Most everyone except CNN, MSNBC and the hard left are calling Trump’s victory a landslide. Maybe that’s because Harris got 70 million votes. I thought Trump would win simply because we typically do not elect sitting vice presidents (George Bush the First was the exception). I also thought he would win because his negatives have been decreasing since 2015. I thought he would win because 68% of the voters said the country was going in the wrong direction (do you know any of the other 32%?). But Harris got 47% of the vote. I guess that means that around 20 percent of her vote was from those who hated Trump enough to continue the disaster of the last four years for another 4 years.
At the LSU – Alabama game, the LSU fans – who are arguably the worse fans in the country – littered an end zone with bottles to show displeasure over an obviously face mask call that kept the ball in Alabama’s possession. When the Texas crybabies threw bottles at the Georgia game, the SEC fined the school $250,000 which I pointed out was what probably less than what they paid their backup punter. The SEC should fine the school $1 million, impose a 15 yard penalty and take away three scholarships. I bet that nonsense will stop.
I asked the caretaker at my farm about Harris’ endorsements and he said “Beyonce don’t have trouble paying for groceries or gas.”
Whether Trump will fire Jay Powell is in the news. Actually, he can’t. Powell was confirmed by the Senate and can only be removed through impeachment. Lots of luck with that.
Remember when the democrats attacked Trump and Vance as being “weird”? That failed, probably in part because Tim (Little Bernie) Walz – and his wife – are truly weird.
Remember when the democrats attacked Trump as being too old? Then he went out and did rally after rally, appeared on 30+ podcasts, and gave countless interviews even to hostile hosts while Harris didn’t even muster the energy to have a press conference during her campaign.
The republican party at least for the immediate future is Trump’s party. Its embrace of protectionism, industrial policy and tariffs are anathema to traditional republican ideals. Trump’s coalition of young males, blue collar workers and those without college degrees used to be democrats. Harris still got 55% of those with college degrees, 85 percent of blacks, 54 percent of Asians, 52 percent of Latinos, 79 percent of Jews and 54 percent of Catholics.
Of course there is double counting. I would bet that the majority of those have college degrees making the democrats the party of white progressives and the subsidized poor.
Exit interviews showed the expected. Harris lost big time on immigration, the economy and foreign policy. She won big on abortion and democracy. Please explain that to me. She and her ilk were campaigning as if the Supreme Court’s decision banned abortion rather than giving infanticide back to the states. Trump had said that he did not favor a federal bill banning abortion and if one showed up on his desk he would veto it. The left said that he was lying. Harris and her surrogates kept shouting that Trump was a threat to democracy. Some polls said that voters thought (rightly so) that the democrats were the greater threat to democracy but those who listed democracy as their top issue apparently thought otherwise.
Did you see the clip where some leftwing talking heads were insulting Latinos saying that voting for Trump meant deporting their aunts and relatives? I guess MSNBC forgot that the Latinos that voted were citizens.
The republicans are saying that Trump has a mandate with winning the presidency, the Senate and the House. However, the margins are still precariously thin. That antiestablishment bunch of twelve or so house members can still gum up the works and keep the party stupid. The majority of House and Senate republicans are still members of the establishment and can work against Trump. Somehow, I think the republicans will still find a way to screw things up.
California is banning the sale of class A motorhomes beginning in 2025 (I am a fan of Tiffins, even if they did punt for Alabama). The other states that conform to California’s emissions standards will follow. Those states are Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington. Of course the banning of motorhome sales will have no measurable impact on the climate but will be devastating to the RV industry – which is mainly located in Indiana. Trump has pledged to rollback California’s ability to make its own environmental rules. Although Congress granted that authority, each one of the standards must be granted a waiver by the EPA. I would guess that the question likely to be settle in the courts will be whether Trump’s EPA will be able to rescind a waiver already granted. There are eight waivers that have yet to be granted. Look for Biden’s EPA to grant them before Trump takes office.
haroldblackphd.com 