Charles P Pierce: Why I'll Never Sympathize with Regretful Trump Voters

[kpete]

YOU SADDLED THE REST OF US WITH MISRULE AND DISASTER. OWN IT.

..................

And you know what I say?

Shut up.

This is a story about hypocrisy, not about ambivalence.

You fell for a con. Seventy percent of you voted for the very policy that has taken your friend away because you thought the damn coal mines were coming back when everyone has been telling you for years that the coal industry is as dead as Kelsey's nuts and that Donald Trump, Jesus Christ, and J.H. Blair working together couldn't bring it back. Because, I suspect, you know that better than anybody, you channeled your frustration and despair into chants of "Build The Wall!" And, Ms. Johnson? Virtually all of "those people" actually do come here and help. If that head of lettuce on the counter could only talk…

............

Tonight, the president will unveil his facsimile of a federal budget and I guarantee you it will make the lives of practically every person in all these stories worse, not better. And, in a few months, when it's really begun to bite, the editors and news directors will send out more expeditions to find out what "real Americans" feel about the disaster they've wrought on themselves, and us. They all had the same choices we did. They all had the same opportunity to inform themselves; I mean, it wasn't like the campaign was under-covered, and it wasn't like the eventual winner hasn't governed precisely the way he campaigned.

Feeling lost and desperate is a terrible thing. But if, out of loss and desperation, you drink 20 cold beers out of the old preparation room and smash your car into a daycare center, the judge is not going to care how lost and desperate you felt. You build your own prisons in this life. You design your own sentences.


the XLNT rest:
http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a53491/regretful-trump-voters/

[Wounded Bear]

1. K & R ......Pierce nails it again...nt

[Solly Mack]

2. K&R

[Coventina]

3. Thank you Charlie Pierce!!!

[tblue37]

4. K&R. nt

[BeckyDem]

5. He is right and winning the next round should not include coddling a message

for anyone who agrees with his hateful messages. The best we can do is say, NO. He is wrong and this is why. Hillary won the popular vote, that fact should not be lost in our message. Her message was not about causing racial division, not one of causing economic inequality. He is a horrid man who will make things worse for most Americans. How could they not see it if they did not agree with him?

[MFM008]

6. I have no sympathy

for any of his voters,
If I lose my healthcare I don't sympathize when they do as well.
Maggot and his voters can fuck themselves with a garden weasel.

[Alice11111]

32. Fuck them all...they thought it was a joke WWIII, seriously?

How serious is WWIII? This fucker will start it if his ratings fall. Lose. Lose. If they fall far enough for impeachment, he will just start a war. Right now, he keeps picking on Mexico..more than picking...trying to devastate their economy. Hes hoping that can be a war, if he needs one, my guess. Plus, he's a racist pig. He doesn't have a son in law who is Mexican, unfortunately.

[sellitman]

50. A garden Weasel?

Ewwwwwww

Lmao!!!

[Snarkoleptic]

7. "...it wasn't like the eventual winner hasn't governed precisely the way he campaigned."

Nailed it!

I keep hearing stuff like "I didn't think he was going to..." or "I thought xxxx was just campaign BS.".

Anyone with something remotely resembling critical-thinking, would have known this was coming after hearing-
"He's going to become presidential after the primary", "He's gonna be presidential after the general elecation", no wait, "He's got to change after inauguration.".

The most awful example is my former neighbor who's then-7-year-old maxed out his lifetime healthcare benefits and has a pre-existing condition hanging over his head for life.
We worked fundraisers for their familiy, yet he's now on the denial train with such rhetoric as "Guess what? TRUMP WON!".
He surely didn't appreciate me thoroughly explaining how he'd screwed himself and his now-10-year old over.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

44. Fucking unbelievable ...

[NoMoreRepugs]

8. Pierce is spot on...

Do not feel bad for the ignoramus next door who voted against his own self interests - because of his vote he put you and your family at risk - this is war - plain and simple.

[HughBeaumont]

9. The Percy Wetmores of America.

"YOU MADE THIS MESS! NOW CLEAN IT UP!"

[gopiscrap]

10. I agree fuck any trump humper

may they die and rot in hell!

[Cryptoad]

11. as my grandpaw use to say,,,,,

You knew it was a snake when u picked it up to kiss it!

[Kimchijeon]

12. K&R

[meadowlander]

13. And the primaries and general election went on for like two solid years.

If that wasn't enough time to work out what Trump was about, then obviously nothing was ever going to get through to those people.

[world wide wally]

14. I don't even care if you liked his policies (gag)

He, himself, is just an obnoxious asshole that I couldn't stand being in the same room with. The same country is even doubtful.
I guess you just like assholes.

[Blue_Tires]

15. thanks for this...

I'm so goddamned sick and tired of having to treat racists and nutbars with kid gloves...

[louis-t]

16. I love that it is wordy. However, my simple retort is:

"You people didn't do your homework."

[byronius]

17. Quite perfectly reasoned and stated.

Dude owns.

[lark]

18. I'm with him.

No sympathy, they earned what they will be getting. Their stupidity may have ruined the entire world and I hope it hurts them really fast and hard. I just hope it doesn't kill the rest of us as well because we DID NOT approve this jerk and we did not fuck over our country, the working class, the elderly, women, service people, and the sick out of idiocy. We voted for sanity, but Russia and Drumpf and insanity ruled.

[colsohlibgal]

19. Right On Charles

Anyone who voted for Chitolini has some kind of lack of critical thinking.

