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Suffragist Open Thread

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corporette-suffragetteSince it looks like today is going to be wildly successful from a procrastination standpoint, I thought I'd throw up an election open thread (since that's what we're all talking/thinking about anyway). (#ImWithHer, but all opinions are welcome here.) Some fun links that may be helpful:

  • Feel like sharing your outfit with the hive today? (I know I'd love to see some good pantsuits, perhaps like the white one pictured.) Use hashtag #pantsuitpower on Instagram or Twitter. (Note that voting selfies may be illegal in your state — The New York Times has a roundup.)
  • If you're looking for ways to do a Gibson tuck, we included some good tutorials in our last roundup on office up-dos.
    nasty-woman-cocktail
  • Election cocktails are a thing — Quartz and Bloomberg both rounded up some good recipes. I may just have to make a batch of the Nasty Woman cocktail, pictured.

Looking back over election coverage, are there any stories or ideas that have stuck with you? I keep thinking about this article (I have no idea how I found it and I'm not that familiar with the general blog, Cracked) — I think the nation has a long road towards healing our huge divide, no matter how the election ends tonight.

(Psst: feel like reading the Corporette comments on the day of the last Presidential election? Here's the link.)

Update: A reader pointed out that there's a difference between the general suffrage movement and the Suffragette movement in Britain — the proper title for this post should have been “Suffragist Open Thread.” Here's a Wikipedia link for you.

195 Comments

  1. This isn’t Election related but fits in with today’s theme of women breaking through. I read this fascinating article about stunt reporters in the late 19th century that others may enjoy as well. Link in reply.

  2. Would you wear that pantsuit to work? I am surprised at how many people have white pantsuits today.

    1. I would in summer! Probably with a blue, lavender, or green shell, brighter colors cutting a little close to “Del Boca Vista” for me.

      1. Not me. I need to look slim and would NOT in any kind of pant’s suits. I think I would look like a frumpy version of Hillary with a pantsuit. So I wear 4″ pumps with a midi and most men do NOT even look at me, but at my leg’s and bust. That is the way to attract men, NOT with a pantsuit. FOOEY!

    2. I wouldn’t wear one ever. It just seems so impractical: VPL, visible seams, visible tucked-in-blouse, will it survive lunchtime or desk snacks, etc. I think it would be single-use, bordering on disposable. Not to mention what shoes to you wear and: it’s November in the northern hemisphere.

      Maybe for my future tropical real estate career Even then: with lei and fun patterened t-shirt underneath and some rainbow flip-flips or some of the less tame Jack Rogers sandals. The pants would have to be cropped flares. I would have some Iris Apfel glasses (maybe in hot pink though). And good lipstick.

      2. Really, for me, the answer is that there’s no way it will survive lunch or desk snacks or even morning coffee, and this is why I wear a lot of black and navy. Seriously, I can barely wear a white blouse.

    3. I don’t have much that is white, but I’m definitely rocking a pantsuit today! #imwithher

    4. I got married in a white pantsuit and that thing, while beautiful, has stayed in the back of my closet since. I keep thinking I can wear the pants, but I chicken out. I destroy white clothes with a shocking quickness.

    5. I wore one today, because #ImWithHer, but I was trying to think of the last time I wore a pantsuit. The last time I was interviewing, maybe?

      I could never wear a white pantsuit. I am messy. I think I own one white piece of clothing, a summer cardigan, and that’s it. White pants are impossible. One of my coworkers wore a gorgeous winter white wool blazer today, and we complimented each other on our pantsuits.

  3. NYT (free unlimited access through tomorrow, in case you missed it) had a beautiful piece by Harry Belafonte yesterday. Not in the feminist vein, necessarily, but I still loved it.

  5. Thank you for this thread! You are all smart, well educated women: does anyone have a suggestion for a great nonfiction book about the women’s suffrage movement? I spent some time online yesterday looking for one and the picking are pretty slim. Thank you!

    1. Why note Suffragette?

      FWIW, I just re-watched Mary Poppins — forgot that they needed a nanny b/c Mrs. Banks was out campaigning for the right to vote.

      1. First, because Suffragist is a non-gendered term for anyone supporting women’s right to vote. But also because Suffragette has very specific meaning rooted in a British suffrage movement.

        Nice Mary Poppins reference!

        3. Technically, “suffragist” is an advocate for the right to vote (perhaps particularly for women’s right to vote, but that’s largely because women were the last group to get the franchise); as I understand it, “suffragette” is (usually) specific to the women’s movement.

        4. It’s correctly used here. “Suffragette” is certainly associated with the British movement, but is also appropriately used more universally for those advocating for women’s right to vote. Suffragist is just a general term for someone advocating for the right to vote, not necessarily for women.

    2. Huh — good to know. (It probably doesn’t help that the word “suffragette” always makes me think of David Bowie!) I can’t change the URL and I don’t want to confuse people if the title’s different, but I’ll make a note in the text.

  7. Thanks – great pick- and that Cracked article was one of the most insightful of many I’ve read.

    2. Looking back over election coverage, are there any stories or ideas that have stuck with you?

      Agree about the Cracked article. I have similar background to the author and thought it was very well done.

      I will add that Peggy Noonan’s WSJ column back in February “Trump and the Rise of the Unprotected” really stuck. And the comment section is representative of potential Trump supporters- who are neither uninformed nor uneducated, as the conventional wisdom tends to portray.

      1. OP here- no but after a thread here, I read Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Between the World and Me, and started on Beloved. While I didn’t agree with Coates 100% it was vsluable and informative and changed my world view a little! Beloved, even more so.

        1. I read this, too, and found it super eye-opening. I’m waiting on “hillbilly elegy” to come in at the library so I can try to understand another perspective of which I have no firsthand knowledge.

  8. Off topic but advice needed!

    So, my firm has purchased a table of 8 for a party hosted by an organization I belong to. At the table, we will have 1 male partner, 4 female associates at the firm, and 3 female in-house counsel who are the firm’s clients.

    They just announced a charity drive for toiletries for a women’s shelter at the event (after the invites have gone out and are accepted).

    Do I pass on the announcement to all the other people at the table? Do I go out and buy a bunch of stuff to donate on behalf of the firm? Do I pass on the announcement to the 5 people at the firm but not the in-house people? Is it tacky to ask anyone to bring donations?

    Help! I don’t want anyone to feel bad because they didn’t know to bring a donation but it feels tacky to ask people I’ve invited to bring a donation after the invitations have gone out and were accepted.

    1. Send out an email to all indicating that you are contributing on behalf of the group but anyone wants to bring anything additional they can.

      2. Thanks! I have to admit, this was keeping me up last night. I guess I’m making a Target run this weekend.

    2. It might feel wrong for a co-ed work event but I was recently reading that shelters often fail women who need tampons and/or pads. Some women who stayed at the shelter in my town said that because the shortage was so dire, they were often excessively interrogated by shelter staff about the extent of their needs. It never occurred to me that this might be a problem, but there it is.

      1. Thanks! It is a women’s leadership group and this is our one event this year where male guests are encouraged to attend. But, well, it is a mostly-women event donating to a women’s shelter. If a guy is going to be scandalized by the hygienic equivalent of toilet paper, I’m going say “tough sh!t”.

