Well, Right

Nassim Nicholas Taleb:

People are not voting for Trump (or Sanders). People are just voting, finally, to destroy the establishment.

Why is this so hard for so many people to understand?

47 Comments

  1. “People are not voting for Trump (or Sanders). People are just voting, finally, to destroy the establishment.”

    I can’t find the article that contains the above quote. Can you pinpoint the appropriate link?

    Posted March 13, 2016 at 10:43 pm | Permalink
  2. Malcolm says

    It’s in the last-quoted tweet.

    Posted March 13, 2016 at 10:47 pm | Permalink
  3. djf says

    People may think they’re voting “to end the establishment” by voting for either Trump or Sanders, but support for these characters is just empty emoting and acting out. Sanders has no chance of being nominated, and Trump, while he might be nominated, will not win. More fundamentally, if it were possible for either Trump or Sanders to win, either one of them would just continue the status quo once in office. Trump in office would revert to his establishment/corporate progressivism (as he has hinted repeatedly) and Sanders in office would find – fortunately – that he could not push through the parts of his agenda opposed by the establishment Democrats (such as the egregious lizard of Wall Street, Chuck Schumer).

    Trump may have already destroyed the Republican Party as a potential governing party, but that is not the same as destroying the bipartisan establishment of which the GOP is a part (and in which it has basically functioned as a junior partner of the Democrats, even when holding the White House, since the New Deal).

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 1:09 am | Permalink
  4. Whitewall says

    DJF, well said. To destroy a well fixed and well funded “Establishment” such as those who control our lives today, it takes multiple fronts. Pressure from the outside which is showing itself in the current campaign, and enough willing disruptors who will go to Washington and act accordingly. Most of all, maximum effort will have to be applied from inside “the machine”. It will take hard nose street fighters who can work off camera and then come in front of the cameras and start telling the public just what is being done to them behind their backs. It will also be necessary to call out names of people inside government and those outside government…mainly media outlets and individuals. We will have to push right up to the brink of all out rebellion. We the people are coming from behind.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 7:22 am | Permalink
  5. Doug says

    Henry, is this what you where looking for?

    “…what Empire of Jeff said vis a vis Trump:

    You “conservative” “pundits” still don’t get it: Trump isn’t our candidate. He’s our murder weapon. And the GOP is our victim. We good, now?
    http://coldfury.com/2015/08/27/another-of-my-erstwhile-favorites-misses-the-point-by-a-mile/

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 7:24 am | Permalink
  6. Whitewall says

    Doug, I saw the same in Conservative Treehouse right after National Review did their takedown of Trump. The piece was “Cold Anger”. That link might have been shown here, I don’t remember.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 7:43 am | Permalink
  7. JK says

    It will also be necessary to call out names of people inside government and those outside government…mainly media outlets and individuals.

    “But John, there is no Republican Establishment! In fact, I’d like to see somebody actually name some names. Why don’t you name the Republican Establishment! Dare you…”

    Okay, just to name a few: Mitch McConnell, John Cornyn, John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Bob Dole, Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan, Kevin McCarthy, Cathy McMorris Rodgers, Karl Rove, Jennifer Rubin, David Brooks, George Will, Jon Kyl, John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Jeb Bush, Peter King and the whole damn NRSC.

    http://townhall.com/columnists/johnhawkins/2016/03/08/the-republican-establishment-is-worse-than-trump-n2130087/page/full

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 7:56 am | Permalink
  8. Doug says

    We can’t “reform from within” because we’re not “within” to start with.
    Ol’ Remus, http://www.woodpilereport.com

    He is right. It seriously, takes an insurgency of a plurality to change this. Something which will not be denied.
    There is no voting our way out of this. That is the first thing. If there was, voting would have been outlawed like every other instrument of freedom that threatens the protected class’s hold on the centers of power, which they have done or are trying to outlaw. But when they outlaw everything, then everything, becomes legal again.

