Listen, no federal money supports abortions. That’s the deal already. What federal money supports is family planning and reproductive health. Can’t we agree that’s a good thing? More education, planning and birth control REDUCES the number of abortions. Isn’t that the goal? (Note that the Guttmacher Institute just released a report that U.S. abortion rates dropped to a record low, falling below the 1973 level — the year Roe vs. Wade made abortion legal.)
If you defund all these programs, what are people going to do? If you state that life begins at fertilization and make abortion illegal, that is not going to stop abortions from happening (see prohibition, the “war on drugs“).
Why is this a women’s issue? Who is making people pregnant?
Yeah, that’s right.
But the burden is on the woman whether it is consensual or not (for birth control too). And the embryo seems to be more important than the woman herself. Why is that? If the woman has the child and struggles financially because the man is nowhere to be found, then she is a “freeloader.”
I hate you with a white-hot rage. I hate you like Kanye hates a drama-free life. I hate you more than I hate people who drive slow in the passing lane.
Why am I foaming at the mouth? Why do I hate you so much?
Apparently there’s yet a new standard now, which is to not confirm a Supreme Court nominee at all.
Sweet baby Jesus, man — you set the new crazy standard when you blocked the moderate nominee Merrick Garland for 11 months! He was a choice people on both sides seemed to like. And you did it just to spite Obama.
And now you have the audacity to be upset that someone might try to block you?
That’s me, Mitch. My head is exploding, Mitch.
Politicians like you are the reason Congress needs term limits.
From 2008 through 2010, you “orchestrated the delivery of nearly half a billion dollars in federal funds, with a pronounced emphasis on projects in [your] home state” of Kentucky, according to a long-form journalism piece on you in Huffington Post.
Yet you haven’t managed to help the people of Kentucky very much. According to that same article, “More than 17 percent of its citizens go without health insurance of any kind, even as the state’s high poverty rate results in more than 880,000 Medicaid patients.” That’s government assistance, Mitch! Aren’t you, as a GOP leader, supposed to be against government handouts?
You are against this legislation because you think, incorrectly, that gender discrimination in the workplace is a thing of the past. “I could be wrong, but most of the barriers have been lowered,” you said in 2014. You’re wrong, Mitch. So wrong. But as a rich, white guy, you don’t understand, and — worse — you don’t care.
More than 30 years in the Senate — a CAREER POLITICIAN (and people seem to hate that) — and what do you have to show for yourself?
Very little but hatred. Yet you were reelected in 2014, which means we all have to look at your evil, smug face for four more years. You’ve even said you relish the villain role. Delightful!
I beg your constituents to hear my plea to boot you on your money-padded posterior in 2020.
Now that my left-leaning self has cycled through the five stages of grief over not getting to have Clinton as president, I want to do a postmortem of the election like I did in 2016.
Here are things to consider now in preparation for 2020:
▪Pick a candidate people like or at least one they feel they can trust. Likeability shouldn’t be a factor, but it is (see Bush vs. Gore and Obama vs. Romney). Clinton is smart. She is a policy wonk and a hard worker. She has many accomplishments. She also has baggage from Bill, Benghazi, etc. (whether deserved or not is not the focus of this discussion). I loved her. She is a fellow Tracy Flick. However, most Republicans have never liked her and even some die-hard Democrats had trouble getting behind her. A perception of being secretive and scheming doesn’t play well when people are pissed about what they think is a corrupt system that doesn’t help working people. It says something when people would rather vote for the person endorsed by the KKK than your candidate. Yes, misogyny is at play, but so is that baggage. Yes, and some people are racist and xenophobic and voted for Trump because they saw a kindred spirit. That’s the worst part of this Trump win.
▪Don’t assume people are doing their research. Anti-intellectualism is alive and well. Memes speak louder than researched articles. Address perceptions and concerns in public early and often. Maybe you didn’t think the emails would be this big of a deal but the people who already mistrusted Clinton did, as they saw the private server as more evidence of suspicious behavior. And then there are the false equivalency issues, but that topic also is for another day.
▪Don’t just talk to other so-called liberal elites. Evaluate carefully the entire electorate. Consider carefully your approach. Promoting Clinton’s 30 years of experience may not have been the right choice in a year where Red State America is angry at the establishment and institutions they perceive to be at fault for the fact that they feel disenfranchised and left behind. It’s easy to blame the president, and they did (and yes, there’s racism at play here too). It doesn’t matter that the GOP has had control of both the Senate and the House for years and didn’t get anything done. Many of those who voted for Trump were mad at everyone in the ideological bubble — conservative elites included. Many Trump voters liked that he was an outsider who didn’t play by the rules. They truly believe he will shake up the system and make changes for good. And maybe he will.
