What exactly are we protesting at this stage? The fact that we ran a shitty candidate again? That we didn’t have a choice in the primaries? That not enough of us could be convinced that this election was important enough?
Or is it that we’re protesting only in the blue states or cities where it seems unfair to be governed by the will of the hillbilly underbelly.
He won. The DNC is to blame. Biden is also to blame for failing to keep his promise of being a one term president. Kamala did her best, but it was hubris to think this country would elect a Black-Asian woman.
I’m sure the DNC will learn SO much from its mistakes this time.
Our side did a horrific job and we were beset by bad decisions and a terrible starting point. Everyone might be having a massive dose of copium with their coffee, but ignoring the mistakes means we’re destined to repeat them.
I don’t know if the point of view of a foreigner is welcomed or relevant but hey, you know, American politics invites itself too much into European politics so I’ll give my opinion anyway.
we ran a shitty candidate again?
A week ago, Harris was hailed like the second coming of Christ and now she is the cause of the fall of USA into fascism. The dumb personification in US politics is super tiring.
He won. The DNC is to blame.
No, the half of your country that is fine with fascism is to blame. The issue is not with democrats or the DNC, it is the fact that Trump’s numbers are very stable despite all the bullshit he does and say. The DNC is the tool to motivate the other half of the electorate, but don’t lose sight of the half that is responsible for it.
What exactly are we protesting at this stage?
A protest has two functions: showing discontent to the rulers but also to meet, organize and network in order to resist. A protest is a social gathering where people who care enough about issues to come and spend a whole day on it can meet each other.
Or is it that we’re protesting only in the blue states or cities where it seems unfair to be governed by the will of the hillbilly underbelly.
To know the theme, you had to be there. The media NEVER represents a protest accurately.
If you really believe that Trump is going to install a fascist dictatorship, you are supposed to start organize the resistance.
I don’t think you fully grasp the dynamics, but from an outside perspective I’m sure it’s difficult to truly appreciate.
The DNC must be held responsible, because the establishment politicians completely control the narrative. And, except for the ridiculously stacked Covid election in 2020, they have lost 3 times in a row. If dem leadership is never held accountable for their mistakes leading to election losses, then they will never be able to right the ship and gain any real power or momentum. They are not owed our votes - they must effectively campaign to win them. That’s politics.
Unfortunately, as Nancy Pelosi is so fond of saying, Dems prefer to “lean to the green.” They chase corporate donations above all else, and garner voter apathy and disdain as a result. America has nobody (save Bernie Sanders) who fights for the working class now. Unfortunately, Trump at least has the political wherewithal to pretend to be a populist, and says things that trick people into voting for him. The Dems can’t even do that. Trump lost votes compared to last time because he’s a criminal fascist buffoon, to the tune of over 2 million votes. Harris lost many more, over 10 million compared to 2020, because she abandoned the working class and refused to even do so much as call Israelis genocidal. Hell, she was a straight up war hawk in her dem convention speech - dems are supposed to be the anti war party!
So yeah, it’s wrong to blame the voters, the fault lies squarely with Dem leadership if for anything else because they have all the power. Dem voters are sick of getting screwed for over 40 years now, and many repug voters simply want to burn it all down. This is the end result of total corporate capture of government and late stage capitalism, massive problems which far transcend individual voters who may or may not be faced with apathy over a brutal system which consistently fails them.
I don’t think you fully grasp the dynamics, but from an outside perspective I’m sure it’s difficult to truly appreciate.
Quite honestly, I often think that Americans are more confused about their own politics than the rest of the world.
I do believe the working class would be better off with Bernie Sanders than Harris, but also better off with Harris than Trump. That’s fairly obvious. So why do you believe that being more pro-working-class would help Harris win their vote?
The working class does not care about the working class. That’s the thing. The main error of the left is to not own medias like conservatives do to aggressively push their views.
And I wish at one point progressives will try to reconquer the conservative electorate instead of infighting.
The main error of the left is to not own medias like conservatives do to aggressively push their views.
You’re right in that Dems are terrible on messaging. They really suck at it. But, Dems are center right. To call them “left” is just a fallacy these days, just look at their policy proposals if you can get past the identity politics bs to find them. I don’t agree that corporate news media is the answer. Look at what happened with CNN for example…corporations can be bought and quickly transformed to suit the new owners.
