Timothy Birdnow

Last night the wife and I went out to dinner and decided to stop at the corner tavern before going home. It being Sunday the bar (something of a dive to be sure) was almost empty - two patrons sitting at the bar watching football and the female bartender wiping down the counter. We got a couple of beers (Budweiser, of course, in this blue collar establishment, no fancy micro brews here) and parked ourselves at a table.

After the game ended the news came on and one of the first stories was about "continuing protests against President-elect Donald Trump". One patron - a construction worker type - and the bartender both guffawed, thus getting me to chime in "I don't know what they hope to achieve by this; it's not as though Trump is going to quit." This sparked a word from the other patron, a youngish man, who complained about Trump winning while losing the popular vote. Oddly enough, the construction worker type launched into a quite elegant soliloquies about the Electoral College, why it exists and how it is good for the country. Whoda thunk it? This seedy dive became a salon for the intellectual class! I was very pleasantly surprised; not often does one get into a highbrow discussion of the philosophy of the Founders and the Constitution, and most especially not in a south St. Louis corner tavern!

But it did not sit well with the younger fellow, not at all!

First, he dismissed the notion that the Electoral College was a solid foundation of Federalism, and protested that the Senate was the body to give equal representation to all the states. I pointed out that the Senate is half of the Legislative body and a completely separate branch of government from the Presidency. When the facts went against this fellow he launched an offensive, demanding to know who we voted for. I said "it doesn't matter" because we were having a discussion about the Electoral College and not the last election. He then loudly demanded that I acknowledge Hillary won the popular vote. I did nothing of the sort.

"We don't know who won the popular vote; the votes have not yet been fully counted."

That last fig leaf could no longer contain the man's intellectual nudity. He got up in a huff and stormed out. I said as he was leaving that he was afraid of debate, to which he replied "YOU are the one who's afraid". Huh? That is your classic liberal; throw a temper tantrum when your illusions are shattered.

Bear in mind the Republicans lost almost nothing in Congress or at the State level; that means the People voted Republican, not Democrat, so claims Hillary won the popular vote are dubious. How did she win and her Party lose? There should have been some nice pickups by the Democrats this election cycle as the GOP were defending a lot more than the Democrats. Remember, Barack Obama specifically invited illegal aliens to vote, and no doubt felons or other people who do not have a legal right to vote cast ballots for the Hill. I suspect in the end Trump won the popular vote, too.

But even if he didn't so what? The EC is the law of the land. If you don't like it you should promote a constitutional amendment to change it.

And of course Trump campaigned to win the needed electoral votes, not the popular. Had he campaigned in, say, New York State he may well have turned the popular vote in his favor. He didn't because he didn't have any hope of winning New York's electoral votes. Hillary, on the other hand, disdained "flyover country" and failed to show up to campaign in places like Wisconsin.

At any rate there wasn't any more unpleasantness and the other fellow joined us for a beer and some good intellectual conversation.

So what's the point? First, that liberals and Democrats are crybabies who cannot accept reality when it does not comport with their desires. But it also goes to show how liberals make absolute assumptions of their moral superiority, and demand we remain silent in the face of their displeasure. Political correctness has emboldened people like this fellow; he automatically assumed we should agree with him and if we don't we should shut our mouths lest he be offended.

I suspect we have been witnessing vignettes along these lines across the country. Liberals just refuse to accept the fact that they lost, despite their best efforts. Over the past eight years they fooled themselves into believing they were becoming the majority, and now that illusion has been shattered. It's pitiful, but, like all self-deception it must be confronted.

Normally I would have let this go, because we all were in a bar to have a good time. But I am tired of letting these people have their little tantrums to silence the rest of us. This fellow needs to learn how to disagree. We disagreed, but were not disagreeable, and he simply didn't like the way the system works. Well, it works that way for a reason, and ultimately it is a better system that a pure democracy would be, where whosoever can grab a majority of votes on a given day is king. The EC gives us all a fair shake.

But liberalism isn't about a fair shake so much as forcing a minority view on the rest of us.

It should be pointed out that Hillary Clinton used this approach, the claim that she is winning the popular vote, as a tactic in the primaries in 2008. See here.

So what does the future hold? First, Mr. Trump had better watch his back. There have been assassination threats, some even coming from CEO's of powerful corporations. It may well be that Bill O'Reilly will have his newest book written for him in the upcoming months. Trump had better watch his back.

But another possibility is that, should these protests continue, perhaps Barack Obama will suspend the inauguration "for the good of the country" and reluctantly agree to stay on until things can be sorted out. We can't have civil disorder, after all! Of course, Obama and Hillary could end these riots now if they would simply accept the outcome and tell people to cool it. They won't, because it serves their purposes.

Oh, by the way, George Soros is funding the anti-Trump riots.

Revolution is in the air. This election reminds me of the election of 1860, and we know where that went. California is making noise about leaving the Union (and Godspeed, I say!) and the Left is having a collective conniption because they were so close to the fruition of their mindless dreams of socialism only to have it snatched away. And Donald Trump means to drain the swamp - something that would mean the end of the parasites who live off protest and revolution.

Buckle up; this is going to be a wild ride.

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 11:52 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 1179 words, total size 7 kb.