My Student Showed Me How Pervasive and Powerful the Anti-HRC Campaign Was

[ProudLib72]

Twice a month now, a group of people are coming into my college to register students to vote. I saw them today and decided to ask my students if they were registered. This led them into to a discussion of who voted last year. One student is a Hispanic woman (born here and a citizen but identifies heavily with and has spent a lot of time in Mexico). She told me she hadn't voted because both candidates were bad and she didn't want either for president.

I got a little upset. No, I didn't say anything negative to the student. But it made me realize how insidious the Dotard campaign really was. My student is 20, Hispanic, female. Those are three good reasons for her voting for Hillary. The only reason possible for her not casting her vote for Hillary was the negativity, the lies, and the suppression by manipulation that occurred.

Look, this is not the first time one of my students has expressed this sentiment. It's just that this time around, my student had every reason imaginable to vote for HRC or, at least, against Dotard. So how do we get these young people to vote? How can we fight against the disinformation campaign? It's not legal for me to take my students aside and tell the how to vote even though I certainly feel like it. So who is in a position of authority and trust who can legally talk to these people? I mean, my God, today's revelation was a major nail in the coffin of hope.

[Throck]

1. Registering to vote and actually voting are two different things.

I have to drag my daughter kicking and screaming every year.

[ProudLib72]

2. Yeah, but it turned out that she was registered

See, I asked that question first. Then they started discussing the last election and volunteered the reasons why they hadn't voted. I believe her because she seemed genuine. I do admit there are a lot of students who are either apathetic or don't want to bother. The thing is, though, in CO we have voting by mail. All one has to do is register to receive a ballot in the mail. Pretty easy. I really think she chose to ignore the ballot because she was disappointed in her options. That is what scares the hell out of me. It was a giant snow job that convinced a lot of people not to bother.

[bettyellen]

4. That sucks. One of my fondest memories is my dad handing me a registration when I turned 18, because

It was tight timing to get registered for that November. I'll never ever forget how happy he was walking me to the polling place, my old kindergarten school. Citizenship meant a lot to him, he earned his during WW2 and he gave me that understanding- how lucky we were not to be in total poverty abroad.

[DK504]

3. Is it illegal to tell them to research as much as possible

make decisions based on what each candidate stands for?

My first election was Reagan/Carter. Granted there was no choice, but there is always research and positions to study. Why don't young voters do that? It is vital to there future and there parents future, what the F?

[ProudLib72]

6. THAT is a good question

I want to avoid any suspicion of bias, but I am teaching them research....so....hmmmm.

[Ninsianna]

9. And to check the bias of their sources right?

People are still posting things that are clearly wrong and bigoted but they repeat the flat out claims anyway.

Ex. Michael Sainato, from Kushner's paper, The Observer, where the BoB movement was heavily pushed.


TYT, which is currently attacking Democrats and Obama for the massacre last night.

[Blue_true]

5. One of my younger brothers relayed something to me.

We were talking about voting. My brother knows several Black people that he work with who did not vote in the Presidential election.

Their reason to him? Hillary was just as bad as Trump. My brother says some of them feel bad now, but too late, they fucked up when they could have made a difference.

[ProudLib72]

7. My student was still convinced she did the right thing

She stated in the present tense that they are both bad. I remember that distinctly. I also think it's part of the reason why it has stuck with me till tonight.

[Me.]

11. It Feels Like Wilful Ignorance To Me

[SharonClark]

13. She's really just plain stupid.

[Me.]

24. Sigh

[Jim Beard]

83. I know yall hate me because I am a white male but I do have some

knowledge of this. I resigned as a Democratic Party Chairman last year because I was fed up. One year I got a check for $1.84 from the state office to help Democratic candidates, thats all. With the beginning of baby Bush, everything has gone to hell in this county and I can speak very well of the Hispanic voters. THEY DON'T VOTE. Sure we had a good turnout but not compared to the population.