    Richard Fernandez said this salient observation – “Ambitious men through the ages have made the mistake of imagining that power grows in proportion to the coercive force they possessed. In fact there is an inverse relationship between coercion and lasting authority. States fail not from a lack of a police but from a surfeit of lies. Societies die from the loss of trust. The destruction of trust may in retrospect be the single most destructive act committed by elitist politics in the Western democracies. The elites may stopped caring a long time ago, what they never expected was that one day the masses would return the compliment.”

    That is consent. The withdrawal of it. The most powerful weapon ever devised.
    “I Won’t!”
    MYOB!

    The political class are the protected. They are insulated from the consequences directly on their persons in every way from their actions. And I’m saying not just criminally and ethically, I’m saying physically. They are cunning nasty little cowards, they use the rule of law to benefit at this great nations expense, and they hide behind the constitutional aspects of administrative law as a bulwark against the just desserts they deserve so richly for what they are doing to us.
    Hey, they call the AR15 an “Assault Weapon” like they call The Tea Party “domestic terrorists”.
    And they call that rifle an “Assault Weapon” because they are afraid it will be used to assault them because of what they have done.

    Nassim doesn’t fully get it either.
    Donald Trump, (and please excuse my vulgar terms), is The Great Fuck You.

    Because its coming. When those voting for Trump have as undeniable proof of the truth in their hands there was no voting their way out of this, because it matters to them, because when the ‘fuck you’ party that is going for Trump finally figures out that they’ve been duped again because there truly never was any voting their way out of this to begin with, they will instantly become the ‘I’m gonna get you sucka’ party.
    Ripping the chainsaw from the grasp of the political class and cultural marxists as they hack away at the tree of liberty will be difficult in the early stages of defiance and rebellion, but once they start choking (a quality they all share thankfully) it will be a rapid demise.
    The very thing of balkanizing us, and trying to create a Kulak class out of the dirt people, is the very thing which will backfire on them and be the rope that hangs them.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 7:58 am | Permalink
  9. Whitewall says

    JK, long time no see. You are well and dry? Sounds like the GOPe is a crime family?

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 8:00 am | Permalink
  10. Doug says

    Whitewall, Hope you are doing well and all.
    That was a couple of fine pieces Oleg penned.

    “There’s a level of anger far deeper and more consequential than expressed rage or visible behavior. Cold Anger does not need to go to violence. For those who carry it, no conversation is needed. You cannot poll or measure it; and even those who carry it avoid discussion. And that decision has nothing whatsoever to do with any form of correctness.

    Cold Anger is not hatred, it is far more purposeful.

    Cold Anger absorbs betrayal silently, often prudently.

    We’ve watched the shooting of cops, and the parades which follow, absorbing. Cold Anger takes notice of the liars, even from a great distance — seemingly invisible to the mob. Cold Anger will still hold open the door for the parade goer. Mannerly.

    Cold Anger evidenced is more severe because it is more strategic.

    Cold Anger does not gloat; it absorbs consistent vilification and ridicule as fuel. This sensibility does not want to exist, it is forced to exist in otherwise unwilling hosts — who also refuse to be destabilized by it…”

    http://theconservativetreehouse.com/2015/09/27/cold-anger/

    That I believe is a plurality of people who are beginning to grok it is one. Once it reaches a certain mass it obtains a cognitive grass roots understanding it is indomitable. It will not be denied by anything earthly. This is primal in nature. It is the sovereign. Legitimacy is the spear of this kind of movement. Cold? Oh you bet it is. The political class ain’t seen nothing yet.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 8:17 am | Permalink
  11. Why is this so hard for so many people to understand?

    They, the voters, want things to be reset in the hope the ‘new system’ be better than the ‘old’ one. People vote for candidates that represent their values, wishes, aspirations, etc.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 9:02 am | Permalink
  12. Whitewall says

    Doug, that’s it. I’m ok and all. I try to keep stable within all this. Unstable can defeat us. I know where the boundaries are, at least today. I know what it looks like once boundaries are crossed. We would all be wise to observe boundaries and let the other side cross them. Then react as needed. We build greater strength that way and stay on the right side of law enforcement as well.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 9:03 am | Permalink
  13. Doug says

