2016 U.S. presidential election

We're now living in a world where Billy Bush is worth $10 million to someone. How is that possible? I could replace Billy Bush with a fern and get the exact same ratings... And yet, consider the outcome for the two men involved in that pussy-grabbing video: Bush got $10 million, and Trump got elected president.

The 2016 U.S. Presidential Election took place on November 8, 2016, finally putting to rest fears that President Obama is a commie-Muslim King doing everything possible to further rob the GOP base of their few remaining freedoms and usher in Sharia law before Hillary replaces it with Halakha. Her opponent was Donald J. Trump, an unwitting hero to the thousands of Americans that enjoy writing "y dos EVERYTHING hav to BE abot RACE!??!!" in the comments section of every Yahoo article.

This election was the first in recorded history where both major candidates had higher unfavorable ratings than favorable ratings. The Republican Party was too divided and discredited to stop Trump, the Democratic Party closed ranks to block Bernie Sanders, and, as a result, Trump was the only alternative in November to the hated Wall Street-funded status quo represented by Hillary Clinton (despite Trump being a wealthy individual who benefited from said status quo).

The election, topping off the already-abysmal year of 2016, resulted in Donald Trump's victory. Theoretically, he should have won 306 electoral votes versus Hillary's 232, but there were seven faithless electors. Clinton lost three votes to Colin Powell, one to Faith Spotted Eagle, and one to Bernie Sanders, while Trump lost two votes to John Kasich and Ron Paul.

Trade
Trump's true innovation was showing how few voters actually crave the small government/let the market decide rhetoric, including GOP base.

Trump has basically adopted the left's long-standing opposition to globalization, word for word. It's a-pro union, hard-left protectionist argument, and his fans think they're free market "conservatives." It just goes to show many of them are angry former Obama voters.

The most significant difference between the two is the most important: Trump has no connections or loyalties to the Carlyle group or PNAC. And trade agreements remain unpopular in battleground states such as Ohio, where it is blamed for years of manufacturing job losses. Republicans don't want new taxes, sure, but they also don't want unfettered free trade, market secularity, and starving infrastructure projects to cut taxes further. Unlike the GOP leaders, they don't think a 2% tax cut is worth crumbling highways. Trump also played off the undercurrent of isolationism in American culture.

Immigration
Trump's making it clear: The election will be referendum on whether Muslim Americans are a fifth column.

Mass deportations and scaling back outsourcing is almost guaranteed to increase wages for the bottom two-thirds of the workforce. It will likely come at the expense of stock prices (since most companies outsource and then use the proceeds to do stock buybacks) and inflation (the big legacy from Reagan). These are problems that don't hit the mid/lower classes whose livelihoods are determined by their wages as opposed to dividends (401ks).

The GOP's first choice in the primary was Jeb Bush, who is a moderate on immigration. After he crashed and burned, they moved on to Rubio, who is pretty reactionary. Rubio was the establishment's way of telling the base they can have anything they want, as long as they compromise on this one point. But the candidates just couldn't resist labeling each other as soft on immigration. Cruz wanted a wall, increased border control with sci-fi technology, all kinds of crazy stuff.

Traditionally, the GOP has avoided addressing those who employ illegal immigrants and gone after the employees. Usually, it's just LIE berals who argue going after the employers, which is why Bush-Rubio's idea for mandatory E-Verify was laughed out of the debates.

Health care
Whoever decided that Obamacare should get rate hikes on November 1 should never work in government again. One week before the general election, everybody got a big bill showing their health care costs increasing. Repeal remains popular, so if the Republicans were to repeal it, they'd likely benefit electorally.

Background noise
Issues that affected the general election, but played no substantial part in the primaries or debates.


 * SCOTUS: Voters may not like his rhetoric, or him, but they made this Faustian bargain for other reasons. Trump holds the Senate and the house. He'll have four years and likely will get two or three Supreme Court seats to fill; with the Senate in hand, he can go as far right as he likes. That will be very far right, since he'll be trying to solidify his base to win a second term.


 * Don't you think she looks tired?: The tops of the major tickets are the oldest they have ever been in history. Both major candidates were forced to cough up their medical records.