▪Listen to the people in the party who are suggesting alternatives. Bernie Sanders was discounted, then seen as a nuisance. He finally got on board the Clinton train, but many of his supporters never did.If you really wanted to defeat Trump, you should have gone with a Clinton/Sanders ticket. The Democratic Party would have been more united and not throwing votes Jill Stein’s way.
▪ Don’t alienate most of the country. Though the core liberal base really does believe that we are “stronger together,” many Republicans believe some people are not pulling their fair share. Whether they can or are or can’t because of institutionalized racism is a topic for another day. The fact is that many people — voters — have this perception. Speak to their concerns; their concerns should concern us all.
If you don’t understand the feelings of Red State folks because you don’t see all these people on news programs, then you need to do some research yourself and hold the mainstream media accountable. There was an overwhelming narrative that was contradictory: Clinton is bad (Look at all these emails!) and Clinton is good (Trump is crazy!). Many members of the media did not seek the full story of what was happening. As a result, election night was a surprise.
▪ Don’t ignore concepts that people think are affecting their daily lives — whether they are or not. People are upset about immigration and want something tangible done about it. People are scared of terrorists. People are tired of jobs drying up in the Rust Belt. People are pissed about Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) premiums. Clinton discussed these in the abstract while Trump talked about them in concrete terms, albeit wall-building, ban-implementing, fear-mongering ones. He seemed to put America first — perhaps only white, straight America — but that’s what his audience wanted to hear.
You have four more years to get the party back on track. Get with it. Listen to Michael Moore. Shift party focus to serving all of America, including the angry white suburban and rural voter (see video above). Figure out concrete solutions to economic issues, homeland threats and fixing the problems with the Affordable Care Act. Hold the Republicans who control the Senate, House and Oval Office accountable for all their policies, and make sure they don’t roll back reproductive rights, rights for the LBGTQ community, support for legal immigration for people of all religions and nationalities, etc. Work with the Republicans to make this country stronger together. Make sure our institutions are working for everyone — the people upset by the past eight years and the people upset at the prospect of the next four.
You must not have seen my last missive to you. You certainly didn’t get the message. The words in the purple box above are interesting, especially as I took a fresh trip over to your Facebook wall and found this:
My reaction:
I will pledge my vote, but certainly not for whom you want.
After this weekend, I’m certain you exist. The proof: My father is still alive.
I asked you for patience, and you granted my wish.
Here’s a refresher on the circumstances. (You know this already, but I know you have plenty on your plate with all the election-related prayers.)
My cousins were visiting my dad, so Eddie and I made the four-hour (one way) drive to visit him/them. As soon as we got there, and I settled into a chair for a chat, Kat (my stepmother) asked me to fix their DIRECTV setup.
Me:
Hell to me is being tech support.
While trying to get that sorted, Gideon discovered my father’s WiFi connection was down.
Me:
I called DIRECTV tech support as it was clear the issue was bigger than something I could fix, and gave their phone to Eddie. I took my phone to the so-called “computer room” to sort out the modem issue with Windstream.
While on the phone with Windstream, we determined the phone jack might be bad. The following ensued:
Me: Dad, where is another phone jack? Dad: It’s at the end of the phone. Me:
More troubleshooting followed. Meanwhile, I was trapped in this “computer room” feeling like I was in an episode of “Hoarders” and wanting to do this:
If you would like to answer another one of my prayers, you can inspire my father to get rid of the two late ’90s computer systems and desks, floppy disks and miscellaneous paper that clutter this room. And maybe you can compel Kat to get rid of the four creepy dolls, fake ferns and flea-market clocks.
Anyway, thank you for helping me summon the patience necessary to keep from throttling my father. And thank you for helping arrange technicians for both DIRECTV and Windstream to come out Monday. That truly is a miracle.
Good evening! I know you are gearing up for the third (and final, thankfully) presidential debate, so please read this later — like at 3:20 a.m. when you are up tweeting.
When I first wrote you back in July, I said, “I’m sure you are quite lovely in person.” As it turns out, you aren’t. And you have the dubious honor of bringing the P word into the mainstream. Imagine the fun conversations I’ve had with my kids!
