— Feature, Musings —08.31.2024 02:17 PM
My latest: America gets ready
BIDDEFORD, MAINE – George Weismeyer is America.
He lives on the ground floor of a three-story walk up on Gove Street, down by Saco Bay in a working class neighborhood. He used to be an Independent, which is a recognized and registered political affiliation down here. Last year, half of American voters said they were independent, neither Democrat nor Republican.
Asked which way he’ll be voting in November’s historic vote, Weismeyer smiles and says Democrat. Why, he’s asked.
“I used to be an Independent,” says George. “But when he started up on that born in Kenya stuff, that was it for me. Democrat.”
Weismeyer is referring to the Birther Hoax, which happened in 2008. In that year, Barack Obama was running for president, and some conspiracy theorists started to suggest that Obama was ineligible for high office. Because he’d been born in Kenya.
He wasn’t – he was born in Hawaii – but the Birther Hoax got legs in 2012, when a private citizen named Donald J. Trump started to tweet that it was true. An “extremely credible source” had told him, Trump said at the time.
History will record that Obama won anyway, and that was that. But the Birther Hoax – which ushered in the Donald Trump era, and ushered George Weismeyer towards the Democrats – was the official start of Crazy Time in U.S. politics.
In that way, George Weismeyer is America. His political orbit was changed by the black hole in space that is Donald Trump. Everyone in America has had their politics changed by Trump – either pulled toward him by some dark gravity, or pushed away.
Over on Cleave Street, there’s more of this. Two Canadians volunteering for the Democrats on a sunny and hot Sunday are looking for Tammy Wilder. They find her husband instead.
She’s a Democrat, and so is he, he says. Kamala Harris was anointed the Democratic Party presidential candidate just days before, so Tammy Wilder’s husband is asked about the issues Harris should be talking about. He stops cleaning the stove top and squints.
“There’s a lot of issues, actually,” he says. “But that sonofabitch? No way.”
In hindsight, does Obama mock T at that WH correspondents’ dinner because that was what really ushered in the last decade of craziness.
It was a truly perfect storm of bullshit that brought Trump to power in 2016. A ton of the reasons people voted for him, I would have totally been on board with. Neither party cared about the average American. The American political landscape is BARELY less corrupt than Russia’s. 90% of the voters have their minds made up before the candidates are even selected, let alone campaigning. Obama swept to power by people looking for “change,” but by the end he looked like a placeholder in history rather than a transformative figure. People were bloody sick of the Clintons, and truly did not appreciate Democrats treating the election as a proper coronation for Hillary. Yes, the racism and xenophobia and sexism and homophobia were all present, but not one of those voters was going to vote Democrat anyway, and the rest were (and are) fucking sick of being told they only vote out of hate. Trump successfully positioned himself (well… let’s be honest, Stone, Bannon, and other stooges did the work) as “not a Republican, but an outsider,” which invigorated people who wanted to stick it to both parties.
And it worked. But people want normalcy now. Trump doesn’t offer any of that. Just more unproductive Mad King bullshit, all while being backed by billionaires craving more money to stick in warehouses, and religious fanatics who think true freedom comes from mindless devotion.
But with all that in mind – never forget that 90% of GOP voters would gleefully vote for an actual bag of inanimate cow manure if it had an elephant sticker on the front. What gives them cause for hope is that only 75% of Dem voters would say the same if you swapped the logo for a donkey.
Oh, please. The percentage of folks who will blindly vote for their tribe is about the same.
Martin,
I think you know that isn’t true. Leftist voters are far more likely to sit on their hands if they see something in their own candidate that they don’t like. The approval rating for Biden has swung around relatively wildly compared to Trump’s, which has been the same give or take a point for about 8 years now.
You were talking about how they vote. And I stand by what I said. It is actually quite funny when I drill down on a person’s voting history after they explain to me they are non partisan and then they tell me the last republican they voted for was Ike. A very small percentage don’t vote for their tribe(look at the last few elections) and it is certainly not a 15% difference but Liberals like to tell themselves that because they are “right”. How did that work out for Hillary? It’s a condescending take.
Colourful and well stated. I was definitely a “what harm can he do in four years?” Kind of guy. I loved watching all kinds of party sycophants squirm and I had a few animated discussions about the fool in charge and comparisons to Hitler being way over board.
