So, in my local area, I'm surrounded by Trump voters & supporters

Politics & Elections
21

I have a beloved brother who’s a Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, MAGA hat guy. I can always refrain from talking politics. He can’t.

Unfortunately, the way I’ve taken to ending the conversation is by reminding him of one simple fact: I read and watch news from NO END of different sources, from all parts of the political spectrum. He doesn’t. So … as I occasionally remind him … I know everything that he knows, while he knows HALF of what I know.

[It’s far more true than it is condescending]

And everything that we’ve learned from the Dominion/Fox News lawsuit takes that to a dramatically worse level.

When I can get the conversation to come down to issues of fact, I always have the facts correct, and they always support my position. Most of the time, it’s a reflection of what his favored media outlets DIDN’T tell him (lies of omission).

So, I refrain from political discussions with my beloved brother.

But now I have a neighbor who is NOT MAGA but is very conservative (not really a RINO…), understands Trump’s innumerable personal failings, but liked … something about his policies. My neighbor is also in his 60’s and is classically socially conservative.

30 years ago, my lengthy talks with conservatives were stimulating and fun, because we read from the same hymnal but applied disparate values to the facts.

Since Fox (and other RW outlets – primarily Internet and cable TV), nearly every conversation that I have with a Trump supporter – definitely including my neighbor – leaves me horribly sympathetic to Joe Biden in the debate against Trump: if you could fact check him on the fly, that would be all you could do. You would never get a chance to describe your own agenda or share your vision for the country.

I’ve said it here before, but Brandolini’s Law and the Dunning-Kruger Effect accurately characterize the overwhelming majority of the MAGA movement.

The signs, clothing, swag, and sundry Trump/MAGA regalia? They simply remind me of an old meme:

Whenever you hear somebody start a sentence with ‘I seen,’ that sentence never ends with ‘the inside of a book.’

22

Is it really a “coalition” when members are being swayed by manipulation and fabrication, or is it the “Inner Party” and the “dupes” who seriously believe that Obama/Biden/Harris is somehow going to manage to send troops door-to-door to collect all of their guns, or that ‘rolling coal’ is somehow a fundamental human right? This is a party that has become so warped by the “Family Values” propaganda campaigned kicked off by Newt Gingrich (himself a hypocrite of the highest order) it would no longer be recognizable to traditional, ‘Eighteis-era Republicans, even the ones who were nominally “Gun owners, Anti-Abortion, Anti-LGBT, Pro-Coal/Oil, …”

I’m sure there are still rational, right-centrist Republicans but they have been so utterly sidelined in the party ranks that the twice-impeached, insurrection-inciting, felony convict Donald Trump was the virtually uncontested candidate, and all other candidates were doing their gosh-darned best to out-Trump him. This is a Republican party that has turned on traditional stalwarts and even hard-right conservative neocons like Liz Cheney, or people associated with former Republican leaders like Cindy McCain despite the fact that she has never announced any intention or interest in running for public office. Describing the modern GOP as a cult, and in particular a personality cult that has become centered around one polarizing, would-be autocrat, and that it has morphed from a ‘normal’ political party representing (if not actually practicing) fiscal moderation and moderate social conservatism into a dangerous, proto-fascistic movement which has openly welcomed into its ranks Christian Nationalists, white supremacist, and radicalized followers that, to any student of history, like like an early Weimar cosplay Sturmabteilung, most pretending to be militia but with a core of leaders who are actually (if ineptly) trying to organize into a paramilitary force capable of actually carrying out an insurrection.

The time to stop with the “oh, they just have a few bad apples” talk about the Republican party was right after 06 January 2021, when very few of the Republican Congresspeople who just had to evacuate the Capitol because of a violent mob trying to disrupt the certification of the Presidential election, and even fewer voted (a second time) to impeach Trump for clearly and overtly inciting the violence. There were plenty of good people who joined the ranks of the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, no doubt thinking it would be best for business or that the economic and political benefits outweighed the apparent moral inequities (and worse that many suspected or knew about), which doesn’t mean that the Nazi Party was any less of a burgeoning fascism.

Stranger

23

Trump supporters are just weird.

I live in a rural county on the coast. One of the lobster boats in the local harbour flies a Trump flag and there’s at least one house nearby that also has Trump signs and a flag.

Did I mention that I live in Canada? Seriously, they’re just weird.

24

Yesterday we went to a garden tour/“how to” on orchid growing. This was in Hawai’i, a reliably Democratic state. And while I don’t know anything about traits that people who like orchids typically share, it seems like the kind of hobby that one might associate with gentile intellectuals more likely to vote for progressives.

But there was a big honkin’ truck on the property with a big sticker that said, “1 out of 3 Biden supporters … are as STUPID as the other 2.”

Yeah, that’s nice.

25

If I had a good deal of cash and time to spare, I’d love to buy a shitton of Harris signs and put them up overnight all over my area. I live in the reddest of red areas, southern SC.

26

Did you mean “genteel”?

27

I live in a blue-ish county in the red state of Kansas. 90% of the yard signs, flags, and bumper stickers are GOP, but that certainly doesn’t represent the percentage of Rep vs Dem voters. Personally, I am a bit fearful of advertising my political leanings, so I don’t.

Same here.

This, exactly. And this will guide my vote in the upcoming primary. I’m registered GOP so I can vote against the most vile of the candidates.

28

LOL. Yes, I certainly did. I’d like to blame auto-correct but I think a brain fart followed by failure to read my post before submitting is to blame.

