actually saw this on du today.

stay woke indeed.

unauditable hackable paperless voting machines. So many ways to cheat.

because I try to be pithy sometimes. It rarely works.

And we need boots on the fucking ground. When people show up to protest and to GOTV and to vote EVERY YEAR, THAT is when it gets better. If we channel our rage into action, that is when we beat these assholes.

If you call yourself liberal or progressive and need a dream candidate to inspire you to vote in the age of Donald Trump, your either lying or need to get help.

Then we need to investigate, then we need to prosecute.

========

I believe that when the tide turns, we are going to have to use state and federal legislatures as well as the courts to root out the rot.

You want to change the tides without one? State, federal, courts, media are owned by fascists. Want to root out rot? Get an ax and use it. Now.

THIS is the message we need!

to self-flagellate because THEY broke the law and cheated every chance they got.

THAT'S gaslighting.

Fuck that.

This is a coup

They know our first instinct is to blame ourselves and ask what did we do wrong. They use our strengths against us (like self examination) while they lie and cheat their way to election victories.

The first days after the election were devastating, but the worst was hearing "What did the Dems do wrong?" over and over again. When someone as outrageous as Donald Trump wins a presidential election against a highly qualified and experienced opponent, red flags should have gone up everywhere. Any campaign could be better, but there is no way a dysfunctional campaign like Trump's could beat Hillary without something nefarious going on.

Yes, it was a coup.

mistakes.

The one mistake I see is that Hillary had so many enemies going into the election season that even though her message was good her enemies were more powerful. They turned lies into truths in peoples minds.

If we had the same message with a different person perhaps we could have done better.

The way to victory that I see is that the public has to turn from greed, hatred and ignorance to generosity, empathy and wisdom.
We can aide in that but people have to change themselves.

Without doing that we will settle on an agreed list of mistakes and go off and the next time commit new mistakes. We don't need to change our message as much as we need to change people's hearts.

In our everyday interactions with people we can offer thoughts or ideas or actions that could lead to more caring hearts.

It wasn't Hillary. It was the THEFT.

There was a *coordinated effort* launched by the Russians in cahoots with members of the Republic Party. Had it every other candidate, or any other candidate, they would have spread propaganda and lies and fucked with our voting machines.

Get woke.

since 2001 under other names.

The theft is what I mean by being more powerful.

I supported Hillary since the year before she announced. I was here all primary and got alert stalked and spent many months in time out.

I was on our other site with the rest of those got pushed off DU during the primaries.

Even with EVERYTHING they threw at her (when has ANY candidate EVER been so deliberately vilified by so many?), Hillary still won overwhelmingly in every way but the EC. In states that were "blue" for Prez O but that seemingly voted "red" this time around, she lost by comparatively tiny margins. And yes, the election was STOLEN.

I am SOOOOOOOOO tired of Dem self-flagellating and of anyone who promotes it - especially here.

Is the Dem Party perfect? No. But we are MUCH better than the alternative can ever even hope to be and we need to move forward - not go backwards.

Let us improve on what we do best and become stronger where we are weak. Where we are weak is in creating and/or strengthening state and local networks, encouraging candidates to run for office at those levels, and supporting their candidacies so as to nurture our ideals from the ground up. This is a job that NEVER stops. It can't just happen during election cycles; it must be an ongoing process even during off-years. Howard Dean understood this well. Too many Dems still don't.

Most importantly, we should NEVER desert or betray our traditional bases of minorities, women and labor. Anyone else is welcome to join with us and move forward together. But we should NEVER seek out the thugs, racists and radical evangelicals to the detriment of ANY of our bases. We should NOT pander to any group that does not support equal rights for all - and this includes reproductive rights. Period.

If we Dems can do what we should for our own bases, any who are not among them now and who still have functioning brain cells just might wake up on their own.

swiftboating fictions don't become more important than climate change and voting rights and reproductive rights and institutional racism to tens of millions of people who live an alternate reality in 40 states with 80 senators. and so putin trolls can't piggyback 1200 coordinated propaganda spewing rw radio stations anymore.

you said exactly what I'm thinking

that we second guess ourselves? We didn't ask Russia to hack our election; tRump did! We didn't break our promise to make Mexico pay for a stupid fucking wall; tRump did! So why do we let them blame us?

Thanks

We need to be the opposite of them. The best way to stop trolls is by not feeding them.