 * Donald's a heart attack waiting to happen, subsists entirely on fast food, brags about only getting 3-4 hours of sleep (ah, fascists and their love of lack of sleep), and has a family history of dementia—but at least he isn't being hoisted like a scarecrow into a waiting van.


 * Syria: Trump was the peace candidate. His supporters think of war as foreign aid. They'd rather the military be deployed against black people in the cities (and if a few armored vehicles can be spared, helping the local police in their town with their blacks and white trash) and patrolling the southern border.


 * There's actually a complicated argument to be had over the reality that supporting these groups always leads to bad things down the line vs. the other reality that these guys are pretty good at killing the people we want them to. But we're light-years away from that discussion as the current discourse stands.


 * PC Culture: Social conservatism doesn't fly as far as it did in the '90s. The materialist streak that drove conservatism in the '80s is becoming increasingly radicalized towards, to reflect the growing progressive chorus on the left. This is actually pretty smart because it appeals to young people who might hate certain aspects of liberalism, but can't relate to the old culture war stuff.


 * Climate: Saying "Because we're going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business, right, Tim?" in the middle of coal country is actually all the media's fault! (The context behind that quote is not that great, really.)


 * Guns: 87% of people support the idea that suspected terrorists shouldn't be allowed to purchase assault weapons. Furthermore, 90% of Republicans support this. The problem is that plenty of law-abiding people were placed on the terror watchlist erroneously. That's the problem with secret lists, secret courts, and zero meaningful oversight.


 * Another likelihood is that Democrats would instead use this issue as a hammer to bonk Republicans over the head with in November. This election will be about turnout, so both parties need their bases to be riled up.


 * Worth noting: The GOP is likely to retain their raw numerical advantage in the House, but their cushion will be hit. The Senate is statistically expected to flip, and that cushion is the only thing preventing gun laws from being passed.


 * Net Neutrality: Ike attacked the military. Nixon opened China. Reagan fucked the elderly. Bush turned Texas brown.  Trump, the first meme President: NET NEUTRALITY MUST GO!


 * Citizens United: In exchange for Bernie's endorsement, Hillary pledged to introduce an amendment to overturn Citizens United in her first 30 days as President. First of all, the lion's share of her big-money donations came from corporations; approximately 27% of it is dark money coming through SuperPACs. This is not the profile of a person who is going to turn off the spigot.


 * Second, despite the common view of SCOTUS as a tool of the executive branch, rehearing a case that's less than a decade old is not something the Court likes to do.  Furthermore, an amendment takes a 2/3 vote, an untenably high bar for at least the next two elections (and probably the next four). Do you think the GOP will make it virtually illegal to run attack ads on Hillary Clinton again? Without their cooperation, any campaign finance reform is dead on arrival.

Populism
Sanders and Trump showed that if you convince the people you're out to take on the system, you can get a lot further than your actual political acumen would otherwise take you. Trump never had a coherent plan, but Bernie - and Hillary, for that matter - was seldom going to get what he wanted to be done either given the Republican Congress. In terms of policy, Trump and Sanders were on the opposite ends, but very similar in campaigning and tactics. They both made economically populist appeals to the working class and railed against the political establishment. They both sold themselves as anti-"insider". Both claimed to be a victim of the media. They both presented themselves as the only man who can clean up D.C. and serve the American people. They both presented their opponents as stooges/sell-outs. They both had vociferous and loyal supporters.

Nominees and Primaries
Then Incumbent president Barack Obama was ineligible to run in the 2016 Presidential election due to term-limits.

Democratic Party
A largely-untested campaigner. Her '08 campaign was shockingly open to the public after her own staff kept leaking their own emails; she was so bad at running it that they wanted to clarify the dysfunction wasn't from them.

Kaine broke onto the national stage following his response to the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007. After that, he was promptly forgotten.

Primary battles
Bernie started off very positive and treated Hillary with kid gloves, but after one of his staffers got caught snooping in the Clinton database, and the DNC blocked access to voter data from his campaign, the tone completely changed. Many of his supporters believe that the DNC stole the election from Sanders, which furthers youth disenchantment and helps drive down their turnout.

