Welp

You have had nearly a week to either celebrate or mourn, depending on who and what you supported of course.

At the end of the day, I think the emails did it. FBI Director, Comey, released more emails precariously close to the election and I think it influenced potential voters to stay home. Sec. Clinton thinks so as well.

‘FiveThirtyEight,’ a popular political blog spoke to that overall fall of voter turn out, especially in states where Clinton won.

Using the numbers from a reputable 2016 national popular vote tracker and government archives, I looked at voter turn out for myself.

2012 total vote (including third parties): 129,075,630

2012 Democrat vote: 65,446,032

2012 Republican vote: 60,589,084

2016 total vote (including third parties): 128,604,583

2016 Democrat vote: 61,337,682

2016 Republican vote: 60,582,159

From 2012 to 2016 the Republican vote dropped .01142 percent while the Democrat vote dropped 6.2775 percent from 2012 to 2016 showing less motivation from Democratic voters. The total vote dropped a 0.3649 percent while third parties votes increased from 2,518,731 (2012) to 6,684,742 (2016), an increase of 37.6788 percent.

Third parties showed up in this election, proving the distaste of the two popular candidates.

The large drop of vote from 2012 to 2016 for the Democratic candidate is evidence of a large group of unmotivated voters who are not excited about their candidate, and I think their apathy was solidified by Comey’s late and vague disclosure of more (come to find out, insignificant) emails. This was also seen slightly in the Republican’s drop in votes, but not like Sec. Clinton’s.

I hope this gives everyone a fair laugh. I found it in my search for relevant political cartoons.

That is all.

The final stretch

So, tomorrow is the day many Americans have been anticipating since Ted Cruz was the first major candidate to announce that he was running for president in March 23, 2015: Election day.

Election day may bring something other than this campaign season to an end…

Yes, we might actually escape Secretary Clinton’s email controversy.

In my last post I described the ‘October surprise’ of more ‘classified emails’ being found on Anthony Weiner’s computer. The FBI reviewed emails, again, determined if a crime was committed, again, and are not recommending charges, again. The FBI reviewed the emails in eight days and are not recommending charges against Sec. Clinton.

The rhetoric currently circulating the latest development of the email controversy mainly on how the FBI was able to review the emails so quickly and Trump, and other supporters, claiming it was impossible, probably to push the ‘rigged election’ narrative. While Sec. Clinton’s camp hasn’t pushed anything out about the emails, keeping her presidential position and acting above the fray. I think Sec. Clinton’s position of not focusing on petty moments of the past and focusing on the big picture of the election is the best position to take in the final stretch.

In the past few days she has had celebrity appearances with Beyonce, President Obama and Bruce Springsteen, which is a smart move. She has great celebrity support and she has capitalized on it instead of commenting on the newest development on controversy in the news.

Meanwhile, Trump is scraping for support, doesn’t have any celebrities championing for him in person and still focuses on petty issues.

More than 42 million votes already cast, but that is lower than the 46 million votes cast in 2016, which is an indictor that there is a lack of motivation and enthusiasm (Vox). GO VOTE!

I promise it’s very easy.

Do it! Your vote counts!

Tug of War

It’s that time:

We have been hearing about emails since a year and a half ago so is this an ‘October Surprise’? Although this is ‘new’ information out, is this an effective surprise? More emails found on Anthony Weiner’s computer allegedly along with texts between him and a 15-year-old is an interesting take on the emails and there are some affects in the GOP’s favor, this is not enough.

In an article by the Washington Post, Steve Schmidt, a GOP strategist says, “It’s just really unlikely that there is an undecided bloc of voters still weighing Hillary Clinton’s emails. I think everyone made up their minds a long time ago on that subject,” and I agree.

I don’t understand why these emails, found on Anthony Weiner’s computer no less which adds to the media value of her emails, is what is used against Clinton. Many citizens are using their early voting option and have already voted. Surprises should be let out now in order to influence the most voters. Surprises held until a less than a week out from the Election Day will be used to deter voters from going to the polls at all.

The only plus to releasing a large amount of emails with a week until Election Day is the FBI can’t analyze the emails and possibly dismiss them before the election (even though they are trying their best).

USA Today included an interesting take claiming that these emails being released plays to Secretary Clinton’s benefit showing the election is not ‘rigged’ in her favor and she has had major hurdles to cross.

This tug of war between undecideds between two ‘less-than-desirable’ candidates is not a war where someone win will the undecideds over, but will end in a tie where undecideds decide not to vote at all.

‘One and Done’ or ‘Three and Done’?

In the third and final debate between the two major party candidates, Hillary Clinton’s email were again discussed, and this exchange did affect who ‘won’ the debate: Hillary Clinton. Secretary Clinton’s goal of the debate was to keep her head high and let Trump implode. She demonstrated the perfect example of the pivot and avoided Trump swaying voters.

While in the second debate she tried to push people toward fact-checking online, she took the liberty to share the facts in the third debate (feel free to watch the condensed version by Saturday Night Live; interested comparison of the two by TIME).

Trump used the emails in the best was possible. Not just adding to the numbers, ‘more emails have been released’, but mentioning what the emails contained without discussing policy. Sec. Clinton, in defending herself, is prone to discuss the details of policy more than some would like. Yet, in this exchange, she pivoted to details of how the information was collected.

Clinton’s emails were discussed for two reasons: 1) it’s the final debate and her emails have been a running theme of this cycle, and 2) new information was released days prior to the debate.