Hello. I'm new. But I had to reply to this word: GASLIGHTING

Thank you! I say this to my husband all the time. DT & his "Kremlin Thugs" as Maxine Waters calls them are GASLIGHTING America & one half of America doesn't even know it!!!!!!!!!! There is NO question. Yet he looks at me with a crooked head, along w/a brother and a few friends like "ah, girl...you are so confused! What is this gaslight thing you are dreaming up?" They sometimes have me thinking sometimes I am the crazy one. So thanks for the thread!

Some body please answer the poster. People don't know what that means. Can we come up with a better term?

And since most women know it's meaning - and we are the ones leading the Resistance efforts - it's a great term!

and that also includes terms like "pro-abortion", "pro-life, and "conservative". My Dad was a conservative, and he never would have supported any of these coprolites.

kindred spirit. that shit gets on my nerves, all of it! thanks for voicing it.

are getting the shit kicked out of us. Russians or no, the presidential race shouldn't have been so close with the candidate that they brought. They control the Senate, the House, more of the State houses and most the governors.

We are obviously not doing something right.

Two sayings come to mind:

1. Denial ain't a river in Egypt, and

2. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result each time.

There is nothing wrong with some earnest self-inventory here.

Denying the effect on the first election without the VRA protection, which foreign interference, with failures to count votes and the sheer number affected by Crosscheck is sheer insanity and not sound critical thinking.

Nothing wrong with earnest self-inventory, but ignoring the actual facts here to self-flagellate is pretty wrong.

Whining how we can't win because of VRA violations, interference, the EC, etc., isn't productive when we have lost so much power. If someone thinks it's time to change our approach, they are guilty of self flagellation? I prefer that to the the mental masturbation of the blame game and taking no accountability.

It simply won't work. Take a look at how much ground Phil Murphy has in NJ. He's running a states rights, don't tread on me, anti Trump AND anti Republican campaign.

I don't think a House candidate in Michigan (where they voted for Trump) can use this approach in 2018.

At the same time - in NJ - in particular where I live -

Trump voters drive foreign sports cars and 80K trucks. They aren't poor - they are just racists.

This isn't about Trump voters, this is about reuniting and reinvigorating the entire left.

We ARE energized.

Google Lance or NJ-7th and town halls.

This year - Murphy is taking it to the state house on an ANTI TRUMP message.

We are unified in NJ - it's Party First. We have to bring Trump and his Trumpettes to heel. Before they steal all of our money and give it to other people - we have to take care of our own in NJ first.

See - that's how you WIN in this neck of the woods.

AND - this is our year that will determine how we undo Gerry Mandering. The Trumpettes in NJ are all affluent, rich, and wealthy - they are just racist sexists and we are against them.

You have to take the demographics and areas into account. States and Regions matter.

We are one in NJ - and when we sweet it in November - maybe the rest of the party can take a page from our playbook.

We don't have time for philisophical discussions which is what you are asking us to do. There's no time - we need to take the mother fuckers out.

When the *cause* is the *theft* and the theft is only being covered up because the foxes are guarding the hen house, it isn't productive to "change our approach".

It isn't our message, but their crimes.

They've got us right where they want us.

We needed to complete this debate and be on the same page back in December. We're late, we're late, we're late, to a most important date.

Or we will be fucked. I'm hearing very little of that here on either side.

The KGOPB needs to stop rigging elections, and since this shit has been going on since the turn of the fucking century, it's time we talk about it.

Because THAT is why we lose.

they elect.

look at scott walker .

i mean, Obama should have won by far more than he did. especially in 2008 after the bush disaster and idiot palin was on the ticket. but there are many people who vote for shitty republicans every fucking time.

Reagan should never have won either .

You'd think that would focus our minds, but some people keep itching to form circular firing squads.

In any event, attention spans and resilience are two of the key things we need to cultivate now, and so to the task at hand.

Shine the Light on that Shite!

Reality is so damn unbelievable that we keep thinking it's our imagination. I mean really POTUS Trump?? Please tell me it's a nightmare..lol

only one objective, and that's WIN

Yet, it's the Democrats that need to do this and that.

The Republicans have comitted out and out fraud, voter suppression, and invited Russian interference in order to win.

but not "in order to win", but "in order to stage a coup"...because the American People are being held hostage is their will isn't met.

this or that because, despite winning the popular, we are not running government. We can't expect other people to do this or not do that, if we want to actually win the power we have to participate in the world we live in in an effective way. That means doing what it takes, not sitting around saying we will win if the other side _______________. We can't control the other side, we can only control what we do.

