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.

Trump Doesn’t Trust Blindly

As surely everyone in the developed world knows at this point, Donald Trump was elected the 45^th president of the United States in an upset on Tuesday, leading to a series of protests (and riots) in retaliation. Now that Trump is imminently headed toward Pennsylvanian Avenue, some are questioning how he will handle his business.

Currently, there is no formal legislation dictating how the president’s previous business interests are handled upon inauguration. Some elects choose to continue to play an active role in their outside ventures while in office, such as Barack Obama and his book royalties and LBJ with his broadcasting corporations. Others choose to relinquish their assets to a blind trust, or an individual/firm that takes responsibility for executive actions of the enterprises for the duration of tenure. When control is given to a blind trust, the owner who surrendered power of has no knowledge or say of the actions taken.

It seems that Donald Trump has taken the latter of these two options; Trump Inc. will be handed to his children Don, Ivanka, and Eric. This seems to be a smart idea on the president-to-be’s part, for many have noted that maintaining control would lead to serious conflicts of interest, and his ability to separate himself from the business that he treasures so much helps to solidify the narrative that he is all in for the presidency. Some, however, are still dissatisfied with the measures being taken, claiming that there are not nearly enough degrees of separation between him and trustees (as they’re his children) and that some of his properties (namely his luxury D.C. Hotel) lease from the government, making him the head of both sides of the transaction.

From a rhetorical standpoint, Trump’s soft attempt at separation supports the liberal narrative that he is in office for selfish gain and could drive the preexisting gap between the parties further apart (which is hard to imagine), but also manages to support the conservative claim that he is willing to part with his business in order to focus on the presidency. The fact of the matter is, however, that nothing illegal occurs even if Trump plays a hand in his business while in office. Trump hasn’t had any problems with upsetting the liberal population even during the candidacy, and now that he’s elected, I doubt he will start.

On a side note: wow what a roller coaster of an election, right?

Definitively Legitimizing Islamophobia

As previously noted, the Obama and Clinton camps worked diligently to avoid associating Muslims with terrorism and “radical Islam,” by avoiding the phrase almost entirely. But by calling for complete Muslim bans, calling for mosque surveillance, and liberally employing the phrase “radical Islam” in association with Muslim-Americans, Trump has managed to change the definition of Islam, and has legitimized an Islamophobic association that, just days after the election, has many Muslim-Americans feeling unsafe.

The power of the president to define issues equates to, as Zarefksy suggests, being able to plead a cause. Particularly on the subject of Muslim-Americans, Donald Trump effectively took the status quo social definitions of the Obama/Clinton years and changed what “Muslim” and “Islam” meant for many Americans, effectively associating Muslims with terrorism. Throughout his campaign, Trump subtlety (or, at times, blatantly) advanced the case that Muslim-Americans are dangerous and radical by nature of their religion.

And while Trump’s rhetoric might seem like it would be convincing for only a small percentage of the population, now that he will officially ascend to the presidency, his language will be much more powerful and have a much more legitimizing effect. As Zarefsky puts it, “The presidential claim is offered as if it were natural and uncontroversial, rather than chosen and contestable.” Trump’s election to the presidency truly validates his definitions for many of his supporters. These definitions will become a widespread school of thought because they have been legitimized.

No longer does the president say that Muslims should be treated with respect and without fear; this president says the citizenry should be leery and suspicious of Muslims. Muslim-Americans across the country are reporting of the immediate results of Trump’s de-facto, definitional validation:

And the results won’t end there; Trump’s newly legitimized definitions are likely to pervade, at least on some level, for generations to come. Muslim-Americans have been weary of Trump’s rhetoric from the beginning, but now his words carry an unmatched validation which could cause irreparable damage to the image and treatment of newly terrorism-linked Muslims across the country.

290

As the election came to a close, with many happy and many, many upset, Donald Trump has won the 2016 Presidential election. The working-class whites, as predicted in previous blogs, drove Donald Trump to his victory. It has always been a possibility, but in this case, it was made a reality. Democrats have been far more dependent on working-class voters than people realize. Counties that supported Mr. Obama in 2012 voted for Mr. Trump by 20 points says a recent article by Nate Cohn in the New York Times. This means that Democrats were banking on the votes that Trump ended up gaining. This explains why states like Pennsylvania and North Carolina went in the opposite direction than people would have thought. You would think that his rhetoric would be significant to this situation (like how stupid things would sound worse because he is running for president) but in this case his rhetoric was apparently perfect for the situation because working-class whites absorbed it like a sponge. It has now been proven that they did in fact see him as their working class “hero” and believe he will make things better, I mean great, for them.

