Four for the Fourth 2024: A Lament

A lament.

None of this - the loss of abortion rights, the culture war attacks at gays and trans people, the collapse of functioning government - would be happening if Hillary had won in 2016.

None of this would be happening if enough left-leaning voters - progressives, liberals, moderates - had turned up to vote for Hillary in the battleground states that flipped their Electoral counts to trump.

None of this would be happening if the goddamned Beltway Media looked past their own personal vitriol for Hillary to report more on donald trump's ethical and criminal and sexually offensive actions. "But her emails" on the front page of the New York Times while trump's "grab them by the pussy" bragging goes unreported.

The Supreme Court would definitely look differently - and acting more moderate or at least holding to stare decisis as a foundation - than the one we have thanks to trump and that goddamned Mitch McConnell. While the GOP-controlled Senate in 2016 was promising not to grant a President Hillary any appointments to fill the vacancy left by Scalia's death, odds were sooner or later a deal would be brokered to fill that seat. It wouldn't have been a firebrand liberal but it wouldn't have been the likes of Gorsuch or Kavanaugh or Barrett or any other Federalist Society wingnut.

We wouldn't have a Supreme Court willing to undo decades of federal regulatory practices set by the Chevron ruling, and we wouldn't have a Court that undid Casey or Roe.

And we wouldn't have had a Court that would grant imperial powers to a corrupt Presidency. For two reasons: One, Hillary was never as corrupt as her haters kept imagining and would have never gotten to a point of insisting on immunity for "official acts;" Two, even a liberal-leaning Court favoring Hillary would never betray or undo the Constitution like that.

If Hillary had won in 2016, we'd have never given trump even a chance of claiming such legal immunities for the moment when his crimes would have caught up to him. trump's tax evasions and constant grifting would have finally gotten the attention of state and federal prosecutors, and even his delay tactics wouldn't have gotten him past 2020 before finding himself fleeing the nation to avoid jail time.

A trump loss would have diminished the Far Right wingnut MAGA cult, proving their extremism couldn't get past a national popular vote that still favors Democrats (and the center-left). Given all the grifting that the wingnut leadership indulges, they'd have gone for each other's throats by now to claim the scraps trump would have left behind.

We wouldn't be in this darkest timeline. There'd still be political sniping, and derogatory insults aimed at Hillary (and anyone following in her path) as "communist threats to a Christian America" and there'd still be culture war bullshit at the state level, but not with the official seal of approval that trump's offensive regime created.

And this is all a lament is good for. Regret.

It doesn't help to wallow in the past. What Ifs are only good for fiction, and for awareness of how BAD things CAN get if you let the sons of bitches win.

This 2024 is a chance to let go of all regrets of the past. This 2024 is a chance to do what is truly best for the United States and for a citizenry that begs for sanity to reign instead of King trump. 

This 4th of July, we have a chance to stand with the current President Joe Biden as he runs for a second term, a term focused on bringing back abortion and health care rights to women, bringing back good jobs at good wages, bringing back affordable housing across all communities. A second Biden term will defend our allies abroad and stand firm against the corrupt powers (Putin) trying to undermine Western democracies.

The lament is over. The fight for American virtues and American rights and American democracy begins again today.

 

What If: The Timeline Where Hillary Won

I admit, I wake up nearly every morning wondering about this.

Would we - America, the world, Humanity as a whole -  be in such a dire place we are right now where trump causes chaos and criminality on an hourly basis?

What would it be like in a 2018 where voters in key states - Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and especially Florida - decided in 2016 not to be a dick and avoided voting for Jill Stein or trump himself?

What would it look like to wake up in a world where Hillary was President?

Okay, for the Hillary haters out there who'd be screaming OH SHE'D BE TAKING R GUNZ AND GAY MARRYING OUR KIDZ AND SHOVING US INTO CAMPS will you KNOCK THAT SHIT OFF. In the eight years of Bill Clinton and eight years of Barack Obama, your worst fears NEVER HAPPENED and the odds are it wouldn't have happened under Hillary either. Christ. You PARANOID FUCKWITS.

But that's the world we'd wake up to. Every morning, Fox Not-News and Drudge and Rush Limbaugh and the whole fearmonger wingnut army would be up and angry, yelling about whatever slight they think Hillary dropped on them the day before, screaming for her impeachment and letting the worst of them drop the "Lock Her Up" chant for shits and giggles. Just think of all the anger and outrage that happened under 8 years of Obama, only this time with the special vitriol that Republicans have for Hillary.

We'd wake up to a world where the Congress likely remained in Republican control. There's little evidence that a shift in Hillary's favor would have meant the same shift for House and Senate Democratic candidates. So that would mean several things:

• House Republicans would be blocking every attempt by the Clinton White House to firm up Obamacare and other health care reforms Hillary argued for. The sputtering self-inflicted damage Republicans did trying to destroy Obamacare would still be at full throttle, as they'd know Hillary would block their attempts meaning they could repeat themselves and never fear the chance of getting blamed for wrecking it. We may even have gone into another Republican-forced Shutdown by now, because Gods help us every time the Republicans pulled that shit they still won the damn midterms afterwards.
• Senate Republicans would be blocking Hillary's attempts to fill the Supreme Court and other Judiciary seats. Knowing McConnell's desire to screw Obama out of a SCOTUS legacy, he'd carry that hatred over against Hillary. And the excuse this time would be "Well, we dare not appoint any judges while the President is under criminal investigation." (Yes, that IS the argument Democrats are trying right now to block trump's attempt to fill Anthony Kennedy's vacating seat, but it's a hard one to make legally: Dems are better off arguing that Kavanaugh will offer unethical Quid Pro Quos with trump should trump ever find himself under arrest and making Supreme Court appeals to avoid trials) As a result we'd like be seeing an 8-seat Supreme Court with Kennedy holding off his retirement, and Merrick Garland sitting there on the sidelines wondering if he should sue McConnell for emotional damages.
• Speaking of "criminal investigation," we'd likely be in the 18th month of MORE congressional hearings into BEHGHAZI, and HER EMAILS, and the fervent hope that the DNC were hiding things in their servers rather than the fact that Russians were illegally hacking us. Where trump whines about legitimate criminal investigations into Russia's interference - and trump's acts of obstruction / possible conspiracy - Hillary will most likely be weathering each faux accusation by Fox & Friends every morning and wondering when her breakfast toast arrives.

So that's some of the bad stuff we'd be seeing.

In terms of international woes, there's every likelihood the mess in the Middle East would remain a mess. Syria's Civil War would still be a pit of bloodshed and heartache. Half our allies in the region - Turkey and Egypt in particular - would be nightmarish dictatorial hell-holes. The situation with Russia invading Ukraine would still be a pressing matter for NATO. North Korea would still be an annoyance in Asia.

