Dear friend (my fellow liberal),
Okay… That election sucked.
The pundits immediately got to work on the autopsy. They say we lost because Kamala Harris did not listen to their advice about <–insert pundit’s opinion here–>. That includes:
- Inflation and the price of eggs.
- The crisis at the border with asylum seekers.
- Global backlash against incumbents, who we blame for the economic aftermath of the pandemic whether it’s their fault or not.
- The resentment of anti-woke young men. Trump did a better job of reaching bros via the Joe Rogan show and other similar bro-oriented podcasts.
- The partisan weaponization of the justice system. The trials backfired as political theatre, and they have not so far resulted in any semblance of justice either.
- The assassination attempts bolstered an image of Trump as heroic.
- Harris relied on ground game and traditional media, whereas Trump focused on newer media. And with Trump reaching his base directly with Truth Social, and Elon Musk converting the liberal-leaning Twitter to conservative-leaning X, the information ecosphere now favors their ideological bent.
- The country just wasn’t ready for a non-white female president. And it was probably misogyny more than sexism that hurt Harris.
- It’s Joe Biden’s fault. He should not have run for reelection. Kamala Harris didn’t have enough time to persuade voters after he backed out.
Some pundits blame Joe Biden. Some blame Kamala Harris. Some blame the American people. But I have not heard any yet blame themselves.
Allan Lichtman, Michael Moore, and James Carville all confidently predicted a Harris victory. The same thing happened with Hillary Clinton in 2016, though with different pundits (for that election, Lichtman and Moore actually correctly predicted Trump would win). We need to consider whether predictions like these are a death sentence for more centrist candidates, who tend to be less exciting. How many voters saw the predictions and then decided, It looks like she has this in the bag, and I’m not that excited about Harris anyway, so I won’t bother voting?
Polls have proven time and again to be a huge waste of time and energy.
If you are liberal, from this day forward, if a pollster calls you, lie to them. Or if that feels wrong to you, just refuse to answer.
And can we just throw out all the pundits? All the talking heads on cable news channels, all the NY Times and Washington Post opinion columnists, all the podcasters, all the YouTubers — all of them?
Turn them all off. What was the use of listening to any of them? They were wrong about everything and then they blamed other people for their failures. They aren’t helping us; they’re feeding on us. They’re producing theatre of manipulation. Do not trust your spiritual well-being to anyone who profits from outrage.
Anyone who has monetized liberal attention needs to go. Their profit motive is not aligned with seeing progressive policies actually come to fruition; it is aligned with keeping us constantly angry and upset. They make money selling us false hope and then they make money off our despair when those hopes are dashed.
Constantly turning to partisan media is self-destructive: it is more aggravating than soothing on an emotional level, and on a political level it will do nothing to solve the problem of the country having a terrible president.
I also haven’t heard anyone say “we should have stuck with Biden” yet, but I wonder if he could have pulled out a victory here. Biden had a bad debate, but maybe he could have made a comeback. He couldn’t have done any worse than Harris. I like Harris and I voted for her, but switching the candidate without going through a proper primary process was a phenomenally risky move. This was not the time to experiment. And the celebrities and so-called experts who pushed this idea need to think about how much blame they own here. A better strategy would have been to let Biden win reelection and then he could leave office during his second term. This loss was engineered by people I like, people like George Clooney, Nancy Pelosi, and my beloved Barack Obama, and I’m disappointed in them. You thought you knew better than voters and you were wrong.
So now, yet again we’re in a “brace for impact” situation. But this time is different.
There is a segment of the MAGA movement that is driven by pure contempt. They relish knowing that liberals suffer when Trump wins. They get a real charge out of that. They believe that their fellow citizens are the source of the problems in their own life, and Trump is an instrument of their revenge. Last time, in 2016, the MAGA Republicans reveled in drinking liberal tears. But this time, I do not see a flood of liberal tears for them to drink.
They don’t get that we were crying for them as much as for ourselves. And now we are done crying.
It helps, perhaps perversely, that Trump won the popular vote. Depending on your interpretation of why people voted for Trump, it may not reflect well upon the electorate. But it’s just easier to stomach a loss when you know at least the loss was fair and square. I can accept that the country doesn’t agree with me.
Although I’ve condemned pundits for their wrong predictions, I can’t help making a few of my own. There is a piece of wisdom that comes from a beloved old sage:
The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.
~Dr. Phil
Here is my guess of what is to come in Trump’s next term in office, based upon his last term:
- Economic policy will be set by profiteers according to their own interests. Trump will pass record tax breaks for corporations and the wealthy. In the short term, this will indeed provide a boost to the economy. But it will also add to the debt and exacerbate wealth inequality.
