Category Archives: election 2024

13 million

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On the morning of 9/11/2001 I woke up, turned on NPR as I got dressed, and heard a report that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. I turned on the television just in time to see the second plane hit. It was surreal. It was gutting. I vacillated between disbelief and horror. But I knew immediately that the entire world had just changed, and the change was going to be awful.

Same thing happened yesterday morning. I woke up, turned on NPR as I dressed, and heard the unthinkable news that Donald Trump had won the 2024 election. Disbelief, horror, and the same sinking awareness that the entire world had just changed. And the change is going to be fucking awful.

This morning I woke up and decided not to turn on NPR. I did, though, decide to look at the Electoral College vote. I expected the results to show that, like Trump’s first election in 2016, Trump had won the Electoral College vote while losing the popular vote.

But no. Trump won the popular vote. He actually got more votes than Kamala Harris. I just typed that sentence and it still doesn’t make any sense. How was it possible for Trump to get more votes than Harris? I mean, the guy ran the shittiest presidential campaign in US history. The guy was actually shouting about Haitians eating pets. He’d been convicted of 34 felonies, and found liable for sexual assault. How the fuck did that guy win?

This is how:

2020
Trump: 74 million votes
Biden: 81 million votes (the most votes ever cast for a presidential candidate in the US)

2024
Trump: 72 million votes
Harris: 68 million votes.

That’s how. Thirteen million people who’d voted for Joe Biden didn’t turn up. Thirteen million people just didn’t fucking vote. Thirteen million.

Why? I don’t know. I can’t be bothered to research their reasons. Before the election, I heard people complaining that Harris was campaigning with disaffected Republicans. Maybe some people stayed home because they didn’t like Liz Cheney. I heard people complaining Harris had flip-flopped on fracking. Maybe they didn’t vote because of environmental reasons. A lot of people, including me, were angry because she didn’t denounce the Palestinian genocide as vociferously as she should have. Maybe people sat out the vote as a protest. Maybe some people just didn’t want to vote for a Black woman. Maybe they decided to vote for Jill Fucking Stein or RFK. I heard people complaining about how Harris campaigned, that she didn’t do enough interviews, that she gave too many interviews to the wrong news outlets, that she ignored certain demographic groups. Maybe voters stayed home because they felt excluded. Or maybe some people saw all the enthusiasm for Harris on the news and decided she was going to win anyway so they felt they didn’t need to show up and vote.

The reasons really don’t matter. Not now. They didn’t fucking vote; that’s all that matters. They didn’t vote, and Donald Trump won. He got two million fewer votes than last time, and he still fucking won.

No, that’s not true. Not really. Trump didn’t win. Thirteen million voters gave it to him. Because of reasons.

The Palestinians? They’re more completely fucked now than before. Ukraine, absolutely fucked. Liz Cheney, fucked. The environment, fucked in so many ways you need an abacus to keep count. Trans people, fucked. Immigrants, fucked. People who look like they might be immigrants, fucked. Freedom of the Press, fucked. Reproductive rights, fucked. The list of people and causes that will be fucked over is long and deep. Things are going to get exceedingly ugly in the US. In the world. So very fucked.

Because thirteen million decided not to vote. They may never get the chance to vote again.

EDITORIAL NOTE: I’ve ended a lot of posts on this blog with a rant about the necessity to burn the patriarchy to the ground. I passionately believe that needs to be done. Patriarchy hurts everybody. I’m not going to include the rant today, because the American voters just invited the ugliest aspects of patriarchy to run the government and today I’m just too emotionally exhausted to shout. Tomorrow–or maybe next week, or next month–I’ll be less resigned. But today, the patriarchy has kicked my ass.

trump at madison square garden

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Every so often I take a stiff drink and subject myself to the fetid swamp of FreeRepublic.com in order to find out what’s on their feverish minds. This morning I wondered how these ‘patriots’ would respond to the ‘comedy’ at Trump’s Bund rally in Madison Square Garden.

As usual, their first response to anything that might reflect negatively on Trump is to claim it’s Democratic ratfucking or a false flag attack by the Deep State. In this case, they let the Deep State off the hook and went straight to sneaky Democratic infiltration tactics.

