Hillary Clinton – Page 2

The state of a non-state

The result of a special election in Delaware’s 10th Senate district, way up there in New Castle County, was discouraging to First State Republicans who were thisclose to regaining the State Senate for the first time in decades. Instead, the Democrats reached into their vastly deep pockets and bought themselves a seat, spending about $100 a vote to hold on to the State Senate in a district they were already about 6,000 votes in based on registration. (While they didn’t have a majority of the registered voters, they had the most significant plurality. In fact, the results indicated either unaffiliated voters slightly favored the GOP or the Republicans did a little better turning out their voters – just not good enough.)

Perhaps the most interesting takes were from libertarian Delaware-based writer Chris Slavens. Taking to social media, he opined the time was now to work on an old idea for which the time may have come: a state of Delmarva that takes in the remainder of the peninsula. My thought on this: what would the makeup of this new state really look like – would it be a red state?

Let’s start with the basics: based on the 2015 Census estimates this state would have a total of 1,444,288 people.

945,934 in Delaware (556,779 in New Castle County, 215,622 in Sussex County, 173,533 in Kent County)
453,226 in Maryland (102,382 in Cecil County, 102,370 in Wicomico County, 51,540 in Worcester County, 48,904 in Queen Anne’s County, 37,512 in Talbot County, 32,579 in Caroline County, 32,384 in Dorchester County, 25,768 in Somerset County, 19,787 in Kent County)
45,128 in Virginia (32,973 in Accomack County, 12,155 in Northampton County)

Having that number of residents would allow for two Congressional seats, with the most likely and logical divisions being either New Castle + Kent County (DE) or New Castle + Cecil + Kent (MD) + the northern extent of Kent (DE). It’s most likely they would split evenly, with a Democrat representing the Wilmington area and a Republican winning the rest.

On a legislative level, there’s somewhat of an apples-to-oranges comparison because of the nature of each state’s districts – Delaware’s 41 representatives and 21 Senators represent smaller districts than the 12 Delegates and 4 Senators who come from Eastern Shore counties in Maryland. (In reality, there’s a small portion of Harford County that gives the Eastern Shore its delegation of 12 and 4, as the 35th District straddles Cecil and Harford counties.) Meanwhile, the Eastern Shore counties in Virginia are represented by one Delegate and one Senator they share with the other side of the bay. It’s only a fraction of a Delegate district.

Regardless, in terms of raw numbers, Delaware’s Senate is split 11-10 in favor of Democrats – however, Maryland balances it out with a 3-1 Republican split among its districts to push the GOP ahead 13-12. But Eastern Shore Virginia voters send a Democratic senator to Richmond so the parties split 13-13 in this case.

As for their lower houses, the Democrats control Delaware by a 25-16 margin but that would be tempered by the 11-1 edge Republicans have on the Maryland Eastern Shore. With a 27-26 advantage, Republicans would control the Delmarva House 28-26 when the one Republican Delegate is added from Virginia.

That closeness would also be reflected in election results. In 2016, the Delmarva race would have been watched to practically the same extent as New Hampshire, which also had four electoral votes and was razor-close. Based on the totals in all 14 Delmarva counties, the result would also have mirrored that of the Granite State:

Hillary Clinton – 322,702 votes (47.58%)
Donald Trump – 320,387 votes (47.24%)
Gary Johnson – 21,690 votes (3.2%)
Jill Stein – 8,351 votes (1.23%)
all others – 5,094 votes (0.75%)

In most states, the margin would have triggered an automatic recount. But imagine the attention we would have received from the national press on this one! Hillary carried New Castle County, of course, but the other county she carried was on the other end of the “state” and population range – Northampton County, which is the smallest of the 12.

Even the Congressional race would have been close. I am using the three Congressional race results (Delaware – at-large, Maryland – 1st, Virginia – 2nd) as a proxy for a Senatorial race.

generic Republican – 316,736 votes (48.8%)
generic Democrat – 308,891 votes (47.59%)
generic Libertarian – 14,739 votes (2.27% in DE and MD only)
generic Green – 8,326 votes (1.28% in DE only)
all others – 398 votes (0.06%)

This despite a voter registration advantage for the Democratic Party, which holds 441,022 registered voters (43.24%) compared to 317,263 Republicans (31.1%) and 261,735 unaffiliated and minor party voters (25.66%). Note, though, that the unaffiliated total is bolstered by nearly 34,000 Virginia voters, none of whom declare party affiliation.

So if there were a state of Delmarva, there would be a very good chance it would rank as among the most “purple” states in the nation, with frequent swings in party control. (Because each state elects a governor in a different year, there’s no way to compare these totals.*) Most of the counties would be Republican-controlled, but the largest county would have its say in state politics. Yet it would not dominate nearly as much as it does in the present-day state of Delaware as the additional population leans to the right. Moreover, practically any measure coming out of the legislature would have to be bipartisan just by the nature of the bodies.

But if a state of Delmarva ever came to pass, everyone’s vote would definitely count.

* Based on the McAuliffe-Cuccinelli race in Virginia (2013), the Hogan-Brown race in Maryland (2014), and the Carney-Bonini race in Delaware (2016) it comes out:

total Democrats (McAuliffe/Brown/Carney) – 292,196 votes (50.41%)
total Republicans (Cuccinelli/Hogan/Bonini) – 273,928 votes (47.26%)
total Libertarians – 7,342 votes (1.27%)
total Green (DE only) – 5,951 votes (1.03%)
total others – 235 votes (0.04%)

Note that Carney provided 248,404 votes of the Democrats’ total since he ran in a presidential year, while Hogan put up only 100,608 GOP votes to the total because he ran in an offyear election. (Virginia’s aggregate was less than 15,000 votes.) That’s why it’s hard to compare, because Hogan actually prevailed by a larger percentage margin than Carney did.

At throats

Some thoughts at large:

Is it just my imagination, or have the last 20 years simply escalated the tension in this country between political factions?

Once we were told that politics and religion were two subjects that really weren’t suited for dinner table conversation. In days of old, I’m sure the women who used to trade gossip over the back fence as they hung the laundry out to dry and the guys who bowled together on Tuesday nights couldn’t care less about who their neighbors and teammates voted for because they had so much more in common than they did differences. Conversations were more about how to best ward off the Fuller Brush man coming to the door or needing to throw two strikes and count on the fill shot in the tenth frame to win the series and avoid having to buy the final round, not whether the President needs to be impeached for some real or imagined slight.

Fast forward a few decades and now people are selective with their friends and associates, preferring to be in their own information silo. Needless to say, that information silo exists because we’ve come to a point where people consume their news and information almost exclusively from sources they believe are true, and that element of truth comes from being aligned with their worldview. If you had one belief style, you would believe that Ronald Reagan was a dunce whose best acting job was becoming President, the Bushes came from a crooked, out-of-touch family dynasty, Bill Clinton was hounded by overzealous prosecutors and everything against him was just about sex, and Barack Obama was the best thing since sliced bread because he gave us health care. On the other hand, you could also be convinced that Reagan was worthy of sainthood, the Bushes were a true American family dedicated to public service, Bill Clinton was a crook who got away with murder, and Barack Obama was a communist plant who was really born in Kenya. There doesn’t seem to be much of an in-between, and people were made even more passionate by the Trump-Clinton election of 2016.

So now everyone has to be on a side, or you will be assigned to one. If you were #NeverTrump, you had to be a Hillary Clinton supporter. If you think climate change is real but mankind has nothing to do with it, you are still a “denier.” And so on and so forth through a host of political topics and issues – it’s my red team or blue team, wrong or right.

If you have been here since the beginning or known me for any length of time, you know that I’m not a completely neutral observer, although I try hard to be objective as a reporter. I have a set of beliefs and I defend them; however, I’ve been working more on stepping out of the information silo because the research will make for a more interesting book when I finally finish it. When discussing the TEA Party, there is the perspective from conservative media (it was a grassroots movement), the liberal spin (Astroturf set up because a bunch of racists hated a black President), and the truth (they were mainly people who were truly scared about their future and didn’t want the government taking so much money, power, and control.) Such a movement will attract a handful of true racists but really attracts the charlatans trying to make a score via the political topic of the day. I say this about just one subject, but there are myriad others with the same sort of arguments on both sides.