        Anyway, one of the female associates has already asked about donating feminine hygiene products and I told her to bring them.

  9. Anyone else find it interesting that Ivanka and Melania wore white to vote today?!

        2. Is that even legal? I thought we had secret ballots to avoid voter intimidation.

  11. Every 4 years, I fret a little bit about how approximately 50% of the country can feel so radically differently than I do. But this is the first time in 20 years of voting that I am genuinely afraid about what the outcome might bring.

    I am so completely demoralized by the ugliness that this election has uncovered. I’m sure there must be decent, principled supporters of Trump – but at least some are unapologetically racist. Some genuinely don’t see a problem with bragging about sexual assault. It’s just so appalling, and terrifying to think that those points of view are actually that close to the surface for such a large percentage of citizens.

    At the end of the day, the outcome of this election likely won’t change anything for me – I am white, well educated, upper middle class – I have a white son that’s unlikely to be shot by the police, and a white American husband that can’t be deported. I’ve always had health insurance through my job and that will likely continue. I’m not in an industry that will be greatly affected by rescinded trade deals, and my religious affiliation won’t identify me as a target for derision and hatred. But I am afraid for my neighbors and coworkers, who won’t born into the same position of privilege.

    I’m just sad.

    Here’s to hoping for a better tomorrow and a future that everyone gets to benefit from.

    1. Same. And very personally angry as a woman that Trump’s words and actions are seen as okay–or worth living with because of the underlying misogyny that makes Trump voters hate Hillary.

    4. I’m with you on feeling demoralized. I’d classify myself as moderate and historically have voted to the right in keeping with some of my small government and conservative fiscal views. Being in pretty privileged position likely affords me the latitude to hold some of these beliefs. But, holy cow, I don’t recognize what is going on with the right and I am appalled that we are giving a platform to some of these views and angry voices. For the first time in a while, my state is moving to purple/tossup status so I am hopeful that there are a lot of people out there that are also feeling the need to vote for basic decency.

    5. There were hearts still being changed today. My R coworker voted D today after his minority daughter-in-law said she was afraid for her future children under a Trump presidency.

      1. If only that argument had worked on my own father…

        Seriously, his response was “oh whatever, your H is practically white and your kids will totally look white.” #talkaboutmissingthepoint

        1. My dad eventually disavowed trump, but the best he’ll do is no-vote or third party. He still dislikes the Clintons way too much. I’ll take it, though. It was hard for me to deal with his support for Trump.

    6. I totally agree with you. Although the otherwise decent, college-educated Trump supporters actually scare me more than the KKK-supporting lunatics, who are much easier to write off as terrible and crazy. I have a Facebook friend who is a Republican woman in her mid 60s. She posted a lot about how terrible Trump was during the Republican primary (for pretty much the same reasons everyone else said he was terrible) but I guess she is “party before all else” because she came home to roost and is now the most outspoken Trump supporter I know personally. She wrote long defenses of him after the video emerged of him bragging about committing sexual assault. She said things like “it’s not great, but all men talk like this in private” and “we don’t need a president who is a personal role model, just one who will keep us safe.” She’s a mom of two daughters and become the grandmother of a girl this year. One of her daughter’s best friends is Mexican-American. She seems like an otherwise lovely person who proudly posts photos of her beautiful family and takes about the importance of kindness and following Jesus’ teaching and asking for forgiveness when you have sinned. Yet somehow she supports a man who is the antithesis of all that. It just makes me sick – far more so than all the stupid white men with shirts that say “Trump that B!tch” or KKK slogans.

      1. Oh I don’t know. I didn’t vote for him, but I am an R who is pro life, and that was the main reason I would have voted for him. It was hard for me to overcome. I wouldn’t call it “party before all else,” I would call it, I believe in things the R party believes in (although I don’t think he is an R in the slightest, he at least is more that way than Clinton and has promised to be that way). So I think Ds would be in much the same place because of a woman’s right to choose. Many would say it isn’t party above all else, it’s that I believe in those policies, etc.

        1. I can only speak for myself, but if the choice were between a racist, misogynistic, vindictive, quite possibly mentally ill Democrat and a decent, but pro-life Republican (say, John Kasich) I would vote for the Republican in a heartbeat. And I consider myself very pro-choice.

          (Also just want to point out that the evidence that Trump is pro-life is very, very scant. He says it now, but for years he was pretty pro-choice. I will concede that the selection of Mike Pence is certainly a strong move in that direction, but VP has next to zero actual say and there’s nothing to prevent Trump from completely doing a 180 on this issue when he takes office.)

        2. I get that. I’m extremely pro-choice and would choose to have an abortion if my birth control methods fail. It would be incredibly difficult to vote the other way if the pro-choice candidate was beyond crazy on everything else. I hope I never have to face that.

        3. I agree with this. I didn’t vote for him either but the one thing that was tugging at me about not voting Republican is that the next president will nominate at least 1 and up to 3 Supreme Court justices, who will have a huge influence on politics and the law for the next 25+ years.

          The Supreme Court has very little check on its power and have recently been making more and more rulings on social issues that are not based on the law but on their political opinions.

          Trump as president probably couldn’t get a single one of his extreme proposals done because Congress is a huge check on any president’s power (even if Republicans maintain control of Congress, I don’t think they’d let him get much done since they all pretty much hate him).

          Again, obviously I have to weigh this against the fact that he’s a horrible person and the rest of the world hates him and would probably refuse to work with him on anything, but the fact remains that the Supreme Court will likely have much more influence over our lives than Trump would as president.

          1. The Supreme Court has as many checks on its power as the president. They aren’t as obvious and the individuals can’t be removed as easily, but the Court can’t just do whatever it wants against the people’s wishes indefinitely. Also, one of the biggest is that Congress does have a say in who ends up on the SC.

            Also, maybe Trump will defend the unborn children of the world by taking pro-life actions, but I wouldn’t hold my breath based on how he treats every other class of human and how he has refused to stand up for anyone else who has ever been marginalized.

    7. I’ve felt the same for awhile, but I feel hopeful today. I’m guessing I’ll be a wreck tonight watching the coverage but I’m embracing my hopeful feeling today.

    8. I flip it in my brain. I am glad the people who are racists, misogynists, etc., have made it so public. That allows me to cut them out of my life and not have to interact with them moving forward. I was under no illusion that people who believe what Trump is spewing exist, so I am much happier that they are out in the open so I know who they are and can conduct myself accordingly. Negativity wins over positivity in the news – there are still plenty of good people out there who are fighting the good fight.

    9. TK, I am sad, too. For the last several months, I’ve endured some very hateful comments from people I thought were friends. I’ve heard things like “I thought you were intelligent,” “How could you disgrace your gender like that?” and “I never knew you were a racist/bigot/every other hateful name in the book.”

