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[Lo-Volt]

These quotes are what I would expect if British Liberal voters who defected to Labour in the 20th century were brought into the 21st century America. I'm somewhat surprised that we're surprised by some of these statements, even though they directed their votes to an awful place (I'll get to that presently). The Democrats are also a party of capital. The Democrats are a party that triangulated away from the needs of people living in poverty in order to look respectable to the new moderate or whatever their excuse was during the Clinton years. I'm not going to bother relitigating the 2016 election but at the same time, does that sound like a party for "the rest of us"? Not exactly.

I'm sure that's what a lot of Trump voters ended up thinking. Shame then, who they voted for. Hillary Clinton was muddled and came with the worst baggage of the go-go 1990s, never mind her fight in 2008, but even in that context she was ultimately earnest. The alternative was a blatant and proud racist and liar. He wasn't hiding his 1980s ad about the mistreated Central Park Five, for example. If anything, he is the kind of beast enabled by the very thinking his voters hated. Awkwardddddddd! Let that be a lesson. It matters more what you're voting for than what you're voting "against". You have to live with the consequences of the former, no matter what you "meant".

 

[2Smashed4U]

Well look what happened this election. An unhinged lunatic made it past the primaries,generals and the electoral college because of ignorance. And now everyday he threatens the world with war or climate change denial.

If that's not a reason to make democracy more like a job interview, I don't what is.

Just stop dude, you clearly don't know what you're talking about.

 

[shinra-bansho]

You say economy. I read (((economy))).
Or in other words, one candidate was going to throw out the anchor babies and stop favoring those lazy blacks, that are dragging me down.
When you want to improve the situation of the other, you clearly don't want to improve the situation of the average American. I.e. Joe typicalwhiteguy.

 

[wandering]

But it's not that these people are especially stupid -- I don't think most people in general pay attention to politics to the level of knowing the background of Trump's cabinet.

Less than half can name a supreme court justice

Only a bit over a third can name all three branches of government

Over 3/4th young people can't name one of their own senators:

And I even found a stat for this very topic: About two-thirds can't name a Trump cabinet pick

Lessee...

Kennedy, Kagan, Sotomayor, Roberts, Ginsburg, Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch and.... something something blanking

Executive, Judicial, Legislative

Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell

Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III (that Colbert bit always sticks with me), Devos, Tillerson, Perry, Mattis, Acosta, Chao, Mnuchin, Price, Carson, Kelly, and that's all I can recall.

Do I get to become President now?

 

[aeolist]

You say economy. I read (((economy))).
Or in other words, one candidate was going to throw out the anchor babies and stop favoring those lazy blacks, that are dragging me down.

one candidate gave people something to hate in a race that was clearly about the electorate wanting to air grievances and shake things up, the other candidate said that everything's fine and oh my isn't my opponent ever so impolite.

the base republican electorate will always vote for nativism and fucking over the poor and nothing will ever change that. this study is about the people who flipped or stayed home, but i guess we should just give up on them too because that will certainly get the right people back into power.

 

[aeolist]

Well look what happened this election. An unhinged lunatic made it past the primaries,generals and the electoral college because of ignorance. And now everyday he threatens the world with war or climate change denial.

If that's not a reason to make democracy more like a job interview, I don't what is.

Edit: It's also not like there aren't some regulations in place. There are term limits, a minimum voting age, citizenship etc. Time for America to build on it to not let another Trump happen again.

every single voting restriction on the books has been used to disenfranchise left voters (specifically minorities) far more that right wingers. every anti-democratic institution in the country (specifically the electoral college) has benefited conservative candidates far more than liberals.

trump is in office because our system is not democratic enough, not because we have too much. think about this shit for half a second before running your mouth.

 

[APF]

You say economy. I read (((economy))).
Or in other words, one candidate was going to throw out the anchor babies and stop favoring those lazy blacks, that are dragging me down.
When you want to improve the situation of the other, you clearly don't want to improve the situation of the average American. I.e. Joe typicalwhiteguy.

