It’s been a nightmare year for pundits making predictions. The spillover has affected both sides of the aisle. Voters now harbor a festering hostility to the status quo. This animosity has shattered the political way of things.
At stake is that orderly procession of insiders moving up the ladder to take their appointed turn at the pinnacle of power. And insiders are scared. They should be. They have a lot to lose.
Now that the DNC has officially made Hillary Clinton their nominee — will we see yet another unexpected result? I think we will.
But first, let’s look back at the year so far.
On one side, 17 candidates began the race. And what happened? The “dead ringers” for the nomination wilted early. Bush? Rubio? Christie? Adios, all three.
Even in the home stretch between the final two, what did we see? They were clearly chasing the non-conformist vote. Each arguing why he — and only he — rightly qualified as the true political outsider. An ongoing chess match to paint the “other” guy as one of those bums we need to throw out of Washington.
The Cruz camp emphasized Ted’s long track record of standing strong for Constitutionalist principles — even when the rest of his party abandoned them. For that, he earned the respect of many — myself among them. And that is a big part of why he finished ahead of 15 other candidates.
The Trump camp made the case that since he was not a career politician, Donald is the true Washington outsider. That he is untainted by the “wretched hive of scum and villainy” and immune to Washington political horse trading.
To the bewilderment of many, Trump managed to tag Cruz with the “establishment” label. Once that happened, it was over. Down with the establishment. Up with the political outsider. In the only party that actually lets their members decide the outcome, the man with better “outsider” bona-fides took the nomination.
Now let’s see the other party. It only had two serious nominees. The ‘diverse’ party with “crazy old Bernie”, and his opponent Hillary (only 6 years younger, but nobody is supposed to mention that).
The DNC probably let Bernie run because he was ‘harmless’. Really, he was only supposed to be a meaningless foil for Hillary to run down on her way to her “rightful place” as nominee. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, among others, was using the DNC machinery to deep-six Bernie, and coronate Hillary from the beginning. We have the emails that say so. They even discussed rigging polls. (Thanks Wikileaks.)
But if it were not for the huge head start given to Hillary by the Superdelegates (not to mention the perception of “momentum” and “popular support” that was conveyed by that artificial lead) Bernie Sanders just might have snatched the brass ring away from Hillary Clinton.
Why? Because — like Trump across the aisle — he was considered the outsider. He had none of the glitzy Clinton life. None of the jetsetting. None of the perpetual limelight of a Clinton.
He had nowhere near the political clout of Hillary. Was not as connected as her. And that is why so many ordinary Democrats liked him better than they did Hillary. That is why his people Booed Hillary this week at the DNC … at the very moment Bernie was endorsing her.
Sadly, they were more committed to their cause than he was. That would explain why there were so many empty seats at the DNC convention. That would explain why there were so many boos from the crowd. Hillary is the very definition of the corruption they marched to abolish.
Even the FBI is no help. Their own party’s flunkies have been shielding her from meaningful consequences. So what now?
Before the DNC convention was even over, Bernie bailed. Before Hillary could take the stage to loud acclaim, he got the Hell outta Dodge. Bernie Sanders has announced he’s once again an independent.
Where does this leave the supporters? That’s the wildcard. It’s anybody’s guess. But any of the polls we have now reflected Bernie before he walked out of the so-called “Democratic” Party.
Bernie’s crowd had a loud voice, demanding an end to the corrosive influence of wealth on politics. And now? Wikileaks has shown Clinton herself to be ground zero of the problem they wanted to solve.
[Did you see that leaked email with political posts being offered to donors? If you missed it, you’ll want to see it.]
Bernie supporters are now being asked to do the impossible. They are being asked to vote for the real-life face of exactly the corruption they protested against. Will they be good little lemmings? Or will their principles make them jump ship like Bernie finally did?
Has the nomination of Hillary… together with the corruption that got it for her… and the political hacks that shielded her from facing charges when any “little person” would have had the book thrown at them — have these factors together begun to topple the Clinton “House of Cards”?
Did nominating Hillary just guarantee a Trump Presidency? Quite possibly.