      You see, I, along with nearly all of my friends and family (with the exception of the ones who made those hateful comments) am voting for Trump. I’d like to think that we are those decent, principled supporters you hope are out there. We are out there. We’re just tired of what we’re seeing and hearing from our government: That no matter how hard we work, we don’t matter. We’re tired of being ignored, we’re tired of our elected officials ridiculing us for “clinging to God and guns” (yes, one of our own senators said this about us.) We saw our governor destroy a very lucrative industry that kept our state going during the recession by threatening to impose higher taxes on it. As a result, that industry is just a shell of what it was — people lost jobs, and we’re seeing the chances of that happening again with Hillary’s threat against what’s left of our coal industry and its support businesses. We’re conservative, and we’re criticized and told we’re “backwards” and “racist” and “bigoted” for disagreeing with the current administration’s policies. We have sons and brothers in the military and fathers and grandfathers who served and we want what’s best for our veterans and think it’s shameful that anyone who has served our country should be homeless or has to wait for health care. We support law enforcement and can’t understand why it’s so difficult for someone to ‘freeze’ and put their hands up when an officer of the law tells them to do so and to understand that if they don’t, that officer has a split second to decide if his/her life is in danger. We want good jobs and the comfort of knowing those jobs will be around for our kids. We want to feel confident that we won’t be destitute in our old age. We want to feel safe and secure within our own borders.

      We aren’t crazy people. We get up and go to work every day. Some of us own businesses. We have kids. We worry about their future and our retirement years. We worry about our elderly parents and wonder how we’re going to take care of ourselves, our kids, and our parents. We look at what’s going on in the world, and we worry. We go to church. We pray. And we hope for something that will take the weight of this world off our shoulders. The media has managed to portray us as ugly. Hillary called us “deplorable” and “dark and dangerous.” You’d probably be surprised to find that the vast majority of us are just like me and my friends. And we are really just like you.

      You may wonder why we support Donald Trump. He came along and said what a lot of us wanted to hear. He was NOT the establishment that left us in the dust a long time ago. He pointed out the things the establishment did that we didn’t like. He GOT us. He understood the working class folks who got the hell scared out of them in the recession and who aren’t convinced that we’re on steady ground just yet. With Hillary, we’re worried that we’re in for more of the same. With Trump, we stand a chance of something, anything, being different and maybe getting better for us. I don’t agree with or like things he’s said or done. But I was raised to be a strong woman and I have worked in enough male-dominated fields to have heard far, far worse than the things we heard Trump say. I know I can handle my own when a man makes a sexually-charged remark to me. I don’t condone what he’s said or done in those instances, but I can separate what he’s said and done in those instances from what I hope he can do as President.

      As a well-educated white woman myself (a double major in business management and accounting and a minor in political science, graduated from a major university with honors, worked either 2 part-time jobs or 1 full time job all during college and graduated owing only $300 that I paid off one week after graduation), I have done my research on the candidates. I just didn’t like what I saw about Hillary. Trump was not my first pick as the Republican candidate, either. But I need to vote my conscience today and hope that the next 4 years bring some positive changes to our country and that we as a nation can heal after being so divided on so many levels.

      1. Applause!

        I didn’t vote for Trump, but I totally stick up for the people who did!!! They are my family. They are good, loving people who own companies and work hard and give their money to charity and believe in safety and want hope for the future.

        1. Some of them are good loving people. Don’t forget you can be a racist, sexist and misogynist and be loving to those in your extended circle. Same for the Dems who aren’t at all perfect people either. However for this election, the clearly stronger, experienced leader is Hillary and that is who I am voting for.

          1. Right. Being racist or sexist or any other -ist and being kind and thoughtful to your family and friends are in no way mutually exclusive.

        2. Thank you, Anonymous. I was a little worried about posting here, given I’m clearly a minority, but I wanted people to know that we really are good people.

          1. Hi, “good person.” I’m Muslim. I’m also a patriotic American (and a Texan). Trump has advocated putting Muslims like myself on registries, said that Muslims “cheered” at September 11, and of course, the famous Muslim ban.

            I can’t tell you how deeply it cuts to hear these words coming from a man that half of American supports. I wish you could meet me in person, and tell me — to my face — how you could possibly support this man. It’s cruel, and he’s cruel — so please, tell me why, you are not cruel by extension.

          2. “Good” is subjective. Being kind to your friends and family is one thing. I would argue that being a “good person” involves more than that. It’s taking into consideration the well-being of others that you aren’t necessarily connected to. Donald Trump wants to deport 11 million people and ban an entire religion from entering this country. The fact that you are willing to take a “chance” that things will somehow get better for you and your family at the expense of millions of others is what non-Trump supporters find so offensive.

          3. Yeah, this too. I am from a Muslim country, and grew up Muslim. I think it has its problems, but I love the USA even though I am not a citizen yet. The idea of putting people like me and Imwithher on a “registry” reminds me of things that were done in the country I fled from.

          4. I mean that literally, SteelCityMagnolia. Please explain this to me — I’m honestly curious. My guess is that you haven’t actually me a Muslim-American before.

          5. “being a “good person” involves more than that. It’s taking into consideration the well-being of others that you aren’t necessarily connected to. ”

            This.

          6. Hi Imwithher – A little off topic, but I just wanted to chime in because you said you’re a Texan & I’m a Texan too (and you can always tell a true Texan because they include it in introductions) and I just want you to know that, even in this deeply red state, there are many Texans that are with you and are trying to fight that cruel message and show other Texans that it’s not ok. My whole family is Republican (except me), but not one person is voting for Trump. This is not because they are #withher and more because we are with you and all of the Muslim Americans that live here. Texas might not be going blue this year, but I think more eyes are opening and minds are changing.

          7. To Lana at 4:04 — thank you so much for your kind words. I really appreciate it.

          8. I’m echoing Lana. I’m a Texan (hello, fellow Texans!), a lifelong conservative libertarian, and I did not and could not vote for Trump. I had many reasons for not doing so, but chief among them was because Trump’s rhetoric regarding Muslims, minorities, and women is the antithesis of the American ideal. Please do not be too discouraged.

          9. @Imwithher, your comment breaks my heart. I can’t imagine how scared you must be. I’m terrified of Trump and I have comparatively nothing at stake (upper middle class, white, straight Jewish woman). But I want to third Lana and JayJay. I live in a different dark red state and things are changing here too. People are getting more open-minded and receiving more education (education is extremely correlated with rejecting Trump and his bigotry) and attitudes are changing. I saw a map of what the electoral college would look like if only those aged 18-34 could vote and it was almost all blue. The country is changing and bigots are being left in the dust, which is why they want to turn back the clock to a time when white men had all the power. I know that’s probably not much consolation in the moment, with the possibility of a President Trump is looming, but I really believe we are moving forward even in the darkest red corners of America. Hopefully Hillary will be elected tonight and we can begin the process of healing our country, and I think that has to and will start with convincing our Muslim friends that Donald Trump does not speak for America.

        3. As a non-American who works in the field of foreign affairs, I find it very confusing that Trump was associated in any way with “safety”. His support of nuclear proliferation is antithetical to the foundation of world security from a western democratic perspective. A Trump Presidency would significantly reduce Americans safety at home and likely abroad as well.

          There’s also a growing view that Putin’s involvement in the election was not designed at electing Trump, that was viewed only as a nice side benefit, but at destabilizing American domestic politics to reduce America’s efficacy at an international actor.

          HRC is widely regarded in foreign affairs circles as a Secretary of State who made America significantly safer.