Perhaps a reason I needed a break from politics and its associated idea that you have to be either on the red team or the blue team is the realization that the game is on a completely different field. We argue about how much influence Uncle Sam should have on paying for our health care when the argument should be regarding their involvement in general, for example. To speak to anything else is to rearrange deck chairs on the Titanic.

That being said, I’m glad that some people I know had a good time at CPAC this year, but I had no desire to go. They told me that getting out of politics would be liberating, but they didn’t say how much. It’s more fun to discuss issues and try to break through the silos on social media than to go cheer for one candidate or another.

I think it was said that if you want a friend in Washington, get a dog. Politics will make you a lot of friends, although when you leave you notice there are fewer. But taking a stand in this day and age will get you a lot of enemies, and I don’t think they ever forgive or forget. There are lots of reasons friendships break up, but isn’t being for a presidential candidate other than your own a pretty stupid one?

Point and counterpoint in Salisbury: some observations

Earlier today I spent a little time at the “No Ban No Wall No Registry” rally in downtown Salisbury, which was countered by a (more or less) silent protest on the outside. I was only there about 45 minutes, since I had more pressing family business to attend to, but I think my stint there gave me the flavor of the event. So I have some pictures and quotes I jotted down from representative speakers.

My obligatory crowd shot. I believe the event was supposed to begin at 1:00, so I took this about a half-hour into it.

On such an event as this my basis of comparison is the Tax Day TEA Party I attended at that very same location in 2009. Considering that prior event was held on a rainy, chilly weekday afternoon and this one was on an unseasonably warm February weekend (a holiday weekend to boot) the turnout seemed rather small – maybe 300 people. Also note that perhaps 75 of these people were there for the “Resist the Resistance” counter-rally, so my estimate is of about a 3:1 ratio of rallygoer to protestor.

This second crowd shot above came about 20 minutes later, from across the street. Notice the police car parked there, as there were perhaps 4 or 5 pairs of Salisbury police officers surveying the group from different vantage points. Overall, the gathering was rather peaceful and the event organizer only chastised the counter-group once when I was there for being disrespectful. This is a sampling of the counterpoint; however, they were more scattered around the outside. The cheers and chants weren’t coming from them.

As with any protest worth its salt, there were signs expressing a variety of points of view.

I’m surprised the bearer wasn’t asking for the birth certificate. Oh wait, wrong president. But this wasn’t necessarily supposed to be an anti-Trump rally.

Well, then again… but to be fair, this was spotted on a car in the nearby parking lot. I would presume the person who slapped it on wasn’t at the library, though.

True, but many do illegal acts, and in the case of our subject matter crossing the border without permission, identity theft – which many “undocumented migrants” do in order to secure work authorization – and overstaying visas are criminal acts.

I agree with this one as well, particularly with regard to the below sign.

Radical Islam is more of a threat to that light than a temporary pause in accepting refugees and immigrants from particular nations. Shari’a law is not compatible with our Constitution. And looking at the other sign in the top photo, I didn’t think global warming was a concern with this one. Today’s global warming feels pretty darn good, actually. And, by the way, spellcheck is your friend.

Rather than take a photo of the kids drawing on the posterboards (making more signs?) I took this shot. They’re not old enough to know better, although I fear that what they are exposed to isn’t going to lead them in a positive direction.

I did not write down the names of the speakers, so forgive me on that. More important than the names, though, was their sentiments. One high-school age girl who claimed she was brought up in a mixed home (Muslim and Catholic) was afraid she would be “hated and harmed by those misinformed” and that with continued scapegoating of various groups America will unmake itself.

I recall this girl talked about the internment of the Japanese in America during World War II, which was primarily because FDR considered them a threat as we were fighting their homeland. Yet no one is talking about rounding up Middle Eastern males and putting them in a camp – the idea is just to have more “extreme vetting” of a group which has been proven to have a propensity toward committing acts of terror both here and elsewhere.

Another woman (most of the speakers I saw were women, particularly college-age and below) exhorted the audience to educate themselves and not to believe various news sources, including blogs. Hey, I resent that remark – come tell me I’m lying. I certainly will cheerfully admit my bias toward limited, Constitutional government, and I believe Trump’s action regarding immigrants is within his purview. (The Washington judge and Ninth Circuit got it wrong. The law – which dates from the 1950s – clearly states Trump can take this action, just as the last six presidents have.)

I’m not sure if it was the same speaker, but it was noted as well that the Likovich family (the organizer is local college student Molly Likovich) has received “a lot of hateful words.” I don’t condone that tone, either, but please remember hateful words aren’t the exclusive province of the Right.

Something I noticed in further remarks was when a speaker was talking about having respect for all religions, including those who choose not to follow any religion, that last part got the loudest cheer. What someone does with their immortal soul is between them and God, but I found, sadly, I wasn’t surprised by that sentiment there.

I also heard the opinion that we all have blanket stereotypes of people as human beings. But by the same token, this speaker said “Ignorance is not bliss, and knowledge is power.” We had to admit to ourselves these stereotypes and try to change our behavior. The question I have, though, is change it to what? Should we just accept the false notion that all cultures are equal and just let things go? That’s not possible in a civilized society. And while she asked us to “never stop fighting for humanity,” the question becomes which behaviors and cultures are assets to humanity and which are detrimental.

But the last speaker I heard before I departed the scene took the cake.

Thanks to my erstwhile fellow WCRC officer Jackie Wellfonder, I found out this speaker’s name is Amber Green, and yes she is sporting a BLM shirt. Jackie had a video of Amber’s whole speech up on her social media, so I listened again.

Amber was very riled up, which is fine, but when she told the older generation “it’s time for you guys to sit down” and let the younger generation take over because “we have a lot to say,” well, from what they had to say I don’t think they have the maturity or common sense to take over yet.

To show how naïve these people are, remember that one of the speakers said humans have “blanket stereotypes” about each other. Young lady, that cuts both ways. Unfortunately, there is a group of relatively young humans out there who use the blanket stereotypes given to them by their religion as an excuse to murder and maim people, in the belief that dying themselves in the act is their surest way to 72 virgins in paradise. Again, I will admit that I heard only a portion of the remarks but I don’t recall any of the speakers condemning that behavior. Instead, we had to be tolerant of their beliefs because they have the notion that there is moral equivalence between all cultures and religions. So if someone came to the event with a Confederate flag, would they be as forgiving because – remember – all cultures are equal?

I also recall one of the speakers revealing that Molly and several of the other event organizers participated in the Women’s March last month. At least this rally didn’t feature the pink hats, which did little but make those women look foolish.

Good thing there was a little levity about the place, not to mention the bottled water on the table above the sign.

Maybe what we need is a beer summit, and apparently from what I read on social media several of the pro-Trump people went to this establishment to have a few adult beverages. Yet it’s the organizers who need it so they will figure out a little bit of common sense. Lord knows they need something to get through the next four to eight years because they’ll have to deal with Donald Trump and Mike Pence for that long. Despite Michael Moore’s fantasy, Hillary Clinton is nowhere on the succession list.

But do you know what was most silly about this rally? These people have already forgotten something I observed during the 2016 campaign: the more extreme the rhetoric and vitriol toward Donald Trump, the more people embrace him. All this affair did was sow the seeds of division in our nation deeper, but that may have been the goal all along. And despite the glowing coverage in local media, it will just take one terror attack in the name of religion to obliterate the points made today.

The uprising

Saturday could be an interesting day in Salisbury.

I’m sure you know I am writing a book on the TEA Party (more on that in a bit) so one restore point I like to return to in my political memory was the first Tax Day TEA Party we had out in front of the Government Office Building. On a rainy Wednesday afternoon there were probably 400 to 500 people in attendance. Three months later we celebrated Independence Day with a gathering of perhaps 200 to 300. (Sadly, I wrote great pieces on both events but the demise of my photo repository means the photos are dead links. Someday I will rectify that – but I have to find the photos on my old external hard drive, which I also have to find! *sigh*)

Anyway, Saturday could be the flip side of the TEA Party since there’s a completely different protest planned, called the “No Ban No Wall No Registry” Salisbury rally. And unlike the TEA Party of yore, this one will have a counter-protest called the “Resist the Resistance” rally. I’m guessing that the opposition to Trump will have the larger numbers, if only because they’ve secured a little bit of publicity for their event and it’s something that indeed unites certain segments of the community.

