The last time I voted for either a Democrat or Republican for President was when I cast my ballot for Bob Dole in the 1996 Presidential Election. For as many times as I have supported the independent candidate in my lifetime, I was never swayed by Ross Perot's graphs or his single-issue simplicity. I liked that Bob Dole was grumpy, so grumpy in fact, that he could drop an F-Bomb at any second...
Do you know who you really voted for last week?
Donald Trump, who grew the government and increased the national debt during his term.
Or Kamala Harris, who, with Joe Biden, grew the government and increased the national debt...
You know what? No more Mr. Nice Guy. Donald Trump is a mental patient. He is a self-absorbed. spoiled, rich kid....who's now pushing 80. On the campaign trail, Trump had been reduced to simply blurting out any random thoughts that popped into his head. As a free speech guy, I loved that. Listening to the Donald Trump Podcast would have been amazing, like listening to a decrepit Morton Downey Jr. As a voter for President, I HATED that. Being the aging star of The Apprentice, threatening to fire your detractors, doesn't translate into having a second, oops, I mean a third, crack at being the leader of the free world. Serious detractors would claim that Donald Trump was nothing more than a rich-man's Lyndon LaRouche. But everything in the last paragraph has been said both more eloquently, and/or more bluntly, by the mainstream media, that happened to be in the bag for the Democrat Party. The media were not arbiters of neutrality, but partisans presenting their overarching agendas. Extremists on the Left continued to compare Donald Trump to Hitler, right up until election day. You couldn't, in good conscience, say that Trump was a diaper-wearing, senile ol' coot, barely able to recognize his own reflection in the mirror, while at the same time saying that he was an ultra-sneaky Svengali, dictator-wannabe, readying tanks and mobilizing the armed forces to return to power by force. Logic dictated that, in theory, he could be one, but he absolutely couldn't be both. If you're a principled Conservative and hate what I'm saying, you aren't paying attention:
DONALD TRUMP IS A G--DAMN POPULIST.
On the losing side of the coin, why wasn't anyone calling Kamala Harris the Manchurian Candidate? Seriously.
You know who got the most votes for President in the primaries?
Republican Donald Trump - 17 million votes.
Libertarian Chase Oliver - 3,000+ votes.
Democrat Kamala Harris - 0 votes.
The only reason that Kamala Harris was even on the ticket is because Joe Biden did catastrophically bad in the Trump/Biden Debate. Look at that Blue Arrow above: In one day, the betting odds for Biden becoming president dropped to an abysmal 22% chance. That's not a poll, that was the money line in Vegas.
Please pause and absorb how absurd that statement is.
The Democratic Party itself, who threw Joe Biden off the boat like worthless ballast, picked the most "winnable" candidate for president, not who was overwhelmingly voted for in the primaries. Winnable being in quotations, meaning the candidate most likely to win by current American DEI standards. The Democrat Party's main focus isn't you, and it isn't me, it's winning elections. They pulled arguably the biggest bait and switch in modern political history, then shrugged their shoulders, like, nothing to see here. In this case, their roll of the dice failed spectacularly. What was best for America was irrelevant. In theory, a vote for Kamala Harris was a vote for Joe Biden, right? It was their administration---together. She was just wrapped in a nicer and, marginally, more coherent package. But no, she ran against Donald Trump like HE was the incumbent, which was also patently absurd. She didn't answer one question in regard to Joe Biden's cognitive decline, WHICH SHE HAD TO NOTICE.
Which brings us to the crux of the article. Kamala Harris was an opportunist and a good soldier for the Democratic Party, and she was rewarded thusly by that party. I don't begrudge her for that at all, she checked all of the demographic boxes that the powers that be were looking for. Was that the Clintons? The Obamas? Nancy Pelosi? No one is coming forward as the string-puller now that Harris has lost. Who was making the decisions for the Democrats behind the scenes?
And on the right, I also blame the party, but in a different way.
Back in 2016, Glenn Beck said that Donald Trump was the Devil and supported the Constitution Party candidate. In 2024, Glenn Beck said that Donald Trump was the Savior and said that he was the only human being alive that could stop America's march into Communism.
Back in 2016, Matt Drudge thought that Donald Trump was the Savior for the Republican Party, ready to fight the Left at the drop of the hat. In 2024, Matt Drudge dredged up every unsavory thing that Donald Trump has ever done, and there's a lot of that out there, then beat the drum daily that Trump was the Devil.
You know what that's called? P-o-p-u-l-i-s-m. Populism won, bought and paid for by Republican Party Inc.
