Liberal Anxiety Over a 2016 Repeat May Be Why We Won’t Have One

Panicky voters are motivated voters.

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The 2016 election lives loudly in everybody right now.

On the Trumpian right, “the polls were wrong before” isn’t merely an observation, it’s a catechism.

And on the anti-Trumpian left, it’s a constant source of anxiety bordering on panic. It’s making a lot of folks a little crazy. 

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  1. Maddmac

    Thank you Jonah...this was a fun read. I am not a liberal by the way, dammit! :-) What happened to the term "moderate Democrat?" By the way, you asked on the Remnant the other day if you should continue with the "Greetings dear listeners"...I vote to keep it going!

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    Jen

    Listening to the Commentary podcast this morning and it seems to me the pro-Trump crowd (or those who don’t love him but try to give him the benefit of the doubt) are banking heavily on this notion of the ‘shy Trump voter’ or that pollsters are just missing people who are going to vote for Trump (e.g. blue collar whites). John Podhoretz even speculated that because of the way Trump is campaigning perhaps more people are against masks and are just telling pollsters they support mask wearing because it’s the politically correct thing to do. I suppose this could be the case but I’m not really buying it. We’re really supposed to believe people have no problem attending Trump rallies, wearing MAGA hats, being in boat parades but are to shy or ashamed to tell a pollster who they’re supporting? Please.

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    Jason Gibson

    Dig the Rocky reference. What to look for before the next fight of the century:

    Joe Biden talking to Jill:

    "listen to this one.....the debate was fixed, you're a fraud go kill yourself"


    Or Nancy Pelosi telling Joe Biden that he should let it go:

    "hell i won man but I didn't beat him"


    The only question is will Donald Trump submit to training for the next debate by trying to grab a chicken like Rocky did?

    Hey if the debate is on zoom that tactic could bleed into Jonah's last story............

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  4. Joe1776

    The stakes are much higher this year!

    Biden says Trump killed 250 thousand people - don't believe him? check the data!

    But his next term well that is going to be much much worse.

    As you know from the DNC speakers like Michelle Obama, Barrack Obama and many others make it clear that our *life* depends on this election.

    We were lucky to even survive the first 4 years but the party of science says we won't survive the next 4 years. If Trump wins again Elizabeth Warren assures us that *all* life on the planet will end. And that would really be a bummer:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5z85MaktfQ


    So not just me and my wife and kids but even my dog will die if Trump is elected.

    So, of course, we are all very anxious. I'm actually starting to wonder how I can survive the last few months of his term. But if we can make it I know Joe Biden will make my family whole again.

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    Todd T

    I am all for sticking to party line votes outside of the executive if that’s your thing. But shouldn’t the president represent the United States respectfully? Does any legitimate foreign nation see us in a better light because of Trump? Do judicial picks matter so much that you are fine to have this guy constantly embarrass us on the world stage? Maybe I’m just naive.

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    1. Mary Stine

      You are not naive, you are seeing clearly, as anyone would at twelve, hopefully before indoctrination by politics.

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    Dave

    It's funny that the Trump followers keep clinging to these different reasons instead of just using Occam's Razor.

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    Connie

    I was #NeverTrump in 2016. This year, I am blessedly living in a red state, so I did not vote for either candidate. I did not feel compelled to do so. I am 58 years old, and it is the first time in my life I have abstained from voting for President. I did vote for McConnell and Barr (KY-6), however.

    Frankly, my instincts say the Dems are going to sweep. My hope is we hold onto the Senate. If the Dems do sweep, I suspect this will adjust in 2022, as it usually does during midterms.

    Trump has destroyed the dignity of the office. My nephew keeps saying it’s about the judiciary, saying it’s good in the long term. I simply cannot agree. Trump has done such damage to the office of President. You cannot mention his name in the same breath as Washington, Lincoln, Reagan. I think we should purge Trumpism from our ranks and turn our backs on all vestiges of this vile ideology.

    If Biden serves a four year term, I doubt he will get a second one. If, for some reason, Biden is unable to complete his first term, I suspect it would be very difficult to beat Harris in 2024.

    As the political stars realign, I know who I would like to see in the Oval Office in four years: Ben Sasse.

    Time will tell. All is subject to change.

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      Man-Eating Cow

      Ben Sasse? From your mouth to G-d's Ear.

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      Pat Riot

      Ben Sasse seems like he would have been a good guy had he not voted to exonerate Trump. His vote and 15 others could have saved hundreds of thousands of American lives and trillions of dollars in lost GDP. But instead he pledged his loyalty to Trump.

      And why he voted the way he did remains a mystery since he's clearly got no future in the GOP yet he's hitched himself to Trump in a historical way as well. At minimum he'd look like a slimy two-faced politician trying to have it both ways, which I think is unfair, but I really don't understand what he was trying to accomplish by that vote.

      As for the judiciary, Trump's denigration of the office means that Democrats now have full political leeway to pack the courts and obliterate any gains Republicans think they have made. In the mean time, every non-unanimous SC verdict for now on will be dubbed, "a Trump verdict" (and my personal prediction is that Trump's legacy is going to get *much worse* than the depths it's already plumbing as all of the stuff he's currently hiding comes into view and he will no longer have a 24/7 GOP media complex to defend him).

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  8. rob

    I don't know. If there was ever a year that you could get a 269-269 tie I think it could be this year. I have found many different ways playing with the map on 270towin. Its 2020 and you are expecting me to believe there won't be an election crises? I think you already took a Xanax.

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      Bill Nelson

      Biden will win by 30, and that from someone who will start drinking.

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        Angie

        I really hope it won't be as bad as you imagine...I don't think it will...and I survived 4 years of Trump...you will survive and with our yo-yo politics it will be forever one side, then the other which removes everything that was done, then the other etc...I don't think this is a good thing either

        Neither side should have all the power...at the same time, Trump caused a lot of this...there wouldn't be this enthusiasm if not for him

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          Kmregan7

          If it had just been Trump I think it would be different. Trump was aided by Republicans who seemed to just blindly go along with him. McConnell has a lot to answer for, IMO.

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            Angie

            True

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  9. Phil Laughlin

    Enjoyed the variety of commenters. Things didn’t get too ugly for a change.

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  10. CatoTheElder

    Does anyone else note a bit of irony in the prospect of “shy” voters for a candidate like Trump?

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    1. LostVoter

      I do find it very ironic. I've found there are two types of Trump voters in 2020...the bombastic ones with TDS, and the ones who are voting for Trump, but are ashamed of it so they would rather no one else know.

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        Man-Eating Cow

        Hmm. I have a few friends who are neither; they acknowledge they are voting for Trump, even campaign for him, but do so with the claim that it's because the alternative is even worse.

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