Yet still missing the point …

It’s been months since Trump was inaugurated and the left – and Democrats in particular – still don’t understand how or why he was elected.

For the umpteenth time here’s the answer:  how – he got more electoral votes than Hillary; why – voters were tired of the same old crap from the same old politicians.  

Let’s deal with the how factor first.

Democrats, the left, and the media – I know that’s redundant; I could have just said the left – are obsessed with blaming the Russians in some way for Trump’s victory. 

Certainly, the Russians hacked us during the election cycle, but that’s not a big surprise.  They do this to us on a daily basis throughout the year. And much as we do to them every day as well; the last election cycle wasn’t anything special.  Of course the Russians tried to interfere in our elections.  Again, as much as we try to all the time in Russian elections. 

Did the Russians affect the outcome? No.  Do our efforts ever affect the outcome of their elections? Once again, no.  

Did Trump campaign officials collude with the Russians to help Trump? No. Nobody in the intelligence community (the left is suddenly and paradoxically so fond of) can find a single instance of collusion between the Russians and the Trump campaign. Were there contacts between Trump’s people and the Russians? Sure, but there were also contacts between Hillary’s people and the Russians at the same time – something the left conveniently ignores.     

Did the e-mail release by WikiLeaks hurt Hillary? Probably, because those e-mails ultimately confirmed what a lot in the public already believed about her and the Democrats. These reinforced what public opinion polls already showed – that Hillary was seen as untrustworthy and dishonest. Also confirmed was that Democrat Party officials thought the voting public was dumb, easily conned, and easily manipulated. Finally, these revealed dirty laundry that the Democrat Party feared Sanders more than Trump and actively conspired against Sanders. 

The left blames the Russians for these leaks. In truth any twelve year old anywhere could have hacked the Democrat Party servers. John Podesta’s password was “password.” Duh.

The intelligence community believes Russians had some part in getting the e-mails and turning these over to WikiLeaks – something WikiLeaks denies. The intelligence community, whatever that is, is not willing to say there’s a direct link between the Russian government and the e-mail leaks. However, they do think some Russians of some sort were involved. That’s a far cry from supporting the claim that Vladimir Putin ordered the hacking to help Trump beat Hillary.     

In the end, it’s much ado about nothing. It might be something if the info in the e-mails was fabricated but so far nobody has denied the veracity of any of the released e-mails. 

Then there’s James Comey and the FBI.  Another red herring.  Nothing he said, often seemingly reversing positions, made any difference in the election. It was a wash.

So, to get to the heart of how Trump won, after all the other bogus variables are removed, is pretty simple.  Trump supporters were more motivated to vote and did. Potential Hillary voters, without Obama on the ticket, weren’t as motivated and didn’t show up to vote. Trump campaigned hard in long-time blue states such as Wisconsin while Hillary took these for granted and didn’t. Trump won many of the states she ignored, much to the surprise of just about everyone.

Everyone, that is, except for Trump supporters in those states.

So let’s deal with the why factor. 

Trump campaigned on bringing real change to Washington; Hillary campaigned on being the first woman President and maintaining the status quo.  Hillary wedded herself to Obama’s agenda. 

The left, and Obama of course, have never understood how many Americans feel about the Obama agenda. Few wanted to say anything against Obama when he was President for fear of being called a racist, a bigot, or worse.

He was, after all, our first black President. That gave him a lot of Teflon.    

But the reality on the ground was that many felt Obama only represented the views of urban liberals on the two coasts and in the big cities. People in the rest of the country felt their needs largely ignored by the Obama Administration and Democrats in general. 

There also seemed to be a bias against people of faith who actually worked for a living, paid their bills, and took responsibility for their own lives. The rules appeared to be twisting in favor of otherwise able-bodied people who chose not to work, depended on government to maintain them comfortably in their chosen lifestyle, and those – such as illegal aliens – who were allowed to break our laws with impunity.  Aggravating this were Obama Administration actions that seemed to trample on people’s basic rights to worship as they pleased, conduct everyday business on their own terms, and protect their other rights guaranteed by the Constitution. 

