(08-17-2017 03:26 PM)erice Wrote:  I'm not sure why Hillary Clinton is relevant to any of this at this point. Whether people voted for Trump because they supported him, or because they thought he wouldn't be as bad as Clinton, is kind of irrelevant now. He won. And we've learned more about him since inauguration. Particularly in the last week. Does anyone support him as leader of our nation now? If so, how can you support someone who thinks you can march shoulder to shoulder with a group of people, most of whom are carrying torches and shouting anti-semitic slogans, and still be a "fine person"? If not, why are you defending him? (the "you" here is not directed at illiniowl, whom I quoted at the beginning.)

This is a good point. I intend to give people a mulligan re: Trump and judge by what they do from this point forward. I have several relatives who have gotten off the Trump wagon based on what they've seen thus far. I'm much more concerned about how we move forward and what sort of country my children are going to inherit.

But I don't think Trump is defensible at this point. Every day he continues to be President damages the country. I'm not sure Pence is acceptable either after he "fully supported" Trump's news conference.

I'm gone for a while, and now I find you are back on the "basket of deplorables.

Somewhere in the previous 163 pages of this thread is a lengthy discussion, primarily me and Lad IIRC, about this. The upshot, again IIRC, was nobody should think she was talking about them unless they actually were a deplorable. My viewpoint was that she was just looking down her nose at everybody who wasn't for her - mainly, Middle America. Or Flyover America. Or Bitter Clinger America. Or Redneck America. Whatever vituperative label one might want to put on those inferior people. I doubt I am the only one who felt this way. IMO, that was when and why she lost the election.

But if you want to put a percent on it, I think a proper one would be .1%. sixty million times .01% = 6,000, a number big enough to cover charlottesville 20X.I am sure just about all of the racists voted for Trump, if they voted. They didn't carry even a single state for him, though. Probably not even a single county.

sorry about the interruption. I will return you to your regularly scheduled program now.

(08-17-2017 04:44 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  I'm gone for a while, and now I find you are back on the "basket of deplorables.

Somewhere in the previous 163 pages of this thread is a lengthy discussion, primarily me and Lad IIRC, about this. The upshot, again IIRC, was nobody should think she was talking about them unless they actually were a deplorable. My viewpoint was that she was just looking down her nose at everybody who wasn't for her - mainly, Middle America. Or Flyover America. Or Bitter Clinger America. Or Redneck America. Whatever vituperative label one might want to put on those inferior people. I doubt I am the only one who felt this way. IMO, that was when and why she lost the election.

But if you want to put a percent on it, I think a proper one would be .1%. sixty million times .01% = 6,000, a number big enough to cover charlottesville 20X.I am sure just about all of the racists voted for Trump, if they voted. They didn't carry even a single state for him, though. Probably not even a single county.

sorry about the interruption. I will return you to your regularly scheduled program now.

It was brought back up because of Charlottesville and how vocal many of the deplorables there supported Trump and indicated that he was the reason they were there.

So it sounds like the issue that many had was that the label was covering too many people than it should have, and had the percentages been more accurate then the comment would have been fine?

(08-17-2017 04:25 PM)JustAnotherAustinOwl Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 03:24 PM)illiniowl Wrote:  No, you tell me. 60 million people voted for Trump. You think there are 30 million racist, evil bigots in this country? So 1 in 4 voters? How about we start here: Was she off by a little or a lot? And in which direction?

I'll bite.

I honestly don't know.

In the general, I think a lot of Republicans fell into line and held their nose and voted for Trump even thought they had strongly opposed him in the primaries. I go back and forth on this. These people may very well have been offended by the Hollywood Access tape, his attacks on a Gold Star family because of their religion/ethnicity, his mocking of a disabled reporter, his retweeting of white supremacists, his attacks on the "mexican" judge from Indiana, etc. But they voted for him anyway. So I do have to question their values. But I've voted for candidates who I have a middling opinion of as people because they were the option that supported policies I support. For me Trump would have crossed way, way too many lines for me to even consider it if I had been presented with that dilemma. But I wasn't. Further complicating things is the fact that everyone assumed he was going to lose. I have to wonder how the election would have turned out if it was being reported as too close to call. I suspect a lot of reluctant Trump voters might have left that one blank or cast a protest vote.

Now people who supported him in the primary? I have a much harder time giving them a pass. And the initial research backs me up on that. Trump primary voters were much more likely to be racist, sexist, or authoritarian than non-Trump Republican primary voters, who it turns out were not that different from the public as a whole on those issues. Indeed I think that is a key to his hardcore base.

So I'm going to wait and let the political scientists figure this one out. Because they are never wrong and always agree.

The point re the primaries is one I keep coming back to. He didn't just beat Clinton. He beat Bush, Cruz, Fiorina,
Kasich, Christie, Perry, Jindal, Rubio, etc. A lot of people like to think Sanders or Biden would have beaten him,
but I don't know.

And Clinton did win the popular vote by 3 million.

(08-17-2017 04:50 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:44 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  I'm gone for a while, and now I find you are back on the "basket of deplorables.