The hispanic men loved Trump and really, why should they for Hillary, they don't need food stamps aid to dependent children or medical because the have insurance with their jobs. There was no racial difference in the hispanic or white male voting behavior. That is those that voted.

I have quit, I am sick of it. Why should I take the bullshit at the local level from other white men and on the internet from women.

There are only 2 county chairs left in the Texas Panhandle/South Plains. Those are in Amarillo and Lubbock and they can not keep a steady chair.

It used to be good when we would have meetings and trade stories about calling C-Span and using a different different name and town each time.

I am 70 and don't need any more local enemy's. Someone else has to do it but so far, there have been no takers.

[Me.]

85. You Know

I don't see the words hate/white male hooked up anywhere in this thread. Have I missed it? What the issue w/white men is the notion that their concerns should take precedence over 'identity politics', which is code for women, LGBT and minorities.

I do believe you about Latino voters because I know that in 2012 only 2% of eligible Latinos voted. As for the men, maybe someday they will discover there is more involved in all this besides food stamps etc.

A check for $1.84 is despicable and so makes me so wish DEan was back in charge.

[Jim Beard]

86. The female hate was on another thread.

[Me.]

87. Hate Is Never A Happy

But I can also guess you ran across a reaction to misogyny, which is real and ugly and engenders a lot of anger and resentment.

[ProudLib72]

26. Yes and no

I think there was way too much trust of the MSM. HRC got negative press from all directions. You have to think of your average voter (not on DU) who relied on the MSM and whose view was shaped by all that negative crap. At some point we have to acknowledge that a lot of young voters do not go in for politics. Can we really blame them for not wanting to sift through all the negative junk? I'll just leave it like this: I have compassion for the young voters who were misled, and I cannot place the entirety of the blame on them.

[Me.]

33. I Get What You're Saying

On the other hand, with things being as they are with Dreamers and such, I am surprised she isn't more aware/self-educated about what's what, just as those who protested Nancy P aren't. In many cases, it's their lives that are on the line.

[ProudLib72]

35. Yes, I thought about that, too

It is strange. I guess that the alternative still seems just as bad. This is yet one more thing that we need to work on: correcting people's misconceptions about Hillary. I think maybe the negativity and lies remain and skew perception of the Democratic party itself.

[forthemiddle]

73. Not necessarily just the MSM

In Wisconsin, Bernie and Ted Cruz won the primaries, so when the election came I heard over and over again that people couldn’t stand either candidate. Unfortunately, here, Trump was a little less hated.
I have never seen anything like it.

[karynnj]

16. Did you ask what she thought made HRC bad?

The answer would be interesting because then you would have a stronger case that it was lies. I agree with you - 2016 was not a close decision. However, her answer would determine whether the reason was actual facts about Clinton, accepting the Republican frame vs the Democratic one on Clinton (normal politics here) or if she started to list the lies spread by Bannon/Russians.

[ProudLib72]

28. I didn't want to press the matter

Again, the way I reacted emotionally to her comment, I felt like I might be putting her on the defensive with any follow up questions. I wanted to avoid that at all costs. So we are left with guessing. Given that she is no astute follower of the political scene, I had to assume she was being informed by the MSM and whatever hearsay her friends/family were telling her. You might disagree, but I have to call the MSM a Republican frame. At least, that was where I was going with my original post about the disinformation campaign.

[karynnj]

30. I get why you did not want to push things given her response

I think the MSM has both Republican and Democratic voices on cable and the networks. Radio is almost all Republican, much of it very far right.

[yellowdogintexas]

36. I lost count of the people who said "but Hillary is just an awful person.....

and I could never vote for Trump so I did not vote"

Many of these were women.

Yet Not One of Them could actually tell me why Hillary is a horrible person. Not. One.

[TheFrenchRazor]

39. groupthink is the answer, and young people are especially suceptible to this, since their experience

experience and knowledge are limited. i have known several decent liberal leaning young people who were also politically apathetic because they really did not know the details of dem/repub party philosophies, and it was popular wisdom among their circle of friends and media sources that both parties are equally bad. as we all know, the democratic party needs to greatly improve its messaging.

