President Donald Trump

[ILLYRIAN]

Odd, I was so disappointed that the party I would have voted for didn't win, but then if you vote Green's you get used to defeat.
You don't see Green's voters in the streets because their party didn't win, or maybe you do but you think its rush hour traffic.
All those Clinton freaks who exclaimed such shock, horror and disappointment that Trump would caste anger at his defeat if he was defeated. And what happens the Clinton freaks do exactly what they exclaimed shock and horror about. What are they worried about?
Trump spent so much time and effort making threats against all and sundry now that he is in charge, so doing what he said he would do is going to be very hard and that will P off his supporters.
So Americans can expect to go back to getting a new President in two years. But look at the bright side - it won't be that Kardashian twot, he said he'd run in 2020.

What I found the funniest thing said by Trump was that he could shoot a person in Texas and it wouldn't affect the number of people who voted for him. Did he really expect no one to vote for him in Texas, cos he might have shot someone who could have voted for him, really intelligent that guy.

 

[Anyanka Bunny Slayer]

Seems that negativity is going around...

I'm always like this. It has nothing to do with the election. 😉

 

[ILLYRIAN]

Maybe the whole kerfuffle was a ploy by Obama so that the British people wouldn't feel so bad about the Brexit vote.

 

[thrasherpix]

I should mention I live in California. That said, the state varies a lot more than many seem to realize. The stereotypical over the top liberal stereotypes are generally confined to West Hollywood and San Francisco, though a small town near the Oregon border (Arcata) is well known for its hippie-like subculture (though many come and go rather than being actual locals). Beyond that it's a lot more mixed, with a few regions especially conservative (I've even seen native Californians revere the Confederate flag which strikes me as odd, given that I was born and raised in Texas). I believe it was Bakersfield, California, which made me feel like I was already back in rural Texas as (in addition to the heat) it was socially (and politically) conservative there (I was on a road trip to Texas when I stopped there).

Most of those I talked to as I described are from around where I live, but there are 2 exceptions: I talked to my grandmother in rural East Texas by phone, and communicated digitally with a guy in Illinois who can wax brilliantly on all sorts of social topics, including politics which he pays close attention to. We used to talk a lot more than we do today and encourage each other on our writing projects. He's also a major Buffy fan (though I don't think he interacts with the Buffy fandom, and he's a fan of a great many things across several genres).

 

[Monkey Pants]

He's not anti-women. Hillary's campaign people started that rumour, and unfortunately, many people seem to believe it. Yes, he's a bit old-fashioned and can appear a bit chauvinistic, but he loves women. And he doesn't bend over backwards to be politically correct, and says what's on his mind.
As for LGBT, Trump realises that many people are tired of the sudden rush to placate the Hollywood left...to make everything legal. This is one of the MAIN reasons we saw so many states go red last night...and it happened quickly. The small counties of old South, the people that no one really considered, rushed out and voted.
Ultra-conservative? I don't think so. Just not a flaming liberal.

Maybe he likes women as his personal sex dolls, but he certainly doesn't think of them as important or smart. Even with his own daughter he could only talk about her looks, which was...creepy. But then again with all the women he's harassed I'm not surprised.
Neither Hillary or Trump were GREAT candidates, but Hillary was BY FAR better.
Trump is not a politician. He has no plans. At all. He literally has no idea what he's doing.
Hillary has been in politics for many, many years. Working with other countries, working on peace acts, working for women's rights, etc. She actually had plans to make this country better, more equal, cleaner, and more efficient. She's also clearly smarter than Trump, if you watched any of the debates. He is a JOKE. He can't even answer simply questions and had to yell over her to maintain any bit of his superiority.
Trump is a racist, sexist homophobe. All he cares about is looking out for his own--rich white men. He wants the country to be "great again"--like in the fifties when the women stayed home, gays had to be in the closet, and there was no individuality. He wants to set this country back in terms of the economy, women's rights, and LGBT rights that we've worked so hard for. Bye bye to equal marriage, hello to legal conversion therapy. And in case people didn't get it before, trickle down economy DOES NOT WORK. Cutting taxes for the rich and big businesses? Of course...because that's all he's known his whole life. He's one big spoiled rich kid whose daddy had to bail him out of bankruptcy multiple times. He's certainly no brilliant business man, which was the only thing he has going for him.
He encourages racism. The KKK and other white supremacists feel validated in their opinions.
We are cutting off the approval of other countries and many peaceful ties with his election. He's literally going to destroy any world peace we have right now, if he gets his way.
People are afraid of strong women, so they have to try to make Hillary look as evil as possible, and ignore all of Trump's glaring red flags. I can tell you we've never had a president accused of child rape before. Yay America!
We are literally a joke to the world now. I'm simply disgusted.