    Good, I’m glad your well. I know what your saying Whitewall. It all begins with each of us, but we all have to stick together too. Solidarity Brother.
    I’ll say it a million times. This is a great country, our warts and foibles not withstanding, and sometimes because of them too.
    I believe in things greater than me, and that begins with who we are as a people in liberty. Our generosity, our spirit and our indomitable will. I believe too in that respect I’m in no way alone.
    What’s being done to us by those who wish to enrich themselves at our Republic and our expense, they got nothing on us. It is us who believe in what we are as a people, our primal freedoms, our sovereign selves, we hold the moral high ground. We are good people who care about what matters most. It isn’t something people dwell on or even think about much, but it is in our hearts and minds. It manifests itself in a myriad of ways and makes us what we are.
    The fat lady isn’t even warming up my friend.
    We got a whole lot of destiny to fulfill. It is a legacy, not a republic our founders passed on to us. And its evolutionary, as much as revolutionary, that we have to go through these trials and tribulations, and out of that we grow as a people and a nation, its how we get there. Takes a while, but it is as it should be, because in the end it brings out the best in us.
    Those running things can go to hell.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 10:54 am | Permalink
  14. Malcolm says

    Regarding “cold fury”, Churchill described it well:

    The American eagle sits on his perch, a large, strong bird with formidable beak and claws. There he sits motionless, while his keepers come day after day to prod him with a sharp pointed stick – now his neck, now under his wings, now his tail feathers. All the time the eagle keeps quite still. But it would be a great mistake to suppose that nothing is going on inside the breast of the eagle.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 12:00 pm | Permalink
  15. Malcolm says

    djf,

    People may think they’re voting “to end the establishment” by voting for either Trump or Sanders, but support for these characters is just empty emoting and acting out. Sanders has no chance of being nominated, and Trump, while he might be nominated, will not win. More fundamentally, if it were possible for either Trump or Sanders to win, either one of them would just continue the status quo once in office. Trump in office would revert to his establishment/corporate progressivism (as he has hinted repeatedly) and Sanders in office would find — fortunately — that he could not push through the parts of his agenda opposed by the establishment Democrats (such as the egregious lizard of Wall Street, Chuck Schumer).

    Let us say, arguendo, that you are quite right about all of this. None of that, however, contradicts Taleb’s assertion: that people are voting for Trump/Sanders because they want to smash the established political cliques. That an election victory by either of these men may in fact fail to do so is beside the point (I’ve said before that we are long past the point where any election will restore the nation’s harmonious order); voters are simply doing what they can under the existing system. This is, after all, what conscientious citizens ought to be doing: before concluding that the system is hopelessly broken — which is, let’s be clear, a frightening, drastic, and fateful thing to conclude — they are right first to exhaust its menu of possibilities.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 12:26 pm | Permalink
  16. Malcolm says

    Doug,

    When those voting for Trump have as undeniable proof of the truth in their hands there was no voting their way out of this, because it matters to them, because when the ‘fuck you’ party that is going for Trump finally figures out that they’ve been duped again because there truly never was any voting their way out of this to begin with, they will instantly become the ‘I’m gonna get you sucka’ party.

    That’s exactly right. As I noted just above, a decent people who respect order will patiently work through all the menu options the “operating system” provides before they decide to uninstall it.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 12:33 pm | Permalink
  17. “Henry, is this what you where looking for? …
    You “conservative” “pundits” still don’t get it”

    I have no idea what you are talking about, Doug. And I am not a “conservative pundit”. Though I do have some personal opinions of my own, punditry is a pretence I indulge in not. Moreover, I do not believe I have mentioned The Donald in the conversations herein. If I have mentioned him, I plead temporary insanity.

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 5:03 pm | Permalink
  18. Whitewall says

    “Temporary”?

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 6:19 pm | Permalink
  19. What are you suggesting, Robert?

    Posted March 14, 2016 at 8:34 pm | Permalink
  20. djf says

    Malcolm, I understand that people are voting for Trump and Sanders because they want to destroy the establishment. My point was simply that voting for these despicable characters is not going to achieve that end or even weaken the establishment. If you want to try to bring about positive change through political means, I think it makes more sense to support Cruz – for all his deficiencies of substance and style – than a clown like Trump, who plainly is not serious about anything. Supporting Trump is, in my view, giving up on the political system.