[ProudLib72]

45. Groupthink sounds fitting in this instance

Dem messaging needs improvement for sure, but I'm not averse to a little smearing of the sort they did to us. Not outright lies, but loading up with smear instead of strictly policy. It plays to the lowest common denominator, and that is sad; however, I think you would agree that we are to the point of practicing triage as a matter of survival.

[treestar]

63. a black lady told me that

she was talking to young black men who said Obama did not stop the shootings by cops, so why would Hillary be able to?

It's just being uninformed, which is more forgivable for youth.

[Blue_true]

82. That young Black man's logic is like saying

a person should not drink water because water is not always cold. Really screwed up thinking.

Racist cops and cop over-reaction is deeply embedded in our society. Obama was working with police departments to get rid of racist cops and then work on overreaction, like a cop driving up, not being in danger, but shooting and killing someone.

[Ninsianna]

8. Um, that message was not coming from Dotard.

It was coming from various sources that were pretending to be the left. This is the damage that was done, never corrected, her choice to not vote and the reasoning for that was programmed in quite early, by people who kept insisting that the parties were the same and that Hillary and Donald were equivalent.

[haveahart]

10. Some were not "pretending to be the left." Theynwere the "left."They call themselves

Progressives or Bernie followers.

[jalan48]

14. Like millions of other Americans, I'm proud to call myself a Bernie Sanders style progressive.

[lovemydogs]

15. I am a Progressive. I do not apologize for my views

I happen to agree more with Bernie's ideas then Hillary's.
But, I do not hate Hillary.
Neither did the people I knew who supported Sanders
Most progressives I know thought she was fine but, liked Bernie better.

I am sick to death of the hanging onto resentments and blaming Progressives because Hillary lost.

We did not cause Hillary to lose.

It is time to move on

[wasupaloopa]

19. Bernie also spread lies about Hillary. Because of that he is part of the reason we have Trump.

And I believe he will hurt us in 2018 by his attacking the Democratic party,

I wish he would STFU and retire.

[jalan48]

20. What lies did Bernie spread?

[wasupaloopa]

22. His attacking her for giving speaches to Wall Street means she was compromised

Hillary never in her life put Wall Street above the good of the public.

[jalan48]

27. Everyone is is entitled to his/her opinion.

Hillary referred to her speeches to the big Wall Street banks as "bad optics".

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

37. I give Hillary credit for that candid admission... if only she had realized it sooner.

[Ninsianna]

44. I'd like to believe that these were just true believers who got led astray,

but then I look at what they were saying, what they're still saying now and the provenance of their claims, their lies and who they mindlessly repeat and what they claim to be doing about it.

Whatever they might have once been, or might have once started out to be, they're no longer the left. These people too easily cast aside literally every principle of the left, from things as basic as human rights, based on well known right wing propaganda, often parroted verbatim.

[Xolodno]

12. It's often phrased as the lesser of two evils....

...but that doesn't make people vote, but rather not vote. And in some places, its exactly what they want to occur.

It needs to be re-framed, do you want some things of what you want done or none of it? If you don't vote, then you are guaranteeing much worse than slightly better.

That's the problem today, everyone assumes a zero sum game....when its not.

[ProudLib72]

21. Exactly right

The genius (I hate to call it that, but it really is) of the disinformation campaign was that it relied not on flipping votes but convincing people not to vote at all because, by voting for either major candidate, you were voting for evil. See it relied on the simplicity of the majority of the voters' views of the candidates and turned it into, as you said, a zero sum game. It comes down to binary thinking. Either a candidate is good or bad. There may be varying degrees, but the overall "feel" is either positive or negative. All the Dotard campaign had to do was sow some seeds of doubt, let the MSM spread those seeds, an voila! I've also noticed that, once the seeds are planted, the noxious weeds of doubt take firm root and are almost impossible to extract completely. Truly, chasing down and destroying every single lie in the disinformation campaign is like chasing down dandelion seeds in a strong wind.

