Oh, the irony!

Dontcha love it that the stallwart white voters who put Trump into office to effect change, managed to give the whole government over to the establishment Republicans? 

If they voted for Trump because he was anti-establishment, boy have they been conned. 

What Trump tapped into was their sense of powerlessness, that unseen forces are pulling the strings and manipulating “the system” for their own benefit. That “system” encompasses everything from politics to the economy to their local schools to culture. The system made that factory leave town. The system lets immigrants come in and speak a language other than English. Everywhere you look you’re being held down by the system. 

Yeah, but turns out that the System is exactly who won.  

The wealthy and powerful will have more wealth and power when he’s done, not less. There’s a lot that Trump will upend, but if you’re a little guy who thinks Trump was going to upend things on your behalf or in order to serve your interests, guess what: you got suckered. 

I wonder how many of those voters use Medicare?  Because thanks to their vote, Paul Ryan is now on track to eliminate it.

Republicans hope to repeal Medicare — the single-payer system that most seniors rely on to cover their health costs — and replace it with a voucher. This voucher will cover some of the cost of inferior coverage that will leave seniors with higher out-of-pocket costs than they would have paid under traditional Medicare. As a bonus, the total cost of paying for an individual senior’s care — that is, the government’s share of the costs plus the individual’s share — could rise as much as 40 percent.

Inferior coverage at a higher price — that’s the Republican health plan. And it will become law unless three of the 52 Republican senators who will come to Washington in January decide to stop it.

Ironically, it sounds a lot like Obamacare.

Expecting tax breaks?  Don't. Trump's  "commitment is to be of service to that most oppressed and forgotten group of Americans, the wealthy. Trump’s tax plan would give 47 percent of its benefits to the richest one percent of taxpayers."

I wonder how many of them use Obamacare?  Because the Republicans campaigned on its repeal and that's likely to happen, at least in parts.  The mandate and subsidies will go away, insurance rates will skyrocket, and "the changes could lead to the end of the individual health insurance market."  Yeah, that'll be helpful.

How about improved jobs and economic outcomes?  Not gonna happen for the working class.

....there is very little reason to think that any set of policies could meaningfully reverse the long-term decline in U.S. manufacturing jobs. That decline has been driven by a combination of globalization and automation — forces that aren’t likely to reverse any time soon. ...Trump had little to say about education, job training, entrepreneurship or other policy areas that might help workers in rural areas. And though Trump has said that lighter regulation will help the struggling coal industry, that will do nothing to change the low natural-gas prices that are coal’s biggest enemy. Indeed, Trump has also pledged to ease regulation of fracking, which will tend to boost oil and gas production, which will in turn tend to keep prices low. (Clinton, it is worth noting, had a detailed plan to help coal country, although many experts were skeptical about its effectiveness.)

 Yup, so all those things they supposedly cared about, aren't going to happen for them.

Perhaps its enough for them to think of registering Muslims   or reversing LGBT rights or deporting DACA children.

In the end, regardless of what they thought they were voting for, what they are going to get is a polarized, racist country that gives more tax breaks to the elites and puts the white working class further into the poorhouse. 

If we weren't all on the same sinking ship, I might enjoy a little schadenfreude at that.

Indeed, a further irony is that as a white latte-sipping coastal elitist with a decent job and income, I'm likely to do quite well under Trump, at least economically.  But I voted against him, and against the R's, because economically I'd rather pay more taxes and have a decent country that provides health insurance and free education, than one that's a game of  Survivor.  (That's not even considering the disaster he promises to be on social justice, or civil and reproductive  rights!)

Right now, it's all hands on deck to rescue the Republic from itself.  As David Frum tweets,

If you want to save the country, you have to work with people you disagree with on almost every ordinary political issue. 

SO let's get find the sensible Republicans and get to work.