2020 Election Results 5: The Nightmare Is Over (For now)

[Apple_green]

Sending huge congratulations from Australia where we have held our breathe all week along with you guys. It's almost 6:30am here, just woke up and had to check. 

I'm so happy for you all,  I hope this is the first step to helping your country heal. 

 

[adidas]

 

Senior White House correspondents reported insiders were now saying that with Mr Trump refusing to concede, discussions were being held about how to convince him to leave.

“I had one person close to the White House tell me, ‘No one is willing to tell King Lear the truth,’” said Hallie Jackson, MSNBC’s White House correspondent.

https://www.news.com.au/world/north-america/us-politics/will-trump-physically-refuse-to-leave-white-house-if-biden-wins/news-story/e8177b1fe5e78557e35e2f32015e8b0c

[AmazonGrace]

 

[Jinder Roles]

The memes today are *chef’s kiss*

Courtesy of my cousin: 

[Destiny]

LOLOLOL

[Browneyed Girl]

24 minutes ago, HerNameIsBuffy said:

I've been frustratingly afk most of the day with life, but I want to say I really do love you guys and this community.

People talk all the time about bubbles.  We all have them, some due to chance and some we choose.  

While I do go out of my way to hear different political view points and even to read about the unbalanced in our country in an attempt to know what we're up against I've chosen FJ as my bubble.

My place to be amongst other Americans who see the horror of the last four years for what it was.  To be with people who share the same overarching goals for equality, fairness, and decency.  To be with people who can discuss candidate or policy disagreement with civility because we know reasonable people can disagree on some things with neither side being monsters.

And where we know there are some view points without moral equivalency and arguments for hate should never be dignified as equally valid opposing points of view.

And to those of you from all over the world.  The Netherlands, the UK, Australia, Germany, Scotland, Canada, Italy*...your fervent support for those of us here trying to do the right thing has been invaluable.  In some other popular internet forums where American political discussions are populated with international posters there is almost a default of assuming that those of us from the US represent and are represented by this administration. You don't do that here.  You don't paint us all with his racist brush nor act as if we should continually apologize for the accident of birth that makes us Americans.  The phrase NotAllAmericans has never entered my thoughts while reading on FJ.

No country is perfect, but I'll admit I've had more than a few moments of jealousy toward those of you from places with civilized leadership in the last four years.  I've not seen one of you lord it over Americans here or treat us as if all of our people are inherently inferior. You understand that it is our government and way too many of our fellow citizens supporting the tyrannical bent of a would-be despot.

You see us as people, not our government and it's allowed me to learn so much here because discussions were had without derision and defensiveness.

Would I feel like this about FJ if I were a Trump supporter?  No.  Are there probably lurking Trump supporters who hate read here and feast on liberal tears as they put it?  I have no doubt.  Hopefully it's helped inform them about other points of view.  Thanks for not shitting on the carpet.

When I joined FJ I was what I would call socially liberal but very fiscally conservative and my motivation in voting was first and foremost my own pocketbook.  I was a Republican and went independent when I felt the tea party and their ilk had made the GOP unrecognizable.  I was on the executive board of College Republicans when I was in school.  I wasn't a heartless person.  I abhorred white supremacy and police brutality, as a pacifist at no point in my life would I have supported violence in political action.  No iteration of past me would have voted for Trump.  

Even at my most selfish I couldn't have voted for someone I consider genuinely stupid.  Not a word I use lightly, btw.  

My very kind and empathetic mother volunteered and donated a lot of her time and money to good causes, food banks, helping the less fortunate but who saw the answer to these problems in people being more giving toward others on a personal level rather than the government.  She was inherently non-confrontational and hates the nastiness of politics and thus ignored it.  My dad thought all politicians were corrupt so you voted for the one whose corruption would benefit you and in our world that always meant tax cuts.

FJ played a large role in taking me out of my bubble, in exposing me to people affected by the government in ways I am not.  My eyes were opened here, simultaneously also in my career, to how many other things matter to other people.  And as I began to educate myself those things began to matter very much to me also.  

None of this came from one post in a moment of catharsis, nor did it come from blindly agreeing with people just because they were my FJ friends.  Blind agreement has never been my strong suit, much to the chagrin of my family.  It came from years of discussions on all kinds of threads that helped me see things differently.  And in some cases helped me strengthen my long held beliefs because I had to defend them with facts and sources.  