Perhaps most unnerving to many folks was the unrelenting attack on law enforcement. Cops were automatically presumed guilty until proven otherwise. The media played up any shooting of a black or Hispanic by cops, yet appeared to downplay whenever a cop was shot by a black or Hispanic.  Eric Holder of Obama’s Justice Department was quick to blame cops, and to transform righteous shootings by cops, and others acting in self-defense, into Federal civil rights cases. The full power of the Feds was brought down on police departments time and again for little reason. 

I would be remiss if I didn’t add the pissed-off factor.  I still maintain this is one of the biggest reasons Trump beat Hillary.

You can only insult people so many times before they fight back. The Democrats and Obama constantly gave the impression they believed anyone who didn’t agree with them was stupid.  On the wrong side of history. A racist. A bigot. A xenophobe. Whatever. 

When ObamaCare was presented, it was actually based on the premise that most people weren’t smart enough to know what they needed.  So Democrats and government bureaucrats decided what should be in a “good” healthcare insurance plan.  One of the so-called architects of the plan – Jonathan Gruber – went so far as to publicly state that the ObamaCare designers counted on the stupidity of the American public.  Ouch. 

Obama openly and knowingly  lied about ObamaCare. He claimed if you liked your doctor you could keep your doctor, and if you liked your existing plan you could keep your plan – both entirely false – because under the plan’s rules and regulations many were no longer allowed. And because insurance companies now had to provide a wider array of built-in services to everyone – including those with pre-existing conditions and ridiculous stuff like prostate exams for women and maternity benefits for men – premium and deductible costs soared and participating doctor networks contracted. 

Meanwhile, as ObamaCare mandated that employers with more than a set number of full-time employees had to provide coverage to all their employees, employers made more employees part time and cut their hours which also reduced their wages in the process.

For sure there were beneficiaries from ObamaCare. Such as people who suddenly had subsidized healthcare who never had it before. In some extreme cases a few people paid as little as 72 cents a month for their plan after all the subsidies; at the same time their neighbor with a real full-time job might see their own insurance costs double and their deductibles quadruple for a plan offering far less coverage than before ObamaCare.

That’s not made up. In my own company my per-employee healthcare cost doubled just in the time ObamaCare was in effect. And we had an excellent and affordable plan with reasonable deductibles through Aetna before that; unfortunately, that plan was no longer available within ACA guidelines and with about the same deductibles without major cost hikes.  

The net result is that for the first time in our over 30-year history, employees now have to contribute toward their health insurance. 

In my wife’s former company, when she turned 65 she was booted off her employer’s plan and pushed into Medicare. She had the option to stay in the plan if she was willing to pay more than $1,000 a month in premiums. So she went into Medicare, but because our household income for the previous two years exceeded what was allowed, she had to pay a premium penalty and was not allowed to use some of the services without additional cost.    

Ah, but what about the promise that ObamaCare would help small businesses that provided insurance for their employees with tax credits?  As one of the few small businesses – according to our insurance broker – that still paid 100% of the premiums for their employees did I qualify for the credit?  No, because I paid my employees too much. In fact, our broker only had one small business client that qualified – a landscaping service that paid minimum wage.    

And the left still wonders why so many small business owners – and employees of small businesses feel harmed by Obama and Democrats.  When the media and Democrats tout how many people who never had insurance before now do – albeit at incredibly subsidized rates – that’s little solace to those who took it up the butt financially to provide insurance to people getting essentially free coverage. 

Let’s also not forget the folks who lost their jobs to outsourcing, and those likely to be hurt from the TPP which Hillary and Obama called the “gold standard” of trade agreements. Or those who saw their previously good-paying jobs taken by illegal immigrants willing to work for peanuts, while Obama and the Democrats encouraged even more illegals to come here. 

Yes, people were pissed. And Trump was their way to give Washington the finger.       

And that’s yet another powerful reason why Trump won. 

To sum it up: it wasn't because of the Russians; it wasn't because of the FBI; Trump won because he worked harder to win his Electoral College votes and people who voted for him did so because they didn't want more of the same from Washington.        

Any questions?