Somewhere in the previous 163 pages of this thread is a lengthy discussion, primarily me and Lad IIRC, about this. The upshot, again IIRC, was nobody should think she was talking about them unless they actually were a deplorable. My viewpoint was that she was just looking down her nose at everybody who wasn't for her - mainly, Middle America. Or Flyover America. Or Bitter Clinger America. Or Redneck America. Whatever vituperative label one might want to put on those inferior people. I doubt I am the only one who felt this way. IMO, that was when and why she lost the election.

But if you want to put a percent on it, I think a proper one would be .1%. sixty million times .01% = 6,000, a number big enough to cover charlottesville 20X.I am sure just about all of the racists voted for Trump, if they voted. They didn't carry even a single state for him, though. Probably not even a single county.

sorry about the interruption. I will return you to your regularly scheduled program now.

It was brought back up because of Charlottesville and how vocal many of the deplorables there supported Trump and indicated that he was the reason they were there.

So it sounds like the issue that many had was that the label was covering too many people than it should have, and had the percentages been more accurate then the comment would have been fine?

it is indicative of the knee jerk reaction to call repubs 'racists' and nazis.... like they did to romney. instead of saying so-and-so is a racist asshat (like romney) hillary let the mask slip and addressed 'about half' of supporters as that.

in short the typical contempt for the candidate was replaced by a corresponding contempt for the supporters. one that those of us who supported romney always knew was there.

that should be the takeaway vis a vis hillary.

(08-17-2017 05:13 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:50 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:44 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  I'm gone for a while, and now I find you are back on the "basket of deplorables.

Somewhere in the previous 163 pages of this thread is a lengthy discussion, primarily me and Lad IIRC, about this. The upshot, again IIRC, was nobody should think she was talking about them unless they actually were a deplorable. My viewpoint was that she was just looking down her nose at everybody who wasn't for her - mainly, Middle America. Or Flyover America. Or Bitter Clinger America. Or Redneck America. Whatever vituperative label one might want to put on those inferior people. I doubt I am the only one who felt this way. IMO, that was when and why she lost the election.

But if you want to put a percent on it, I think a proper one would be .1%. sixty million times .01% = 6,000, a number big enough to cover charlottesville 20X.I am sure just about all of the racists voted for Trump, if they voted. They didn't carry even a single state for him, though. Probably not even a single county.

sorry about the interruption. I will return you to your regularly scheduled program now.

It was brought back up because of Charlottesville and how vocal many of the deplorables there supported Trump and indicated that he was the reason they were there.

So it sounds like the issue that many had was that the label was covering too many people than it should have, and had the percentages been more accurate then the comment would have been fine?

it is indicative of the knee jerk reaction to call repubs 'racists' and nazis.... like they did to romney. instead of saying so-and-so is a racist asshat (like romney) hillary let the mask slip and addressed 'about half' of supporters as that.

that should be the takeaway vis a vis hillary.

So again, in the end it was about getting the percentage wrong. That's fine that y'all feel that way, that you would have preferred a more accurate and nuanced statement from Clinton regarding the amount of vile people that represent Trump, but stop giving me the runaround and just say that flat out.

Tanq, I do agree that Trump has helped illuminate greatly the issue on the left of too often and quickly taking a misspoken statement and applying a tag to the person that doesn't fit (hellloooo "binders full of women"). Or reading too much into certain policy preferences.

(08-17-2017 05:19 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 05:13 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:50 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:44 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  I'm gone for a while, and now I find you are back on the "basket of deplorables.

Somewhere in the previous 163 pages of this thread is a lengthy discussion, primarily me and Lad IIRC, about this. The upshot, again IIRC, was nobody should think she was talking about them unless they actually were a deplorable. My viewpoint was that she was just looking down her nose at everybody who wasn't for her - mainly, Middle America. Or Flyover America. Or Bitter Clinger America. Or Redneck America. Whatever vituperative label one might want to put on those inferior people. I doubt I am the only one who felt this way. IMO, that was when and why she lost the election.

But if you want to put a percent on it, I think a proper one would be .1%. sixty million times .01% = 6,000, a number big enough to cover charlottesville 20X.I am sure just about all of the racists voted for Trump, if they voted. They didn't carry even a single state for him, though. Probably not even a single county.

sorry about the interruption. I will return you to your regularly scheduled program now.

It was brought back up because of Charlottesville and how vocal many of the deplorables there supported Trump and indicated that he was the reason they were there.

So it sounds like the issue that many had was that the label was covering too many people than it should have, and had the percentages been more accurate then the comment would have been fine?

it is indicative of the knee jerk reaction to call repubs 'racists' and nazis.... like they did to romney. instead of saying so-and-so is a racist asshat (like romney) hillary let the mask slip and addressed 'about half' of supporters as that.

that should be the takeaway vis a vis hillary.

So again, in the end it was about getting the percentage wrong. That's fine that y'all feel that way, that you would have preferred a more accurate and nuanced statement from Clinton regarding the amount of vile people that represent Trump, but stop giving me the runaround and just say that flat out.

