National Politics allowed in General Community this week.

I'm still in shock, as I am sure many of you are. Un-f*cking-believble.

I'm sure we all have many thoughts and feelings about this travesty. I'll share mine as I gather them after some reflection.

Since this is such a traumatic event, I'm going to relax my "local only" rules around the General Community category for the rest of week. So you are welcome to post your thoughts and feelings about the national election here for the time being. :waccosun:

Take good care of yourself and others. This too shall pass... :heart:

The Ukulelians the Santa Rosa ukulele group I play with on Wednesdays is usually practicing holiday songs this time of year. We played the blues for the entire two hours today. The sadder the song the better it seemed to work. It helped but I'm still pissed off at Comey for his stinking letter, Anthony Weiner for his asshole stupid sexting obsession, and Clinton for running her own server. I understand that she needed to keep certain things out of the Republicans hands while she was Secretary of State but it backfired in the worst way possible leaving us starring into the pit. Pretty much enraged at all of it.

I'm posting information about the Santa Rosa Ukulele scene here. The classes are only $2 which goes to the Finley Center to offset the cost of providing the space. Leaders and instructors are not paid.

Hey, Barry, thanks for providing a (limited) opportunity to vent about national issues.

Is it helpful to know this?

A majority of America voted for Hillary. We, the American people, did not elect Trump.

With 99% of the vote tallied, Clinton garnered 60,269,080 votes. Trump got 59,930,946. That works out to 338,134 more votes for Hillary than for Donald. A close race, but Hillary won. Hillary won this election by almost exactly 2 Santa Rosas worth of voters.

True, Trump won this election in the Electoral College. And now we have to deal with the fact that the Electoral College puts Trump in the White House.

Maybe it's time for America to think about changing the way presidents are selected.

One advantage of jettisoning the antiquated Electoral College and going with the popular vote: EVERY VOTE IN EVERY STATE WOULD COUNT EQUALLY.

That ain't the case under our current Electoral College system.

Maybe someone out there can explain what's good about it?

Dan Gurney

Quote:

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Posted in reply to the post by Dan Gurney:

A majority of America voted for Hillary. We, the American people, did not elect Trump....

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It's also important to realize 60 percent of the people who voted for Trump find him repugnant and didn't like voting for him. If you examine the status of non college working class white men you will find this group is under so much stress that their life expectancy is actually going down. So for many it seemed or was a matter of life and death to vote for someone who they believe could help their cause. True there are large numbers of racists and misogynists in that group but I don't believe it is the majority nor the primary driver for their huge turnout especially in the rustbelt states. It is hard for me to believe Trump will be able to do much for them but who knows they might get lucky.

When you look at the map of the red states from the election - it's pretty much the whole country, except for a few blue states in either coast, & Indiana. The media has been full of reports of the rust belt: white people who've lost their jobs, sometimes houses, drug deaths in their towns... much different than Sonoma Co. They were ready to take a gamble on Trump, rather than the same old with Hillary.

Thanks Goat!
I agree about not necessarily needing to exit completely; the threat, err, suggestion alone, accompanied by a high percentage vote for a Cal-Exit would shake Washington in a big way. It's like following-through with a punch though; gotta aim past the objective to deliver maximum impact.

Here's a link to an interesting discussion on DemocracyNow about Electoral College and reform of, with a Stanford Professor, John Koza.

Millions Sign Onto Call for Electoral College
to Award the Presidency to Popular Vote Winner Clinton

Web page for the campaign for a National Popular Vote to reform the Electoral College
https://www.nationalpopularvote.com/

Historical Background of Winner-Take-All system used for Electoral College (John Koza)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubIeQ-uO_b0

It's been a week since the disaster. The shock of it is not quite so sharp, but the horror continues to develop....

None-the-less its time to return to our "regularly scheduled programming" of local-only posts in General Community.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts and feelings about this dramatic shift of reality. I have moved all the national political threads to the National and International Politics category where you are welcome to continue the discussion. Of course any posts with direct local content (organizing a protest, etc) are most welcome here.
We will survive! :waccosun: