In all fairness, we Trump supporters do not want to be sore winners, so we should set a time limit on our triumph. I propose three years.
In that spirit, let’s enjoy the Never Trumpers’ tweets leading up to Trump’s election night triumph. Now that I’ve had time for a full-blown archaeological dig, I can present a whole fresh trove of self-righteous idiocy.
Save this column to share with your children, and they with their children, for many years to come.
(Language Warning)
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— PATTON OSWALT: The Comedian Who Realized He Wasn’t Really all this comical and decided to try his hand at political commentary instead.
His tweets are a perfect time capsule of Never Trump supporters’ confidence that Hillary would win — which soon turned to bitter recriminations.
The day before the election, Oswalt was mean and nasty, but his mood changed as the election results came in:
NOVEMBER 7:
@pattonoswalt Every craft cocktail bar in Williamsburg is trying to create the “mazel tov cocktail” right now.
@pattonoswalt Someone make this drink ASAP. This is what we should toast to tomorrow.
NOVEMBER 8:
@pattonoswalt This is the latest feeble folly of the Trump campaign that has been crushed. It’s over, Donny. Get ready.
@pattonoswalt Oh my god, that LAUGHTER when he shows up. “He’ll lose!” It’s all over, Don. #Elections2016
NOVEMBER 8 — LATER:
@pattonoswalt Come on Broward County! Rub your Democratic crotch into the stripper pole of freedom! #Florida #ElectionNight
@pattonoswalt f*ckf*ckf*ckf*ckf*ckF*CKF*CKF*CKF*CK #ElectionNight (My stars.)
@pattonoswalt EVERY EXPERT ON EVERY NETWORK IS TERRIFIED NOW. AND EVERY ONE OF THEM MADE THIS HAPPEN. #Elections2016
NOVEMBER 8 – MUCH LATER:
@pattonoswalt Hey Chris Matthews, Trump didn’t “get” people’s feelings. He EXPLOITED them. He HATES people. #ElectionNight
@pattonoswalt Oh, FUCK YOU Brit Hume. Don’t pretend you were the only one who opposed Trump. F*ck you. #ElectionNight [Again, asterisks, mine.]
(Brit Hume was clearly anti-Trump from start to finish.)
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— POLITICAL CONSULTANTS
My favorite tweets come from Republican political consultants who have made millions of dollars over the years to transform the Republican Party into a miniature fringe party, as exemplified by the election results below:
1992: Republican Party loses to draft-dodging troublemaker.
1996: The Republican Party loses to a draft-dodging troublemaker who tried to destroy health care.
2000: The Republican Party narrowly wins an election that is so close it isn’t decided until December.
2004: A wartime Republican Party president wins the presidential election, almost losing to a gigolo.
2006: The Republican Party loses both houses of Congress in a historic victory after the Republican president makes amnesty a key part of his second term.
2012: The Republican Party loses the election to a president who destroyed healthcare, led a disastrous intervention in Libya that killed our ambassador, and appointed Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court.
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— MIKE MURPHY: Highly paid Republican Party campaign consultant who helped Jeb! raise $150 million from gullible donors to win four (4) delegates.
NOVEMBER 5:
In response to “But what happens if he loses?”
@murphymike: A howl of rage so raucous you don’t need a TV to hear it from 200 miles away. #LookingForward #Earmuffs
In response to John Noonan’s tweet: “I can’t remember how many times people like @stuartpstevens @murphymike have warned the Republican Party about the millions of new Latino voters”
@murphymike: Indeed.
@murphymike Oh, I think I know what the outcome of a Jeb vs. HRC match would be in Florida… and eight other key states.
(Yes, Jeb! was a political juggernaut. If only he had some money to get through the primaries!)
NOVEMBER 6:
@murphymike My large prediction: I think FL will win quickly; that will be clear in the early numbers. Then cable news will do a huge 180 on the “long night.”
@murphymike I’m still not convinced he’ll win Ohio. If today’s WSJ/NBC numbers are correct, I think he’ll lose Ohio. Plus FL, etc.
@murphymike The real media bias is not about Democrats or Republicans, but about the breathtaking horse race… even if the basic facts are to the contrary.
@murphymike That Hart/POS RV poll is the one I always take the most seriously. For the millionth time Trump will lose. FL/NC will go relatively quickly.
@murphymike Prediction: HRC win in Florida will make network execs say “nobody saw this coming,” when in fact their Trump exaggeration was flawed from the start.
NOVEMBER 7:
“Elwood” tweets to Mike: “Well Mike, if you can’t see your work being done, we can’t help you!! We hope you get airtime for how wrong you were!”
@murphymike Oh Elwood. I’ll be thinking of you tomorrow night when the networks call Florida at 9pm for Clinton and end this Trump nightmare.
NOVEMBER 8:
In response to “Do you think Trump will win?”
@murphymike: No. Although I will say FL is closer than I and many FL hackers thought.
In response to: “Still think Trump will lose?”
@murphymike: Yes
@murphymike I believed in data in politics for 30 years and the data died tonight. I couldn’t have been more wrong about this election.
(Unfortunately, Mike got his “data” from The New York Times, the GOP’s best friend in the whole wide world. That’s where Mike got the radiant idea to have Jeb! babble in Spanish and call illegal immigration an “act of love.”)
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— STUART STEVENS: Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign think tank, whose outreach to the Latino community resulted in fewer Latino votes than Trump, while he lost the white vote to Obama in five states.
NOVEMBER 6:
@stuartpstevens Fascinating article. But if Trump is so good at media, why is he the most unpopular candidate in current history?
@stuartpstevens A fresh NBC/WSJ poll shows Trump is on track to become the first Republican to lose educated whites since FDR. Goldwater won them.
(Trump won among white, educated people.)
@stuartpstevens A quick look at the future of Trump’s party: Every 4 years, the electorate becomes 2% less white and 4% less white with high school or less education.
(Maybe the Republican Party should stop pushing policies that make people less white.)
@stuartpstevens (Replying to Corey Lewandowski) Give it 48 hours to get bitter. Gotta keep the momentum going.
@stuartpstevens (About Trump) The world is full of die-hard losers who want to settle scores for their losses. He can solve that with shuffleboard.
NOVEMBER 7:
@stuartpstevens It seems the “elite” are all those who won the election.
(What Stuart Stevens didn’t do.)
@stuartpstevens It’s not an encouraging statistic that Trump is losing every demographic group in the country that is developing. From college-educated whites to Latinos.
(Again, mistake, mistake, mistake for both whites and Latinos.)
@stuartpstevens One of the key differences between Clinton and Trump: The Clinton world understands that rallies are about who watches them on TV, not the crowd.
(Hillary wasn’t strategically trying to avoid drawing huge crowds: she couldn’t get them. Apparently, crowd size mattered.)
@stuartpstevens Whoever you support, the professionalism and consistency of the Clinton campaign is impressive. They are professionals. @AdamParkhomenko
(Stevens tagged his longtime Hillary aide in that tweet, so perhaps deep down he knew no one in the Republican Party would hire him again.)
NOVEMBER 8:
@stuartpstevens Trump burned down the house to get more non-college educated men to come to his side. He did no better than Romney and worse with every other group.
(Preliminary exit polls show Trump doing MUCH better than Romney not only among non-college educated men, but also among Latinos, African Americans, and Asians.)
** ** **
Today, Mike Murphy sits alone and plays Jenga with piles of cash looted from corporate donors ($150 million wasted entirely), while a bewildered Stuart Stevens wanders the streets of Manhattan, window shopping, and daydreaming about the fancy suit he’ll wear to Romney’s inauguration.