Tanq, I do agree that Trump has helped illuminate greatly the issue on the left of too often and quickly taking a misspoken statement and applying a tag to the person that doesn't fit (hellloooo "binders full of women"). Or reading too much into certain policy preferences.

you misread lad. it isnt about proportions. it is about letting the mask slip about what was typically said about candidates and revealing the underlying contempt of supporters of the candidate.

let me interpret. (some non-negligible proportion) are deplorables (a pretty fing harsh term). the rest (who seem to be too fing stupid to notice the candidate has support of deplorables) are otherwise allright. illuminating a significant amount of deplorables is an enormous implied insult to the rest.

imagine if a republican said 'half of obamas voters are fing wefare leeches. the rest are okay."

with all the gnashing of being tone deaf and 'implications' of what is said all the time i dont quite understand why the statement is such a mystery....

(08-17-2017 06:49 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 05:19 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 05:13 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:50 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:44 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  I'm gone for a while, and now I find you are back on the "basket of deplorables.

Somewhere in the previous 163 pages of this thread is a lengthy discussion, primarily me and Lad IIRC, about this. The upshot, again IIRC, was nobody should think she was talking about them unless they actually were a deplorable. My viewpoint was that she was just looking down her nose at everybody who wasn't for her - mainly, Middle America. Or Flyover America. Or Bitter Clinger America. Or Redneck America. Whatever vituperative label one might want to put on those inferior people. I doubt I am the only one who felt this way. IMO, that was when and why she lost the election.

But if you want to put a percent on it, I think a proper one would be .1%. sixty million times .01% = 6,000, a number big enough to cover charlottesville 20X.I am sure just about all of the racists voted for Trump, if they voted. They didn't carry even a single state for him, though. Probably not even a single county.

sorry about the interruption. I will return you to your regularly scheduled program now.

It was brought back up because of Charlottesville and how vocal many of the deplorables there supported Trump and indicated that he was the reason they were there.

So it sounds like the issue that many had was that the label was covering too many people than it should have, and had the percentages been more accurate then the comment would have been fine?

it is indicative of the knee jerk reaction to call repubs 'racists' and nazis.... like they did to romney. instead of saying so-and-so is a racist asshat (like romney) hillary let the mask slip and addressed 'about half' of supporters as that.

that should be the takeaway vis a vis hillary.

So again, in the end it was about getting the percentage wrong. That's fine that y'all feel that way, that you would have preferred a more accurate and nuanced statement from Clinton regarding the amount of vile people that represent Trump, but stop giving me the runaround and just say that flat out.

Tanq, I do agree that Trump has helped illuminate greatly the issue on the left of too often and quickly taking a misspoken statement and applying a tag to the person that doesn't fit (hellloooo "binders full of women"). Or reading too much into certain policy preferences.

you misread lad. it isnt about proportions. it is about letting the mask slip about what was typically said about candidates and revealing the underlying contempt of supporters of the candidate.

let me interpret. (some non-negligible proportion) are deplorables (a pretty fing harsh term). the rest (who seem to be too fing stupid to notice the candidate has support of deplorables) are otherwise allright. illuminating a significant amount of deplorables is an enormous implied insult to the rest.

imagine if a republican said 'half of obamas voters are fing wefare leeches. the rest are okay."

with all the gnashing of being tone deaf and 'implications' of what is said all the time i dont quite understand why the statement is such a mystery....

Again, what you're boiling it down to is the proportions were off. I understand that issue and why that's a concern. If what I just stated isn't true about why that statement bothered so many, than what other explanation is there?

This weekend demonstrated that those deplorable are not a myth.

(08-17-2017 04:50 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:44 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  I'm gone for a while, and now I find you are back on the "basket of deplorables.

Somewhere in the previous 163 pages of this thread is a lengthy discussion, primarily me and Lad IIRC, about this. The upshot, again IIRC, was nobody should think she was talking about them unless they actually were a deplorable. My viewpoint was that she was just looking down her nose at everybody who wasn't for her - mainly, Middle America. Or Flyover America. Or Bitter Clinger America. Or Redneck America. Whatever vituperative label one might want to put on those inferior people. I doubt I am the only one who felt this way. IMO, that was when and why she lost the election.

But if you want to put a percent on it, I think a proper one would be .1%. sixty million times .01% = 6,000, a number big enough to cover charlottesville 20X.I am sure just about all of the racists voted for Trump, if they voted. They didn't carry even a single state for him, though. Probably not even a single county.

sorry about the interruption. I will return you to your regularly scheduled program now.

It was brought back up because of Charlottesville and how vocal many of the deplorables there supported Trump and indicated that he was the reason they were there.

So it sounds like the issue that many had was that the label was covering too many people than it should have, and had the percentages been more accurate then the comment would have been fine?

I think it likely that most of the truly racist people who voted - the KKK, white Supremacists - people for whom race is the single most important issue - did vote for Trump, simply because what is the alternative for them?

I think the numbers of those people is tiny.

