11.13 Frank Bruni in the New York Times: “Obama’s presidency will end with Democrats in possession of 11 fewer Senate seats (depending on how you count), more than 60 fewer House seats, at least 14 fewer governorships and more than 900 fewer seats in state legislatures than when it began. That’s a staggering toll. While the 2016 race for governor in North Carolina remains undecided, the settled contests guarantee the G.O.P. the governor’s office in 33 states: its most bountiful harvest since 1922. If Democrats don’t quickly figure out how to sturdy themselves — a process larger than the selection of the right new party chairman — they could wind up in even worse shape. They’re defending more than twice the number of Senate seats in 2018 that Republicans are, a situation that gives the G.O.P. a shot at a filibuster-proof majority. Meantime, the perpetuation of Republican dominance at the state level through 2020 would grant the G.O.P. the upper hand in redrawing congressional districts after the next census.’’
11.13 David Remnick on CNN: “When I listen to Conrad Black describe Donald Trump, I think I’m hallucinating. When I hear him described as not a sexist, not a racist, not playing on white fears, not arousing hate, when he’s described in a kind of normalized way as someone in absolute possession of policy knowledge, as someone who somehow is in the acceptable range of rhetoric, I think I’m hallucinating. And I fear for our country and I don’t think it’s unreasonable to do so. And of course I accept the results of the election. Of course I do. At the same time, I also know that Vladimir Putin played a distinct role in this election, and that’s outrageous. And we’ve normalized it already. Less than a week after the election is over, suddenly Washington is going about its business talking about who’s going to get what jobs. You would think that Mitt Romney had won. It’s a hallucination, but I don’t think we can indulge that. And I think that if you are serious about serious opposition in this country, or serious journalism, or whatever your role is to play, the time is now.”
.@NYGovCuomo in the @NYDailyNews, promises to "reject the hateful attitudes that pervaded throughout the 2016 campn” https://t.co/urbZaT2I5A
— Jimmy Vielkind (@JimmyVielkind) November 13, 2016
11.12 Melissa DeRosa: i love this
11.12 The Washington Post: “Clinton’s margin in Milwaukee, for instance, which boasts a heavily African American electorate that Democrats rely on to carry the state, far under¬performed that of Obama in 2012. Trump, meanwhile, earned a similar vote count as 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney. He won the state not because he out¬performed his predecessor but because Clinton under-performed hers. “You can test a whole set of arguments against Donald Trump and always the top attacks on him had to do with temperament,” said Anna Greenberg, a Democratic pollster who worked on several down-ballot races in this cycle. “But you can have things that test well but don’t move people to vote. Obviously we don’t know if it would have been different if she had a more consistent economic message,” Greenberg added, “but I think it’s hard to win without it.” Clinton made a pledge to build “an economy that works for everyone, not just those at the top,” a mantra in nearly every speech while promising to be rebuild the middle class and create more pathways into it. She outlined myriad plans and proposals that she said would help deliver new jobs and rebuild U.S. manufacturing. Yet, there was no simple or overarching message that tied it all together. As a rallying cry against economic injustice, a pledge to be “the small-business president,” for example, sounded bloodless. Even among minority voters disinclined to vote for Trump, that message fell short. “Pre-election research showed that among African Americans, their feelings of economic optimism were precipitously lower in this election than in 2012,” said Geoff Garin, a pollster for Priorities USA who conducted this research independently of the super PAC. “And their feeling that Clinton’s economic policies would help people like them were substantially lower. Those kinds of things affect people’s willingness to come out to vote.”
11.11 Leon Wieseltier in the Washington Post: “Isn’t it rich? The apostle of anger now hopes that we rise above anger. Having employed divisiveness as his primary instrument, the president-elect now implores us to put an end to our divisions. In the name of post-electoral comity, we are supposed to forget what we know. At this moment, therefore, it is important to affirm the reality, and the inevitability, and even the nobility, of some of our divisions. They are, some of them, based on fundamental distinctions of philosophy, on divergent conceptions of the individual and society, on incompatible ethical standpoints, on irreconcilable views of America and its responsibilities in the world. Vaporous homilies about working together — one of President Obama’s specialties, and behold his legacy — only confuse the situation. Where we can work together, let us work together — who is against infrastructure? The rehabilitation of compromise in a system of government designed for compromise would be a salutary development, though the unified Republican government makes it unlikely. Yet there is still the matter of first principles. There is no way to unite the view that one should deport the children of illegal immigrants with the view that one should not deport the children of illegal immigrants. This is what Martin Luther King Jr. meant when he deplored “the luxury of cooling off.” If the presidency of Donald Trump inspires anything, it should be a fierce spirit of opposition.’’