It's just in those situations, we wouldn't be overwhelmed by the internal chaos of a trump regime. We wouldn't worry about a State Department ravaged by incompetent leadership - Bye, Rex! - that gutted needed foreign policy experts and sabotaged our nation's abilities to retain strong connections to our allies. There'd at least be some sense of stability.

The United States would not be an isolated, hated nation the way we are now under trump. NATO would not feel bullied. Our Asian allies would not feel abandoned. Canada, for God's sake, wouldn't be in a trade war with us.

That's the other thing: No tariff war. Hillary would never have pulled the stunts trump has raising tariffs on steel and other products. We wouldn't be caught in the crosshairs between an angry China, angrier EU, royally miffed Mexico, and a super-pissed Canada.

We would not have the scandals of Cabinet Secretaries like Scott Pruitt ripping off taxpayers and breaking environmental standards that keep Americans healthy. That depends of course if McConnell's Senate decided to let Hillary HAVE a hand-picked Cabinet in the first place.

The nuclear arrangement with Iran - backed by NATO - that trump is trying to derail would instead be in full force, and nobody except the warmongers would be angry about that.

Putin would still be scheming and getting his Russian hackers to try and wreck the 2018 midterms in ways to get the U.S. to drop the sanctions against himself and his cronies, but our intel agencies would be operating with the belief that their President has their back.

Our immigration policy would not be the nightmare it is now. While the Far Right Republicans in Congress would never approve any Hillary-backed reforms, we won't at least be coping with trump's hideous travel bans and we won't be arguing over the deluded "need" for a border wall with Mexico. The current trump practice of separating children from their families as they seek asylum? THAT particular nightmare shouldn't even be dreamt of in Hillary's timeline.

We wouldn't have a madman causing ulcers every morning when he tweets his insanity. Half of social media wouldn't be yelling and screaming at the other half. Well, not as much as it would normally be yelling.

In this world, trump would be busy wasting other people's money on his failing TrumpTV channel, struggling to find enough advertisers to keep it floating while most wingnuts remain watching Fox Not-News for their anger fix. His rage-filled tweets wouldn't cause stock market drops. Hillary's tweets won't do a damn thing, because she rarely showed the habit during her campaign and most likely as President would stick to messaging through her Communications Office like every other President before her.

In a HillaryWorld, it'd have been a world much like Obama's after 2011: Republicans yelling and fantasizing over their latest conspiracy theories and blocking any Democratic agenda, while the Democrats chug along trying to make sure government works and the planet doesn't blow up.

Would it have really been as horrifying a reality as the one we have now???

The Unforced Errors of a Political Witch-Hunt

As far as "October Surprises" go, this was one that kind of exploded in the face of the ones throwing it onto the political landscape. To wit via the New Yorker:

On Friday morning, James Comey, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, sent a letter to the heads of several committees on Capitol Hill, in which he said he wished to “supplement” the testimony he gave in July about the Bureau’s investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private e-mail server. During that testimony, Comey had defended his decision not to bring any charges in the case, even though his agents had found evidence that Clinton and her aides were, in his words, “extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information.”

Back in July, the Republicans in Congress berated Comey for his lack of communication with their committees that were witch-hunting, uh investigating Hillary. As such, Comey promised to keep them better in the loop. Hence this letter:

In his letter on Friday, Comey wrote, “In connection with an unrelated case, the FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation. I am writing to inform you that the investigative team briefed me on this yesterday, and I agreed that the FBI should take appropriate investigative steps designed to allow investigators to review these emails to determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to assess their importance to our investigation.” Comey added that the agency couldn’t yet determine “whether or not this material may be significant or not,” or “how long it will take us to complete this additional work.”

Comey’s letter was brief and, evidently, carefully stated. Remarkably, though, its release wasn’t accompanied by any contextual information or background briefing to either lawmakers or the press...

That meant Comey's letter could be twisted into a hundred different ways. For the Hillary-Haters in Congress, that meant they could use it as a weapon:

...It made its way to much of the media in the form of a tweet posted shortly before 1 p.m. by Jason Chaffetz, the Republican Congressman from Utah who chairs the House Committee on Oversight, and who is a longtime Clinton tormentor. “FBI Dir just informed me, ‘The FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation,’ ” Chaffetz’s tweet said. “Case reopened.”

So for about three hours this past Friday afternoon, the entire political world was caught up in another maelstorm of WTF ZOMG HILLARY DOOMED NOW ranting. Republicans both high and low crowed. Trump started talking like the election wasn't rigged anymore.

And then people started asking just WHAT was in these new emails to begin with, and how they could tie into the questionably overblown scandal of Hillary's Secret Sec of State Server. Reporters like Pete Williams at NBC started digging - and started hearing from sources in the FBI and Department of Justice - and found out the "new and shocking" emails were in fact tied into the ongoing investigation into disgraced ex-Congressman Anthony Weiner's habit of sexting (including the recent allegations he went after a 14-year-old girl online), and that it had more to do with Hillary's personal advisor Huma Abedin - Weiner's rightly angry ex - than with Hillary herself. There's no evidence Hillary has anything to do with these new emails.

In other words, this is just another goddamn Nothing-burger the Far Right are twisting into another anti-Hillary conspiracy.

The story quickly turned on the fact that Comey overstated the value of the new revelations as they related to Hillary, and that he misrepresented which investigation was actually being pursued. He also - according to former FBI personnel - violated various departmental protocols with the FBI and DOJ. The one who's really in trouble now is Comey.

The one who OUGHT TO BE IN TROUBLE is Chaffetz. He's the one who took Comey's vague letter and turned into a source of fake outrage for the Republicans on the Far Right to tout as the final blow to Hillary's Presidential hopes. But elected officials apparently never answer for their sins, and Chaffetz is likely going to get re-elected in his safe Deep Red district back in Utah.

So we can look forward to at least two more years of Chaffetz tossing these types of bombs onto America with fake investigation after fake probe after fake outrage towards Hillary. He's already promised to do this.

It shouldn't be the Republicans getting angry here: It should be the Democrats. And you Dems BETTER USE THAT ANGER TO GET THE DAMN VOTE OUT AND KICK THESE REPUBLICAN BASTARDS OUT OF OFFICE.

/rage

Big Event Today: Hillary In Tampa

It's one of those things you gotta do in your life if you're into history and politics.

You got to go see a Presidential rally at least once. Cross it off the bucket list, as it were.

So this Monday I get an email from Hillary's campaign saying "hey, RSVP for her rally in Tampa on Wednesday" and I'm all "wow I just happen to have that day off from work (gotta cover for Saturday) and this would be an awesome thing to do!"

So I went.

Eh, you know my leanings. If you've been reading this blog since 2007 you know I've leaned Democrat - even as I stand proudly as a Moderate ex-Republican - and this would be a chance to go stand around with 5,000 people or so.