This is exactly it IMO. You cannot separate the perceived economic concerns from the racial resentment. They're one and the same.

 

[SlimySnake]

Pretty much all of the trump supporters i know in Ohio and ny are college educated white collar workers making 6 figures or close to six figures.

I am not saying they arent affected by the economy but they are pretty well off compared to rural America.

 

[shinra-bansho]

Impolite. Lol. Okay. If that's all you think was directed at Trump...

The people who stayed home based on the survey results were entitled millenials who just want free college, and don't think a Trump presidency will affect them. In 2018 they will answer the way they did about 2016 contradicting they're current thoughts. Because they're privilege in graph form.

The people who flipped think they're not doing as well, and think that the Democratic party is more geared towards the wealthy. Which is not the same as actually not doing as well and the Democratic party actually favouring the wealthy more than Trump. Nor does it show why. But several other reports have shown the why. Blacks and browns.

 

[Angry Grimace]

I think the conclusion I'm getting from this is "because people are dumb as bricks."

 

[The Technomancer]

I think the conclusion I'm getting from this is "because people are dumb as bricks."

A lot of people do not prioritize politics in a material way.

 

[DontBeThatGuy]

He's literally out there entertaining incredibly wealthy mar-la-go guests every weekend, and I bet these folks still have zero regrets, because you know, reasons. (that they would be willing to divulge that is...)

 

[Zen_Arcade]

Well look what happened this election. An unhinged lunatic made it past the primaries,generals and the electoral college because of ignorance. And now everyday he threatens the world with war or climate change denial.

If that's not a reason to make democracy more like a job interview, I don't what is.

Edit: It's also not like there aren't some regulations in place. There are term limits, a minimum voting age, citizenship etc. Time for America to build on it to not let another Trump happen again.

It's a terrible idea that would quickly and easily be abused.

The smartest thing to do to change elections would be to get rid of the electoral college.

 

[Phoenix RISING]

It's because they are stupid!


'well, it's actually racism'


So, because they are stupid


'Well, it's actually sexism'


So, because they are stupid


'Well, actually it's because they believed Donald Trump would be good for the economy despite his business record'


So, because they are stupid.

https://youtu.be/hAT9nkGZa08

This is what GAF sounds like in these kinds of threads now.

Will be refreshing when everyone is finally done venting and coping and start discussing feasible solutions. Right now though, it sounds like dispair.

 

[Rentahamster]

Will be refreshing when everyone is finally done venting and coping and start discussing feasible solutions. Right now though, it sounds like dispair.

Not everyone has fully worked out the stages of grief from their system yet.

 

[pigeon]

Will be refreshing when everyone is finally done venting and coping and start discussing feasible solutions.

Be the change

 

[entremet]

Pretty obvious it was the economy. Bernie's populist rise for a relative national newcomer was also due to his economic focus.

Why was the Trump/Bernie/Obama voter a thing? Weird confluence, but it was observed.

Many posters blaming bigotry as the primary reason never put up convincing evidence refuting that Obama won these voters handily.

 

[kirblar]

Pretty obvious it was the economy. Bernie's populist rise for a relative national newcomer was also due to his economic focus.

Why was the Trump/Bernie/Obama voter a thing? Weird confluence, but it was observed.

Many posters blaming bigotry as the primary reason never put up convincing evidence refuting that Obama won these voters handily.

Obama won 100% of Obama-> Trump voters!

 

[7DollarHagane]

All of these responses calling thr focus grouped voters idiots, stupid, poorly educated, etc. The democrat party will never be able to let go of their "smarter than you, better than you" rhetoric, will they?

I know it makes you feel better about yourself, but if you want to connect with people, its time to stop insulting them, no matter how right you may be.

If you cant say something nice, dont say anything at all. And no, this is not defense of racists and nazis, these are obama voters that were turned off by the democratic party between 2012-2016.

 

[Massive Duck. C.M.]

Pretty obvious it was the economy. Bernie's populist rise for a relative national newcomer was also due to his economic focus.

Why was the Trump/Bernie/Obama voter a thing? Weird confluence, but it was observed.