The working class does not care about the working class.
This is the exact kind of elitist bile Dems spew which turns off voters. Of course the working class cares deeply about their social and economic well being. Unfortunately, nobody in power does. Why should they, after all? Nobody they interact with on a daily basis suffers the plight of the working class citizenry. Still, paid family leave, universal federal background checks, child tax credit, Medicare for all - these are all insanely popular policies which poll at 60-90%+ approval ratings. Why do the Dems refuse to run on these issues? Because their donors pay them not to.
It is not messaging. The messaging of conservatives is terrible too. It is about owning media to play the propaganda game. Policies are irrelevant, image is everything.
Of course the working class cares deeply about their social and economic well being.
They vote opposite to that. I know it sounds elitist, but it is also factual: someone poor who votes for Trump votes against their interests and does so out of ignorance.
Why do the Dems refuse to run on these issues?
They don’t?. See, they did not shout their message loud enough if you haven’t heard it. There is not a single “identity politics” item, that’s how conservatives have framed this and that’s their message you imprinted.
So fuck the platform, the same would have happened with Sanders. The problem is that the message is not being placarded loud enough into social media, TV, newspapers, that not enough people get bribed to tell voters they are stupid if they don’t vote for dems.
The gloves should have been taken off a while ago. The battlefield is the widely ignorant voter population. Either you find a way to educate them or you accept to play the propaganda game.
They are not owed our votes - they must effectively campaign to win them. That’s politics.
You aren’t owed life, or shelter, food every day, or freedom from imprisonment from no reason. Or from torture. Nobody outside yourself has any obligation to create for you a system that you like.
We made all this up, all this justice, flawed or not. We create it every day. Except now it might be about to go away. We either get together and create and sustain it, or it can blow away like a fart in the wind.
That’s realpolitik. Welcome to it, and congratulations.
No, the half of your country that is fine with fascism is too blame.
*Also to blame.
A week ago, Harris was hailed like the second coming of Christ and now the cause of the fall of USA into Fascism.
Not by all of us. I didn’t want her in 2020, either. She’s a glorified cop. Example: as a DA, how many people did she imprison for marijuana charges? But then she ran on legalization? I know there’s more to this and nuance is everything, but that hypocrisy is and example.
Applying the law but wanting it to change is what is called “rule of law” and democracy. Not understanding it is a part of what makes it so easy to slide into fascism.
“Nuance” my ass. Expecting a DA to follow its conviction instead of the law is the opposite of what you want.
That’s what I was getting at. Frankly, I wouldn’t want a DA or any cop-adjacent to run the country. Better her than the Orange Turd, but I’m splitting hairs here.
Anyone should have been a shoe-in against him. But they weren’t. She wasn’t. It wasn’t a single factor. We will scream until we’re blue in the face, pun intended, but in the end, the Dems fucked this.
The candidate they ran was not better than Trump at connecting with the populace. As a result, we got a false populist.
The time for infighting is done. I don’t see what complaining about the DNC accomplishes at this stage.
I think you can apply the same thing to anyone from the DNC who wants to talk about Latino or Arab voters who didn’t vote for the Democrat. It’s all just irrelevant at this point. It’s solidarity and survival time. I don’t care whether you think it’s this person’s fault or this other person’s fault.
Thank you for saying this, shout it out. An overwhelming amount of white people voted for trump plus they did some legal election fuckery. I really think the promoting of infighting is for people to not to see above the clouds. Please don’t fall for infighting (not you OP).
Respectfully, now is exactly the time for introspection. And even blame. It’s over, there’s nothing at stake. Like Bernie, I disagreed with Harris on some things, but I thought she was an overall great candidate running a difficult campaign in an unfairly short window. So I fell in line. I talked to people (gross), I donated, I voted.
There’s plenty of blame to go around. The Harris/Democratic Party/Biden aren’t perfect, but voters still had a chance to stop Trump & Project 2025 and we failed miserably. So no, I don’t think it’s infighting to admit this shit isn’t working…
Stating it now gets our anger pointed at the people responsible for our loss so that next time, they don’t repeat the mistakes of 2016, almost 2020, and now 2024.
We need reform if we’re going to maintain a two-party system.