I'm seeing, by the by, a bunch of pro-Trump people crowing about "poor turnout" at this event because Trump was here in Tampa a few days ago with "20,000" announced attendance and Hillary "oh boo hoo" was smaller at an announced 4,500. Let me make this clear: Turnout at the rallies does NOT equal turnout at the election places, and hilariously enough the early reports are that Hillary is WINNING turnout there.

So anyway, here's a slew of photos of me going to the rally.

I stopped off at the downtown library for Tampa-Hillsborough to make sure my tablet charged up, and because as a librarian I always make a visit to any library just to feel the ambiance.

This is where the line got to from the park, with the library in the distance, I'd say about four blocks away. The line would eventually snake all the way around this parking garage towards the Performing Arts center I believe.

While standing in line I bumped into a platoon - eight or nine women - who where in Tampa for a professional college administration association's conference. They were in from New York, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and they had gotten last-minute emails like I did. They were thrilled they were getting a chance down here to see Hillary.

 I asked one to get a photo of me. Selfies only do so much.

 Vendors out selling gear. The conference ladies were upset nobody was selling "Nasty Women" t-shirts.

A break in the line. It's called a traffic stop.

You can see where the rally is set up in the Curtis Hixon park. Nice water fountain.

I dunno if I'm in any trouble posting pics of the Secret Service sniper teams on the rooftops.

 As with any rally, the opposing candidate's fanbase will have their hecklers in force. I have to admit this one had put some effort into it. The others were uninspiring and in some ways more vulgar than this. One woman went around with a sign saying "My DOG Has a Vagina Does That Qualify Her For President?" I was sorely tempted to shout back "Your dog is more qualified than Trump" but I didn't want to start a ruckus on a good day.

Here's all the camera crews setting up for the day. To my knowledge nobody at the Hillary rally shouted insults or threats at them. Unlike what happens at a Trump rally...

This is where I ended up facing the stage. A good number of families circled this part, a lot of mothers showing up with daughters - and a few sons - in tow.

This is a historic thing. People talk about seeing Presidents or candidates when they were younger. My dad talked a few times about growing up in DC and being in one of the inaugural parades for Eisenhower.

Tampa's Congresswoman Kathy Castor, doing warm-ups for the crowd while Hillary's stuck in traffic (she was in Lake Worth earlier this day).

I'm swinging around to get pictures of the crowd, and pictures of downtown Tampa. You notice anything about those buildings? Trump did not build a single one of them (the one he failed I think got knocked down to make way for someone else's tower).

 I think that's Mayor Bob Buckhorn. Hugely popular in Tampa.

Hillary at the podium!!!

And yes, this is a problem nowadays at political rallies and historic events. I'm getting phone-blocked trying to use my tablet to do exactly the same thing. I know I was blocking people who were behind me (I tried apologizing...).

There we go, clearer view. Had to wait a few minutes.

 And here's the security phalanx to escort Hillary and the other VIPs back to the airport to wherever Hillary needed to go to next. I asked the cops "Smile please" but I think only a couple of them did. Ah well.

And that's just the photos. Here's the video clips!

Good Lord. I'M ON FILM. How did that happen? Anyways, for all those eight regular readers of this blog, now you have a face and a voice to go with these rants.

I know I'm in shadow: the sun was just starting to get behind me. If I ever get a video editor program that can clean things up, I might try to brighten this enough to make me more FABULOUS... ahem,

Here's me walking into the fenced-off part of the event. Ooh, water! Yes, this is an outdoor event in Tampa even in late October, this was a hot day. Thank God for the cool breeze coming off the nearby river. When I say Oops at the end it's because I almost lost the bottled water cradled in my other arm.

Showing you the early crowd - this was about an hour before the event actually started - and to show you downtown Tampa in the distance.

I have to apologize on this one: We were about five or six other speakers getting onto the stage and we were all getting pumped up that the next speaker was Hillary! They asked us to sing "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" for her and everything! And then... Instead it was someone else coming onto the stage so I paused the recorder just as they were saying "Academy Award nominee..." so I'm going oh great another celeb but then they finished saying "Angela Bassett." And this is actually good because Ms. Bassett is from the area - grew up in St. Pete - so I switched the camera back on. This explains the interruption. Sorry.

I can get a better clip of Ms. Angela Bassett getting the crowd fired up. Give me a second, here we go:

via GIPHY

Oh. That's Ms. Bassett firing up Trump's car. Anyway.

So after a few more guest speakers, including a great speech from US Citizen/Chef Jose Andres - one of the chefs who famously quit working for Trump because of Trump's anti-immigrant rants - here is Hillary walking out to the crowd!!!

I didn't include the whole speech or anything. You ought to get that from any of the news feeds out here. Lemme link one of them here.

Anyway. That's been my day. Long drive back on I-4, bleh. Got home and spent a lot of it getting these videos uploaded to share. After this, there's work to be done. Well, AT work, doing my job as a librarian. And also getting some volunteer hours in with the local GOTV efforts with Hillary's campaign people in Polk County.

It's more than just showing up at rallies, people. It's showing up TO VOTE. Everybody's got to do that, especially everybody voting for Hillary and for sanity.

Let's do it.

Just one last thing, though. Hillary, seriously, when you're campaigning for re-election in 2020, do everyone a favor in Florida and do these rallies INDOORS. It's called AIR CONDITIONING AND IT EXISTS FOR A REASON.

Things We Learned From the Final Presidential Debate of 2016

1) Trump thinks he should have won an Emmy.

2) Trump still can't stop himself from interrupting people. Not just Hillary - which he clearly does out of spite - but also the moderator Chris Wallace, which Trump did out of narcissism.

3) The turnaround time on making t-shirts, buttons, posters, and other marketing materials is close to magic today. Within HOURS, Hillary's fanbase was selling tees of "Nasty Women" to crow against Trump's tin-eared attempt to insult her.

4) Thank God for the baseball postseason.

4a) Cleveland Indians are in the World Series. Chicago Cubs tied up with the Dodgers and may be back on track to win the NL title. We may be facing a World Series in which one sad-sack team FINALLY WINS.

This is, of course, the Seventh Seal harkening the End Times.

5) Trump kept lying last night like an unrepentant muthafu.......

6) Saturday Night Live is kinda at the point where they don't have to write a script, they just have to read the original transcripts of the debate and react accordingly. For example, there's a specific moment last night where Kate McKinnon should just break out the celebratory wine bottle during the inevitable cold open skit.

7) Trump is still an idiot.

8) Trump is still incredibly scary on foreign policy issues, especially Putin and other dictators he admires.

