Dear Hillary
Dear Hillary,
I can't explain the appeal of Donald Trump or how so many Americans drank his particular brand of Kool-Aid. I wish I could, because right now, I am very saddened by this turn of events.
I can, however, tell you some reasons why you didn't appeal to many. I hope that the party in general, and you in particular, listen and learn from this.
First and foremost, you dismissed Bernie and his supporters. Hundreds of thousands of people were inspired and excited by this guy, but it seems like nobody in the party even tried to figure out why. It was like you won the candidacy, and those of us who felt the Bern were just patted on the head, told to go to our parents' basements and play video games until November 8, at which time we should emerge and vote for you and never question it. That was an unrealistic thing for you to expect from those of us who supported him, and here are just a few reasons why:
1. Bernie himself inspired us. To us, he isn't a democrat with ideals, he is an idealist who is a democrat. That was refreshing and spoke to us in a way that very few candidates that have been offered up to us in recent history have. We WANT and NEED to be inspired. You didn't HEAR that message, even though we spoke it very loudly and clearly. You did absolutely nothing to continue to try to inspire us in this way at all during the entire rest of your campaign.
2. When you are supporting a guy because his ideals, his commitment to his values, his vision and his passion inspire you, and you don't necessarily care what party he represents, then you as a voter may choose not to just vote for the party he represents. You may actually seek out another candidate who comes closer to inspiring you. You failed to take that into account.
3. I think that you think all of Bernie supporters are just directionless millenials who have dropped out of college and just want to smoke pot, avoid responsibility and get handouts for the rest of their lives. You need to understand that that was NOT the case. Most of his supporters aren't seeking handouts, and they aren't trying to avoid taking responsibility for their lives or getting jobs. And many of his supporters aren't millenials, we are from my generation, as well as those that came after.
4. Speaking of, I want to introduce you to my generation, because I don't think you've met us. I think of my generation (gen X) as the Prince Charles generation. We're a generation that was told, from like day 1 in kindergarten, that we needed to work hard in school, get good grades, and go to college. There would be student loans to help us, which would be no problem! When we finished college, there would be all these plentiful, well paying jobs, and we'll be able to pay those loans back, no problem, and be on to this picture perfect life full of financial prosperity and we'll all have the great house, with a great yard and great kids kind of upper middle class suburban yuppie life. It would be AWESOME! Except that it isn't. We did what we were told to do. We went to college, we got the loans, we emerged all ready for those plentiful good paying jobs, but that never quite happened.
We're the generation who was entering college during the first Gulf War. We've been at war essentially since then. We're the generation who has experienced financial crisis after financial crisis after financial crisis. We're the ones that have always had the jobs dry up just as we need them. We're the ones who have been hanging out, preparing for and working towards jobs that we were promised would be there, but those jobs have always been held by the people of the generation before us and still are. So here we are, waiting for those people to retire so we can move up, except that they never retire and the retirement age always keeps getting moved back, so they never will. We're just like Prince Charles, who has spent his whole adult life preparing for a job that his mom has to die in order for him to do. Except that his mom won't die, and when she does, he'll get passed by in favor of William. And we probably will be passed over as well.
Nobody sees the people of my generation. Nobody understands our frustration. Until Bernie. Bernie GETS us. He sees the kind of help we need to move forward. Nobody else does, especially you. To us, you are just another politician who doesn't understand the disconnection between the life we were promised by everyone, especially the government/establishment and the lives we've actually lived. The promises we grew up with never materialized, but we've had to pay for them anyway. We are very angry and disillusioned. You, and the rest of the party, really need to understand us and address us, and see that our issues are a product of the government policies of our youth, and we therefore have a right to be angry and frustrated with that government. We want change. Does that sound familiar?
Second, the e-mails. I get that you don't think they were a big deal because they weren't. But you don't seem to understand that most of us weren't willing to just take your word for it. It SEEMED to us like a big deal because the FBI was involved. The whole situation was all cloak and dagger-y to us. We need you - not the FBI, not a congressional hearing - but you to talk to us about this issue and give us reasonable explanations. Tell us WHY you had this private server, WHY did you use it. Tell us about all the meaningless crap that you see in your e-mail. Explain to us that OF COURSE no real top secret stuff is talked about in e-mail. Make us understand that your work e-mail is very much like our work e-mail and that's the kind of stuff that we're talking about. You should have had a press conference, or gone on some tv shows to discuss, or done some youtube videos explaining this to share on social media. You should have done SOMETHING to assure us that you're not some careless government stooge or some shady spy type or something. When you weren't open about it, it just seemed more and more like it WAS a big deal and that you WERE hiding something. Huge mistake. Huge.