Good news! Trump is planning to point a huge amount of anger at the Democrats as soon as he gets into office. Jack Smith, Joe Biden, Laetitia James, and who knows who else will probably get federal charges which will probably succeed.
I’m glad to hear you are united with that anger. I’m sure it will help us maintain the two-party system. What’s your next step, once those obstacles to the two-party system are cleared out of the way?
And how exactly do we save democracy? By overthrowing the Democratic process because we do not like the outcome? Remember that this is the first time in the past 30 years a Republican president did not only won the election, but the popular vote as well.
There were a lot of warning signs that Harris wasn’t doing so well. Democrats just didn’t want to admit it out of fear that would discourage people to vote for her.
Absolutely not. Plenty of people, a hell of a lot of people, were very bothered by that shenanigan. It turns out that shouting people down instead of listening to them doesn’t win popularity contests.
A lot of us have been quite vocal about that failing for over a year now. Say what you like but if you’re implying Trump was the only one upset about that you’re dead wrong.
I get why people are upset with the DNC, but it’s supposed to be a representative Democracy. I am exasperated, betrayed, depressed, and more about this election, but the reality is that near 40% of the voting eligible population didn’t vote. That’s 93 million people who didn’t vote. You can say it’s disenfranchised voters. You can blame leadership. But it’s our house. It’s our responsibility to elect our representatives.
Except the DNC chooses the candidate. HRC bought her way into the candidacy by paying off the debt of the DNC in 2016 with the help of Donna Brasil and Debbie Wasserman Schultz supplanting the movement toward a true populist, Bernie.
Again, in 2020, the DNC encouraged everyone to drop out, including Kamala, to support Biden over Bernie, because the DNC will never get behind a true Progressive.
Never underestimate the DNC’s ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Not saying there wasn’t a spike in people searching if Biden dropped out, but a spike of approx 100 searches isn’t really that significant.
Similarly, I looked at the “can I change my vote” trend that I’ve seen reported, and again it was 1000 searches (if you’re generous) and was pretty much entirely on election day. Which to me would indicate was more people who voted early wondering if they could change their vote on election day.
Don’t get me wrong, I would love if there was something to blame to make me feel better about sharing a democracy with a bunch of hateful morons, but even trying to find evidence to convince myself that they are more dumb/uninformed than hateful isn’t turning up much.
Idk where you get the idea it is hillbillies supporting trump. 57% of white people (inb4 white women try not to take any credit, 53% of them) voted for Trump. Less than 20% of the entire US population is rural, that 97% of land. It’s the majority of white people, which is why turn out for everyone else (except Latino men, they have their heads up their ass too) is always so damn important to stop white supremacy and fascism. If turn out dips in any other major demographic, this the result we get. The fascists know this, which is why voter suppression is always a top agenda item for them at the state and local level.
I was using it as slander, not literally. They might as well be yokels for being so blind or misled to the snake oil they were peddled.
I am a Latino male, FYI. Cuban heritage. I cannot grasp why so many Latino males voted for them. As I told my family, as far as the GOP are concerned 🇵🇷 == 🇨🇺. We are “the help.” “Less than,” as it were.
Idk what’s going on in the Latino community that 60% of Latino men went for Trump, but that’s what happened. It isn’t just the Cuban community, they are nowhere large enough to make those kind of numbers. I know certain religions beliefs probably played a large role, but I’m almost wondering if a bunch of weirdo white dudes just identified as Latino trump supporters in exit polls. It isn’t like they haven’t been caught masquerading as other groups; “blacks, Latinos, gays, etc. For trump.” Only to turn out to be just a bunch straight white folks astroturfing.
I don’t either. My girlfriend is Mexican. In MX, they despise Trump, but if they are here and Latino, they support him. I know two dudes, both Mexican, one an immigrant and the other from Texas who voted for him.
The latter was getting in peoples’ faces about it and celebrating obnoxiously at the bar where we all gathered to watch the results. I’m in Seattle.
That spot on Texan behavior, regardless of what other identies/cultures they may have, lol. I find the trump supporters that are aggressive and angry about it are usually the ones who WON’T articulate why that is, and therefore usually terrible people and only trying to reveal that part to other verified cult members. He is a potentially dangerous person, don’t let your guard down, especially around anyone or anything vulnerable.
What exactly are we protesting at this stage? The fact that we ran a shitty candidate again? That we didn’t have a choice in the primaries? That not enough of us could be convinced that this election was important enough?
