Thursday, November 8, 2018

2018 Mid Term Post Mortem






I was determined I was going to not dwell on politics or the problems of the world around me.



How about a week of Doctor Who themed posts? Hey, I’m down with that!


OK, the mid-term elections are happening so maybe I should comment on that? Fine, I will. So I prepared the post you’re about to read about the election that was two days ago.


And already that feels like ancient history.


On Wednesday, Li’l Donnie Trump threw a temper tantrum with the White House press corps and launched a new salvo in his war with the press.


Li’l Donnie finally sent Jeff Sessions packing and putting the Robert Mueller investigation into jeopardy as Trump wages war on law and order, at least the part of law and order that has its eye on him.


And speaking of war, a nightclub in California was turned into a war zone when a gunman opened fire and killed a dozen people. 


The world demands that attention must be paid.


So....

Below is the scheduled post for today on the mid-term elections.


Tomorrow morning, I will present the regular scheduled post on Doctor Who. I posit that we know more about Yasmin Kahn than you think. That’ll be fun.  


After that, I will try to wrap my head around all that has occurred including I’m sure new fuckery from Trump in the meantime.


__________________________________


Well, it’s been a couple of days since the mid-term elections here in the good ol’ US of A.  So where are we now?



The good news is the Democrats are in control of the House of Representatives. This is good news in that the Republicans abdicated any kind of leadership in the face of Donald Trump’s worst excesses.  And in turn kept giving in to the most extreme positions of the House GOP’s most extreme conservative members.

Under Republican control, the House was more interested in placating and protecting Trump than anything else.

Holding the President to account for lies and bad leadership should not be a partisan issue. But Republicans more interested in obtaining and keeping power did nothing in the face of Trump’s most egregious lies, his most unprofessional conduct, his most chaotic and dangerous leadership. The party sticks together so Trump could do no wrong.

So the Democrats may have better luck holding Trump accountable.

One temptation the Democrats need to resist is immediately going in for some kind of impeachment proceedings. Yes, Trump lies a lot but so far, not under oath. Yes, Trump’s business dealings may be riddled with numerous legal and ethical holes but so far, nothing has been tied to his Presidency. The length of Trump’s neckties are a crime against fashion but not an impeachable one.

I would love to see Li’l Donnie limp out of the White House under a cloud of impeachment but to the Democrats, take things a step at a time. Wait until you have a solid hook to hang an impeachment hat on. Don’t go running after an impeachment out of the starting gate.

So the reiterate, the good news is the Democrats are in control of the House of Representatives.


The bad news us that for everything else, Trump's race baiting appeals to hate, fear and ignorance worked to his advantage. Races for Senate and Governor that were tight with a slight possibility for a Democratic win fell into the Republican column after incendiary visits from Trump. Li'l Donnie's singular focus on immigration, specifically casting the caravan of Central American refugees as an invasion and a threat, proved to be effective motivators for the Republican base, particularly white, non college educated rural evangelicals. 


Over the course of Tuesday evening, Democratic Senators in red states where Trump won in 2016 were defeated by Republican challengers. The upshot is that the Republican - Democrat split moves from 51-49 to 52-48. 


The good news is that a lot of people went to the polls to repudiate Trump's message of hate, fear and ignorance. For that, we should be proud. Trump represents the worst of America and a lot of people made their ways to the voting booth to declare, "No! That is NOT who we are!" 


The problem remains that a lot of people also went to the polls to endorse Trump's message of hate, fear and ignorance.


The mid-term elections for 2018 are over.


The work is not done.  












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