The Carter Family (no, not THAT Carter family) surfaces at the Associated Press offices

November 10, 2016: "Clinton still on track to win the popular vote." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqIPDyK5Pmo

Where's Dollar Bill now?

Readers who remember our resident liberal troll Dollar Bill may also remember my warning him, repeatedly, that his defense of Obama's using his executive power to override the will of Congress was a double edged sword: what DB approved of then would come back to bite him when a president of another political persuasion came to power.

DB never replied to that (in fact, DB never once actually engaged in argument; when challenged he simply shouted "racist" "Bush/Chaney/Bush/Chaney/Bush/Chaney!" and switched topics), but that prediction has come true, much sooner than I'd hoped, and people are noticing.

"Democrats have been arguing for years that President Obama should have the power to get a lot done on his own, without going through Congress: executive orders, going to war, etc. If President Trump exercises similarly broad powers, remember: Trump didn't build that!"

Now they tell us

Clinton insiders admit Hillary was a lousy candidate.

With Hillary defeated, Bill plagued by recurrent “bimbo eruptions,” and Chelsea reportedly devastated by the toll that failure in public life has taken on her parents, it’s game over for the Clinton Dynasty, sources said.

“The Clinton world is done,” another Clintonista told The Post, snarking that if Hillary could be stopped by Barack Obama in the 2008 primaries, and then Trump in 2016, she has no business ever running for elective office again.

“She was beaten by a community organizer who was senator for 25 minutes, and a reality-TV show host,” that source explained. “They don’t create adjectives to describe this. It’s an incredible moment in history.”

Another loser going down in flames isn't really particularly "historic", but hyperbole aside, why did the establishment Democrats hitch their wagon to this tired old mule? A remorseful Democrat writer at Slate provides the most obvious answer: it was seen as the gateway to  personal power and riches.

The Democrats will now control next to nothing above the municipal level. Donald Trump will be president. We are going to be unpacking this night for the rest of our lives, and lives beyond that. We can’t comprehend even 1 percent of what’s just happened. But one aspect of it, minor in the overall sweep, that I’m pretty sure we can comprehend well enough right now: The Democratic Party establishment has beclowned itself and is finished. . . .

The party establishment made a grievous mistake rallying around Hillary Clinton. It wasn’t just a lack of recent political seasoning. She was a bad candidate, with no message beyond heckling the opposite sideline. She was a total misfit for both the politics of 2016 and the energy of the Democratic Party as currently constituted. She could not escape her baggage, and she must own that failure herself.

Theoretically smart people in the Democratic Party should have known that. And yet they worked giddily to clear the field for her. Every power-hungry young Democrat fresh out of law school, every rising lawmaker, every old friend of the Clintons wanted a piece of the action. This was their ride up the power chain. The whole edifice was hollow, built atop the same unearned sense of inevitability that surrounded Clinton in 2008, and it collapsed, just as it collapsed in 2008, only a little later in the calendar. The voters of the party got taken for a ride by the people who controlled it, the ones who promised they had everything figured out and sneeringly dismissed anyone who suggested otherwise. They promised that Hillary Clinton had a lock on the Electoral College. These people didn’t know what they were talking about, and too many of us in the media thought they did.

Aw come on, you don't need an expert to predict this

Experts question whether Clinton Foundation will survive. Look: if they no longer can sell access to the presumed heiress of the United States, what's left to peddle? Donations will disappear quicker than six-figure lecture fees from Goldman Sachs. Nonetheless, these "experts" also see other difficulties:

The months ahead could determine what kind of future, if any, the Clinton Foundation can have as Congress and the new administration of President-elect Donald Trump take what is certain to be a tough look the ethical and legal issues that have swirled for years around the troubled charity.

Former President Bill and Hillary Clinton, the former secretary of state, have been accused repeatedly of turning the foundation into a tool for personal enrichment by using it to market official government favors, access and influence to wealthy individuals, corporations and foreign governments.

....  Charles Ortel, a Wall Street analyst and vocal critic of the foundation, believes the IRS and state officials must “go inside” the charity for an exhaustive audit.

“I suggest that the correct thing here to do is to study it from the inside, get all the books and records,” Ortel told TheDCNF. “They must look at how flagrant the abuses were, figure out which donors are responsible for violations, understand why they may have made contributions to the Clinton Foundation.  And we have to go after all of the donors.”

... Leslie Lenkowsky, a nationally recognized expert on charities and philanthropic groups, told TheDCNF that if the Clinton Foundation cannot compete successfully on a level playing field with other charities, it will go out of business.

“With the end of the Clinton political dynasty, at least for the time being, the Clinton Foundation is going to have obtain support the old fashion way, they’re going to have to earn it,” Lenkowsky said. “It was very difficult to really find evidence of accomplishments. It should be closed down if it can’t demonstrate that it’s doing good stuff.”

UPDATE: A reader sends this along:

The gift that keeps on giving

Reader Don sent along this story last night; reading it this morning gave me almost as much pleasure as awakening yesterday to find that the Hillarybeast was gone. We're going to need permanent safe space recovery rooms installed on every campus in America, and I'll donate the first gross of plush-puppies - I have no hard feelings.

Trump will name leading Climate Warming Denier  to head EPA transition team 

Donald Trump has selected one of the best-known climate skeptics to lead his U.S. EPA transition team, according to two sources close to the campaign.

Myron Ebell, director of the Center for Energy and Environment at the conservative Competitive Enterprise Institute, is spearheading Trump’s transition plans for EPA, the sources said.

The Trump team has also lined up leaders for its Energy Department and Interior Department teams. Republican energy lobbyist Mike McKenna is heading the DOE team; former Interior Department solicitor David Bernhardt is leading the effort for that agency, according to sources close to the campaign.

