Well, here we are…at the precipice of vanquishing the demagogue. The one-term, impeached, loser demagogue.
As most of you know, when we first started putting the team together and discussing this website, we talked about things we wanted to do and things we didn’t. One of the first general consensus things was that we did not want a “BOOM!” click-baity type site. So we banned the use of “BOOM!” in our headlines. With one exception…
It’s been a long haul, my fellow TNBers, and we’ve been through a lot.
But we hung in there. Together.
And now we can spend some time in celebration…not in knowing that the Republic is saved (far from it), but that it is at least saved from another four years of the totally incompetent, divisive, ignorant, dangerous, destructive nature of Donald Trump and unfettered Trumpism.
That is worthy of celebration. But our work is far from done.
As we contemplate how TNB will move forward, we would like to provide some personal comments from each of us who came together to create TNB.
Steve:
I would like to thank all of you for sticking with us and building a community here at TNB. I can’t express enough how much this place has meant to me, personally, as a refuge from the crazy that is out there. It was great comfort to know that I was not the only one seeing it.
Thank you!
As most of you know, this news blog site was never intended to be just a Trump bashing place. We created it in order to provide a place where people of any political viewpoint could visit and put forth their ideas and thoughts and would be welcome as long as they were civil and respectful. We also wanted this to be much more than just a “NeverTrump” site. We wanted to be able to inform, educate, and entertain in various ways. Of course, it did gravitate into mostly a “NeverTrump” Trump-bashing site. I think there is no denying that, and I am just as guilty as the next person on that (except for AlienMotives who, to his credit, valiantly attempted to maintain much more balance with other things…many kudos to him).
I think that Trump has pretty much sucked the oxygen out of everything during the past four years, so it was unavoidable in having a constant focus on him.
Going forward, I very much want to get back to the vision of this site and very much hope that you will all continue to join us in that.
Beth:
It’s been a long five years. So. Very. Long. Many times it felt like it would never end. This “BOOM” post has been a long time coming. I might print and frame it! Well done, you Human Scums, you!
The people sharing these muddy Never Trump/ Resistor trenches have made this battle bearable. We’ve fought a good fight and this moment is sweet. A terrible person, who never ever should have been elected, has been defeated and it is right that Americans are dancing in the streets, bells are ringing across the world, and foreign leaders are rejoicing with us. The world breathes a deep sigh of relief with us. But for all the relief, the damage has been done. Our institutions are weakened. Relationships, both internationally and personally, are broken. Conspiracy theories loom large in the minds of many. The nation is literally ill.
This fight isn’t over. Your millage may vary but, from my perspective, the Republican Party needs to pay a high price for enabling this madness. The enablers must be held to account. Relationships must be mended, internationally, at least. Whether personal relationships with people who thought voting for Donald J Trump was a good idea and now believe Q is a prophet can even be salvaged, I have no idea.
So much of what we previously took for granted has been turned upside down – people we admire have fallen from their pedestals and we are stunned at rank hypocrisy.
It’s all discombobulating but, as is the truth for much pain in life, the upheavals can be for a higher good, if we are willing to learn the lessons they afford us. Going forward, I hope we can help those still in the thrall of tribalism, on both sides of the aisle, see the perils such blindness brings. No American should ever be hesitant to point out dangers to the Constitution, no matter which party the threat comes from. And there will be threats, there always are. We are tired but our Republic (yes, Ben, we in fact HAVE kept it!) is worth the endless fight to protect her. Thank you to all my TNB friends – old and new. You have kept me sane all these long years.
We created The News Blender as a haven for those who just wanted to be able to hang out with decent folks and be able to state an opinion without getting attacked for it. Long may our little haven live.
Tiff:
I can’t really put my thoughts, or hopes for our Blender future, into words, given we still have 70 long days that will feel like years of Impeached One-term’s presidency.
It’s been a long-long 5 years. Two of those years we’ve spent muddling our way through blogging where we’ve laughed, we’ve cried, we’ve argued, we’ve hugged it out, and we’ve been angry, but in the words of Barry Manilow we’ve “made it through the rain.”
I’d just like to thank all of you who have hung-in there, laughed with us, cried with us, argued with us, hugged us, and been just as angry as we’ve been. For now, I say “raise your glass,” and let’s “celebrate good times.”
AlienMotives:
When I signed on, we all had similar ideas of what we wanted to do. There were differences in opinion on specific topics, but we all came from similar perspectives: a devotion to honesty, a belief in individual freedom, and a love of America and its history. Above all, it was to be a site run by people who had been historically conservative and refused to sign on with authoritarianism of any stripe.
Then Trump sucked all of the oxygen out of the room. This site was specifically not meant to be anti-Trump; Steve’s essay series didn’t mention Trump in any way. One of Lenny’s first pieces was about the shameful history of immigration law. Tiff wrote articles on whatever struck her interest. But as Trump extended his tendrils into our lives and our news, we focused more on him. We received an early indication of just how cult-like some of his followers could be when an old associate from The Right Scoop offered to write for us… and then used his limited access as a method of spying and reporting back, as if we were some enemy force.
As it turned out, we were, only because we remained committed to the truth.
My goal, moving forward, is pretty much what it’s always been. For as long as I remain, my efforts will be guided toward honest discussion about issues, presentation of information that other people might not have (whether overnight oddities or lesser-noticed or foreign activities) and listening to peoples’ opinions instead of trying to shut down conversation. I’m hoping that’s easier without constant harangues from the most powerful individual in the land.
Lenny:
We created the News Blender to do what The Right Scoop could not; allow people from all walks of life to interact and discuss the happenings of the day, without fear of reprisal, while we present the news from a factual and often conservative point of view.
However, nobody expected how destructive to rational discourse the Trump administration could be. I think that had a big impact on what TNB has become.
Hopefully with the worst President in American history out of office, things might start to get back to normal. Maybe the pieces can be picked up and without the daily freak show, normal news can once again be reported on and discussed.
It’s my hope that TNB promotes itself and expands bringing in new voices, (including new writers), that bring new, outside ideas, even ones we don’t share, and can have reasonable discussions like normal people without instantly taking sides and automatically assuming the worst intentions.
In order for people to grow together, we must be willing to listen to the ideas that we might not like, or even understand, with a modicum of consideration, otherwise we are just posting for egocentric praise from the peanut gallery.
Having said all of that, we would like to allow everyone to continue the celebration of this victory, but also to remind everyone that we really do want to have this site be a welcoming place for everyone who is willing to be civil and respectful to each other. And in that sense, we want to have it be a positive place.
I’d also like to remind everyone that although we were successful in our quest to send Trump packing, there were over 70 million Americans that voted for him. There are a wide range of reasons that they chose to do so. They are not all racists. They are not all deplorable people that we can simply dismiss. Many of them are our friends and family that we love.
In order to save this Republic (and our personal relationships) we have to find ways to mend things and work together. Just as I told the Trump supporters in my post about voting for Biden that they can’t be winning if they completely disregard half the people in the country and simply consider them the enemy, we can’t disregard them.
I hope that everyone can keep these things in mind as we plot the next course for TNB.
In the meantime, here is the feed to President Elect Biden’s address to the nation. As President LOSER Trump likes to say…ENJOY!
