Mountain Views News, Sierra Madre Edition [Pasadena] Saturday, November 12, 2016

B4

OPINION 

DICK Polman

Mountain Views-News Saturday, November 12, 2016 


Mountain 
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LEFT TURN/RIGHT TURN

 MAKING SENSE by Michael Reagan

Peter Funt

GET A GRIP, LOSERS

 It’s all over. 

 So why are people still arguing about something Donald Trump 
said three weeks ago? 

 Why are protestors milling around the streets of our cities 
holding up misspelled signs and promising revolution? 

 The argument ended early Wednesday morning when the votes 
were counted. 

 Trump won. 

 It was shocking, amazing, impressive, historic – all that and more. 

 The billionaire with no ideology except egoism, the ex-Democrat 
no one thought had a chance, turned everything upside down and made fools, losers or 
incompetents out of both major political parties, the liberal media, the pundits, the pollsters, 
the financial markets, the weathermen… 

 You hear suicidal talking heads in the liberal media saying that Trump tapped into 
something they didn’t see. 

 Of course they didn’t see it. They’re liberals.

 The reality is that Trump tapped into the kinds of issues that talk radio has been talking 
about for 25 years. 

 Every issue he brought up in the campaign – from the border wall and the bad trade deals 
to tax cuts, ObamaCare and Islamic Muslim terrorism -- has been talked to death on talk 
radio. 

 Trump won because he internalized talk radio. Its audience became his base, which is 
different from the GOP’s base, and he won because his rural rust-belt people showed up on 
Election Day to smoke Hillary. 

 So live with it, all you liberal media people, broken-hearted Hillary followers and angry 
Bernie children. 

 No matter how much you hated or feared Donald Trump three days ago, he’s going to be 
your president in January. 

 I know it won’t happen, but I hope all sad people will get a grip and say, “Hey, now that he’ll 
be the president, what can we do to help him make America great again?” 

 Otherwise, what’s their position going to be for the next four years? Join protest marches? 
Sit back and expect Trump to do everything on his own?

 Or is it to be helpful? 

 If it’s to be helpful, the first thing you have to do is stop arguing about the issues of the 
campaign 48 hours after it ended. 

 Your guy lost. Live with it. 

 Four years ago, and eight years ago, our guy lost. We lived with it. 

 Now the Republicans are in charge – of everything. 

 All the things they’ve been saying they wanted to accomplish in Washington but couldn’t 
because of Harry Reed, Nancy Pelosi and President Obama’s executive orders are soon going 
to be possible. 

 Republicans in Washington – including the ones who hated Trump -- now have at least 
four years to put into place all those things they believe will make America great again. 

 It’s going to be kind of hard to get things done if even the people on our side keep screaming 
and complaining about Trump. So get a grip. 

 No matter what we Republicans thought about Trump’s racist statements, or his crude 
locker-room talk on the bus, or his narcissism, the bottom line was we thought less of Hillary 
Clinton. 

 Even at his worse, Donald was more likable than Hillary could ever be. That’s why she lost. 

 Finally, to all those Democrats and Republicans who don’t want to live in America 
anymore because Trump won, I have some advice: 

 “Get out of the streets. Go back to work if you have a job. Go back to school if you want to 
learn something. 

 “Cut with your rioting. Cut with your foot stomping. Cut with your bad language. Cut 
with your whining.

 “And, really, grow up.” 

 This is how it works every four years. 

——-

 Copyright ©2016 Michael Reagan. Michael Reagan is the son of President Ronald Reagan, a 
political consultant, and the author of “The New Reagan Revolution” (St. Martin’s Press). He is 
the founder of the email service reagan.com and president of The Reagan Legacy Foundation. 
Visit his websites at www.reagan.com and www.michaelereagan.com. Send comments to 
Reagan@caglecartoons.com. Follow @reaganworld on Twitter. 

 Mike’s column is distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate. For info on 
using columns contact Sales at sales@cagle.com.

WHAT DID VOTERS 

REALLY SEE?

So, the most frequent refrain since Election Day is that “no 
one saw this coming.” Not the pollsters, not the media, not 
the Democrats’ machine.

 We might also note that the Cleveland Indians didn’t see 
what was coming after the rain delay in Game Seven.

 But unlike the Indians, we saw plenty, and we saw it early on. More than a year 
before the election we saw how a reality-TV star could dominate a debate stage 
and, with total disregard for truth, slice and dice 16 other candidates.

 We saw the power of controlling the message through social media. The world’s 
first Twitter Candidate spewed middle-of-the-night vitriol that by noon the next 
day was often the lead story among mainstream media.

 We watched as the powerful forces of skewed news––led by Fox News Channel, 
Breitbart and Drudge––invented some stories and distorted others for a vast 
audience that was fearful, hateful, vengeful and eager for political and emotional 
reinforcement.

 We looked on, often entertained, by the spectacle of rallies that attracted tens of 
thousands of people, without much regard for the fact that these rally-goers and 
their friends might actually cast votes.

 We saw qualified Democrats like Joe Biden and Elizabeth Warren step aside 
so that the Candidate of Destiny could brush away Martin O’Malley and––with 
alarming difficulty––socialist Bernie Sanders.

 We noted that the Democratic National Committee can be every bit as reckless 
with the rules as its Republican counterpart.

 We watched as a litany of poor judgments came back to haunt the Democrats’ 
nominee. It wasn’t about legality, it was about optics. It was how a suspicious 
electorate would view outrageously high speaking fees, stonewalling over emails, 
and a murky relationship with a multi-billion dollar family charity.

 Following the conventions, we observed one candidate working harder on the 
trail and making many more campaign stops than his opponent.

 We read between the lines that several outrageous threats and promises from 
early in the campaign were fading away in calculation for the home stretch. 
For instance, there wouldn’t really be “mass deportations” of undocumented 
immigrants, only a roundup of violent criminals. There wouldn’t actually be a ban 
on Muslims entering the country, only a more serious “vetting” of people coming 
from the world’s hot spots. Et cetera.

 In the final days we looked at poll results that seemed comforting, even though 
state figures were far less reliable than national numbers.

 We saw the apparent arrogance of a candidate who took states like Wisconsin 
and Michigan for granted, and who trotted out Hollywood big shots like Lady 
Gaga and Cher, who many Americans find so easy to resent.

 On Election Day, we saw some long lines at polling places and didn’t bother to 
vote. We saw the elaborate post-election celebratory set-up at the Javits Center in 
New York and figured the contest was in the bag.

 It was there to see all along. Alas, in our new and confusing political world, 
seeing isn’t always believing.

——-

Peter Funt can be reached at www.CandidCamera.com

 Peter Funt is a writer and speaker. His book, “Cautiously Optimistic,” is available 
at Amazon.com and CandidCamera.com. © 2016 Peter Funt. Columns distributed 
exclusively by Cagle Cartoons, Inc., newspaper syndicate.


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