While we're at it, you should have done something like this about the rape case thing and the partial birth abortion thing.
Third, your campaign. Hey, girl. I actually respected your campaign. It was the kind of campaign I've been hoping to see for awhile. I liked that you didn't sling all kinds of mud at him and focused more on your qualifications. But here's the thing. You were up against a big, bombastic blowhard with no problem bashing you. You needed to campaign a thousand times harder, be way more visible and be far more vocal. Your campaign and whatever message you had was very much lost in his noise.
Fourth, your message. Or lack of one. It was like we were all just supposed to understand what you stood for by osmosis. Or that we were supposed to see what Trump stood for and assume you would be better than him and therefore we should vote for you. You expected marginalized groups like women, minorities, Muslims, LGBTQ groups, etc. to just see somehow that Trump = bad, so you must = good, without you ever telling us why you are good or what you will do to improve our lives. While I agree wholeheartedly that Trump was clearly the worse choice for anyone in any of these groups, it appears that many in these groups expected more than "I'm better than this guy" from you. And rightfully so.
Fifth, your opponent. I said it earlier, and will say it again. I loved that you let him make himself look bad without ever really getting dirty yourself. But, there is a shit-ton of stuff in his background that makes him a horrible choice for president, and making us aware of them isn't mudslinging unless it isn't true. Since the media wasn't doing their job in telling us about his fraud case, or all the times he violated court orders, or the repeated accusations of active racial discrimination, or all of the lawsuits against him and and why they were filed, it was YOUR job to make us aware. He wasn't going to. We needed to know and nobody else was doing it. Now we're stuck with him but we're all blissfully unaware of what he's capable of.
Six, you let false stories stand. Social media was filled with fake news stories about you. Filled. All the time. There was no effort from you or your campaign to challenge them. While I admire your determination to believe that we're all capable of discerning between true and false, I am a librarian and can tell you absolutely that people will believe all kinds of bs, even if it should perhaps be obvious that it isn't true. You needed to have a campaign staffer or two on social media on a daily basis choosing the "BS story of the day" or something, explaining how or why the story was false. Not only would it have helped you set the record straight, it would have improved your visibility on social media, which brings us to...
Seven, social media; or ffs, connect with us already. Where the hell were you? Crickets from your campaign. You really needed to be present somehow. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube. Instagram, Snapchat. Write a blog and Pinterest your stories. Sheesh, do a Reddit session, even. There are a ton of places to find us and talk to us. Figure out how to be there too. Make a connection with us. This would have been an ideal way for you to address the perception that you're out of touch by actually NOT being out of touch. And while you're there, pay attention to what is being said about your opponent, because if you had, last night's results would not have been nearly the surprise it was. You might even have been able to do something so it wouldn't have happened.
And, Eight. You just assumed you could count on a bunch of states, and apparently Wisconsin was one of them. Yes, Pres. Obama carried Wisconsin, and yes, we do have something of a history of going Dem for president. But Obama EARNED Wisconsin's vote by campaigning here. We saw and heard from him All. The. Time. We actually came to believe that he cared about the fate of our state. We barely even heard your name during this election...and had you visited us a couple of times here and there, you might have noticed the amazing number of Trump signs EVERYWHERE. Logic should have told you that Wis wasn't a done deal - I was, in fact, shocked to hear last night that Wisconsin had been expected as a W for your team. This state has elected Doofushead Walker how many times, and the SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE is a republican from Wisconsin. As a state, we are not averse to going to the dark side, my friend. Believe me. And if you had campaigned here, you could also have made some visits to, say, Iowa, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio? See where I'm going with that? Never, ever, ever assume that you can count on a state's vote without doing the work to earn it. Lesson learned the hard way, I guess.
Anyway, for what it is worth, you had my vote, though a very grudging one. I wish things had gone another way for all of us.
Maybe next time.
