Reports from the heartland
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@Mik sorry, I call BS. I have plenty of respect for and curiosity about people who don't think like I do. The time for that curiousity in the case of Trump is long over. The facts have been plain as day for a long time. The refusal of people to face those facts leads to only one obvious conclusion--they are either idiots or they are morally craven.
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@pique - I just saw your post in the other thread.
You can ignore what I've said here, as I have a much better understanding of your frame of reference and your experiences living in a very conservative state.I was going to delete the post, but I'll leave it for others to consider.
@pique said in Reports from the heartland:
If the electorate went for Trump because the cost of living went up in the wake of Covid, what made voters think that Trump would make it any better?
You are not those people and they are not you. You are looking at it from your @pique 's knowledge base and understanding of economics, not theirs.
Great example I heard just before the election...woman was talking about how much she disliked Trump but that she was going to vote for him. When asked why, she said "he's a businessman and he will run the country like a business. He'll help bring down prices." I think her analysis is deeply flawed because she's not taking into account a lot of bits of information about why we've had inflation, but I cannot expect her to think like me. If we met in person, I could try to offer some of those bits of information to re-frame and fill out the picture I think actually exists and to help her see things differently. I would also be open to learning something from her, perhaps about the financial challenges she is facing that are prompting her to vote for someone she expressed such a strong revulsion for. What I will not do is call someone like her stupid. People shut down when they are put down. Nothing is solved.
Example closer to home...
I do not have a musical background like many of you and am like a duck out of water during discussions of the subtleties of various pianos. I do not hear what you guys do when you play various pianos. I cannot imagine having to care for a piano almost as if I were caring for another person, selecting a home where it will fit and maintaining the perfect environment in order to keep it at its peak sound. I'm like "buy a digital, you don't have to tune it or baby it." I do not think you guys are crazy, and I know I am not stupid. We are simply different people, with varying skills and interests.
And so I try to view my fellow citizens similarly when it comes to political differences. I try to understand what they are thinking, and if I disagree with them, I try to meet them at whatever place they are to share my thinking with them to see if I can influence or persuade. And I try to learn from them and try to imagine walking in their shoes.
You really should take the 9 minutes and listen to Smerconish. He makes way more sense about this than I do.
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Thanks for giving me that grace, wtg. And I read your post anyway. Just FYI, I would never ever insult someone by calling them stupid to their face. It's what I think, and I'm sharing those thoughts here, but no one should construe that to mean that I disrespect people in person by calling them stupid. Or even in a place where they might see it. I've had hundreds of friendly conversations about politics across kitchen tables in conservative homes over many years. I always learn something, I always open myself to their perspective. I'm a trained reporter, and in many of those conversations I was doing my job by listening with openeness and curiosity to learn about a different perspective.
We are now well past all of that. The threat to the nation is dire. There's no room for that any more. I think the dems did listen. I think they did accommodate. I think Trump voters are in thrall to their churches and to overseas interference and to disinformation. This is a mass delusion. They haven't just voted against our interests, but against their own interests. Trying to understand them further is futile. I don't know what will break the spell, but something will eventually.
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@wtg said in Reports from the heartland:
Smerconish did a lengthy intro to his show today. Much to consider in what he says....8 min video...
Good piece. I think there is much truth in what he says. I watched Trump's barbershop piece. You could tell that is where he felt most comfortable, most himself, was with the guys there. I've seen it in other milieus as well.
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Maher was good too.
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I’ve been reading opinion pieces for the last several days. No one seems to have a clue what happened but I’ve come to my own conclusion.
Trump promised cheap groceries. Harris did not.
Everything else is noise.
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I don’t know about that. I don’t like the inflation but in my mind there was never any doubt that we’d need inflation to reduce the debt. I’ve been surprised it didn’t happen earlier.
There’s a spectrum of reasons, really too many to list.
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@Mik No one cares about the debt, especially not Trump voters. Don’t believe me? Just watch.
It’s the price of eggs that tipped the scales.
And fast food.
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Whatever the reason for the Dems loss, the DNC will never figure it out.
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Not if they are unwilling to look deeply. Pelosi blaming Biden is an indication they will not.
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It's true that people assess their lives by whether they can afford things, a little luxury, a new car or holiday. If not, they are ready to punish people in power.
Yet the USA has economic growth we Brits can only dream about; your inflation, your pay packets."It's hard to summon up the kind of empathy which explains why someone votes for Donald Trump. It's hard to conceive of how someone could hear him talk of eugenics, could watch him slip into violent fantasies, could see this representation of all the most selfish and childish instincts in the human personality and think:
yeah, I want more of that." -
I think @Mik ‘s point is important. We won’t get anywhere by looking down on our neighbors or making already alienated groups feel more alienated.
At the same time, many people did indeed vote against their own interests, and it’s really hard to deal with that. (Hence all the “Leopards Ate My Face” stuff)
@Steve-Miller said in Reports from the heartland:
I’ve been reading opinion pieces for the last several days. No one seems to have a clue what happened but I’ve come to my own conclusion.
