patrick.net

No. The Republicans laughed him off, as did the Democrats. He smashed them all in the primaries, from Jeb who entered the primaries with a massive warchest of millions upon millions, to Robot Rubio, to Creepy Cruz, all of whom the GOPe backed in turn. And right up until Election Day, the smug Legacy Media and the Democrats were positively chortling about what Hillary's margin of victory would be. Learn something, and stop looking to blame boogeymen

Blame boogeyman? What the hell are you talking about?

And, if Republicans didn't believe in Trump, how the hell did he get elected?

joeyjojojunior says

Blame boogeyman? What the hell are you talking about?

Putin, Pepe, FBI, and White Male Racist-Misogynists.

joeyjojojunior says

And, if Republicans didn't believe in Trump, how the hell did he get elected?

I'll try again.

The GOPe leadership opposed Trump. Even the Koch Brothers backed out and only supported Congressional Candidates.

On the other hand, the whole power of the Democratic party was arrayed by it's leadership behind Clinton. The WaPo ran 16 stories in 16 hours against Bernie. Wall Street and Silly Con Valley raised outrageous sums for Hillary. DNC operatives were boasting about feeding friendly journos anti-Bernie information.

The Republicans abandoned the GOPe and chose the outsider. The Democrats were tricked and pushed into backing the Status Quo Clinton.

"Putin, Pepe, FBI, and White Male Racist-Misogynists."

Putin and the FBI clearly had an effect. They were among the many causes for Clinton's loss. Not the only or even most important reason, but in there somewhere.

"The GOPe leadership opposed Trump. Even the Koch Brothers backed out and only supported Congressional Candidates"

Who cares. That's completely irrelevant to my point that Republican voters were sold a bill of goods by a shyster pretending to represent upheaval.

Real Republicans were voting against Trump, and for Clinton.

I'm keeping my European passport for sure. It keeps my blood pressure in check.

Was Obama elected by a substantial margin and have a democratic Congress for his first two years or not?

Why did he waste it on the Affordable Redistribution of Wealth from Workers to Corporations Act?

Thunderlips is Tovbot2 says

After Franken did take his seat The Democrats had a 60-member Fillibuster-Proof Supermajority Senate for 9 months making the Republicans all but powerless there. They also picked up Arlen Specter via defection to the Democrats. And even after the loss of the supermajority, they still had a strong majority of votes.

I apologize for being off by a couple of months.

But, the main point is correct: A fillibuster proof majority existed for a good chunk of time, and when it didn't they still had a strong advantage over the Republicans.

You claimed he was "Shut down by a unified Republican Senate"

A "Republican Senate" suggests the Republicans control the Senate. Nobody says "Democrat Congress" when they mean "Democrats in Congress" or "Unified Democratic Minority" in Congress.

At no point did I infer that the Democrats were totally unified. And that applies in reverse. Right, Olympia Snowe?

Thunderlips is Tovbot2 says

Was Obama elected by a substantial margin and have a democratic Congress for his first two years or not?

Why did he waste it on the Affordable Redistribution of Wealth from Workers to Corporations Act?

You're never going to get anyone to answer this honestly.

rando says

You think our economy will be like Japan's?

No, just our debt/GDP : )

Doesn't sound so bad.

It's only bad if you want to earn more than some fraction of a percent on your bank deposits / CDs.

I've been to Japan and the place seemed to be doing pretty well. And we don't quite have their demographic problem.

This is because they don't have a demographic "problem", more of a blessing.

Japan's going to have more jobs than people at some point.

The downside is a lot of scaleback in domestic-facing industries (e.g. education) as the population shrinks, but the major cities are still doing OK, they're sucking young people from the rural economic wastelands.

@bellingham bill

What is that little blip in 2011?

Quigley says

Even Jimmy Carter was limited to three years of ineffective government.

wat? Carter enjoyed healthy Democratic majorities during his 4 years. Granted, many of these Democrats were conservative southerners [like Carter I might add], but they could get something done here and there.

And while you've been programmed to believe the economy was shit during those 4 years, the fact is we gained 10 million fucking jobs then

This was inflationary (especially for housing as the front half of the baby boomers were hitting their 20s and 30s in the late 70s), and what killed the Carter economy was Volcker raising rates to the moon.

blue is a zoom-in of the previous graph to 1979-80, and red is the Fed Funds rate - annual CPI (anything positive is the Fed putting the brakes on the economy)

Note the late 1970s boom peaked corresponded to when Volcker really tightened credit, right into the 1980 election season.

Well Trump doesn't have a supermajority of Republicans and many of them will be opposed to his legislation anyway on elitist grounds!
Now watch as he proceeds to pass much meaningful legislation without needing the crutch of a fully subservient congress.

The Dems are the least of Trump's problems.

Trump will be sabotaged at every stage, and you few on very quickly at his very first stumble, by the John McCains, Lindsey Grahams of the world, and more importantly, the military-banking-industrial-Pharma complex.

Trump will be sabotaged like no other President in history prior, by MANY powerful forces.

We're entering a true period of orchestrated, intentional chaos, domestically and internationally.

2008 will seem like the good old days by contrast.

freespeechforever says

Trump will be sabotaged at every stage, and you few on very quickly at his very first stumble, by the John McCains, Lindsey Grahams of the world, and more importantly, the military-banking-industrial-Pharma complex.

You bet. But it will be interesting to see how he handles them. If he can troll the shit out of them like he did the media, it'll be something to see.