          2. That’s hilarious that she made it safer. The middle east is a disaster, which happened on her watch. We have had multiple terrorist attacks on her watch. In what way did she make America “significantly safer”? I’m not saying Trump would, and I didn’t vote for him, but I call bs when I see it.

          3. Why was HRC the cause of the change in the Middle East?

            Suggesting that the crises in the Middle East are somehow her ?fault/responsibility is showing a lacking of understanding of the progress of recent history.

            The Secretary of State is a liason/negotiator, and HRC is very good at Diplomacy.

          4. As three of many examples (links omitted to avoid moderation)

            “Michael O’Hanlon, a national security expert at the Brookings Institution who has advised Clinton, judged her State Department record “more solid than spectacular” when she left office in 2013. He stands by that assessment but says some of her efforts have borne fruit that was not discernible then, such as the pivot to Asia and attention given to climate change.”

            “After that I was convinced she had wisdom that was missing in many parts of the US foreign policy world, where there is too much bravado,” Khar said. “She could step back from the US position because she understood the long-term repercussions. She had a much more realistic perspective.” Khar = then Pakistani foreign minister

            David Miliband, who as UK foreign secretary overlapped with Clinton for her first 16 months at secretary of state, called her “the best listener in politics” and argued that her mix of personal skills and beliefs defy easy categorisation.”

            – plus that whole getting rid of Osama Bin Laden thing and if you think that she had no role in that you do not understand the amount of groundwork that goes into foreign affairs
            – on a personal level – a close friend of our family (not American) has a close relationship with Bedouin tribes in Libya and has visited yearly and spent approx 3 months there for more than thirty years. He is of the firm view that not a lot more could have been done to stabilize Libya without the kind of lengthy and comprehensive commitment on a military and development basis that the USA was not prepared to make (a la post war Germany).

      2. “He was NOT the establishment that left us in the dust a long time ago. ”

        – He is the living embodiment of the establishment

        “I know I can handle my own when a man makes a sexually-charged remark to me. I don’t condone what he’s said or done in those instances, but I can separate what he’s said and done in those instances from what I hope he can do as President.”

        – He is a serial sexual assaulter who makes no apologies for it. Glad YOU can ‘handle it’ when a man makes a sexually charged remark at you. What about when he grabs your pussy? At a job you can’t afford to lose because you need the healthcare benefits for your sick kid? That’s the kind of man you support.

        1. +1

          “I know I can handle my own when a man makes a sexually-charged remark to me. I don’t condone what he’s said or done in those instances, but I can separate what he’s said and done in those instances from what I hope he can do as President” <— That is a picture-perfect example of privilege at work. *You* can "handle it" when someone acts toward you the way Trump acts toward women, and *you* are educated enough and employable enough that you have the ability to walk away from a job where someone is harassing or harming you, so you get to just ignore how he treats women, because it doesn't affect you personally.

          If you cared even an iota for other women, women not of your background and not of your good fortune, you would not be nearly so cavalier about this.

      3. If you want to not be called a bigot, don’t vote for one who makes hatred the central focus of his campaign. If your conscience is comfortable with him, you get the name calling you deserve.

        3. +1 to Anonymous at 3:18

          There is no excuse for supporting somebody who bases his campaign on bigotry against others because you think he’ll make things better for you.

        4. +2 to 3:18.
          No, you’re not just like me and my friends. You like candidate who said a Mexican-American judge wasn’t qualified to do his job because of his heritage, who proposed banning people from the US because they practiced a certain religion, who bragged about assaulting women and was subsequently accused by more than a dozen women of rape or sexual assault and who mocked the disabled simply because you like what he’s selling *for you*. Most educated Americans care about people besides themselves.

        5. This is so true and totes agree.

          This is pathetic. Internalized sexism is a hell of a thing.

      5. There are many things I do not like about Donald Trump, and many things I do not like about Hillary Clinton. I deeply empathize with some of the things that the “basket of deplorables” feel and fear; I am angry and anxious at our apparent inability or unwillingness to face these issues.

        No one wins today. We will elect one person that the voters and electoral college find the less horrible choice. Neither candidate has a mandate or popular support.

        So, SteelCityMagnolia, I do not find you any of these things you say. I wished for something better for all of us. Steve Almond said this quote on the Dear Sugar podcast, and this is what I will live.

        “Because when this election is over, there are still going to be millions of Americans who didn’t vote for your candidate, and if we cannot bring ourselves to recognize that those are human beings – Americans who struggle with the same things and carry around the same anxieties and worries about taking care of our family and x, y and z – then there’s no hope.”

        1. “Neither candidate has a mandate or popular support.”

          Based on what? The votes haven’t been counted yet.

          1. When the President receives a significant majority of the votes, they are said to have a popular mandate. Nothing suggests yet that either of these candidates will have a significant majority.

      6. This is as reasonable a defense as I’ve heard, and I sincerely hope that most trump voters are more like you than the ignorant, racist caricature they’re often portrayed as.

        Your statement about separating the things he’s done from what he can do as president is exactly why I’m ok with voting for Hillary even though she’s made mistakes. The reason I can’t say the same for trump is that i think his words during the campaign are so damaging to the culture of respect and inclusiveness America is supposed to represent that it’s irresponsible to give him the biggest microphone for 4 years. I’m not terribly afraid of what he would do as far as governing, because I have faith that cooler heads would stop him from actually being Hitler. And as a white, and white collar American, I don’t stand to lose too much, personally. But he could certainly change cultural norms in a way id hate to see.

      7. You feel you’ve been left behind by the establishment and he gets you. But are things really so bad that you are willing to take the particular risk that Trump poses for a “chance” for things to get better for you? I understand wanting an anti-establishment candidate who may shake things up, but with Trump I just see the potential downsides of the way he is going to shake things up be so much greater than the potential upsides. If you have the flu and you could take medicine that has a 70% chance of killing you and a 30% chance of making you better, I think I’d just stick with the flu.

        Also, just because he says he is going to bring all blue-collar jobs back to America does not actually mean he can do it, and I really have not seen any basis to believe that he could. Even if he does make things better for his constituents, there’s not going to be stability if he makes things a whole heck of a lot worse for everyone else. Trumps track record shows that he favors people that are good time him, no matter what awful things they do to anyone else, and punishes those he feels have slighted him. Having such an unprincipled man in charge of the most powerful country in the world is just too dangerous, even if he is able to make things little better for the “real” America.

        1. +1 I am all about respecting people’s opinions, but I still have a hard time swallowing those who support Trump because he is anti-establishment and going to shake things up. There is no evidence he has any plan to do the things he claims he can do.

      8. I appreciate your input SCM. Would you mind sharing specifically what you saw that you didn’t like about Hillary? You must have felt very strongly about her weaknesses to vote for Trump, even though he wasn’t your first choice R candidate.

        I understand almost no one supports 100% of everything a candidate says, but I’m curious why the things you thought were important (healthcare, robust middle class, improved life for working poor, veterans affairs, strong female empowerment) in a candidate are the things you believe Trump will be better for you/your community on, when it’s shown that Hillary’s policies are more favorable on those points? The healthcare one really surprised me. Do you believe Trump will bring back the coal industry?