9) The biggest fallout from that debate has been Trump's refusal to accept the results of the November 8th election night if it goes against him. This ties into the last week or so of Trump yelling that the election "is rigged" in a direct attempt to undermine the entire process. When asked about if he will concede if he loses during the debate, Trump's vague answer was "I will look at it at the time. What I’ve seen, what I’ve seen is so bad."

And during today's rallies post-debate, Trump added with a horrifying condition: "I will totally accept the election results... if I win."

He's essentially saying the only legit result of the election should be HIM winning, even if he loses by 7 percent of the popular vote and with Hillary trouncing him in the Electoral College 342-196. And he's encouraging his voter base to think the same way.

This is insane. Trump is taking a flamethrower to the entire integrity of the electoral process, which he can't prove is that corrupt and broken - rigging a Presidential election is actually so large-scale and complex that it's next to impossible - but he still tries to sell as such.

10) Hillary essentially won all three debates by presenting herself as informed, composed, confident, and prepared. They weren't the best debate performances of all time - Hillary still tries to talk to people like a college professor and can't really be as relaxed in her presentation - but compared to the sniffling, bloated, rude, ill-informed mockery of a candidate next to her, she hit home runs all three nights.

Get the damn vote out, America. Early voting is already starting in some states and should be going on everywhere by next week (Florida's starts on the 24th).

Vote Hillary for President. Don't vote Republican for ANY office if you can help it.

This election matters.

Things To Do For Tonight's Final Presidential Debate for 2016

Tonight is the last televised debate between Hillary and "Screw You Guys I'm Going Home" Trump.

Here are your options for tonight's viewing:

1) Find a writers' group meeting to attend tonight and get prepped for your upcoming NaNoWriMo writing effort for November.

2) There's playoff baseball on tonight, I think.

3) Are hairstyle salons open at 9:00 PM EST?

4) Find a pro-Hillary debate watch party in your area and bring enough booze to endure the Trump-shitshow but not enough to prevent you from safely driving home. Either that or make sure there's a designated driver to come by after the debate to pick you up. I doubt anybody at the party is going to want to stay sober watching that draft-dodging tax-dodging tiny-fingered Cheeto-faced ferret-wearing shitgibbon.

5) You might wanna start shopping at the local CostCo for your winter survival supplies and tonight might as well be the time to do it.

6) Read a book. I've got some lovely books you can purchase and download to your Kindle... (ow stop hitting me)

7) Watch sober, and then get on your knees and pray. BEG FORGIVENESS FROM THE ALMIGHTY that we as a nation were fools to let Trump anywhere near the Presidency and BEG BEG BEG a thousand times for the Good Lord to show Mercy upon us by gifting enough voters with the wisdom to NOT VOTE TRUMP when their time in the ballot booth comes.

7a) And for the Love of God don't vote Republican, period.

Keep your head down and survive, America. We're going to get hit by the eye of this Trumpstorm...

What If: Hillary Wins AND Gets a Friendly Congress for 2017

I've speculated already about how it would look if Donald Trump won the Presidency.

It wasn't pretty. And my speculation wasn't the only one.

So, with Trump now stuck in polling below 40 percent and the likelihood Hillary secures all of the Obama 2012 states (plus Arizona and North Carolina and MAYBE Georgia, Texas and Utah!), we now need to speculate about what it would look like if Hillary won.

I will keep Texas - barely - on the Republican side, but if Latino
turnout rocks that house, it would be an epic GOP collapse.
I REALLY want Georgia to flip Blue...

Click the map to create your own at 270toWin.com

Okay, Republicans, deep breaths, stop panicking, oh c'mon for the love Flying Spaghetti Monster you SURVIVED Bill and Obama for decades, settle the hell down...

Anyway, previous prediction of post-election posing was that if Hillary wins but Republicans retain control of Congress, we'll likely be in the same obstructive gridlock the GOP has enforced on this nation since 2010 (and in a lesser form in 2009 when they abused Cloture rules in the Senate). Given the outright hatred the Republicans will have towards Hillary - and their belief that they have enough "criminal" charges on her - the possibility of constant Congressional investigations into every little move she makes is a near-lock.

On the bright side, the likely scenario is that the Republicans can lose the Senate - out of 34 seats open, the numbers suggest the Democrats can pull off a 52-54 seat majority - giving Democrats a chance to break the gridlock on Supreme Court nominations and other Judiciary/Executive vacancies that are in dire need of filling.

While the polling doesn't reflect any serious victory for Democrats in flipping the House, this is a "What If" scenario so let's go there: What if Trump's anger towards the GOP Establishment convinces his voting base to reject the down-ballot tickets to where Republicans lose a lot of seats? What if, thanks to a divided Republican party, the House goes from 234 Republicans over 201 Democrats and goes 220 D - 215 R?

It's not much, it'll be a slim hold on the House of Representatives, and there's always a chance some Democrats will vote against the party line - in this situation the backbenchers will have disproportionate control on some issues - but this version of the universe will give Hillary a Congress basically willing to grant her as much of her agenda as she'll want.

What does that actually mean?

Hillary's platform would be called a standard "liberal" agenda. She's on record supporting a Public Option fix to the ACA (Obamacare), a massive infrastructure budget to repair our aging highways and bridges, closing tax loopholes for the rich and for corporations, protecting Planned Parenthood, and boosting public education. Her biggest controversial issue is over gun safety laws that the NRA would never accept.

What we'd likely see in 2017 with Hillary and a Democratic Congress is a sweeping stimulus package covering massive construction projects - road, bridges, transit systems, schools, power grids - combined with moderate hikes in the tax rates for upper income earners (and possibly forcing the megacorps into bringing back all those tax dollars they're hiding overseas) to pay for it. While the Republicans will squeal in outrage over it and may try to block it in the Senate, there's every likelihood Hillary - using that Johnson-esque A-N worldview of hers - will get it pushed through.

The question will become "what impact will Hillary and the Democrats - no longer restrained by conservative austerity anti-spending efforts - have on the overall economy of the next four years?"

This is key, because economic performance is ALWAYS the best way for a sitting President to win a second term. As long as the economy works or improves, the incumbents are safe. Only during economic uncertainty - especially major downturns like a Recession similar to 2008's - will the sitting party get hit with electoral losses.

As long as Hillary can build on the slow rebuilding that Obama oversaw and lowers the unemployment down to a health 4 percent while seeing gains in wages and reductions in personal debts -THIS is what Hillary and the Democrats should focus on - then she's a lock to win a second term in 2020 (despite the fantasies of the GOP, more on that later).

So I would totally predict a Hillary administration is going to see a long, stretched-out battle against the banks by the Democrats to work on cutting back on debt-causing matters like college loans, mortgages, and the like.

There's also the likelihood of long, stretched-out battles against any Republican-controlled state government over state-level funding issues and economic cost-of-living issues surrounding city/county zoning laws (that last part might even involve a few Democratic states too).