[heaven05]

20. Could give less than a damn

about their 'reasons and excuses' for voting boy-potus puppet and his two string pullers into the triumvirate of power holders that has now become the prezidency, openly, racist and without shame or conscience. No I've made my position known at my local watering hole. Some glare, others drop their heads and my ex-friends stay away from me and I, them.

[Orrex]

21. They are fucking idiots and should be called out as fucking idiots

I don't care who it offends, I don't care who it alienates. If you find me 100 remorseful Trump voters, the breakdown will be something like:

40 who love what he's doing and support him blindly and with passion

30 who voted for him but don't want to admit it aloud, though they'll still vote Republican

25 who insist that they regret their vote but will absolutely vote Republican again in 2018 and 2020

5 who truly regret their vote and who honestly lean toward voting Democrat in 2018


So we can either spend the next two or four years kissing their asses in hope of snagging those five voters, or we can refocus on our own GOTV efforts to get more Democrats to the polls for the midterm & the next general election.

[brer cat]

40. +1000 nt

[LisaM]

48. The trick is going after that 5%

Their votes would change everything.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

22. It's not as if tRump DIDN'T say he was going to do what he is doing.

Mind you, tRump has said just about all three sides of every issue and promise, but in the main he promised drastic immigration measures, drastic budget cuts, repeal of ObamaCare and drastic deregulation.

So when those budget cuts and elimination of key regulations hits the tRump supporters, they knew it was coming. Or could have figured it out.

They also knew they were going to lose their healthcare. Or could have figured it out. Repeal of ObamaCare was explicitly promised and they explicitly voted for it.

Two things that are going to hit them hard are tax increases to the middle class (to pay for defense and millionaire tax cuts) and the coming Trump Slump in the economy when the immigration and trade downturns start to bite. tRump has ridiculously rosy expectations for the economy.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

43. They voted away their health care and clean water ...

...just as long as those "dirty Mexicans" get deported. They pretty much cut off their noses to spite their faces. Thing is, they cut our noses off, too.

[murielm99]

23. I really despise it when the news directors

send out expeditions to talk to "the man in the street." Most of the time those stories are slanted so they tell us what they want us to hear. Most of the time they set up false equivalencies. Just report the news, morans!

[lunatica]

27. yeah, but they also expose the Idiocrats among them

[Fantastic Anarchist]

46. Or they have one person with a clue ...

... but have two morons for rebuttal.

[coco22]

24. Kicked&Recommended..

[ffr]

25. No pitty for Joe and Jane Hoodwink. They are vindictive fools.

And we, the majority, get to go down in flames with them.

Not a day goes by where the first waking realization I have is DT won. O-M-G!!!

[SharonClark]

26. "You build your own prisons in this life. You design your own sentences."

Brilliant!

[lunatica]

28. And they keep doing it again and again

Because they're sure that one of these times it's gonna work.

[mcar]

29. Pierce speaks for me!

[still_one]

30. I agree, but for a different reason. Everyone who voted for trump knew he was a racist, sexist, and

and xenophobiic, and they still voted for him

[Liberalagogo]

31. It's not so much they fell for a con

They KNOWINGLY fell for one. So fuck 'em.

[Hekate]

33. Love Charlie Pierce

[Tracer]

34. I'm fed up with sympathy for them.

I live in a very upscale town (moved here when it wasn't so "upscale&quot . You'd have trouble finding a house to buy under a half a million. No one here was hoping for a return of coal jobs!

Yet out of 7,000 voters here, 2,000 voted for the jackass.

It wasn't racism, I'm sure, nor religion. There are plenty of Asians, Jews and other ethnicities here (there are even a few black families)

All I can think is that they saw a useful idiot who would sign anything that the Republicans stuck in front of him -- especially a bill that would lower their taxes.

P.S. I used to work with Charlie Pierce. He's a great writer.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

35. What's disturbing is the comments on an article Charles links to

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-coal-bust-illinois-met-20160918-story.html

There are so many buying the Trump BS on how he's going to revive the coal industry.

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

45. And the fact that they want to revive such a terrible-in-so-many-ways industry

does not reflect well on them either.

[luvMIdog]

36. An obvious fumbling maniacal asshole ran against a calm and experienced woman

They KNEW and chose the asshole. All I can think is this-

If you like assholes then it must mean you are also an asshole.

[czarjak]

37. Fuck Donald Trump...

Fuck anybody that voted for or supports Donald Trump.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

38. Beautifully said.

"Shut up."

That's what I'm going to use from now on. I'm tired of trying to explain things to these morons. Fuck them.

[dalton99a]

39. They intentionally chose evil, against all warnings.

So, yeah, fuck them.

[Historic NY]

41. They will die sooner as Trump peels back spending...

on food quality science, health, water quality, & air quality, enjoy the time you got left....

[denvine]

42. I totally agree!

Everyone had the same information and WTF, how could they not see what type of person he is?

[Mountain Mule]

47. Hot Damn! K & R!

Charles P Pierce is one straight talking, stand up, hell of a guy! I want to be the president of his fan club, and I'm fed up with all this sympathy for the devil myself. I refuse to feel sorry for the morons who voted for Putin's Agent Orange Con Man. There's going to be rough times ahead for everybody, including myself, but I'm fighting back and no whining. Indivisible!

[IronLionZion]

49. I never thought leopards would eat MY face

But Hillary's emails!

[IronLionZion]

51. The only way they can redeem themselves

is to elect large Democratic majorities in Congress in 2018. And it better be large in state levels too.

[Paladin]

52. K&R. Charlie Pierce is a national treasure.

And trump supporters are dead to me.