The real story here isn't "rigging". It's the funneling of state and Congressional campaign money into an incompetently-run presidential election. Summary: Obama neglected the party apparatus entirely; he has his own thing. Wasserman-Schultz doesn't fundraise well, bleeds party coffers dry by giving consultants cushy contracts. In 2015, Hillary was raising money from Harvey Weinstein and the like; Robby Mook offers to keep the party afloat in exchange for Democrats deferring to HRC at all times, not a big deal because they expect her to walk away with it. The voting starts, and Sanders is stronger than even Sanders expected. The party has to field competitive primaries, but itself functions as an arm of the Clinton campaign, who actually "owns" the party via controlling the purse strings. This is a big deal that everyone forgot about in '16; Hillary killed the down-ballot both because of her unpopularity and because SHE TOOK ALL THEIR MONEY.

Republican Party
The Republican nominee is known popularly for kicking Gary Busey off his game show.

An ice-chewing X-Man villain who calls his wife "mother."

Primary battles
Conventional campaigning was wasted money this cycle, as "vanity" candidates like Trump and Carson began way ahead of the candidates spending millions on field operations. He absolutely crushed Rand Paul and Jeb Bush, both of whom had robust field campaigns. CNN's job is to make money, and Trump brings eyeballs.

More to the point, their core base is dying off, so Republicans need to run more TV/movie stars. Worked with Reagan, Schwarzenegger, and now a reality show star (face it, he was better at that than real estate). It's not irrelevant that Clint Eastwood, of all people, was given a prime-time speaking slot at the last convention.

Adding to that, you can see by the step change in the graph here that the leadership had plenty of time to unite and stop Trump, but kept their heads firmly in their asses. 17 nominees, fucking really?

Libertarian Party
Gary is the first Libertarian candidate to poll over 10%, so that's a breath of fresh air to a drowning man. Most of his "supporters" were waiting for an excuse to jump ship like the rats they are.

Legal counsel during the Watergate inquiry, an odd coincidence.

I just got a nomination, but then I got high
Both Johnson and his campaign were abysmal failures during the election, though. His talking points were pretty damn uninspiring, mainly because he ignored economic issues at a time when economic issues were paramount and literally defaulted to their "we support weed" argument. (Remember that video of Johnson blowing up on a Guardian reporter after he was questioned about his economic plans?) As a speaker, he's completely forgettable.

A significant minority turned out to vote "Not Trump" while staying true to the party down-ballot. Many of them said they'd vote Johnson or maybe Clinton (or if you're in Utah, Evan McMullin). Still, in the privacy of the voting booth, they caved. In every state, the number of people who voted for Johnson was significantly less than his projected share of the vote. In fact, if 1% of the voters had chosen Johnson instead of Trump (like they kept telling pollsters), Clinton would be president.

Remember, we're dealing with Libertarians. You don't want to go down that rabbit hole.

Green Party
"Hmmm, hmmm…yeah, yeah…hmmm, hmmm…Nader…Nader…Nader…Nader…"

Star of TV's Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

To save some people the trip to Google...
Yes, Darryl Cherney was the Green Party candidate running against Jill Stein. You Jillbots never give up, do you? Last we checked, the party doesn't vote until August! #SeeYouInHouston

Among his other promises, Cherney wants to pardon Julian Assange... after he's been charged in Sweden? (Because he says he's gonna apply the Constitution internationally, duh. One World!)

Minor third party candidates
The following candidates may be standing in one or more states. They ranged from long-established minor parties to joke candidates.


