Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S. • Hacker News Board

Re: Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S.

#941

Post by pc86 » Wed, Nov 09, 2016, 3:43 PM UTC

thewarrior wrote: post #44

It is possible to view this as an isolated event or a trend. Coming on the heels of BREXIT this is a trend. The attempts at building an interconnected globalised world are beginning to fail. A bunch of elites decided to create their own trans-national utopia unchecked by borders and dismissed all criticism as racist or bigoted. The globalisation project has been rejected by a majority of the population. Whether it is…

> There is no genuine leftist alternative.

Enough of this No True Scotsman bullshit that I see constantly here and basically anywhere with something approaching an international audience. In the context of the United States, which is where this election occurred and where the majority of people are reading this site from, the Democratic Party is a leftist party. Yes, if you want to lump in European democratic socialism, they fall elsewhere on the spectrum. When is the last time a US Democrat and the European Democratic Socialist were facing each other on the ballot? It's a meaningless comparison.

Re: Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S.

#942

Post by drcongo » Wed, Nov 09, 2016, 3:45 PM UTC

ericras wrote: post #242

ctvo wrote: post #95

Grew up in the US. I'm a minority. I think this is the only time in my life I've ever felt like I didn't belong in America. Tonight a large portion of the country confirmed that the US is for whites. That it's not a melting pot. This demographic has been angry for a generation because they've felt like their culture, their socio-economic status and way of life is slipping away and this election (after 8 years of a bl…

I'm a white Trump voter in flyover country. You belong in America as do all Americans. This was a push back against an out of touch corrupt elite in Washington and mass immigration. Not all immigration, but the massive increases of the past several decades. Yes, we do want to preserve the culture - not white culture but American culture. I fully expect that Trump will reach out and moderate. If not, there's always an…

But, aren't you also from an immigrant family? Isn't 99% of the country from immigrant families? I genuinely don't understand how a country that is built on and by immigration hates immigrants so much.

Re: Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S.

#943

Post by amai » Wed, Nov 09, 2016, 3:46 PM UTC

estefan wrote: post #120

l33tbro wrote: post #55

Call Trump what you will, but he played the media like Hendrix. They took the troll-bait and reported every outrageous soundbite gleefully, all in pursuit of a few clicks and ad-bucks. Meanwhile, Trump gained more and more of a platform and eventually established a cult of personality.

Given all the barefaced lies told during the Brexit campaign and the US campaign it does lead to questions about democracy, i.e. should the average man on the street really decide? To be sure I'm not advocating Communism but perhaps up until 20 years ago the lack of social media helped contain outright lies and extreme views, perhaps with people asking the intellectual(s) in their social circles about candidates. The…

We don't have democracy. What we have is called https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oligarchy . And the solution to this problem was already know to the ancient greek: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sortition

"It is accepted as democratic when public offices are allocated by lot; and as oligarchic when they are filled by election. (Aristotle)"

Re: Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S.

#944

Post by ant6n » Wed, Nov 09, 2016, 3:47 PM UTC

rl3 wrote: post #157

This election proved that virtually the entirety of the election prediction space has no idea what the hell it's doing. We live in a world of big data with vast computational resources, and this outcome is somehow an upset—a totally unexpected surprise.

A major problem is that the electoral system is chaotic. In the sense of chaos theory: small deviations in input (votes) lead to large differences in the result (electoral college votes). The pollsters were off only be like 2-3% or so, and a bit the distribution.

Also, it appears Trump Supporters were often too ashamed to be honest to pollsters.

Re: Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S.

#945

Post by devy » Wed, Nov 09, 2016, 3:48 PM UTC

Whereas almost no political pundit would expect Trump to be the president-elect, there is one guy consistently predicted the result. His name is Scott Adams, the creator of Dilbert[1].

Also worth mentioning is that Bloomberg ran an length article about Trump's campaign team and how they operate. One interesting tibits was the fact that the same team behind Brexit was also the major helper in the late stage of Trump's campaign. That team is Cambridge Analytica[2], funded primarily by Hedgefund manager/computer scientist Robert Mercer from Renaissance Technologies. Mercer was a major donor of Republican party and indirectly helped Trump pick Kellyanne Conway as his one and final campaign manager.

[1] blog.dilbert.com

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_Analytica

[3] http://www.businessinsider.com/donald-trump-brexit-us-presid...

Re: Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S.

#946

Post by amai » Wed, Nov 09, 2016, 3:49 PM UTC

icedchocolate wrote: post #284

Honestly Brexit and Trump both tell me that democracy doesn't work, because the majority of the population is undereducated, bigoted, and has absolutely no idea about how to run an economy - it makes no sense for the working class who don't understand the most basic of economic concepts to influence how the economy is run. I hope he doesn't screw America's economy by preventing skilled immigrants coming in and helpin…

We don't have democracy. What we have is called https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oligarchy . And the solution to this problem was already know to the ancient greek: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sortition

"It is accepted as democratic when public offices are allocated by lot; and as oligarchic when they are filled by election. (Aristotle)"

Re: Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S.

#947

Post by amai » Wed, Nov 09, 2016, 3:50 PM UTC

Houshalter wrote: post #265

I hate democracy. Most voters aren't informed at all. Attractive candidates win 2.5 times more often than less attractive ones. Money and crappy 30 second ads apparently influence the outcome. First past the post voting means no one can even vote for what they really want to begin with. It wouldn't be so bad if the president didn't have enormous power. And they aren't supposed to. But it's been growing so much over t…

We don't have democracy. What we have is called https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oligarchy . And the solution to this problem was already know to the ancient greek: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sortition

"It is accepted as democratic when public offices are allocated by lot; and as oligarchic when they are filled by election. (Aristotle)"

Re: Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S.

#948

Post by beaner » Wed, Nov 09, 2016, 3:52 PM UTC

ant6n wrote: post #902

It's all okay. You're allowed to be a racist now.

I guess this is pretty obviously just blatant trolling and should be downvoted, but if not, you're only proving my point. You should also take the time to read the "Smug style in American liberalism" post that is also trending. [1]

[1] http://www.vox.com/2016/4/21/11451378/smug-american-liberali...

Re: Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S.

#949

Post by ohyoutravel » Wed, Nov 09, 2016, 3:54 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #928

It pains me to see HN serving pages so slowly, so I'm going to try an experiment and bury the current thread for a minute or two. Don't worry, we'll restore it or an equivalent; momentous stories like this one (or Brexit) are exceptions to the general rule against politics here. I just want to see if not having to render 2000 comments so often will let us catch a breath. Edit: ok, that definitely helped. I think the…

I am logging out to read as requested, but out of curiosity, why does logging out help the page loads?

Re: Donald Trump is the president-elect of the U.S.

#950

Post by pc86 » Wed, Nov 09, 2016, 3:55 PM UTC

debacle wrote: post #927

thewarrior wrote: post #44

It is possible to view this as an isolated event or a trend. Coming on the heels of BREXIT this is a trend. The attempts at building an interconnected globalised world are beginning to fail. A bunch of elites decided to create their own trans-national utopia unchecked by borders and dismissed all criticism as racist or bigoted. The globalisation project has been rejected by a majority of the population. Whether it is…

> The attempts at building an interconnected globalised world are beginning to fail. Because the interconnected globalized world had a lot of "buts" to it. You can be interconnected and globalized... ...but we're going to still lock down copyright ...but we're going to export bad patent laws ...but we're going to externalize pollution even more than we were before ...but we're going to ignore competition and allow ma…

I'm fairly certain copyright and patent laws played no role in out-of-work steel workers in western Pennsylvania and Ohio turning out in droves for Trump.