Week-long Welcomings from Moosylvania: Election Week – Nov. 6th through Nov. 12th

Welcome to The Moose Pond! The Welcomings posts give the Moose, old and new, a place to visit and share words about the weather, life, the world at large and the small parts of Moosylvania that we each inhabit.

Welcomings will be posted at the start of each week (every Sunday morning). To find the posts, just bookmark this link and Voila! (which is Moose for “I found everyone!!”).

The format is simple: each day, the first moose to arrive on-line will post a comment welcoming the new day and complaining (or bragging!) about their weather. Or mentioning an interesting or thought provoking news item. Or simply checking in.

So … what’s going on in your part of Moosylvania?

NOTE: The comments page will now split off after 20 or so left margin comments with the most recent comments on the current page. To see the older comments, scroll to the bottom of the page and use the link.

37 Comments

  1. Back from voting – fog thick as pea soup. Pretty good crowd out already – sadly I think a chunk of my red republican district will continue to support Rs – my county as a whole went for Obama 2012.

    Hope fog lifts before time for me to go to school.
    Will log in from campus to let you know what the student response looks like.

  2. The waxing energy, Oct. 31st through today, Nov. 8th


    Energy building throughout the day … Get Out And Vote!

  3. At work, one foot slightly redder than the other. But I have aloe vera spears with me & it is sandal weather so the hurt one can be barefoot as needs be. Keeping a good thought for today — love and happiness, everyone. Love and happiness.

  4. Morning all! Cool and sunny here this morning – but it will be warm and dry here for probably most of the “winter”. Sigh.

    I’m still amazed that so many states that I think of as progressive, like New York, Pennsylvania and Michigan, don’t have early voting or vote by mail, like Florida does. I think at least 2/3 of Florida’s vote is already in, and of course, I voted a few weeks ago by “absentee” ballot, which really is just vote by mail, you don’t have to present any reasons for voting that way, just ask for it. I briefly had MSNBC on a few minutes ago, and someone was reporting from Tampa that there were no lines at the polling stations – well, duh, most of us already voted, dude. Voting early and by mail does kind of take away from the “event” feel of Election Day, but my legs could not have taken standing in line – that’s why I couldn’t be a poll watcher as I have been in the past here – so I’m very grateful for the VBM option.

    Just finished watching my recording of Samantha Bee’s “Full Frontal” show last night, and if you can find it on the internet to watch, I highly recommend it – great stuff about Hillary and about scary Russian treatment of the press. She is just terrrific!

    I am completely confident Hillary will win tonight, but I am concerned about the Senate. But I watched the rallies last night from Philadelphia and Raleigh, and our whole team – Hillary and family, POTUS and FLOTUS – certainly left it all out on the field, so if their efforts couldn’t motivate people to get out and stop Trump, and give Hillary a Senate she can work with, nothing could.

    In case anyone is interested in what’s happening in Florida, here’s a link to Steve Schale’s final Florida election blog – he knows whereof he speaks. And he thinks Hillary’s got this – Patrick Murphy beating Rubio is a much longer shot though. I did hear from a friend last night that a good mutual friend who’s a long time Democratic operative here and now is with the Clinton campaign (after being a Bernie guy early on), says the Dems are hopeful about Murphy winning, so I will just think good thoughts today. Here’s Schale’s blog – http://steveschale.com/blog/2016/11/8/we-made-it-america.html

    I’m going to order in Mexican food tonight for dinner in honor of the “Taco Truck on Every Corner” promise! Everyone have a great day and evening, and let’s celebrate President-elect Clinton tonight!

    • I know what you are saying but this is overrated:

      Voting early and by mail does kind of take away from the “event” feel of Election Day

      For working families, and workers in the kind of jobs where if you are late or don’t show up you are fired, voting early is the only way they can vote. Voting early takes away the vagaries of the weather and circumstances and guys with guns at your polling place. We need to make it easier to vote and I hope it is a high priority in the 115th Congress. Even some Republican – the endangered kind – might let an update to the Help America Vote Act get passed … and signed by President Hillary Clinton.

      Here is the Samantha Bee segment on Hillary. NSFW!!

        • This is a really powerful segment from Samantha Bee. It is a shame that it takes comedians to cut through the awful bs that is peddled by cable news.

  5. Happy Election Day! 55 at the moment heading for 65 and it may or may not clear off later but it’s overcast now. Yesterday had a headache I just couldn’t shake so I didn’t stay up for any of the rally stuff. I have a whole lot of faith in our team though and I’m not worried. At least not about the national election.

    The number 8 card in my Tarot deck is Strength as shown by a woman controlling the power of a lion with a garland of roses. That works. :) I’ll be spending the day trying to concentrate on work and the evening at GOS in one or more of the live blogs. Bright the day, Meeses. {{{HUGS}}}

  6. Good morning, 56 and sunny in Bellingham. Election day at last! I loved watching history being made last night. When President Obama helped her with the footstool, kissed her cheek, and then left the stage and she began speaking I was blinking tears.

    I have some work I need to do today but needless to say my thoughts are with the voters of our country…..may they be wise.

  7. Jesus. I can’t believe it.

    I feel sick.