Going into the election, Hillary was the clear front-runner among all voters. This was due to the clear underestimate of working class whites. What ended up happening is that whatever gains she made among well-educated and Hispanic voters nationwide…were overwhelmed by Mr. Trump’s huge appeal to white voters without a degree reports Cohn once again.

From this point forward not much can happen since Mr. President-elect Trump has already won. What will probably happen is not much a change to the lifestyles of working-class whites. It takes a lot of time to make things happen in the government and who even knows if Donald Trump knows how to move these processes along. What should happen is some kind of lawsuit or impeachment due to the controversy of Donald Trump and the fear that everyday minorities have to face.

How the Supreme Court May Have Helped Trump Win the Election

In a shocking turn of events, Donald J. Trump was elected President of the United States early Wednesday morning, defeating his highly favored opponent Hillary Clinton. As we all know, the vacant seat on the Supreme Court heightened the stakes in this election, and may very well have helped Trump secure the victory.

Appealing to Conservatism

Trump said from the very beginning that he was “looking to appoint Judges very much in the mold of Justice Scalia.” That’s a blanket statement, but Trump’s statement here rhetorically worked to appeal to traditional, conservative values. Justice Scalia was very-far right on most issues and fit the typical Republican platform, and this appeal to conservatism may very well have convinced some to vote for him. In fact, an exit poll revealed that the percentage of voters who saw the Supreme Court as the “most important factor” in the election favored Trump over Clinton, 57 to 40 percent.

The Missing Puzzle Piece?

Early polls suggested that only 45 percent of Republican voters were satisfied with Trump as their party’s nominee and with Clinton favored to win all along, it’s only right to assume voters were swayed by alternative factors. The nation seemed shocked upon Trump’s victory; however, the Supreme Court may offer an explanation for this historic turn of events.

OK so now he is the new president…but is law and order actually here to stay?

As many of you know, Donald Trump was elected as the new 2016 President Tuesday night, November 8th or should I say early morning Wednesday. His concession speech was actually written very well and stated exactly what the American people needed to hear, “It is time. I pledge to every citizen of our land that I will be President for all of Americans, and this is so important to me…I’m reaching out to you for your guidance and your help so that we can work together and unify our great country.” He needed to bring the American people together of all backgrounds together and unify the country. But do all American people feel unified and able to accept the election results?

The Sun reports,“Police said at least 500 people swarmed on streets in and around UCLA, some shouting ‘f**k Trump’ and others chanting “Not my president!” It was even reported that people from downtown Portland were burning an American Flag.

Anti-Trump rallies were also happening in downtown Athens, GA. A UGA student stated: “I’m just here to stand up for who I am as a person just because Trump has degraded females, hispanics and immigrants and I fall into all three of those categories among many other categories of people that he’s degraded who I would like to stand up for,”

With all of these rallies happening, how will Trump use his “law and order” rhetoric to protect the police and stop them? Will he give more power to the police in such cases like these? It will be interesting to find out as time will tell.

Clinton Loses, but Not With Millennials

Clinton lost the election, but a USA Today poll shows that she won among millennials.

The issue is that she did not win with the same margin as Obama in 2008. According to Philly.com, Obama collected 60% versus Clinton’s 54%, which along with decreased support from minority groups, may have cost her the election.

What rhetoric did Hillary use to lose the millennial vote? Surely her support from millennial idols Beyoncé and Jay-Z helped. Also receiving support from Obama should have motivated his voters, but it didn’t. The International Business Times reports “half of young voters said they were ‘fearful,’ not ‘hopeful,’ about the future of the U.S,” which is opposite of Obama’s slogan of Hope. Coming out of the Bush presidency, millennials depended on hope from a younger platform to speak for them. Clinton did not meet these demands in the same way as an elderly, untrustworthy option for the Democratic Party. Bernie Sanders stole much of her younger voters’ support, even though he endorsed her. Third party candidates also stole many millennial votes from her.

Could Hillary have won the millennial vote with a different rhetorical approach? Millennials did not resonate her despite her attempts to seem like the selfie taking, Galifinakis fan, which may have made her seem more inauthentic than she was. While she emphasized the importance of the future of her granddaughter, she needed to focus more on the immediate future of America, millennials to better address how despite their fear, there is hope that millennial will have opportunities to survive in America.

