If you think 170,000 votes in four or five states means they were “in play,” then we have serious vote analysis to do.
These states can all be “had”-—including MN, VA, NH, and, I think, even NJ and DE next time. But we cannot hide our heads in the sand and pretend this was a massive Trump turnout.
This was a “Let’s give him a shot” election. You can bet when election day MN voters went 2:1 Trump, they weren’t died-in-the-wool Republicans. They were indies and Ds who just had had enough of Obama.
We should all celebrate the victory, but in doing so PLEASE don’t delude yourselves into thinking this was some sort of mandate, except for change. It was Americans agreeing to try something else. Trump can change that to “We like what Trump is doing” in four years, but we won’t do so if we pretend that overwhelming numbers of voters put him in office. Realism is your friend.
I'm not sure what you're saying here. I suggested that Wisconsin, PA, MI, and Minn. hadn't been in play in decades. I believe I was correct in saying that. Not only were they "in play", he won them, MI being the closest of the votes, less than 13,000.
I agree with your assessment in your last post: This was a “Let’s give him a shot” election. I would add, it was a revulsion with Clinton and her party election as well.
I'll add one more thing: My guess is she had close to 5% votes from the democrat fraud express, and if you discount this ugly fact, it's as big a landslide as Reagan in 1980.