WHITE HOUSE CLOWN
RE: “No, New York Times, I Will Not Give President Trump ‘a Chance’” [Feature, Nov 16]. “Giving Trump anything is a ridiculous notion,” wrote Calendar Editor Bobby Roberts. “He’s just been given the White House. He’s been given everything he’s ever had, earned almost none of it, and lost most of it.”
After days of rehashing the repulsive travesty that we decent people are still struggling to come to grips with, I read your column and felt a flood of relief. Finally, someone articulated what I’ve been trying to convey. The fact that Mitch McConnell explicitly promised to obstruct the appointment of [Supreme Court nominee Merrick] Garland and hold out until the next administration should be something we are all outraged about; if more excellent journalists wrote about bully tactics and normalization of racial superiority ideology instead of yet another piece on trying to “understand the angry Trump voters,” it would spread awareness on a similar scale.
E.B.A.
THE IDIOCY WILL CONTINUE UNTIL MORALE IMPROVES
RE: “Wondering What You Can Do? A Lot.” [Feature, Nov 16]. “If you actually care about cultivating and growing a viable third party, guess what? Oregon has one,” wrote Senior Editor Megan Burbank. “Maybe you could get involved with the Working Families Party and work for change in a sustainable way instead of just feeling righteous while fucking things up for the rest of us every four years.”
I have to take your writers to task for lambasting third-party voters for costing Clinton the election. They have no clue how many of those voters were Republicans who couldn’t bring themselves to vote for Trump.
The saddest fact is the perception that a third party vote is automatically an inferior vote. Until people realize they have more than two choices, this idiocy will continue.
Jim
STRONG, SMART, LOUD
RE: “Strong, Smart, Loud: Hillary Clinton Is Everything We Have Been Taught Women Should Not Be” [Blogtown, Nov 21]. “You can listen to Michael Moore speak at length about how the Democratic Party didn’t connect to its base of working-class blue-collar men in the rust belt—or how Clinton didn’t campaign enough (or at all) in Wisconsin and Ohio and Pennsylvania. You can agree that perhaps Clinton didn’t do enough to connect with Joe the Plumber,” wrote Tricia Romano. “But you are missing the key point: Clinton can’t connect because men like that are predisposed to not like women like her. Women from those parts of the country don’t like women like her. Clinton represents everything we have been taught women should not be: strong, smart, powerful, independent, loud.”
Hilary didn’t lose because she’s a woman. Sure, it affected the opinions of a few million people who weren’t going to vote for her anyway, but that’s all. She lost because she is the embodiment of the political establishment that has failed so many people, and Trump conned people into thinking that a billionaire is somehow “outside the establishment.” Both the DNC and the RNC got stung this year because they live in their bubble in DC, and didn’t keep their fingers on the pulse of the rest of the country. She was the right candidate at the wrong time.
Stu
IMBECILE PARADE
RE: “Frank Cassano’s Imbecile Parade” [New Column!, Nov 16], in which Mercury columnist Frank Cassano asked local imbeciles who was to blame for the 2016 election. To Felicity Charmichael of SE Portland, who “lodged a protest vote for Jill Stein,” Cassano suggested she take “your conscience, your Jill Stein, and your protest vote and cram them inside the ballot box of your ASS.”
I’d have thought Our Frank would be gloating about Trump sneaking in.
AlaskanNow
FRANKCASSANORESPONDS! I’m so glad you took the time to inform me of my political views, you anonymous imbecile. For the record, “AlaskanNow,” the only time I’ll gloat about an election is when it’s won by ME—and also for the record, shut your fucking face and go jack off to Northern Exposure! Oh, I’ve just been informed that this space is where the Mercury awards a “letter of the week” and gives out tickets to the Laurelhurst Theater—but since none of these stupid letters are worth a single shitstain, I’ll be keeping these tickets for myself. Happy holidays, turkey fuckers!
Letters and comments may be edited for space. Email us at lovenotes@portlandmercury.com.