 * for the American Freedom Party, whom even Wikipedia describes as a "white supremacist"
 * Tom Hoefling for the Constitution Party and its off-shoot America's Party
 * James Hedges for the Prohibition Party
 * Gloria La Riva, a community activist and organizer for the American Indian Movement, for the Party for Socialism and Liberation in Colorado, and the Peace and Freedom Party in California
 * Mimi Soltysik for the Socialist Party USA
 * Alyson Kennedy, for the Socialist Workers Party
 * , a former teacher and one-time supporter of the Black Panther Party from Alabama, for the Workers World Party
 * Chris Keniston, for the Veterans Party of America
 * Evan McMullin, an anti-Trump conservative Republican running as an independent candidate in Utah
 * , a restauranteur standing for the Nutrition Party, at least in Colorado
 * , for Reform Party and his own American Delta Party; he had previously campaigned for the Democrat nomination in 2016
 * Dan R. Vacek, a pro-marijuana activist for Legal Marijuana Now, standing in Iowa and Minnesota
 * David French, attorney and blogger for National Review. Ah, just what this country needs: someone who reviews Game of Thrones episodes while complaining about its SJW fanbase, every week as president. French, a registered Independent, put out a statement saying that he deeply considered running, but decided not to.

Repudiation
Mexican government policies are pushing migration north. There isn't any sensible approach except what we need to do simultaneously, you know — secure our borders, technology, personnel, physical barriers if necessary, in some places.

I have an especially purulent contempt for those Democrats who went cravenly along with the bellicose frenzy back in ’03, as opposed to the more formal “Morning, Sam/ Morning, Ralph” enmity I feel toward Republicans, who are, by their own cheerful admission, out-and-out villains. My feeling toward Republicans is like my feeling about sharks... It may be true that sexism was a factor in this campaign—I myself voiced my suspicion months ago that America still hated women more than it hated black men—but, in the end, Hillary Clinton lost because she deserved to.

Trump accidentally stumbled (and lucked) his way into a path to victory. We know he didn't use data or anything because he doesn't trust statistics. Apparently, Trump just held mass rallies where he thought the most people would show up. Zero data or voter mobilization. Everyone was mocking him for campaigning in Clinton's northern firewall. Using pure animalistic instinct, he discovered a small number of whites in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania were willing to switch parties, and he dragged the Republicans kicking and screaming over the finish line. Of course, he'd never have won if Clinton had been nearly as good as Obama at inspiring people to turn out for her; Democratic turnout dropped significantly in 2016 in big liberal cities in swing states (e.g., Milwaukee and Detroit), obviously due to a lack of enthusiasm for Clinton.

More to the point, Trump flipped four states (Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin) despite getting a plurality of the vote in each: most voters voted against him but didn't unite behind Clinton enough to allow her to win. Bernie Sanders often notes, correctly, that Trump's victory was really more of a Clinton loss than a Trump victory: Trump's improvements over Romney were modest at best compared with the massive dropoff in support for Clinton compared to Obama. Therefore, it is clear that disapproval of Clinton was more important than approval of Trump. It is inaccurate to point to Trump's nonexistent "brilliant strategy" as the reason for his victory. Also, the fact that the race was close was hardly surprising given that the Dems had controlled the White House for 8 years already and that the economy wasn't exactly spectacular.

Trump did amazing with people on the bottom half compared to his predecessors, Clinton did amazing with people on the top half compared to her predecessors. They still trended the traditional rich/poor divide, but the shift was staggering. Clinton won a ton of hyper-rich districts that haven't been Dem since FDR like Orange County. The big shock was Pennsylvania going for Trump, despite the numerous terrible things he said about the state. He did better in PA during the primaries than the other candidates.

The media is stuck on a very contrarian idea that Trump's win had nothing to do with the economy and that the Electoral College stole the election. They also pretend that Trump's economic message played no part. Still, a state-by-state survey showed that the people who actually matter in Presidential elections care more about economics than people in safe states. In her new book, Hillary instead blames Russia, blames the FBI, blames other people generally, and sexism.