        I also voted with my conscience and I cannot in good conscience vote for Trump because voting for a racist bigot makes me a racist bigot. We are not so different.

        1. “We are not so different” while you call her a racist bigot for voting for Trump. Nice pretend reconciliation.

          1. It was’t reconciliation. I was saying that I also voted with my conscience and many HRC voters do, too. My examination of my conscience led me down a different path. This is America – if you can vote for a racist bigot, I can call you one for supporting one, because, after all, bigotry is a certain set of ideals, which a voter endorses as their own.

            I am genuinely curious how someone in coal country believes Trump will make their lives better. It is a terrible situation but the industry died out with new technology and other industries, not because liberals willfully took it away.

      9. First of all, this makes no sense because Trump appears to know nothing about economic policy. I guarantee you that he does not, for example, know what the Fed does, or know what the difference between fiscal and monetary policy is. How you could believe that someone could “fix” a system he knows literally nothing about is beyond me. Additionally, there have been hundreds — if not thousands — of economists (from all across the economic spectrum) have come out and said — “if Trump enacts the policies he says he will enact, it will destroy the US economy.” He knows nothing, makes no effort to learn anything, says things that are incoherent, and his one or two policies that he does seem to know will be ruinous to our economy. The fact that you can’t see that is mind-boggling to people.

        Second — and this is to address your argument that you and your fellow Trump supporters are not “hateful” – my family is Muslim. Trump has suggested banning all Muslims and placing American Muslims on registries. If you don’t see that as racist/hateful — I believe with all my heart that you are in the minority in that belief. It’s so racist and hateful, in fact (and so unconstitutional, and so deplorable) that even if there were positive economic movements that could result from a Trump presidency (and I assure you there are not — see paragraph above), they do not just justify voting for him.

        And so — this is why many people believe that Trump supporters are ignorant, racist, and hateful: they don’t comprehend that he will be destructive to the US economy, and regardless, they are willing to vote for him anyway.

        1. Sorry, it looks like I double posted after one of my comments went into moderation.

      10. “…can’t understand why it’s so difficult for someone to ‘freeze’ and put their hands up when an officer of the law tells them to do so and to understand that if they don’t, that officer has a split second to decide if his/her life is in danger.”

        The epitome of white privilege. And certainly does not account for those situations where people do that and lose their lives anyway.

        1. Yes, this comment is horrifying. As if not putting your hands up properly justifies being killed.

        3. Funny how you play the white privilege card on a forum where people talk about things like push presents and designer bags and coats and shoes that cost more that all my month’s utility

          3. This forum is the epitome of “white privilege”. I find it laughable that a couple of you cows had the audacity to throw down that ridiculous remark in an attempt to try to defend your side of the discussion. What’s so hard about making sense of that.

          4. So I can’t empathize with populations that are struggling with systemic injustices because I have disposable income? I can’t be aware that my economic privilege is due in part to advantages that I was born with? Good to know.

            Seriously, though, your comment makes no sense.

          6. You keep on using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means…

            White privilege does not mean being a privileged (rich) white person. White privilege means that white people enjoy certain societal advantages simply because they are white. Advantages like not being viewed with undue suspicion by police officers. Have many people on this forum benefited from white privilege? Yes. Do many people on this forum also regularly check their privilege and seek to understand the circumstances of those that do not benefit from white privilege? Yes.

            There. I’m done feeding the trolls.

          7. There’s nothing inconsistent about liking expensive handbags and also believing unarmed black people shouldn’t be murdered.

          9. Google what privilege means. You have no idea what you’re talking about.

            And I’ve been reading this s*te for like 8 years and I’m pretty sure no one has ever talked about “push presents.” GTFO here with that ish.

        4. This was so incredibly disturbing to read. What about Tamir Rice? What about Eric Garner? BLACK MEN GET KILLED IN AMERICA WITH THEIR HANDS UP. BLACK TWELVE YEAR OLDS GET KILLED IN AMERICA BEFORE THE POLICE OFFICER PUTS THE CAR IN PARK.

          Incredibly sensitive today given the results from last night but I am honestly absolutely disgusted with the person who wrote this.

      11. I get it, i really do. I grew up in WV. Watching the coal mine industry decline, watching hardworking, proud people struggle to figure out how to feed their families has been heartbreaking and devastating. I drove by a food bank in McDowell County not too long ago and the line waiting for it to open was as long as some polling lines today. Apparently the FOOD BANK sometimes runs out if you don’t get there early enough.

        What’s even harder for me as an educated self-identifying liberal/progressive (living far away now in a elitist liberal haven full of people who say nice things but have never actually been exposed to anything that doesn’t match their pretty little world view) is to watch people I know who I respect as good and smart dismiss and deride these good, hard-working people, mocking them cruelly and without repercussions. Its not OK. It doesn’t help things. The closest Clinton came to losing me this campaign was her “basket of deplorables” because its so emblematic of the divide and lack of attempt to understand the other side that is dividing this country.

        Some of the smartest people I’ve ever met don’t have teeth, and I really mean that. Intelligence and education aren’t the same thing, and too many people dismiss someone for their accent and their appearance, have written off entire swaths of this country and ignore them entirely. They are not part of any economic redevelopment plan or anything else. They are forgotten.

        Washington IS broken, and I’m not looking forward to 4 more years of gridlock, which seems to be about the best we can hope for.

        But, I also don’t see or understand how Trump is the answer. Everything we know suggests the opposite of the things he says or the reasons people say they are supporting him:

        – Trump doesn’t support veterans. Nothing he has actually done has been in support of veterans. He’s a draft dodger who has constantly maligned veterans. Even the fundraiser he held for veterans while campaigning only, reluctantly, finally donated some of the money to veterans groups after reporters started checking for evidence of the donation.
        – Trump has personally never done anything but send jobs overseas. Why will he create them now?
        – Trump has made robbing small businesses part of his business plan. He doesn’t pay the bills, he threatens to sue, and he uses his vast resources to bully people out of getting what they are owed.
        – Trump University pretty much sums up all the respect Trump has for poor, uneducated people in this world.
        – Trump has employed illegal immigrants in his construction projects.

        I understand where people are coming from, but I just don’t understand how they can think Trump is the answer.

        2. THIS. I understand the disillusionment completely. As detailed in Hillbilly Elegy, there is an entire culture that is basically ignored/put down by Washington and Hollywood.

          I just don’t understand how you go from “all our jobs have left” to “I want to vote for the man who has a record of not paying his contracts and send jobs overseas.”

        3. I grew up in rural Illinois (look up county maps – a very Red state only turned blue because of Cook County) and you’ve captured my thought process exactly. I voted for Hillary without a shred of regret, but I hate that my family and friends are being forgotten and no one seems to care.

          “Intelligence and education aren’t the same thing, and too many people dismiss someone for their accent and their appearance, have written off entire swaths of this country and ignore them entirely. They are not part of any economic redevelopment plan or anything else. They are forgotten.

          Washington IS broken, and I’m not looking forward to 4 more years of gridlock, which seems to be about the best we can hope for.