[Xolodno]

25. More like whack a mole....

...but I digress.

Too many look for a "messiah" when....there is no messiah prophesied. The system isn't set up for one...but, too many expect that.

[ProudLib72]

50. We need to figure out why Obama was a messiah

Obviously part of it was coming out of the W administration, but I think there was much more to it.... like excellent messaging.

[LisaM]

80. I think that was a personality issue. Peole liked his persona.

I thought his messaging was actually fairly vague. People love those big rallies, though.

[Motownman78]

32. Except voters increased

from 125 million in 2012 to 130 million in 2016. So voter suppression cannot be part of why we lost. It is interesting that HRC got only 55% of the 29 and under vote whereas PBO got 65%.

[TheFrenchRazor]

40. yeah; obama was "cool" whereas hillary was cranky grama. young people do not always make decisions

decisions based on objective, rational assessment of facts; that's not hillary's fault as a candidate, but it does point to the democratic party's need to find a better way to reach younger voters.

[Ninsianna]

46. Actually it can,

we have reports of hundreds of thousands of people in many states being turned away from voting, not being given voter ids in time (despite a court ruling), being turned away for lack of adequate ids, despite having many forms of government issues ids, and being given provisional ballots that were never counted.

That's not even looking at the votes that were never counted, in places like MI where the vote totals from the machines didn't match the books, etc. etc.

Your screen name is Motownman, did you have no idea what was happening in Wayne County during the recount?


I can't paste a link for some reason (browser is being weird), but I suggest you google a piece by Ari Berman on Bill Moyers site entitled: "A New Study Shows Just How Many Americans Were Blocked From Voting in Wisconin Last Year" posted on 9/27/17

Wisconsin Voter ID Law Proved Unsurmountable For Many (An AP story posted on 5/14/17 on www.jsonline.com addresses the point you found so interesteing about the under 29's, many of whom are college students and young mobile people in the workforce who don't update their basic id, and quite a few who demonstrate a basic failure of understanding about how elections work, when registration happens or when things need to be done.

[MichMan]

58. The votes not recounted were due to election staff incompetence, nothing else

Wayne County,which contains Detroit, has been 100% Democratic for decades.

A Michigan State law from 1956 does not allow recounts of precincts that have irregularities between the poll books and recorded votes. I assume that the intent was to avoid all kinds of post election shenanigans with ballot box stuffing etc. and the law was passed after a very contentious Governor election in 1956.

The issue in Detroit was that many precincts had more votes recorded than there were voters. Since Detroit voted over 90% for Clinton, it was safe to assume that these "extra" votes would have only been in her favor. A recount would have most likely caused her vote totals to go down. The main issue seemed to be an incompetent election staff that knew the totals were wrong, but either didn't know what to do or just wanted to go home and didn't care. This isn't the first election that Detroit has bungled.

[Ninsianna]

59. They were due to faulty vote scanners,

something easily remedied by actually counting the damned votes.

We know that the democratic precincts were where the majority of the issues happened.

The problem is that assuming anything in this election is a terrible idea.

[MichMan]

61. State law from 1956 prohibited it

The State law regarding recounts has been in place for 60 years. I believe it was passed after many allegations of post election cheating in a contentious governors race.

The issue was that the Detroit election workers knew that the vote totals didn't match the poll books, but certified the results anyway. When that happens, the correct action is to reconcile the totals before sending them off to be tallied. They failed to do so. Either they were incompetent or just wanted to go home and didn't care.

It wasn't that votes were not counted, votes apparently were fed into the scanners more than once as most of the issues were with over votes. With the voters of Detroit choosing Hillary 95%, it is pretty clear that the over votes only added to her total. There were never votes that were not counted; the original recorded vote totals were still used with Hillary winning by huge margins in Wayne County

The RW was pretty upset at the time, as many were convinced that it was done intentionally to stuff the ballot box for Clinton. Obviously that is ridiculous; when it was most likely caused by poor training or incompetence within the election staff.

