If you're still voting for Donald Trump, maybe you don't know who it is you're supporting.

One of the most emotionally satisfying moments in a movie, for me, is when a bully gets his comeuppance. George McFly punches Biff Tannen, and his life--and his family's--is transformed. Is there any more wonderful moment in film than Ralphie beating up Scut Farkus? In last night's debate, Hillary was Ralphie and Donald was Scut. I want to make sure, Donald Trump fans, that you know just who he is.

Some of you, I suppose, know very well who and what Donald Trump is, and support him anyway. Perhaps when you went to the movies, you rooted for Biff Tannen and Scut Farkus. The polls show that the race between Hillary and Donald is very close. I would hate to find out that America has that many people who know a bully when they see one, and support him anyway. If there are that many such people in America, our country is an ugly place indeed.

I'll try to be charitable here. Maybe you don't see Donald Trump as Biff Tannen. Maybe you cast him in the role of "the tough cop who doesn't play by the rules." But really, that cop is a bad cop and an asshole to boot. He's no hero.

OK, maybe you love tough guys on principle. Maybe toughness is everything to you. Have you noticed how wimpy and whiny Donald Trump is when he's not busy bullying? The people who have "treated him unfairly" or might treat him unfairly in the future include Megan Kelly, Anderson Cooper, and Lester Holt. Not to mention entire newspapers and TV networks.

And now Donald is blaming his loss in last night's debate to a faulty microphone. I can see him in gym class, missing a routine fly ball and blaming his crappy glove. Or pretending to trip over a rock in the field.

Donald the bully is afraid. He knows that Hillary knows more than he does about government. So he blames everybody involved for rigging the process against him. The bully is a not-so-secret wimp.

Just want you to know who this guy is that you're supporting.

They just hate her because she didn't stay at home and make cookies.

Everyone has a theory as to the origins of Hillary Clinton's reputation as a suspect character. People have been investigating her dealings--and coming up with nothing--for so long that many people assume she must be a crook. Mainly, though, the investigations have been politically motivated--Republican skullduggery.

What's the origin of Hillary Hate? I trace it back to Bill Clinton's first election campaign and his first term in office. Hillary made it known from the start that she had a lot more to offer a Clinton administration than your average First Lady. Why should she waste a JD from Yale Law School, after all? Why shouldn't that come in useful?

The day after Bill Clinton's first election, I saw one of those "Don't blame me, I didn't vote for Bill OR Hillary" bumper stickers. Clearly, Bill Clinton's enemies on the right felt that Hillary had already, before Clinton was even inaugurated, stepped out of the First Lady role and into a job she hadn't been elected to. When she started the hearings on health care, they clearly thought she was out of line.

What rankled, of course, is that Hillary was invading the boys' territory, and being better at it than a lot of the boys. It still rankles, apparently.

A matter of faith

The United States has been a field experiment in economics for longer than I have been alive. One observation from this study is that we are usually better off economically speaking when the Democrats are running things. Time and again conservative policies send the economy into a tailspin.

Just as when the religious praise God in the wake of natural disasters, conservatives never stop believing in the face of evidence that their theories are wrong.

Conservatism in economics is a faith.