I can't explain the appeal of Donald Trump or how so many Americans drank his particular brand of Kool-Aid. I wish I could, because right now, I am very saddened by this turn of events.
I can, however, tell you some reasons why you didn't appeal to many. I hope that the party in general, and you in particular, listen and learn from this.
First and foremost, you dismissed Bernie and his supporters. Hundreds of thousands of people were inspired and excited by this guy, but it seems like nobody in the party even tried to figure out why. It was like you won the candidacy, and those of us who felt the Bern were just patted on the head, told to go to our parents' basements and play video games until November 8, at which time we should emerge and vote for you and never question it. That was an unrealistic thing for you to expect from those of us who supported him, and here are just a few reasons why:
1. Bernie himself inspired us. To us, he isn't a democrat with ideals, he is an idealist who is a democrat. That was refreshing and spoke to us in a way that very few candidates that have been offered up to us in recent history have. We WANT and NEED to be inspired. You didn't HEAR that message, even though we spoke it very loudly and clearly. You did absolutely nothing to continue to try to inspire us in this way at all during the entire rest of your campaign.
2. When you are supporting a guy because his ideals, his commitment to his values, his vision and his passion inspire you, and you don't necessarily care what party he represents, then you as a voter may choose not to just vote for the party he represents. You may actually seek out another candidate who comes closer to inspiring you. You failed to take that into account.
3. I think that you think all of Bernie supporters are just directionless millenials who have dropped out of college and just want to smoke pot, avoid responsibility and get handouts for the rest of their lives. You need to understand that that was NOT the case. Most of his supporters aren't seeking handouts, and they aren't trying to avoid taking responsibility for their lives or getting jobs. And many of his supporters aren't millenials, we are from my generation, as well as those that came after.
4. Speaking of, I want to introduce you to my generation, because I don't think you've met us. I think of my generation (gen X) as the Prince Charles generation. We're a generation that was told, from like day 1 in kindergarten, that we needed to work hard in school, get good grades, and go to college. There would be student loans to help us, which would be no problem! When we finished college, there would be all these plentiful, well paying jobs, and we'll be able to pay those loans back, no problem, and be on to this picture perfect life full of financial prosperity and we'll all have the great house, with a great yard and great kids kind of upper middle class suburban yuppie life. It would be AWESOME! Except that it isn't. We did what we were told to do. We went to college, we got the loans, we emerged all ready for those plentiful good paying jobs, but that never quite happened.
We're the generation who was entering college during the first Gulf War. We've been at war essentially since then. We're the generation who has experienced financial crisis after financial crisis after financial crisis. We're the ones that have always had the jobs dry up just as we need them. We're the ones who have been hanging out, preparing for and working towards jobs that we were promised would be there, but those jobs have always been held by the people of the generation before us and still are. So here we are, waiting for those people to retire so we can move up, except that they never retire and the retirement age always keeps getting moved back, so they never will. We're just like Prince Charles, who has spent his whole adult life preparing for a job that his mom has to die in order for him to do. Except that his mom won't die, and when she does, he'll get passed by in favor of William. And we probably will be passed over as well.
Nobody sees the people of my generation. Nobody understands our frustration. Until Bernie. Bernie GETS us. He sees the kind of help we need to move forward. Nobody else does, especially you. To us, you are just another politician who doesn't understand the disconnection between the life we were promised by everyone, especially the government/establishment and the lives we've actually lived. The promises we grew up with never materialized, but we've had to pay for them anyway. We are very angry and disillusioned. You, and the rest of the party, really need to understand us and address us, and see that our issues are a product of the government policies of our youth, and we therefore have a right to be angry and frustrated with that government. We want change. Does that sound familiar?
Second, the e-mails. I get that you don't think they were a big deal because they weren't. But you don't seem to understand that most of us weren't willing to just take your word for it. It SEEMED to us like a big deal because the FBI was involved. The whole situation was all cloak and dagger-y to us. We need you - not the FBI, not a congressional hearing - but you to talk to us about this issue and give us reasonable explanations. Tell us WHY you had this private server, WHY did you use it. Tell us about all the meaningless crap that you see in your e-mail. Explain to us that OF COURSE no real top secret stuff is talked about in e-mail. Make us understand that your work e-mail is very much like our work e-mail and that's the kind of stuff that we're talking about. You should have had a press conference, or gone on some tv shows to discuss, or done some youtube videos explaining this to share on social media. You should have done SOMETHING to assure us that you're not some careless government stooge or some shady spy type or something. When you weren't open about it, it just seemed more and more like it WAS a big deal and that you WERE hiding something. Huge mistake. Huge.
