Colorado). From a strategic standpoint, it would seem to make sense
to attach a higher weigh to those victories (the same is also true for
Florida, Ohio, and some other states where he lost).

None of this necessarily means that Bernie would have won, I just think that
it seems as though the primary process is not very well designed for choosing
the best general election candidates. This is even more true if you consider
what a large proportion of states have closed primaries that specifically
exclude independents. It seems obvious that they will be far less likely to
vote along party lines in a general election but, in many states, they're
given no say in the primary process. I can understand why the DNC can't just
say, "sorry, but the deep south doesn't count and neither does New York or
California," but opening up the primaries seems like a perfectly reasonable
strategy to put forward stronger general election candidates.

I don't really have a broader point beyond that, it just seems like the
parties really set themselves up to produce such, to put it gently, sub-
optimal candidates.

------
Animats
What can Silicon Valley do to make America great again?

\- There will be higher tariffs for China imports. The US needs to make more
of its own stuff. Start planning on moving manufacturing to the US for sales
in the US. Don't use Shentzen as much. Plan on exporting to China, and expect
some help from the Government if China's government gives you problems. The US
needs to get its imports and exports balanced.

\- The wall will be built. It will need sensors. The IoT crowd needs to
develop better sensors than the overpriced crappy ones from the last attempt
in that direction.

\- Better detection of illegal aliens is necessary. One of the biggest source
of illegal immigrants is visa overstayers. For those, pictures are available
from when they entered the US. Social media must be searched for them.
Surveillance cameras need to be connected to cloud systems which recognize
them. Police cars need very high definition cameras and face recognition to
find those people so they can be deported. Deep learning systems will be
needed to decide if a likely face match is worth investigation. With good
automation, people will only be hassled once. Then they're either known as
legal or on their way to deportation.

\- E-Verify, the online system for verifying eligibility to work in the US,
needs to be made available as a mobile app for employers. Pictures of
documents, faces, and fingerprints should be used rather than typing in info.
It should be possible to onboard a new hire in less than a minute.

\- The immigration system is too paper-oriented and too slow. It needs to be
online and fast. This will speed up deportations.

\- Labor-intensive operations in farming need to be automated. The technology
exists for automated picking of most fruits and vegetables, but the demo-level
hardware is too slow, too expensive, and too fragile. That gear needs to be
brought up to production level. Look for financing for farmers from the
Department of Agriculture. This will reduce demand for low-paid illegals.

\- Commercial cleaning needs to be automated. The Roomba was just the first
step. There's still no good commercial-grade floor cleaning robot. The janitor
industry is ready for a major downsizing.

There are opportunities here waiting to be seized. Get busy!

~~~
knowaveragejoe
I don't get why you think some of these are essential to "make America great
again"(as if you could actually reasonably quantify why it stopped being
great).

\- The wall will be built. It will need sensors. The IoT crowd needs to
develop better sensors than the overpriced crappy ones from the last attempt
in that direction.

My understanding is that the proposal is untenable for a variety of reasons,
so we probably won't see "the wall", but maybe some additional walls in some
places.

\- Better detection of illegal aliens is necessary. One of the biggest source
of illegal immigrants is visa overstayers. For those, pictures are available
from when they entered the US. Social media must be searched for them.
Surveillance cameras need to be connected to cloud systems which recognize
them. Police cars need very high definition cameras and face recognition to
find those people so they can be deported. Deep learning systems will be
needed to decide if a likely face match is worth investigation. With good
automation, people will only be hassled once. Then they're either known as
legal or on their way to deportation.

How does this concept not terrify you? Why do we need to go further in this
direction? It sounds rational as far as achieving the goal. But the
implications of spurring this development are immense. I don't get why you
would willing move towards such a pervasive police state.

~~~
Animats
Trump's pitch was to stop the "race to the bottom", where Americans have to be
"competitive" in wages with the cheapest countries in the world. The anti-
free-trade stance and the anti-immigration stance come from that. Stem the
tide of cheap labor and cheap imported goods, and wages for Americans will
rise. Side effects, yes, but it might be an improvement. Few rich countries
are as open to both immigration and imports as the US has been.