In terms of domestic policy, the Pro-People agenda that Obama solidified in 2011-12 will made concrete. Gay Marriage and other Gay/Transgender rights under a full Democratic federal government will be made moreso, even against any Republican state-level obstruction like the "bathroom safety" and "gay cake" laws. Hillary is bound to fill more court vacancies - even Supreme Court ones - with Left-leaning progressive justices, adding to the Right-leaning (but not wingnut) judges already placing small-c conservative rulings on these issues. There's also increased odds of better pro-Women rulings on birth control, health care, child care and job protection/wage improvements. As well as the likelihood civil rights for Blacks, Latinos and minorities in general will be safe for the next decade (and one day permanent).

On foreign policy, Hillary will deal on fair terms with her allies without fear of a Republican Senate trying to knee-cap her. She is more aggressive on foreign issues which may mean an increase in direct interventions with land troops, but she may be tempered by a more Progressive Congress - especially in the House - that would seek to clamp down on any military misadventures.

Whether Hillary continues some of Obama's more questionable practices - especially drone "warfare" and the surveillance state - depends entirely on Congress. It is up to Congress to set the laws on these matters, and one hopes that a more Left-leaning legislature will set stricter guidelines and oversight. But let's be honest: every President - even Obama, and he's a good guy - cannot willingly give up such legally grey powers. It's going to be a fight if the Progressives push this issue.

While all this happens, you can guarantee the Far Right media will not roll over and play dead. Fox Not-News, Rush, Drudge, every wingnut with a video stream and a book deal is going to be at DefCon 1 claiming Hillary is destroying America. The other media outlets - CNN, MSNBC, ESPN - may find themselves at war with conservative talking heads trying to dominate for air time on the nightly roundtables, but if they have any sense or decency the major outlets need to ween themselves off that Far Right Noise and invite actual experts to their shows anymore. If we're lucky, a Democratic sweep this November might wipe out every favorite Congressional Republican guest - sorry, McCain - and force the networks to invite more elected Democrats for a change.

To anybody who thinks a Hillary win combined with a Democratic Congressional win is going to lead to the End Times: yeah, stop listening to the wingnuts. We've seen years of Democratic control - 2009 to 2010, 1993-1994 - and we never had A) massive arrests of all citizens, B) alien takeovers, C) the Rapture. Lighten the fuck up, wingnuts. Hillary may be talking about gun safety laws but that doesn't mean SHE'S COMIN TO TAKE OUR GUNZ. Hillary can't abolish the 2nd Amendment - that takes Congress, two-thirds of both houses, AS WELL AS two-thirds of the states - so take that fantasy off the list. At WORST you gun-nuts, Hillary is going to press for a re-interpretation of that amendment to recognize gun safety ("well-regulated") outweighs unlimited gun usage ("shall not be infringed"). What Hillary's gonna do is make it harder for the NRA to turn a profit on our kids getting shot.

The concerns about militia violence are legit, but we should recognize that a mass majority of Americans are not THAT violent. Losing the Presidential race may cause a lot of sound and fury, and of course losing Congress will make it worse, but it will only go so far. The wingnuts will talk about coups and secession and whatnot, but most of them will just go home and gripe about how bad it all is and wait for the next scandal to prove themselves right (note: there may be certain circumstances that might escalate that from talk to action...). That said, I hope the FBI and Homeland Security redouble their efforts on tracking and shutting down the homegrown terror militia groups already waging war on our nation.

So that's how it will kind of look once 2017 rolls onto the computer clocks.

It also depends on if that year's summer blockbuster lineup will be actually any fun. For that I will blame Obama, though.

The Gravity of the Situation

(Update: Thanks as always for the link, Infidel!)

So last night was the debate. I was planning on going to a watch party but I came down with the sore throat bug (tis the season) and forced myself to stay home and livetweet #Gotham before livetweeting #debatenight

Gonna see if I can share some of my tweets:

well you can see who liked THIS one.

Cough. Excuse me, head cold. More tweets from last night:

It's enough to make a man sick. Twice.

Lemme just share from Balloon Juice about last night:

If you didn’t watch last night, rest assured: Hillary did a fine job, and Donald Trump… repeated all his Greatest Hits from the Rallies bits. He didn’t lose a single member of his devoted “base”, but he sniffled, lied, talked over the woman on the stage, claimed that America is a job-leaking hellhole which every filthy brown terrorist can’t wait to invade, lied some more, contradicted the African-American moderator (while lying), sniffled, called President Obama “your president”, took credit for “settling” the birtherism issue, and by every metric and “optic” looked like a coked-up, aging con artist in a bad suit rambling about “the nuclear” and “the cyber”...

Trump's own physical appearance became a liability. The tweets about his constant sniffling - which brought up jokes about his being sick, or else jokes about cocaine being a hell of a drug, and both - and his wilting on-stage became brutal and unavoidable. Per Drezner at the Washington Post:

The most interesting thing, however, was that as the debate went along, Clinton got stronger and Trump got weaker. A look at the debate transcript suggests that Trump’s answers got more rambling and more incoherent toward the end of the debate. Clinton remained her steady self...

...By the end of the debate, after 95 minutes of petulance, Trump claimed that he had a great temperament. The audience spontaneously laughed in response.

Presidential debates are tough, but being the president is tougher. And my main takeaway from tonight’s debate is that Donald Trump doesn’t have the stamina to last four years as America’s commander in chief. Or, as Clinton put it: “I think — I think — I think Donald just criticized me for preparing for this debate. And, yes, I did. And you know what else I prepared for? I prepared to be President. And I think that’s a good thing.”

Zing!

As Drezner notes: Can you picture Trump lasting four years in the White House? Not just in terms of stamina but in terms of focus and dedication to the job. He's all over the place, uncontrollable and undisciplined. Bush "Strategery" the Lesser handled himself better at these final-round debates, and that's saying something.

There was the expectation that because of the weak Republican primaries - where Trump's opponents were terrified to whack at him, leaving him unbruised - he'd flail and fail at a debate where his opponent - Hi, Madam President! - would actually punch back. And while Hillary did land a few blows, the real shocking thing is that a lot of Trump's wounds were self-inflicted. His own appearance defeated him (which begs the possibility he's going to refuse to show up to the next two he's supposed to do).

Of course, the big takeaway from last night is... that this will not greatly affect the polling or the amount of support Trump is getting from his GOP base. The horror that at the very least Trump is getting 40 percent of the vote will not go away (not unless he eats a live baby on-stage or something). The best to hope for is that the remnants of the Undecideds or the moderate Indy voters are now - hopefully and finally - terrified of Trump and will boost Hillary over 45-50 percent and in enough swing states to ensure an Electoral College stomping.

Hope hope hope.