While we're at it, you should have done something like this about the rape case thing and the partial birth abortion thing.
Third, your campaign. Hey, girl. I actually respected your campaign. It was the kind of campaign I've been hoping to see for awhile. I liked that you didn't sling all kinds of mud at him and focused more on your qualifications. But here's the thing. You were up against a big, bombastic blowhard with no problem bashing you. You needed to campaign a thousand times harder, be way more visible and be far more vocal. Your campaign and whatever message you had was very much lost in his noise.
Fourth, your message. Or lack of one. It was like we were all just supposed to understand what you stood for by osmosis. Or that we were supposed to see what Trump stood for and assume you would be better than him and therefore we should vote for you. You expected marginalized groups like women, minorities, Muslims, LGBTQ groups, etc. to just see somehow that Trump = bad, so you must = good, without you ever telling us why you are good or what you will do to improve our lives. While I agree wholeheartedly that Trump was clearly the worse choice for anyone in any of these groups, it appears that many in these groups expected more than "I'm better than this guy" from you. And rightfully so.
Fifth, your opponent. I said it earlier, and will say it again. I loved that you let him make himself look bad without ever really getting dirty yourself. But, there is a shit-ton of stuff in his background that makes him a horrible choice for president, and making us aware of them isn't mudslinging unless it isn't true. Since the media wasn't doing their job in telling us about his fraud case, or all the times he violated court orders, or the repeated accusations of active racial discrimination, or all of the lawsuits against him and and why they were filed, it was YOUR job to make us aware. He wasn't going to. We needed to know and nobody else was doing it. Now we're stuck with him but we're all blissfully unaware of what he's capable of.
Six, you let false stories stand. Social media was filled with fake news stories about you. Filled. All the time. There was no effort from you or your campaign to challenge them. While I admire your determination to believe that we're all capable of discerning between true and false, I am a librarian and can tell you absolutely that people will believe all kinds of bs, even if it should perhaps be obvious that it isn't true. You needed to have a campaign staffer or two on social media on a daily basis choosing the "BS story of the day" or something, explaining how or why the story was false. Not only would it have helped you set the record straight, it would have improved your visibility on social media, which brings us to...
Seven, social media; or ffs, connect with us already. Where the hell were you? Crickets from your campaign. You really needed to be present somehow. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube. Instagram, Snapchat. Write a blog and Pinterest your stories. Sheesh, do a Reddit session, even. There are a ton of places to find us and talk to us. Figure out how to be there too. Make a connection with us. This would have been an ideal way for you to address the perception that you're out of touch by actually NOT being out of touch. And while you're there, pay attention to what is being said about your opponent, because if you had, last night's results would not have been nearly the surprise it was. You might even have been able to do something so it wouldn't have happened.
And, Eight. You just assumed you could count on a bunch of states, and apparently Wisconsin was one of them. Yes, Pres. Obama carried Wisconsin, and yes, we do have something of a history of going Dem for president. But Obama EARNED Wisconsin's vote by campaigning here. We saw and heard from him All. The. Time. We actually came to believe that he cared about the fate of our state. We barely even heard your name during this election...and had you visited us a couple of times here and there, you might have noticed the amazing number of Trump signs EVERYWHERE. Logic should have told you that Wis wasn't a done deal - I was, in fact, shocked to hear last night that Wisconsin had been expected as a W for your team. This state has elected Doofushead Walker how many times, and the SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE is a republican from Wisconsin. As a state, we are not averse to going to the dark side, my friend. Believe me. And if you had campaigned here, you could also have made some visits to, say, Iowa, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio? See where I'm going with that? Never, ever, ever assume that you can count on a state's vote without doing the work to earn it. Lesson learned the hard way, I guess.
Anyway, for what it is worth, you had my vote, though a very grudging one. I wish things had gone another way for all of us.
Maybe next time.
Wow Nora! You nailed it. Thank you for writing this.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Wendy! You are very welcome. Feel free to share if you like.
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