Ebell is a well-known and polarizing figure in the energy and environment realm. His participation in the EPA transition signals that the Trump team is looking to drastically reshape the climate policies the agency has pursued under the Obama administration. Ebell’s role is likely to infuriate environmentalists and Democrats but buoy critics of Obama’s climate rules.

Ebell, who was dubbed an “elegant nerd” and a “policy wonk” by Vanity Fair, is known for his prolific writings that question what he calls climate change “alarmism.” He appears frequently in the media and before Congress. He’s also chairman of the Cooler Heads Coalition, a group of nonprofits that “question global warming alarmism and oppose energy-rationing policies.”

Ebell appears to relish criticism from the left.

In a biography submitted when he testified before Congress, he listed among his recognitions that he had been featured in a Greenpeace “Field Guide to Climate Criminals,” dubbed a “misleader” on global warming by Rolling Stone and was the subject of a motion to censure in the British House of Commons after Ebell criticized the United Kingdom’s chief scientific adviser for his views on global warming.

More recently, Ebell has called the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan for greenhouse gases illegal and said that Obama joining the Paris climate treaty “is clearly an unconstitutional usurpation of the Senate’s authority.”

He toldVanity Fair in 2007, “There has been a little bit of warming ... but it’s been very modest and well within the range for natural variability, and whether it’s caused by human beings or not, it’s nothing to worry about.”

Ebell’s views appear to square with Trump’s when it comes to EPA’s agenda. Trump has called global warming “bullshit” and he has said he would “cancel” the Paris global warming accord and roll back President Obama’s executive actions on climate change (ClimateWire, May 27).

It's Christmas morning in America

Hold it men, he's not bluffing!

According to the WSJ, Trump's been hard at work on the transition, and it appears he's actually going to follow through on his promises. I was content to have the Supreme Court secure for the next 4 or even, fingers crossed, eight years, but the man could fundamentally transform the country, as Obama promised and almost achieved. Difference is, Trump may save the country, rather than bring us down to a Third World kleptocracy.

Mr. Trump sketched a broad outline of his first days in office during an October speech in Gettysburg, Pa., ....

His actions, he said, would be aimed at cleaning up corruption and “special interest collusion.” He promised to protect American workers, and “restore security and constitutional rule of law.”

The plan included a hiring freeze on new federal workers, with exceptions for positions in the military, public safety and public health. He promised to eliminate two regulations for every new rule created. He wants a five-year ban on lobbying for officials who leave the executive and legislative branches of government.

In his first days in office, Mr. Trump plans to announce he will reopen the North American Free Trade Agreement, and will withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership. He plans to order his commerce secretary to identify, and then remedy, all foreign trade “abuses that unfairly impact American workers.” He plans to lift restrictions on tapping energy reserves, approve the Keystone Pipeline, and cancel billions in payments to United Nations climate-change programs.

The New York businessman has vowed to cancel President Barack Obama’s promise to protect from deportation undocumented immigrants brought to the country as children, and start deporting as many as 2 million undocumented immigrants with criminal records.

“It will focus on three to five structural reforms from Day One, including controlling the southern border,” Mr. Gingrich said about the first 100 days of the Trump administration. “It will almost certainly include very dramatic civil service reform to allow us to fire people who are incompetent or corrupt or breaking the law."

They're so goofy, they'll probably give the Nobel Prize for Literature to Bob Dylan

Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman, now with the NYT: 

Nov. 9, 12:32 AM If the question is when markets will recover, a first-pass answer is never.

WSJ, November 9, 4:35 PM Stocks rally, Dow up 257 points.

One person wasn't scared off by the election results

One contract reported today, 36 Arch Street, in Riverside (overlooking Binney Park) asking $1.399. In full disclosure, this is owned by a friend of mine, and I'd be tempted to pull my punches if I thought a good punch was merited, but I don't. It's a nifty house with a nice view over the park and an easy walk to OG. The problem, as a family house, is that it's small and vertical: the master bedroom and bath, for instance, comprise the entire third floor, and it's carved out of the hill behind it, so frisbee tossing and baseball games will have to be conducted across the street in Binney.

But not every house has to accommodate a family of four, and this isn't intended to (although when it was built in 1900 it probably held at least that many people, and probably more - times change). It's a good buy at this price, in my opinion. Not that 2007 prices are especially relevant to those prevailing today, but the owner did pay $1,617,500 for it back then, so this buyer is getting it at a reasonable discount from the crazy days.

Deranged Cos Cobber lashes out

A reader sent me a copy of this tweet from a twit, Cos Cob resident Sarah Dara Littman. I've met the lady once, years ago, over coffee with former Greenwich Time editor Joe Pisani and a former Greenwich Time reporter. We exchanged pleasantries and departed, never to meet or speak again.  So why libel me now? I'd excuse this as the ranting of a silly woman who was driven to hysteria by last night's election results, but she published it Monday, when Hillary was still being called a shoo in. Bizarre.

Nobody's gonna steal MY house!

The owner of 137 Old Mill Road has re-upped with David Ogilvy, continuing an unbroken string of 717 days with the same agent and the same price: $11,500,000. Loyalty to Mr. Ogilvy is perfectly understandable, but refusing to acknowledge that no one has wanted to pay this price since it came on the market in June, 2014 is just sheer stubbornness. That may pay off, eventually, but so far, reality is winning over dreams.

1927 house, by the way, on 4 acres, last renovated in 1986. Hmmm.

UPDATE: Apparently the owner can wait as long as she wants to sell this house: she not only has more, she sold one of her NYC co-ops for $46 million back in 2007. Sometimes divorcing a hedge funder can be a financially savvy move.