Many posters blaming bigotry as the primary reason never put up convincing evidence refuting that Obama won these voters handily.

We've had several threads with research pointing to it as the primary motivation

 

[Jmanunknown]

Pretty obvious it was the economy. Bernie's populist rise for a relative national newcomer was also due to his economic focus.

Why was the Trump/Bernie/Obama voter a thing? Weird confluence, but it was observed.

Many posters blaming bigotry as the primary reason never put up convincing evidence refuting that Obama won these voters handily.

their is your answer

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-mythology-of-trumps-working-class-support/

 

[Massive Duck. C.M.]

I think this just proves that you can't trust "allies" when it's go time

 

[Realyst]

You say economy. I read (((economy))).
Or in other words, one candidate was going to throw out the anchor babies and stop favoring those lazy blacks, that are dragging me down.
When you want to improve the situation of the other, you clearly don't want to improve the situation of the average American. I.e. Joe typicalwhiteguy.

Pretty much exactly this. Folks (meaning middle class Trump voters) don't necessarily think that they they can no longer achieve millionaire status in a vacuum, they think that others are increasingly able to take advantage of that same access. They want less competition, not more.

 

[entremet]

Obama won 100% of Obama-> Trump voters!

To be fair, HRC ran a decent campaign given her images issues, but her EC strategy fucker her.

 

[2Smashed4U]

Pretty obvious it was the economy. Bernie's populist rise for a relative national newcomer was also due to his economic focus.

Why was the Trump/Bernie/Obama voter a thing? Weird confluence, but it was observed.

Many posters blaming bigotry as the primary reason never put up convincing evidence refuting that Obama won these voters handily.

Right. The conservative voters that vote Republican out of spite for "welfare queens" or whatever obviously exist - but they aren't what swung the election. Those people already vote Republican every time anyway.

There are a lot of rural voters that don't give remotely give a shit about things like that because they aren't immediately in their sphere.

 

[Dartastic]

All of these responses calling thr focus grouped voters idiots, stupid, poorly educated, etc. The demicrat party will never be able to let go of their "smarter than you, better than you" rhetoric, will they?

I know it makes you feel better about yourself, but if you want to connect with people, its time to stop insulting them, no matter how right you may be.

If you cant say something nice, dont say anything at all. And no, this is not defense of racists and nazis, these are obama voters that were turned off by the democratic party between 2012-2016.

Conveniently, I just read this article which makes a lot of really salient points. While I think there's a time and place to call something stupid, stupid, it's probably a good idea to use it less as an easy insult. It's something I think I need to do myself, honestly.

The War on Stupid People - American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth. (The Atlantic)

 

[Boylamite]

1. George W Bush's administration sees huge Recession, fucks EVERYBODY and cripples the Economy.

2. That shit is dumped in the lap of Obama and G.W exits, stage left, in cartoon fashion.

3. Republicans in the Senate and House block a good number of Obama's ideas, then state Obama is a bad President cause he can't get nothing done!

4. Economy DOES start to get better, but from how it was crippled by the previous administration, it is going up slowly (it was REALLY fucked, dude).

5. People take the Republicans' criticism of Obama to be "God's word", he "didn't do anything for the country" (even though he DID and other things, he TRIED but was obstructed by the Rs)

6. Republicans say they'll help those hit by the failing Economy, even though in their heart of hearts, they could give a rat's ass about the little man. They are all richies, anyway, and probably are in league with those very same people who lead to the Recession in the first place (laughing about the poor simpletons plight at their ski lodges and tropical vacations).

The Republican party's ultimate goal is to sleaze their way into the country's tax revenue and filter it to the the companies they collect campaign donations from.

To this end, they target the demographics with the least critical thinking skills (christian right wing, racists, lowly educated, etc) and win their votes with easy, cheap moral issues. Sometimes these issues line up nicely with the corporate backers, like guns and war, and sometimes the republicans pervert an ideal by conflating it with something they can't reasonably defend (like how high taxes and a strong social safety net is unamerican, or against christian ideals).