Whether Trump really intends to do that, or whether he'll just go for the
generic Republican platform (tax cuts for the rich, few restraints on
business, heavy military spending, God, guns and gays to distract the voters)
remains to be seen. But that's not what he was elected to do, and he doesn't
have political debts which force him to do that.

Trump talks about building infrastructure. That, he's probably serious about.
He is, after all, a real estate developer, and they're a "build it and they
will come" crowd. Sometimes they don't come, and Trump has a few bankruptcies
behind him. But he did get stuff built. One could do worse. Japan's solution
to a slow economy is to overspend somewhat on infrastructure. That beats
pouring money into the banking system.

(I didn't vote for Trump. But about half of Americans did, and they have some
legitimate beefs. So I'm writing about what to do to actually fix the problems
Trump was elected to solve.)

------
dmode
A minority of Americans (note that Clinton is winning the popular vote) have
too much power over the world. A Bush presidency destroyed the world, because
people wanted to have beer with him. A Trump presidency will even do further
damage because people "hated the establishment"

~~~
pasquinelli
and i suspect that they hated the establishment simply as a way of having a
strong opinion without actually knowing anything about what's going on.

------
wnevets
The cognitive dissonance required to be a trump supporter is quite amazing.
For example states that legalized weed but voted for trump.

~~~
forgetsusername
> _The cognitive dissonance required to be a trump supporter is quite amazing_

I love how the left continues to believe that implying the right are stupid
and incapable is still a winning strategy.

~~~
wnevets
I love how anyone who disagrees with the right must be on the left.

------
readhn
The fact is Hillary is part of the corrupt machine, part of the problem. And
Trump is ego centric lunatic who can not be trusted with our kids future.

America should have voted against all of them and ask for better candidates.
But that would never happen.

------
hiven
Policies aside, why does he always look so orange. It's not even a little bit.

~~~
open_book
I think it's that fake spray on tan stuff. Tried it once and I was orange,
too.

------
spiderfarmer
Instead of just starting another thread I would like to see the discussion
broken down in separate topics. But I realize that's not what Hacker News is
meant for.

------
VonGuard
Can we setup a YCombinator in Europe? Canada? Somewhere other than the US?

~~~
Desustorm
There are already quite a few similar companies, such as Entrepreneur First
([https://www.joinef.com/](https://www.joinef.com/))

------
coding123
All I can say is I wish we elected Romney 4 years ago.

------
neves
It looks like Clinton has won the majority of votes:
[http://www.nytimes.com/elections/forecast/president](http://www.nytimes.com/elections/forecast/president)

The USA electoral system is really crazy.

~~~
devopsproject
the electoral college is not the problem, FPTP is the problem

~~~
neves
What is this? Is it [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-past-the-
post_voting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-past-the-post_voting) ?

~~~
devopsproject
yes. you can see what maine did about it:
[http://www.rcvmaine.com/](http://www.rcvmaine.com/)

------
antithesis
I'm curious as to how instrumental automation and illegitimate poll voting
have been in producing this result. I'm talking about things like pro-Trump
Twitter bots[1], 4chan's /pol/ board mass-voting Trump in online polls, and
automated thread voting to keep /r/The_Donald at the top of the trending
subreddit list on Reddit. Does anyone have an idea?

1\. A third of pro-Trump Twitter activity turned out to be automated. See:
[http://money.cnn.com/2016/10/18/technology/twitter-bots-
dona...](http://money.cnn.com/2016/10/18/technology/twitter-bots-donald-trump-
hillary-clinton/)

~~~
daodedickinson
It's pretty interesting that Sam Altman wanted to stop Trump but YCombinator's
Reddit was so instrumental in his victory, despite the opposition of it's
employees. Facebook and Twitter helped Trump, too, despite Trump probably have
sub-10% support among Facebook and Twitter employees. Google's SEME didn't
seem to help as much as I thought it would. This will become more and more
debated FAST now that Germany is beginning legal action against Facebook for
helping promote political speech that Merkel and her allies have tried to keep
from flaring up.

------
happy-go-lucky
He was trying to win. She was trying to stop him. That's all she did.

------
andyjohnson0
Two questions from a non-USian:

1\. Can Trump deliver the results expected by the people who voted for him?

2\. If he can't, what happens then? In particular, what kind of leader comes
after him?

