via WCPO.
It’s no secret that I have had little to no patience with those who keep trying to explain the “reasoning” of Trumpholes. All the excuses, all the hand-wringing have gotten an oh, please from me. Why? Because I don’t buy the excuses, never have. I was right here, in rural nDakota, I saw what happened. I heard people talk. I know what motivated them – hate, and fear born of losing their oh so precious privilege, with the fear of losing white privilege higher than any other. Bigots, misogynists, combinations, they were all upfront about their motivations. That could not have possibly been more fucking clear during the whole damn near never-ending election process. Oh, but all those Trumpholes with that ugly center, they didn’t like being disparaged or looked down upon, so they started claiming this, that, and the other for their vote. To which, my response was “bullshit.” And now, there’s a study. Yes, a fuckin’ study was undertaken to discern the true motives of Trumpholes, and guess what? Why, they are misogynistic, hateful fuckbuckets! Wow, who woulda ever guessed. For Chrissakes, the idiocy, I, it’s ohhhh.
Facts, however, as a rather more illustrious predecessor of President Trump once remarked, “are stubborn things.” Interestingly, on the very same day that Sanders offered his evidence-free defense of Trump voters in Boston, the latest data from the American National Election Studies (ANES) was released.
Philip Klinkner, a political scientist at Hamilton College and an expert on race relations, has pored over this ANES data and tells me that “whether it’s good politics to say so or not, the evidence from the 2016 election is very clear that attitudes about blacks, immigrants, and Muslims were a key component of Trump’s appeal.” For example, he says, “in 2016 Trump did worse than Mitt Romney among voters with low and moderate levels of racial resentment, but much better among those with high levels of resentment.”
The new ANES data only confirms what a plethoraofstudies have told us since the start of the presidential campaign: the race was about race. Klinkner himself grabbed headlines last summer when he revealed that the best way to identify a Trump supporter in the U.S. was to ask “just one simple question: is Barack Obama a Muslim?” Because, he said, “if they are white and the answer is yes, 89 percent of the time that person will have a higher opinion of Trump than Clinton.” This is economic anxiety? Really?
Other surveys and polls of Trump voters found “a strong relationship between anti-black attitudes and support for Trump”; Trump supporters being “more likely to describe African Americans as ‘criminal,’ ‘unintelligent,’ ‘lazy’ and ‘violent’”; more likely to believe “people of color are taking white jobs”; and a “majority” of them rating blacks “as less evolved than whites.” Sorry, but how can any of these prejudices be blamed on free trade or low wages?
Okay, there’s all the stuff most of us already knew. Can we finally stop fucking pretending that these people were simply suffering from economic wounds? They are horrible, immoral, nasty assholes. Now, if the rest of the liberal/lefty/democratic side can finally get this through their unfortunately thick skulls*, perhaps the Resistance could gain some solid ground.
*In particular, I am sick to death of Sanders making excuses for these Trumpholes.
The Intercept has the full story.