But the republicans don't give a shit about their voters, it's all just a dog and pony show to allow them to extract as much money from the infrastructure of the country as they can. It is so damned worrying to imagine how bad things are going to get if this continues to go unchecked.

 

[Psychoward]

It's because they are stupid!


'well, it's actually racism'


So, because they are stupid


'Well, it's actually sexism'


So, because they are stupid


'Well, actually it's because they believed Donald Trump would be good for the economy despite his business record'


So, because they are stupid.

lol

 

[polyh3dron]

These people were foolish, sure, but dem messaging suuuuuuuucked

Hillary's messaging suuuuuucked, to be specific. It sucked in '08 and sucked in '16.

 

[kirblar]

All of these responses calling thr focus grouped voters idiots, stupid, poorly educated, etc. The demicrat party will never be able to let go of their "smarter than you, better than you" rhetoric, will they?

I know it makes you feel better about yourself, but if you want to connect with people, its time to stop insulting them, no matter how right you may be.

If you cant say something nice, dont say anything at all. And no, this is not defense of racists and nazis, these are obama voters that were turned off by the democratic party between 2012-2016.

You deliberately misspell the "democrat party" slur to bait the responses?

 

[Chmpocalypse]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blog...rs-a-worrisome-answer/?utm_term=.dc596260558f

https://www.washingtonpost.com/r/20...nion/Graphics/Post-election_Research_Deck.pdf

Alternate title: Obama Voters Flipped to trump Because They're Total Fucking Morons When it Comes to the Economy and Who is Really Fucking Them Over

 

[Dartastic]

You deliberately misspell the "democrat party" slur to bait the responses?

"I" is next to "o." Chill out.

 

[kirblar]

"I" is next to "o." Chill out.

This is why I'm not: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democrat_Party_(epithet)

 

[KDC720]

Purely anecdotal but I have a rather well-off relative who voted Trump so he could stay well-off. He also thinks Trump is a moron but he didn't want to pay more money in taxes.

I know their are folks on GAF who like to mock the whole "economic anxiety" thing, but I do honestly believe it was one of the big factors that got Trump elected. Not saying racism and bigotry weren't, because I do think they were the other big factors at play here, but their were a bunch of reasons why Trump won and I think it's hard to pin down the primary reason.

His whole election was like this perfect storm of hate, fear, and complacency.

 

[7DollarHagane]

You deliberately misspell the "democrat party" slur to bait the responses?

On mobile, didnt even realize it was typed wrong and dont know what the slur is supposed to be.

 

[Foffy]

Alternate title: Obama Voters Flipped to trump Because They're Total Fucking Morons When it Comes to the Economy and Who is Really Fucking Them Over

This is more onto a lack of intellectual and critical thought.

I mean, consider where people learn about politics. Friends, family, and the TV. These are fucking AWFUL resources to rely upon.

 

[TarNaru33]

https://www.google.com/#q=hillary+talks+about+economy+election+2016

Just wanted to tell you there was already a study done and the amount of times Hillary spoke of her policies were less than the times she attacked Trump.

Really Democrats should of seen this as a very good warning during the campaign, with people waving away his offenses with stupid reasoning. Attacking Trump was obviously not hurting him during the campaign and no one thought to change tactics.

In my view Bernie wouldn't have made that mistake since most of the times he talked, he repeated his favor of the working class and his disdain for the 1%. He also spoke of how much he disliked many free trade agreements, something that hurt Hillary in the Rust Belt states. He was much better candidate in terms of independents and whites and I highly doubt he would of lost minority and regular democrat votes. Almost anytime he spoke, he spoke of the working class and economy.

I find it odd that people are chanting how Bernie losing the primaries shows he wasn't the candidate Democrats needed when it was clear everyone was already flocking to Hillary (mainly due to her name) while in the Republican party, none of the options were desirable to Repubs, so Trump got it.

All in all, it seems to me that Democrats need to put most of their focus on economics, especially after a recession and a period of time where people felt like the recession was still ongoing. Identity politics is great and should still be near the forefront, but it won't matter if you cant win elections. This is at least until/if U.S switches the way it does its federal elections.