I think a lot of people heard her statement this way - "half of the people not voting for me are deplorable"

For me, and I suspect many others, it just confirmed what I thought was the attitude of top democrats toward the common people in this country - the people famously referred to by Obama as "clinging bitterly to their guns and religion", when he was caught on a hot mic. He never would have referred to people that way in public, but it revealed how he really thought. Same as Hillary's deplorable comment revela how she really thought - that most of those people in the red states are just ignorant scum. Same as her thoughtless comment about putting coa; miners out of work. who cares about coal miners, anyway. Dirty, ignorant people, right. maybe we can re-educate them.

But these words by your leaders just point up the attitude displayed by the foot soldiers. We just finished eight years of any criticism of Obama or his policies being labeled as racist. I am tired of the characterizations of conservatives as trigger happy militia, and the characterizations of anybody with concerns about the immigration problem as racists. If you think women's bathrooms should be for women, you are labeled as sexist. If somebody religious opposes gay marriage, then all conservatives are homophobes.


So Hillary's statement rang true, just a slippage of the veil. She said what she really thought, a cardinal sin in politics. It resonated with a lot of people, I am sure, who were tired of being labeled as (pick any) racist, sexist, homophobic, Islamophobic, etc.

So, yeah, any true ____-ophobes out there probably supported Trump, or didn't vote at all. But the absolute numbers are tiny, no matter what your colleagues in Camp Purity tell you.

I had already decided that I could not support Hillary no matter who ran against her before she called me and most other Texans a deplorable, so it didn't change my vote. I was not pro-Trump, I was, and am, anti-Hillary. But I think it may have cemented the vote of a lot of people who were still undecided, and so IMO it was the final blow that killed her campaign.

So how many people in this country fit the definition of deplorable in at least one category to some degree? I think it may be close to 100%. Now if you want to just take the percentage of those who hold extremist positions, it may be closer to 3-5%. If you just count the ones that Hillary was talking about, it might be 1.5%. Heck, isn't this the woman who blamed her loss partially on misogyny? Kind of tells what color glasses she views the world through. Now figure the percentage who make this the centerpiece of their lives - the KKK types. Maybe .1%? I have heard estimates of 6,000 KKK members nationally. How many did they get to Vorgonoa, despite a month of publicity? 200? 300? I understood there 50 in the march. Not much for a national movement.

so, as one who Hillary considers deplorable, without know a thing about me, hell yeah, I took her comment personally.

I was shocked that she lost, and the margin was so close that IMO had she just not pandered to the stereotypes of her adoring crowd that night, she may well have won. JMHO.

Time for me to fade back into the woodwork. I left this site for a reason. But everybody falls off their diet once in a while.

(08-17-2017 07:14 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 06:49 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 05:19 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 05:13 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:50 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  It was brought back up because of Charlottesville and how vocal many of the deplorables there supported Trump and indicated that he was the reason they were there.

So it sounds like the issue that many had was that the label was covering too many people than it should have, and had the percentages been more accurate then the comment would have been fine?

it is indicative of the knee jerk reaction to call repubs 'racists' and nazis.... like they did to romney. instead of saying so-and-so is a racist asshat (like romney) hillary let the mask slip and addressed 'about half' of supporters as that.

that should be the takeaway vis a vis hillary.

So again, in the end it was about getting the percentage wrong. That's fine that y'all feel that way, that you would have preferred a more accurate and nuanced statement from Clinton regarding the amount of vile people that represent Trump, but stop giving me the runaround and just say that flat out.

Tanq, I do agree that Trump has helped illuminate greatly the issue on the left of too often and quickly taking a misspoken statement and applying a tag to the person that doesn't fit (hellloooo "binders full of women"). Or reading too much into certain policy preferences.

you misread lad. it isnt about proportions. it is about letting the mask slip about what was typically said about candidates and revealing the underlying contempt of supporters of the candidate.

let me interpret. (some non-negligible proportion) are deplorables (a pretty fing harsh term). the rest (who seem to be too fing stupid to notice the candidate has support of deplorables) are otherwise allright. illuminating a significant amount of deplorables is an enormous implied insult to the rest.

imagine if a republican said 'half of obamas voters are fing wefare leeches. the rest are okay."

with all the gnashing of being tone deaf and 'implications' of what is said all the time i dont quite understand why the statement is such a mystery....

Again, what you're boiling it down to is the proportions were off. I understand that issue and why that's a concern. If what I just stated isn't true about why that statement bothered so many, than what other explanation is there?

This weekend demonstrated that those deplorable are not a myth.

not proprtions at all. try 'obama attracts welfare leeches as voters. the rest are too fing stupid to notice".

get off your 'only proportions' high horse. the statement is overtly contemptible of the former group, and impliedly contemptible of the second.

and to be blunt im not here to fing argue 'why' i find that statement wrong on a lot of levels. i told you. take it at face value or not.

second, i find it somewhat astonishing that people who diagnose every trump implied nuance or omission or dog whistle dont find that statement offensive to both groups mentioned.

(08-17-2017 07:36 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 07:14 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 06:49 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 05:19 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 05:13 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  it is indicative of the knee jerk reaction to call repubs 'racists' and nazis.... like they did to romney. instead of saying so-and-so is a racist asshat (like romney) hillary let the mask slip and addressed 'about half' of supporters as that.

that should be the takeaway vis a vis hillary.