          But, I also don’t see or understand how Trump is the answer. Everything we know suggests the opposite of the things he says or the reasons people say they are supporting him”

      12. Thank you for articulating your position. It is refreshing to see this “side” represented in the comments here, for a change. I mostly agree.

      13. I respect and understand your views, even though some are different than mine.

        Unfortunately, you have bought into lies from a man who only thinks of himself and has never done anything for anyone but himself.

      14. For a well-educated woman, your defense isn’t terribly articulate. It appears that you are voting for Trump because he “gets” you and you don’t like HRC for some unspecified reason. You do realize you’re not voting for your future boyfriend, right? Dear lord.

        1. I read a great quote floating around the internet today, I forget where:

          “A vote is not a valentine; it’s a chess move.”

          1. Most Americans don’t think that way though. Likability has always been hugely important in elections.

        2. Dude. That’s s*xist. No better than Gloria Steinhem saying Bernie voters were looking for guys. Can we not condescend to women who make different choices than us?

          1. Actually it wasn’t sexist, dude. What would be sexist is asking whether a guy would ever write such rambling, emotional, but-he-gets-me nonsense.

      15. There’s only one good statement in this post. “He came along and said what a lot of us wanted to hear.” That’s exactly right – Trump knows his audience and is telling them what they want to hear.

      16. Steel City- Here’s what I’m reading in your post. You’ve listed a lot of grievances about your and your cohorts’ lives and the way the current administration has treated you, but what you haven’t done is explained why a Trump presidency will make anything better. Further, you have not explained why you are not a bigot even though you support a bigot. All you’ve done is show that you think he’ll make your life better so you’re willing to ignore the bigotry. Charming.

        “We’re just tired of what we’re seeing and hearing from our government: That no matter how hard we work, we don’t matter. We’re tired of being ignored, we’re tired of our elected officials ridiculing us for “clinging to God and guns” (yes, one of our own senators said this about us.)”

        Who is telling you this? White conservatives have the power in this country. Who on earth is ignoring you? Good god, Christians have such a stranglehold on this country that they (#notallchristians) flip out when the rest of us merely ask not to be discriminated against. We’ve had whole SCOTUS cases upholding the ability of Christians to inflict their religious beliefs on the rest of us. Anyways. On to jobs. Minorities who struggle to find employment are often told by conservatives whites to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and get jobs, or to “better themselves” and go to school if they can’t find a job that earns a decent wage so that they can stop “taking government handouts.” But why is it the case then that when conservative, low-skilled workers who lost their factory jobs can’t adapt to a new economy that the entire electorate must bend over backwards to acknowledge the struggle? The entire economy must be reshaped to keep your outdated jobs? Whatever happened to “bettering yourselves,” hmm? I think that both responses are wrong; I’m just saying it’s hypocritical for people who are so devoted to the free market to sit there and expect that the government will protect their *specific* jobs. Seriously, why do coal miners have the right to demand that the rest of us suffer terrible environmental and public health impacts just so that they can keep their jobs, instead of adapting to a changing world like the rest of us have?

        “[We] think it’s shameful that anyone who has served our country should be homeless or has to wait for health care.”

        Agreed. But why do you think a Trump presidency will improve this situation? What efforts have the Republicans made to help anyone get healthcare…….ever? What have they proposed that you believe will be effective?

        “We support law enforcement and can’t understand why it’s so difficult for someone to ‘freeze’ and put their hands up when an officer of the law tells them to do so and to understand that if they don’t, that officer has a split second to decide if his/her life is in danger.”

        You are grossly privileged and clearly haven’t been understanding what is actually happening in these shootings. What an ignorant statement. Your statement is ignorant, and you should feel bad. Imagine what it must feel like to be in a confusing, frightening situation with 4 guns trained on you, by people who suspect you are a criminal. Do you trust yourself to freeze, perfectly? You do realize that failing to freeze is not grounds for summary execution in this country? It amazes me that you don’t want to hold police officers- people who are (or should be) trained to deescalate and handle dangerous situations—to a higher standard when evaluating reasonable force. Sorry, if a cop thinks his life is in danger just because someone twitched, that person is probably too dangerous to be a cop.

        “And we are really just like you.”

        No you are not. You may have some of the same concerns as I do, but you are not the same as me. I am not willing to throw my fellow citizens under the bus, support bigotry, support policies that amount to civil rights violations, support a person who behaves like a despot, because he might “shake things up.”

        “You may wonder why we support Donald Trump. He came along and said what a lot of us wanted to hear.”

        So… am I supposed to take this to mean that you wanted to hear all of the hate and bigotry and sexism? Or that it just was white noise because he validated your anger? That’s such weak thinking. If I told you I’d give you a million dollars tomorrow, would you vote for me?

        “He was NOT the establishment that left us in the dust a long time ago.”

        Please. I can’t think of anyone more establishment than Donald Trump.

        “With Hillary, we’re worried that we’re in for more of the same. With Trump, we stand a chance of something, anything, being different and maybe getting better for us.”

        But WHY do you think it will be better? Look, if you need to take out the garbage, you don’t bulldoze the kitchen.

        “I don’t agree with or like things he’s said or done. But I was raised to be a strong woman and I have worked in enough male-dominated fields to have heard far, far worse than the things we heard Trump say. I know I can handle my own when a man makes a sexually-charged remark to me. I don’t condone what he’s said or done in those instances, but I can separate what he’s said and done in those instances from what I hope he can do as President.”

        This is another grossly privileged and ignorant statement. First of all, discussing sexual assault (which he did) is not the same as making a sexually charged statement to someone. Second of all, you neglect the fact that not all women may be in that position. Apparently you’re willing to throw them under the bus. Third of all, the fact that you may be able to “handle” when someone makes a sexually charged comment at you has nothing to do with the fact that it’s NOT OK TO SUPPORT A MISOGYNIST AS LEADER OF THE FREE WORLD. I want the person leading the country to be an advocate for women. To respect them. He doesn’t RESPECT WOMEN and you want to elevate him the presidency. It’s mind boggling to me. It is heart wrenching to feel like my president could be someone who looks at me not as a person or a citizen, but as just a piece of pussy to grab, or disgusting, or a pig, or not pretty enough, or too pretty, or too uppity for getting out of the kitchen, and so on and so forth.

        I work in male dominated environments and I have been subject to sexual harassment and sexist comments. The appropriate response isn’t “oh well I’ve heard it before so I’m not going to hold the president to a higher standard,” it’s “this type of speech is not ok in this context or any context.” Gee, do you think that it will help the situation to have a president who rubber-stamps that sort of attitude? Christ.

        Why can you separate what he’s said and done in “those instances” from what he’ll do as president. Seriously, why? Do you think he will become less sexist over night? Does it just not matter to you if the president treats half of the electorate with such egregious disrespect?

        “But I need to vote my conscience today and hope that the next 4 years bring some positive changes to our country and that we as a nation can heal after being so divided on so many levels.”

        You and I are not the same. My conscience doesn’t include discriminating against my fellow Americans. Sickening. How can you possibly think that we will be “healed” when you’ve got an irradiated mutant cheese-puff saying the things he’s said about gays, women, Muslims, Hispanics, blacks, the disabled?

