Bottom Line on Trump: Sizable Number of Whites Don't Want to Face the Future as a Minority.

[ancianita]

I've been reading The New Yorker for thirty years, and as far as I can remember, this is the first time in many years that I've seen TNY attempt to tap into right wing thinking in the present. Sure, it's examined past right wing activity, but not present.

Putting my mocking of Trump's campaign slogan aside, this article represents, to me, a sitting up and taking notice by the East Coast intelligentsia. ( I hope my excerpts below don't exceed the allowable.)

More to the content: Donald Trump has tapped into not only racist sentiments within his party, but also deep dissatisfaction in the base over Republican neglect of their interests. This article opens up ideas held by conservatives about what a future America might look like. While the title hints at the "fearful and the frustrated," there is a signal optimism presented about conservative politics that bears examining.

Trump’s constant talk of his money, his peering down on the one per cent (not to mention the ninety-nine), has helped him to a surprising degree. “I love the fact that he wouldn’t be owing anybody,” Nancy Merz, a fifty-two-year-old Hampton Republican, told me.

Trump’s fans project onto him a vast range of imaginings—about toughness, business acumen, honesty—from a continuum that ranges from economic and libertarian conservatives to the far-right fringe. In partisan terms, his ideas are riven by contradiction—he calls for mass deportations but opposes cuts to Medicare and Social Security; he vows to expand the military but criticizes free trade—and yet that is a reflection of voters’ often incoherent sets of convictions.

Trump became the top choice among Tea Party voters, supplanting (and opening a large lead over) Senator Ted Cruz, of Texas, and Governor Scott Walker, of Wisconsin, both Tea Party stalwarts. According to a Washington Post /ABC News poll conducted last month, the “broad majority” of Trump’s supporters hailed from two groups: voters with no college degree, and voters who say that immigrants weaken America. By mid-August, Trump was even closing in on Hillary Clinton. CNN reported that, when voters were asked to choose between the two, Clinton was leading fifty-one per cent to forty-five.

On July 20th, three days before his trip to Texas, Ann Coulter, whose most recent book is “¡Adios, America! The Left’s Plan to Turn Our Country Into a Third World Hellhole,” appeared on Sean Hannity’s show and urged fellow-Republicans to see Trump’s summer as a harbinger. “The new litmus test for real conservatives is immigration,” she said. “They used to say the same thing about the pro-life Republicans and the pro-gun Republicans, and, ‘Oh, they’re fringe and they’re tacky, and we’re so embarrassed to be associated with them.’ Now every one of them comes along and pretends they’d be Reagan”...

Ordinarily, the white-nationalist Web sites mock Republicans as Zionist stooges and corporate puppets who have opened the borders in order to keep wages low. But, on July 9th, VDARE, an opinion site founded to “push back the plans of pro-Amnesty/Immigration Surge politicians, ethnic activists and corrupt Big Business,” hailed Trump as “the first figure with the financial, cultural, and economic resources to openly defy elite consensus. If he can mobilize Republicans behind him and make a credible run for the Presidency, he can create a whole new media environment for patriots to openly speak their mind without fear of losing their jobs.” The piece was headlined “WE ARE ALL DONALD TRUMP NOW.”...

Griffin, a thirty-four-year-old who writes an influential blog under the name Hunter Wallace... told me that he embraced white nationalism after reading Patrick Buchanan’s “Death of the West,” which argued, in Griffin’s words, that “all of the European peoples were dying out, their birthrates were low, and you had mass immigration and multiculturalism.” Griffin once had high hopes for the Tea Party. “They channelled all that rage into electing an impressive number of Republicans in the South, but then all they did was try to cut rich Republicans’ taxes and make life easier for billionaires!” he said. “It was all hijacked, and a classic example of how these right-wing movements emerge, and they’re misdirected into supporting the status quo.”

Griffin had recently told his readers that his opinion of Donald Trump was “soaring.” He sees Trump’s surge as a “hostile takeover of the Republican Party. He’s blowing up their stage-managed dog-and-pony show.” Griffin is repelled by big-money politics, so I asked why he spoke highly of Trump. “He’s a billionaire, but all of these other little candidates are owned by their own little billionaires.” He mentioned Sheldon Adelson and the Koch brothers. “So I think Trump is independent.”

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/08/31/the-fearful-and-the-frustrated

[Scuba]

1. Makes sense; they know how America treats minorities.

[brer cat]

2. ...

[ismnotwasm]

8. And just How do minorities treat each other?

[ismnotwasm]

11. And you think white people behave better?

[Blue_Tires]

14. ^^^^^^^ OK....Who's sock is this? ^^^^^^^^

[ancianita]

12. Are you implying that you accept them because you understand various examples of minority-

majority conflicts?

You're so new here, I'm just trying to figure out your position.

And if you believe in American exceptionalism, would you endorse these conservatives as coming from that so-called historical identity?

[Igel]

23. They know how most countries treat minorities.

They also know how minorities in minority-majority neighborhoods get treated.

The assumpton by many is apparently that after acting one way, people will suddenly become tolerant and understanding of diversity when they no longer count towards "diversity." When advocates suddenly become fiduciaries, the assumption is that all their expectations, goals, and attitudes will change.