~~~
pasquinelli
that's what's great: they don't expect anything from him.

------
CWuestefeld
In an election largely between two epically bad candidates, the outcome fell
in the direction I'd felt would be less bad, but in a way that's worse than
I'd expected. I had strongly criticized both Clinton and Trump, but felt that
in the balance, Clinton was a more dangerous candidate. Seeing how the chips
fell, though, I'm even less confident that this was the preferable outcome.
There are two key factors leading me to this conclusion.

First relates to the big-picture politics. For all the disagreement about
policy, Clinton really was the centrist candidate, and certainly within the
Democratic Party, the strong voice of moderation (at least in domestic
policy). Something I failed to consider was that this defeat weakens the voice
of moderation, thus making the extremist voices from Sanders and Warren
louder. Clinton may be a bad person, but Sanders and Warren represent some
really bad ideas, and if this gives those ideas fertile ground to grow in,
that's a real problem.

And there's a real possibility of that. The demographics representing Trump's
win shows that his grasp on the rust belt manufacturing interests was much
greater than previously thought. The thing is, Trump's not a Conservative and
never has been. He represents populist ideas that overlap significant with the
Sanders and Warren ideas. Politically they're on opposite sides, but
ideologically they're quite the same. The election results give that ideology
more weight, and Trump can see them realized.

The second relates to Trump's relationship with the rest of his party. Looking
back to the summer and the party conventions, there was a clear rift in the
GOP, with powerful members barely tolerating Trump, if at all. That was a good
thing: it meant that should Trump win, his party would likely keep him in
check. But unfortunately (and I do think it's unfortunate) it seems like that
rift is healing. And with the GOP retaining control of both houses of
Congress, it's dangerous to have so much control in the hands of one party,
with Trump at the helm.

So where do we go now? Well, maybe there's a silver lining here. Maybe the
prospect of Trump power with both political branches in GOP hands will inspire
the Democrats. Maybe they'll re-discover the benefits of limited government,
and in particular the boundaries of Presidential power.

Unfortunately I have little hope of that: Obama certainly said all the right
things when he was in the Senate and GWB was in the White House, but when he
got power himself, all of that restraint went out the window. So let me offer
to my Liberal friends this olive branch: I'll be there fighting with you
against overreaches from Trump and the GOP, but I hope you'll stay by my side
in four years when the tide is likely to turn. And I hope that my Conservative
friends who criticized President Obama for overreaches will remain consistent.

The trend toward populism is a thornier problem, and I don't have a
satisfactory answer. My best hope is that people will come to their senses.
It's intuitive and satisfying to believe things like "the Mexicans are taking
all our jobs" or "our trade deficit shows we're losing out to the rest of the
world" or "higher minimum wages are necessary to protect those on the lowest
rung". Recently the Democrats have tried to market themselves as the party of
intelligence and science. When trying to make that case - whether you’re a
Democrat or a Republican - please first look to the scientific consensus on
those topics.

~~~
pyre
> And I hope that my Conservative friends who criticized President Obama for
> overreaches will remain consistent.

Unlikely. A majority of people just want to pick a side and rabidly defend it.

For example, the democrats contesting the Bush-Gore Florida results was just
"sour grapes," but conservatives clamouring to see Obama's "long form" birth
certificate to prove that he wasn't eligible for office wasn't?

~~~
anthony_romeo
Agreed, and the likely response is "You can't complain, Obama did it!" And the
cycle goes back and forth. Just like trying to, say, filibuster the nomination
of Supreme Court justices.

------
eruditely
People are pretending that only rural whites voted for them, when the category
for white includes Pashtuns, Persians, and other Iranians , and I'm almost
certain a majority of Sikhs voted for Trump like I did. Thank god, this was
nothing if not a complete rejection of he politics of New England.

------
kelvin0
Well this would be scary if modern Presidents were the ones actually running
things. They are part of a system which has more power over them than the
other way around. Before down voting me, please take the time to reply
instead, I would prefer your written feedback.

------
api
If you want to know why Trump won:

[https://morecrows.wordpress.com/2016/05/10/unnecessariat/](https://morecrows.wordpress.com/2016/05/10/unnecessariat/)

------
chris_wot
Amazingly, you can agree with the first post here exhorting folks to be civil
and courteous and it will be considered rude and belligerent, marked off topic
and you'll be derided by a moderator who should know better.

