# Progressives are deluding themselves. Trump's support is as strong as ever among his voters **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 5, 2017, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040 "2017-02-05T02:15:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Oly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oly/32/8255_2.png) [@Oly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oly)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/61 "2017-02-06T05:47:24Z")
The way we represent the outcomes of elections distorts what really happens. Trump won the electoral college, but lost the popular vote. Yeah, yeah we’ve all heard that but it does matter. Most people did (do?) not want him to be president. That margin is bigger when you think about what percent of eligible voters voted for him. Adding together those who voted for someone else and those who voted for no one gives us, what, about 25%? So one in four eligible voters “support” Trump. Hardly a mandate, sea change or what ever hyperbole. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c57346/32.png) [@Little\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Pig)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 6:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/62 "2017-02-06T06:18:56Z")
Oh Joy! I’m going to have to post this is a few threads. [Check this out](http://www.newsday.com/news/nation/create-your-own-trump-signed-executive-order-with-online-generator-1.13066643). ---
**Author:** ![TimeWinder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bcef8e/32.png) [@TimeWinder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TimeWinder)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 6:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/63 "2017-02-06T06:32:53Z")
> [@Lakai](#): > > My suggestion to progressives/liberals is to stop demonizing Trump voters as racist, xenophobic, Nazis, etc. Keep doing it and you’ll lose the next election because you’ll pick a candidate who has no clue what a large number of voters actually want (e.g. Hillary ignoring white working class voters) With all due respect, fuck that. They _are_ racist, xenophobic, etc. Nazi’s. I’ll stop calling them that when they stop acting like that. Seriously, have you been paying attention since the election? If the way to win elections is to support racism, xenophobia, misogyny, bigotry, abuse of the poor, and cruelty to the non-billionaires, well, then I’m willing to lose the elections. But as I’ve said in other threads, it doesn’t matter. This election was decided in the entirely fictitious world that exists only in right-wing “sources,” and had nothing to do with the actual merits of either candidate; one candidate didn’t have merits, and he was elected, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/64 "2017-02-06T06:33:11Z")
> [@Oly](#): > > The way we represent the outcomes of elections distorts what really happens. Trump won the electoral college, but lost the popular vote. Yeah, yeah we’ve all heard that but it does matter. Most people did (do?) not want him to be president. That margin is bigger when you think about what percent of eligible voters voted for him. Adding together those who voted for someone else and those who voted for no one gives us, what, about 25%? So one in four eligible voters “support” Trump. Hardly a mandate, sea change or what ever hyperbole. It’s likely that the general population reflects the voting population in candidate preference. Or something close. You are assuming that no one who didn’t vote supports Trump. Do you really think that’s true? ---
**Author:** ![Rigamarole](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/77aa72/32.png) [@Rigamarole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rigamarole)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/65 "2017-02-06T07:30:06Z")
Agreed with the OP - his support base is stronger than ever, and they’re loving this shit. And there’s this weird delusional wish-fulfillment fantasy on the left that he won’t even serve a full term (impeached and removed with a 2/3 vote by the Republican-juggernaut congress? Not bloody likely). Not only will he serve the full term, but his re-election in '20 is all but guaranteed. Strap yourselves in for 8 long, shitty, years. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 7:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/66 "2017-02-06T07:47:06Z")
> [@Fiveyearlurker](#): > > The Trump voters in my immediate family, which is my entire immediate family, have gleefully owned up to this. They didn’t vote for Trump because they like him. They voted for Trump because it makes liberals (which they define as anyone to the left of Pat Buchanan) angry. Absolutely no other reason. To paraphrase Stewart Lee, that’s like complaining about the service in a hotel by shitting in the bed, without realising that you now have to sleep in a shitted bed. ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 11:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/67 "2017-02-06T11:16:26Z")