And speaking of mainstream and conversations with kids, I do have to thank you. We regular humans are having some interesting conversations that apparently should have happened long before now.
We are talking about rape culture. We are talking about saying to men, “Don’t rape,” instead of telling women, “Don’t look like you are asking for it.” We are talking about the thousands of indignities women face on a regular basis.
On Facebook today, I posted a link to a blog post titled, “It’s Not Okay,” by a writer named Molly.
In response, a man who was a good friend of mine in high school wrote this:
While I certainly appreciate his note, that episode was not on my list of stories. I was thinking more about that time when a guy at a bar grabbed my P word just like you like to do, Mr. Trump. Or when a guy I had just started dating let himself into my apartment and replaced my sheets and shower curtain with ones on which he had drawn himself. Or when a guy assaulted me at gunpoint in college.
Yeah, those are the ones that stick out.
Every woman I know has stories like mine.
And I want to be clear for the purposes of educating you and your defender Rush Limbaugh, I did not want, ask for or agree to any of the above.
If there is consent on both or all three or all four, however many are involved in the sex act, it’s perfectly fine, whatever it is. But if the left ever senses and smells that there’s no consent in part of the equation then here come the rape police. But consent is the magic key to the left. — Rush Limbaugh on his show Oct. 12
So thank you, I guess, for bringing this topic more into the light than it ever has been. It gives me an extra reason to talk to my boys about how to be respectful men and not someone like you.
It’s apparently sweater weather in hell, as I have suddenly developed a bit of affection for you. In fact, I retweeted you last night.
And I don’t even think it was just debate delirium.
I wasn’t a huge fan of yours back in 2012. At the time, I thought of you as a used-car-style smarmy salesman peddling elitism (evidenced succinctly by that 47 percent comment).
You are like an ill-fitting prom dress that suddenly doesn’t seem so bad. “Maybe I can take it in here … and here … and dye it … “
Here’s a roundup from Forbes on Nov. 7, 2012, of why you lost that election. Nothing has changed since 2016 except Trump made it OK to be loud and proud about being racist (and misogynistic and xenophobic).
I received this email from you at 1:12 a.m. today. Have we met? Your name does not sound familiar. A quick search of Facebook revealed your account. We are not friends, so I’m not sure why I am on your mailing list.
I don’t want to keep you hanging on the edge of your seat waiting for my reply, so here it is:
No.
And not only no, but hell no.
While I was on your FB page seeing if we had any friends in common, I found this:
And this:
And, DEAR GOD, this:
It’s clear we are not on the same page about how to make “Amarica” great again. (“Again” implies there was a time when we were better than we are now. When exactly was that? Based on the information you posted publicly, I’m guessing you believe it is when slavery was A-OK.)
First off, let me say that I love your work. My favorite is “The Divine Comedy,” with particular love for the “Inferno” part. I am an orderly person, so I gravitate to categories. The nine circles of Hell speak to me and my Type A personality.
I went on a work trip last week, and I’d like to add people to the circles, if I may.
Candidate: People who meander in the middle of the airport concourse, weaving side to side and making it difficult to walk around them Circle of Hell: First circle — limbo (or maybe the vestibule — land of the indecisive)
Candidate: That guy in the bar who won’t let you have a drink in peace Circle of Hell:Second circle — lust
Candidate: People who stand in the middle of the moving sidewalk when they clearly should move to the right to allow people to pass Circle of Hell: Third circle — gluttony
Candidate: People who take up the airplane arm rest immediately upon sitting Circle of Hell: Fourth circle — greed
Candidate: People who take up seats with their bags in the airport gate area and look at you sullenly if you dare to ask to sit Circle of Hell: Fifth circle — anger
Candidate: People who put their feet on their airplane tray tables Circle of Hell: Sixth circle — heresy (because EWW!)
Candidate: People who are unaware of the circumference of their backpacks Circle of Hell: Seventh circle — violence
Candidate: People who try to get on the plane when their zone has not been called yet Circle of Hell: Eighth circle — fraud
Candidate: The pilot who wants to tell you too much about the flight when you just want to watch the movie Circle of Hell: Ninth circle — treachery [Listen, Captain: You do your job (flying), and I’ll do mine (resting).]
Like I said, I appreciate order. I need these people to get it together or go to (their circles of) Hell.
Thank you, Mr. Alighieri, for considering my suggestions.
(Wait … What’s that? I’m a candidate for at least three circles, you say? No … )
Observe and report 