How we voted — by age, education, race and sexual orientation

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/politics/presidential/Exit-polls-Blacks-Hispanics-and-millennials-less-passionate-for-Clinton-.html

http://www.ibtimes.com/who-voted-trump-millennials-supported-clinton-54-percent-youth-vote-2443100

They just keep on coming…

Well, apparently losing the election was not enough for the Clinton Camp according to the people over at WikiLeaks. Today, they released 300 more emails from Podesta, in what is now the 36^th leak to come out. It seems to be more of the same things coming out at this point; early information, evidence of political doublespeak, and political strategizing. This batch came with some information from the Obama campaign as well, as Podesta worked with him back in 2008.

What does releasing these emails still really accomplish though? Of course, the WikiLeaks side of things is to give information to the public that they deserve. For Trump, this is fuel for his early fire. If you remember back during the first debate, Trump was saying he’d release his taxes when Clinton released all her emails. Video linked here

This isn’t the end of it for his side though. The Washington Post reported earlier that he still might be pursuing a legal track of prosecuting her after he is sworn into office. If you’ll remember, as the article explains as well, he said during a previous debate that he planned to appoint a special prosecutor to try her. Apparently the Republican side in general though is saying that this would probably be a bad idea, but his supporters were frequently seen at rallies shouting “Lock her up!” so I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

All that these emails are doing at this point though are throwing her further under the bus after a loss and giving Trump and his supporters more tools to make their case against her.

Clinton’s Creation of the Devil

We now know the results. Donald Trump has been elected as the next President of the United States and so many across the nation are heartbroken and afraid.

Hillary Clinton was a shining beacon for closing that gash of racial injustice within our country. For so many people she had rhetorically constructed herself as the golden warrior against the darkness of racial injustice. She was their savior. Now with the results of the election people are terrified. The terror and fear that Hillary Clinton pushed in regards to Donald Trump’s character and the lack of fighting that image on Trump’s part, has consumed so many United States citizens. They have found themselves in a rhetorically constructed “Hell”. Whether any of these policies or threats proposed by Trump actually go through, people have heard the rhetoric and are absolutely horrified of it.

People are so horrified that the day after the election results were announced there have been schools shut down, bomb threats, rallies, protests, and hundreds of acts of distaste towards the results. In CNN’s article Thousands take to the street to protest Trump win, the authors write about the overwhelming protests of thousands of US citizens in response to Trumps win. Clinton helped to construct as the anti-Christ in regards to inclusivity and diversity.

A retrospective look at women and the election

Yesterday, the United States of America elected its 45^th president. After a historic election filled with mudslinging, negativity and record low disapproval ratings, Donald J. Trump emerged victorious. Women were predicted to be the deciding vote in this election, but data collected from last night shows that Hillary Clinton’s rhetoric did not have quite the impact on this demographic that she was hoping for. Instead of shattering the glass ceiling, she realized the polarizing effect her campaign rhetoric actually had on women voters, sending many over to Trump’s camp.

Despite her loss, she still made sure to address women in her concession speech. She thanked the women that had supported her saying that nothing made her prouder “than being their champion.” She also addressed young girls, empowering them to live in the confidence that they are “deserving of every chance and opportunity in the world to pursue and achieve your dreams.” Her tone of the entire was much more approachable than it had been during any part of the campaign. Donald Trump’s acceptance speech was also much softer spoken than any previous speech he had given. Now that the election is over, it is interesting to look at the shifts in the campaign.

This battle began with the argument of one candidate being unstable and one candidate being untrustworthy. Surrogates like Michelle Obama shifted that argument to being good vs. evil. Finally, the campaign rhetoric created two groups, the deplorables and the nasty women, as Ana Navarro would say, who hashed it out in the polls. Both of these rhetorically created groups were depending on women, but in the end, Trump’s campaign for change to pulled enough women to his side despite the misogynist language he used.

Ana Navarro said today on The View that the U.S. has stepped through the looking glass to enter Wonderland, and that we are now sitting across from Alice herself. I’d have to agree with her. This election has been nothing short of crazy, and the response from women voters has ranged from celebration to heartbreak. I think the media’s involvement in this election combined with the gloom and doom rhetoric of the campaign has resulted in a frenzied electorate of women voters. I think that the group will become more polarized in the future as a result of the divisive language in this campaign. However, I also think that the rhetoric could result in a major feminist movement similar to the one Susan B. Anthony led many years ago. The women of America are strong willed and powerful, always fighting for what they believe in, and regardless of political affiliation, I think that this election has spurred them on to keep fighting for the future they want in America.