    Supporters of Sanders seem to want to turn the US into Cuba, something even worse than the status quo, so I have no sympathy at all for them.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 6:05 am | Permalink
  21. Doug says

    That is an extremely sublime point you make Malcolm. I think it is an underlying dynamic which is worthy of a lot more exploration than it receives.
    It was a very poignant assertion about patience and tolerance in the Declaration of Independence.

    Personally I always thought it was the most important passage in that astounding document. The Tory’s didn’t know what to do when they read the DOI, that these Patriots could conceive of not being obedient was unfathomable to them. The Tory’s didn’t get it, that people who are the most tolerant become the most indomitable if pushed and repressed far enough.
    Sound familiar?
    In the most crude terms, I think it can be summed up where Christian Judean culture, and the men who comprise it, do not burn down their cities and towns, destroy the bonds of civility and destroy their traditions and civilization, they come and burn down your fucking cities and towns, destroy your civilization. And are very good at it.
    Didn’t Churchill say something about a people of a republic once pushed too far, once unleashed where the fiercest and most unstoppable force of people on Earth?

    Anyone can say what they will about the power of the coercive form of a government or the power of one particular kind of tyranny or dictatorship, and its true to a certain point. Because always a great number of people will submit, and that is why it has power to begin with, it is how totalitarianism works, like many peoples whose comments belie their fear of resisting or their submittance, and or belief resistance is futile, because that is consent tacit or coerced, to being ruled by men, where those in power go wrong, and the loyalists who abide them, is with people who are not afraid of fighting, and dying for what they believe in is their unalienable primal rights and freedom.
    I think most in the last category don’t really think and reason in those terms, they tend to have a sense of things on a gut level, and it doesn’t require critical or reasoned thinking for it to matter. That is the grass roots nature of it. Nothing on God’s green Earth can sway them either, because they are right in their rightful liberty’s. They know it, and they begin to grok who the enemy of their freedoms are and the object of the source of their unhappiness is.
    This is whats going to transpire in hearts and minds, what is transpiring I think. It’s not that there is no voting our way out of this, (TINVOWOOT by the way), it is that it doesn’t matter TINVOWOOT. It is a gestalt of profound proportions, an awakening, and it is beginning. It is secession of the heart from tyranny.
    It is like the whole carbuncle of the 2nd Amendment. It is a really great sanction on paper, it is probably what has kept this republic together more so than any man made concept written. But ultimately you don’t need the 2nd, because your right to defend yourself is primal and not limited or prescribed within some limits by some man made “Law”.
    The analogy is parallel for voting. When the Dirt People begin to grasp the ballot box is a construct of an illusion, the truth voting has many viable and legitimate forms nothing to do with obedience to a political system designed to rob them of their consent and subjugate them accordingly, that is when their vote truly counts, and more important how they wield their consent, or withdrawal of it. This I think is the dynamic underway. It has left the political class in the dust. They only have coercion force and threat and use of violence left to control the Dirt People, it is all they ever had really, it was only dressed up in a fig leaf of legitimacy. An illusion of legitimacy.
    That is what the political class is faced with. A crisis of legitimacy. It is existential.
    Andrew Brietbart said something beautiful, “Culture is upstream of politics” (Lord I miss that guy, he was a warrior), I say, Liberty is upstream of tyranny, and so is the grass roots nature of the Dirt People.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 8:15 am | Permalink
  22. Doug says

    Ah hello Henry!
    Did you not write this at the top of the comment thread?

    “I can’t find the article that contains the above quote. Can you pinpoint the appropriate link?”

    Nobody came to your assistance, so I did with the link.
    Didn’t you read Oleg’s piece on cold anger? It is a really cool bit of thinking.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 8:21 am | Permalink
  23. Malcolm says

    djf,

    Even Cruz seems, to many, just another politician. (Also, a lot of people find him kind of creepy; there’s something “off” about his face and voice.)

    Trump is something altogether different — what some on the dissident Right have called, in vulgar terms, a “shitlord”.