So again, in the end it was about getting the percentage wrong. That's fine that y'all feel that way, that you would have preferred a more accurate and nuanced statement from Clinton regarding the amount of vile people that represent Trump, but stop giving me the runaround and just say that flat out.

Tanq, I do agree that Trump has helped illuminate greatly the issue on the left of too often and quickly taking a misspoken statement and applying a tag to the person that doesn't fit (hellloooo "binders full of women"). Or reading too much into certain policy preferences.

you misread lad. it isnt about proportions. it is about letting the mask slip about what was typically said about candidates and revealing the underlying contempt of supporters of the candidate.

let me interpret. (some non-negligible proportion) are deplorables (a pretty fing harsh term). the rest (who seem to be too fing stupid to notice the candidate has support of deplorables) are otherwise allright. illuminating a significant amount of deplorables is an enormous implied insult to the rest.

imagine if a republican said 'half of obamas voters are fing wefare leeches. the rest are okay."

with all the gnashing of being tone deaf and 'implications' of what is said all the time i dont quite understand why the statement is such a mystery....

Again, what you're boiling it down to is the proportions were off. I understand that issue and why that's a concern. If what I just stated isn't true about why that statement bothered so many, than what other explanation is there?

This weekend demonstrated that those deplorable are not a myth.

not proprtions at all. try 'obama attracts welfare leeches as voters. the rest are too fing stupid to notice".

get off your 'only proportions' high horse. the statement is overtly contemptible of the former group, and impliedly contemptible of the second.

and to be blunt im not here to fing argue 'why' i find that statement wrong on a lot of levels. i told you. take it at face value or not.

second, i find it somewhat astonishing that people who diagnose every trump implied nuance or omission or dog whistle dont find that statement offensive to both groups mentioned.

And I wasn't here either to argue proportions. My original question was how do we discuss this issue (the very active support of a candidate by hate groups) in the future?

Your response indicates that we can't.

(08-17-2017 04:35 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:15 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:06 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  This is kind of my point. As was pointed out by another poster, even at the time she said she was grossly generalizing. So for people to get so up in arms about the % that she applied to that statement missed the point of her comment, which was that Trump had a lot of vocal support by deplorable people and he was feeding them what they craved.
And Charlottesville has cemented the fact that a percentage of the those who supported and voted for Trump are truly deplorable people, and Trump did, and continues to, feed them.
The percentage of those who voted for Trump that fall in that category doesn't matter - it's the fact that he is in bed with them that does. Yet somehow, because an incorrect % was applied by Clinton (that percent, if actually calculated, should be much lower), the conversation was never about the fact that Trump actively courted those individuals as it should have been, but that people who supported Trump and weren't those individuals, were offended that perhaps some people thought that maybe they were the deplorables.

And this is precisely the sort of rationalization that cost Hillary the white house.

So you're saying that the actual percentage of these deplorable people matters that much? Why?
Or are you saying that calling any of Trump's supporters deplorable is what matters?

No, I'm saying that this sort of rationalization, and the arrogant condescension that goes with it, is what cost Hillary the white house.

I don't think the left understands, even today, just how off-putting the "deplorable" comment was. I would guess that it changed the minds of a few fence-sitters, and perhaps even some who had been leaning Hillary before it. I think it reflects to some extent the thought process of those who believe that their way is the only way and anybody who doesn't buy it is deplorable--in either a moral or an intellectual else. In the end, I'm fairly certain it probably cost her enough votes to turn Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, and maybe Ohio. And that is where the election was lost.

(08-17-2017 09:07 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:35 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:15 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 04:06 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  This is kind of my point. As was pointed out by another poster, even at the time she said she was grossly generalizing. So for people to get so up in arms about the % that she applied to that statement missed the point of her comment, which was that Trump had a lot of vocal support by deplorable people and he was feeding them what they craved.
And Charlottesville has cemented the fact that a percentage of the those who supported and voted for Trump are truly deplorable people, and Trump did, and continues to, feed them.
The percentage of those who voted for Trump that fall in that category doesn't matter - it's the fact that he is in bed with them that does. Yet somehow, because an incorrect % was applied by Clinton (that percent, if actually calculated, should be much lower), the conversation was never about the fact that Trump actively courted those individuals as it should have been, but that people who supported Trump and weren't those individuals, were offended that perhaps some people thought that maybe they were the deplorables.

And this is precisely the sort of rationalization that cost Hillary the white house.

So you're saying that the actual percentage of these deplorable people matters that much? Why?
Or are you saying that calling any of Trump's supporters deplorable is what matters?

No, I'm saying that this sort of rationalization, and the arrogant condescension that goes with it, is what cost Hillary the white house.

I don't think the left understands, even today, just how off-putting the "deplorable" comment was. I would guess that it changed the minds of a few fence-sitters, and perhaps even some who had been leaning Hillary before it. I think it reflects to some extent the thought process of those who believe that their way is the only way and anybody who doesn't buy it is deplorable--in either a moral or an intellectual else. In the end, I'm fairly certain it probably cost her enough votes to turn Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, and maybe Ohio. And that is where the election was lost.

