How Hillary Clinton lost the election
By Sidney Johnson
As a progressive, I hate to say I told you so, but the era so many scoffed at is actually here and it’s as ugly as we imagined.
The people have spoken, your electoral college has voted and that familiar voice of white-male supremacy in America – which has been largely ignored – has found its megaphone. This truth may disgust and anger you, but Donald Trump is your next president.
It’s scary to think how taxpayers might pay for a militarized police force tasked with removing illegal Mexican immigrants from their homes, or a nationwide stop-and-frisk that targets minorities. Now it’s more probable, though unlikely, that a theocratic nut-job like Mike Pence could influence the overturning of Roe V. Wade. But we need to look no further than the decisions of the disgraced Democratic National Committee for Hillary Clinton’s defeat and the path our country has been set upon.
The deception of Debbie Wasserman Shultz, Donna Brazile, Luis Miranda and any participant in the DNC who snuffed the populous candidate, Bernie Sanders, fostered this mess. Everyone involved spat in the faces of their actual progressive supporters, chained to their pre-chosen candidate during the Democratic primaries.
They were more concerned with upholding the status quo of a pro-corporatist, neo-liberal Democratic party instead of listening to the overwhelming pleas of their base. Each understood they would have no place in a Sanders administration if he were elected and stood #WithHer as a backup plan. No one did anything to correct this injustice to democracy as it unfolded, and yet, they scratch their heads wondering why they couldn’t secure the nomination.
Here’s a tip: Stop. Doing. Shady. Things.
Voters see what you’re doing, and social media ensures that even when partisan news outlets won’t.
We arrive at a new day, one where red and blue bases reject crooked mouths regurgitating an aged cadence prioritizing donor interests over the issues that matter to them the most. It is the task of anyone running for public office to propose transparent policies that fall in line with their constituency in order to get elected.
Although I strongly disagree with his message, Trump did this masterfully without political experience. Clinton, as well as her die-hard supporters, never got the memo and, instead, touted Trump as a boogeyman to conjure superficial votes from whoever they could.
By now, you’ve probably seen the polls confirming what progressives screamed all along: how Sanders was the only Democratic candidate who could’ve bridged the gap between urban millennials and rural whites. He could have ridden a wave of support to the White House lawn, leaving the bitterness of Trump supporters exposed for all to see outside the gates.
It was a great plan, but it wasn’t enacted. Trump is now at the helm of the most powerful military in history. Not to mention the new Republican Congress and a Supreme Court seat that could hinder progressive policies for years to come.
There are now Democratic loyalists blaming anyone who didn’t vote for Clinton, scapegoating the actual reasons why she didn’t get elected. It’s her likeness to a sane Republican, as shown by her voting record: the Iraq War, the Patriot Act, TPP and not supporting the LGBTQ+ community until it became popular.
You can curse millennials, third party voters and those who wrote into their ballots, but somewhere beneath that dense partisan loyalty, you knew this was a possibility. Your candidate was flawed and the people didn’t trust her.
It’s both comical and terrifying how the most qualified candidate lost to a reality star. This is a man who mocked the disabled, has 3,500 pending lawsuits, proposed a ban on all Muslims until now, admittedly groped women without their consent, proposed to murder the families of ISIS and promised to repeal the Paris Agreement because he believes climate change is a Chinese hoax.
Maybe Clinton’s message should’ve been more #ImWithYou to those who ultimately dictate her political future.
Featured Image: Hillary Clinton, right, testifies at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee on the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty and implications for national security programs at the Dirksen Senate Office Building in Washington, D.C., June 17, 2010. | U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Chad J. McNeeley
the people spoke & she has more votes. The majority of people voted for Hillary.