    You are quite right that the impulse for Trump is, in many ways, an impulse to “give up on the political system”. For most patriotic Americans, though, that impulse is not quite ready, yet, to manifest itself wholly outside the system.

    Trump is that last stop on the highway before you begin to leave civilization behind. The wilderness is a scary place. As it should be.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 10:02 am | Permalink
  24. Malcolm says

    Doug,

    “Culture is upstream of politics”. Exactly.

    As I wrote just the other day:

    …politics, and power, are downstream, as Gramsci and the Frankfurt school understood all too well, from “metapolitics” – the laborious seeding of the culture with methodically inculcated values, and, where necessary, the uprooting of existing values to prepare the soil. (It is no coincidence, after all, that “cultivation”, “culture”, and “cult” all share the same Latin root cultus, which has, among its more familiar meanings, “worship” and “reverence”.)

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 10:20 am | Permalink
  25. @Doug (Posted March 15, 2016 at 8:21 am):

    Yes, I wrote the question about the link, but I didn’t follow the link you provided because I was puzzled by your following statement, “You conservative pundits still don’t get it…”

    What makes you think I’m a conservative pundit? And why do you assume that I still don’t get it? And since I have not made any comment about Trump, what is it you think I don’t get?

    I must be missing something. Please clarify your remarks to me.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 10:29 am | Permalink
  26. P.S.: Actually, Malcolm did come to my assistance with, “It’s in the last-quoted tweet.” But I still couldn’t locate the link, probably because “last-quoted” is an ephemeral reference, especially on twitter.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 11:18 am | Permalink
  27. Malcolm says

    Henry,

    In the post I’d linked Taleb’s name to this page, which quotes several tweets. The quoted passage was in the last of those tweets.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 11:28 am | Permalink
  28. Malcolm,

    I think what we’ve got here is “failure to communicate“, AKA a comedy of errors.

    [img]https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/b8/20/e7/b820e727642bde38f31d56629b7f6f92.jpg[/img]

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 11:55 am | Permalink
  29. Whitewall says

    Henry, nice find! It is especially useful with the proper accent.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 12:00 pm | Permalink
  30. Thanks, Robert. Of course, accent is difficult to mimic in text.

    It’s hard to believe I saw this movie when it was released in 1967 — almost half a century ago! I’ve never forgotten the “failure to communicate” scene.

    Time flies when you’re having fun:)

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 12:11 pm | Permalink
  31. djf says

    Malcolm,

    I am in agreement with you, with 2 caveats:

    (1) While Trump’s supporters are acting within the political system, I think they are doing so irrationally (I could say the same about Democratic voters who think the politicians they vote for are “fighting inequality” or are “helping the middle class”).

    (2) You imply that the next the step is to act outside the political system. I don’t think that’s even an option. This is not 1775.

    As for Cruz, I am well aware of his deficiencies and can well understand why many do not trust him. IMHO, as unsatisfactory as Cruz is, he’s the best option we have. Better than Trump, anyway. Obviously, millions disagree.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 2:05 pm | Permalink
  32. JK says

    Eh, Malcolm? All Y’all? Anybody got the email address for the feller goes by the name of Ben Domenech, and writes over on the Federalist site?

    (Back to Malcolm, your post’s final sentence “Why is this so hard for so many people to understand?”)

    Here’s Ben’s takeaway:

    They want more. Now, what they want in the immediate does not look like limited government conservatism. If the Tea Party’s mantra was “no more bailouts”, the Trump army’s mantra is “where’s my bailout?”

    http://thefederalist.com/2016/03/15/the-civil-war-over-the-republican-party/

    ***

    What Henry said March 15, 2016 at 11:55 am.

    (Poor Mr. Domenech has either, drank of the wrong, or too much bathwater.)

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 2:16 pm | Permalink
  33. Doug says

    I like that bit of agitprop too Henry.

    Ya I think your confused about that quote, it was not directed at you in any way shape or form. It was part of the copy and paste of the link i posted in the comment text box, nothing more. I’m curious, why would you think I called you a pundent? That is kind of wierd.

    It had nothing to do with you other than providing a bit of what the link was, so you wouldn’t be seeing just the HTML code of the link.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 2:49 pm | Permalink
  34. JK says

    Figured I’d better Hasten to add before djf takes me to the woodshed.