[Ninsianna]

62. I understand.

however, we don't know what actually happened, or what the final vote counts actually were. It wasn't just Detroit, the Trump folks on the ground were being rather nasty with regard to ballots clearly marked for HRC.

We don't know what the actual totals were, and frankly, that's a problem for me, regardless of the outcome, every vote should be counted and verified.

Were provisional ballots counted?

The issue is that funny business was recorded and observed. We needed people with eyes on the ground in the precincts as votes were being tallied and sealed.

In the chaos of that that night, the plan to send people to these areas to do this was not followed through. That is where the campaign dropped the ball. Organizers and volunteers were huddled together until very late on election night and sent home to get rest and be ready by 7 to deploy to wherever was necessary, and then the calls were put off while they figured out what to do in Brooklyn.

We don't know what happened, and we should have had people there to have eyes on how they did the counting and sealing, but that didn't happen. When it comes to actual mistakes that the campaign made, these vital things are forgotten to yell about whatever RW points people seem to like.

[treestar]

65. That one is especially dumb

as you can see well, if you see it that way, at least vote for the lesser. You'd think that would be more motivating to vote to at least avoid the worse evil. People who look at it negatively must have a wish for things to be even more negative, I guess.

[Takket]

17. With respect to Rush (the band)

Point out that "if you choose not to decide you still have made a choice".

Also that this is your only opportunity to decide your fate. If you don't vote you are essentially admitting you are incapable of handling the responsibility of deciding your fate and delegating that responsibility to total strangers that most likely do not have your best interests at heart.

Also note that "I don't want either to be president" is an irrational argument because one WILL be president whether you vote or not. You will NOT get your way in that regard by not voting. So vote, even if it on one issue you care about.

[ProudLib72]

23. Look at my post 21

I agree that the argument is totally illogical, but they somehow managed to make it seem like not voting was a good choice. Heck, I still have some biking magazines from before the election that feature a two page ad promoting a vote of no confidence! This from a very progressive magazine! So not voting was actually a progressive choice!!!! Check this out: https://www.change.org/p/the-american-people-vote-no-confidence-in-the-presidential-election-via-a-write-in

I think it might be a good idea to go back and collect these pieces of election memorabilia, put them all in one place, and analyze how they managed to make our election go south.

[wasupaloopa]

18. Why didn't your student have the critical thinking skills to reject the bull shit?

That anti Clinton crap didn't effect me that way.

[erpowers]

55. Similar to My First Thought

Your statement is similar to my first thought. I thought this student should have been willing to take the time to look at Hillary Clinton's and Donald Trump's policy ideas and make a decision based on the information she learned. I think there were a large number of intellectually lazy people during the 2016 election who either voted without knowing the issues, or did not vote because they just listened to other people who told them the two candidates were equally horrible.

I think anyone who would have read Hillary Clinton's plans would have decided to vote for her over Donald Trump unless they were a hardcore Republican, or just a Hillary Clinton hater. I looked at Hillary Clinton's policy ideas and even though I did not agree with all of her ideas I thought she had some really good ideas that made her a much better candidate than Donald Trump. I do not look at Donald Trump's ideas, but I mainly knew where he stood on the issues.

My second thought was to ask the teacher what he/she taught and if he/she could inform the students of the ideas being advanced by each candidate. It seems teacher who can need to bring up political discussions in there classes. They need to make sure their students are informed. They also need to make sure their students are debating this issues. Maybe more people would have voted for Hillary Clinton if the had known and understood the issues and ideas of each candidate.

[radius777]

29. 25 years of anti-Clintonism from right and left

took its toll amongst many constitutencies in this election that would otherwise lean Dem.

Remember, this girl, who is only 20, grew up only hearing this stuff, so it's not suprising.