Yet I have to question their sincerity, since they haven’t batted an eyelash when the last six presidents have put up a similar ban of some type against particular countries, not to mention the recent change in policy toward Cuban refugees. (However, I may give them the benefit of the doubt if they chastise Trump’s predecessor for that change.) I also have to question their reasoning as to why we should not secure our borders, which is our right as a sovereign nation. Once upon a time we were more secure in the fact that two oceans and inhospitable terrain shielded us from the world, but no more. By the same token, is it not our right to know who is visiting the nation and for what purpose? If only they were against a registry for firearm owners, we may be on to something.

While I agree that Donald Trump is a lowering of the standard one should expect from the President, so was Hillary Clinton. (Thus, I voted for the Constitution Party nominee.) I can’t promise anything because I also have a family commitment that day, but if I have the chance I may wander down there to see what’s going on and maybe play reporter once again. Lord knows I haven’t been much of a blogger lately because I’ve spent a lot of time working on The Rise and Fall of the TEA Party.

So it’s on that front I’m going to make my final point of the night. I had envisioned the book being done by this fall, but recently I have had a different opportunity placed before me that I think is worth pursuing for some other personal and professional goals I have. At this time, it will take a significant portion of my already limited free time so in order to give this a fair shake I think a more realistic timetable for the book is now the first half of 2018. I’m going to put it on pause for a few months, with the hope that this opportunity may morph into something else that would give me the time back.

One other benefit: it can give me a chance to see how this resistance movement pans out and how it compares to the grassroots TEA Party. So there is that, and Saturday will be the first chapter of that story.

March for Life 2017

By Cathy Keim

Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations. Jeremiah 1:5 (KJV)

The 44th March for Life was held this past Friday. I was able to go on the bus from St. Francis de Sales Parish here is Salisbury, as they graciously opened their extra seats to several of us fellow pro-lifers that were headed to the biggest pro-life gathering in the world. Many of the hardy souls on board the bus had been to the March for Life for years.

The mood was upbeat as we rolled towards D.C. Not only was the weather mild for January, but there was excitement that change was possible. After eight years of the most relentlessly pro-abortion president in our history, there was now a new administration that was showing itself to be aligned with the pro-life movement.

The ladies that organized the bus had the whole operation down to a science after years of practice. We were all issued matching hats that the Loving Life Committee had made so that we could keep together. There was a big bow on a fishing pole to keep an eye on when the masses started moving. Best of all, there were fabulous home baked cookies for the trip home when we were cold and tired. I don’t think that I could have made the trip with a nicer bunch of people. As the photo above shows, we represented both young and old.

The bus dropped us off near the Washington Monument and we tried to get through the security perimeter. This was a new addition to the event and it was not able to process the mass of people quickly enough to get us in there for the opening speeches. However, we could see them on the big screens and hear them over the loudspeakers.

Kellyanne Conway and Vice President Mike Pence were there to bring greetings from President Trump and to assure the crowd that President Trump was behind the pro-life movement. Once they had finished and departed, the security scanners were abandoned and we could enter.

There was a large group of politicians on stage, but due to the time given to Vice-President Pence, they were not even introduced by name. Representatives Chris Smith (R-NJ) and Mia Love (R-UT) and Senator Joni Ernst (R-IA) spoke for the group and pledged that they would defund Planned Parenthood.

Additional speakers were:

Archbishop of New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Baltimore Ravens tight end Benjamin Watson, former Planned Parenthood Director and founder of “And Then There Were None” Abby Johnson, Mexican Telenovela star Karyme Lozano, author and radio host Eric Metaxas, [and] Bishop Vincent Matthews of the Church of God in Christ, who advocates for adoption in the African-American community.

Without the loudspeakers and the big screen, I would have seen and heard nothing since the crowd was so large. The organizers did an excellent job of planning and keeping the event on schedule, especially with the huge surprise of Pence appearing.

Next was the actual march to the Supreme Court. The crowd was so massive that I could not really get a feel for the crowd until we hit the upslope at Capitol Hill. I took a picture in front of me and one behind me and this is what I saw.

The crowd was good natured and happy to be moving after standing in the cold. There were many young people present, which brought a vibrancy that was often missing at Tea Party events. We finished the march at the Supreme Court, then everybody disbanded to head for home.

My thoughts as we stood in front of the Supreme Court were about how wicked the men were that made the decision to declare open season on all the babies in America with their faulty ruling in Roe v. Wade. About 57 million babies are estimated to have been murdered in the womb since 1973 and millions more will continue to be murdered unless the politicians get the courage to stand up and end this atrocity.

In the third debate between Hillary and Trump, the topic of abortion came up. Hillary spoke glibly about women and their rights. The words rolled off her tongue as she had clearly rehearsed the answer to achieve this polished response, complete with a heartfelt plea for the mothers.

A quick point of my own is that if a mother is truly concerned about her health being compromised by the pregnancy, she is just as able to have a C-section as she would be to have an abortion. The pregnancy is terminated either way, but the obvious difference is that the baby lives on rather than dying. That is the whole point of the abortion discussion. It is not the health of the mother; it is that the desired result is the death of the baby, wiped away as just another inconvenience by the pregnant woman.

Next Trump took on the issue and compared to Hillary’s polished wording, he sounded clumsy. At the time, I was struck by the difference between the deceptive smoothness of Hillary’s words and the blunt, jarring words blurted out by Trump. Watch for yourself.

I knew that many people would mock his defense of life including many on the pro-life side, because they were not convinced that he meant it. I have also heard pro-lifers rail against leaders that have gotten caught in the media storm of a poorly-worded answer about abortion. The pro-lifers are so concerned that their cause will be set back by an unguarded answer, that they will turn on any poor soul that makes a misstep and is dragged under by the media storm. Does the name Todd Akin ring a bell?

The fear of the media has caused many a pro-life politician to tone down their beliefs and to use euphemisms rather than upset voters. At the third debate, Donald Trump expressed the dismay that any normal person should feel at the horror of a baby being murdered in its last day in the womb. I took note right then and there that he might be the man to stop the abortion industry in its tracks.

President Trump observed the Women’s March the day after his inauguration and then sent his senior advisor, Kellyanne Conway, and his Vice-President, Mike Pence, to personally represent him at the largest pro-life march in the world less than a week later because, in all truth, the Women’s March was about one thing: abortion. Once again, Donald Trump does not sit back and take the abuse. He counterattacked by endorsing the pro-life movement.

The mood was upbeat at the March for Life because people knew that there finally was a president who was not afraid to take the political risk of standing boldly for life. He has stated that he will nominate a pro-life Supreme Court justice.

The Washington Times reports:

President Trump signed an executive order on Monday barring federal funds from organizations that promote abortion around the world, including the International Planned Parenthood Federation, in what activists say is the president’s first major pro-life action while in office.

Suddenly the impossible seems possible. Could we as a nation finally overturn the grave injustice of Roe v. Wade?

No ordinary politician could make the effort without being hammered to the ground by the media, the opposition, and his own party. Despite the GOP having a pro-life plank, there are plenty of Republican politicians that would love to avoid the issue completely. Now is the time for the politicians that have only paid lip service to pro-life issues in the past to develop some backbone, stand up, and be counted. I would remind them that they are elected to serve our country, to stand on principle, and to protect the citizens’ rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. They should seize this opportunity to pass laws protecting babies! Instead of cringing before the Planned Parenthood lobby and the media, they should act. It is better that they stand for life at this crucial moment than to worry about their re-election, for courage is doing the right thing in the face of evil. It is better to strike the blow for life than to miss the moment and retain your seat for years to come. Abortion destroys the lives of the women that choose abortion, their babies, and their families.

When our nation returns to its roots and declares that all lives are valuable from conception until natural death, including the disabled, then we will be able to say that we stand for liberty and justice for all.

March of the undesirables

Since I was told – with a very condescending tone by a woman, I might add – to blog about Saturday’s Women’s March on Washington, here you go. Be careful what you wish for.

First of all, let’s look at the timing and philosophy of this. One day after a new President is sworn in, these women gather to protest policy decisions that probably won’t happen, doing so in the most outlandish of ways. I suspect dressing in anatomically correct costumes is really going to endear you to middle America. </sarc>

So why did they get together? This is a description of why they marched, their “unity principles.” Let’s see what they stand for.

ENDING VIOLENCE

Women deserve to live full and healthy lives, free of all forms of violence against our bodies. We believe in accountability and justice in cases of police brutality and ending racial profiling and targeting of communities of color. It is our moral imperative to dismantle the gender and racial inequities within the criminal justice system.