11.11 Robert Vaughn dies
11.10 Warriors head coach Steve Kerr: “Maybe we should have seen it coming over the last 10 years, you look at society, what’s popular, people are getting paid millions of dollars to go on TV and scream at each other, whether it’s sports or politics or entertainment. I guess it was only a matter of time before it spilled into politics, but all of a sudden we’re faced with the reality of, the man that’s going to lead you has routinely used racist, misogynist, insulting words. That’s a tough one. It’s tough when you want there to be some respect and dignity, and there hasn’t been any. Then you walk into a room with your wife and daughter, who have basically been insulted by his comments, and they’re distraught. You walk in and see the faces of your players, most of them who have been insulted directly as minorities, it’s really shocking, it really is.”
Kerr said the Warriors discussed the matter as a team in the morning. “The whole process has left all of us I think feeling disgusted and disappointed. I thought the Jerry Springer Show was the Jerry Springer Show.”
11.10 Pistons coach Stan van Gundy: “I didn’t vote for (George W.) Bush, but he was a good, honorable man with whom I had political differences, so I didn’t vote for him. But for our country to be where we are now, who took a guy who — I don’t care what anyone says, I’m sure they have other reasons and maybe good reasons for voting for Donald Trump — but I don’t think anybody can deny this guy is openly and brazenly racist and misogynistic and ethnic-centric, and say, ‘That’s OK with us, we’re going to vote for him anyway.’“We have just thrown a good part of our population under the bus, and I have problems with thinking that this is where we are as a country. It’s tough on (the team), we noticed it coming in. Everybody was a little quiet, and I thought, ‘Well, maybe the game the other night.’ And so we talked about that, but then Aron Baynes said, ‘I don’t think that’s why everybody’s quiet. It’s last night.’ It’s just, we have said — and my daughters, the three of them — our society has said, ‘No, we think you should be second-class citizens. We want you to be second-class citizens. And we embrace a guy who is openly misogynistic as our leader.’ I don’t know how we get past that. Martin Luther King said, ‘The arc of the moral universe is long, but bends toward justice.’ I would have believed in that for a long time, but not today. … What we have done to minorities … in this election is despicable. I’m having a hard time dealing with it. This isn’t your normal candidate. I don’t know even know if I have political differences with him. I don’t even know what are his politics. I don’t know, other than to build a wall and ‘I hate people of color, and women are to be treated as sex objects and as servants to men.’ I don’t know how you get past that. I don’t know how you walk into the booth and vote for that. I understand problems with the economy. I understand all the problems with Hillary Clinton, I do. But certain things in our country should disqualify you. And the fact that millions and millions of Americans don’t think that racism and sexism disqualifies you to be our leader, in our country … . We presume to tell other countries about human-rights abuses and everything else. We better never do that again, when our leaders talk to China or anybody else about human-rights abuses. We just elected an openly, brazen misogynist leader and we should keep our mouths shut and realize that we need to be learning maybe from the rest of the world, because we don’t got anything to teach anybody. It’s embarrassing. I have been ashamed of a lot of things that have happened in this country, but I can’t say I’ve ever been ashamed of our country until today. Until today. We all have to find our way to move forward, but that was — and I’m not even trying to make a political statement. To me, that’s beyond politics.
“You don’t get to come out and talk about people like that, and then lead our country and have millions of Americans embrace you. I’m having a hard time being with people. I’m going to walk into this arena tonight and realize that — especially in this state — most of these people voted for the guy. Like, (expletive), I don’t have any respect for that. I don’t. And then you read how he was embraced by conservative Christians. Evangelical Christians. I’m not a religious guy, but what the hell Bible are they reading? I’m dead serious. What Bible are you reading? And you’re supposed to be — it’s different. There are a lot of different groups we can be upset at. But you’re Christians. You’re supposed to be — at least you pride yourself on being the moral compass of our society. And you said, ‘Yeah, the guy can talk about women like that. I’m fine with that.’ He can disparage every ethnic group, and I’m fine with that. Look, I don’t get it. And I’m having a hard time taking it. I’m just glad that the people I’m with here — and I’ll include you guys, too — that I like. Because I’m going to have a hard time. I will say, one point of pride, I live in Oakland County, Michigan, and I was surprised, but Oakland County voted for Clinton. At least I can look around say, ‘We weren’t the ones putting that guy in office.’
“It’s incredible. I don’t know how you go about it, if you’re a person of color today or a Latino. Because white society just said to you, again — not like we haven’t forever — but again, and emphatically, that I don’t think you deserve equality. We don’t think you deserve respect. And the same with women. That’s what we say today, as a country. We should be ashamed for what we stand for as the United States today. That’s it for me. I don’t have anything to say about the game tonight.”
11.10 Alabama head football coach Nick Saban says he was unaware that Tuesday was Election Day as millions of other Americans voted to elect the next president of the United States. “It was so important to me that I didn’t even know it was happening,” Saban said. “We’re focused on other things here.”