Well done, YCombinator.

------
Exuma
This has created a very large divide which is very interesting to watch
unfold... how certain groups are so off the mark as to the cause, and to watch
both groups react. Never thought I'd see something like this.

------
Shivetya
The media and many people need to ask, why were the Republicans mocked for
having seventeen contenders and no one made hay out of the fact that Democrats
only had three

------
birdmanjeremy
Any insight into potential impacts on the tech industry?

------
spenvo
random thoughts

tech: the kinds of tech challenges we'll be facing in the next 8 years are
extraordinary - cyberwarfare, advanced AI, self-driving cars, brittle state of
internet/device security, designer babies via genetic engineering. i'm worried
about the general lack of competency of the exec branch in navigating through
them.

thanks to the past 16 years, surveillance state powers are far beyond any in
history.

the supreme court had some good decisions re privacy in the last few years,
wouldn't count on that moving forward b/c scalia was pretty reasonable.

goodwill from silicon valley will drop off precipitously. revolving door from
google, Facebook to government will stop (pros and cons there, but mostly
cons)

election stuff: during this election there's been a flare up in racial
tensions, a safe space for the alt-right, etc

but HRC lost states Obama won -- the disparity was huge between elections.

so, yes racism played a role (and set up the worst Republican candidate
winning the thing), but in the general election it was only one of many many
factors, and maybe more of a side effect rather than a cause of the result.

DNC will probably be scared about pitching husband/wife combos or dynasties
moving forward, minor knocks against Chelsea, Michelle Elizabeth Warren has a
strong path moving forward.

silver lining to all of this is the Democratic party has a chance to reform
itself. demographic trends are favoring Democrats in future elections

------
nemo44x
Might be a good time to take a short out on AMZN. Trump promised they will be
investigated for antitrust.

------
sremani
Is this a black swan event?

------
throw7
This sucks. Web forums are the worst way to curate/understand/participate in a
dialogue... especially something like this topic. All I see is a wall of text
where supposedly "the good stuff" floats to the top by magic.

 _sigh_

------
akhilcacharya
I think we're seeing the start of a post-fact era.

------
hypertexthero
The U.S. needs to implement a Basic Income.

[http://www.scottsantens.com/basic-income-
faq](http://www.scottsantens.com/basic-income-faq)

------
cdelsolar
lol, go back about 8 years and try to picture reading this headline.

------
SSLy
I'm gonna help by flagging this thread.

------
dang
We buried the previous thread on this because, at almost 2000 comments, it was
pegging the server. If you'd like to read it, and don't intend to comment, you
could help your fellow users by logging out first, so we can serve you the
page from cache:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12907201](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12907201).

If you do intend to comment, please take extra care to do so civilly and
substantively, in the spirit of this site. Most people in the mammoth thread
did do that (especially relative to what one might expect), so today we're a
little more proud of the community and a little less proud of our software.

~~~
paulddraper
So...now we have to start all over?

I know I sound like a complete d--k, but my laptop from 2012 has eight cores
that each run over 3 billion cycles a second. How do < 2000 comments make your
servers more than blink? I'm guessing you have more than one server?

I get frustrated by sites not accepting HN's "hug of death". An now HN can't
even stand its own hug...

Anyway, thanks for getting things running again! You guys are awesome!

~~~
dang
We don't have more than one server and HN proper (not counting caches) runs on
a single core.

Believe me, we hate slow software at least as much as you do and have put a
lot of effort into addressing this. HN is a lot faster than it used to be on
median load. It still falls short on excessive load. We'll get there!

~~~
ihuman
HN is still made in arc, right? Does arc support threads? Racket does, so I
would assume arc does.