Is FJ a circle jerk on some issues in some ways?  Yeah.  That's why I deliberately seek out exposure to other view points elsewhere as well.  Is FJ a safe space?  Absolutely not, and I would never want it to be.  Anyone with any viewpoint can post here and as long as they are socially potty trained they have as much freedom to post as those who share more popular POVs here.  

But for this time in history I am glad FJ was a place that was here for me to come and restore emotional my emotional equilibrium after hearing of another instance of Trump and his goons wiping their ass with the constitution.  

As I sit here, in this moment, I wish I knew all of you personally.  After years of reading post after post overflowing with empathy, compassion, outrage over cruelty, and repudiation of hate I feel a closer kinship to you guys when it comes to this than anyone in my real life, with the exception of my kids.  Despite the anonymity I consider you guys so much more than screen names of randoms on the internet.  In a way I can't possibly explain or understand I consider you real friends.

I am riding high on an insane oxytocin rush from the learning his reign of terror won't continue for another four years, so I know I'm rambling.  I don't expect anyone to read all this, but my brain was demanding my fingers get busy and type this somewhere.  

TLDR:  I love you guys.  ❤️  Now to get caught up on the eleventy million posts I missed writing my version of War and Peace with this post.

 

 

 

 

 

Mods??

I am not joking when I say there are times that we really need to be able to give more than one reaction to a post.  

Buffy - I give you all the good reactions and off the top of my head these too....

    

 

[formergothardite]

3 minutes ago, Destiny said:

LOLOLOL

Someone is deep, deep in denial.

[AmazonGrace]

 

[GreyhoundFan]

1 hour ago, Audrey2 said:

I'm so happy he is still around as well.  My big fear was he would pass and the orange menace would be responsible for his State funeral and would do nothing. I know President Carter is in his mid-90s as is Bob Dole. Well I didn't agree with a lot of Bob Dole's politics, I think he was a decent man as well and I hope that when he passes President Biden celebrates his life as well, in a much better way than Trump did for John McCain. (Although I wouldn't want Trump at my funeral either!)

I always use Bob Dole when I talk about missing "the old days". I can't think of any political position on which I agreed with Dole and I voted against him when he ran for president, but I have always believed hi to be an honorable man. I always felt like he was doing what he truly felt was the right thing for our country. I just disagreed on what was right. It's my dream that we get to being able to disagree with the other side without despising them.

 

1 hour ago, Zebedee said:

OMG, Jake Tapper now telling everyone to have low expectations of DJT, and loving calling him "Outgoing President Trump".

I think they should start calling him "Lame Duck Trump". That would get his panties in a major wad.

 

1 hour ago, SassyPants said:

Is this a retweet? Did Trump actually post that drivel?

I posted it earlier today. Supposedly it was an official announcement from the WH.

[Destiny]

These are amazing:

https://slate.com/tag/goodbye-trump-admin

The Ivanka one in particular.

[FiveAcres]

40 minutes ago, HerNameIsBuffy said:

When I joined FJ I was what I would call socially liberal but very fiscally conservative and my motivation in voting was first and foremost my own pocketbook.  I was a Republican and went independent when I felt the tea party and their ilk had made the GOP unrecognizable.  I was on the executive board of College Republicans when I was in school.  I wasn't a heartless person.  I abhorred white supremacy and police brutality, as a pacifist at no point in my life would I have supported violence in political action.  No iteration of past me would have voted for Trump.  

 

Not long after I moved to Colorado, I was trail-riding with a woman who was to become my best friend. I was shocked when she told me she was a Republican. She is registered Democrat now, I believe. Anyway, this was in the early nineties and she was already on her way out of the party.

We were recently discussing it and she pointed out that when she was young, the Republicans were actually just as good, if not better, on racial politics than the Democratic Party. 

[thoughtful]

Found this similar (but, to my mind, even more biting) tweet under the "Queens man evicted" one:

 

[Destiny]

1 minute ago, FiveAcres said:

We were recently discussing it and she pointed out that when she was young, the Republicans were actually just as good, if not better, on racial politics than the Democratic Party. 

The Republican Party was forever changed by Reagan IMHO. That and the selling out to the religious right. 

[adidas]

Edited - my phone glitched sorry!