I also do think that Dems and the left in general is now viewed by young people as overly purist and dogmatic.. anything that contradicts the white progressive bubble is shouted down... a stark contrast to how Dems were perceived amongst my gen(x).. Bill was viewed as the cool uncle type who might take you out for fast food, or to the strip club, or would let you smoke-up (but maybe not inhale? ). Dems have lost that vibe.. they're now perceived as boring and serious as Repubs.

So Hillary (and Obama, to a lesser extent) were damaged by those forces, in addition to the Russian/Comey meddling.

[betsuni]

31. It's "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" except with propaganda, not aliens.

One of the reasons for the great success of propaganda in the U.S. now is that people have such short attention spans and don't read. Brains need good workouts. Also, not admitting when they don't know something.

[CakeGrrl]

34. The Follow-Up Question - it is NEVER asked

by the media when the GOP lies.

Use it with anyone who makes this kind of statement. One simple follow-up can open the door to either a discussion or a realization that their reasoning is seriously flawed.

"Why?"
"What has she done that makes her as bad as Trump?"

If they can't articulate an answer, then it's just a matter of believing what's been repeated without thinking about what it really implied.


Unfortunately, America has been systematically dumbed down for years, and there is widespread ignorance about the details of government, how it functions, and its impact on daily life.

We're probably at the stage where people have to have things hit bottom and learn the hard way.

[TheFrenchRazor]

41. true. nt

[Ninsianna]

47. When I've done this, I've found them "articulating" talking points verbatim.

Just recently, on twitter, they launched into Alex Jones level stuff. Not sure if it was a bot or just a gullible idiot who had been ratfucked, checking their timeline showed a lot of "Lee Camp" and various other Russia Today personalities with inflammatory and debunked crap that's still being peddled to witless idiots who have no clue what facts actually are. It's gotten to the point, where you can't even tell which ones are the Trumpkin trolls, since the rhetoric and talking points are identical and uniformly anti-Democratic, Anti-HRC, anti-Obama and anti- anyone of color.

[ProudLib72]

49. And not having lived long enough to witness

changes to the American cultural/social/political landscape have been made under different administrations. She is 20 now, which means she was 12 when Obama became president. What 12 year old follows politics? I seriously doubt she remembers what life was like under the W administration. If she does "remember" something, what she remembers is going to be constructed on her parents' views.

Something that I have been dealing with for the past few months has been the realization that almost none of my students experienced 9/11. These are first and second year undergrads who were born between 1998 and 2000 (I get some high school students doing college credit). They were babies when it happened! For me it seems like it happened yesterday. I cannot begin to imagine what it would be like to have not lived through the W years, the rise of neo-conservatives, the tea party, Iraq and Afghanistan. And I suspect that there are a lot of DUers who can't begin to imagine what it would be like not to have lived through Vietnam (I was born at the tail end).

The status quo for these kids is Obama era administration. It worked, good things were accomplished. There may have been a few ups and downs, but government worked, and it worked for the betterment of the majority. The kids haven't realized yet, through no fault of their own, that this administration is the polar opposite of the last and they are at serious risk.

[Scruffy1]

38. This is what negative campaigning is all about.

It keps people from voting.

[emulatorloo]

42. +1. And Republicans don't sit home.

[oasis]

43. People who refused to vote in 2016 share the blame for what's coming.

Idiots.

[ProudLib72]

52. Be fair now Oasis

How informed were you at 20, and how many 20 year olds do you know who are well informed?

These are not Dotard voters we are talking about. These are reasonable people who were misled but who may be redeemed, so we can't dismiss them outright.

[JoeStuckInOH]

48. If only there had been a candidate with good favorability rating & resonated with young voters, too

[Hortensis]

51. Yes, and equipped with some kind of supernatural anti-swiftboating shield.

Political PR experts know that candidates whose backgrounds are not well known are at extreme risk of having the professional right-wing smear machine create and swamp the nation with very destructive "backgrounds" for them.

