Otherwise depression and fatalism might set in.

got the popular vote lead because of California. IIRC, Hair Fuehrer won the popular vote in the rest of the states. If that is true, I think we can chalk it up to a different culture in different areas of the country.

And even in states she lost, she actually received many votes. Trump's win was razor thin in some of the battleground states.

It is not as if only California nd New York and Illinois voters voted for her.

Personally I do not believe the "different culture" meme has too much validity. I place far more weight on voter suppression and media focus.
Edited to add:
Sorry, welcome to DU also.

I stand corrected about the popular vote per state.

There definitely was a LOT of voter suppression, but there is also a difference in culture.

I live in a small town in Michigan, and we have lost a large number of good, manufacturing jobs in this town over the last 20--30 years. Those good-paying union jobs were replaced with minimum wage service jobs. People here don't want to move away from the place where their families have lived for generations, and the result is that their standard of living has substantially decreased. I can understand why a snake oil salesman promising "those jobs are coming back" would have a lot of appeal to desperate people.

Clinton won 15 of those 21 states by double digits.

Clinton also won many of the urban centers in states that Trump won.

Trump won the popular vote in the other states, BUT those other states are rural and have less people in them.

That is why Trump won the election but lost the popular vote. That is also why Hillary's popular vote margin is not by any means solely on California and New York.

And welcome to DU.

Thinking of the Democratic National convention, I see nothing wrong with the message, the party platform, or the candidates -- it was great. I'm in a cranky mood what with all the negativity and nitpicking and emotion. Why is it so hard for people to be objective? America loves bullshit, I guess. Now we have to live in the Opposite World of Republicans because something about the Democratic Party not being perfect, whatever the hell that means. Bullshit. Bah Humbug.

Trump's rallies and the never-ending "issue" of the emails and candidate likeability.

When emails were an issue during the Bush Administration, the millions of deleted emails were only briefly considered newsworthy.

As to likeability, I do not know any of the candidates. I vote based on positions, not some type of likeability quotient. As if running for President is the equivalent of running for Prom Queen.

And I was a Sanders supporter, and voted for him in the Illinois primary. I made no secret of that, but in the general election Sanders was not a choice. So I voted, as I always have, for the better candidate. I have never voted for a perfect candidate because I have never been the candidate.

So if we are to come together, if we do not unite after this and work for 2018 no amount of discussion about changing demographics will help. Yes, younger people are generally more tolerant, but old racists were also young once. We cannot assume that every young voter is naturally going to be a Democrat. We really need to force the media to pay attention to what the GOP will do, or try to do, and let voters know how the Democrats would do it better.

And we must keep repeating that Clinton won the popular vote. There can be no GOP talk of a mandate without a Democratic rebuttal.

I voted for Hillary to stop Trump, the Republicans, and their evil agenda.

I was elated with Bernie, his policies, his vision for this country.

I was not excited to vote for Hillary.

I did it to stop TRUMP, the Republicans, and their EVIL agenda.

I cried for 2 days when Hillary lost.

I still can not believe it is real.

I am a 63 year old female.

That is my 2 cents.

I keep seeing posts that some people think Bernie cost Hillary the election.

I have the exact opposite take on that.

I will never forgive the Hillary supporters.

That is my 2 cents.

Flame away.

voted to stop tRump and everything else you wrote.

I agree with everything you wrote.

EXCEPT the last point. I have no problem "forgiving" or reconciling with Hillary supporters. I recognize the urgent need for all of us to work together in the next two years to defeat the incipient fascism, and the first step has to be to lay aside the ugliness, strive to learn from the strengths of the other campaign, and work together. NOW.

To fail to do this is to go the same route as the left in pre-fascist Germany. We all know how that ended.

But I do have the most vicious and insulting of those who want to continue the primary fights on ignore. (That includes some Bernie supporters, as well.) I have had to do this in order to continue reading DU. It protects my blood pressure and bad nerves and lessens my state of depression over the election results not to have to read the contemptuous remarks they make at every mention of Bernie's name and his supporters.

Every hateful slur by these fellow DUers is a stab in the heart of this lifetime FDR/JFFK Democrat, early Bernie supporter, and Hillary voter.

Having these DUers on ignore also eliminates over half the posts I see in most any given thread in 2016 Postmortem. I can still log out and read them all, and occasionally I do that, but quickly log back in.

Wat

I am following Bernie's lead, but I am not as forgiving as he is.

What could have been makes my heart ache !!!

Except for the "ignore" advice. I do not use the ignore feature. If someone calls me an idiot I would rather read it because sometimes they are correct.

For the same reason I followed Discussionist, and JPR, and Free Republic. Not because I agree with any or all of the comments, but to get a sense of what is out there.

I believe that part of that is expressing the anger over Clinton's loss. After a loss, it is natural to look for someone or something to blame.

But as long as we remember that Clinton won the popular vote, and as long as we attempt to force the media to acknowledge that fact, it will make it harder for the GOP and the corporate media to talk about a mandate.

As to forgiveness, forgiveness is for you. Holding on to the anger is corrosive. So please try to let the anger go and remember that if Democrats come together and work together 2018 is only 2 years away.

No forgiveness here either.

have more fans, no matter how many points the other team scores.

But the popular vote is one measure of enthusiasm. And if Democrats can motivate the 41% of unmotivated voters, the electoral votes will follow. But it really must be a 50 state outreach strategy.

Will have to work together to weaken the ACA and keep the individual mandate. There are also future temporary tax cuts that will need to be made permanent.