29

I live in the reddest part of the bluest state. As I was being shown around my new place of work, I noticed lots and lots of flags everywhere but it didn’t really register because it was the Monday after July 4th. My new co-worker, who shares my politics, warned me to “never mention anything political outside our little dept.”. I have to keep reminding myself never to express my true opinions in public around here.

When I first returned here after escaping Floriduh, my car still had FL plates. I was at a gas station and a young(ish) dude approached and starting asking me about how I liked it there (FL) and why did I leave, etc. Maybe I imagined it but it felt like he was trying to suss out my politics. I just said “weather”.

30

Fortunately our HOA prohibits all yard signs except for real state and temporary contractor signs. The town has restrictions too, which is why the main road between us and Scottsdale is absolutely plastered with signs starting at the town limits.

Hillary was absolutely right back in 2016:

You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right?” Clinton said. “The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic—you name it. And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up.

Many love to misquote her by leaving out the “half”, while the rest have been jumping right into that basket. If we add “self-serving spineless hypocrites” to the basket it’s damned close to 100%.

31

What’s changed is that for a lot of Americans being ultra MAGA is part of their core identity and they’re threatened by those who aren’t part of the cult. Take someone like Liz Cheney, who likely agrees with 90% of the policies MAGAts actually like, and she was rejected by the cult because she didn’t buy into what the Mango Mussolini is selling.

I live in Arkansas and I’m in a similar situation. There’s a guy in my neighborhood who left his Trump 2020 sign in his yard until 2022. When I go to other parts of the state, it’s pretty much MAGA all the way. Back in 2020, I walked into a diner in a small Arkansas town to pick up my order and I was the only person with a mask on. You could tell who everyone voted for just by looking at us.

I didn’t think about this until you mentioned it, but I do see fewer signs in my neighborhood these days than I did in 2020. I remember one house in particular that was decked out in Trump signs doesn’t have a thing this year (and it’s occupied by the same people).

32

The Republican Party has been taken over by MAGA who demands members obey their Mango Mussolini. Liz Cheney is a staunch conervative who the majority of MAGA followers would approve of her policies, but she was ejected from the cult because she didn’t buy into Donald’s lies about the 2020 election. Her conservative beliefs weren’t a problem, she didn’t kowtow to Trump. That was the problem. The Republican Party is dead but a lot of people don’t know it because MAGA is wearing its skin.

33

Yes, my region and county is very unionized and voted in 2016 and 2020 almost 60% or so for Clinton and Biden.

Trump signs, “Fuck Joe Biden” signs, all that everywhere.

I spoke to my older neighbor in 2020. He was 76. No signs on his lawn.

He said, “Yeah, so we gotta get Trump outta there. He puts the “ME” in America.”

We have no signs, voting straight Blue.

34

My area is red, but we abut up against very blue area (St Louis). I do not see huge amounts of Trump things, and in fact, there was a house vandalized that had a confederate flag in the backyard (probably a Trump voter). A few yards down from there, someone put up a Biden Harris sign. However, our country did vote 60 percent for Trump in 2020. But it is an area, like the Missouri Mississippi confluence, which is close to me, that mixes both waters as it combines, so we seem to have various types here. I see rainbow stuff, too, quite a bit more of that than the Trump stuff. Our UCC is also openly pro gay rights, and that is evident on its marquee. In general, this is a very middle class area, most people want to get along, and they have alot to lose by being too extreme. It is certainly not static, bc I hear of folks fighting back, voting against school board extremists, protesting library censorship, (we were in the national news awhile back bc of our library fighting against a book ban). We also had a restaurant that did not want to host a gay wedding rehearsal dinner, haha, it is no longer in business. This is St Charles County, and perhaps it is more a purple place, but still…Trump won the county in 2020, so those who vote here certainly voted bright red.

35

So, as I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I’m in a very purple-red part of a purple-blue state (Colorado Springs, CO), and similar to those upthread, most people who visually advertise are Trump supporters.

In my personal (older) neighborhood I have 2 households within a 3 block radius that kept flying (or displaying) Trump 2020 flags until replaced with Trump 2024. It does leave me feeling isolated, but when I look at voting trends, the bluing of even this area continues, even as the eastern and western parts of the state stay damn red.

But it’s THIS sort of thing that makes me queasy:

This was parked right upfront at my local Kroger (major chain grocery store for those who don’t know). Be glad I didn’t image the stuff on the sides, because they (in board terms) came close to calls for direct violence.

Those who are full on MAGA (distinct form Republicans) Do Not Care about making you feel unsafe. They want you to feel unsafe.

36

Might want to censor that license plate, just in case? I know you probably don’t mind yourself, given what you said, but you know how sue happy these people are.

37

Per @leaper’s advice removed the image, but was unable to edit it and relink it prior to the 15 minute timeout, so here it is again, sorry for the confusion.

Imgur

38

I saw an “F*** Joe Biden” sign on farm property that bordered I-16, which runs between Savannah and Macon, GA. It’s surprising to me that people think that’s cool to advertise, like it’s OK that thousands of cars every day need to see that sentiment. It’s like putting up a public sign on your property that says, “I’m an F’in Idiot”…

39

In the town next to me, the children’s are of the library has windows along the wall by the road. Across that road, facing the library, is a big “F Joe Biden” flag.

40

They still don’t understand that he holds those rallies to sell merch to line his pockets. I’m guessing they’ll never get that.