There is no doubt that this racist POS is a Kumrade supporter. He should be exposed immediately.
by alstewartfan

I’m guessing the comedian was implanted by the rat party.
by No name given

He may have thrown the Harris campaign a badly needed lifeline. It would not surprise me if he was a DNC plant.
by Dan in Wichita

You would have to prove to me beyond any doubt whatsoever that this person wasn’t simply a plant to show his indignation.
If someone is so mentally insufficient that they take such sincere offense at a joke, they aren’t capable of voting on any intellectual level. All emotion. Sounds like a Leftist.
I say a plant.
by rlmorel

Surprisingly, most Freepers agreed the comedy was racist. Not everybody, of course, but I’ve never seen this much general condemnation of a speaker supporting Trump. However, even those who felt the humor was racist focused their disapproval on whoever invited the comedian. They saw it primarily as a political or tactical mistake.

sigh this is really frustrating. why was this non-funny person even invited to speak? why are standards so low for this kind of event?!
by CondoleezzaProtege

It’s outrageous and disgusting.
by Romulus

It was an unforced error on the part of Trump’s campaign, but it will probably not have a huge impact. The electorate has become more sophisticated these days. Most have learned to filter out the “Trump is a felon”, “Trump is a NAZI”, “Trump is a threat to Democracy” talk and focus on what matters.
by mbrfl

IMO it’s such an unforced error. There was no need for something so stupid.
by hillarys cankles

Of course, there were those who defended the ‘comedy.’ Some thought it was actually funny. Some complained about the limits placed on free speech. Some felt that Democrats just don’t know how to take a joke.

You cannot joke about anyone other than white males. Let them shout from the rooftops and watch the entire act.
by bray

NYC humor is not MAGA humor.
by stars & stripes forever

I thought he was funny. He told about a pile of trash floating in the Atlantic Ocean, they call it Puerto Rico.
by tired&retired

Back to the joke. Good jokes have some truth to them. This was one of them.
by PeterPrinciple

“Distressing result of eating turkey day after day.
The poor old party has come out all over feathers“

Finally, there were Freepers who simply didn’t understand what the fuss was about. Somebody told a bad joke, who cares? It’s not a big deal. It’ll all be forgotten soon. Nobody cares about Puerto Rico anyway. It’ll have no effect on the election at all.

Puerto Rico isn’t actually a state so although they can technically vote, they don’t actually get a single Electoral vote…So (shrug) oh well I guess..
by apillar

Most Puerto Ricans I know in the US are voting Trump. They left the island “paradise” of Puerto Rico for a reason.
by LeonardFMason

I don’t visit FR very often these days. I’ve lost my ability to be dispassionate about it. But one thing I did find interesting on this visit: more people are willing to openly criticize Trump, to call his competence into question, to acknowledge some of his flaws. They’re all still going to vote for him, of course, but he’s been tarnished. He’s no longer the Flawless Genius he once was.

And when Trump’s support on FreeRepublic begins to get squishy, well…as my kin used to say, “A pig has enough arithmetic to take a short cut to the trough.” They loved him when he was a winner. They still loved him when they thought he’d been cheated. But will they still love him when he’s a two-time loser?

my prediction

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We’re going to have a history-making election in eleven days. Here’s what I think will happen. Wait…two things. First, let me admit I’ve been wildly wrong before, especially in 2016 when I was absolutely confident Hillary Clinton would win big. Second, this post will be ever so much better if you read it using the voice of Maria Ouspenskaya. Okay, right, here’s what I think will happen:

  1. Harris wins, carried primarily by women who are mobilized by Dobbs. At least ONE of the seven swing states will be a landslide Harris victory. If she wins North Carolina early, that’s it–game over.
  2. Trump will obviously claim victory, will claim fraud, will challenge everything in court, and will lose almost every case–just like last time.
  3. There won’t be any serious Congressional fuckery during the Electoral ballot count.
  4. Jack Smith’s cases against Trump will pick up speed.
  5. Trump will visit a nation in the Middle East (probably the United Arab Emirates, possibly Saudi Arabia–neither of which have extradition treaties with the US) to negotiate a golf course or hotel…and will stay ‘temporarily’.
“Even a man who is pure in heart and says his prayers by night may become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms and Autumn moon is bright.”