So you are saying that calling any of Trump's supporters deplorables was the issue. It's honestly one or the other - either the over generalization was the issue (which I can understand) or the comment itself.

And since it sounds like you're saying it is the comment itself, that's why I'm asking how we have these conversations going forward. Charlottesville showed that dangerous, disgusting people are using Trump and his words and justification to come out of the shadows and publicly spout their vile beliefs, intimidate others, and promote their world view. We need to be able to discuss these things in the future, no?

And as I said to Tanq, this also shows why the left's general quickness to pull the race or sex card quickly, has caused massive issues.

(08-17-2017 07:40 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  My original question was how do we discuss this issue (the very active support of a candidate by hate groups) in the future?

There is no acceptably nuanced way to say that you hold vast swaths of this country in contempt. So perhaps start by stopping holding vast swaths of this country in contempt.

And make no mistake: These attitudes of contempt ("deplorable"), of condescension ("too dumb to know they're voting against their own interests"), of demonization via apocalyptic rhetoric (Republicans want to "kill" people with their health insurance ideas or "put y'all back in chains") toward people well within the mainstream are held by FAR more people than subscribe to truly vile ideologies such as white supremacy or neo-Nazism. A few posts above we have JAAO unable to bring himself to state that even at 30 million Hillary was actually overstating the number of deplorables rather than understating it, and then engaging in a lot of self-important chin-stroking about whether he will deign to give a pass to people who voted differently than he did. Honestly, can you people even hear yourselves talk?

You want to know how to discuss the issue? Hillary could have said, "I have noticed that Donald Trump has been getting the support of vile, racist elements such as the KKK. I call on him to repudiate these elements in the strongest terms. There is no place for these deplorable views in our national conversation [yada yada yada]." Now, Trump -- being an idiot -- surely would have dithered for a few days, then said something insufficiently condemnatory, leading to more outrage, but ultimately after some adult wrote out the words for him and beat it into his thick skull that he needed to say them, he would have finally put the issue to rest. (The correct course of action would have been to emulate Reagan, who when asked about some potentially embarrassing endorsement from some fringe group, said, "All it means is that they are supporting my agenda. I won't be supporting theirs.")

But the reason Hillary didn't take that course is because she didn't want the issue put to rest. She - and Democrats writ large - weren't and aren't interested in marginalizing already-marginalized views. There's no gain in that. They are interested in marginalizing mainstream views. They are interested in ginning up the base to believe they are opposing true evil. They are interested in pushing the narrative that the barbarians are at the gates. And sadly, at this point, I think many have come to believe their own BS.

Trump gets some support from vile quarters that are nevertheless miniscule in numbers. But by all means, call on him to repudiate those supporters. By all means, criticize Trump to your heart's content. Lord knows he deserves it. And by all means, advocate for your political point of view. But it now seems that to far too many that apparently is inadequate. Far too many simply cannot stop there, and think there's always a larger point that desperately needs to be made about the growing and alarming "normalization of hate," or the dark night of fascism descending on this country, or some such. Get over yourselves. Trump, too, shall pass, this isn't 1936 Germany, and your neighbors aren't the equivalent of Klansmen, the Gestapo, or slaveholders.

(08-17-2017 09:15 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  So you are saying that calling any of Trump's supporters deplorables was the issue. It's honestly one or the other - either the over generalization was the issue (which I can understand) or the comment itself.
And since it sounds like you're saying it is the comment itself, that's why I'm asking how we have these conversations going forward. Charlottesville showed that dangerous, disgusting people are using Trump and his words and justification to come out of the shadows and publicly spout their vile beliefs, intimidate others, and promote their world view. We need to be able to discuss these things in the future, no?
And as I said to Tanq, this also shows why the left's general quickness to pull the race or sex card quickly, has caused massive issues.

You're so busy splitting hairs that you're missing the point. Hillary's comment--and your last few posts--come of as incredibly snide and arrogant and condescending to people who don't agree with your views.

This is something about which the whole left wing seems very tone-deaf. I don't think you have a clue how your comments would be perceived by anyone not on the left, and pretty far left. I just don't think that you, or she, or her campaign team, ever understood just how badly that sort of stuff played.

(08-17-2017 09:45 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 09:15 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  So you are saying that calling any of Trump's supporters deplorables was the issue. It's honestly one or the other - either the over generalization was the issue (which I can understand) or the comment itself.
And since it sounds like you're saying it is the comment itself, that's why I'm asking how we have these conversations going forward. Charlottesville showed that dangerous, disgusting people are using Trump and his words and justification to come out of the shadows and publicly spout their vile beliefs, intimidate others, and promote their world view. We need to be able to discuss these things in the future, no?
And as I said to Tanq, this also shows why the left's general quickness to pull the race or sex card quickly, has caused massive issues.

You're so busy splitting hairs that you're missing the point. Hillary's comment--and your last few posts--come of as incredibly snide and arrogant and condescending to people who don't agree with your views.

This is something about which the whole left wing seems very tone-deaf. I don't think you have a clue how your comments would be perceived by anyone not on the left, and pretty far left. I just don't think that you, or she, or her campaign team, ever understood just how badly that sort of stuff played.