Groups like Judicial Watch had several of these napalm creations created for each candidate, all personalized and ready to launch in a saturation bombing for whoever won the primary.

You really should be curious about the various depictions and gates they had all set up for the candidate you're imagining. You'd never recognize him now.

[Not Ruth]

53. This is why I want a list of the 10 million people that Facebook hammered with Russian ads

10 million people reading ads vs 140 million voters. Best $100k Putin ever spent.

[Steven Maurer]

66. Latest news is that it was actually 70 million N/T

[Not Ruth]

67. Half of the amount of people that voted

$100k was a steal

[still_one]

54. That is why I will never forgive Jill Stein and those who spread the lies and distortions

encouraging people not to vote for the Democratic nominee with their false equivalencies, and their bullshit line, "they need to give me a reason to vote for them"

The SC wasn't reason enough
Civil rights weren't reason enough
Women's rights weren't reason enough
The environment, workers rights, healthcare, Medicaid, Medicare, social security, and a hundred other issues weren't reason enough

They are frauds, and no one should forget what they did

[erpowers]

56. Can You Inform Them About Politics or Political Ideas?

What do you teach? Can you take time out of your class to discuss the ideas of political candidates? I think it would help if you would take time out of your class, if you could, to assure the students are informed about the political stances of the candidates. Other than that, maybe you could encourage your students to learn about the political ideas being pushed by the candidates running for office. Maybe you could also ask the students what they want the government to do and then instruct them to vote for the candidate that comes closet to the ideas they support, will do most of what they want, or will oppose most of what they do not want.

[ProudLib72]

60. I teach composition

Part of that is writing argument papers. She is in the first semester composition course, so we don't get to research till the end of the term. I suppose I could ask some of the other professors if and how they integrate politics into their composition courses. It's really in the second semester that we get into critical thinking skills on a deeper level, but it would be possible during the first semester as well. You also have to remember this is a community college, and the English department serves the other departments. I was discussing this with the new chair yesterday. We aren't really stand alone, which he thinks is a mistake. So there might just be some hope for the future.

[LisaM]

57. I frankly think that there was negativity against Hillary on college campuses during the primaries

and I don't think it was all coming from the right.

This is not to dismiss the disinformation, the false ads, the outright lies, and the relentless attempts to smear her since the 1990s or earlier.

However, I think in both 2008 and 2016 there was a certain type of political event that appealed to college students, and it's not the type of event that Hillary is good at.

[treestar]

64. Was it just them or Congress and other offices too?

Like did she vote in the lower elections?

Also not wanting either of them means she was still going to get one of them, so why not figure out for sure if one is worse?

Shows how even educated people can choose to remain uninformed.

[ProudLib72]

68. The entire ballot

She just did not vote at all. She washed her hands of the entire election.

I may be putting words into her mouth, but this is the meaning I attached to her reasoning. That is something to consider, the notion that abstaining from the vote entirely means the person is absolved from consequences, is somehow not responsible for anything that happens. It runs contradictory to logic, yet she spoke with absolute conviction. Again, I put this down to the power of the disinformation campaign. So this might be an area to concentrate on the next time around: convincing people that not voting is equal to voting for the wrong person and will carry dire consequences; not voting is not cool and does not absolve you from responsibility.

[treestar]

70. +1

I had a friend once who boasted of never voting, and I never could figure out why he was so proud of that and thought he was so cool due to it. But that's a good point.

[ProudLib72]

71. Do you think it's down to a person's age or the campaign rhetoric

If you had a friend who thought this way, then it suggests the idea has been around for some time and has nothing to do with the campaign. Remember when "Rock the Vote" got started in 1990? Perhaps we need something to replace it, a pro-vote campaign that is up to date.

BTW: I'm not saying that Rock the Vote isn't still actively pursuing young voters. What I mean is that young voters might be more responsive to a brand spanking new campaign because they can claim ownership of it. It's just a thought.

[treestar]

72. Yes good idea

It was someone under 30.

