61.4% of people voted in 2016. Think about that.

[guillaumeb]

A record 137.5 million Americans voted in the 2016 presidential election, according to new data from the U.S. Census Bureau. Overall voter turnout – defined as the share of adult U.S. citizens who cast ballots – was 61.4% in 2016, a share similar to 2012 but below the 63.6% who say they voted in 2008.
A number of long-standing trends in presidential elections either reversed or stalled in 2016, as black voter turnout decreased, white turnout increased and the nonwhite share of the U.S. electorate remained flat since the 2012 election. Here are some key takeaways from the Census Bureau’s report, the data source with the most comprehensive demographic and statistical portrait of U.S. voters.

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/05/12/black-voter-turnout-fell-in-2016-even-as-a-record-number-of-americans-cast-ballots/

So when we write about Sanders voters, or Clinton voters, or Stein voters, we must acknowledge that 38.6% of voters did not vote at all.


Some of it was due to ignorance, some due to deliberate and targeted GOP voter suppression directed at likely Democratic voters.


My personal view is that the Democratic Party does have a winning message, but that the conservative corporate media generally ignores that message to better focus on Trump's lunatic raving and lies.


My prescription is that we must treat 2018 as the first small wave, the precursor to a larger 2020 wave.

And to better insure that the 2020 wave happens, we must force the media and our elected representatives to focus on voter suppression. Stacey Abrams is showing how to do it. She refuses to concede, and continues to focus on Kemp's deliberate cheating. But she cannot be the only one. Democratic voters and politicians must focus on the undeniable fact that the GOP can only win by suppressing the vote and cheating on counting ballots.