It seems to me we already have laws which cover the violence against their bodies part. Besides, I was taught a real man doesn’t hit a woman.

But then they go off the rails on the racial profiling and targeting. If that is the criminal element and we know where the crimes occur, one would seem to think that’s where law enforcement should focus its resources. And I’m still trying to see where we have gender and racial inequities, particularly since much of the sentencing in this country is predefined.

This one is a little iffy, but I guess I can give them an “e” for effort.

REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS

We believe in Reproductive Freedom. We do not accept any federal, state or local rollbacks, cuts or restrictions on our ability to access quality reproductive healthcare services, birth control, HIV/AIDS care and prevention, or medically accurate sexuality education. This means open access to safe, legal, affordable abortion and birth control for all people, regardless of income, location or education.

A non-starter, particularly since women have the ultimate measure of birth control. Haven’t there been advocacy drives that beseech women not to have relations with their men until they do some act against their interests, like vote for Hillary Clinton? (Why yes, there have. And the idea of keeping it zipped up isn’t just used in America.)

But seriously: there is no other reliable measure as to when life begins but conception. And since our Declaration of Independence tells us all men (meaning mankind, not the specific gender) are endowed by their Creator (that’s not the sperm donor, by the way) with certain inalienable rights – and life is listed first among those rights – it is pre-eminent. Although it is difficult, you can pursue happiness to some extent without liberty, but you have neither that pursuit nor liberty without life. Thus, the right to life of the unborn trumps (pun intended) the liberty of the mother to terminate the pregnancy. Her liberty is lower in the hierarchy.

LGBTQIA RIGHTS

We firmly declare that LGBTQIA Rights are Human Rights and that it is our obligation to uplift, expand and protect the rights of our gay, lesbian, bi, queer, trans or gender non-conforming brothers, sisters and siblings. We must have the power to control our bodies and be free from gender norms, expectations and stereotypes.

The last time I checked, 99.999% of humans are born either female or male, based on chromosomes and anatomy. That’s the way the Creator made us. While I would prefer couples be opposite-sex, though, I know there is some small percentage who see it differently. My only request: call your relationship something other than “marriage” because that is exclusively reserved for one man and one woman. Civil unions were fine with me, as they satisfied the legal advantages given to opposite-sex couples.

WORKER’S RIGHTS

We believe in an economy powered by transparency, accountability, security and equity. All women should be paid equitably, with access to affordable childcare, sick days, healthcare, paid family leave, and healthy work environments. All workers – including domestic and farm workers, undocumented and migrant workers – must have the right to organize and fight for a living minimum wage.

Honestly, I believe the whole “equal pay for equal work” thing is a sham. If a woman is doing a better job or more tasks than a man who is supposedly doing the same thing and not being paid as much, well, it’s time for her to find a new employer who will pay her more in line with her worth and expectations. A company that continues that practice will soon lose enough good workers to change.

The rest is standard-grade liberalism that was stale in 1975. And, by the way, are you saying only men have affordable childcare, sick days, healthcare, family leave, and a healthy work environment? That’s news to me considering our workforce at my employer has numbers that are almost even and both men and women take advantage of these things.

CIVIL RIGHTS

We believe Civil Rights are our birthright, including voting rights, freedom to worship without fear of intimidation or harassment, freedom of speech, and protections for all citizens regardless of race, gender, age or disability. We believe it is time for an all-inclusive Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

I think all this is covered already. But might I suggest this amendment instead?

Congress shall make no law that codifies discrimination for or against any person based on their race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation. This Amendment shall also be construed to include a prohibition on Congress enacting additional criminal code or punishment solely based on these factors.

I hesitate to add age or disability in there because it would open the can of worms of Social Security, Medicare, and the Americans With Disabilities Act, among other things. (Oddly enough, that post was written 11 years to the day before the March. Guess I knew it would come in handy someday.)

DISABILITY RIGHTS

We believe that all women’s issues are issues faced by women with disabilities and Deaf women. As mothers, sisters, daughters, and contributing members of this great nation, we seek to break barriers to access, inclusion, independence, and the full enjoyment of citizenship at home and around the world. We strive to be fully included in and contribute to all aspects of American life, economy, and culture.

To determine this, the first thing to do is define “disability.” I don’t know what they consider as one.

IMMIGRANT RIGHTS

Rooted in the promise of America’s call for huddled masses yearning to breathe free, we believe in immigrant and refugee rights regardless of status or country of origin. We believe migration is a human right and that no human being is illegal.

Sorry, a nation has the right (and duty) to secure its borders. Humans are not illegal, but their actions may be.

ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

We believe that every person and every community in our nation has the right to clean water, clean air, and access to and enjoyment of public lands. We believe that our environment and our climate must be protected, and that our land and natural resources cannot be exploited for corporate gain or greed – especially at the risk of public safety and health.

Radical Green rides again, dressed up in pink. So I suppose any farmer who is a corporate entity may as well give it up? Oh, never mind – let’s just call a spade a spade: they don’t like Big Oil. They know as well as I do that mankind doesn’t have the first thing to do with climate change, but the charade is great for gathering a lot of small-minded people.

**********

Basically, this group goes a collective 0-for-8 on real issues. You know, there was this guy whose birthday we celebrated recently who made a big deal about content of character rather than the color of skin – I suspect we can extrapolate this really well to the particular parts and chromosomes they are carrying.

As someone on social media noted, thirty million women had their own march on November 8 and went to the ballot box to elect Donald Trump – for better or worse, despite his faults. I’m sure that not all of the women in the march on Saturday agreed with every one of these tenets, and it wouldn’t shock me if there was some small percentage who just went for the party. But they were there while the silent majority of women looked on and agreed these people were completely, off their rocker, nuts. I think the silent majority was right.

Best of all: I bet my wife agrees with me on most of this. I love domestic bliss and having a conservative, God-fearing wife.

The era of Trump is set to begin

For all the hype and hope that somehow the Trump Train would be derailed over the last year-plus, that engine has reached its destination with the Electoral College formally making Donald Trump the President-elect. Indeed, the guy who many of us thought would have his poll lead evaporate once the field was narrowed down and figured in no way could defeat Hillary Clinton served us a heaping helping of crow. (And it wasn’t the best-tasting stuff, either.)

Perhaps what was most hilarious about the Electoral College vote was that Hillary Clinton had more defections than Donald Trump did. From the state of Washington, four of the twelve electoral votes she was supposed to receive went to others: former Secretary of State Gen. Colin Powell received three while Sioux tribal activist Faith Spotted Eagle received one from a fellow Native American. (I would imagine she may be the first Native American to receive a Presidential electoral vote.) Also, one of Hawaii’s four electoral votes that were supposed to go to Clinton went to Sen. Bernie Sanders. There were other Democrats who attempted to vote for others in protest but they either changed to Clinton or were replaced by another substitute elector.

Coming off the Trump ledger were two Texas votes: one for Ohio governor John Kasich and the other for former Congressman and three-time Presidential candidate Ron Paul, who finally got an electoral vote in a year he did not run (although his son Rand did.) So if you count the nominal Republican Powell as a member of the GOP, the Republicans got 309 of the 538 votes. (The GOP also picked up an extra vote for the vice-presidency, where Maine Sen. Susan Collins received one of Washington state’s four faithless votes along with fellow Senators Maria Cantwell and Elizabeth Warren. Native American activist and two-time Ralph Nader Green Party running mate Winona LaDuke received the other. No Republican defected from Vice-President-elect Mike Pence.)

So we have much of Donald Trump’s cabinet in place (pending confirmation, of course) and the transition is well underway. But it’s still less than clear to me just what we can expect from a Trump presidency. I will say that, after an initial steep drop, the Dow Jones and NASDAQ have looked favorably upon it and anecdotally I’m hearing the real estate industry is expecting a banner year (although interest rates have finally edged up after a long period of stability.) If perception is reality, perhaps we can get to the 4% GDP growth Trump promised – and the post-election euphoria may help Barack Obama enough to avoid going 0-for-8 on 3% or better growth, as the election happened early enough in the fourth quarter to possibly have a significant impact.

On the other hand, holiday sales results are mixed, as shoppers still have discounts in mind. The turning away from brick-and-mortar stores may lead to some significant closings in 2017, which will be blamed on Donald Trump rather than the continuing trend of shoppers to go online to buy their gifts.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump will certainly be tested on a leadership level, with today’s murder of Russia’s ambassador to Turkey leading some conspiracists to believe it’s the first shot of World War 3. That incident managed to temper the newsworthiness of another truck-based terror attack, this time in Berlin. And don’t forget the president-elect has already spoken out about the drone incident with China over the weekend.