~~~
dang
Racket has green threads, which gives us non-blocking IO but that's about it.
There's another concurrency mechanism that uses OS threads but Arc doesn't
rely on it, and from the little I looked at, I don't think it would work with
the HN software's design.

~~~
samth
There are two parallelism approaches in Racket, both of which provide OS
threads. The most useful one for web servers is called 'places', and is
somewhat like Erlang -- you can only communicate immutable serializable data
between different places, as well as OS resources like file handles. I know
other people have used places to scale web applications, but I haven't looked
at how HN's design would be affected.

If you have questions about using this, please feel free to email me about it.

------
pikzen
As an outsider...what the hell did you guys just do?

There are many, many reasons for Trump's election. Maybe it's time to rethink
a bit about how you guys do politics?[0]

Distrust of the establishment (of which HRC was the perfect embodiment). Jobs
which have disappeared forever which were promised to be brought back. And as
software developers for a lot of us here, maybe it is time to get more of us
to think about the consequences of our work. Clear populism from Trump, always
an easy way to get votes, and not just from the less educated. Enough
disinterest from the american public in politics that a /pol/ meme ends up
being elected. DNC primaries that were a joke, where HRC was selected against
many odds. Candidates that campaigned not for themselves but against Trump
while he just reaps free publicity.

I'm just... speechless. With the amount of power he's going to have as POTUS +
SCOTUS nominations + House/Senate majority, the potential for a massive step
back is insane. Roe vs Wade, ACA. Not to even mention the issue of dropping
the Paris/COP21 agreements. The one small hope we had for the future just got
destroyed. That's the second time you do that America please stop ;_;

[0] Being from France, I realize that we also have our problems and we also
have to do that.

~~~
forgetsusername
> _Distrust of the establishment (of which HRC was the perfect embodiment)_

This is what is so amazing to me: there was a massive surge in anti-
establishment sentiment, from Sanders on the left to Trump on the right. It
was unparalleled in my lifetime. Yet the DNC decided to run a candidate who is
basically the epitome of Washington establishment? It's embarrassing.

~~~
duderific
But, the DNC _is_ the establishment, so why would they do anything other than
run an establishment candidate? And how much power does the DNC actually have
over which candidate is run? That is decided in the primaries (see: RNC's
control over which candidate was nominated).

~~~
monodeldiablo
They control the purse strings. The DNC could easily have given Sanders some
dosh and infrastructure to get his message out. But the leaked emails clearly
show they did everything they could to undermine his campaign.

------
elcct
I think people are tired of political correctness and left wing (or so called
liberals if you will) stealing the fruits of hard work of the people in form
of taxes and regulations and pushing "equality" agenda at all cost. People are
not equal.

~~~
pmarreck
> People are not equal.

And yet, the right would have you believe that my ignorance is just as good as
your knowledge (RIP Asimov). Because you are just an elitist educated librul,
and how can you even breathe the thought that you're better than me in any
way, shape, or form, especially when it comes to making important decisions
that demand critical evaluation of a lot of evidence? I have a family and
mouths to feed and can only afford 1 i-Whatever for the whole family, I don't
hang out on Twitter or Facebook and only have time to listen to catchy
patriotic slogans.

But hey, I sure as hell took the time to come out of the mysteriously dark
woodwork and voted yesterday!

I guess all that effort I made to keep an at-risk youth out of prison and get
him into college was pointless.

~~~
ryanx435
Its ignorant for you to assume that people on the right are ignorant and
honestly the attitude of people like you were one of the driving forces of me
supporting and voting for trump.

Here I am, working as a software engineer, with a BS in computer science,
fluent in multiple languages, able to criticaly evaluate evidence in order to
make decisions, and just as educated as you are, and you automatically assume
that just because I'm on the right I am ignorant.

Its people like you that have poisoned the well of society.

~~~
grzm
_" Its people like you that have poisoned the well of society."_

There's a lot of heated discussion. Regardless of who won, this was always
going to be a large population of people who were going to be disappointed if
not strongly upset by the result. The polarized atmosphere makes discussion
very difficult. Language like this makes it even harder for people to hear
what you're trying to say. You're actively engaged in the discussion, which is
great! We all need to work to improve the situation and make it constructive.

~~~
ryanx435
>You're actively engaged in the discussion, which is great!

please stop talking to me like i'm a child. its condescending and doesn't
"work to improve the situation and make it constructive."

~~~
grzm
I'm sorry you took it that way. That wasn't my intent. I honestly want people
to be able to talk with one another in a way that actually makes a difference.
Insulting people and using inflammatory language just causes people to stop
listening and dig in. It doesn't change people's minds.

Ignoring the tone, do you think the content of what I wrote is constructive or
useful? If so, how would you choose to convey the same message?

