The valley need to get over themselves and learn to appreciate the lessons from the unlikely Trump victory.
Trump is the quintessential startup success story. Jump in the ring, breaks shit (always easier to ask for forgiveness than permission) then somehow makes his way to a hit product. He disrupted the business of politics much in the same way that uber disrupted the business of transportation.
Guess Peter Thiel really is the smartest guy in the valley after all.
Per Mark Cuban tweet (not a sv guy per se but still a voice representative of the community):
We all need to give President-Elect Trump a chance. Support the good. Lobby against what we disagree on. No one is bigger than us all
Having a population of idiots is not something Trump can claim responsibility for. He is simply an asshole who has exploited this for his own gains.
What exactly is there to learn from this? That democracy doesn't work when to large fraction of the electorate are ignorant fools.
The lesson should be a better school system for America. But of course that would not be in the interest of republicans. They rely on large number of idiots to win elections. So it is not going to happen.
They will make sure that there is an elite which gets good education which can run companies and create new ones. But there needs to be a large underclass of simpletons to keep the system going.
> Having a population of idiots is not something Trump can claim responsibility for.
> large fraction of the electorate are ignorant fools.
if you think the roughly half of all American voters that voted for trump are idiots or ignorant fools, than it is perhaps you that is the idiot. Simply by the law of large numbers there exists a significant number of them that are smarter and better educated that you are. Disparaging them as an lesser group is a dangerous way of thinking.
He did not say that all Trump voters are idiots or ignorant fools, he said a large fraction.
It is a fact that non-college-educated white voters overwhelmingly voted for Trump, while college-educated voters preferred Clinton. Not all college-educated persons are smarter than non-college-educated persons. But combined with the fact that 370 economists (among which 8 nobel prize winners) said not to vote for Trump, and newspapers overwhelmingly endorsed Clinton(243-20 [2]), it might be fair to say that most Trump voters are either not too bright or not very well-informed.
> the fact that 370 economists (among which 8 nobel prize winners) said not to vote for Trump, and newspapers overwhelmingly endorsed Clinton(243-20 [2]),
honestly who cares if 370 economists said not to vote for trump? Economics isn't a solved field and I'm willing to bet that there are an equal number of economists who can and have made the argument that voting for trump is better for the economy. and as for the newspaper endorsements, who cares what they think? Newspapers are increasingly irrelevant in this society. Why should I listen to the opinions of a newspaper's editorial board, say, over the opinions of a tv news network's editorial board? or the opinions of a blog writer? or a political cartoonist? there is nothing inherent in being a journalist that makes their recommendations carry more weight than the recommendations of any other profession.
> it might be fair to say that most Trump voters are either not too bright or not very well-informed.
This is absolutely not fair to say and it is intellectually dishonest to come to this conclusion. what does "not too bright" even mean? are you implying that half of america is too dumb and their voices should be silenced in the political sphere? sounds like tyranny to me.
> honestly who cares if 370 economists said not to vote for trump?
Maybe people having economical problems might have something to gain by listening to people who have studied economics?
> Economics isn't a solved field and I'm willing to bet that there are an equal number of economists who can and have made the argument that voting for trump is better for the economy.
Medicine is not a solved field either, but would you rather go to an MD or put your faith in witchcraft when you're ill?
If you look into it, I doubt you will find an equivalent group of economists making the pro-Trump argument. If you do, I would love to read their arguments.
> and as for the newspaper endorsements, who cares what they think? Newspapers are increasingly irrelevant in this society.
Newspapers might be becoming financially unviable, but for now they still do a reasonably good job of spreading more or less accurate information. They are not perfect, but they do try to check their sources and most at least try to give a balanced view. They also have a bit more time to prepare their stories compared to the relentless pace of cable news.
The fact that such an overwhelming group of well-informed people from across the political spectrum made a coherent case against Trump, should maybe have given you some pause.
> Why should I listen to the opinions of a newspaper's editorial board, say, over the opinions of a tv news network's editorial board? or the opinions of a blog writer? or a political cartoonist? there is nothing inherent in being a journalist that makes their recommendations carry more weight than the recommendations of any other profession.
Not all opinions are equivalent. Those endorsements by newspapers are made by a group of people who have discussed and thought about those endorsements for quite a bit. They have weighed the pros and cons. A lot of conservative papers knew they were going to lose a lot of subscriptions by not endorsing Trump, but did so anyway, sometimes braving death threats.
Some blog posts or cartoonists might be insightful, but most are not.
> This is absolutely not fair to say and it is intellectually dishonest to come to this conclusion. what does "not too bright" even mean? are you implying that half of america is too dumb and their voices should be silenced in the political sphere? sounds like tyranny to me.
You are putting words into my mouth. I never advocated for their voices to be silenced.
I apologise for calling people not too bright. But the fact that such a large part of the population voted for a person that will solve none of their economic problems but will exacerbate them, is hard to understand. I jumped to conclusions about their intelligence, there might be other explanations. I could be wrong about Trump too. I hope so. We shall see...
I asked some people in my circle who voted Trump, why?
2 votes that went Trump based purely on abortion & gay-marriage.
1 vote went Trump based purely on Obama-is-taking-away-our-guns-and-the-22-ammo-shortage-is-Obamas-fault-cuz-shortage-happened-during-obama. Seriously.
I read an Instagram post of an Georgia gal who voted Trump purely to get ACA repealed.
There appear to be a variety of reasons why people went Trump, but based on my very-small-sample I think there are significant portions of the population that are captured with the traditional positions.
These 3 aforementioned rural voters don't participate in any new media available on the internet and are traditional media (tv, newspaper) consumers. OTOH, the rest of us participating on the internet appear to be a much smaller demographic echo chamber...
Trump is the quintessential startup success story. Jump in the ring, breaks shit (always easier to ask for forgiveness than permission) then somehow makes his way to a hit product. He disrupted the business of politics much in the same way that uber disrupted the business of transportation.
Guess Peter Thiel really is the smartest guy in the valley after all.
Per Mark Cuban tweet (not a sv guy per se but still a voice representative of the community):
We all need to give President-Elect Trump a chance. Support the good. Lobby against what we disagree on. No one is bigger than us all