> [@Rigamarole](#): > > Agreed with the OP - his support base is stronger than ever, and they’re loving this shit. And there’s this weird delusional wish-fulfillment fantasy on the left that he won’t even serve a full term (impeached and removed with a 2/3 vote by the Republican-juggernaut congress? Not bloody likely). Not only will he serve the full term, but his re-election in '20 is all but guaranteed. Strap yourselves in for 8 long, shitty, years. Since he barely won, and since the democratic party candidate was much disliked having such defeatism seems very silly. the opposition to Trump needs only to make a nomination of a personable and a charismatic candidate who campaigns well. You were able to elect the President Obama two times, he was a charismatic candidate, who knew how to connect. It is not that hard - instead of flinging hatred at the opposition, it is more useful to look at the mobilization of those who abstained and find the good charistmatic candidates who motivate. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/68 "2017-02-06T12:42:06Z")
> [@Ramira](#): > > Since he barely won, and since the democratic party candidate was much disliked having such defeatism seems very silly. > the opposition to Trump needs only to make a nomination of a personable and a charismatic candidate who campaigns well. > You were able to elect the President Obama two times, he was a charismatic candidate, who knew how to connect. > It is not that hard - instead of flinging hatred at the opposition, it is more useful to look at the mobilization of those who abstained and find the good charistmatic candidates who motivate. Indeed. I firmly believe that Trump’s policies (& the Republican Congress’s policies passed with his approval) will hurt more Americans than they help. So I truly hope that some Trump voters will change their minds. Other Trump voters are lost to reason. But I’m mostly concerned about the voters who didn’t bother because Hillary didn’t make their nipples tingle. Or who made a Third Party “Statement.” Next time, we need an Electoral majority–not just the Popular votes that we’re told do not matter. Although they do haunt The Donald… ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/69 "2017-02-06T12:50:16Z")
**Little\_Pig** No, you’re not. Do not cross post to multiple threads, especially when the topic is only tangentially related. Do not spam the board like this. > [@Little\_Pig](#): > > Oh Joy! I’m going to have to post this is a few threads. [Check this out](http://www.newsday.com/news/nation/create-your-own-trump-signed-executive-order-with-online-generator-1.13066643). ---
**Author:** ![Oly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oly/32/8255_2.png) [@Oly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oly)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/70 "2017-02-06T14:00:58Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > It’s likely that the general population reflects the voting population in candidate preference. Or something close. You are assuming that no one who didn’t vote supports Trump. Do you really think that’s true? Depends what you mean by support, I guess. Minus the probably small fraction that didn’t vote because they couldn’t for some reason, people who chose not to vote apparently supported, insofar as voting expresses support, no one. Which means they did not support Trump. But sticking to numbers instead of words, the fact remains that 25% (roughly) of people who could vote felt strongly enough that Trump should be president that they were sufficiently moved to vote for him. ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/71 "2017-02-06T14:55:59Z")
> [@elbows](#): > > Condescension notwithstanding, any poll can only be as accurate as the truthfulness of the respondents. And, this past election indicates people are willing to say one thing, to avoid appearing a deplorable before the pollster, but vote their truth once in the voting booth. > > Tell me again how better math education is going to correct for that. A better education in the mathematics will correct the incorrect perception that the polls were very off at all, indeed the contrary the variance was very tight, and thus lead to avoid making incorrect conclusions like you make in stating the above. but since without a good mathematics education the incorrect reading of statistics and of probability is frequent, bad conclusions will be drawn. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/72 "2017-02-06T16:49:53Z")
> [@Oly](#): > > The way we represent the outcomes of elections distorts what really happens. Trump won the electoral college, but lost the popular vote. Yeah, yeah we’ve all heard that but it does matter. Most people did (do?) not want him to be president. That margin is bigger when you think about what percent of eligible voters voted for him. Adding together those who voted for someone else and those who voted for no one gives us, what, about 25%? So one in four eligible voters “support” Trump. Hardly a mandate, sea change or what ever hyperbole. Trump won the popular vote because of the numbers in CA and NY, where Hillary campaigned to get her popular vote numbers up and that he ignored as a lot cause to winning the election. If you look at popular vote totals without CA and NY included, Trump won that popular vote by about as many votes as Clinton won overall. I don’t think that ‘most people did not want him to be president’ is a meaningful statistic; even with her popular vote ‘win’ Hillary would have less than 1/3 of eligible voters supporting her as president, so would have a supermajority opposed to her. Outside of NY and CA, Trump is as strong of a popular vote winner as Hillary. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/73 "2017-02-06T17:29:06Z")