Or is it that we’re protesting only in the blue states or cities where it seems unfair to be governed by the will of the hillbilly underbelly.
He won. The DNC is to blame. Biden is also to blame for failing to keep his promise of being a one term president. Kamala did her best, but it was hubris to think this country would elect a Black-Asian woman.
I’m sure the DNC will learn SO much from its mistakes this time.
Edit: case in point for all you downvotes: https://www.latintimes.com/did-joe-biden-drop-out-google-trends-presidential-election-trump-harris-564875
Our side did a horrific job and we were beset by bad decisions and a terrible starting point. Everyone might be having a massive dose of copium with their coffee, but ignoring the mistakes means we’re destined to repeat them.
reflecting is important.
I don’t know if the point of view of a foreigner is welcomed or relevant but hey, you know, American politics invites itself too much into European politics so I’ll give my opinion anyway.
A week ago, Harris was hailed like the second coming of Christ and now she is the cause of the fall of USA into fascism. The dumb personification in US politics is super tiring.
No, the half of your country that is fine with fascism is to blame. The issue is not with democrats or the DNC, it is the fact that Trump’s numbers are very stable despite all the bullshit he does and say. The DNC is the tool to motivate the other half of the electorate, but don’t lose sight of the half that is responsible for it.
A protest has two functions: showing discontent to the rulers but also to meet, organize and network in order to resist. A protest is a social gathering where people who care enough about issues to come and spend a whole day on it can meet each other.
To know the theme, you had to be there. The media NEVER represents a protest accurately.
If you really believe that Trump is going to install a fascist dictatorship, you are supposed to start organize the resistance.
I don’t think you fully grasp the dynamics, but from an outside perspective I’m sure it’s difficult to truly appreciate.
The DNC must be held responsible, because the establishment politicians completely control the narrative. And, except for the ridiculously stacked Covid election in 2020, they have lost 3 times in a row. If dem leadership is never held accountable for their mistakes leading to election losses, then they will never be able to right the ship and gain any real power or momentum. They are not owed our votes - they must effectively campaign to win them. That’s politics.
Unfortunately, as Nancy Pelosi is so fond of saying, Dems prefer to “lean to the green.” They chase corporate donations above all else, and garner voter apathy and disdain as a result. America has nobody (save Bernie Sanders) who fights for the working class now. Unfortunately, Trump at least has the political wherewithal to pretend to be a populist, and says things that trick people into voting for him. The Dems can’t even do that. Trump lost votes compared to last time because he’s a criminal fascist buffoon, to the tune of over 2 million votes. Harris lost many more, over 10 million compared to 2020, because she abandoned the working class and refused to even do so much as call Israelis genocidal. Hell, she was a straight up war hawk in her dem convention speech - dems are supposed to be the anti war party!
So yeah, it’s wrong to blame the voters, the fault lies squarely with Dem leadership if for anything else because they have all the power. Dem voters are sick of getting screwed for over 40 years now, and many repug voters simply want to burn it all down. This is the end result of total corporate capture of government and late stage capitalism, massive problems which far transcend individual voters who may or may not be faced with apathy over a brutal system which consistently fails them.
Quite honestly, I often think that Americans are more confused about their own politics than the rest of the world.
I do believe the working class would be better off with Bernie Sanders than Harris, but also better off with Harris than Trump. That’s fairly obvious. So why do you believe that being more pro-working-class would help Harris win their vote?
The working class does not care about the working class. That’s the thing. The main error of the left is to not own medias like conservatives do to aggressively push their views.
And I wish at one point progressives will try to reconquer the conservative electorate instead of infighting.
You’re right in that Dems are terrible on messaging. They really suck at it. But, Dems are center right. To call them “left” is just a fallacy these days, just look at their policy proposals if you can get past the identity politics bs to find them. I don’t agree that corporate news media is the answer. Look at what happened with CNN for example…corporations can be bought and quickly transformed to suit the new owners.
This is the exact kind of elitist bile Dems spew which turns off voters. Of course the working class cares deeply about their social and economic well being. Unfortunately, nobody in power does. Why should they, after all? Nobody they interact with on a daily basis suffers the plight of the working class citizenry. Still, paid family leave, universal federal background checks, child tax credit, Medicare for all - these are all insanely popular policies which poll at 60-90%+ approval ratings. Why do the Dems refuse to run on these issues? Because their donors pay them not to.