We have become a presidential campaign party instead of building a party.

only pity is the head wasn't covered by a brain-eating bottle blonde alien invader.

Republicans won't stop breaking the law. We need to deal with that one way or another.

Democrats have no power so they're not going to stop anybody from doing anything.

Until Democrats learn how to run campaigns, nothing is going to change. They need to get away from identity politics in campaigns and focus on what most people are concerned with, and that is the economy and security.

They could have reminded people that Republicans caused the deepest recession since the Great Depression. They could have reminded people that Republicans also caused the Great Depression.

They could have reminded people that Republicans allowed us to be attacked in 2001, allowed Bin Laden to get away, started two wars that cost the U.S. trillions of dollars.

They could have gone after Trump's fraud, business ties to Russia, bankruptcies, and illegal tax filings, but they focused almost solely on Trump's misogyny.

That's why they lost.

overwhelming odds. Also, that stuff that white men keep dismissing as "identity politics" plays a vital part in economic and security issues. We keep reminding them of this, but they seem to seek to silence us and brush our worries away because they know so much more about this than the women and the POC whose "identity" is something that renders them insecure on a daily basis and affects them economically in numerous ways.

What point does reminding people of facts do when they're fact averse, don't know history and are willfully ignorant? They won't even bother thinking, just echoing propaganda and attacking the DNC and the candidate. They went after all of these, but people believed the lies they were fed by the GOP, by Russia and fake "progressives" who were feeding them the same nonsense on the internet with fake websites.

They won 3 million more votes, despite it all, so this tactic of attacking the Dems while ignoring all the factors at play here and the reality about what was going on simply doesn't, it's facile, it's WRONG and it's bashing Dems while letting off the actual culprits here who poisoned the populace with propaganda, lies and venomous attacks.

this includes DREs, optical scanners, central tabulators, etc.

Would be nice if county clerks were put back in charge of voter rolls instead of Crosscheck

Would be nice if Congress would rewrite HAVA to EXCLUDE computers & outsourcing to corporations ANYTHING having to do with our elections!!

The cleaner our election process is, the more we will see Democrats winning -- no second guessing about the message, blah, blah blah

What is a DRE?

What is HAVA?

Enquiring minds want to know!

DRE is a Direct Recording Electronic voting machine, a touch screen that records the vote on the screen.

HAVA is the Help America Vote Act

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help_America_Vote_Act

Look around the world...please. It's turning right everywhere...France to India to Philippines to Australia and on and on. We are all being herded by the four horsemen: overpopulation, climate change, habitat loss, income inequality. Oh, and overpopulation. Did I mention overpopulation?

Right now Florida is burning. It should be so wet down there you couldn't even light a campfire. Think Everglades, alligators, boas. The desert of Northern California is drowning and people are still using heaters because it's so cold. Which political party is going to help the country deal with that and how will they do it?

The world has finally run out of habitat for humans. We're already being habituated to eating insects, lab meat made of sewage and other unsavory stuff. Don't even think about drinking water: best example are the Middle East wars. Sure, start filtering sea water. Does the party have a platform that deals with long term problems like desalinization of the oceans?

Even the most illiterate hermit ensconced in next to nowhere knows about income inequality. S/he is probably pissed at the bishop eating out of silver bowls. More millions will be losing their jobs to robotics. What is the plan to regulate wealth?

And finally, the most ignored and most dangerous threat is overpopulation and everybody has just given up. It could be treated like a party campaign if a party would take it up.

People can be swayed, influenced, manipulated, convinced, educated and all the rest if we focus on the four horsemen who threaten our species with self-extinction. But doing that ain't gonna be nice. We are approaching the horizon of a very black hole.

just didn't want to be too strident -- sometimes people shut down when the language is too harsh

If I were to reword it the way I actually feel, I would say something like:

It is URGENT & IMPERATIVE & A MATTER OF LIFE OR DEATH THAT WE GET RID OF COMPUTERIZED VOTING MACHINES, CENTRAL TABULATORS & OPTICAL SCANNERS, ETC. AND RETURN TO HAND COUNTED PAPER BALLOTS AT THE PRECINCT LEVEL