~~~
ryanx435
No, you don't understand. I'm coming from the opposite perspective: all of the
tone policing and condescending attitudes and elitism of the left is stifling
discussion and democracy. It is a soft form of totalitarianism. When you say
that "Language like this makes it even harder for people to hear what you're
trying to say" what I hear you saying is that my opinions are not valid
because I'm not saying them properly. That is no different, from my
perspective, than someone not listening to hispanic people's political opinion
because they speak spanish instead of english.

tone policing, like you are doing, just causes people to stop listening and
dig in. It doesn't change people's minds.

> Ignoring the tone, do you think the content of what I wrote is constructive
> or useful? If so, how would you choose to convey the same message?

by saying my views as bluntly as possible and actively rejecting your tone-
policing and condescending attitudes.

~~~
grzm
Thanks for taking the time to reply. I haven't found that to be my real-life
experience.

~~~
ryanx435
as proven by the election, a significant portion of americans have.

~~~
grzm
The country is pretty evenly split. The reasons people chose to vote (or not
vote) for a particular candidate cannot meaningfully be boiled down to the
manner of discourse.

If this thread is any indication, neither of us is solely correct.

------
davidf18
Typically, Democrats have been closer to supporting the working class and the
Republicans have been closer to Wall Street.

Clinton ignored the suffering of the working class calling many of them a
"basket of deplorables". Instead, she would take $675,000 for 3 talks to
Goldman after many Americans had suffered from the housing crisis. These
"deplorables" as Clinton would call them helped to win Trump the election.

Sanders had 85% of the youth vote but instead of changing her policies to
reflect Sanders she criticized Sanders. Even after BrExit, which reflected the
suffering of working class in Britain, Clinton still did not understand and
have sympathy for the working class. So, the working class, "the deplorables"
voted for Trump.

------
serge2k
So I've only been alive long enough to remember 5 presidential elections in
detail. 2/5 the electoral college has disagreed with the popular vote.
Previously it resulted (after court decision) in the election of Bush, widely
seen as one of the worst presidents ever.

Second time is Trump, who is at best unqualified.

Why is this system still in use? What are the benefits of the electoral
college? Other than disagreeing with the popular vote at times, doesn't it
also discourage voting since a vote in california is worthless next to one
from florida?

------
shuntress
What happened to the ~1300 comments?

~~~
dang
Explained at
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12911042](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12911042)
and
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12910929](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12910929).
Sorry, I forgot I had 'delay' set on my profile or you would have seen the
first of those instead of an empty thread.

------
yolesaber
I'd argue you are clueless. Trump has been sued several times for the
discrimination against black people, he fired black people from his casinos
and moved them to the back, he INSISTS TO THIS DAY that the Central Park Five
are guilty despite DNA evidence, he jokes and also brags about literally
molesting women.

People like you disgust me. Stop acting like his words and actions don't
matter.

~~~
vinhboy
Thank you for saying this. I needed this today.

I am so damn sick of people trying to wiggle out of the "racist" label.

Economic anxiety is not an excuse for racism.

~~~
gragas
I voted for Trump and I'm not racist.

~~~
AnOscelot
Doesn't matter if you're personally racist or not. You voted for a racist who
has used racism as a substantial part of his campaign. You've done your part
to give a racist power.

~~~
vinhboy
Thank you for saying this. I didn't want to respond to him because this answer
seemed so obvious. I am glad others see it.

------
Pulce
Leslie Nielsen with an hidden script. Welcome on the stage.

------
gragas
I'll say this again:

Does this not prove that "diverse" liberalism isn't so diverse after all?
Shouldn't a diverse group of people have seen this coming?

Or is liberalism actually systematically excluding people by labelling them as
"racist" and "sexist", when in fact they're just fiscal and social
conservatives?

~~~
mhurron
What does any of this mean?

Trump is labeled racist, sexist and misogynistic because of his words and
actions. As are most people.

And lots of people saw a Trump presidency as a possibility, like, everyone
paying attention to the fact that there was a Republican presidential runner,
and that person was Trump.

