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Trump: “If you like your light bulb you can keep your light bulb”
I know we’re supposed to pretend that Trump’s victory isn’t just another example of Obama underestimating the JV team. As for the president’s impressive 53% approval rating, I can only ascribe it to the state he has left his party in.
It’s know it’s hard to believe that being called deplorable, racist, xenophobic, nativist, fascist and jingoistic might make one reticent around pollsters, but here you have it: Donald Trump is learning the nation’s most-guarded secrets while Hillary Clinton is learning to drive to drive a car (a lot of good it will do her in Saudi Arabia.) If we could harness the awesome power of Republican schadenfreude we wouldn’t have to worry about climate change.
Speaking of the climate, how much more complicated do you imagine it to be than polling? It turns out that as with the foreign policy establishment, the domestic policy establishment, the consultant class and the self-styled experts of all kinds, pollsters are engaged in just another form of chiropractic: a useless activity good only for making progressives feel good for a while.
Even – especially? – a Trump skeptic like me is amazed at how much good has taken place before the man has even taken office. Just last week, for example, I managed to get out of jury duty by showing up in my Make America Great Again t-shirt. (If you can’t get out of jury duty then you are, by definition, not my peer.)
Over the next few months, as facts replace narrative, expect the mainstream media to express profound resentment about having to go back to work. As for everyday Americans, everything seems to much more clear only a few days out from the election. For example, Hillary’s incessant pounding of the table on the importance of early voting is now viewed for what it was: a clarion call to vote for her before the other shoe dropped. We’ll never know, of course, had Hillary won if she would have claimed a mandate. All we know is that she certainly has one now.
What are we to make of someone who loses a race between two historically-unpopular candidates? Is this not a victory of sorts?
Then, of course, we have the anti-Trump protesters: far and away the most entertaining aspect of this election. And no, it’s not just the sight of kindergarteners consoling college students over Hillary’s loss. The protesters remind us that some people will always find new things – like the regular, peaceful transfer of power – to be frightening. (By the way, am I the only one who’s noticed that the anti-Trump protesters seem disproportionately white? They should hire some GOP consultants to educate themselves on the importance of Latino outreach.)
But Democrats should look at the bright side. (Long, awkward pause). ANYhoo….
Looking back, every seeming advantage Hillary enjoyed during the election turned out to be a liability. Donna Brazile lost her CNN gig for feeding Hillary questions in advance of the CNN-sponsored debate. Meanwhile, expectations were so low of Hillary that it doesn’t even occur to anyone to so much as call her out for accepting such unfair advantage. Did voters see this as white privilege? You bet they did. But we won’t have Hillary to kick around any longer. My understanding is that she’s already back to using a private email server…
Progressives, meanwhile, are shell-shocked. When they say “This isn’t the America that I know” they’re being truthful: they’ve only see it on flights between LAX and Kennedy.
Of course, there were other candidates and issues on the ballot. The other winner in 2016 is indisputably retail marijuana. For lovers of liberty like me the legalization of retail marijuana in California, Nevada and Massachusetts is long overdue. For a drug that supposedly robs users of ambition and drive, its advocates sure are running circles around their drug-warrior opponents. How long now before Vermont legalizes same-sex weed?
As for that sad sack Obamacare, Trump’s core supporters call for repeal and replacement. But it’s my hope that we retain at least that part of Obamacare responsible for skyrocketing premiums just weeks before each election.
At this point, I wouldn’t put it past Diane Feinstein to accuse skyrocketing premiums of meddling with the election.
Published in General
I love you David Deeble, you made me laugh out loud. That’s twice today I have laughed. Things are picking up.
Yeah, that’s what I was thinking too. Everything you said, I was thinking it. Yeah. It’s amazing how much I was thinking what you said. And I’m not even in one of the Legal Marijuana states.
I must say Mr. Deeble, you are some kind of mind reader…
Happy to hear it, HarrisVentures.
This is great.
I think those premiums mailed out eclipsed everything else that had gone on before.
I used to work with a committee to try to get our town to agree to raise our property taxes to increase our school budgets. One year, one person on the committee realized that we were doomed as long as town meeting was scheduled a week after the property tax bills went out. :) That’s all I could think of, and laugh about, these past six weeks.
Love your columns. Thank you for posting them on Ricochet.
You’re welcome, MarciIn: and thank you for your thoughtful post. Love it!
The protesters remind us that some people will always find new things – like the regular, peaceful transfer of power – to be frightening.
Oh so true!
Love this.
Thank you, Boomerang – and happy to hear it.
Perfect.
I always just wait for them to ask things like:
The best part of that incident was the police sergeant who was the arresting officer for the trial in question trying to keep a straight face at my growing litany.
For civil trials, I usually get eliminated on the basis of occupation.
Heh, heh.
(Applause)
“please, don’t forget your waitress, and remember we’ll be here all week… Tell your friends”
I recommend you reread this post and when you do, imagine it being delivered by Bob Hope in his prime.
I think David does just fine. Would like to compare him with Will Rogers, but very few remember him anymore.
“I don’t make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts.” – Will Rogers
Now, see, this guy’s funny!
I’d like to see a Ricochet throw-down between Deeble and Gould. I know who I’d put my money on, but, even the losers would get a good laugh! Win-win.
I was disturbed when they asked the jury pool here in Baltimore how many had done jail time or were closely related to a convicted felon. Half of the room stood up. None were disqualified on that basis.
I am motivated here to show a quote from Scott Adams’s blog:
Love it!
Thank you, Mezzrow.
Will Rogers, of course, was famous for his line “I’m not a member of any organized political party – I’m a Democrat”. But now I’m reminded of Robert Benchley’s great line “There are two kinds of people in the world: those who divide people into two groups and those who don’t.”
Pollsters can learn a lot from Scott Adams!
That is very funny. I think you should make this a “quote of the day.”
I’m happy to imagine @daviddeeble delivering it in his present state.
There are two kinds of people in the world: real people and hallucinations.
Incidentally, I will never forget how to spell hallucination. It was the word I misspelled and was eliminated by in a junior high spelling bee. I only gave it one L.
David since you started posting on Ricochet I really have not understood why your pieces where not regularly featured on the front page. You are by far the most constantly funny writer on this site. You really should be considered a contributor.
No, you won the spelling bee. But you’re halucinating about the memory.
Thank you, Brian! Please know that that each column takes me about a six-pack, though.
“Laces out!”
There’s some lesson about irony in this story but I haven’t figured out what it is. My mom had been helping me study from a word list for weeks prior to the competition. In the auditorium during the final few minutes before the competition started she was quizzing me on the handful of words she had marked that I had trouble with. I was a little annoyed by this because with my nerves, I just wanted it to start and get it over with. The last word she tried to quiz me on as we were asked to take our places was, believe it or not, hallucination. I remember looking at the typewritten word list, printed on that pastel colored copier paper that was popular in the 90s, with a big pencil underline on hallucination. But I decided the chances of me getting that word were so slim that I needn’t bother to quickly try to learn it. And with all that luck I’ve still never won the lottery.