- He will roll back environmental regulations particularly around climate change, encouraging corporations to pass their externalities on to the American people, who will have to foot the bill for the damage. In the short term, again, this too might provide some economic boost, but in the long term it will have consequences for public health and of course the environment.
- Once again, members of the next Trump administration will turn on him when they realize he is terrible. There will be defections, including high-profile members of his inner circle. But fewer this time than last, because Trump will select people based on loyalty over competence.
- Because Trump is choosing people based upon loyalty over competence, his administration will be dangerously incompetent.
- When a crisis strikes, like another pandemic, the Trump administration will once again respond with chaos, blame, conspiracy theories, and fecklessness. Let us not forget that under Trump’s leadership, the USA at one point had 25% of the world’s coronavirus cases, in spite of the fact we only have 4% of the world’s population. Once again, people will die in America unnecessarily because of the venality, ineptitude, and narcissism of Donald Trump.
- To the degree that the Trump administration dismantles structures that have protected public health in agencies like the FDA and the EPA, public health will obviously suffer. If RFK deregulates raw milk, America will have to contend with preventable cases of bird flu. If RFK smooths the path for charlatans to sell stem cell therapies for macular degeneration that actually damage eyes instead of helping them, more Americans will be hurt. However, I have a feeling Trump isn’t this stupid to allow this to happen. If his administration ends up allowing the murder of autistic children by chelation of heavy metals in their blood, a potentially dangerous process that has no beneficial impact on autism, people won’t like it. And RFK might also back down on some of his crazier ideas when he is exposed to top scientists in the field bringing him up to speed on the science. But we will see. This one could go either way. I suspect the end outcome will be that Trump’s changes to the FDA will hurt, not help, public health, but the damage won’t be as significant as we might fear.
- Trump’s administration will take credit for the economy handed to him by the Biden administration. The investment in America’s infrastructure will pay dividends, and Trump will receive the thanks, even though his first administration failed to do anything at all with infrastructure, and it was actually Biden who is to thank. If America is made great again under Trump, it will not be because of Trump, but because of Democrats.
- This will put JD Vance in a strong position to run for President in 2028, as he will be free to distance himself from Trump’s worst qualities at the same time he takes credit for Biden’s economy. To defeat him, the Democrats must make some dramatic changes — not in our core values, but in our messaging and our messengers.
The next administration will put criminals in charge of justice, polluters in charge of the environment, ignoramuses in charge of education, liars in charge of communication, cheaters in charge of creating a level playing field for businesses, conspiracy theorists in charge of public health, traitors in charge of protecting our allies, and sociopaths in charge of social welfare.
Bad news! But there is good news, too. The good news is always the same:
The better angels of the human spirit–love, empathy, compassion, and the light of reason–will always prevail. In spite of mighty resistance, in small steps, slowly but surely, despite a million setbacks and delays, they will prevail.
How this will be expressed over the next few years, I do not know. The bad news is easier to predict than the good news.
But I think I know a path forward for liberal people in a time of darkness.
I am reminded of this quote from Shakespeare:
That light we see is burning in my hall.
How far that little candle throws his beams!
So shines a good deed in a naughty world.
You are that little candle.
Don’t worry about fighting the MAGA ugliness right now. If you step outside of the arena, after a time — after they are tired of gloating and bragging and peacocking — they will turn on each other and begin to self-destruct. This is their nature.
Some of our American family have fallen for the seduction of hatred. They are forming a group identity around the dehumanization of other people. The surest sign of that to me is their vitriol toward transgender people, but we also see it in their fear of immigrants, their suspicion of “the enemy within” (us), their disregard for the autonomy of women over their own bodies, their distrust of democratic institutions, and their bizarre and unpatriotic love for dictators around the world. Hatred like this is a form of suffering. It is a cancer that weakens them. Sadly, we cannot help them right now.
In a couple of years, we will reemerge with renewed energy. But for now…
If you are a painter, paint something new. If you are a writer, write something beautiful. If you are an artist, turn to your art, and if you are not an artist, make your regular life a piece of artwork. That is your job right now.
It’s time to go quiet. Hide from politics. Focus on living — put your energy there. Let your little candle shine in your kindness and your creativity. Put aside your fear and anger. Let that flicker of goodness pervade all aspects of your daily expression of your identity.
The country is going to suffer under the incoming administration. But this is the outcome of a fair election. In a democracy, we accept the results of elections even if we do not like them. There is no point in fretting or complaining. Now we focus on surviving in our own lives, and on the good we can do on the local and personal levels.
And gradually we will find each other in the darkness. We will follow the other little lights we see. We will gather an army of little candles and fill the world with our light.
When we return, it will be with a new vision. Something beautiful. Something for everyone. Something we’re able to articulate better than ever before.
Until then…
I remain ever yours,
William Bloom