Trump promised cheap groceries. Harris did not.
Everything else is noise.
I suspect this is more than half, but not 100% of what happened.
Trump didn’t win this election for just one reason.
I agree that there is a large contingent of Trump voters who are motivated by “the economy.” But there is also a not insignificant group who are truly motivated by the most hateful parts of Trump’s rhetoric. They are scared of the changes they see in America, they’re afraid that increasing diversity means there won’t be a place for them any more, and they respond to the hatemongering and say “yep, that’s it, that’s what I want.”
I think the reason Trump won is probably threefold: 1) because he was able to get the votes of both of those groups, the economy people and the hate/afraid people; 2) because Dems weren’t able to convince the economy people that Dems would actually be better for the economy, and 3) because Dems weren’t able to reach across the aisle to both groups and appeal to our mutual humanity, to make those connections.
Ok, fourfold: 4) because Biden didn’t drop out of the race much, much sooner so that the Dems could have had more time to move the needle on numbers 2 and 3.
Ok, fivefold: 5) the people who could not hold their noses and vote for Harris because of what's happening with Israel and Gaza, so they stayed home, or worse, they voted for Jill Stein.
I truly believe each of these factors played a role and addressing only one would not have had much impact on the end result. We would have had to address, to resolve, each of them.
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@AndyD said in Reports from the heartland:
"It's hard to summon up the kind of empathy which explains why someone votes for Donald Trump. It's hard to conceive of how someone could hear him talk of eugenics, could watch him slip into violent fantasies, could see this representation of all the most selfish and childish instincts in the human personality and think:
yeah, I want more of that."Andy, who said that? (If it’s in the thread and I missed it, apologies)
Anyway, I get this. For many of us, it’s very hard to have any empathy toward anyone who supports Trump because what we see first and foremost are these elements: the eugenics, the racism, the misogyny, the hate, the narcissism…
Somehow, many people, when they look at Trump, don’t see those things as primary, if they see them at all. Or, like those looking at the leopard, somehow, magically, think it doesn’t apply to them.
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Sorry, I have to add to my list above.
Sixfold: 6) we have to recognize that another big influence on this election was surely right wing news media and proliferation of the fake news.
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From the Wapo:
"Eight columnists responded. Charles Lane might have gotten off the best one-liner: “Democrats have been acting like the proverbial American tourist in France, trying to get their point across by shouting louder in a language only they understand.” -
Really great guests and discussion on Fareed's GPS this morning. David Frum and Ezra Klein, Oren Cass, and the editor of The Economist (can't remember her name).
If you have access to CNN and can watch it, do it.
When the world wearies and society ceases to satisfy, there is always the garden - Minnie Aumônier
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You forgot the wealthy and those with an interest in his tax cuts for them and liberation from government control. Also you forgot the Christian evangelicals who believe Trump was sent by god. Where I live, those appear to be the two most potent forces. I'm not buying the economy theory. People are actually better off economically under Biden than they were under Trump. And Trump has offered less than zero to make the economy better. Musk promised economical pain under a Trump administration.
There's a lot of Monday morning quarterbacking going on here that just isn't in alignment with reality.
The uber rich want Trump because they are greedy. Lots of non rich people want to be rich so they follow the lead of the rich.
From what I see in Trump country, the number of folks who voted for him because of grocery and gas prices has to be vanishingly small. They are all economically better off with Biden. This is greed and mass delusion fueled by a propaganda machine. An the weirdos who think a Trump presidency is somehow better for the Palestinians. See what I mean about mass delusion?
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@wtg said in Reports from the heartland:
Really great guests and discussion on Fareed's GPS this morning. David Frum and Ezra Klein, Oren Cass, and the editor of The Economist (can't remember her name).
If you have access to CNN and can watch it, do it.
Fareed's take, which is the intro to the show:
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/11/10/politics/video/fareeds-take-gps-2024-election-results-digvid
When a transcript of the entire show is posted online, I'll link it in this thread. Might be a few days.
Frum is most concerned about what Trump will do once he is inaugurated. He thinks that the US has made it this long because in the past, the elected people were willing to play by the rules and maintain high standards. He thinks the GOP elite have basically sold out and that rough waters may be ahead. He thinks 1) Trump will pardon the January 6th rioters, 2) Ukraine is toast and 3) he'll give away Taiwan.
Also lots of discussion about how rocky things are in Canada, Europe, and the UK with respect to their incumbent governments. Lots of turmoil.
I think we can say that we live in interesting times.
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I find their post-mortem with Alan Lichtman far more on point:
https://www.cnn.com/2024/11/10/politics/video/fareeds-take-gps-2024-election-results-digvid
I hope that takes you to the correct video. If not, scroll down the selections until you find Lichtman's. Corporate greed and massive disinformation are the new keys. I strongly agree.
fear is the thief of dreams
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I agree with Bernie Sanders in the short clip they also had from him, where he talks about how Dems should have had a much stronger message about the true culprit in our divided nation: the billionaire class who are pitting us against each other for their own benefit. The rise of the oligarchy is the real threat to us.
