I have never believed that this country would move past Trump. The thing that many R's missed for many years, decades even, was the anger and bitterness of the the Fox/Limbaugh/Levin/et al audience. It may not have been that way among the "educated" R's but in the hinterlands, those folks HATED all things Democratic.
I always loved to h…
I have never believed that this country would move past Trump. The thing that many R's missed for many years, decades even, was the anger and bitterness of the the Fox/Limbaugh/Levin/et al audience. It may not have been that way among the "educated" R's but in the hinterlands, those folks HATED all things Democratic.
I always loved to hear politicians say, "the voters are smart, they will make the right choice". Voters are not smart, mayber 1/3 of the general electorate is smart, maybe. The rest are simply moving through life trying not fall into open manholes. If the last 6 years have proven anything, they have proven that.
A culture war that has been nurtured for 35ish years has inertia that cannot be diminished quickly. This is what the "establishment" Republicans and never-Trumpers just don't seem to "get". The war's outrage feeds on itself, to wit, the obsessions with CRT, schools promoting sex reassignment, and Q's pedophiles, even without external fuel from the Orange Menace, etc. If most of my neighbors were to sit down with a Dem supporter and listen to that person's views, they would not believe much of it, as it wouldn't align with the fears that have been instilled in them for years. There's no good or likely fix - and the chance of secession and/or civil war is high, especially in MAGA-dominant areas where most people are well-armed.
It will never diminish while every media outlet carries it 24/7. I am so damn sick of hearing about these people I could vomit! The more noise, the noisier. And this is just spreading noise, it is not disinfectant. If it bleeds, it leads. Sadly, we will do all the bleeding.
And probably even earlier. The Robber Barons were probably the Trumps of their day. Certainly FDR faced daunting challenges. Luckily he also had some good people in the military and govt.
Yes--listening to the voters on Sarah Longwell's Focus Group podcast alarms me. My Bad Thought is that maybe it SHOULD be complicated to vote--if you are too dumb to figure out how to register, maybe you shouldn't be voting? Yeah, I know--it's wrong, but I can't help having that impulse when I hear one of those people blathering on about how Trump got a lot of things done.
They cite Trump's immigration policy as if it were an accomplishment instead of a human right's horror. With the publication of the Atlantic piece last week, the US lost any standing to criticize human right's violations anywhere else.
Well, there's the 50 ft wall between us and Mexico. Fully complete and insurmountable. There's the tax cut that fueled government debt. There's dirty foreign kids in cages. There's a wonderful vaccine in record time that has microchips in it. There's a stable and peaceful middle-east. There's four years of Vlad not stepping on a rake in Ukraine we all got to live through. All kinds of things.
I realized that when I came to the Midwest and was told Cracker Barrell was for "good eating," and it is frequented not only by desperate travelers, but also the locals.
I knew I was in for a fun trip of politics about feeling good "locally" and fuque the rest of the nation on their needs.
Do not underestimate the importance of Newt Gingrich in weaponizing the hatred politically and offering Limbaugh et al. the legitimacy that they craved for their rise to prominence (and personal enrichment, e.g. the Rush to Excellence tours). The repeal of the Fairness Doctrine didn't help matters either. Taken together they gave those opportunists just the right platform to succeed where others before them had fallen short of the mark.
I have never believed that this country would move past Trump. The thing that many R's missed for many years, decades even, was the anger and bitterness of the the Fox/Limbaugh/Levin/et al audience. It may not have been that way among the "educated" R's but in the hinterlands, those folks HATED all things Democratic.
I always loved to hear politicians say, "the voters are smart, they will make the right choice". Voters are not smart, mayber 1/3 of the general electorate is smart, maybe. The rest are simply moving through life trying not fall into open manholes. If the last 6 years have proven anything, they have proven that.
Couldn’t be stated better!
A culture war that has been nurtured for 35ish years has inertia that cannot be diminished quickly. This is what the "establishment" Republicans and never-Trumpers just don't seem to "get". The war's outrage feeds on itself, to wit, the obsessions with CRT, schools promoting sex reassignment, and Q's pedophiles, even without external fuel from the Orange Menace, etc. If most of my neighbors were to sit down with a Dem supporter and listen to that person's views, they would not believe much of it, as it wouldn't align with the fears that have been instilled in them for years. There's no good or likely fix - and the chance of secession and/or civil war is high, especially in MAGA-dominant areas where most people are well-armed.
It will never diminish while every media outlet carries it 24/7. I am so damn sick of hearing about these people I could vomit! The more noise, the noisier. And this is just spreading noise, it is not disinfectant. If it bleeds, it leads. Sadly, we will do all the bleeding.
And probably even earlier. The Robber Barons were probably the Trumps of their day. Certainly FDR faced daunting challenges. Luckily he also had some good people in the military and govt.
Yes--listening to the voters on Sarah Longwell's Focus Group podcast alarms me. My Bad Thought is that maybe it SHOULD be complicated to vote--if you are too dumb to figure out how to register, maybe you shouldn't be voting? Yeah, I know--it's wrong, but I can't help having that impulse when I hear one of those people blathering on about how Trump got a lot of things done.
They cite Trump's immigration policy as if it were an accomplishment instead of a human right's horror. With the publication of the Atlantic piece last week, the US lost any standing to criticize human right's violations anywhere else.
Well, there's the 50 ft wall between us and Mexico. Fully complete and insurmountable. There's the tax cut that fueled government debt. There's dirty foreign kids in cages. There's a wonderful vaccine in record time that has microchips in it. There's a stable and peaceful middle-east. There's four years of Vlad not stepping on a rake in Ukraine we all got to live through. All kinds of things.
Problem is that the stupid racist Mexicans were able to cut through the "Great Wall of Trumpist-Fascism" with a battery-powered Sawzall.
They were made that way by Limbaugh and Fox News. The silly down home crassness of Limbaugh was very sophisticated brainwashing.
I realized that when I came to the Midwest and was told Cracker Barrell was for "good eating," and it is frequented not only by desperate travelers, but also the locals.
I knew I was in for a fun trip of politics about feeling good "locally" and fuque the rest of the nation on their needs.
Do not underestimate the importance of Newt Gingrich in weaponizing the hatred politically and offering Limbaugh et al. the legitimacy that they craved for their rise to prominence (and personal enrichment, e.g. the Rush to Excellence tours). The repeal of the Fairness Doctrine didn't help matters either. Taken together they gave those opportunists just the right platform to succeed where others before them had fallen short of the mark.