They won't. You want power, that's your goal. You want equality, that's your goal. Wanting power over others in order to enforce equality is not a viable possibility unless people are perfect. I find no expectation that skin color = perfection. Yet I see people make that assumption all the time, that skin color = character. It's a mental illness. Always has been, whether it's the KKK or the New Black Panther Party. A person commits mass murder because of racial animus, it's a bad thing if there's one skin color and how dare we think there's mental illness; it's undestandable if it's another, and, well, we'll find justification. If you're the KKK, that justifies Roof. If you're NBPP, it justifies dear Vester.



I personally remember the outcry when affirmative action was extended to Latinos, Asians & Pacific Islanders, and even women. It was special, it was owned, and desiring its sharing was not desired.

As power filters out to other communities, the definition of "power" changes to make sure that the rules stay the same. As the definition of "equal" came to be met, it changed to make sure that power in the courts was retained. Ultimately, at some point, it's not equality; it's power. And that properly makes people nervous.


I consider some of the demands I hear. "We need our kids to have equal opportunity to education." You look at some schools, and they suck. They're miserable. And there's a correlation between sucky schools and race. Then you look at many schools with a considerable achievement gap--and you find a correlation between cultural and behavior expectations between students of different classes & ethnic groups in the classroom and bad educational outcomes. There's a racial correlation, but if you decide to ignore the easy thinking and look deeper you find a class correlation. It extends to non-blacks and non-latinos. (This, of course, is heresy, and dealt with on DU as elsewhere by a kind of Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith; race is really what matters. Ignore the fact that class accounts for most of the data, and is required for the non-black data. Because if you look past race you find that most of the "racist" data is accounted for by class. Why pretend you need two factors when you you mostly just need one? Because of the need to gain power.)

Regardless, perceptions matter. At least for the privileged.

[flamingdem]

3. It's not just conservatives taking a liking to Trump

While she may be unusual, my otherwise liberal neighbor likes Trump because she's upset with the immigrants in our neighborhood. Her 67 year old world has changed too much and she'll do anything to hold back the tide.

[ancianita]

4. The article's also a look at conservative voter attitudes that DU should be more aware of.

[Historic NY]

5. "They're everywhere".........

such xenophobic nonsense. Lets see for the most part its the people that they are complaining about that take the jobs that are beneath many, but they're everywhere. If there is such a fear then they better start reproducing. The talk of deporting 11 -31 million illegals depending upon which Republican asshat is talking is not economically feasible. Trumps empire itself employs hundreds of undocumented people, many who have been here for decades. They are the people that clean his toilets, cut his grass and for the most part take the jobs many other won't do. Playing to fear that is what Republicans do. The Republican Party is dying because as Lindsey Graham said they aren't reproducing enough angry old white males. There are a lots of ignorant people in this country, like Griffin who is probably going to be one of those Graham speaks about. If every undocumented worker stopped working one day it would be like a nationwide strike, there aren't enough people willing to fill the vacuum.

[ancianita]

7. "they better start reproducing..." Yep, exactly why they're into fighting PP, limiting abortions

nationwide, putting abstinence only sex ed in schools and rewriting history books to legitimize whites fighting for economic and 'states rights' victimization in revised Civil War history books.

I'm totally with you about the future of the work force and the work stoppage that would exist if these conservatives were to have their way.

However you see them, those expressing all the "xenophobic nonsense" are still part of a consistently voting population that DU can't dismiss and had better confront when it examines the mindset of the electorate.

Which is why I posted the article. Trump has a growing poll and rally presence for reasons shown in it.

[Gothmog]

16. The Demographic trends are not favorable to the GOP or its all white base

The Trump supporters are really upset with the concept of being an minority and potentially being treated the way that they treated minorities

[uppityperson]

18. Why don't you get another hobby? It is such an odd thing to do, sign up repeatedly

and have your posts disappear every time. What is your problem?

Dang, I missed the reply. Probably for the better. Thanks MIRT!

[GP6971]

20. Enjoy your stay n/t

[ancianita]

21. Hmm...what's going on with all the drop-ins? Weird auto-removals. MIRT?

[GP6971]

25. Probably MIRT. n/t

[Spitfire of ATJ]

22. Oh yeah,...we need to save the Great White Males.

[WillyT]

24. HUGE K & R !!! - Thank You !!!

[ancianita]

27. Thank YOU! When you show up, I win!

[ancianita]

31. Thank you back!

[Warpy]

26. Well, poor babies.

White folks are just another minority here in NM and I like it just fine.

If they'd stop being terrified of nothing, Trump's chumps would find it's OK, too.

[ancianita]

28. Been there at least eight times to visit and feel the same way...son lives in Silver City.

Isn't the whole immigration and race dynamic different out West, though?

Go down to Los Cruces or Nogales and aren't the sentiments similar to those of conservatives in the rest of the country? Just asking because I don't know, but I've heard some things.

[Warpy]

29. The southern third of the state is a reddish purple

and the only reason I can figure out is that Republicans like the hottest climates to prepare themselves for hell.

Nogales isn't in NM.

[ancianita]

30. Aah. Thanks, yeah, it's in AZ. I'm also glad to see how NM is a blue island in the red state West.

Haha Republicans... good one!

[Doctor_J]

32. do they not understand that lots and lots of us white people disagree with them?

Trump's like those tiny nationalist parties in Europe except with Fox news and hate radio here, he's able to get free positive publicity. This won't play in the ge

[ancianita]

33. I hope "lots" means a majority. White minority anguish + demogoguery is dangerous.