        3. I heart you, specifically:

          You may have some of the same concerns as I do, but you are not the same as me. I am not willing to throw my fellow citizens under the bus, support bigotry, support policies that amount to civil rights violations, support a person who behaves like a despot, because he might “shake things up.”

          1. Also, Trump is only like Steel City if she is an insecure person with a gold-plated toilet in his personal jet. Trump doesn’t get you, Steely. Kellyanne Conway had to tell him that his annual dry cleaning bill was people’s entire yearly salary.

        6. Blessed to have a beautiful community of women that uses their BRAINS and critical thinking skills.

        7. +1 Beautifully put. When you support someone who is a bigot, you support everything he says. Dont cherry pick and say I like this part of him and not that. Well he is on and the same.

      17. Well, I, for one, think you ARE a terrible person.

        Save me the sob story, sister. You sound extremely ignorant, sheltered, and irrational.

        1) The world is changing indefatigably, and wishing to go back to the “good old coal or industry days” is not going to happen. We need concerted policy effort to bring job training and re-training in what’s viable now and in the future (technology, green energy, etc.).

        2) Your “brothers,, fathers, husbands” in the military? This here tells a lot about what I term ignorance and shelteredness above. What about the mothers, sisters, and wives? Eh? Eh? Your internalized sexism showing.

        I am very tired and angry after this election season, and, let me tell you – I both hate you and feel sorry for you.

      18. You are not like me.

        Your grandparents’ grandparents and cousins did not live in a world where “those people” were blamed for the overall unemployment, joblessness, and despair. Where they were made to “register” with the government, where they had their rights stripped away, and then killed. Because they were “them” and not “us.”

        You are not like me.

        You do not have friends with dark skin who are monitored in stores, who are stopped by the police for no apparent reason, or who are consistently searched & questioned at airports.

        You are not like me.

        If our roof is leaking, we don’t hire a demolition team with no experience to destroy the house, we hire a builder with 30 years of experience to construct a new roof.

        You are not like me.

        I, who despite having a masters degree am underemployed and have shoes with a hole in bottom, do not think that a man with a gold plated toilet in his private jet “gets me.”

        You are not like me.

        THE END.

  12. Any of you fellow Tampanians heading to the watch party at the Marriott Waterside tonight? Meet up?

    1. I misread this and thought the party was at the Marriott Waterslide tonight! My version sounds like more fun.

  13. I cannot wait until I can vote! I just became a resident this year, so it will be a while. But I am following the elections as much as or more than most American citizens.

    My husband and I were both feeling stressed last night. The idea of a Trump presidency is frightening on a personal level. And I think not being able to vote makes it even worse.

    1. I can’t imagine how that must feel. I hope you talked to your friends who can vote about why he scares you. I’ve found that having a personal connection makes it easier for people to break with their traditional political party. My Republican father voted for a Democrat for President for the first time in 30 years because my mom and I talked to him endlessly about how much Trump scares us.

      1. Yeah, I definitely have but I don’t know if it helps. I don’t know a single person who ever considered voting for Trump. The worst part was when my son asked me if my husband and I were going to get deported if Trump wins. Gah.

    2. I’m in the same boat, became permanent resident last year. When leaving the house this morning my husband said: ” We haven’t packed bug out bags, I guess we feel pretty optimistic about this”.

  14. Just voted! So thankful we have that right in America regardless of race, sexual orientation, gender, economic status, etc.

    Sad news is: no stickers at my polling place :(

  15. I feel sad that half the country supports Trump. Its scary to me that people are not only OK with, but rabidly supportive of, someone who (among other things) brags about sexual assault, wants to ban an entire religion of people, says all Mexicans are rapists and murderers, mocks a disabled reporter…it makes me very scared for our country.

    I don’t think he will win. But the fact its so close frightens me. I’m a woman of color, my husband is an immigrant, and while we don’t have children now I worry about the type of world our future kids will grow up in where hateful discourse is acceptable.

      2. that’s one perspective. For me, it bore out how the misogyny I have experienced in my own life, appears unfortunately not to be unique. Nutella had a great post on the morning thread.

      3. I actually don’t disagree with this. I think Hillary would/will make a very competent president, but because of her “scandals” and demeanor, she is a weak candidate. It’s along the same lines as moderates getting weeded out in the primaries… Unfortunately, I’m not sure the system is set up to favor the best people making it to the end.

        I don’t think that’s how you meant it, though.

        1. I’m talking about her scandals, not her “scandals.” No really. She was passed and used two debate questions from CNN. Name me a male candidate who has done that. She had a foundation that vastly blurred the lines between her official capacity and her own gain. Name me a male candidate who has done that. She deleted emails after she was under subpoena. Name me a male candidate who has done that. Etc.

          These are FACTS. They are not whitewashed. They are facts. They make her a weak candidate. You can think she is accomplished. She is. You can think she will make a better president than Trump. She will. But the facts are that she has a lot of baggage.

          1. She deleted emails after she was under subpoena. – this is literally not a fact.

          2. +1. Although she is massively qualified compared to Trump, she did make legit mistakes. We can’t sweep these under the rug.

      4. OP here. I did vote for Bernie Sanders. I think he would have handily beat Trump. Everyone would have rallied behind him, Berniecrat or Democrat!

        1. I would have lost a lot of sleep over that matchup. I think I’d ultimately have chosen Bernie because never trump, but I wouldn’t have been happy about it because he is so far to the left of my views, and I thought a lot of his promises were just as ridiculous as Trump’s, just withput the hatred. I recognize a lot of people feel that way about the current matchup.

        2. Lol. No republican would have crossed the aisle for a socialist. The race would have been even tighter.

          1. I think so too. It’s anecdotal, but about 10% of the people I know who are voting for Hillary lean conservative but just can’t take Trump. I’m know several of them wouldn’t vote or would vote third party if it was Bernie v. Trump. One person told me he thinks Bernie is “the Trump of the left” (not saying I agree, just saying that is how a moderate Republican I know sees things).

          2. But think of all the Bernie supporters who are being asked to put their misogyny aside to vote for her now.

            (FTR, totally agree with you that the Rs I know who are with her would have been unlikely to vote for Bernie as a leftie “socialist.”)

        3. Many Rs I know who have broken with their party to vote HRC over Trump have told me they would not have been able to vote for Bernie Sanders. Hillary may be losing votes from the far left as compared to Bernie (although most authorities now say almost all original Bernie backers are voting for her) but she is probably picking up some from the moderate right that he couldn’t. Remember also that he was never the subject of GOP propaganda. Almost everyone who hates HRC hated her long before this year. Many people knew nothing about Bernie and simply liked him because he was a Democrat who wasn’t Hillary. The GOP propaganda machine would have changed that. I’m not convinced that the election would look much different if he were the Democratic nominee.

          2. What? I’m not denying Dems have a propaganda machine too. Both sides do. My point is just that Hillary has been attacked by the other side for 30 years and there’s basically nothing new they can throw at her that hasn’t been said already. Bernie has never been the subject of those kind of attacks from the other side, and if he were the nominee they would occur and would likely change public perception of him among moderate/independent/undecided voters. This comment is not an attack on the GOP.

