What I don’t understand is why people who aren’t members of the privileged classes support Trump and his agenda. He talks a good game but his actual policies while president didn’t help them.
Policies is only a small part of it. The fact that he expresses anger against the same people they express anger against is a much bigger part of it, along with making them feel like they’re spoken for.
IMHO, many Trump voters, if given the choice of $20,000/year of healthcare/education/retirement/grocery assistance, or getting to see gays/transgender/feminists/illegal immigrants/Muslims/SJWs banned, would choose the latter.
But Biden actually does things to help them. As in 2016, I don’t understand Trump’s appeal.
Yes, but you’re appealing to logic. Emotion is a much more powerful overrider than logic. Ironically, it’s the right wing that likes to say “Facts don’t care about your feelings,” but the truth is also the opposite: “Feelings don’t care about your facts.”
Biden appeals to logic but Trump appeals to emotion, and emotion is far stronger.
Moved hijack from Has the US political landscape even been this divided in living memory? - #24 by Thing.Fish thread.
Have fun, but please avoid blatant hijacks.
Thank you.
It’s not just Trump, but all of the modern conservative movement. This larger question goes back at least 20 years and is the topic of this book: What’s the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America (2004).
Many of them are consumers of conservative media (Fox News, etc.), which tell them, over and over again, that Democratic policies are not helping them, and that only Trump/Republican policies will do so.
They have allowed themselves to become convinced that Democrats are not only opposed to their interests, but that they (Democrats) are evil, and are working to actively destroy America. They have bought into the idea that only Republicans can save America, and keep the Democrats from outlawing religion, outlawing guns, making their kids gay and/or transgender, etc., etc.
As @Velocity already noted, it’s not about logic, and it’s not about a firm understanding of the “truth” of the matter. It’s about emotion and fear, and only trusting media sources and politicians that they agree with.
“A demagogue or rabble-rouser, is a political leader in a democracy who gains popularity by arousing the common people against elites, especially through oratory that whips up the passions of crowds, appealing to emotion by scapegoating out-groups, exaggerating dangers to stoke fears, lying for emotional effect, or other rhetoric that tends to drown out reasoned deliberation and encourage fanatical popularity.”
"Demagogues overturn established norms of political conduct, or promise or threaten to do so. Historian Reinhard Luthin defined demagogue as “a politician skilled in oratory, flattery and invective; evasive in discussing vital issues; promising everything to everybody; appealing to the passions rather than the reason of the public; and arousing racial, religious, and class prejudices—a man whose lust for power without recourse to principle leads him to seek to become a master of the masses. He has for centuries practiced his profession of ‘man of the people’. He is a product of a political tradition nearly as old as western civilization itself.”
[Wikipedia]
That’s one reason I find the possibility of Trump winning this election terrifying.
That’s easily explained by the fact that you’re thoughtful and paying attention 
Here’s a couple of quotes from another historian well placed to characterize this behavior:
“The fundamental principle of all propaganda was the repetition of effective arguments; but those arguments must not be too refined – there was no point in seeking to convert the intellectuals. For intellectuals would never be converted and would anyway always yield to the stronger, and this will always be the man in the street. Arguments must therefore be crude, clear and forcible, and appeal to emotions and instincts, not to the intellect. Truth was unimportant, and entirely subordinate to the tactics and psychology, but convenient lies (“poetic truth”, as he once called them) must always be made credible.”
“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State."
–Hugh Trevor-Roper, English historian, paraphrasing Joseph Goebbels, WWII German Propaganda Minister
Any of this sound familiar (, he asked rhetorically)?
Also, as far as poor-to-middle-class conservative voters supporting a party which often gives the tax breaks to the wealthy: there’s the phenomenon of the “temporarily embarrassed millionaire” (as John Steinbeck described it).
The people you’re asking about are almost certainly never going to benefit from Republican tax cuts, are almost certainly never going to be affected by the estate tax, etc. But, they cling to the dream that maybe, somehow, they will be wealthy someday, and they don’t want those terrible Democrats to steal all their wealth.
Joe the Plumber, for instance.
I’d also like to add something a bit non-traditional, but – with luck – responsive.