~~~
gragas
I'd argue he's none of those things.

~~~
mhurron
I would like to see you try.

And I mean that with no sarcasm. I would genuinely like to see you make the
case that he is not racist, sexist and/or misogynistic.

~~~
venomsnake
I'll bite. The majority of insults Trump hurled were targeted at individuals.
Insulting someone even if race/sex/gender is included is not by itself racist,
misogynistic or whatever. It is just hitting where you know it will hurt the
most - which is good tactic IMO.

And he was careful never to insult big parts of the electorate - it was
usually the left that generalized.

All of his big gaffes were either towards non citizens or specific citizens.
He never had his basket of deplorables moment.

It was between him and Megyn Kelly, the latino judge, the khans.

And we get to the "grab them by the pussy" \- and we end in the messy world of
human courtship ... where we are all sexist and objectifying the objects of
our desire. Both sexes included.

Of course the assaults are assaults ... and I won't defend them. Somehow they
disappeared from the media in the last few days though.

Trump is a dirty fighter. But I think that the majority of his sexism, racism
or wherever is mostly opportunistic strikes where he sees weakness.

------
olivercreashe
We're all fucked now!!

------
chris_wot
Do it in the spirit of those who hold the office of U.S. Presidency: be civil
and courteous, make sure you don't disparage anyone's ethnicity or gender, and
make sure you don't make wild and unfounded accusations, amiright?

~~~
dang
Please don't ignore the request to be civil and substantive. HN depends on it.

We detached this comment from
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12911042](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12911042)
and marked it off-topic.

~~~
chris_wot
What. The. Hell? That is absolutely civil, and it is substantive and it's a
fact we should all aspire to!

This is an unmitigated bit of bastardry, and you ought to be ashamed of
yourself.

~~~
inimino
Your veiled sarcasm wasn't fooling anyone, and arguing with the moderators
(who honestly have enough to do) is tiresome. Please be sincere, if you're
going to comment at all.

~~~
chris_wot
How would you know that? There's nothing cynical about that! As an Australian
we hold the U.S. up as a model of civility. You've got no idea how uncivil our
parliament is. Let me give you an example of one of our former Prime Ministers
in parliament time:

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lEsN4-XLE2k](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lEsN4-XLE2k)

Another Prime Minister said an opposition MP should "beaten with a blow
torch".

So don't tell me when I'm being sincere or not. I have watched Bush, Obama,
Clinton, old clips of Reagan and Carter and they might have had unsavoury
policies, but they made sure they gave dignity to the Presidency. And sure,
they often tussled and sometimes they forgot themselves, or skirted the edges
of what is considered acceptable for that role, but they largely remained
civil and showed some level of courtesy and respect for the populace and their
opponents.

So I fully stand behind my comment. Whether you want to impune my motives or
my sincerity, oh you who I've never met or spoken to or interacted with in any
other way, well you feel free to do so but I know what I said was right, and
something I think we should all try to aspire to.

~~~
inimino
I respect your opinion. However, expressing yourself in such a backhanded way
tends to raise the emotional temperature, especially online. It's better to
make your points directly and not to work in a political needle through the
back door as it were.

~~~
chris_wot
Backhanded? Unless you _actually think_ that the presidency isn't something
that should be used as a model for discussions and debates, there's nothing
backhanded about it at all.

Perhaps you could get off your high horse and stop saying my motives are less
than pure? Right now I feel you are lecturing _me_ like an errant schoolboy.
You, after all, are the one telling me I have "veiled" sarcasm. I'm telling
you I don't and I thought my opinion - even if you disagree with it - was
something constructive I could bring to this thread.

So, perhaps try to ascribe less to my motives given I have no idea who you are
and I have never interacted with you before, not to mention my comment history
shows I tend to be a pretty serious minded poster. It's hardly respectful to
impune my motives when you have no real evidence to the contrary to inform
your suspicions.

In fact, the only temperature that's being raised right now is _mine_ , given
you appear to be attacking my character. And that's a tad hypocritical.

dang, on the other hand, has no such excuse.