[NCDem777]

69. Give them something to vote FOR rather than against

From what I saw, most of Hillary's ads were focused more on Trump than they were on Hillary. About how Trump was awful (and don't get me wrong he is) but spent little time talking about herself in comparison. Maybe there is a reason for this, but regardless it gave Orange Foolius more exposure.

"I'm not the other guy" is not a good selling point even if the other guy is Orange Foolius.

[LittleBlue]

74. Will you give her a fair grade? Just leave it alone. Politics don't belong in the classroom.

I was always annoyed when my professors made political statements in class. One was ex-military who voiced support for Oliver North during the Contra Affair. I knew from that moment that I would risk getting graded down for disagreeing with him.

I've always viewed airing political alignment in the classroom as an unspoken threat against students who disagree. TBH if that guy had given me less than an A I would have filed a complain against him with the school, the same as I'd advise that student to do to you if you give her a low grade. The fact that this is eating at you makes me question whether she will receive a fair grade. Let it go and don't punish her for thinking differently than you.

[ProudLib72]

75. Be assured that I definitely do NOT hold it against her

My point was that she represented a lot of young voters, so I understand it's not just her. The only question I asked the students was whether or not they voted, and that was because of the registration table set up in the hall a few feet away from the classroom. The rest of the information was provided freely and without any prompting from me. The only other time I have brought the subject up was last year during the elections, and that was to encourage students to vote. I was very careful not to betray my personal opinions of the candidates.

I DON'T want to know my students' political affiliation or views because I want to avoid bias.

[Eliot Rosewater]

77. I dont see even an INKLING of the poster saying that

[LisaM]

81. Politics doesn't belong in the classroom, but discussing civic responsibilty sure does.

It's mind-boggling to me that anyone can absolve themselves of non participation in a democracy.

[Eliot Rosewater]

76. Big problem, they have been convinced that they only need to vote when a candidate

is perfect.

Problem is there are none of those and never have been.

We all know better, we know you take what you can get, etc.

[ProudLib72]

78. Look up at my post 50 about Obama as a messiah

It's a two-fold problem.

1. They have been living under Obama for their adult lives and haven't known how bad it can get. These guys were born in the late 90s, so that would have been Clinton. They were very young through W, so they really only remember Obama as adults.

2. Obama had awesome messaging, and coming after W he must have seemed like a messiah. We didn't have that with HRC because we didn't have a horrible administration before her. It was like she was supposed to at least live up to Obama if not surpass him. In other words, he was a tough act to follow.

Combine those two, and you get something like, "Government runs well enough and I don't see such a huge difference between the two candidates. I'm not excited to vote for someone, so I can just leave it alone and trust that everything will run smoothly."

Under W I had several anti-Bush bumper stickers on my car. Under Dotard, I am afraid to put bumper stickers on my car. That's maybe a subtle difference the kids don't understand.

[Eliot Rosewater]

79. Most voters under 25 are voting for the first time I think and they were

convinced that perfection is required, so to speak.

For the first time in my life we have a very popular candidate saying the DEMOCRAT was no good, cant be trusted, status quo, etc.

These youngsters bought that, and they still do.

We are discussing the future and the future is dreadful if these youngsters arent advised differently.

[ProudLib72]

84. Ok, let's suppose the difference is the crap from the other side

Our messaging was the same. That, then, gets back to my main point about the disinformation/smear campaign run by Dotard's side being much more powerful than we have been giving it credit for. I don't know the answer for combating it. Do we run a smear campaign of our own? Do we sue the MSM for running the lies? Do we step up our messaging to drown out the other side? There are so many possibilities, but none of them are tested and we don't have a guarantee. We could just be wasting time and money with whatever strategy we choose.

I would love to have a serious discussion with my students, but that is unethical and dangerous. I could get in trouble. The school could get in trouble. So we need to find a substitute authority figure, one that is trusted and respected, to advise them differently. And we need to figure out the proper platform for such an authority figure to use to disseminate the message.