What should happen here is a switch in the Narrative that the Beltway prides itself on: That is, that the Beltway insiders are "always right" and plugged-in to the "real power-brokers" with real news. There may still be a push for "both sides!" false equivalence to force their ongoing lust for a horse race, but we should see a major shift in the tone among the media elites towards highlighting the sins, flaws, and outright lies of Trump and his handlers.

But will that all happen?

Here's where my hope turns to despair. For more than a year we've seen Trump campaign exactly in this manner: Shameless, reckless, lying, self-serving, arrogant, noisy, inhuman, insane. Everything he did last night was a greatest hits version of every horror Trump displayed on the campaign trail... and in all those previous disasters, Trump's numbers went up. He kept moving, he kept lying, he kept winning in the worst ways. That shamelessness is key: Most other politicians would never sink to the levels Trump does, because they are actually concerned about their reputation and their futures. Trump doesn't care: He believes his reputation is flawless - hint: it's not - and his soul unblemished, so he continues to behave this way because nobody stops him and because too many people buy into his con game.

The normal dynamics of an election cycle tells us that what happened to Trump tonight would sink any campaign. The law of gravity regarding any single gaffe requires that Trump sinks below his support and fades into zero. But that has not happened to him yet: And after all of the failures and insults and chaos, Trump keeps gaining ground he should not gain. I've seriously begun worrying that either the polls are rigged or that there really are that many clueless voters buying into Trump's scam.

It would be pretty to think that Trump sinks to 33 percent support by the end of the week, and that Hillary regains solid leads in swing states like Florida, North Carolina, and Ohio, and that even Georgia and Missouri and Arizona become Leans Blue with some happy relief on my part.

But does political gravity work the way it used to?

Comparisons

If I had to compare the two major Presidential candidates to previous office-holders - so that people could see what the potential administration would be like after 2017 - I'd have to go like this.

To compare Donald Trump to three previous Presidents, in reverse chronological order, I'd go:

George W. Bush. AKA Bush the Lesser.

Even though Dubya did have a Positive outlook on the role of the Presidency - and came into the office with enough experience to at least fake competency (until it was too late) - he shares with Trump one glaring sin: Sheer ignorance of the real world when it comes to making informed decisions. Trump as President will get caught flat-footed and clueless on far too many crisis moments, making bad decisions and even no decisions allowing emergencies to turn into disasters. Anything along the lines of a Katrina can happen, and on a greater scale.

Richard Nixon.

Just on the constant lying alone, Nixon and Trump are soul brothers. In other details, Trump has a recklessness when it comes to delegating authority to untrustworthy underlings. Trump has clearly made enemies and has made it known he'll use the White House to inflict revenge. Whereas Nixon at least grasped foreign policy and to my knowledge worked with our allies as well as our opponents, Trump never will. And Nixon did show a level of bipartisanship with Congress to pass legislation and get things done: even with a fully Republican Congress there is a likelihood Trump's ego will burn too many legislators.

Andrew Jackson.

I know this is a bit of reach going back that far, but honestly in terms of temperament Jackson is a very good example to suggest how a Trump Presidency would look. Jackson led with his massive and angry ego: every political issue he made a personal matter, and obsessively went after the institutions to fulfill his Populist agenda without care or concern of the consequences. Jackson had a slash-and-burn mentality that wrecked his own party, creating political divisions that haunted the nation for decades afterward. Trump will lead the same way. Consider also Jackson's horrific record mistreating Native Americans, and you have a carbon copy with Trump's open hostility to Blacks, Mexican, Chinese, and Muslims.


To compare Hillary Clinton to three previous Presidents, in reverse chronological order, I'd go:

Bill Clinton.

The guy standing next to her at most formal functions and the dude to make the history books as the first President to be the First Husband. Where I listed Bill as an Active-Positive, Hillary will not share his skill set as an effective bipartisan deal-maker. Bill is also effective and inspirational as a speaker, able to speak to the issues with a touch that few modern politicians can master. Hillary does share Bill's empathetic nature, but hasn't established a style that can display it well. With Bill in the same White House as hers, he will become an invaluable advisor able to keep her focused on positive agenda while she pushes with a more aggressive style he deployed.

LBJ.

The most direction comparison I can make for Hillary. They share a lot of traits: the need for control, the need to prove him/herself, stubbornness disguising itself as will-to-power, the noticeable insecurities of being in someone else's more popular shadow (for LBJ that was FDR and Kennedy: for Hillary that's Obama and her own husband). Johnson was one of the better Presidents when it came to getting bills through Congress even against incredible odds. Hillary will have the same temperament to get the job done, and has enough understanding of how Congress works - having been a Senator - to follow in LBJ's footsteps. The problem here is that Hillary's stubbornness and Us vs. Them mentality she's displayed before as First Lady (her handling of the 1993 Health Care bill failures) is exactly akin to Johnson's: it's the same kind of mindset that led to Vietnam turning into a quagmire and Johnson's own Great Society agenda turning into a bureaucratic mess.

Harry S, Truman.

The direct comparisons aren't noticeable because Truman's more Active-Positive mindset towards governance conflicts with Hillary's more Active-Negative world-view. However, they share a handful of virtues topped off by driven dedication to homework and awareness of the issues at play. Truman governed with a Confident style, which is what Hillary can aspire to as opposed to a more confrontational one.

So, that's how I see the candidates.

Trump will be the next Dubya, the next Nixon, the next Jackson. Each one of them leaving legacies of economic and political disasters. There are no upsides here. No likelihood of improvement or effective leadership, and every likelihood of civil unrest and economic collapse.

Hillary will be much like her husband Bill, and like Johnson, and hopefully in her better moments another Truman. At her worst she'll be another LBJ coping with a morally dubious debacle that could sink her administration. At her best she'll be maintaining a solid yet underperforming economy with a few foreign policy wins, overseeing  Left-leaning shift in the Judicial system, and in strong position to earn a second term in 2020.

Why I Didn't Come Up With a Drinking Game for the Trump/Clinton Debate September 2016

I created drinking games early on in 2015 for the Republican and Democratic primary debates, but not for the one that's coming up next week.

It's because back then it was funny and caustic and there was a sense of how much of a circus the whole thing was. Especially because Trump was going to - and did - go into the debates with a Scorched Earth tactic that made the debates both painful and malicious to watch.

Today, this shit's not funny.

Trump is honestly one vote away from the White House and the unlimited damage he could do in the Executive branch.

That doesn't require a game for drinking. Not one damn bit.

Stay sober, America. SOBER UP DAMN QUICK and stay that way for November, because it is up to you now. Every voter, sane and sober, needs to show up and stop Trump.

Clinton Foundation Vs. Trump Foundation

Where I work, I have access to a foundations/grants database.