11.9 EJ Dionne in the Washington Post: “Sixty-three percent said that Trump lacked “the temperament to serve effectively as president.” But 20 percent of those voters supported him anyway. And 61 percent said they did not think Trump was qualified to be president. But 18 percent of those voters were ready to elect an unqualified man as president. What the polls suggested was that a large number of Americans were prepared to throw a fit, regardless of the consequences. The contours of the vote were not all that different from those of the 2012 election, but Clinton ran slightly behind President Obama’s performance among key groups, small deteriorations in the Obama coalition that hurt her in key states. She won 89 percent of Democrats, down three points from Obama’s share. She won 80 percent of African American men, down seven points from Obama’s showing. These small shifts plus Trump’s working-class gains were enough to swing key states his way. After the Brexit vote in Britain, many voters woke up the next morning and wondered what they had done to their country. Judging from the doubts many of Trump’s supporters had about him, you wonder — depending on how this turns out — how many will wake up with the same feeling about what they did on Tuesday.”
11.9 David Remnick in The New Yorker: “The election of Donald Trump to the Presidency is nothing less than a tragedy for the American republic, a tragedy for the Constitution, and a triumph for the forces, at home and abroad, of nativism, authoritarianism, misogyny, and racism. Trump’s shocking victory, his ascension to the Presidency, is a sickening event in the history of the United States and liberal democracy. On January 20, 2017, we will bid farewell to the first African-American President—a man of integrity, dignity, and generous spirit—and witness the inauguration of a con who did little to spurn endorsement by forces of xenophobia and white supremacy. It is impossible to react to this moment with anything less than revulsion and profound anxiety.”
11.9 Mitch McConnell: “It’s always a mistake to misread your mandate. And frequently new majorities think it’s going to be forever. Nothing is forever in this country. We have an election every two years right on schedule. We have had since 1788. And so I don’t think we should act as if we’re going to be in the majority forever.”
11.9 T.A. Frank in VF.com: “We’ve seen a huge realignment that was carried out peacefully. In other countries, this happens too late and unfolds at gunpoint. Since 1865, the United States has resolved these things in a civilized manner—as it did in 1980, or in 1932. It happened again with this election. Millions of Americans feel trapped in a speeding car going the wrong way, seeing their way of life overturned with too much force and suddenness, and our establishment was saying, “Doesn’t this thing go any faster?” The tragedy was that only Donald Trump seemed to pick up on this. But he did, and voters rewarded him. The sooner good people get Trump’s message, the sooner Trump becomes superfluous. Let’s hope it’s soon.”
11.9 Maureen Dowd in the Times: ““As flawed a candidate as Trump was, he had his finger on the pulse,” [Dowd’s brother] Kevin said. “The polls were off because nobody wanted to admit that they were going to vote for him. But it’s a populist revolt and a lot of people believed in Trump’s message: too much regulation, too much government. The whole thing is a bunch of guys getting rich on Capitol Hill and not paying attention to the people who elected them. They stay in Congress a couple years, then move on to K Street and call on the same people who replaced them.”
11.9 Thomas Friedman in the Times: “As much as I knew that it was a possibility, the stark fact that a majority of Americans wanted radical, disruptive change so badly and simply did not care who the change agent was, what sort of role model he could be for our children, whether he really had any ability to execute on his plan — or even really had a plan to execute on — is profoundly disturbing. Before I lay out all my fears, is there any silver lining to be found in this vote? I’ve been searching for hours, and the only one I can find is this: I don’t think Trump was truly committed to a single word or policy he offered during the campaign, except one phrase: “I want to win.” But Donald Trump cannot be a winner unless he undergoes a radical change in personality and politics and becomes everything he was not in this campaign. He has to become a healer instead of a divider; a compulsive truth-teller rather than a compulsive liar; someone ready to study problems and make decisions based on evidence, not someone who just shoots from the hip; someone who tells people what they need to hear, not what they want to hear; and someone who appreciates that an interdependent world can thrive only on win-win relationships, not zero-sum ones. I can only hope that he does. Because if he doesn’t, all of you who voted for him — overlooking all of his obvious flaws — because you wanted radical, disruptive change, well, you’re going to get it.”
11.9 Roger Cohen in the Times: “Enough of elites; enough of experts; enough of the status quo; enough of the politically correct; enough of the liberal intelligentsia and cultural overlords with their predominant place in the media; enough of the financial wizards who brought the 2008 meltdown and stagnant incomes and jobs disappearing offshore. That, in essence, was Trump’s message. A New Yorker, he contrived to channel the frustrations of the heartland, a remarkable sleight of hand. Ohio and Wisconsin lurched into the Trump camp.This upset victory over Hillary Clinton, the representative par excellence of the American political establishment, amounted to Brexit in American form. Ever since Britain’s perverse, self-defeating vote last June to leave the European Union, it seemed plausible that the same anti-globalization, often xenophobic forces could carry Trump to victory.And so it proved. The disenfranchised, often living lives of great precariousness, arose and spoke. Clinton never quite seemed to understand their frustrations.”
11.9 Graydon Carter in Vanity Fair: “Do not tell me America is no longer a land of opportunity.’’
11.8 Rachel Maddow on MSNBC: “You’re awake by the way. You’re not having a terrible, terrible dream. And you haven’t died and gone to heaven. This is your life now, this is our election now, this is us, this is our country – it’s real.”