 

reposted below ❤️

Edited November 7, 2020 by adidas

[JoyfulSel]

Four years ago, someone here on FJ posted this website and I added it to my bookmarks. Every once in awhile, I would check it to see the time go down, and man am I so happy to see it continue to tick down now that the election is over!

https://www.tickcounter.com/countdown/1611151200000/america-new_york/yodhms/FFFFFF3B5998000000FF0000/Time_Until_Trump_Leaves_Office

[adidas]

 

 

These two tweets are so beautiful. 

Edited November 7, 2020 by adidas
Phone silliness

[JordynDarby5]

Thank you God! Thank you all those who voted for Biden! Thank you! The nightmare is finally over! I'm so excited. I can't believe it! I've been trying so hard not to get hopeful just in case things went the way they did in 2016, But no more. Its all over! Thank you! 

[GreyhoundFan]

So Rudy's inane screech-fest was held next to an adult book store named Fantasy Island. You couldn't make that up.

 

[Ozlsn]

4 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

Me too and it's not even my country.

Same. I'm still surprised Rupert Murdoch gave up on him.

3 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

Heh, that's even better than "Australian spiders die in shuttle disaster". 

1 hour ago, Destiny said:

I don't know why I hoped for the Menace to be a damn adult and concede, but I kind of did. I feel so sorry for President-elect Biden's transition team. 

Same. If ever you expect a team to trash the joint on the way out it'd be this mob doing it. I hope the building works posted earlier are routine, and not fortifications.

[Zebedee]

@FiveAcresI have a few US friends like that too. They were dual US-UK citizens, and less informed about US politics than UK since they had often always lived in the UK, so they held on to Republican family membership too. The ones who stayed in the UK are dedicated Dems now, the ones who moved back to the US gave up Republicanism sharpish. The UK friends who moved to the US were mostly left-wing voters here, and find that Biden would make a fine old-school Conservative! Which is, TBH, how I feel about the average Democrat (as a left-wing voter here!). They were all basically shocked at what the Reps are now.
Fiscal responsibility is one thing, and I'm very happy to hear good arguments for it. I do not love "big government" as an idea - but for me, as large as is necessary is good, not the smaller the better. I want it to be small enough to avoid interfering in what consenting adults do with their bodies, and large enough to ensure that every person gets the care they need, and, crucially with the fundies, every child gets the education they should have. And that CPS is well-funded enough to ensure that starving, beating, keeping children ignorant is forbidden. But Reps these days seem to have a different idea of that. 

 

[Jasmar]

Thank you all for the awesome posts here. I think I have ptsd: just can’t get it through my head that the nightmare is over, at least for now. As I read here, little by little I’m starting to believe it might really be real. The last four years have been so incredibly traumatic… I even lost the last vestiges of my identity as an Evangelical in 2016. Just so many feels.

[AnywhereButHere]

 

Quote

 

the ending is great! ?

Edited November 7, 2020 by AnywhereButHere

[Destiny]

Per CNN, the WH has called a lid (no presidential appearances) for the day. I'm appalled that he isn't conceding. I know I should be inured to the fuckery that the Orange Menace can wreak on our country, but he still manages to shock me somehow.

This sign is fucking delightful! Well played to whoever made it. 

 

Edited November 7, 2020 by Destiny

[Zebedee]

8 minutes ago, Ozlsn said:

Same. I'm still surprised Rupert Murdoch gave up on him.

Nah. The useful idiot has passed the sell-by date. He's now marked for the non-recyclable trash - just as Trump treated so many other people too, like McSally in AZ. Murdoch just cares about the money and the power, and isn't a cult member or a Qanon type. Give it a few weeks, and he'll be saying publicly, "Trump, who's that? Did he bring me covfefe one time?". As, I suspect, will most of Trump's allies, bar the ones he might have dirt on, like Lyndsey Graham, maybe? In which case, I hope Trump is as vindictive as I feel right now.... After all, you are allowed to publish books in prison, though I don't think you can profit from it!

2 minutes ago, Destiny said:

the WH has called a lid (no presidential appearances) for the day

He does everything by Twitter, anyway. Plus, he lies so much, CNN would cut him off anyway! Anyway, I much prefer to see Americans partying than listen to the Orange One lie.

[thoughtful]

18 minutes ago, Destiny said:

The Republican Party was forever changed by Reagan IMHO. That and the selling out to the religious right. 

I think the flip from D to R as the "racist party" started much earlier, though, with Nixon or even a bit before.

Judging by what my older relatives have said, and yes, as ever, what I've gleaned from old movies, the Rs were the party of the rich since at least the 1920s.