------
st3v3r
The reason people are demonizing Trump supporters is because they ran on a
ticket of undoing just about all of the progress that many had fought hard for
over the past eight years. LGBTQ rights are likely out the window, as is any
hope at gender equality or income equality. So forgive me if I have no
sympathy whatsoever for those that are being "demonized" on social media, as
they likely aren't going to have to face any actual consequences for this
decision.

~~~
dang
This is the sort of sharp step down in civility that we need to avoid when
replying here. I'm sure you can express your views without doing that, so
please don't do that.

We detached this comment from
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12911283](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12911283)
and marked it off-topic.

~~~
st3v3r
You're going to have to explain what was uncivil in my statement. Nowhere did
I call anyone names. Nowhere did I insult anyone. I explained the feelings
that many of us have of what happened, and why we're not so eager to kiss and
make up.

------
myf01d
Posted via Internet Explorer 6

------
edko
I doubt that, by consistently saying the same thing, anyone can be right for
24 years. The world changes; what is right 24 years ago may not be right
today, and vice versa.

~~~
mattnewton
Equal rights for people regardless of race, creed or gender identity is going
to be right for a hell of a lot longer than 24 years. The reality of class
struggle is going to be right for a lot longer than 24 years.

~~~
edko
"Equal rights for people regardless of race, creed or gender identity" is not
a Bernie exclusive. You do not win elections by being right (if you need
proof, look at current events). Sometimes, being too absolutely right, and not
in sync with the times, makes you lose elections to someone who is very wrong.
That is what I mean by saying that you cannot be consistently right for 24
years: the timing of your message also has to be right.

~~~
Ar-Curunir
So changing moral principles based on political expediency is a _good_
quality? No wonder politics is rotten.

~~~
deong
Well, here's what I'd say.

My moral principles are fairly well set, but that's pretty easy because I only
have to satisfy myself and my close family. Would I prefer it if the world was
such that a strong candidate was always available who shared my worldview
exactly? Sure, but that's not realistic. Political candidates have to satisfy
a lot of people, and there is going to be some level of balancing different
concerns. Some of those concerns may be deeply held personal ethics, but
others will be the "dirty business" of day to day politics and governance. So
I don't view it as a major failure for a candidate to have arrived at my
position later than I did.

Government involves compromise (or at least it did until relatively recently).
I find it somewhat childish to rail against the closest allies I have on the
basis that they weren't quite close enough for quite long enough.

------
wodencafe
This is not technology news.

------
geigera
I know, isn't it grand?

------
ocdtrekkie
As of this writing, this post has exactly 666 upvotes. I screenshot it.

------
Artoemius
Given that the race was pretty close, I wonder if we have Peter Thiel to thank
for this result. Personally, I have a feeling that Trump would lose without
Thiel's support.

~~~
ryanx435
the vast majority of Americans have either never heard of Peter Theil or
straight up don't care what he thinks. Most people don't care about silicon
valley because it doesn't affect their day to day lives in an overt manner.

~~~
readhn
That's part of the problem. We in SF, NY, Boston live in a bubble, "fantasy
America". We do not see how the rest (75%) of America is doing. My friends are
buying $800,000 - $1mil homes and think that they did pretty ok while some
poor schmuck in Alabama is eating Oreos for dinner... The income gap is huge
and these elections are the result of this historical inequality. I'm not
calling for communism our socialism here just saying that half of the country
are not doing well. Now if we get those self driving trucks rolling - what
happens with the last accessible middle class paying job in USA - truck driver
and huge portion of middle class America that is still hanging in somehow? We
need a change that Hillary couldn't provide and I doubt that Trump could do it
either.

~~~
icarot
I am particularly happy that people outside of that SF/NY/Boston bubble chose
Donald Trump, while acknowledging his character flaws, instead of paying any
attention whatsoever to the mass media.

Though I fully agree with you -- We need a change (which change? I'm not
sure!). Hilary Clinton definitely couldn't provide any positive change; also
doubt Donald Trump can, thus I apathetically voted for a different candidate
than either Clinton or Trump. Yet, I fully stand behind President Trump (feels
weird to say that, eh.. I know..) as our president, with our country balanced
in unity. I hope for the best with his leadership of the next four years!

~~~
readhn
Well there was no other choice except voting against all and disrupting
election process which would never happen with out some major unification
across America. Not happening today.

So here we are taking sharp 90 degree turn at the fork. We would rather have a
clown in the white house (with mysterious bag of tricks) than continuing with
the current policies.