Hillary outspent her opponent by a considerable amount, had virtually the entire establishment's backing, and still lost:


 * Trump entered the race after a meeting with Bill, where he was encouraged to "have a bigger role in shaping the future." They literally handpicked their opponent and still lost to him. She even signal-boosted him because she thought he would lose. It was the "pied Piper" strategy per the emails.
 * Didn't campaign where Bernie beat her. Gambled her entire campaign on 8-year-old polling data from the previous President. The polling led many liberals to believe they didn't even need to vote, and led Trump supporters to believe they needed to vote en masse to prove a point. More Democrats voted for Trump than Republicans voted for Clinton, despite the "Never Trump" noise.  Clinton mistook damage control for party disloyalty, and it cost the Democrats big in down-ballot races.
 * She also put no effort into campaigning in the rust belt even though her husband and other people told her to. She made little or no attempt to connect with people outside her base of middle-class professionals and wealthy backers. Her campaign was run by soulless policy robots and her roundtable of sorority girls. If you read the post-mortem and Podesta's emails, it's like they're trying to assemble this simulacrum half-blind, whereby whatever they decide will be what the candidate (most qualified of all time) not only has always been, but is also ipso facto evidence of her being the most qualified of all time. Clinton accidentally insulted the people who she wanted to vote for her ("...put coal out of business..." "...basement dwellers....", "...basket of deplorables...") because she thought it was going to be a massive blowout win.
 * It's not Trump's economic policy that made him win; it was Clinton's failure to establish a competing vision about economics and power that did. The Democrats left a vacuum. She actually had some policies that maybe would have helped people that didn't vote for her a little, but they were bloodless market-driven incentive type stuff that nobody sane would get excited about to keep things sweet with donors.  Even if Clinton could have broken 50% of the popular vote (which looked unlikely anyway), they'd have said the election results were simply a referendum on Trump and not actually reflecting the desires of the American people.
 * Hillary was caught not properly caring for classified information from the Defense Department. If it was a subordinate of hers, they would have been 100% charged. Still, because she's an "Original Classifying Authority" (as per an Obama signed), then she can keep moving the goalposts whenever it's convenient and make rhetorical exercises like there being no proof of intent (which is impossible unless she was dumb enough to put it on paper), even though she was an OCA for the wrong department. Her lawyer husband then decided to have an "impromptu" meeting with the attorney general, prompting Lorretta Lynch to recuse herself. FBI Director James Comey confirmed the sketchiness in a July press conference. Nate Silver did the analysis and came back saying that the Comey Letter (which Giuliani boasted about knowing was coming for weeks until people pointed out that it was illegal for him and the FBI to be sitting on) was enough to push Trump over the top at precisely the right time. Clinton collapsed from a 4% lead to 2% in the week following his little stunt.
 * We also found out the Clinton campaign financed the so-called "piss tape" dossier. It was in and out of the news in the blink of an eye. Right-wingers are noticing that and will be endlessly using it for recruitment. Good luck trying to stop Trump when right-wingers have evidence of a conspiracy against Trump. All they had to do was allow Trump to fail on his own and fight him legislatively. Still, they led the Democrats into contributing to the fuel that will unite the Republicans under Trump for the foreseeable future.

Three-fifths of a vote
Surveys showed Hillary polling lower among Cubans than in other states with a high Latino population. Still, North Carolina should have almost been in the bag for Clinton, and Arizona was still in play. In all three states, people of color make up a much larger population share than they do in other states. Because whites are basically the only demographic who felt energized by Trump, pollsters significantly overestimated her chances.

Lots of minorities were effectively banned from the polls. In 2013, the Roberts Court struck down a crucial part of the Voting Rights Act, which mandated the DOJ to review changes in states with a history of voter discrimination (i.e., the entire South), to make sure they don't disproportionately affect people of color (and poor whites). This freed up Republicans to prevent as many Democrats from voting as possible. Several hundred polling places were closed in these states, disproportionately in areas with non-white residents, and many had to wait hours in line to cast a vote--if they bothered to show up at all. Voter ID laws, which disproportionately affect people who lack time to register for them (e.g., poor people), also played a role.

Not to be outdone, Governor Rick Scott (R-FL) announced they wouldn't reschedule the deadline for voter registration, even after a hurricane swept the state just days prior. A federal judge overruled him.

These states also have "tough on crime" measures that result in minorities losing their right to vote. If rural white backlash cost the Democrats the north, Jim Crow-era policies cost them the south.

Videos

 * Captain America: Uncivil War
 * We should really be using Brooker to predict the future at this point.