    I did not vote for Lord Shithead (whatever) in Arkansas’ primary – an’ I’m mighty reluctant to do so even in the general.

    I did the only (possibly) honorable thing a single voter could *effectively* do in my particular corner of Arkansas’ Ozarks.

    (Sit down Whitewall. Breathe.)

    For the very first time I voted in the Dem Primary. For the Commie.

    Took durn near a month’s bottle of Prilosec to get some relief.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 2:50 pm | Permalink
  35. Doug says

    Malcolm says

    Doug,

    “Culture is upstream of politics”. Exactly.

    As I wrote just the other day:

    “…politics, and power, are downstream, as Gramsci and the Frankfurt school understood all too well, from “metapolitics” – the laborious seeding of the culture with methodically inculcated values, and, where necessary, the uprooting of existing values to prepare the soil. (It is no coincidence, after all, that “cultivation”, “culture”, and “cult” all share the same Latin root cultus, which has, among its more familiar meanings, “worship” and “reverence”.)”

    That despicable little worm Gramsci, he’s as bad as the Fabians, worse. Gramsci’s the original shit stirrer of the marxists. His nasty legacy just won’t go away. How he could be venerated down through time like that can only be attributed to the human extinction movement and their psychopathic/genocidal nature. Cultural marxists, I’ve had a craw full of them. Its time to gift the sonsofabitches with the one thing they fear most. Turn our backs on them. Don’t give them a shred of credibility. Laugh and insult them when necessary. Like Alynski said about ridicule as a weapon.
    They have made themselves the pariah’s of the rest and whats best of the human race, and their extinction can’t come swift enough.
    The seeds of hate they have sown boggle the mind sometimes.

    I didn’t read your culture observation above previously, I see it now, its is the diametric way to put it. Neat, I like how you put that. Thanks for that, the insights are very good. Andrew’s and yours axioms lend much credit to each others. Like all great thinkers through time.
    Sometimes you got to think in X instead of Y to see things. It is nice to be on the same wavelength. My wife has been saying for awhile the world is turning, lot of people are beginning to be less nebulous and coming to a mind, a great wakening like a ground swell. The turn of the tide. I think these things take time, and have a kind of power to change the world all outside their diminutive beginnings, like Senneca said.
    I’m a big fan of infiltrating and outflanking the political with culture. More than a fan. I’m an insurgent at heart. I’m a happy Bitter Clinger and “white extremist domestic terrorist” and proud as a peacock to be one. It is a badge of honor no less to be despised by the despicable.
    So culture, oh ya, you bet Malcolm, its everything. It ties traditions together in a thread through time and place, it is family and tribe and community, trade craft, art, the land, traditions that have substance and connections. And faith too.
    And it is so intertwined with that patience and tolerance thing and how it defines the limits of it for Gramsci and his barbarians.
    Yes Sir.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 3:26 pm | Permalink
  36. Whitewall says

    JK you had better wash that Prilosec down with some homebrew. I don’t know the drift of Ozark politics but I sense they are “confused”.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 4:05 pm | Permalink
  37. Malcolm says

    djf,

    (1) While Trump’s supporters are acting within the political system, I think they are doing so irrationally…

    To some extent at least, I’m sure that’s true.

    (2) You imply that the next the step is to act outside the political system. I don’t think that’s even an option. This is not 1775.

    Not an option? It’s all a question of who holds the real power. And power is not guns (although of course the American people have lots of those); it is far more abstract than that.

    Power is, at root, nothing more than a shared belief. And when the beliefs of hundreds of millions suddenly change, you’d be surprised what the “options” are.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 4:15 pm | Permalink
  38. JK says

    @ WW, I don’t know the drift of Ozark politics but I sense they are “confused”.

    Yep. I reckon so.

    Here’s just my county’s returns (just 100+):

    Bernie Sanders- 473 37.39%

    Hillary Clinton- 701 55.42%

    Ben Carson- 111 8.01%

    Donald J. Trump- 652 47.04%

    Marco Rubio- 181 13.06%

    Ted Cruz- 386 27.85%

    ***

    Now I will admit to my vote *being *somewhat *personal though. The Saturday previous I’d been at my closest FFL when a guy showed up who just happens to be … and it’s a long running story so.

