An Antidote to Post-Partisan Depression
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I
wasn’t going to write about the election at all this week. Not mind you for lack of things to say (but then you knew that). It’s just that it’s not the right time to write certain things; perhaps later but not now. But as the saying goes liftor b’velo klum i efshar to pass over last week’s events in total silence is impossible. And so here goes…
First to sum up what has transpired I quote National Review editor Rich Lowry adding only one sentence of my own:
It is simply one of the most extraordinary events in American electoral history for someone to come out of nowhere with no political experience with little or none of the usual elements of a political operation with a couple of the worst weeks in a general-election campaign in memory with almost all the national polls against him at the end to win the presidency… On this night even those of us who were skeptics have to tip their hats. What an achievement.
Yes Eibeshter there really is none like You.
Next on a personal note I want to begin by thanking Y.S. ofLakewood(you know who you are… I think) who way back in December 2014 informed us in the letters section of this very magazine that there was something called the “KOBRE ’16 Presidential Campaign.” It was Issue 538 — you could look it up as Leo Durocher used to say. (Actually I’ve got my legendary baseball managers mixed up; that was Casey Stengel’s line. Durocher said “nice guys finish last ” which I’d like to hope also describes my run for office.)
So I literally read about my candidacy in the papers. Story of my life: Whether it’s that dinner’s ready or that I’m running for president I’m always the last to find out.
With this Y.S. person as manager we ran probably the most successful stealth campaign in American political history. We were almost entirely under the radar except for the time someone recognized me on a Boro Park street and congratulated me on my campaign and flustered I had to sheepishly admit it existed. The pundits the pollsters the prognosticators they all said it couldn’t be done that without field offices and advertising and all the other trappings of conventional political operations we wouldn’t get a single solitary vote…
Which brings me to my next act a distinct honor and privilege and that is to thank my voter.
I’m particularly grateful for her support seeing as she lives inColumbus which made her write-in vote in the all-important swing state ofOhiotruly significant. In what those in the news business call an “unrelated development” she’s also my daughter. And although that means she’s actually not unrelated she’s certainly unbiased.
To her I say: “My fellow American thank you thank you thank you for your support your trust and your belief in me. And also can you please take all those tchotchkes gathering dust in the basement back home with you next time you come for Yom Tov?”
For those wondering why I was unable to get my spouse’s vote for a 100 percent increase in my totals it’s because she followed what she thought was the good advice of some column she read somewhere suggesting not to vote at all. Big mistake because I have it on good authority that all the author of that piece meant was that he wasn’t voting for the Democrat or Republican but had nothing against casting a vote for other presidential candidates like Mike Maturen running on the American Solidarity Party line or me running on the Black Hats Matter line (nor for those running for other offices down-ballot).
There’s no question it was a hard-fought campaign. I fought hard against the effort to put my name in contention. But in the end Y.S. ofLakewoodwon and I lost. Not to mention the voters. Before I knew what was happening my hat (and yarmulke) had been thrown into the ring and without a spare skullcap on hand (where’s Rabbi Grossman when you need him?) I was left with no choice but to run after it.
So there I was in the middle of the ring trying desperately to get my brand-new size 56 Borse back in shape. Actually this year there were three rings along with a bona fide carnival barker selling steaks or underwear or vodka I think. Or was it real-estate seminars for the small price of one’s life savings? We’ll find out at trial later this month.
And yet despite the odds (with names like Manafort Lewandowski and Stone) we persevered. We tried mightily to make this election a referendum on character two of whom were on the actual ballot and 140 of which were used by one of those candidates as his idea of a policy paper.
At this juncture I’d like to thank various people and organizations for their part in ensuring that the American tradition of a peaceful transfer of power has been maintained by enabling a Trump victory thereby averting the need for his minions to get violent or put the names and addresses ofClintonvoters on the Internet.
First of course to Mrs. Clinton for being the single weakest Democratic presidential candidate imaginable. But also for graciously conceding defeat to someone who refused to commit to doing the same to you. And for asking your supporters to give an “open mind and a chance to lead” to the man who promised to imprison you and whose supporters chanted “Lock her up!” the way they do it in Chavez’sVenezuela. That couldn’t have been easy for you.
To Evan McMullin (that’s a candidate not a new fast-food sandwich) for failing in your valiant drive to become the President of Utah. To Vladimir Putin for all your help in so many ways in trying to makeAmericagreat again. You are obviously a real American patriot.
To the IRS for not telling the American people that Trump was at liberty to release his tax returns despite any audits real or imagined and that the reason for those audits was not that as he put it he’s “a strong Christian.”
To the Electoral College which is poised to use the technical “laws of this country” to turn a loser of the popular vote into a winner much as a certain businessman “took advantage of the laws” four times to turn himself into a winner and his lenders workers and contractors into losers. Back at the Republican convention when delegates tried to use their party’s rules to give a loser of the popular primary vote a shot at the nomination they were threatened with visits to their hotel rooms. But hey that’s so July.
And to the parallel universes of the media: The left-wing one now suffering from cosmic whiplash after donating billions in free primary airtime to fatten Trump for his eventual ritual slaughter in the general — until the ox sprang free and turned to gore the shochet. And to right-wing media like Breitbart whose CEO finally just dropped the pretense and became the Trump Campaign’s CEO.
Whoever said people of widely divergent ideologies can’t work together to achieve common goals?
In closing the fact is that in the end we fell short of the votes needed and so it’s time for the painful but inevitable task of every losing candidate: the concession speech. I’ll make this brief. Those rumors that having lost my bid for a new day job inside1600 Pennsylvania Avenue I’m planning to open a kosher falafel stand right outside it: they’re just plain false. I will be making no such concession not there nor anywhere else. Period.
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