That’s it. Those are my predictions. While Donald Trump has–and will apparently always have–passionate supporters, I think most folks are just sick to fucking death of the guy. I think they’ve had enough of his bullshit and chaos. I think even folks who may not have voted for Harris will be relieved if/when Trump finally leaves the stage.

I may be wrong, of course. But I can hear the voice of Maleva talking to Larry Talbot, “as the rain enters the soil, the river enters the sea, so tears run to a predestined end.”

just the right amount of fretting

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We’re two weeks out from election day and there’s a whole lot of OMG OMG Trump’s gonna try to steal the election if he loses OMG WTF do we do now?! floating around in social media. And it’s making some folks downright frantic.

Yeah, Trump is absolutely going to try to steal the election when he loses. That’s just a fact. We all know it. We saw him try to do it four years ago. Of course, he’s going to try it again. This time he’s better prepared for it. This time he knows what he did wrong last time. (Okay, that’s not entirely true; Trump is just a bone-ignorant as he was last time, but now he’s got a cadre of feral GOP fascists who are far more skilled at ratfucking.) This time the stakes are higher…both for the nation and for Trump his ownself. He loses, and he’s looking at prison.

So yeah, it’s understandable that folks are worried. EXCEPT for this: the Dems are also better prepared than last time. We’ve had four years to put as many safeguards in place as possible. We’ve had four years to anticipate Trump’s moves. Things look better for us than they did four years ago. For example:

  • We’ve changed the Electoral Count Act to make it far more difficult for state legislatures to reverse the results of an election.
  • We have hundreds of lawyers, lawyers in every state, ready to counter the GOP’s attempts to ratfuck the votes, and they’ve got dozens of briefs already written and ready to file, tailored to each state.
  • The governors of five of the seven so-called ‘swing’ states are Democrats. The two GOP-led states includes Georgia, where Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger both resisted Trump’s efforts four years ago.
  • Of the 60+ lawsuits brought by Trump four years ago, all but one was shot down. Many of the judges in those cases were Republicans, some appointed by Trump his ownself. They’re no more likely to agree with him this time.
  • Four years ago Trump had the Department of Justice and the Attorney General in his pocket to help him. Now, the DOJ and the AG are more independent.

This isn’t to say that your anxiety isn’t warranted. It’s not to say there’s nothing to fret about. Trump, his Nazgûl lawyers, and his angry supporters are willing to use any corrupt means that might give them a chance to obtain power, including violence. We HAVE to be concerned and vigilant.

I mean, c’mon, look at the amount of badly-applied makeup this guy’s wearing.

But remember, Trump failed last time. He’ll almost certainly fail again. Failure is Trump’s true brand. Trump is all make-up and weird hair. His strength is mostly an illusion. So yeah, there’s reason to fret. It’s right and proper to fret about the election.

Fret enough to get out to vote. Fret enough to encourage your friends and fam to vote. Fret enough to put up a yard sign or cough up some coin to donate to your local candidates. Ain’t nothing wrong with fretting about this election.

But don’t fret too much.

enjoy your genocide?

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A couple of days ago on Bluesky I announced my decision to vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz on Wednesday the 16th, the first day in-person voting was allowed. I knew with mathematical certainty that somebody would respond with a comment about genocide. And sure enough:

Voting for Kamala Harris?
Get fucked, liberal. Enjoy your genocide.

Obviously, Kamala Harris hasn’t done nearly enough to halt the genocide of Palestinians. That’s just a fact. Why she hasn’t done more is worth examining, but her motives don’t much matter to the people in Gaza and the West Bank. It’s absolutely valid if that makes you reluctant to vote for her. It’s valid if it prevents you from voting for her.

But to interpret a vote for Harris as support for genocide is bullshit. Yet, we’re inundated with smarmy ‘enjoy your genocide‘ comments by smug assholes whose illusions of moral superiority allows them to justify putting their personal ideology before the lives of actual people. To suggest that voting for Harris not only makes us complicit with evil, but that we take delight in it is monstrous. Worse, it’s stupid.

