T+8: Suitable For Framing -- November 16, 2016

And he hasn't even been sworn in as president yet.

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Majority Of Americans Now Feel More Confident About President Elect
9% Don't Know What To Think

Link here:  51% more confident; 40% less confident. Gallup.

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The Political Page

For the past several years, I have not watched network news (I still do not watch "network news") -- I could not tolerate the biased reporting -- implicit, explicit, omissions, commissions. I particularly hated MSNBC, the least "bad" was Morning Joe, but even that I refused to watch.

Now I can't wait to get up in the morning to watch Morning Joe. I actually set my alarm to watch it. I still don't watch -- and I have no plans to watch -- the evening network news shows or the network morning talk shows.

I watch MSNBC for several reasons now, mostly to watch the narrative gradually changing. In some instances, the narrative is changing rapidly.

I think the anchors went through the seven stages of grief in about 24 hours, and are now "accepting Trump" as their president. LOL.

I continue to enjoy the "eyes wide shut" phenomenon.

Exhibit A:

• they are upset about Rudy Guiliani's conflict of interests, but...
• never mention that the Clintons were broke when they left the White House, but with her "pay-for-play" scheme at the State Department and clever method of laundering money through the Clinton Foundation. they went from being broke to multi-millionaires -- measured in hundreds of millions, not tens of million.

It's also interesting to see the self-righteousness of the news media. The MSNBC crew was aghast that Trump went out for a family dinner last night without a press pool. Helloooo! He's not the president yet.

And finally, the MSNBC crew is aghast that he has not named his entire cabinet yet. Helloooo!. It's been less than one full week since he was elected president -- okay, maybe a full week now -- but he's got "forever" to name his cabinet. Anyone he names today won't be confirmed for months. The bureaucracy will do just fine; maybe the bureaucracy will do better without a political appointee at the top. Trump will have some very good friends near the top of some of those bureaucracies even without a confirmed political chief. My hunch is the Department of Defense will do just fine.

Eyes wide shut? The MSNBC crew is all worked up about the "delay" in getting the names of his cabinet. Helloooo! The Supreme Court will go a full year without a ninth justice simply because Obama was seen as a failed president.

Speaking of a "failed" presidency, we are also now seeing stories in the mainstream media that would have never been seen two years ago.

Exhibit A: this headline over at Yahoo!Finance -- "This Obama Failure Opened The Door For Trump." It had to do with Obama's plans to raise American exports.

Eyes wide shut.

Exhibit A. There is a continuum from "nationalism" to "globalism." The Clintons skated to where the puck was headed: globalism. Obama, according to a majority of Americans, skated well past the puck, hitting the plexiglass, and taking several of his teammates with him. The phrase "make America great again" is all about nationalism. Any surprise then that Trump picked who he picked for top job in the White House? Americans voted for "Make America Great Again" in overwhelming numbers and that's all about nationalism.

Why does the MSNBC seem so surprised?

[Later, 12:58 p.m. Central Time: from The Hollywood Reporter, a staunch Hillary supporter Jeffrey Katzenberg, says it all comes down to this: 

It all comes down to a fundamental, disturbing question: Is our next president a demagogue or democrat? 

Hillary wasn't? when she "moved" into her fake southern accent? Bernie Sanders wasn't? Wow! Eyes wide shut.]

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The Terror Dream: Fear and Fantasy in Post-9/11 America

Susan Faludi

c. 2007

DDS: 306.2

This might be an interesting book to read in light of the 2016 presidential election. One can argue that Susan Faludi -- who I assume is a huge Hillary supporter -- presaged Donald Trump's win back in 2007.

A quick scan of the book suggests this is a view of 9/11 and its aftermath from the perspective of traditional feminists. But a reading of the introduction suggests that America is finally coming out of its post-9/11 "fear and humiliation" as the author calls it.

Page 9 - 10, she writes:

American analysts have remarked on the "intense humiliation" that seems to drive our Islamic male antagonists.

Indeed, the military interrogation policies that led to the abusive treatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib were based on the conviction, as one source explained it to the New Yorker's Seymour Hersh, that "the biggest weakness of Arabs is shame and humiliation."

But what about our own shame, our own humiliation?

It doesn't take a degree in psychology or political science to see where this is going. It's been at least nine years since Faludi wrote that.

Perhaps Americans finally tired of our political leaders in Washington acquiescing to "fear and humiliation" fifteen years after 9/11. Americans were ready to emerge from their decade of fear and humiliation and they wanted someone whose ideology reflected that. (Everyone agrees that Hillary had no ideology; she had no moral compass; she lacked consistency; she had no plan except to continue to adding to her predecessor's legacy.)

Many in the media seem to think that "Make America Great Again" simply refers to trade and nationalism. I like to think it means that American no longer feels threatened or humiliated by what happened on 9/11, and the new president will act accordingly.

The photo op when he meets the Queen of England and the King of Saudi Arabia will tell me everything I need to know: I hope he stands erect, looks them in the eye, and extends a firm handshake.

No bowing.