IF WE CLEANED UP OUR ELECTION PROCESS -- I.E. HOW WE MARK BALLOTS (CLEAN ELECTIONS USE PEN & PAPER) AND HOW WE TABULATE THEM (CLEAN ELECTIONS HAND COUNT AT PRECINCT), HOW WE COMPILE VOTER ROLLS (TAKE THEM OUT OF THE HANDS OF CROSSCHECK & OTHER CORPORATIONS AND RETURN THIS TASK TO COUNTY OFFICIALS TO DO), HOW WE DRAW VOTING DISTRICTS (CLEAN ELECTIONS PROHIBIT GERRYMANDERING), WE WOULD FIND THAT DEMOCRATS WOULD BE WINNING ELECTIONS AND THAT ALL THIS DISCUSSION OF HOW THE MESSAGE NEEDS TO BE CHANGED WOULD NOT BE HAPPENING

Republicans just have to get within cheating / stealing distance to win an election.

Democrats have to win an election by doing so well that it is out of stealing / cheating range by the Republicans.

Our whole political system is sick and way out of balance, and its immune system or ability to defend / correct itself is very weak. Instead of reinventing themselves and making their conservative messaging more relevant to the emerging demographics of a younger, more diverse electorate, they have remained the party of old, angry white men, and consequently have gotten more and more desperate to win elections, to the point of voter suppression, cheating, etc... With our political balance and immune system thus weakened, enter the Russians and their cyber-warfare as an opportunistic infection.

I agree with Ladybug that the Democrats should not spend so much time morbidly second guessing themselves with a "What did we get so wrong?" approach. Hillary would definitely have won if any one of the following had NOT happened:

1) The Republican / Conservative / Corporatist leaning Supreme Court voted to gut the Voting Rights Act
2) Comey released his damaging letter about some new Clinton emails
3) The ratings-beholden media gave Donald Trump at least 2 billion dollars in free airtime
4) Russian cyber warfare to interfere in our election.

Maybe you can put forth some others. At any rate, the election was very, very close, and if anything had happened differently, the election could have been just out of stealing range, and Hillary would have won. Of course, if we had gotten rid of the Electoral College, the Republicans wouldn't have a snowball's chance in hell of winning an election - they would have an RIP sign on their tombstone in he American political graveyard, right alongside the Whig party.

I think number 3 gets overlooked far too much of the time.

It was utterly ridiculous the way they kept him front and center!

This, in my opinion, is the main reason Hillary is not president, and the main reason she is still so hated.

This was stolen.

This was treason...and it's going to keep happening if we don't start talking about it.

Comey sent it to Chaffetz in confidence.

I would point out that while Hillary won the popular vote, the Republicans won the popular vote if you add up all the house election results. (IE Trump was less popular than the republican aggregate)

And then gerrymandering took a tiny lead and turned it into a massive controlling stake in the house.

With Trump infesting the white house, a controlling stake in the senate, and the house, and the governors mansions, and a majority of state legislatures, and the SCOTUS, and pretty much every other lever of power falling under the control of a republican or other RW politicians, exactly how do we get them to stop breaking the law?

I would argue the main thing keeping most of us from breaking the law is the sense that we know we shouldn't, that we dont want to harm others or break the social contract. I would also argue that the bulk of Republican politicians don't have that sense, and that the only thing that keeps them from breaking the law is that the potential of consequences that outweigh the potential benefits. But since they control the system, they do not choose to enforce the law, so there are no consequences. So they have NO reason not to break the law, only benefits from doing so. I expect the lawbreaking will be ever more extreme unless or until that changes.

That means we have to find some way to win in spite of the illegalities. Unless you know of a way to stop the law breaking now?

Don't let them make you think 2017 and 2018 aren't important.

The focus needs to be on now - not 4 years from now.

When will they ever give up the dream that getting the Presidency is all that is necessary?

that isn't a winning strategy, because we can't control what they do and do not do. We have to figure out how to win by doing what we can do, not hoping they don't do what they have always done. You have to play the hand you're dealt. If the dealer is cheating you have to figure a way of stopping the cheating or learn how to win even though he cheats. He isn't going to stop cheating just because cheating isn't nice.

They are liars and cheaters. It's their strategy. They have no shame.

How to win is by holding them to account for the CRIMES that they committed, not pretending there is only "what we can do, and hoping they don't do what they've always done"

Don't gaslight.

Stay woke.

We really are stronger together!

I wonder how many Republican election "wins" were actually due to rigged voting machines?