When Trump brought up the open borders subject from Clinton’s recently leaked emails, Sec. Clinton responded by dismissing Trump’s fear tactic (open borders, a flood of immigrants) saying the comment was about energy and then pivoting to the question: why is a Russia and WikiLeaks supporting hacking and distributing private individuals’ information? Although, a totally valid question in this author’s opinion, Trump calls out her pivot making her look like a ‘politician’ (in the worst way possible).

However, this exchange did not influence the polarized edges not the undecided moderates thus leaving the majority in Sec. Clinton’s favor.

Why

Although the rhetoric within debates and in interviews include details about Hillary’s emails, her emails are not the focus of campaign ads, but rather are used as a piece of evidence why she is untrustworthy and should not be president.

In this campaign ad, Clinton’s emails are just a reason against her own rhetorical question asking why isn’t she 50 points ahead (full statement seen here).

The political campaign ad above, fits into two main categories of political ads: examining the record of the opposition and clarifying the comments of the opposition. While clarifying the comments of the opposition, explaining ‘why’ Clinton isn’t 50 points ahead, the ad uses her own record, an outside person of authority, Comey, the FBI director saying her emails contained classified information, along with criticizing her policies in the middle east and her comment calling half of Trump’s supports a “basket of deplorables).

The ad tried to make her emails and her deplorable comment on par with terrorism and the spread of ISIS. Showing Clinton speaking in the same filter and soundtrack as what appears to be ISIS fighters. The ad ends with Trump in a bright filter, wearing the ‘Make America Great Again’ cap and a big thumbs up.

The rhetoric is clear, simple and straight forward, not detailing or mentioning any policies, nor including what the ‘classified’ information was. The emails are just used as a sound byte to try to remind voters the she ‘messed up’ and is ‘untrustworthy’. However, with the FBI director saying her emails did include classified information makes her seem guilty, and relating her been guilty of the email controversy to her also being guilty of the rise and spread of ISIS, even though that has not been proven, it is proven in the rhetorical situation by association.

According to the facts, you don’t have mail

It seems in this presidential election cycle, fact-checking is at the forefront of traditional media’s digital and social campaigns. These short blurbs detailing what is ‘true’ and ‘false’ are easily sharable and bring traffic to the news sites.

The New York Times, NBC News, NPR, USA Today are just a few sources that published fact checks after the debate.

Although headlines said Trump hammered Clinton on her emails, the fact checks don’t reflect that.

The headlines show that people respond to rhetoric and not facts. NYT fact check only had two facts on Hillary’s emails, and the ‘facts’ from the debate weren’t new information presented.

NPR presented a full transcript with fact checks throughout. In the debate, Clinton’s emails were initially brought up by Trump and then Clinton was questioned by Martha Raddatz, one of the moderators, and Clinton took full responsibility and apologized immediately, something Trump has not done for any allegations.

Trump keeps calling Clinton a liar because of her emails, but he doesn’t present new information while she is presenting facts directly on her website. If rhetoric includes the situation, she is combating the untrustworthy argument by trying to make Trump look not only aggressive and dangerous, but also dishonest.

Trump then did not allow Clinton to respond, acting aggressive and although the emails were discussed briefly, the loud outbursts allowed for her emails to remain in the headlines. This works well for Trump because the email controversy is running out of newsworthiness and is subject to fall out of the public eye.

Trump should drop the email controversy and, to continue with the untrustworthy argument, present new examples of her untrustworthiness. Hillary is (arguably) using the best defense to email rhetoric by apologizing and trying to move on. However, Clinton’s defense doesn’t help moderate voters. Trying to move away from the emails could look like she is avoiding the subject, with her back and forth with Trump, but Trump’s aggressive position and interruptions looks more as if she was avoiding him and trying to follow Anderson Cooper’s instructions to take questions from the audience while trying to listen to the people. Trump looks aggressive and stuck on a single issue that has already been discussed and investigated extensively.

This email controversy looming behind Clinton seems pretty familiar, but I don’t recall what it reminds me of…

Swing away

For those who are not caught up: If you don’t know, now you know.

The rhetoric surrounding Hillary Clinton’s email controversy from the GOP, and especially candidate Donald Trump, has not changed much since the beginning, a controversy that proceeded her candidacy for president. The rhetoric has not changed much because there is a need to continue a simple narrative that can be followed easily.

Check out this lovely timeline by the WSJ detailing Secretary Clinton’s email troubles.

After several interviews and investigations with various federal agencies, the GOP, Trump and those opposed* to Hillary (Arguably, these are three separate groups with a common denominator: They aren’t with her.), choose to continue with the same, simple rhetoric and message even though the message should be losing ground. There should be new issues to discuss and the email controversy should not be used any longer because of the loss in relevance (from federal investigations not finding her responsible), and the amount of time that has passed (The FBI called Secretary Clinton “extremely careless,” but decided to not pursue criminal charges in July of 2016).

Those opposed to Secretary Clinton, especially the Republican party and their candidate, stick to the emails narrative because those opposed have the opportunity to talk about Sec. Clinton’s experience negatively without fleshing out difficult policies and using no more more than two syllables per word. Short concise messages from a well-known narrative make for decent enough rhetoric to drive home the message: do not trust her.

“Why did she delete 33,000 (emails)?” – Trump from the first presidential debate, Monday, Sept 26.

She lied. She is a liar. She cannot be trusted. She hid the emails from you. She deleted them but she is hiding something.

For the Republicans to continue to swing at this scandal and beat it to death seems illogical to some, the simple rhetoric and narrative drives home the message and makes great sound bites. It also creates a conversation of controversies that can involve other issues of untrustworthiness like white water and Goldman Sachs speeches.

*I personally did not find it fair to assume those against Hillary are necessary Trump voters or Republicans.