 

[Guy]

Maybe the whole kerfuffle was a ploy by Obama so that the British people wouldn't feel so bad about the Brexit vote.

I assume you've seen this?

 

[brinkster130]

I'm wondering, American BB'ers, as I'm reading a lot on Twitter from unknowns, how is the atmosphere in your towns/states, and how did your states vote? I'd like to hear from real sources.

Depends on where you are in the country; most states lean one way or the other so the majority of people don't see outside their bubble unless they look.

I'm in California and it's a primarily democratic state. The biggest thing I've seen, heard and felt is the dissapointment in people's acceptance of Trump's hate speech and sexism. People may not be racist or sexist themselves but they clearly had no reservations voting for someone who had no problem representing those things. Back in 2012 Romney made a comment about a "binder full of women" and that derailed his campaign and very possible lost it for him. Fast forward four years and Trump laughs about sexual assault and treats women with disrespect and people don't blink an eye....it just sheds light on an ugly part of our culture. Women are not as valued and respected, rape culture is real and it's ok to not care about that.

In reality the hate and dislike for the candidates was so deep that people were going to be upset either way. To be honest, I was and still am surprised how smoothly things went down.

 

[Skanky Vamp]

To be honest, I was and still am surprised how smoothly things went down.

It wont be over until December. There is growing interest in having the Electors vote for Clinton. As there are only a handful of states which require the Elector's vote to match the state, there are many where the Electors could simply say "for the betterment of the country" or something and not vote Trump. I doubt that will happen, but you don't know what could happen between now and then.

 

[GoSpuffy]

It wont be over until December. There is growing interest in having the Electors vote for Clinton. As there are only a handful of states which require the Elector's vote to match the state, there are many where the Electors could simply say "for the betterment of the country" or something and not vote Trump. I doubt that will happen, but you don't know what could happen between now and then.

that's never happened before, has it?
 

 

[white avenger]

There is growing interest in having the Electors vote for Clinton. As there are only a handful of states which require the Elector's vote to match the state, there are many where the Electors could simply say "for the betterment of the country" or something and not vote Trump.

This seems kind of ironic, considering all the outrage from Democrats when Trump said that he wouldn't question the election results IF HE WON. Seems like they want to have one standard for Republicans and another for Democrats.

For God's sake, people, Hillary took her shot, and she lost. It's over and done with. Live with it. If more Democrats had even bothered to show up at the polls, we probably wouldn't be looking at 4 years of Trump Presidency now. Hillary and all of her people just plain underestimated Trump's ability to get his supporters out to vote, and it cost them the election. They were lazy. They were complacent. They were overconfident. They should have worked harder for their candidate.But all that's history. It can't be changed, just because they weren't prepared. They don't get a do over. They lost, fair and square. They should learn from their mistake and move on, like grown ups.

I'm just grateful that we don't have to refer to Bill as the First Lady now.

 

[Sternbeeere]

I don't know anyone who owns a gun in Portugal. I've never even heard people have a conversation about guns. It's weird when people casually talk about owing them. If I saw anyone who wasn't a police officer with a gun, I'd panic.

It is the same in Germany, almost no one owns a gun here and if he or she does, it is either a police officer or someone who does some kind of sports with those guns, i do not know what its name is though.

Fast forward four years and Trump laughs about sexual assault and treats women with disrespect and people don't blink an eye....it just sheds light on an ugly part of our culture. Women are not as valued and respected, rape culture is real and it's ok to not care about that.

I think there are general changes in societies world wide in that matter, everyone getting more conservative etc.

 

[brinkster130]

I think there are general changes in societies world wide in that matter, everyone getting more conservative etc.

Yes, societies change...that's life. That being said conservative does not equal hating women or being ok with sexual assault. There was a reason why so many in the Republican Party didn't endorse him and spoke out against some of the things he said.

 

[Skanky Vamp]

@GoSpuffy @brinkster130 Actually yes, it has happened. There have been Electors that opted not to vote for whom they "should" have voted for in the past. Multiple occasions of it happening; not often though. But for this they are talking about doing it en masse, which no, that has never been done.

 

[Sternbeeere]

If the electors vote in discordance with the state votes en masse, that would cause protests from all the Trump voters in turn. And as sad as it sounds in this context for some American groups, this would be a huge blow against both democracy and American electoral system. So as nice as it sounds for many, this actually would not be good.

 

[white avenger]

It's my understanding that the electors cast their vote, and, once cast, that's the end of it. Apparently, they are under no obligation to vote according to what the majority of their state's voters choose, but, once cast, their vote stands. There is no changing the vote later. No retro-votes. No do overs. No, "Oh, what I REALLY meant to say was..." In other words, the vote has been taken and totaled. It's over. It's done. The fat lady has walked off the stage, and the curtain is drawn on the 2016 Presidential Election. See you back here in 2020 for a new show. That's all folks. Thanks for coming. Lights out. Bye.