Explain to me how I am splitting hairs? Either the issue in your mind was painting Trump supporters with too broad of a brush or with painting any Trump supporters with that brush. Again, I ask because I think there is a serious issue to be addressed when hate groups publicly state that they feel emboldened by a public figure, and obviously you don't believe that how that issue was handled in one instance was correct.

You can hide behind your line of how condescending this post sounds or actually address it like illiniowl did, which made it clear that it was the broad generalization that they felt was the issue.

And what is so arrogant or condescending about these posts? I wouldn't mind you explaining that to me as well.

(08-17-2017 09:29 PM)illiniowl Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 07:40 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  My original question was how do we discuss this issue (the very active support of a candidate by hate groups) in the future?

There is no acceptably nuanced way to say that you hold vast swaths of this country in contempt. So perhaps start by stopping holding vast swaths of this country in contempt.

And make no mistake: These attitudes of contempt ("deplorable"), of condescension ("too dumb to know they're voting against their own interests"), of demonization via apocalyptic rhetoric (Republicans want to "kill" people with their health insurance ideas or "put y'all back in chains") toward people well within the mainstream are held by FAR more people than subscribe to truly vile ideologies such as white supremacy or neo-Nazism. A few posts above we have JAAO unable to bring himself to state that even at 30 million Hillary was actually overstating the number of deplorables rather than understating it, and then engaging in a lot of self-important chin-stroking about whether he will deign to give a pass to people who voted differently than he did. Honestly, can you people even hear yourselves talk?

You want to know how to discuss the issue? Hillary could have said, "I have noticed that Donald Trump has been getting the support of vile, racist elements such as the KKK. I call on him to repudiate these elements in the strongest terms. There is no place for these deplorable views in our national conversation [yada yada yada]." Now, Trump -- being an idiot -- surely would have dithered for a few days, then said something insufficiently condemnatory, leading to more outrage, but ultimately after some adult wrote out the words for him and beat it into his thick skull that he needed to say them, he would have finally put the issue to rest. (The correct course of action would have been to emulate Reagan, who when asked about some potentially embarrassing endorsement from some fringe group, said, "All it means is that they are supporting my agenda. I won't be supporting theirs.")

But the reason Hillary didn't take that course is because she didn't want the issue put to rest. She - and Democrats writ large - weren't and aren't interested in marginalizing already-marginalized views. There's no gain in that. They are interested in marginalizing mainstream views. They are interested in ginning up the base to believe they are opposing true evil. They are interested in pushing the narrative that the barbarians are at the gates. And sadly, at this point, I think many have come to believe their own BS.

Trump gets some support from vile quarters that are nevertheless miniscule in numbers. But by all means, call on him to repudiate those supporters. By all means, criticize Trump to your heart's content. Lord knows he deserves it. And by all means, advocate for your political point of view. But it now seems that to far too many that apparently is inadequate. Far too many simply cannot stop there, and think there's always a larger point that desperately needs to be made about the growing and alarming "normalization of hate," or the dark night of fascism descending on this country, or some such. Get over yourselves. Trump, too, shall pass, this isn't 1936 Germany, and your neighbors aren't the equivalent of Klansmen, the Gestapo, or slaveholders.

Thanks for the straight answer to the question.

I think personally, one of the things that clouded my thoughts on this was the often personal feelings that some on this board projected to the deplorables comment, and how they felt that they were being called a deplorable (seemingly regardless of the % applied by Clinton). I think that tripped me up because of how obvious it was that they weren't being called a deplorable that I was often glossing over the issue that was created by writing off a large swath of people, in a similar manner to Romney's 47% comment, or the hypothetical that Tanq offered.

I'm hopeful that going forward all parties can learn from the mistakes that Clinton made and Trump continues to make. It's pretty clear there are still some serious societal issues that need to be addressed and worked on, and perhaps nuance will win out in the end.

(08-17-2017 09:59 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  Explain to me how I am splitting hairs? Either the issue in your mind was painting Trump supporters with too broad of a brush or with painting any Trump supporters with that brush. Again, I ask because I think there is a serious issue to be addressed when hate groups publicly state that they feel emboldened by a public figure, and obviously you don't believe that how that issue was handled in one instance was correct.
You can hide behind your line of how condescending this post sounds or actually address it like illiniowl did, which made it clear that it was the broad generalization that they felt was the issue.
And what is so arrogant or condescending about these posts? I wouldn't mind you explaining that to me as well.

You're splitting hairs because you're trying to parse my statement in ways that miss the point. The point is not the issue in my mind. For one thing, I didn't vote for Trump. The point is the perception by blue collar voters in Pennsylvania and Ohio and Michigan and Wisconsin. And I don't know whether it was too broad a brush or the comment itself that pissed them off. But one thing is clear. Something pissed them off enough to vote for Trump, and that cost Hillary the election.