In its many insidious forms, this is what the deep and wide misogyny in America looks like, and because it is so deeply ingrained in our culture, it often goes unrecognized but is always there, just the same.

as I still have a modicum of respect for the language, but everything else in your post is great.

The press is once again inserting influence by pushing these divisive issues. Just watched one on MSNBC. Sick of it.

Please!!!

Stop. Using. Periods. For. Emphasis. In. Titles.

Just kind of silly. That is all.

Thanks for this thread LaydeeBug, thoroughly enjoyed reading EVERY post and the well thoughout discussions/opinions. It has been very thought provoking and has encouraged me do whatever I can (big or small) and seek out/support activist organizations. You are right on so many levels and it's up to US to turn this ship around so we are NEVER faced with another trump scenario again.

I don't believe Russian activities weren't in play during Obama's terms or campaigns but his approach to winning was wiser and smarter. So I know we can do it again but we need to apply the glue to our approach and messages that will reach the masses and take back our government. I'm off to start now. Already supporting Ossloff (I'm in GA) but also look into "Swing Left" to help other districts as well. Yes we can do this DUers.

Thanks again LaydeeBug this was a welcomed discussion to start my day.

"You never use the language of the other side, even to negate it, even to argue against it. You never use their language. Why? Because the language activates those ideas and the more that language is used, even if you argue against it, you're going to activate those ideas and make them stronger. If you listen to MSNBC constantly, what you'll find is people on the left arguing against right wing ideas using right wing language."

https://ralphnaderradiohour.com/dont-think-of-an-elephant/

Apologies for bringing ralph nader into this. But it's where I found this EXCEPTIONAL and WORTHY quote.

I was lurking on the site as I must get busy on a Florentine Quiche for lunch.

Here is a link to all the works by Professor George Lakoff. It is wonderful to hear from someone who appreciates a scholar's work. Well worth reading and using his tips for political success, imo. oops, edited to add link

https://georgelakoff.com/writings/

Dems call themselves "progressives" because the right wing turned liberal into a bad word and Dems did not speak out. "Pro-abortion" instead of pro-choice and dems did not speak out. "Illegals" instead of refugees and dems did not speak out.

Start the fight by putting on your boots and telling the media to mind their language.

Now I want to read Lakoff.

Hahaha - watch the GOP disintegrate into oblivion. They can't win without lying and cheating because their ideas suck. They can't win in a fair fight and they know it!

and we all know they are.

ALL thinking that THEY should be the candidate & NONE dropping out even when it looked like Oshoff may get 50%

THIS. 1000x this.

We also need to remember that despite Putin's interference with the election, GOP voter suppression techniques like "Crosscheck" and Republicans tampering with electronic voting machines, Hillary Clinton STILL would have won the election were it not for FBI Director James Comey's Oct. 28 letter full of lies sent to Congress..(11 days before the election)...a CLEAR violation of the 1939 Hatch Act.

HRC was 11 points ahead of Trump in the polls after the Access Hollywood tape came out
("I grab 'em by the pussy&quot ..but she immediately lost most of that lead after Comey's treasonous letter was sent to GOP Congressional leaders.


Re: the term "Gaslighting" (Wikipedia)
"Gaslighting is a form of manipulation that seeks to sow seeds of doubt in a targeted individual or members of a group, hoping to make targets question their own memory, perception, and sanity.
Using persistent denial, misdirection, contradiction, and lying, it attempts to destabilize the target and delegitimize the target's belief."

The term owes it's origin to "Gas Light" a 1938 play, and 1944 film directed by George Cukor in which a husband (Charles Boyer) slowly manipulates his wife (Ingrid Bergman) into believing that she is going insane.

We need feet on the ground and lawyers in court challenging election tampering and voter suppression. Russia will pull out all the stops in 2018--assuming Trump and or Pence is still in office--trying to protect its investment.

The 2020 Presidential race can wait.

Yeah. We have to get fired up and actively advocate broadly for the midterms. That is always a given.

However, to ignore the filthy cheating, slimeball conning and treacherous foreign manipulations, hacking and outright blatant criminal activity that gave the election to an incompetent, pathologically lying ignoramus and his slickly chosen treasonous pond scum cronies is to sell the Democratic Party way short and blame the victims.

The reason we had 3 million more votes and were eons ahead in all the poles is because we DID win the election. We DID vote Hillary in. She did win.
The fucking Spooge Republicans and their vomitous comrade pals broke every law/rule/morality and got away with it.

Bastards.