After voting and Cajun food, feeling very civic-minded.

The thing is, there are lots of other issues that also deserve our attention. I mean, the fate of representative democracy in the US is on the line. So are women’s rights,. And LGBT rights (especially trans rights). Voter’s rights. There’s the issue of Ukraine and Russian aggression. There’s housing and tax policy, and climate change, and the labor movement, and energy policy, and food safety, and and and.

Voting for a third party candidate (or refusing to vote at all) isn’t going to do dick to help Palestinians—or anybody else. There isn’t a single issue—social, political, economic, environmental—that would improve if Trump gets re-elected. There isn’t any likelihood of the lives of marginalized groups being improved if Trump returns to the White House. Moral grandstanding is selfish when others are at risk.

So yes, I voted for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz yesterday. To me, it was the obvious choice. To me, it was the only moral choice, the only choice that might actually help people.

EDITORIAL NOTE: One of the best things about Bluesky is the blocking mechanics. If a person accuses you of enjoying genocide, you can simply block them…and hey, bingo, they disappear. You don’t see them, they can’t see you, and the green grass grows all around, all around.

that bastard Pythagoras

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I have a problem with the ancient Greeks. I can never remember who did what, who said what, and who taught what. I can never quite remember which ones were poets, which ones where philosophers, which ones were mathematicians, which ones were playwrights, which ones were scientists. It doesn’t really matter; it almost always turns out that each of them basically did everything.

But I know this: it’s that bastard Pythagoras who’s credited with first writing ‘There are two sides to every question.’ Then a couple thousand years later, Thomas Jefferson added fuel to the fire in a letter; he wrote: “There’s always a different point of view, which is entitled to be heard.”

Yeah, no.

Pythagoras and Jefferson, those guys took it for granted that those questions and different points of view would be reasonable, at least semi-rational, and somewhat honest. But that’s not the world we live in today. Today a motherfucker will flat out lie his ass off, knowing the news media will find a way to soften–or worse, justify–the lie. Not only that, they’ll dodge using the term ‘lie.’

One of the lead stories in this morning’s WaPo started with this: Donald Trump and his campaign have waged an aggressive campaign against fact-checking. Which is to say Trump doesn’t want anybody to call him out for lying. The article went on to list a few of his lies, calling them ‘falsehoods’ or ‘fabricated tales.’ Fabricated fucking tales. Aesop, another of those Greeks, he told fabricated tales. Donald Trump tells lies.

Pythagoras. I’m not saying it’s all his fault, but c’mon.

But because of that bastard Pythagoras, WaPo felt compelled to include another side to the story. Ready? This: Harris, too, has taken a cautious approach to interviews. Jesus suffering fuck. That ‘too‘ carries a lot of weight. It suggests Trump’s lies are a ‘cautious approach to interviews’ and Harris is basically doing the same thing. That’s not true. In essence, WaPo is lying about Harris in order to be ‘fair’ to that lying sumbitch Donald Trump.

This stuff isn’t complicated. Yeah, there ARE at least two sides to every legitimate question. But c’mon, journalists, do your fucking job. If Candidate A says, “Gravity exists and a fall from a great height can kill you” and Candidate B says, “Gravity is just a theory and the government can’t stop me from jumping from a great height” that doesn’t mean there are two sides to the gravity story. If you report Gravity opponent not afraid of great height risk you’re basically telling folks it’s okay to be suspicious of gravitation. That’s not news; that’s you being irresponsible by spreading bullshit.

Journalists, Pythagoras and Thomas Jefferson aren’t the boss of you. Stop spreading bullshit. If those guys were around today, they’d say, “There are two sides to every question, but c’mon, you can ignore obvious bullshit” or “There’s always a different point of view, which is entitled to be heard, but complete fuckwits should be shrugged off.”

Grow the fuck up, journalists, Call a lie a lie. Do your goddamn job.

trump and his nazgûl advisors want to take us back to 1798

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Shit’s getting way beyond weird now. We’re moving into deeply scary fascist lunacy. Yesterday Trump posted this:

I will invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to target and dismantle every migrant criminal network operating on American soil.