    Goddess help us all.

    He had no ground game, they said. She’s got this, they said. Sam Wang is never wrong, they said. WHAT HAPPENED?

    I ask you, WHAT HAPPENED?

  8. I am gutted. I feel sick for Hillary and for the Obamas and for the country and the world. They’re still counting votes, I’m going to bed and maybe a miracle will happen and I’ll wake up and this awful piece of garbage will not be President after all.

    • Hillary has called Trump and conceded. It’s over. Al Giordano thinks we’re facing fascism now and have to organize to fight it – I can’t figure how we do that, but maybe there will be ideas later on. For now, I can’t believe this is my country.

  9. I’m heart sick, and so worried for my family. The grand kids are in tears and their parents are upset. I know we will all find a way to cope but how is the scary unknown.

    I’m old and can hide in my garden, but my kids can’t.

    I’m so sorry we are sharing such grief tonight.

  10. Morning, meesers! Not a good morning but President Obama promised us last night that the “sun will rise in the morning” and, sure enough, it is doing that right now.

    I stayed up long enough to see that we would probably lose Pennsylvania. After tossing and turning for a couple of hours, when the clock struck 2am, I got up and scanned my Twitter feed looking for encouraging words. There is a lot to process but one thing is clear: Hillary Clinton did not lose this election because she was a bad candidate or any of the other day-after “Hillary’s fault” think pieces that you will probably read. She lost it because she is a woman and men, even men of color and college educated white men, could not vote for her. She lost because 40% of women did not want a woman president.

    There is a lot to process and digest. We picked up two seats in the Senate (the third is still being counted) and turned Nevada blue. We moved three states closer to blue than they have ever been. We lost an election and it definitely sucks to be us. But here is the nugget I found in my early morning reading that gave me hope – “Don’t Mourn, Fight Like Hell“:

    There is no way to sugarcoat it. This election is a brutal affront to women, people of color, Jews and Muslims, and all who value kindness and tolerance. Paranoia and divisiveness have won the day.

    But here is the nugget of hope – there are more of us who value kindness and tolerance than there are of those who do not. Hillary Clinton will very likely win the popular vote underscoring once again the need to vigorously defend the right to vote and have a uniform system of voting. President Obama and former Attorney General Eric Holder will be leading that charge and we need to raise our hands and say “we’re with you”.

    We have been playing chicken with the right to vote for 16 years now and this time it hit us head on. We have two years to get this thing figured out.

    The president is supposed to speak to us today. I have to find out what is going to happen with my health insurance. This is good timing – I will know going into the exchange that the Affordable Care Act subsidies will be gone next year and I can buy the least expensive policy and hope like hell I can stay healthy.

    See all y’all later!

    • Good morning, 57 and mostly cloudy in Bellingham. Forty five years ago today our twins were born, and regardless of what was happening in the world around us my focus was to love them, care for them, and to keep them safe. So now I need to dry my tears, calm my rage and fears, and find a way to help my family cope.

      Life in the blue bubble of my part of Wa State will continue on but today I’m still blinking tears.

      https://projects.seattletimes.com/2016/election-results/#Statewide

  11. I got nothin’. Checking in so y’all know I’m here. I can’t listen to or read the news, but John Scalzi’s blog is a small cold comfort (did she win the popular vote like he says at the end of his piece?) Anyway, I will be listening to a LOT of music. I brought breakfast but I can’t eat it. Just having enough cheese & cracker that I can drink my tea without my stomach rebelling.

    • She is up in the national popular vote which is small comfort indeed but it does mean something.

  12. Sorry to have not checked in – I’m in the middle of commenting on two rants I posted at orange. I couldn’t sleep and read some of the list of blame Obama, blame Hillary, blame black folks, blame Markos diaries and lost it.
    be back later.

    • I can only imagine what it was like over there. I saw some of it this morning on Twitter and had to mute a lot of people.

      The problem was that when the Democrats won the presidency to go with Congress in 2008, we were also handed a crap sandwich from the Bush Administration – two wars, the worst financial crisis in 80 years and a country where the rule of law had been nearly destroyed by an out of control Justice Department. So Nancy Pelosi queued up a lot of great legislation in her House and Teddy Kennedy died and we lost our filibuster-proof Senate majority. So the swamp never got drained and we were only able to make changes on the margins and it all got blamed on Barack Obama.

      I have no doubt that the next Democrat will be handed another crap sandwich from the Trump/Pence Administration and will have to fix it while trying to prioritize – again – the policies that our country desperately needs.

      One of my favorite songs from the campaign is “Rise Up” – and we will rise up, a thousand times if we need to.

  13. You know, I think I’m done. Everything I thought I knew has turned out to be a lie. I thought we were winning. I’ll never believe aggregators again. I’ll never believe polls again.

    Thought it would be enough to canvass, donate, and so forth. Not so.

    I don’t EVER want to hear Rethugs talk about “family values” again.

    In shock. See no hope. Bye, Social Security. Bye, Medicare and ACA. Goodbye to all that, as Robert Graves said.

      • Three election cycles in a row for Virginia.