On a whim, I took a look at the two foundations currently in the news:

The Clinton Foundation versus the Trump Foundation (as of 2014 reports)

Clinton Foundation	Trump Foundation
Assets:$354,190,170	Assets: $1,273,895
Giving: $5,160,385	Giving:  $591,450

On the one hand, you can see that the Clintons are working with greater assets, doing a better job of fund-raising, and giving out ten times as much as what Trump Foundation does. The only thing favoring Trump's non-profit is that they give out more (over half) of the assets they claim... it's just not anywhere near what the Clintons are doing.

Clinton Foundation stated purpose "works to strengthen the capacity of governments and individuals to alleviate poverty, improve global health, strengthen economies, and protect the environment."

Trump Foundation stated purpose "giving primarily for health organizations, youth development, and social services."

Clinton Foundation doesn't set a geographic limit, even giving on an international basis. After all, they're covering global health and environmental issues.

Trump Foundation limits themselves to giving primarily in New York or Massachusetts. No real reason given.

The governing board for the Clinton Foundation has CEO, CFO, executive Director. The only Clinton family member I see active with the non-profit is Chelsea Clinton.

The governing board for the Trump Foundation is all Trump: Donald himself, two of his kids, one of his grandkids, and I think his son-in-law. I know I shouldn't suspect *cough* nepotism *cough* but still...

The database I use didn't show on the records the foundations' rating scale, it may have been under a different part of the directory. But for what I know, the Clinton Foundation is vetted and graded and the Trump Foundation isn't.

And the Beltway media only wants the CLINTON Foundation to close down?

Screw them.

The Worst Thing You Can Pin On Hillary

(w/ Update: hello again Crooks and Liars readers! Thank you Tengrain for the Mike's Blog Round-up link! Please stay and peruse the rest of the blog today, I hope there's more here to your liking.)

It's not the fake body count that the Far Right keeps pinning to her.

It's not the questionable email server, or Benghazi.

It's not how she forgave Bill for his out-and-out cheating.

It's that, well, basically, nobody in the media likes her.

It's this nitpicking like obsession with her Unfavorable numbers, that if only the Democrats had nominated somebody who was truly hugely popular - shut up BernieBros, Sanders was too abrasive and too Left-wing to make it - we'd be seeing a 50-state landslide for "Insert Democratic Savior Here" able to overwhelm congressional gerrymandering to secure major Senate and House wins.

It's like high school all over again.

You go to war with the President you have, not the President you wish you had.

Hillary is unpopular. Fine. Let's stick with that.

Hillary is also competent, intelligent, well-versed in the mechanics of how government works not only on the floor for voting but in the back-rooms where deals are made.

Hillary can be - will likely be - more bull-headed and obsessive than Obama has been, but where Obama let the obstruction ride to allow his Republican opponents to self-implode, Hillary will likely go all LBJ (remember, Hillary is Active-Negative by my estimates) and wheedle, press, maybe even outright bully her opponents into submission. Meaning that a lot of the stuff stuck in gridlock - our needed funding for schools and highways, fixing our income inequality, tweaking Obamacare to close the gaps starting to show in our healthcare reforms, pressing harder on foreign policy to stop a lot of the ongoing wars in Syria perhaps - will finally break out. These are still - despite the probability of blowback and screwups - worthy goals to support.

At this point, fuck the popularity contest part of political campaigning.

It's time to vote for the competency. For getting shit done.

I'm with her.

Playing With the Polling Numbers Mid-August 2016 Version

It's either this or writing three different science fiction short stories I can plug together to make an self-published anthology I can use to teach an e-publishing class at my library next month.

Anyway.

Going by Nate Silver's 538 polling forecasts as of August, which shows the likelihood one state is leaning between Hillary and Trump - so far, neither Johnson or Stein have enough percentages within each state - let's go with the states that are so clearly going for one candidate that they are basically locks this November, and convert that result into the 270towin.com mapping for better visualization:

Click the map to create your own at 270toWin.com

Look at that. These are the states already locked up. Hillary has THAT huge of an electoral lead. Granted, there's still a lot of states left to go.

Now, next let's add the states that are leaning either for Hillary or Trump but have enough of the "wiggle room" room crossing the dividing line to make them competitive. However, leave off the states where the current average - represented by a dot centered in that sliding bar - is closest to that line.

Let's start off with Trump-leaning states:

Click the map to create your own at 270toWin.com

Okay, that adds in a lot of Red to the map. Let's add Hillary-leaning states now:

Click the map to create your own at 270toWin.com

If we were just playing this as a game of numbers, it'd already be over. But this is just forecasting: the actual results won't matter until when people, you know, actually FREAKING VOTE.

And for the final touch, let's fill in the final states - Arizona, Georgia, South Carolina and Missouri - based on how their sliding bar of interest ekes across the middle of the numbers, and how the Dot of Averages specifically lines up:

Click the map to create your own at 270toWin.com

It's not a huge Electoral beatdown - nothing like 1984 or 1964 - but it will be a bigger win than Obama's electoral numbers (and every likelihood of a Popular vote landslide victory), showing a nationwide track of Democratic dominance that the Republican Party can no longer ignore. And if Hillary can flip at least Georgia and South Carolina - which is possible if she campaigns aggressively in those states - she can shove a stake into the heart of the Southern Strategy monster that the Far Right had been counting on the last 40 years.

Granted, this is still August, and there's still the debates - if Trump deigns to show up - and anything can happen, and who knows what October Surprise is in store from the wingnuts... and this still all requires one thing:

GET THE DAMN VOTE OUT, DEMOCRATS! Show up at the ballot box, in spite of the GOP suppression efforts! DOOO EEEETTTTTTTTT!

The Scenarios 2016 Edition

(Update: Thank you again, Infidel753, for your linkage from your blog!)

For the 2012 election - four years could not have passed that quickly, did it? - I gamed out the end of the Presidential and Congressional election between Obama and Romney, and what each scenario meant for the nation. So for 2016 I should do the same.

There's really only four variations at the end of November 8th:

Trump wins

In this scenario, I don't even have to consider the variances for Congress (with both houses currently under Republican control). If Trump wins, it will happen through a form of deceit and voter suppression on a scale certain to cover the entire Republican ticket. I mean, there is a likelihood the Democrats could win the Senate in a fair fight. But if Trump wins, there was no fair fight: there was either massive lies towards the voters, a massive smear campaigning, massive blocking of voters at the booths (which is now less likely thanks to the courts tossing out horrific voter ID laws), or outright fraud (which is now an issue regarding Russian hacking, if they can get at our electronic ballot machines).

No, in this situation Trump wins with every likelihood he'll have a Republican Congress winning with him. And if that happens we are all screwed.