In many respects, the speculation on what Trump’s effect will be has already written the bulk of an annual piece I’ve done, looking ahead at the next year. It’s not quite as short or sweet as last year’s but I suspect the era of Trump sets the tone for 2017 to such an extent that I’m just going to skip that look forward for the year and assume this will suffice.

Assuming no act of God to the contrary, all this will begin in earnest at noon on January 20 when Donald Trump becomes our 45th (and perhaps most accidental and unlikely) President.

A more agreeable tone?

The election of Donald Trump was a surprise to most pundits, who were expecting Hillary Clinton to win both the popular vote and the Electoral College. But her plans were spoiled when she lost three states she expected would be her “blue firewall” even if she lost in Florida: Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Those 46 electoral votes assured her defeat when they accrued to Trump’s column (although Michigan may still switch as a recount is likely required.) Add in a surprisingly lopsided win in Ohio for Trump as well as the expected blowout in Indiana, and the Rust Belt was pretty solidly in Donald Trump’s corner.

Much has been made about the droves of working-class voters that seemingly came out of nowhere to propel Trump over the finish line, and a survey released by the Alliance for American Manufacturing bears this out:

The national survey, conducted by The Mellman Group and North Star Opinion Research (firms that poll for Democratic and Republican candidates respectively) found that 85 percent of those surveyed support a national manufacturing strategy. Support for a manufacturing strategy is robust among both Trump voters (89 percent) and Clinton voters (83 percent).

Manufacturing may have been an election-determining issue, as Trump won manufacturing households by 18 points with Clinton winning non-manufacturing households by 4 points.

It comes as no surprise that by more than a two-to-one margin voters believe manufacturing is critical to our future and reject the notion that high-tech or services could take its place.

“The biggest surprise on election night came from the Industrial Heartland,” (AAM President Scott) Paul said. “Manufacturing is the engine that drives the heartland’s economy. The good news is that Trump and Clinton voters alike want to get it back on track.” (Link added.)

Unfortunately, the survey doesn’t cite the evidence ascertaining the voting patterns of manufacturing and non-manufacturing households, but my presumption would be that a “manufacturing” household is one where a family member either currently works in the sector, is retired from it, or was previously in the sector but lost his or her job. Thousands of voters fit in this category: using my native Ohio as an example, Trump did far better overall than Mitt Romney did in key manufacturing centers like Toledo (Lucas County), Lorain (Lorain County), Cleveland (Cuyahoga County), Akron (Summit County), Canton (Stark County), and Youngstown (Mahoning County).

Lucas County: Romney 68,100 (33.9%), Trump 74,102 (38.7%)
Lorain County: Romney 58,095 (41.9%), Trump 65,346 (47.8%)*
Cuyahoga County: Romney 184,475 (30.2%), Trump 179,894 (30.8%)
Summit County: Romney 111,001 (41.4%), Trump 109,531 (43.8%)
Stark County: Romney 86,958 (49.2%)*, Trump 96,345 (56.4%)*
Mahoning County: Romney 41,702 (35.5%), Trump 52,808 (46.8%)

*winner in county.

In total, Trump amassed 27,695 more votes in these industrial counties, and while he only won 2 of the 6, he averaged a 5.4% improvement overall. Having a little residual knowledge of how Ohio politics works, seeing how Trump was close in the initial count was a good sign for him – oftentimes in the urban counties the closer election districts report first (they are more heavily minority) so a Republican almost always starts out behind. It’s a matter of whether they get too far back to reel in the leader as the suburban and rural precincts begin to come in. And like the Eastern Shore of Maryland, the rural areas of Ohio are also an indicator for GOP candidates who need to rack up totals in the 65 to 75 percent range to make up for the losses in urban counties. Trump did this in spades, garnering an astounding 80.7% in Mercer County along the Indiana border – part of a group of adjacent western Ohio counties where over 3 out of 4 voters were Trump backers. (Of the few Ohio counties that went for Hillary Clinton, just one was a non-urban county and that comes with a caveat – Athens County is the home of Ohio University. Somehow, as a Miami graduate, I’m not surprised.)

It would be my guess that the AAM will be much more Trump-friendly than they may have appeared at first glance as a union-backed creation. The President-elect is promising heavy investment in infrastructure (a priority of theirs) and has a view on trade much more in line with the protectionist playbook the group has created.

And certainly I don’t want to say the manufacturing jobs are gone for good; however, those workers who are of a certain age (basically my age or older) may not share in the rebirth of manufacturing like they hope they might, if only because the ship of state which has sailed since the days of NAFTA and the rampant offshoring of the era will be difficult to turn around right away. Not only are trade and infrastructure key factors, but so is reducing the tax burden on American companies. On the other hand, the prospect of punishing American companies that move offshore may hasten their plans and create more headaches in the short run.

Donald Trump won his electoral votes in the Midwest by promising a return to the good times of a half-century ago, when it was possible for a guy to graduate high school and get a job through family or friends with a union shop that would keep him employed for the next forty years or until he decided to take his pension and retire. Those days are a memory. But we can still be a nation that makes stuff, and it would be to our advantage to become that nation as the world becomes a more competitive place.

The writing game

I wonder if people thought Marita Noon’s final column was actually about me since I hadn’t posted in several days. (However, I did a little work on the site and updated the SotW Tracker page.) But you may recall I made some comments at the end of her post regarding what she had chosen to do in her career beyond writing in and about the energy field.

Something you may have missed earlier this week ties into the plight of the energy worker, and it’s a shame Marita won’t be commenting on it here on my site. On Tuesday the United States Geological Survey (USGS) came out with the news that a west Texas oil field could be “the largest estimated continuous oil accumulation that USGS has assessed in the United States to date.” They estimated 20 billion barrels of oil could be recovered, which would supply our needs for three years just by itself. (Ironically, this field probably lies deep under Marita’s house.) It’s great news, but with a catch: the price of oil needs to rebound to $60 to $65 a barrel to make this bonanza worth recovering economically. According to an oil industry expert quoted by CNN:

Morris Burns, a former president of the Permian Basin Petroleum Association, told KWES the low price of oil – currently around $46 a barrel – means the oil will sit underground for the foreseeable future.

“We are picking up a few rigs every now and then but we won’t see it really take off until we (get) that price in the $60 to $65 range,” Burns told the station.

Many years ago I remember the price of gas getting under a dollar a gallon; this was probably back in the late 1980s/early 1990s. At the time oil had plunged to about $10 to $15 a barrel. For consumers it was great news but for oil companies and workers it was a desperate time. A few weeks before her “retirement” from energy writing and commentary, Marita had wrote what seemed like a counter-intuitive piece concerning the slowly increasing price of oil. But if you look at it from the perspective of an energy worker, the best of all worlds is a price where demand stays constant but profitable. Oil scraping $30 a barrel may have dropped our pump prices close to $1.50 a gallon but it was killing the domestic energy industry (which several OPEC members wanted it to do, as the U.S. is now their major competition.)

By the same token, Marita began her career in the energy field at a time when oil prices were sky-high and we truly needed to work out ways to make ourselves energy independent at a lower cost. (One such idea I played up in the summer of 2008 because it was done with such humor was the “NozzleRage” campaign. Unfortunately, their answer was a government mandate for flexfuel cars and additional requirements for ethanol.) But these prices also came with the benefit of sustaining the industry in such a manner that the fracking revolution created a boom in the energy industry and made previously dormant regions like the Dakotas and west Texas economically attractive again. (North Dakota, in particular, was depopulating prior to the Bakken oil boom because there was little there to attract young jobseekers who were abandoning the state in droves – by 2005 it had the largest percentage of residents age 85 and older.)

And Marita was sharing in that boom – as she noted, her “field of dreams fundraising model” was getting her enough $500 annual donations to provide a reasonable living. But as the industry suffered, her own revenue sources withered and it eventually led her to dismiss her PR person and in the end chased her away. (Had Hillary Clinton won, the result of her withdrawal from the punditry game would likely have the same but surely Marita would have considered herself a failure.)