        We turned Nevada blue, Harry Reid’s legacy. We moved Arizona bluer, we moved Georgia bluer. We can still have a blue North Carolina if we can get the voting fixed.

    • I am still working my way through the stages of grief. Last night, after spending close to an hour comforting my daughter (who was in tears), when I tried to go to sleep I felt like I was being crushed into little bits, everything important to me lost forever. I got up after tossing and turning for a few hours. When I saw the actual bloody map I saw a few rays of hope for the country and I am pretty close to acceptance. I have not cried yet – I might do that now that my daughter is off to school. I need to be strong for her and optimistic for her and remind her that millions and millions of people rejected hate and not all of the millions and million of people who voted for Trump are hateful bigots, they really have no clue what they have done. Sadly, they will find out soon, taking us along with them.

      There were a lot of us who thought that it would be one more election cycle before the demographic tide gave us a locked in majority and it appears that trying to make history two presidents in a row was too much for our nascent coalition. But we’ll be back.

      The religious right voted 85-90% to elect a man with no religious or spiritual foundation and no discernible moral compass. They will have this blemish on their souls throughout eternity.

      • Jan, on C-SPAN, last night we caught an interview with a godly bible-thumper who claimed that Thing has found Jesus and repented.

        Thing, who cheats, lies, and paid for his mistresses’ abortions.

        My cousins in Texas vote on one issue: abortion. According to them, “God” can “see us in the womb.”

        ‘Nuff said.

  14. Margaret and Helen:

    Dear World, We are so sorry but we got this one wrong. Really, really wrong.

    Margaret, I love you. We will survive, but now it is up to the next generation. If we raised them right, they will find the good in people and this country will find a way forward.

    It is my hope that my daughters will one day see a woman as President. Like Hillary, we have fought the good fight for the right reasons. That spirit does not die tonight. It lives on in the next generation of strong, confident, smart women. Thank you Hillary. I wish we could have broken that ceiling together.

    Hang in there. I mean it. Really.

    I add my “Thank you Hillary”. I am sorry for you and for us that our nation is no more post-sexism than it was post-racism. We will have a woman president some day and the path you blazed will still have the twigs bent leading the way.

    • Let’s ALL buy white posterboard, write “Sorry, World” on it, and pose for pix of ourselves holding it on Facebook.

      It won’t do anything good but it might make us feel better.

      Should we add, “Thank you, Hillary Clinton. The country wasn’t ready for you”?

      • Once I get a grip (still not there yet) I will put together a post of some of the uplifting Tweets I saw this morning while I was trying to keep from puking.

        I am glad that I don’t have to go out into the world today. My daughter is a little worried about reactions at school – I hope the administration has prepared for the new NO PC age of Trump.

  15. 46 at daybreak heading for 65 on a bright sunny day that no way reflects the way I feel. We’ve been “Gored” – I personally believe that at least one state, probably Florida, was messed with by people who are much better at messing with elections than Jeb Bush was back in 2000 (i.e., it will never be proved) – but the media build up of Trump combined with the decades long trashing of Hillary was part of it. White Supremacy was a big chunk of it – we thought things were getting better, that we were marginalizing the hate groups. No, they just went underground and built their movement, waiting for such a chance as Trump and our media gave them.

    I am sick at my stomach, have chills, and am trying to hold some of the kids on the HNV diaries together. They are too young to remember the 2000 election even though they remember W’s presidency. I’m trying to convince them that we can survive this if we stick together. I don’t know how the hell to fight back something like this but I’m game for trying. I hope. Denise knows more about fighting back than I do – and I’m a physical coward. But I hope I’m game for trying. {{{HUGS}}}

  16. Florida was lost in part because of 250,000 votes for Stein and Johnson – that was more than the margin needed for Hillary to win.

    I just got up at 11:30 AM – I really didn’t want to get up at all, but the dogs have to be cared for. If not for them, I would have just stayed there, so guess it’s a good thing I have something to care for besides myself. I’m scared for my own limited future – what will I do if the Trump truly crashed the world economy, what will I live on?

    I just put on Twitter and I’m seeing the blogging of Hillary’s speech – I can’t turn on the TV and watch it, I can’t bear witnessing the pain and my own disappointment made so real. From what people are saying, it’s a wonderful patriotic speech, but I am not in a state to listen to it right now. I’m just flattened at the prospect of a Russian run US Presidency that will make it a goal to bring chaos to Western countries and destroy liberal democracy everywhere.

    I don’t know if I can bring myself to teach next spring – on the other hand, I probably shouldn’t turn down the $10K they pay me, given how things are probably going to go financially.

    I got nothing, sorry guys.

    • hugs Geordie……..listen to her speech when you can. To me, she spoke as “mom in chief” showing us the way forward. I’m trying to be strong for my family but the tears just won’t stop.

      • I listened to the speech because it was on in my car radio but I was not going to watch it. I am glad I didn’t watch. I am not ready for that many tears yet.

        It was a good speech, ruined by the commentary wondering why she never spoke that way during the campaign. She did but when Hillary Clinton spoke, brains turned off. That is one of the problems with being in the public eye for 30 years – everyone “knows” what you are going to say and stops listening.

Comments are closed.