The most obvious point is that the Supreme Court falls under Far Right control for another generation. The Republican Senate has kept that one vacancy open for just that. Given that Clarence Thomas is already talking retirement regardless who wins, that's another seat to fill. There's still other Justices - Ginsburg, Kennedy, Breyer - well past retirement age who can either die in office like Scalia or retire. There's at least three seats the next President can fill. And if it's Trump with a Republican Senate those seats will all be Far Right acolytes with even fewer scruples and more conservative ire than Scalia.

The federal budget is the next obvious. Despite all of Speaker Ryan's rationalizations, we're talking about one of the most severe slashing budgets we have ever seen, a budget that would cut into the social safety net for families while giving large tax breaks to the extremely wealthy. With Trump there to sign pretty much any paper shoved in front of him, the GOP Congress gets what they finally want: Kansas on a national scale.

Not to mention every WORST CASE SCENARIO that everyone else on the planet is pointing out will happen with a Trump administration, and we are looking at the darkest hour in American History.

Hillary Wins, Republicans Retain Control of the Senate, Republicans Retain Control of the House

In this scenario, we get pretty much the current status quo: a Democrat in the White House and Republicans on the Hill.

This is possible if the Republicans retain enough party discipline to separate Trump like a cancer from the rest of their ticket. It'll be hard - as they are likely losing the independent non-party voters fleeing from Trump's demagoguery - but possible. The House will be easy to keep thanks to gerrymandering, but the real trick will be to save enough GOP Senators in Blue or battleground states to maintain a 51-seat control.

If this happens, we are at least saved from the disaster of what a Trump presidency would inflict on the world. We would not, unfortunately, be saved from the disaster of a Republican-led Congress.

We'll still have a Republican-controlled House filled with enough Far Right backbenchers spoiling for a fight that any sensible bipartisan work on a budget will be impossible. We'll still have a Republican-controlled Senate that is going to come up with more excuses to avoid filling Supreme Court seats, or else "Bork" every Hillary nomination until she surrenders and nominates Scalia clones.

And that's not getting into the likelihood of this Republican Congress starting up every possible investigation into every little thing Hillary does just to stir up sh-t and find an excuse to impeach. We've seen it before... we've seen it since 1993 for God's sake.

It'll be the last eight years of Republican Obstruction against Obama... only with anger and vitriol towards a woman instead of a black man. /headdesk

Hillary Wins, Democrats Gain Control of the Senate, Republicans Retain Control of the House

The polling models and predictions lean this way, although nothing is certain in life except death, taxes, and Republican Ignorance. But I digress.

The likelihood is strong because there are more Republican Senators up for election than Democratic (24 to 10) meaning more odds they lose seats just on the statistical norms. Throw in half of those seats are in Blue or battleground states and there's a good chance Democrats can eke out a 52-seat control.

This can be a marked improvement for the Democrats, and especially for Hillary. This would give them the ability to fill that vacant SCOTUS seat with a Far-Left/Center-Left Justice that would reliably flip the Court Center-Left for at least the next ten years. They'd be able to fill more Appellate level Judicial openings as well, and hopefully a lot of Executive branch positions that the Republicans have refused to fill the last two years (or even longer given their history of Secret Holds). And if any Supreme Court Justices retire (or, sad to note, pass away) within the coming session, Hillary can lock a Left-Leaning Court for decades.

The Senate Republicans could try to obstruct those fillings with Secret Holds, but in an era of Hillary - who is Active-Negative enough to force the issue - what would happen is a major rewrite of Senate rules to weaken those Holds into nothingness (it'd upset Democratic Senators who fear the precedence will come back to hurt them, but Hillary and other Senators angry at all the delays will do this to break the logjam).

The bad news in this scenario is that the Republicans will retain control of the House. And the House has Constitutional powers to make life miserable for Hillary and the Dems. For starters, they can still call their own investigations into every little thing Hillary does just to harass her administration into inaction. Above all, they still retain power of the purse: all budgets by law have to originate from the House, meaning Ryan is going to keep pushing his slash-and-drown tax-cut agenda (just as long as he's still in the Speakership role...). Getting a bipartisan compromised budget through would be a nightmare.

Hillary Wins, Democrats Gain Control of the Senate, Democrats Gain Control of the House

This is the unlikeliest scenario simply because gerrymandering is such a bitch. Pardon my Klingon.

This really only happens where the Republican voter base - discouraged by a vile Trump campaign - fails to turn out in sufficient numbers across all districts and allows a more vigorous Democratic turnout - in a situation where voter suppression efforts fail and/or independent voters reject the GOP in toto - to pick up wins in GOP-leaning districts.

This would create a brief flurry of celebration among Democrats and likely a period of quick legislative activity during the first three months of 2017. To Republican horror, there would likely be a reconfirmation of Obamacare with major reforms put in place to fix the gaps the system is showing: Most likely a hard Medicaid program that Red states CAN'T reject and a Public Option of some kind to bring health care closer to universal coverage.

The budget plans will likely include the tax hikes on upper incomes that the Democrats have been pushing for since 2008 (and haven't been able to secure due to Senate Cloture and Holds before 2010 and GOP House control ever since). Again, any attempt this time by Republican Senators to block tax hikes will get cut down by Democrats tired of all that obstructing.

As noted in the earlier scenario, Judicial and Executive vacancies across the board will get filled.

Some but not all of the progressive agenda Bernie Sanders put on the Democratic platform will get passed. The Far Left will get pissy about it, but whatcha gonna do? The smart move by Hillary will be to pass something to strengthen banking regs and make Wall Street accountable for their sins of the last fifteen years, which would appease most of the progressive base (until 2020).

The response of the Far Right - among the hard cases still in office because gerrymandering kept them in the safest of districts, or because they're safe in their cable network studios - will be one of howling rage. They never accepted Obama's victories and will never accept Hillary's (or any other Democrat's). We're already getting complaints by Trump and other conspiracy-minded wingnuts that "this election is rigged" and so will ensure continued faux outrage over their losses. Any state under Far Right control is going do what they've threaten to do during the Obama years: they will pull every legal trick to "nullify" federal laws and regulations, and bring up any and every argument to (yes, they would go there) secede.

Even with a full Democratic ticket victory, the fighting will not end. Even if it's an Electoral curb-stomp equal to what Reagan inflicted on Mondale in 1984, even if Democrats win every Senate campaign, even if Democrats win 20-plus seat control of the House, the Republicans will never accept it. It doesn't fit their Almighty Fox Not-News Narrative.

The best thing to hope for is that Hillary does win, and with enough of a mandate to continue improving our nation's economy and doing something to generate more jobs in the construction and manufacturing industries (hopefully something along the lines of repairing our broken bridges and roads and building new schools).

So, to summarize: Please for the LOVE OF GOD don't let Trump Win. That is the pure nightmare scenario. Please get the vote out for Hillary Clinton and PLEASE get the vote out for the Senate and House elections and even state legislative elections to reduce the risk of state Republicans going full John C. Calhoun on us.