Here’s who David Frum is:
And here’s a compendium of his quotes that, in aggregate, do what I feel is an exceptional job of characterizing today’s GOP and its supporters:
It’s quick, easy reading, but I think it’s incredibly sagacious and insightful.
One key point is that most people are members of some privileged class or another. There are black and brown men who see Trump as elevating men over women, and assume that’s the key point, and that he won’t actually do anything against black or brown people. There are white women who see Trump as elevating white people over brown or black, and assume that he won’t actually do anything against women. There are straight people who see the fight as being straights vs. gays, and assume that Trump won’t do anything against them. Rich people, likewise, think that it’s all about economic status, and view Trump as on their side. Or, if Trump ever does act against women/brown people/gays/whatever, it’ll only be against that other group of women/brown people/gays/whatever.
Now, if you can find a poor brown Hispanic lesbian who supports Trump, yeah, then you’d really need to question why. And I wouldn’t doubt that there are a few. But very, very few.
Ask any Trump supported an they’ll tell you it’s the other way around. That the Democrats are the party of the privileged elite. They’ll point to Hollywood’s support of democrats and those overpaid tenured college professors as their proof. In their mind Trump is on their side in wanting to stick it to the rich.
They’ll tell you democrats just want to tax you to death and spend your money on woke social programs that are part of privileged elite agendas.
Fox got into their heads badly.
One final thought…
They don’t read the Constitution. They don’t read the Transcripts (of the call with Zelenskyy). They don’t read the Mueller Report. They don’t read the Durham Report. They don’t read the Transcript of the Devon Archer interview. They don’t read Jack Smith’s 37-count Mar-A-Lago Indictment or his Indictment for trying to overthrow the US government. They don’t read Robert Hur’s Special Counsel Report. They don’t read the 98-page Georgia Indictment. I’m not convinced they even read.
They don’t watch the January 6 Committee Investigative Hearings. They don’t watch Durham’s Congressional testimony. They don’t care a bit what evidence Alvin Bragg and Letitia James might have. They don’t look elsewhere to learn about the revelations from the Dominion lawsuit.
There’s absolutely no reason to believe that they have any awareness of the “alternate slate of electors” scam whatsoever. None.
Instead, they line up and get empty talking points as though they were communion wafers at Church, and then they spend all day regurgitating them, safe in the knowledge that their fellow MAGA types will smile vapidly, and that they can dismiss the substantive corrections of others as “FAKE NEWS” or “RINOs.”
None so blind as those who will not see.
This post from a similar thread comes to mind:
In a nutshell, Trump (and Republicans in general) have successfully harnessed hate, fear, and ignorance among a large portion of the populace by elevating social issues like immigration, LGBTQ rights, and “creeping socialism” well beyond the actual problems they are posing, and hiding failed policies (protectionism, “trickle-down”, or no policies at all) under all that, to get people to vote against their own interests. They’ve fully abandoned the whole “big tent” idea (remember that? how quaint!). Add the propaganda arm of the GOP (Fox News) reinforcing hate, fear, and ignorance, et voila, Trump has a real chance of becoming President again.
Bears repeating: The GOP has been successful in using social issues as a wedge to get people to vote against their own interests.
We could probably put nearly all of the inflation that we experienced in the last several years on the shoulders of Trump. But, that said, it’s what the average factory worker voted for.
They ain’t economists.
Fundamentally, most people don’t really understand what they’re voting for, what the options are, what the merits and demerits of those options are, etc. They just know that someone’s saying they’re going to help them, or not saying that, and they’re generally going to take that at face value. The OP makes the presumption that people understand things. They don’t. If they did, then yes, clearly we wouldn’t be where we are.
Trump is actually running a fairly good strategy of, on the one side, cozying up to unions and blue collar types, promising to put his thumb on business and, Mussolini style, force them to run their businesses with a worker-first operating viewpoint. And then, on the other side, telling CEOs that he’s open to the highest bidder and effectively willing to do anything from assassinating foreign businessmen to letting them dump toxic sludge in the middle of Wyoming, so long as they offer a large enough tribute and kiss the ring.
Within that, Trump just needs to balance the optics so that he maintains political power via his electorate - doing just enough to keep the workers thinking that he’s doing everything for them - while renting out the Resolute Desk to Elon Musk for his next orgy.