In 2016, John McCain said no to a third-party run and made no third-party endorsements.
In 2020, Mitt Romney said no to a third-party run and made no third-party endorsements.
In 2024, Liz Chaney said no to a third-party run and made no third-party endorsements
If Liz Chaney ran third party, she could have siphoned off enough votes to stop Donald Trump. Liz Chaney chose to not weaken the Republican Party, assuming that the Republicans would get 'em the next election cycle. McCain, Romney, and Chaney all chose their party over their country because they were all afraid to give a third-party traction for the future. A lot of established politicians did the same thing. They claimed they'd do "anything" to stop Donald Trump, but wouldn't run as third-party candidates, or endorse third-party candidates.
The Democrats and Republicans are only worried about holding onto their 2-party duopoly. They are nothing more than Coke and Pepsi trying to corner the soft drink market. Whenever a small soft drink company makes some waves, Coke and Pepsi either buy it, or put it out of business. That is the same basic principle as Donald Trump promising "independent" RFK Jr. a position in his cabinet.
The two parties are in the business of getting candidates elected- You're interrupting me, making faces, "well, duh." Listen, I'm not stupid, I understand there's a certain cost that comes with an election, but do you know how much the Democrats and Republicans spent on political advertising, in just 2024? Almost $11 billion.
$3 billion on the presidential race alone. You might as well have just burned that money. That money didn't create great art, result in the construction of any buildings or highways, or even feed the poor. That money is just gone, poof, right into thin air.
Just for perspective, this year's entire budget for the State of Vermont is $8.6 billion.
That shitshow last week could have been avoided-
How 'bout next time around, we let the top 5 candidates in the polls in the presidential debates. That wouldn't work? Primary debates have more candidates, it would surely work.
Maybe we should move to Ranked-Choice voting: "Our 'choose-one' elections deprive voters of meaningful choices, create increasingly toxic campaign cycles, advance candidates who lack broad support and leave voters feeling like our voices are not heard. Ranked choice voting is the solution."
Do you think Donald Trump or Kamala Harris would have won in a 'Best of 5' format?
Let's see, if that was in place this for this election, this is what my ballot would have looked like:
Chase Oliver (L)
Jill Stein (G)
Donald Trump (R)
Kamala Harris (D)
RFK Jr. (I)
Now very early in the process, I was intrigued by RFK Jr., but as the race went on, you could see he didn't really have a plan beyond plowing skanks. Speaking of unseemly behavior, the week before the election, Shirley McLaine came out and said that's been the Kennedy Family's method of operations since John and Bobby were tag-teaming Marilyn Monroe. That little tidbit got remarkably little run in the press, probably because it would damage the Democrat Brand.
The two major parties have done a great job of erasing third-party candidates from the conversation. That way, they increase their chances of getting their candidate of choice elected in the next voting cycle. But if you villainize someone in ranked-choice voting, half the population puts someone like Trump at 1 and the other half of the population puts someone like Trump at 5. That means the guy (or gal) who is universally at 2 is probably going to win.
I should have been happy that Donald Trump went to the Libertarian Convention. Donald Trump at bare minimum, made passing references to libertarianism. But Donald Trump would say ANYTHING to get your vote, that's why he says so many contradictory things. It's not about content, it's about winning. And his strategy won.
When there's only two candidates, what are you against works great. When there's 5, there's more of a move away from personalities to ideas.
Let's just say you think my opinions are invalid because I'm an old white man. Guess what? I voted for Chase Oliver, the gay, no, very gay, openly gay, candidate that was soft on drugs and pro-choice. Your argument is that he's not the right type of gay? What is the right type of gay? Young Adults SHOULD have loved Chase Oliver. 3 months ago, he was the only major candidate that didn't reek of Ben Gay. (Biden, Trump, RFK Jr., Jill Stein, all 70+)
You wish you knew more about Chase Oliver? Too fuckin' late. The only thing you knew about Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, both good and bad, is what the two political parties sold you. The candidates were the product, and you purchased one, or the other, with your vote.
America has a government that is too big, with two giant corporations that pose as political parties that run it. Both believe that they are too big to fail.
As I ready myself to lay my head on my pillow for the night, Donald Trump is creating a new government agency to address government waste. Anyone else not see the irony in that?
For a week I've just been pissed. I can't relate with the people ecstatic that Trump won, and I can't relate with the people who are despondent that Harris lost. You say my perspective is just a bunch of randomly quilted together thoughts?
Well then maybe I should send my resume to Donald Trump, he has spent the day making mostly inexplicable government appointments.
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