Okay, we can be confident Trump himself is completely ignorant of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798. But some of his Nazgûl advisors are as clever as they are hateful, and they’ve latched onto an ugly 226-year-old chunk of legislation. The Act in question was one of a set of four laws dealing with immigration and speech enacted in response to an undeclared war with the French First Republic (after the fledgling United States decided to stiff France for loans they’d accepted during the American Revolution).

Three of those laws–the Naturalization Act (dealing with the requirements for citizenship), the Alien Friends Act (allowing the imprisonment and deportation of non-citizens), and the Sedition Act (criminalizing false and malicious statements about the government)–are no longer in effect. They were either repealed or allowed to lapse. But the Alien Enemies Act is still, weirdly, in effect. It’s now Chapter 3 under Title 50 of the U.S. Code. It states:

[A]ll natives, citizens, denizens, or subjects of the hostile nation or government, being of the age of fourteen years and upward, who shall be within the United States and not actually naturalized, shall be liable to be apprehended, restrained, secured, and removed as alien enemies.

It was used against the French in that undeclared war in 1798, against the British in the War of 1812, and against Japanese-Americans after the attack on Pearl Harbor at the beginning of World War 2 (and to a much lesser extent, against Germans and Italians after the US entered the war). Don’t ever forget that 82 years ago the US forcibly rounded up approximately 120,000 men, women, and children of Japanese descent, and detained them without trial for around three years.

This hateful fuck will try to end representative democracy in the US.

Could it happen again? Yep. If Trump should win/steal the election and invoke the Alien Enemies Act, it absolutely could happen again. Obviously, the act would be appealed to SCOTUS. Although none of the Acts of 1798 were subjected to judicial review (Marbury v. Madison, which confirmed the concept of judicial review, wasn’t decided until 1803), the few SCOTUS references to the Alien and Sedition Acts have suggested the Court would consider them unconstitutional. But that was before the current Trump Court, which is so far up Trump’s ass that they granted him wide immunity for ‘official’ actions. It’s very possible this Court would allow it.

Remember this: the Act refers to people “not actually naturalized.” To be eligible to begin the naturalization process, you have to have been a permanent resident in the US for at least five years (three years if you are married to a U.S. citizen). Once the process has begun, it still takes around another six months or so to become a citizen. That means people who’ve been living legally in the US for five and a half years could still be detained, confined without trial, and deported by Trump.

This is fucking terrifying on so many levels. Trump back in power, with a cooperative SCOTUS and aides who are dedicated fascists, will do unimaginable damage, not just to the US and representative democracy, but to the entire world.

picking up stones

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Trump: Women, I am your protector.
Women: You’re what?
Trump: You will no longer be abandoned, lonely, or scared.
Women: Okay, dude, you’re creeping the fuck out of us right now.
Trump: You will no longer be in danger.
Women: Oh shit, we are deffo in danger now.
Trump: Your groceries will be more affordable.
Women: [looking at each other] The fuck?
Trump: You will be able to turn on your faucet and have water come out.
Women: [looking at each other] Yeah, I don’t know. I’ve got segue whiplash.
Trump: You will no longer have to be depressed or unhappy.
Women: While you’re talking, there isn’t enough Xanax in the world.
Trump: You will no longer have to think about abortion.
Women: Uh, yeah, I’m pretty sure we will.
Trump: You will no longer have to worry about strangers eating your cats.
Women: Jesus suffering fuck, this guy.
Trump: I will protect women at a level they have never seen before.
Women: Fuck you in the neck, we can protect ourselves.
Trump: Nobody protects women more than me.
Women: We’re calling E. Jean Carroll right now.
Trump: Women will be happy.
Women: [Picking up stones] Feeling happier already.

EDITORIAL NOTE: We must burn the patriarchy. Burn it to the ground. Burn it, gather the ashes, piss on them, douse them in kerosene, set them on fire again. Burn the patriarchy, then drive a stake directly through the ashes where its black heart used to be. Set fire to the stake. Keep burning it, over and over. Burn it for generations. Nuke it from orbit. Then find a good book, some chocolates, and a cozy chair. Maybe with a cat.