The ridiculing of the left towards anyone who
would consider voting for Trump must have suppressed closet Trump voters.
It failed to turn them to voting for an authoritative corrupt elitist and
served to hide the impending loss for Clinton. One of the reasons for the joy I
felt knowing (any) Clinton lost.
From
zerohedge.com
Paul Krugman finally says
something accurate, IMO.
"...it’s clear
that almost everyone on the center-left, myself included, was clueless about what actually works in
persuading voters. Tuesday’s fallout will last for decades, maybe
generations." It will not
matter. Whatever the problem, government is not the solution.
This
tickles me. Krugman, the guy who holds himself out to be the all-impressive
and knowledgeable economist in pushing his liberal agenda, admits he was
wrong. I really have a special disdain
for this man, but I give him kudos for this admission.
"In Rust Belt towns that few
national reporters bothered to visit, I didn’t find many racists or rednecks
(some, but not many). The mainstream media caricature of angry blue-collar
whites turning to Trump out of racial animosity and misogyny didn’t stand up to
scrutiny. Most of the people I spoke to were simply
discouraged. Many were embarrassed at the state of their communities, which
aren’t just struggling with deindustrialization but also with a horrifying
heroin epidemic. Support for Trump in these places didn’t have much to do with
a belief that he would fix these problems. Not many people in northeastern Ohio
or western Pennsylvania really think Trump is going to bring back the steel
mills or put coal miners back to work.
Their support for him has a different explanation: respect. Trump was
the first national political figure in generations who saw them, acknowledged
that they have been left behind, that their cities and towns are in a state of
persistent decline, and promised to help out somehow. When you’re used to
being dismissed as bitter folks who cling to guns and religion, as President
Obama did in 2008, or denounced as “deplorables” and “irredeemable,” as Hillary
Clinton did during this election, respect goes a long way—even if there are no
easy solutions, from Washington or anywhere else, to the problems that plague
your town."
"It doesn’t matter, at this point, that
Trump doesn’t understand what’s really to blame for the plight of the
industrial Midwest, or how to ameliorate it. What matters is that he showed our
political and media elites what can happen when you reach out to Americans who
have been left behind, whom the rest of country has not even tried to
understand, and offer them some respect."
I can definitely relate to the
overwhelming truths of these statements. Most people I know who voted
Trump are nowhere near the hateful, racist and sexist bigots identified by the
left. They are Americans that have not seen the rising success that those
on the coasts and DC have been able to experience from the crony capitalist
policies of the past 10-20 years.
And by the
way, I am no fan of the way Trump speaks. PC speech is a joke but Trump
takes it too far the other way. Can we not just speak with respect to
others? Clinton is no better calling Trump supporters “deplorable.” Which
is least moral, calling Mexicans rapists or Americans deplorable? I don't
know and I don't care to find out. But I do know that neither one is especially
nice.
Why have incomes risen so much in DC? They
must have a good amount of entrepreneurship right? Lots of natural resources
right? Wrong - unless you're talking about entrepreneurship to create more
government busy bodies and bureaucrats to do nothing but command an ever
increasing above average salary and pension while they control my life.
"Large is the number of “Progressives”
(today in the United States, people such as Bernie Sanders and Harold Meyerson)
who, in opposing free trade, oppose vigorous and open market competition – and
who believe in their bones that, with this opposition, they further the
interests of the poor, the powerless, the downtrodden, the weak. These
protectionists are blind to the reality that their opposition to open
competition and free trade in fact gives aid and comfort to crony capitalists
who are unjustly enriched by such policies – policies that inflict
disproportionate harm on the poor, the powerless, the downtrodden, the
weak."
I have said it before - Trump's rhetoric may do damage
to minorities and the less affluent (and his economic policies will too) but
few people have done more to hurt those same people than Bill and Hill Clinton.
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