Willie, Willie, Willie!!

[hardnox]

So goes the mob's chant in the greatest American political novel, All the King's Men. Closely based on Louisiana Governor Huey Long, the folk have come out of the bayous and piney woods to stand outside the capitol as the legislator tries to impeach their champion, Governor Willie Stark.

Say what you will about Huey Long, he knew his people- was one of them. And he was deeply hated by the land baron and oil people who he soaked in order to pay for his public works (which he usually named after himself).

Say what you will about Donald Trump, there's no reliable evidence that he's ever rubbed shoulders with a single member of his White Working Class. Until now they've been an abstraction to be gamed for his own enrichment.

We'll see.

[hardnox]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huey_Long

Worth a read by anyone.

I'd forgotten that Huey was going to take on FDR in '36 with the help of Father Coughlin. That ought to perk 3020's ears up.

[schnurrbart]

Read an article yesterday by some guy who says he is digging into the seemingly really strange vote numbers in several of the swing states. Haven't looked at them to see if he right or not. Clinton had overwhelming voter turn out and support in most of these states before the election. However, trump came up and won in 4-5 of the states by the almost exact 1% just enough to not trigger an automatic recount. This sigh of said it was virtually mathematically impossible to do so. He made sound like The Russian connection and the FBI director were very heavily involved -- reinvestigates 11 days out and the 4 days out said no problem but as kellianne said "the damage was done"! Interesting anyway.

[hardnox]

I'm far from convinced on all of that yet but it is fair to say that if we let Ohio stand in 2004* then we were asking for it to continue. the Anonymous story on blocking Rove's attempt to hack Ohio in 2012 has always seemed credible to me.

But I think the democrats have to come to terms with the likely fact that if they hadn't let the Hillarians screw Bernie the thing woudn't have been within hackable margin.

*moral of the story- if you're the guy who hacked an election, don't fly on small planes. There are other ways to kill you but that is an easy one.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Connell

Michael Louis Connell (November 30, 1963 – December 19, 2008) was a high-level Republican consultant who was subpoenaed in a case regarding alleged tampering with the 2004 U.S. Presidential election and a case involving thousands of missing emails pertaining to the political firing of U.S. Attorneys. Connell was killed when the plane he was flying crashed on December 19, 2008.