> [@Fiveyearlurker](#): > > The Trump voters in my immediate family, which is my entire immediate family, have gleefully owned up to this. They didn’t vote for Trump because they like him. They voted for Trump because it makes liberals (which they define as anyone to the left of Pat Buchanan) angry. Absolutely no other reason. [Tom Tomorrow to the rescue today.](http://images.dailykos.com/images/362026/story_image/TMW2017-02-08color.png?1486319801) Anybody who tries to defend this nihilistic and absurd line of justification gets no slack at all from me. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/74 "2017-02-06T17:48:05Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > Trump won the popular vote because of the numbers in CA and NY, where Hillary campaigned to get her popular vote numbers up and that he ignored as a lot cause to winning the election. If you look at popular vote totals without CA and NY included, Trump won that popular vote by about as many votes as Clinton won overall. I don’t think that ‘most people did not want him to be president’ is a meaningful statistic; even with her popular vote ‘win’ Hillary would have less than 1/3 of eligible voters supporting her as president, so would have a supermajority opposed to her. Outside of NY and CA, Trump is as strong of a popular vote winner as Hillary. “Alternative math”? Hillary’s votes include the ones from Harris County (Houston)–where she won with a larger margin than Obama had. Sorry, the millions who preferred her live throughout the USA. Even in states that went Red in the Electoral College. For now… Why can’t Trump & his supporters just ignore the popular vote. We know that’s not the one that “counts.” Or maybe it does mean something. ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/75 "2017-02-06T18:46:49Z")
> [@elbows](#): > > “This poll seems respectable.” > > This, right here, is the root of the problem, in my opinion. What is it going to take for people to understand that polls have ceased to be in any way measurably accurate? The questions, if you’ve ever been polled, are as far as you can get from unbiased and straight forward. And we have clearly entered an age where people are willing to say one thing to the pollster but go with their true feelings once in the voting booth. What more evidence do y’all need exactly? > > How anyone, can quote any poll, after these election results, with a straight face is beyond me. > > And how can the Left still look to poll numbers for answers to how we got here? Nate Silver has written extensively on the fact that the polling error in this election wasn’t any greater than historical averages. The polls in fact said that Clinton had a slight advantage, but within the historical error margin for such polls, and the amount by which Trump won was within reasonable margins. So, yeah, we can still believe polls. Just because they have an error margin doesn’t mean they are without useful predictive power. That hasn’t changed. Suggesting that polling is useless or meaningless because of a close election is completely incorrect. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/76 "2017-02-06T18:56:52Z")
> [@Oly](#): > > Depends what you mean by support, I guess. Minus the probably small fraction that didn’t vote because they couldn’t for some reason, people who chose not to vote apparently supported, insofar as voting expresses support, no one. Which means they did not support Trump. But sticking to numbers instead of words, the fact remains that 25% (roughly) of people who could vote felt strongly enough that Trump should be president that they were sufficiently moved to vote for him. So what? Every president’s numbers look low like that. But we have poll that ask people what they think and I don’t see any reason NOT to use those polls once the election is over. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/77 "2017-02-06T18:58:24Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > Trump won the popular vote because of the numbers in CA and NY, where Hillary campaigned to get her popular vote numbers up and that he ignored as a lo[s]t cause to winning the election. If you look at popular vote totals without CA and NY included, Trump won that popular vote by about as many votes as Clinton won overall. I don’t think that ‘most people did not want him to be president’ is a meaningful statistic; even with her popular vote ‘win’ Hillary would have less than 1/3 of eligible voters supporting her as president, so would have a supermajority opposed to her. Outside of NY and CA, Trump is as strong of a popular vote winner as Hillary. That’s pretty stupid logic. And quite frankly I’m sick of this whole “coastal bubble” meme that implies somehow that New York and California are these weird tiny isolated, irrelevant