In a roundabout way, this brings me to a point I began to make the other night: writing for a living is a difficult game at which to succeed. I found this out several years ago when I was out of work and tried to make a go of it – there are too many people out there chasing too few dollars, particularly in general interest writing. When I reviewed political websites during the campaign I openly questioned whether the people some hired to write their copy even lived in the country, which I can do because I have had to compete with people who can live on a few dollars a day. A penny per word nowadays is a huge amount to make for an article, but even if you wrote 5,000 words a day that doesn’t fly in America. Yet on competitive writing job sites you’ll often find people who are willing to take half that – or less – just to write copy. (And that doesn’t count the old adage used to trap aspiring writers who get convinced to write for nothing because “it’ll give you the exposure you need.” Yeah, right. Expect to double your salary every week from that point.)

So when a polished and experienced writer like Marita, who wrote several motivational and Christian books under her maiden name Marita Littauer and the energy columns under her initial married name Marita Noon (she has since remarried, but maintained the name for professional reasons) can’t make a go of it, one has to wonder what’s in it for others in that same predicament?

Now I have never done a “field of dreams” fundraising approach, although I have been known to “bleg” every once in awhile. And it brings a smile to my face when I see someone actually clicked the donate button up top and chipped into my PayPal account. But as I have told you when I left the political party game (and slowed down on my own writing pace to some degree) part of the reason I stepped back was to write a second book – hopefully learning from the mistakes I made with the first one. That will continue nonetheless because I believe I will be making important points and contributing to dialogue going forward. The same also goes for this website – I really meant to write this column Wednesday but was sidetracked for several reasons. So you get it late Saturday night instead.

Sometimes I wonder, though, if my priorities are quite where they should be. Truly I enjoy writing, but I also have to make sure to be a good Christian, husband, stepdad, and employee. So I may never get back to (or even arrive at) the place where some said I had to be to maintain a successful blog, meaning lots of content updated frequently. After all, I often get the opportunity to sell article space on my site for dubious reasons, probably someone else’s marketing scam. I’m not going to damage my brand like that.

But the reason I went into this spiel is to make it plain I can understand why people get so frustrated with the writing game. We seem to be the last thing people need, but I happen to think we are the most indispensable people out there when it comes to making sense of the world. For that reason, Marita’s insight (as well as that of several others I have known through the years) will be missed.

My work here is finished

Commentary by Marita Noon

For the past decade, I have been dedicated to fighting bad energy policies. My efforts began in New Mexico, where the organizations I lead are based, and expanded to focus on national issues. When I accepted the executive director position on January 1, 2007, New Mexico had an anti-energy governor and America had a pro-energy president. Two years later that flipped. By then, I’d become deeply committed to what I began to call the “energy makes America great!” message and I’d realized the issues in which I was engaged didn’t stop at the state line.

While I do not come from a background in energy, and have no formal education in it, through my work, I quickly learned about the important role that energy plays in America’s economic prosperity and growth. Because I didn’t know a lot about energy before taking the position, I understood how little the average person thinks about energy – until their power goes out or gasoline prices spike. I believe that if people better understand the role of energy in their lives, they’d make wiser choices when they vote. I have been passionate about the cause.

The election of Donald Trump as our 45th president is a vindication of my work as one of his big campaign messages was about America’s abundant resources and his promise to manage and maximize them – rather than to lock them up.

While I have worked these past ten years to educate people and keep a positive energy message in the public dialog, during the past several months I have specifically engaged in doing everything I could to be sure our next president was pro-energy. I knew I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if Hillary Clinton won, and I hadn’t done everything I could to prevent that from happening. I don’t have the reach of a Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, or Sean Hannity – or even Ann Coulter, Laura Ingram, or Michelle Malkin. But I do have a platform. My weekly column is widely distributed. I typically do dozens of radio interviews each month. And I’ve frequently spoken for many industry, political, and civic organizations.

Because most of my time as executive director was during the Obama years, I’ve fought for the Keystone pipeline and against the many punitive regulations that stem from the green agenda – most specifically the Clean Power Plan that is the cornerstone of Obama’s climate change agenda.

The recent news cycle has been so myopically focused on the presidential election, I suspect few people are even aware of the U.N. climate change meeting going on right now, November 7-18, in Morocco. There green campaigners and policymakers are meeting for talks on implementing the Paris climate agreement. Imagine their shock when they realized that Trump would be our next president. He’s made canceling Obama’s commitment and ending the billions of climate change payments to the U.N. a key part of his stump speech. On November 9, Bloomberg wrote: “Doubts about U.S. support for the accord could stall progress in talks in Morocco this week and next, since other nations wouldn’t trust that any commitments the U.S. made will stick after Trump takes office.”

Truly, getting the entire globe onboard for the plan that would raise energy costs, hurt the poor, and lower living standards was always doubtful. Just last week, China, which gave lip-service to the agreement, announced that it will raise coal power capacity by as much as 20 percent by 2020 – this, despite its climate pledge. Last month news came out of France that it would drop plans for a carbon tax – which was expected to kick start broader European action to cut emissions and drive forward the international climate accord. But now, under a Trump presidency, the Paris climate agreement’s entire future is “doubtful.”

Trump will kill the Clean Power Plan and other key climate policies. He’ll end the war on coal. Coal-fueled power plants that were slated for closure can now achieve their full life expectancy and continue to provide communities with cost-effective electricity. He’ll approve the Keystone pipeline and improve drilling access on federal lands. He’ll roll back regulations and diminish the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority. Wind and solar companies already realize their days of feeding at the government trough are over: immediately following Trump’s victory announcement, stock in the world’s largest wind turbine manufacturer “plunged” and solar stocks have been “hammered.”

Trump’s energy policies are my energy policies. Mission accomplished.

Thank you to the thousands of individuals and companies, from coast-to-coast, who have supported this work through notes of encouragement, membership in the Citizens’ Alliance for Responsible Energy, and financial contributions. Contrary to what those who send me nasty notes might believe, I do not think the Koch brothers or ExxonMobil even know I exist.

I have used what I call a Field-of-Dreams fundraising model: “If you build it, they will come.” This has mostly worked throughout my ten years at the helm. I’d send out fundraising letters and those who believed in my work sent checks – with an annual average of about $500 each. But then came the downturn in oil prices and coal company bankruptcies – and the accompanying job losses. Suddenly, the pool of people who’d written checks, and could continue to do so, got smaller. Likewise, the types of events where I’ve been a popular presenter no longer have a budget for speakers.

Nearly a year ago, I had to discontinue the services of the DC-based PR firm I’d used to successfully schedule all those interviews. During 2016, there’s only sporadically been enough in the checking account to cover my salary. Because I believed so strongly in the “energy makes America great!” message, I’ve continued without pay – hoping my efforts would impact the election.

It has been a good decade. I’ve gone to some great places and met amazing people – many of whom I will always consider friends. Some of my favorite achievements include: the publication of my book Energy Freedom; being part of the successful effort to keep the sand dune lizard from being listed as an endangered species; meeting with legislators in the Southeast to give them my booklet Solar Power in the US – lessons learned and guidance for policymakers; going to Washington, DC, and working on the effort to lift the oil export ban; and the massive “green-energy crony-corruption scandal” collaboration with Christine Lakatos (and the huge body of work we created including her blog the Green Corruption Files). In fact, the final piece Lakatos and I did together: “Haiti needs electricity, Hillary gives them a sweatshop,” received nearly 15,000 Facebook “shares” from its publication on Breitbart (for comparison, one of my columns a couple of weeks earlier, received 8). Out with a bang!

The original organization, the Citizens’ Alliance for Responsible Energy and the companion advocacy arm Energy Makes America Great (founded in 2010) will reemerge in some form – which is still being discussed. But I will no longer be involved (with the possible exception of occasional writing.)

Most of my readers and supporters don’t know that during my executive director tenure, my marriage of 29 years ended. I was single for several years and then married one of those “amazing people” I met in this work. I moved from Albuquerque to Lubbock – where my husband’s work is based. Throughout it all, I never missed writing and distributing my weekly column – even during my honeymoon (my first weekly column was published by Townhall.com in 2011). I’ve done radio interviews from my bed, office, and car; hotel rooms; and airports – and have been honored to be a regular guest on many, many shows.

Will I miss this? Yes. But I am excited about my future. For the first time in my 58 years, I’ve had the opportunity to ask myself: “what do I really want to do?”

In my youth, I majored in interior design because I loved fixing up houses. Over the years, I’ve claimed that I was codependent with houses – not people. People can fix themselves, but when I see a house in need, I feel compelled to fix it – though, until now, that was never an option for me.