          3. This. I’m traditionally an R (though rarely have been a straight ticket in the past), and #imwithher and proud of it today, but I don’t think I could have voted for Bernie. He is/was too far left for me to swallow.

          4. at Anon 3:22. I’m not sure why that comment elicited a haha. That’s kind of what the GOP’s purpose is – to take down Democrats and push GOP candidates. Just like the DNC’s purpose is to take down Republicans and push Democratic candidates. That’s neither a surprise or a controversial statement. I mean, why else would political parties exists?

        4. I consider myself pretty liberal. I really like Elizabeth Warren and I’d vote for her in a heartbeat. Same for Kirsten Gillibrand. But I don’t like Bernie. I think there was a real thread of misogyny in his campaign. Certainly, the Bernie Bros were anti-Hillary and he sure didn’t try to shut them down. And he should have stopped his campaign earlier in the summer.

          I would have voted for him if he’d been the nominee, but I wouldn’t have been happy about it.

          1. I feel the same way about him and his campaign. I would have held my nose and voted for him if I lived in a swing state but since I don’t I probably would have written someone in (maybe Hillary).

          2. Yup. I’ve been withher since 2008, and haven’t forgiven Bernie. If he was the only option against Trump, I might have had to have a tough choice, but I imagine a lot of relatively centrist Ds would have had trouble getting behind him.

  16. Just a rant, because 1) it’s late and 2) I’m already dressed. I’m going to be speaking to a mostly foreign audience tonight about the U.S. elections as returns roll in and am supposed to be (publicly) neutral on the candidates. The Boss says wear patriotic colors..but nothing I have looks politically neutral! White is now Hillary, red and blue are both party colors…and wrapping myself in a flag toga-style offends my Girl Scout sensibilities. Harumph. I need a khaki dress with the Constitution stamped all over it, apparently.

    2. White is not Hillary. White is women’s suffrage. I don’t think taking a “stand” on that is considered political (although to some Trump supporters it’s very controversial, apparently).

      1. Melania and Ivanka wore white to vote this morning so it’s not just Hillary…

    3. The morning shows today were full of people wearing orange. Thus far, about the only color as yet unclaimed.

      3. I don’t know. I think orange is one of the adjectives most frequently used to describe Trump. xD

  17. It’s not election related per se, but this Harvard Business Review article was one of the most influential in my thought process this political season:
    https://hbr.org/2016/04/if-theres-only-one-woman-in-your-candidate-pool-theres-statistically-no-chance-shell-be-hired

    The reality that if there is only one woman in your candidate pool means she will be excluded (consciously or unconsciously) and overlooked because she is different is not okay. #ImWithHer for lots of reasons, but one of the main ones is that this needs to changes, and I think a female president is a great start.

      1. Right?! Or did Carly Fiorina matter?! I don’t know. Extrapolating one study performed in a specific industry is hard :)

  18. I’m feeling a little maudlin this afternoon. I haven’t voted yet; the polls weren’t open when I came to work, so I’ll go when I leave work tonight. My mom, who passed away this summer, would have been horrified by the tone of the campaign, but she would have loved to have cast her ballot for the first woman to be nominated by a major political party. In 2008, she caucused for President Obama (I caucused for Hillary Clinton), and she was starting to work on re-organizing her very rural county’s Democratic party when she got sick in 2011. Her health didn’t allow her to continue with her plans, but a friend who is a little older than I am was able to carry them forward. It is now the smallest organized party organization in the state of Kansas, with 52 total members in a county of about 7500 people.

    It is also either the end of another campaign or the start of a whole new adventure. I’ve been running the campaign of a friend who trying to win a statehouse seat. We’ve had very direct messages about the direction our state government has taken, and we’ve had a lot of really positive feedback about the ads we’ve run. We also took some non-traditional approaches to campaigning, where we had meet-and-greet nights at local bars, under the idea that you go to meet people where they are and ask how you can help them. We sponsored trivia night at the local liberal-leaning Irish pub, and everyone was really into talking with us about what we see as what we have to do to get our state on track. We ran Spanish-language ads on the local radio station’s Sunday afternoon Spanish-language show, something that I’ve heard repeatedly endeared us to the Hispanic community.

    I’m pretty sure I will be choked up when I vote tonight. I’m not just voting for me. I’m voting for my mom. I’m voting for my nieces, that they should never be denied opportunities because they mark “female” on a census box. I’m voting for my mom’s father, a World War I veteran and Southern Democrat who was only able to feed his family in the years following World War II thanks to a series of political patronage jobs he got because of his political affiliation, and who once threw a white drifter off his property for refusing to work with a pair of black veterans in the state park. I’m voting for my dad’s mother, who had to take her 8th grade year of school twice in order to be able to allowed to attend high school with her younger brother, because their father believed it would be a waste of gas to send her to town to high school by herself.

    #ImWithHer, because I really do believe we are #StrongerTogether.

    1. Your mom sounds like she was a wonderful woman. I’m so sorry for your loss. Your post brought tears to my eyes. Enjoy casting your ballot tonight!

  19. This year has held a lot of firsts for me:
    First time I’ve ever voted a single party ticket- because the republican party has already begun talking about blocking anything that Hillary puts through in legislation or Supreme Court picks. We’ve had enough of that for the last 8 years.
    First time I’ve ever rooted for a Bush- because despite his behavior during the Bush/Gore election and his governorship of FL, where I live, he was the least concerning Republican candidate to me. I tend to be a moderate liberal, but I know that the general American population fears the word “Socialist.” I also know that the American people are still very angry about Benghazi, and don’t trust Hillary- which has been exacerbated by the entire e-mail thing. I don’t think it matters how often it’s reported that her name is cleared in the media or by law enforcement for either of these issues, she’ll still be mud splattered to many people.
    First time I’ve ever had people tell me all about the successful business man that a candidate is with 0 evidence of success.
    First time I’ve seen a candidate make it to the final voting day without discussing a realistic plan for any of the issues facing our country.
    First time that I’ve seen a candidate call upon a frenemy foreign government to hack another candidates systems.
    First time that I truly fear for the safety of those that I know and love under a presidential candidate. I have friends from every continent and religion, friends who are LGBTQ, friends and family that are hispanic and black. I personally am a nonchristian woman who has had an abortion. Now- I pass for WASP very well. But just because I’m likely to be safe from harm (excepting the permissibility implied by the defense of the Billy Bush video, but I am trained in hand to hand combat, and have used it in self defense before) doesn’t mean that I can allow for my friends and family who are darker complected for me to be in danger without a fight for their rights and safety! During the primaries, Trump was advocating for internment camps for American Muslims and geneva convention violations for ISIS fighters abroad. I live by the mindset that extremism and hate breed extremism and hate.
    Neither candidate is ideal. Both need to check the definition of “charity” as it pertains to their organizations. Both have ties to businesses and people that do not have the average american in mind or heart. But to me there is a clear lesser of two evils in this race, and that’s where I’m placing my vote.

    1. btw- Yes, I am aware that I do have an ample amount of privilege for myself. I camouflage my past to increase access to privilege, but I try to use it to help others improve their situations.

  20. Thank you to all in this community for the thoughtful discussion during the election season. I learned a lot.

    #imwithher #imsonervous

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