Hillary has accepted it, after a night of "crying uncontrollably" also probably multiple curse words and tossing assorted items around, and, quite possibly, making arrangements to transfer large amounts of cash to offshore accounts and relocate to an extradition free country.

Obama has accepted it (I would have loved to be a fly on the wall during that 90 minute closed door conference!!!) after possibly checking with Hillary about similar travel plans.

The vast majority of the voters on both sides have accepted it.

The ones who are protesting have gone far beyond any Constitutional rights to free speech by disrupting traffic, committing acts of violence, and destroying private property. They have committed criminal acts, and should be arrested.

Remember the old Chinese curse about living in interesting times? It's beginning to get absolutely fascinating around here.

 

[Skanky Vamp]

It's my understanding that the electors cast their vote, and, once cast, that's the end of it. Apparently, they are under no obligation to vote according to what the majority of their state's voters choose, but, once cast, their vote stands. There is no changing the vote later. No retro-votes. No do overs. No, "Oh, what I REALLY meant to say was..."

That's correct, except that they don't officially vote until December 19th. Hence my point in saying what I said. Then they all send their votes in, which has to be received no later than the 28th. They are read. Then on Jan. 6th Congress meets to go over said votes to formally decide the new president as opposed to the president-elect. Then on the 20th they are sworn in.

https://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-college/resources/2016-key-dates.pdf
 

If the electors vote in discordance with the state votes en masse, that would cause protests from all the Trump voters in turn. And as sad as it sounds in this context for some American groups, this would be a huge blow against both democracy and American electoral system. So as nice as it sounds for many, this actually would not be good.

It would be a good way to dismantle the Electoral College and let it strictly be a populous vote.

 

[white avenger]

(The Electoral College) don't officially vote until December 19th.

No, but the results have been broadcast on every network in the U S and quite a few foreign channels. The public already knows how many votes were taken in each state. Whether the Electors are legally bound to abide by he vote of the people or not, they are morally obligated to do so

It would be a good way to dismantle the Electoral College and let it strictly be a populous vote.

No, it would be a disastrous way to begin to dismantle the United States. If the Electoral College is outdated and needs replacing, then try and do it legally and peacefully. Having the Electors arbitrarily change the election results at this point would cause far more harm to the nation than anything Trump could possibly do in 4 short years.

In the meantime, Donald Trump won the election fairly by the rules as they exist at this moment. He's the President Elect, and Hillary Clinton is just someone who tried to be elected and failed. Maybe she can try again in another 4 years, but this election is over.

 

[Skanky Vamp]

If the Electoral College is outdated and needs replacing, then try and do it legally and peacefully.

For all but (I believe) 7 states, it would be legal for the Electors to vote for whomever they want. They have no obligation to vote for who the media says they are to vote for. There are numerous reasons why, some electors, could MORALLY change the vote.

We, as a nation, often just take it for granted the electors will vote for what they are "supposed" to, thus consider their vote as happening on the 8th. But their vote is the only vote that counts, and that does not happen until December 19th. But I do agree it would be disastrous if they did it, I was merely stating that they can, could and would be justified legally and morally in so doing.

 

[white avenger]

I do agree it would be disastrous if they did it, I was merely stating that they can, could and would be justified legally and morally in so doing.

I agree with "can," I accept "could," but I can see no way that their actions in doing so at this point would be in any way "justified," not only by those who voted for Trump, but also by the vast majority of those who voted for Hillary. The votes were tallied and broadcast on national television, and are a matter of public, if not technically official, record. Trying to change that at this point would be totally and undeniably wrong and would set a precedent for future elections.

 

[Skanky Vamp]

I agree with "can," I accept "could," but I can see no way that their actions in doing so at this point would be in any way "justified," not only by those who voted for Trump, but also by the vast majority of those who voted for Hillary. The votes were tallied and broadcast on national television, and are a matter of public, if not technically official, record. Trying to change that at this point would be totally and undeniably wrong and would set a precedent for future elections.

They wouldn't be changing anything as they have never voted before. The electors wouldn't be changing the people's vote, which were tallied and shown, they would only be changing the prognosticators that stated who the electoral votes went to. Just as early polling, and exit polling was inaccurate as to whom was going to win the general election, the media would again be inaccurate as to who would win the electoral votes.

I can list all of the ways they could be justified for casting an alternative vote, but I don't think that really matters, as it won't happen. But again, that is why, even on this forum months ago, I said you needed to get rid of the Electoral College. One vote should equal one vote, and it doesn't. All votes should be equal, and they aren't. The peoples vote does not matter as the people, as it stands, are only saying whom they would like their government officials to vote for for president. It's not dictated (except for again, I believe 7 states) how the electors vote.