When I purchased my home in New Mexico at an auction on the courthouse steps, it was incomplete. Serving as the “general contractor,” I lined up the team to finish the house and did much of the work myself. When I moved to Lubbock in December 2014, my husband and I bought a house that needed TLC. Along with him, I’ve personally planned, painted, and planted. While I’ve always enjoyed my professional endeavors, these hands-on rehab projects have been some of my most rewarding.

In August, I was at my mother’s in Palm Springs. There, I got some work done on her vacation rental – which I manage. It was a bit of an epiphany: this is what I love doing. I came home and had a long conversation with my husband. Together, we’ve now started a real estate rehab business – though he will continue to spend most of his time in his work as a CPA.

I am looking forward to embarking on a new chapter in my life: Triumph Properties Lubbock Inc. This opportunity brings me full circle. I’ve made an offer on my first flip house and, because it is a short sale, I am waiting for the bank’s response. I invite you to keep in touch through Facebook.

I am honored and humbled by your encouragement and support. My work here is finished.

The author of Energy Freedom, Marita Noon serves as the executive director for Energy Makes America Great Inc., and the companion educational organization, the Citizens’ Alliance for Responsible Energy (CARE). She hosts a weekly radio program: America’s Voice for Energy – which expands on the content of her weekly column. Follow her @EnergyRabbit.

**********

Editor’s note: While I’ve only had Marita on board a fairly short time (I picked up her column starting this past March) I have had the pleasure of reading it before anyone else does to get it ready for publication – I do so as I tweak it slightly to make it look better on WordPress and my website. She is definitely a voice on energy that we need and her departure from full-time writing means I’ll have to begin addressing that topic more as part of my usual commentary on the political scene. But if she passes anything else along I will be certain to make room – after all, now she will become an expert in another vital industry, that of construction.

But her usual Tuesday morning columns will be missed by this writer, and it brings up a different topic I’ll likely discuss at length later this week.

Thoughts on Trump: a postmortem, part two

When I did part one I intended to wait until all of the write-in votes were counted and tallied before continuing, but it appears that process will be very time-consuming and drag out over the next couple weeks. So I will save the third part for that facet of the evaluation I wasn’t anticipating would take so long and carry on with what we do know to date, beginning with the rest of my predictions. I’m still working in reverse order.

On the Wicomico County level, Donald Trump will carry the county with ease, with 63.7% of the vote compared to 32.8% for Hillary. Gary Johnson will hover around 2.3% here and Jill Stein at 0.4%; in fact, Evan McMullin will beat her…

I keep making the mistake of thinking Wicomico County is more conservative than reality bears out. Trump won Wicomico County, but underperformed my expectations by a full 10.6 percentage points (53.1% vs. 63.7%.) Hillary received 8.8% of my overage, going from the 32.8% I guessed to the actual 41.6%, while Gary Johnson was the recipient of a small portion as well, outperforming with 3% against the 2.2% I predicted.

But it was the Green Party candidate Jill Stein who vastly outperformed, going from a cipher to a semi-cipher with 1%. She received 388 votes, and with 526 write-in votes to allocate – a total which presumably includes a batch for non-candidates like Larry Hogan or Mickey Mouse – I think Stein will end up beating McMullin after all. He needs nearly 3/4 of all the write-in votes and that’s a tall order.

The suspense will be much less in Maryland, where Trump will lose but not as badly as polls once suggested. Out of 2.6 million votes cast (again, down slightly from 2012) Hillary will get 56.1% and Trump 38.7%. Among the rest, Gary Johnson will get 3.3%, Jill Stein will pick up 1.2%, and write-ins the rest.

Turns out turnout wasn’t even as good as I thought, even knowing the high number who voted early. As of this writing, there were 2,545,896 Maryland votes for President, and you’re asking a lot for a 2% undervote on that part of the ballot (although it is possible.) But Hillary picked up an “extra” 3.5% in the state, a total that Trump exceeded by underperforming my estimate by 3.8%. (It is 59.6% for Hillary vs. 34.9% for Trump.) Gary Johnson also came up short, getting 2.8% vs. the 3.3% I projected, but Jill Stein came close with 1.3% as opposed to the 1.2% I predicted. But the write-ins I guessed would be less than 1 percent are (as a combined total) leading Stein 32,957 to 32,406. (Worth noting: over 6,000 absentee/provisional votes have been deleted from the write-in totals, so the final tally among them may be closer to 30,000 rather than the 40,000 I noted in part one. Still, that is over thrice the number of write-ins cast in 2012 at this point – although a high number will be non-official candidates as well.)

For the last part, I’m going to bring in my predicted electoral map.

The important race: Hillary Clinton will pull out a fairly close popular vote race by 1 or 2 points nationwide, but fails to eclipse 50 percent just like her husband. However, there is a highly distinct possibility we may live the 2000 election all over again: the Electoral College very well could finish 279-259 Trump and the straw that breaks Hillary Clinton’s back will be losing Florida. Trump will win 30 states but Florida will be the dagger the GOP regains to defeat Hillary. Also from the 2012 map Trump will regain Colorado, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, and Ohio for the GOP, plus one Electoral College vote in Maine. (That one vote in Maine could be key if Florida and Pennsylvania trade places, with the former going to Clinton and the latter Trump. If Trump takes one Congressional district in Maine he would prevail 270-268, but if that elector decides to go with the other three Maine electors it becomes a tie.)

Click the map to create your own at 270toWin.com

The reasons neither candidate breaks 50 percent: about 4.5% for Gary Johnson, 1.5% for Jill Stein, and various write-in candidates will split roughly 2% of the vote. This means Hillary beats Trump by something like 46-45 or 47-45.

It does not look like Hillary Clinton will win the popular vote by more than a margin that would trigger an automatic recount in many states (0.5%.) Both Clinton and Trump are hovering in the 47 to 48% range; based on standard rounding rules it’s 48-47 Hillary right now. So I was actually correct on margin.

But I’m intrigued by the states I messed up on. Let me share a little secret with you: my prediction map was based on a very simple formula – take the last poll from each state and if it was anything less than Clinton +3 give it to Trump. After all, people tell me I barely know Maryland and Delaware politics, let alone the dynamics of swing states I have never been to. But I did sense there was a Bradley effect going in that people either wouldn’t admit to a stranger they were voting for Trump or they were convinced that where there was the smoke of allegations over dirty dealings by Hillary Clinton there was the fire of influence-peddling, despite the FBI clearing her twice.

So Donald Trump did not win Colorado, Nevada, or New Hampshire as I predicted (although there may be an automatic recount in New Hampshire based on margin.) But I think he will gladly trade those 19 electoral votes for the 46 he gets by winning Michigan (maybe, as that is also likely an automatic recount margin), Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin (!). Trump lost Colorado by 3 and Nevada by about 2, so they were close as were Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, both taken by Trump by about 1 percent. Even if they find a trunkful of votes somehow deposited under home plate where Tiger Stadium once stood, though, Trump wins the Electoral College by 290-248. (If Michigan holds it’s 306-232, not quite the 332-206 Obama was re-elected with, but a healthy margin nonetheless. Even without Michigan, though, Trump beats Bush’s 2004 re-election, let alone the 2000 race.)

Yet despite underperforming my expectations, the Libertarian Gary Johnson blew away his party’s previous best national showing with 3.3%. Jill Stein actually did worse than I expected, garnering just less than 1% nationally. On both sides of the spectrum, those who wavered in their support for alternative candidates fell prey to the siren song of the duopoly who continually tries to convince people a vote other than R or D is “wasted.” And that’s the way the establishment continues to reign. So let me digress for a moment to wrap up the prediction part of this post…

First of all, national turnout will be about 124 million votes, which will be down from 2012 but not as bad as I once predicted.

Turnout was better than I guessed, but it will still be down from 2012. (By the way, I thought someplace I wrote it was 128 million in 2012, but the undervotes pushed it beyond 129 million casting a ballot. So far they have counted 126.8 million ballots.)

…and pick up with my thoughts on why Trump did so well where he was expected to lose.

If you see a common theme in those three states (as well as Ohio) this election was all about trade and job creation. These are the voters who have seen their livelihoods taken away by NAFTA and the relocation of manufacturing to other nations like China, so they have a latent animus against the Clinton family to begin with.