It is not messaging. The messaging of conservatives is terrible too. It is about owning media to play the propaganda game. Policies are irrelevant, image is everything.
They vote opposite to that. I know it sounds elitist, but it is also factual: someone poor who votes for Trump votes against their interests and does so out of ignorance.
They don’t?. See, they did not shout their message loud enough if you haven’t heard it. There is not a single “identity politics” item, that’s how conservatives have framed this and that’s their message you imprinted.
So fuck the platform, the same would have happened with Sanders. The problem is that the message is not being placarded loud enough into social media, TV, newspapers, that not enough people get bribed to tell voters they are stupid if they don’t vote for dems.
The gloves should have been taken off a while ago. The battlefield is the widely ignorant voter population. Either you find a way to educate them or you accept to play the propaganda game.
You aren’t owed life, or shelter, food every day, or freedom from imprisonment from no reason. Or from torture. Nobody outside yourself has any obligation to create for you a system that you like.
We made all this up, all this justice, flawed or not. We create it every day. Except now it might be about to go away. We either get together and create and sustain it, or it can blow away like a fart in the wind.
That’s realpolitik. Welcome to it, and congratulations.
I agree with what you said in this block.
*Also to blame.
Not by all of us. I didn’t want her in 2020, either. She’s a glorified cop. Example: as a DA, how many people did she imprison for marijuana charges? But then she ran on legalization? I know there’s more to this and nuance is everything, but that hypocrisy is and example.
Applying the law but wanting it to change is what is called “rule of law” and democracy. Not understanding it is a part of what makes it so easy to slide into fascism.
“Nuance” my ass. Expecting a DA to follow its conviction instead of the law is the opposite of what you want.
That’s what I was getting at. Frankly, I wouldn’t want a DA or any cop-adjacent to run the country. Better her than the Orange Turd, but I’m splitting hairs here.
Anyone should have been a shoe-in against him. But they weren’t. She wasn’t. It wasn’t a single factor. We will scream until we’re blue in the face, pun intended, but in the end, the Dems fucked this.
The candidate they ran was not better than Trump at connecting with the populace. As a result, we got a false populist.
A female DA against a rapist who should be in jail. I don’t know in what universe it wasnt a good match.
Ours. You’re in it.
We are protesting the end of American democracy.
The time for infighting is done. I don’t see what complaining about the DNC accomplishes at this stage.
I think you can apply the same thing to anyone from the DNC who wants to talk about Latino or Arab voters who didn’t vote for the Democrat. It’s all just irrelevant at this point. It’s solidarity and survival time. I don’t care whether you think it’s this person’s fault or this other person’s fault.
Thank you for saying this, shout it out. An overwhelming amount of white people voted for trump plus they did some legal election fuckery. I really think the promoting of infighting is for people to not to see above the clouds. Please don’t fall for infighting (not you OP).
Respectfully, now is exactly the time for introspection. And even blame. It’s over, there’s nothing at stake. Like Bernie, I disagreed with Harris on some things, but I thought she was an overall great candidate running a difficult campaign in an unfairly short window. So I fell in line. I talked to people (gross), I donated, I voted.
There’s plenty of blame to go around. The Harris/Democratic Party/Biden aren’t perfect, but voters still had a chance to stop Trump & Project 2025 and we failed miserably. So no, I don’t think it’s infighting to admit this shit isn’t working…
Stating it now gets our anger pointed at the people responsible for our loss so that next time, they don’t repeat the mistakes of 2016, almost 2020, and now 2024.
We need reform if we’re going to maintain a two-party system.
Good news! Trump is planning to point a huge amount of anger at the Democrats as soon as he gets into office. Jack Smith, Joe Biden, Laetitia James, and who knows who else will probably get federal charges which will probably succeed.
I’m glad to hear you are united with that anger. I’m sure it will help us maintain the two-party system. What’s your next step, once those obstacles to the two-party system are cleared out of the way?
Oh, you think there’s going to be a next time.
Not really
And how exactly do we save democracy? By overthrowing the Democratic process because we do not like the outcome? Remember that this is the first time in the past 30 years a Republican president did not only won the election, but the popular vote as well.