 

[pigeon]

All of these responses calling thr focus grouped voters idiots, stupid, poorly educated, etc. The democrat party will never be able to let go of their "smarter than you, better than you" rhetoric, will they?

I know it makes you feel better about yourself, but if you want to connect with people, its time to stop insulting them, no matter how right you may be.

I agree with this. They're not idiots or poorly educated. They're just white supremacists and okay with it. Calling them idiots is another way of telling yourself that racism isn't a cancer on America, it's just a weird mole that we can excise with free college.

It isn't true, guys. That shit is malignant.

 

[Chmpocalypse]

The ones that went for Trump who were Obama supporters were the white working class who the Dems didn't have any answers for.

Well, I mean, Dems didn't want to coddle their racism, and rightfully so.

 

[aeolist]

Alternate title: Obama Voters Flipped to trump Because They're Total Fucking Morons When it Comes to the Economy and Who is Really Fucking Them Over

alternate alternate title: obama voters flipped to trump because they correctly understand that democrats are only marginally less eager than republicans to help the rich continue to line their own pockets at everyone else's expense and there was a candidate who at least said that shit out loud

 

[2Smashed4U]

Well, I mean, Dems didn't want to coddle their racism, and rightfully so.

They didn't have to - Obama didn't.

 

[kirblar]

On mobile, didnt even realize it was typed wrong and dont know what the slur is supposed to be.

Gotcha. "Democrat Party" is a slur commonly used by the right which would immediately make someone aware of it question whether you were actually posting in good faith. (you didn't know, we're cool!)

 

[CopperPuppy]

Economic concerns and racist motivation aren't mutually exclusive. Trump's voters weren't so inclined merely because they viewed him as paying attention to their problems; they liked him because it sounded like he would pay attention to only their problems.

 

[Massive Duck. C.M.]

alternate alternate title: obama voters flipped to trump because they correctly understand that democrats are only marginally less eager than republicans to help the rich continue to line their own pockets at everyone else's expense and there was a candidate who at least said that shit out loud

That doesn't differ from what you quoted

 

[Boylamite]

alternate alternate title: obama voters flipped to trump because they correctly understand that democrats are only marginally less eager than republicans to help the rich continue to line their own pockets at everyone else's expense and there was a candidate who at least said that shit out loud

The guy with the expensive suits and gilded penthouse apartment was saying it

 

[aeolist]

The guy with the expensive suits and gilded penthouse apartment was saying it

as opposed to hillary clinton, who is just as rich but didn't even try to connect with the poor

 

[2Smashed4U]

as opposed to hillary clinton, who is just as rich but didn't even try to connect with the poor

That isn't true. She didn't really connect in the end no, but she certainly did try. And it's not like Trump did himself either.

 

[Zap Rowsdower]

They didn't have to - Obama didn't.

That was before Trayvon Martin's murder and the rise of Black Lives Matter. That ignited the latent racism in a lot of white America which a lot of the alt-left people want to keep ignoring because they have no idea what they're talking about.

 

[TarNaru33]

Economic concerns and racist motivation aren't mutually exclusive. Trump's voters weren't so inclined merely because they viewed him as paying attention to their problems; they liked him because it sounded like he would pay attention to only their problems.

Selfish voting is always the case, but you make it sound like "only their problem" as just being whites, this isn't even remotely true.

The people that swung from Obama and cost us the election done so mainly due to economic concerns and how the democrats failed them due to Republican obstruction, not racism. Unfortunately, most voters do not put in even a modicum of research, they go by what they mainly remember and that is Obama failing them and Hillary being almost exactly like him.

Racism played a major part, but I really wish people stop putting that as the reason, because it simply wasn't. Those incredibly racist voters almost always vote Republican now.

 

[-MB-]

Sounds more to me that many who voted for Obama merely did it cuz Bush fucked up so badly.
Now that all that is past, they flock back to the same old hatred fueling right wing populist nonsense.