Mea culpa, Trump is neither conservative nor is he an outsider anymore. He is the face of what remains of the once GOP. Too many republicans fail to see their party is no longer GRAND nor a PARTY. He is the face of something very wrong in politics and this is not new. It’s the OLD George Wallace and Jeff Davis and a bit of Uncle Tom meets Misogyny, totalitarianism and corruption in one package. Lincoln would have shot himself if he knew what his political party looked like today.
There is only one political party for good or bad in the USA today and that is the democrats. They have flaws but they still remain close to their core middle of the road for everyone principals.
Hopefully there is a 2028 election cycle and there is a credible alternative for those who don’t view themselves as democrats. However to get there – republicans have to understand they need to implode. A better alternative comes when the stain of Trumpism is removed. If that’s not possible a new entity must form.
I hope a hell of a lot of independent who might normally stay home feel a need to take a side.
I would venture so far as to say I was glad Trump won in 2016. For about a week. His candidacy exposed fatal flaw after fatal flaw in the American two party system. It also made every partisan in America look like an ass. Then we learned the hard way that most of them just don’t care about any of that.
I figured he would win after Brexit. Seemed obvious to me. I knew he was getting under-polled because when I told people I thought he would win and why, it was like they could not even consider the possibility.
Our media didn’t do us any favours in 2015-16 in not digging into Hillary Clinton’s hugely negative approval ratings. I’m not one of those reflexive media haters, but that was a big fail on the media’s part. Especially up here in Canada.
Yes Obama hurt poor widdle Donnie’s feewings.
You’re blaming Obama for the fact that Trump has the thinnest skin of anyone who has ever lived?
The WH correspondents’ dinner is a comedy roast. People are supposed to get roasted. Every clinically sane person knows that. But poor widdle Donny goes there and his poor widdle feewings get hurt and is embittered for life. What a pathetic, narcissistic loser.
No and I understand all of that(obviously) but T likely ran because of that night so one wonders what Obama would do if he could do it all over again.
The Democrats are no longer the party they used to be. They are the party of the Hollywood elites, of liberals like George Soros, Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, of Big Tech, of the war machine, of open borders and of cultural revisionism. I doubt John Kennedy would recognize the Democrats of today.
And big Pharma-everything has flipped.
Is Elon Musk big tech? You know, Trump’s new bestie?
That is a very recent phenomena. Musk stood in line for 6 hours to shake Obama’s hand. They also used to be the party of free speech and anti government control of the media and Zuckerberg blew that wide open.
Is Peter Thiel big tech? You know, the guy who’s basically responsible for JD Vance’s political career?
You really want to go down this road?
Sure. Thiel was always in the minority in Silicon Valley. Not so much anymore. A better question might be why have the Dems lost their support.
Ever heard of David Sacks?
Dear Mr. Kinsella, On one hand I understand your support for Democrats in the USA, of say even five years ago. The current bunch on the federal level, (1) accepted trans men to compete against female athletes, luke warm and tepid support of Israel, even before Oct 7th, inflation also way up. The last three and half years, not one Cabinet Minister said anything about the obvious decline of President Biden, not withstanding his wife and long term aides, who until the debate let him do that debate knowing in there heart of hearts, he was no longer capable. The dynamic power couples of BilHil and BarMich, dropped the hammer on Ole Joe from Delaware, and before they could say in unison, “onto the Democratic Convention for an open convention and may the best supporter of the dynamic power couples, should prevail, Ole Joe the perpetual DC insider, who got help from Big Tech to suppress the now factual Hunter Laptop and the 51 Deep State Globalists to help turn the tide of the 2020 election, but lo and behold the barely there Joe, before he could blow another gasket on live TV, announced that Kamala had to be the new contestant for the vaunted US prize, who never won even one delegate during the 2020 primaries, and who was wiped off the DNC debate stage by, Tulsi Gabbard. Kamala also treats people who directly work with her, like last weeks garbage and has a very high turnover of staff/people. Finally, your so called nemesis, I know, I know orange man bad, is going to take Kamala Harris to the proverbial cleaners, with no CNN taped interview with Tim Walz help, who during his time as Governor of Minnesota, waited five days to release the National Guard during the frenzy of the BLM, which just so happened to decimate many black owned businesses and neighbourhoods, and everybody and I do mean a lot of people will see who Kamala Harris really is, a very educated woman, out of her depth.
Deep State Globalists!