Yet these were also the union voters who either went with their union leadership to support Al Gore, John Kerry, and Barack Obama, or (more likely) just said the heck with it and stayed home because they liked neither choice presented by the duopoly. And let’s face it: to these working-class people George W. Bush only became president because his dad pulled the strings, John McCain wasn’t appealing because he was a Washington insider, and Mitt Romney was the subject of their class envy. But Donald Trump made the election about things they cared about with his populist, pro-America appeal, so they turned out for him.

And it’s worth adding that pollsters tend to call those they know are likely voters. As I noted, much of this group stayed home for the last several elections and they’re skeptical enough of the press to deceive the pollsters if they do happen to call – thus, all the pollsters overestimated the base of support for Hillary in these states.

If I have a perception of these Trump voters, they remind me of my dad: he was a union worker for over 35 years, was drafted into the Army and served his hitch (fortunately in the period between Korea and Vietnam), and he worked for several years at a friend’s greenhouse even after he “retired” from his longtime employer (a concrete block plant that is no longer in business.) I have no idea if he voted, but if he did he fits well the profile of one of those Trump supporters who came out of the woodwork.

So I’m left with the surprise and shock I received when I opened up my browser to the New York Times website where I was tracking the results and finding they were predicting a Trump victory was more and more likely. It was surprising because it was lining up with my EC prediction, and shocking once the results began rolling in from Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Conversely, I’m not shocked by the discord in the election’s wake, just saddened (remember, I didn’t vote for Trump either – but I’m not going to march in the streets about it.)

My last part is going to wrap up the predictions once I get the write-in results. Already Darrell Castle is at 180,000 votes nationwide and that will hopefully increase as states where he was a write-in tally their ballots. Considering the Constitution Party has never broken 200,000, it’s a start. I’m going to be interested to see how Castle fares in Maryland and Delaware.

I suppose the next great political event around these parts will be the runup to the Maryland GOP Fall Convention that I will miss (but only in the sense I won’t be there – as it turns out I have much better plans for that particular weekend) but will elect a new party Chair whose top job will be to re-elect Larry Hogan in two years.

In the meantime, I may do a little work on my book this weekend. I also found out there will be a change afoot with this site, so stay tuned.

Closing the loop: a postmortem, part one

I’m sure that many millions of people like me who stayed up until almost 3 this morning (yet had to get up and go to work) were of several minds: anything from watching a slow-motion trainwreck to openly savoring the bitterness coming from the hearts of the so-called “experts” who predicted a massive blowout loss for Donald Trump. And until the last maybe week to 10 days I was among that group, but it seems there is a reservoir of support Trump could keep tapping into that other Republicans could not.

That subject is one I will get to in due course (that being part two) but for the moment I just want to work through my series of predictions and see if my crystal ball has been fixed. Just as I reeled them out from national to local, I will wind them backward to wrap them up.

And just as an aside, while early voting had historically high turnout, the reason will end up being that people just wanted to wash their hands of this election.

I think that panned out to a fair extent. Turnout is lining up to be right around or perhaps slightly below where it was in 2012, depending on how many absentees or provisional ballots there were. Including early voting, Maryland brought out a little over 2.5 million voters. Considering the state has about 300,000 more voters in this cycle, I think the turnout percentage will decrease or stay about where it was – the timing of votes was what shifted.

Across the border, I fear Delaware will vote for more of the same then wonder why their state isn’t getting better. Basically the state will have the same political composition with different names on the nameplates in Congress and state executive offices – not that Sussex County agreed with it, but they will be outvoted as usual by the New Castle Democrat machine.

In the state of Delaware, Hillary Clinton beat Donald Trump by a 53%-42% margin, Democrat Congressional hopeful Lisa Blunt Rochester won 56%-41% over Republican Hans Reigle. and in all three state government races, the Democrats won by almost identical margins: 58%-39%, 59%-41%, and 59%-41%. Aside from an extra 10,000 or so votes cast in the governor’s race to accommodate the Green and Libertarian candidates, the Democrats’ totals were all within 2,000 votes and the GOP within 2,500.

But if you break it down by county and the city of Wilmington, you find that Hillary won 84.8% in Wilmington, 59.4% in the rest of New Castle County, 44.9% in Kent County, and 37.2% in Sussex County. The problem is New Castle County’s Hillary votes were more than the combined overall total of either Sussex or Kent County. Sussex only went 41% for Rochester, 45% for governor-elect John Carney, 47% for lieutenant governor-elect Bethany Hall-Long, and 40% for new insurance commissioner Trinidad Navarro. Going forward they need to keep statewide Democrats in the 20s in Sussex County, but that may be a tall task as those who retire there generally come from Democratic core states and apparently don’t change their voting patterns.

On the questions, I believe Question 1 will get in the neighborhood of 80% statewide but maybe 75% here. The biggest controversy will be that Question A’s Option 2 will win a plurality of the vote but not quite a majority – a spirited Democrat effort will pull Option 2 down to 48% but Option 1 will get just 32%, with 20% opting for the hybrid. Otherwise, all the charter amendments will pass by healthy margins of 65 to 80 percent in favor.

Question 1 got 73.6% here (so I was close) but I underestimated the statewide wisdom to some extent, as the partisan measure passed on a 72-28 margin overall (as opposed to 80%.) I was just 3 percentage points off on Question A but Option 2 managed a slight 51% majority rather than a plurality. The Democrats probably got a late start in backing Option 1 because it underperformed my estimate by 7 points while the hybrid Option 3 outperformed by 5 points. The other questions ranged from 63 to 77 percent in favor, so I was in the ballpark. Maybe my public opposition brought them down 2 to 3 percent each.

Andy Harris will be returned to Congress, but not by as much as previous years. He will get 60.7% of the vote both overall and in Wicomico County, but Joe Werner’s 35.9% of the vote districtwide will shrink to 33.8% here. The Libertarian Matt Beers will have 3.2% districtwide but do somewhat better here, with 5.2% support in Wicomico County.

I was somewhat correct with Harris. He got 7% better than I predicted districtwide, but I was correct that he did decline slightly from 2014, when he was a shade over 70%. That extra came from Werner as he came up 7.9% short of what I thought he would and Matt Beers came in 1% better at 4.2%. Here in Wicomico, though, I was much closer: Harris underperformed my guess by 1.7% while Werner jumped 3.3%. The Libertarian Beers came in 1.5% less here. It’s worth noting, though, that the Libertarians’ share of the vote has increased slightly with each election they participate in – back in 2008 they had 2.5%, in 2010 3.8%, in 2012 3.8% (but Muir Boda came close to edging the write-in Democratic candidate here in Wicomico with 5.9% vs. 6%) and now 4.2%.

Looking at the U.S. Senate race, I think that Chris Van Hollen wins no more than eight counties but those will be enough to propel him to victory with 61.1% of the vote, compared to Kathy Szeliga’s 37.8%. Margaret Flowers will get 0.6% and various write-ins the rest. Wicomico will be one Szeliga wins, but not quite as strongly as Trump – she gets 59.3% of the vote while Van Hollen has 40.3% and Flowers 0.2%.

Van Hollen won just six counties, but unfortunately for Szeliga they included the four biggest so she was trounced. I gave Van Hollen about 1% more credit than he deserved, but Szeliga got no benefit as she was 1.4% short. All the underage went to Flowers, who grabbed over fivefold the share I predicted at 3.2%. Just as some on the right may give Libertarians the vote in a race they know is safe (I’ve done this several times in the past) I think those well out on the left figured it wouldn’t hurt to push the Flowers total up. But when Szeliga undercuts my modest expectations (to have a shot, she really had to be in the 75% range here and elsewhere on the Eastern Shore) by a full 5.7%, it’s a short wait for a concession speech. Van Hollen only lost our supposedly conservative county by 10.4 points (and beat my guess by about 3 points) but a shocker was that Flowers did about as well here as she did statewide. I thought she would be lucky to get 100 votes locally; she picked up 1,163.

I’m going to stop with that because I want to see the write-in votes for President before I comment on that race. But I will say that I am shocked at the number of write-in votes, as over 40,000 were cast statewide. I’m sure many of these won’t be counted, but it won’t be 85% of them like it was in 2012. I may have been overly pessimistic on Evan McMullin, Darrell Castle, Tom Hoefling, and so forth as they may split 15 to 20 thousand votes (although McMullin will get the lion’s share.) We won’t know for a few days, though, and when we do I will pick up with the second part regarding the Presidential race.