    Anyway, to make it short, guy was a BIG Clinton operative dating back to the 80s. He and my Dad were never on speaking terms. … skip forward past a bunch of stuff … & while Dad never actually “worked a campaign” I have. Though not this cycle … yet.

    All I really wanted to do that Saturday was to make the guy my Dad never got along with, realize I was gonna at least, negate the guy’s vote.

    And so I did. But, as I say, it was personal.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 6:00 pm | Permalink
  39. “I’m curious, why would you think I called you a pundit? That is kind of weird.”

    Doug,

    Well, because there was no delineation of that remark (using HTML tags like “em” or “B-Quote”) that would indicate it was a quote and not directed at me. It was the weirdness that puzzled me most of all. I read your other comments and I just couldn’t understand why you would say something like that to me.

    “We good, now”.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 6:59 pm | Permalink
  40. JK says

    @ Whitewall

    Wanted to give you some “flavor” of what’s happened in, just my county, over the last several years. (I’m supposing Robert if, you’re comming with anybody on this site, we are “pretty sure” who … maybe. Not that I’m particularly averse to adding a contact; it’s just that … well it’s been complicated on my end since about August.)

    From 2008:

    Hillary Clinton 1,346 80.36%

    Barack Obama 236 14.09%

    Mitt Romney 117 13.06%

    Mike Huckabee 526 58.71%

    John McCain 178 19.87%

    2000 Census – 11,642

    2010 Census – 12,245

    ***

    +603 to the population of which, I’d wager at least 75%, for one or another reasons, do not or, cannot exercise the franchise (don’t vote in other words).

    Total D 2008 ~ 1582

    Total R 2008 ~ 821

    ***

    Total D 2016 ~ 1174

    Total R 2016 ~ 1330

    I don’t know the drift of Ozark politics but I sense they are “confused”.

    Again; Yep – But we’re gettin there!

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 7:21 pm | Permalink
  41. Doug says

    We where already good. I didn’t want you to think I wasn’t appreciative of your comments and insights.

    Speaking of which, Cool Hand Luke sure is allegory for these interesting times don’t you think.
    It is why I think it was really cool you posted it.

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 7:24 pm | Permalink
  42. “Cool Hand Luke” continues to be one of my all-time favorites. I’d vote for him in a flash:)

    Posted March 15, 2016 at 7:57 pm | Permalink
  43. Doug says

    I hear you BigHenry, you said it. Its one of my all time favorites too.
    Have you read this?:

    ‘The there Where None’
    http://www.abelard.org/e-f-russell.php

    It’s Eric Frank Russell’s masterpiece about total resistance. A whole cast of characters of Cool Hand Luke’s.

    Posted March 16, 2016 at 2:44 pm | Permalink
  44. I haven’t, Doug. I’ll put it on my “To Read” list, which by now is longer than my “Have Read” list. And the latter list is no slouch in the length department. So much to read; so little time …

    Posted March 16, 2016 at 5:03 pm | Permalink
  45. antiquarian says

    I guess I see Trump much more simply. I think the G.O.P. has been taking the political capital of its supporters, giving them attention and slogans in return, and blowing the capital on stuff that business conservatives like– tax cuts and the like. The non-elites (including an astounding number of independents, Democrats and minorities) finally had enough of that, and with Trump (a stupid method, but I suppose they were desperate) are forcing issues like political correctness to the fore.

    I’m quite sure that one way or another, Trump won’t be President, and should not be, but it may be salubrious to have the issues brought forward.

    Posted March 23, 2016 at 8:42 pm | Permalink
  46. antiquarian says

    Just parenthetically– it’s Nassim Nicholas Taleb, not Nicholas Nassim Taleb.

    Posted March 23, 2016 at 9:30 pm | Permalink
  47. Malcolm says

    Right you are, antiquarian. I seem to make these careless mistakes often lately. Fixed now.

    Thanks.

    Posted March 23, 2016 at 9:48 pm | Permalink

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