backwaters with an inflated influence on American politics and economics. The combined population of New York and California is almost 60 million people and represents 18% of the population of the entire country. The combined GDP of California and New York represents almost 25% of the national GDP. These states are also home to some of the largest, most educated, most diverse and culturally significant cities in the country. So I’m curious as to why Trump supporters think that excluding these states is an appropriate methodology? > [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Trump opponents are in denial about how awful the American public is. So they didn’t foresee him winning because they thought nobody would vote for him, and now they think people will reject him for his actions because they want to believe that his supporters were fooled, instead of knowingly putting a bigoted psychopath like Trump into power because he’s a bigoted psychopath. They were “fooled” in thinking that they will ultimately benefit from Trump’s policies. Keep in mind, 8 years ago America elected it’s first black president. Twice. Millions of Americans didn’t just suddenly become bigots in that time. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/78 "2017-02-06T19:47:23Z")
> [@Procrustus](#): > > Thanks for sharing this. Why do they want to make liberals angry? IMO, that’s a bad way of putting it. I think it’s more that many people see attacks on Trump as being attacks on themselves, they being similarly un-PC on many issues. And the notion that despite the unremitting hostility of the establishment and the media, a person with non-PC views can get elected president, is a very pleasing one. In sum, it’s not that they’re happy with the suffering of some liberal out there minding his own business and just being liberal all by himself. It’s the liberals who are out there trying to suppress alternative viewpoints as being bigoted and ignorant etc., and being stymied in their effort, that gives these people pleasure. I include myself in that group, though in my case it did not motivate me to actually vote for Trump. But I’m sympathetic in this specific regard and consider that to a positive aspect of Trump’s election. ---
**Author:** ![Rigamarole](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/77aa72/32.png) [@Rigamarole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rigamarole)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/79 "2017-02-06T20:01:56Z")
> [@Ramira](#): > > Since he barely won I wouldn’t call 306-232 “barely” winning (you can cry ‘popular vote’, but that’s an irrelevant red herring, since we know that’s not how it works). > [@Ramira](#): > > and since the democratic party candidate was much disliked having such defeatism seems very silly. > the opposition to Trump needs only to make a nomination of a personable and a charismatic candidate who campaigns well. LOL. Remember the [del]guys[/del] shitty robots the Dems ran against Dubya in '00 and '04? Obama was a rare diamond in the rough. We’re not likely to see another like him. Bernie was really good, but he’s already quite old and I think he’ll just be too damn old to be electable in '20. > [@Ramira](#): > > You were able to elect the President Obama two times, he was a charismatic candidate, who knew how to connect. > It is not that hard - instead of flinging hatred at the opposition, it is more useful to look at the mobilization of those who abstained and find the good charistmatic candidates who motivate. So, Kanye West? I’m not even joking, he’s said multiple times he’s serious about running and he’s going to be campaigning next election. I wouldn’t have ever thought he’d get any traction, but now we know anything is possible when it comes to the presidential race shitshow. Yeah, I just don’t see who on Earth the Dems are gonna come up with that could beat Trump (seen talk of Biden, which would be lovely, but he’s said several times he doesn’t want that job so I’d be surprised if he changed his mind). ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040/80 "2017-02-06T20:07:17Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > So I’m curious as to why Trump supporters think that excluding these states is an appropriate methodology? Well, you’ll have to ask a Trump supporter about that then, as I’m pretty damn far from a Trump supporter. But I am a supporter of things like actual facts, and the fact is that Trump has and had significant, widespread support across the country, with to the point that he won by a comfortable margin outside of two states. And, again, the two states that account for Clinton’s popular vote win are states that Trump deliberately didn’t campaign in because he knew he couldn’t win in either of them while Clinton campaigned heavily in them hoping to rack up more popular vote. There are pages and pages of real criticism of Trump, harping on an easily falsifiable issue (that’s even easier to ignore for his supporters, since they’ll believe the ‘coastal elites’ narrative) is counterproductive. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/progressives-are-deluding-themselves-trumps-support-is-as-strong-as-ever-among-his-voters/779040.md?page=5)