Do you really believe that comments like those alluded to by Illini ("deplorable," "too dumb to know they're voting against their own interests" and "Republicans want to kill people with their health insurance ideas" or "put y'all back in chains"), or your own, "dangerous, disgusting people are using Trump and his words and justification to come out of the shadows and publicly spout their vile beliefs, intimidate others, and promote their world view," aren't smug and condescending and arrogant? Really? Seriously? Because that's how they are perceived in mid-America.

Ask for how you talk about it, when you're engaged in retail politics, you don't. That stuff plays well with your base. But you don't win elections with your base. You win elections by getting people who are sitting on the fence to lean your way. And you don't do that by putting down people who don't agree with you 100% of the time. It's the same problem republicans have brought upon themselves by making idiotic statements about abortion.

It's the kind of thing you discus in academic settings or behind closed doors with your base. But you don't say it on the stump.

(08-17-2017 10:30 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(08-17-2017 09:59 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  Explain to me how I am splitting hairs? Either the issue in your mind was painting Trump supporters with too broad of a brush or with painting any Trump supporters with that brush. Again, I ask because I think there is a serious issue to be addressed when hate groups publicly state that they feel emboldened by a public figure, and obviously you don't believe that how that issue was handled in one instance was correct.
You can hide behind your line of how condescending this post sounds or actually address it like illiniowl did, which made it clear that it was the broad generalization that they felt was the issue.
And what is so arrogant or condescending about these posts? I wouldn't mind you explaining that to me as well.

You're splitting hairs because you're trying to parse my statement in ways that miss the point. The point is not the issue in my mind. For one thing, I didn't vote for Trump. The point is the perception by blue collar voters in Pennsylvania and Ohio and Michigan and Wisconsin. And I don't know whether it was too broad a brush or the comment itself that pissed them off. But one thing is clear. Something pissed them off enough to vote for Trump, and that cost Hillary the election.

Do you really believe that comments like those alluded to by Illini ("deplorable," "too dumb to know they're voting against their own interests" and "Republicans want to kill people with their health insurance ideas" or "put y'all back in chains"), or your own, "dangerous, disgusting people are using Trump and his words and justification to come out of the shadows and publicly spout their vile beliefs, intimidate others, and promote their world view," aren't smug and condescending and arrogant? Really? Seriously? Because that's how they are perceived in mid-America.

Ask for how you talk about it, when you're engaged in retail politics, you don't. That stuff plays well with your base. But you don't win elections with your base. You win elections by getting people who are sitting on the fence to lean your way. And you don't do that by putting down people who don't agree with you 100% of the time. It's the same problem republicans have brought upon themselves by making idiotic statements about abortion.

It's the kind of thing you discus in academic settings or behind closed doors with your base. But you don't say it on the stump.

Holy heck. Are you really saying me calling white supremacists that is smug, condescending, and arrogant?

I am VERY specifically talking about what happened in Charlottesville, which is when a bunch of white supremacists got together and did some disgusting things. And when a number were interviewed, they EXPLICITLY stated that Trump was the reason they were there and they were supporting him.

If you're literally telling me that calling a spade a spade is condescending, then f*** yeah, I'm condescending as all get out. But explain to me why calling self-avowed white supremacists those things is condescending? If middle America thinks that those who believe white supremacists are pieces of **** then we have a much bigger problem.

And you're going way past what I was talking about by bringing up the election and its results. I was not talking about the effects that the deplorable comment had on the election, or why Clinton lost, but the reaction it garnered and why it did.

The reason I brought up the election was because that was my point from the beginning. All of this "holier than thou" stuff pisses off a lot of people. Call them the Archie Bunker voters, but blue collar voters are who voted against Hillary in the Rust Belt in unexpected numbers, and that's what cost her the election.

What I think is irrelevant. I didn't vote for Trump, in part because what we've gotten so far is about what I expected. You need to think about how these sorts of comments played with those who voted for Trump. And all I'm saying is that when you get outside the democrat base, those comments don't play well.

You didn't question any of those comments that I repeated from Illini's post, which are things Hillary or her supporters actually said. I would therefore ask whether that means that you do see the problem there.

As for your comment, number one you didn't specifically say white supremacist, you just talked about those emboldened by Trump's words. To anyone considering voting for Trump who does not consider him/herself to be racist, it is potentially offensive. I could see a blue collar guy in Wausau who felt that Obama's words emboldened cop-killers or Islamic terrorists, thinking "Hmmm, they won't admit their own faults, but they attack others. I'm not voting for them." You're trying to reduce to an intellectual argument something that was an emotional event. That kind of intellectual argument plays here, and plays well to the democrat base, but it doesn't work well with blue collar Fred and Ethel from Wausau. Elections are often won, not by the candidate who makes some amazing speech or move, but by the candidate who doesn't screw up. "Deplorables" was a major screw-up by Hillary.

Hillary pissed people off, they didn't vote for her, and she lost. Maybe it was her personality. Maybe it was the old Carville-Stephanopoulis joke about her dress. Maybe it was comments like these. All I'm saying is that it's something you need to watch going forward. Because this country is too divided to go pissing off people whose votes you need.

So to answer your question, no, I'm not necessarily saying they come across to me as condescending. But they do to a bloc of voters that Hillay needed if she were going to win.