My Thoughts on the Ongoing Presidential Election

Well, it's certainly a very ... interesting year, no?

Now that the presidential nomination is essentially wrapped up in both parties, I suppose I should give my thoughts.

I'm late on this, I know.  The primaries have been de facto finished for some time now.  But since I never got around to it before, I'll just post my thoughts now.
(I don't have anything particularly earth-shattering to say.  I won't be giving out any analysis that hasn't been already thought of by millions of other people.  But, like a lot of social media posts, the purpose of this post is just to make clear which positions I identify with, and not to try to say anything new.)

Thoughts On the Democratic Party Primary
I was a supporter of Bernie Sanders in the sense that his rhetoric most closely matched my own political positions.
But in another sense, I was never really a supporter of Bernie Sanders because I never really thought he had a snowball's chance in hell at winning, so what was the use of getting all excited about it?
In fact, I was somewhat mystified by the optimism of Bernie Sanders supporters.  A few of the people in my workplace were big Bernie Sanders supporters, and they really believed he was going to surprise everyone and win the nomination.
I couldn't understand the optimism.  Couldn't everyone see where this was going? I mean, we've seen this in every Democratic primary.  In every Democratic primary, there will be one candidate who gets support of the Democratic Left-Wing.  And in every primary, the Left-Wing candidate always gets crushed by the establishment candidate.

So it was no surprise when Bernie Sanders eventually lost to Hillary.
What was surprising was how close the whole thing came.

It's definitely a statement that the Left-Wing of the Democratic Party, particularly among younger voters, is bigger than anyone thought.
Whether this will translate into any tangible political gains for the Left remains to be seen.  But it was...something.  And I'm sorry I didn't give it more support when it mattered.

As for Hillary...well, since I expected all along this is what would happen, I'm at least spared the outrage, and can skip straight into the accommodation phase.  She is what she is.

I remember as far back as the 1990s hearing the following analysis: "There are no political parties for working people.  The two major political parties are both pro-business parties.  But one is the insane business party, and one is the sane business party.  So you may as well at least vote for the sane option."
Back in the 1990s, you could argue that was rhetorical exaggeration.  But it's scary how much that's turned into prophecy.  The Republican Party has clearly gone insane.
So, yes, I know Hillary Clinton is completely in Wall Street's pocket.  But if my only options are between a sane business party, and an insane business party, I'll pick the sane one, thank you very much.

Thoughts On the Republican Party Primary

So, put me in the camp of people who never took Trump seriously until it was too late.
I thought he was a joke in the summer of 2015.
By the fall, he was an interesting development who was throwing the Republican Primaries into disarray.
But I never really believed the Republicans would be crazy enough to actually choose him.  Right up until Ted Cruz dropped out, I always believed that the Republicans would sober up, or that the Republican political establishment would step in and intervene.

I am still kind of in disbelief that Trump actually won the nomination.  I keep thinking I'll wake up and that it will all be a bad dream.

It's clear that the Republican Party is in some kind of crisis.  But what exactly this all means, and what will be the end result of it... who knows!

Checking in on my Predictions
Since Donald Trump actually won the Republican Primary, my prediction that his campaign wasn't serious is looking like a mistake.  (I already did one mea culpa on that post already).

And yet...even since Donald Trump won the nomination, there has been a lot of evidence coming out that his campaign was never serious.
Like the open letter from one of his former top strategists that the campaign was never supposed to be serious.
Or the recent revelation that Donald Trump has done no work to organize a campaign or to raise money.

Rachel Maddow argues (in my mind convincingly) that this is further evidence that the Trump campaign was just one big book tour.


And then there is the continuing evidence of Donald Trump continuing to say and do stupid things.
This played very well with the Republican Primary voters, of course, but conventional wisdom is that once you win the primary, you have to scramble back for the center.  Donald Trump is not doing that, and I'm not sure why.

Time will tell what his final end game is.  But I'm still not entirely convinced he's serious about being President.  I guess we'll see.

My other prediction, however, about Hillary winning the election, is looking safer than ever.
...And I know people are saying that we can't under-estimate Trump.  And people are saying that, yes,  a Trump victory could happen, and so we should be scared.  And people are saying that Brexit proves that voters can do incredibly stupid things some times.

But I'm going to go ahead and put my reputation on the line on this one.  There is no way Donald Trump will ever win in the general election.  He's going to get creamed in November.  He surprised us all in the primaries, I know, but that's because he was appealing directly to the racists and the crazies in the Republican Party.  There's no way he's going to duplicate that success when he has to try to appeal to moderate voters.

Addendum #1
Put me in the group that thinks the amount of press coverage the Presidential election gets is disproportionate to the importance of the event.
Which political party controls congress is actually much more important than which political party controls the White House.
This is something which the Republicans have figured out a long time ago, but which, unfortunately, the Democrats still are having problems grasping.

And yet, here - I - am, once - again - writing - yet - another  - post - on  -the - Presidential  - election, instead of on my local congressional election.  So I'm as much a part of the problem as anyone else.  What can I say?  I'm only human, and liable to get distracted by the media circus as much as the next guy.  When news shows and late night talk shows talk about the presidential election 7 days a week, of course it's going to be at the forefront of my mind, and all my opinions are going to be formed about that issue.

Addendum #2
Related to addendum 1:
In addition to the huge amount of coverage the Presidential Campaign gets, the way in which it is covered is particularly unhelpful--Horse Race Journalism (W) is unfortunately the dominant way in which the news media covers the campaign.  That is, when the focus isn't on the size of their penises, or other irrelevant issues.

And I'm cynical enough that I'm one of those people who believe that there's an explanation behind this besides journalistic laziness or the need for ratings--the media is owned by big businesses, and the big businesses would just assume run things themselves without the pesky public getting actively involved in issues.

Addendum #3
We are currently witnessing the self-destruction of the Republican Party. Or that is to say, the destruction of the Republican Party in its current form.
I don't think the Republican Party will ever dissolve completely.  Half of this country will always hate the other half of this country, and that hatred will need to be organized in some sort of political party.  But the particular ideology of those parties changes over time.  (In the 1850s, the Republican Party was the party of the Northern Liberals.  Now they're the party of Southern Conservatives.)

Ever since Reagan, the Republican Party has been a very awkward marriage between the Libertarians (who don't want the government to regulate anything) and the Religious Right (who want to use the government to legislate morality).  Because of this awkward alliance, it's never been ideologically consistent within my lifetime.
But at the moment, it's difficult to say what, if anything, the Republicans actually stand for, other than the politics of resentment.  I mean, we know the Republicans really really hate Obama, and they really really hate liberals.  But other than that, they don't seem to be putting forth any type of ideological message.

I suspect this means that the old messages of the Republican Party (fiscal responsibility, and fear of sex) no longer resonate with its base.  And the Party Establishment hasn't figured this out yet.  But eventually they will, and they will adapt, and then the Republican Party of the future will stand for something completely different.
What form that will take...who can say.

Link of the Day
Noam Chomsky: After the Electoral Extravaganza