There is no way to save democracy now.
Up until 5 days ago the only person pushing the talking point that there wasn’t a DNC primary was Donald Trump. Just sayin’
There were a lot of warning signs that Harris wasn’t doing so well. Democrats just didn’t want to admit it out of fear that would discourage people to vote for her.
Absolutely not. Plenty of people, a hell of a lot of people, were very bothered by that shenanigan. It turns out that shouting people down instead of listening to them doesn’t win popularity contests.
A lot of us have been quite vocal about that failing for over a year now. Say what you like but if you’re implying Trump was the only one upset about that you’re dead wrong.
That’s absolutely not true. I was angry not to have a choice from the start.
Then, due to some bullshit rules, there wasn’t even an open candidacy vote at the convention.
Get mad and indignant all you want, but we had no choice this election. It was Biden or Harris. Nothing else was close to viable.
I get why people are upset with the DNC, but it’s supposed to be a representative Democracy. I am exasperated, betrayed, depressed, and more about this election, but the reality is that near 40% of the voting eligible population didn’t vote. That’s 93 million people who didn’t vote. You can say it’s disenfranchised voters. You can blame leadership. But it’s our house. It’s our responsibility to elect our representatives.
Except the DNC chooses the candidate. HRC bought her way into the candidacy by paying off the debt of the DNC in 2016 with the help of Donna Brasil and Debbie Wasserman Schultz supplanting the movement toward a true populist, Bernie.
Again, in 2020, the DNC encouraged everyone to drop out, including Kamala, to support Biden over Bernie, because the DNC will never get behind a true Progressive.
Never underestimate the DNC’s ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Not saying there wasn’t a spike in people searching if Biden dropped out, but a spike of approx 100 searches isn’t really that significant.
Similarly, I looked at the “can I change my vote” trend that I’ve seen reported, and again it was 1000 searches (if you’re generous) and was pretty much entirely on election day. Which to me would indicate was more people who voted early wondering if they could change their vote on election day.
Don’t get me wrong, I would love if there was something to blame to make me feel better about sharing a democracy with a bunch of hateful morons, but even trying to find evidence to convince myself that they are more dumb/uninformed than hateful isn’t turning up much.
You can’t disprove a negative.
Idk where you get the idea it is hillbillies supporting trump. 57% of white people (inb4 white women try not to take any credit, 53% of them) voted for Trump. Less than 20% of the entire US population is rural, that 97% of land. It’s the majority of white people, which is why turn out for everyone else (except Latino men, they have their heads up their ass too) is always so damn important to stop white supremacy and fascism. If turn out dips in any other major demographic, this the result we get. The fascists know this, which is why voter suppression is always a top agenda item for them at the state and local level.
I was using it as slander, not literally. They might as well be yokels for being so blind or misled to the snake oil they were peddled.
I am a Latino male, FYI. Cuban heritage. I cannot grasp why so many Latino males voted for them. As I told my family, as far as the GOP are concerned 🇵🇷 == 🇨🇺. We are “the help.” “Less than,” as it were.
Fuck the GOP.
Idk what’s going on in the Latino community that 60% of Latino men went for Trump, but that’s what happened. It isn’t just the Cuban community, they are nowhere large enough to make those kind of numbers. I know certain religions beliefs probably played a large role, but I’m almost wondering if a bunch of weirdo white dudes just identified as Latino trump supporters in exit polls. It isn’t like they haven’t been caught masquerading as other groups; “blacks, Latinos, gays, etc. For trump.” Only to turn out to be just a bunch straight white folks astroturfing.
I don’t either. My girlfriend is Mexican. In MX, they despise Trump, but if they are here and Latino, they support him. I know two dudes, both Mexican, one an immigrant and the other from Texas who voted for him.
The latter was getting in peoples’ faces about it and celebrating obnoxiously at the bar where we all gathered to watch the results. I’m in Seattle.
That spot on Texan behavior, regardless of what other identies/cultures they may have, lol. I find the trump supporters that are aggressive and angry about it are usually the ones who WON’T articulate why that is, and therefore usually terrible people and only trying to reveal that part to other verified cult members. He is a potentially dangerous person, don’t let your guard down, especially around anyone or anything vulnerable.
I pegged all that previously, so you’re not wrong. He was a bit off already. Then I learned he was a trumpanzee.