The Donald Trump Score Card

or criminal enterprise loot

 

You are 100% correct.
The thing that get's me is that republicans say that people should take personal responsibility for the poor decisions one makes. Except if you are white your bad luck was caused by a minority.

 

I get so tired of him using that national security line. Of course his supporters buy into that bullshit.

 

Trump still has an approval rating of 40% I don’t think that number can all be ‘fuckinstupid’ there are Trump fanatics that are deranged or delusional, there are others that vote for republicans because they are ill-educated and ill-informed, which makes them easily manipulated or bamboozled and yet others that have grievances against a system that doesn’t seem to be serving their interests but there are those that voted for Trump because they are more interested in money than the interests and wellbeing of the US.

 

They hate immigrants. They call migrant workers "illegals" when the legal wording is "undocumented worker" or the worker is on an expired visa. The main thrust of Trump's campaign was against immigrants, to appeal to the KKK crowd. Then he gets into office and issues a pardon to Sholomo Rubashkin who hired 400 "illegals" to work at his Iowa meat house.

 

And some of them think Trump and Pence will establish the Kingdom Of God On Earth and kill all the Muslims and other dark skin people.

 

Since most of the people I know are Trump supporters and can't really be characterized as "fucking stupid", there must be other explanations. Some of it, I think, is similar to their religious beliefs. By any objective measure, some of the religious beliefs people purport to hold are "fucking stupid". Why do they hold them, if the believers aren't "fucking stupid"? Part of it is behavioral conditioning from family upbringing. People tend to have the same political allegiances, religion and values as their parents, especially if those are reinforced by the culture of the local community. From an evolutionary standpoint, there was an adaptive advantage to relying on information passed on by trusted adults instead of having to figure out everything on one's own. . Sometimes they don't, which can be a product of rebellion, if the parenting and local culture become oppressive or they are exposed to outside influences. Rationalization of self-interest is another important factor. Folks of materialistic disposition may be attracted to the Republican pitch and Weber's "Protestant ethic" of self-reliance (God prospers righteousness), and may rationalize their acquisitiveness ideologically as being "wealth producers" or God's elect, as opposed to those lazy freeloaders or sinners who want the "govmint" to take care of them. And if they are successful and move into a more affluent community, they may take on the political and religious orientations of the new neighborhood,. Politically, that could be Republican. With religion, it used to be Episcopalian; probably still a "mainline" Protestant group, although that's changing.

And I think an important factor is what public opinion experts call "rational ignorance" and economists call "information costs". Ignorance of political and religious reality might seem to be a handicap, but for many people, it's an acceptable trade-off in managing a busy life of competing responsibilities. Instead of trying to keep up with the news cycle twenty-four seven and trying to figure out which source to believe, most of us buy into information packages supplied to us by trusted sources. In religion, that could be the Pope, some televangelist, or Pastor Bob. In politics, it may be CNN or MSNBC on the left or Fox or Breitbart on the right. My mama told me religion and politics were two two things not to talk about in public gatherings. There's a reason for that. Since some my best friends are Trump supporters, I have to weigh the satisfaction of expressing my opinions against the risk of ending a beautiful friendship. For example, yesterday I brought up the family separation issue in Trump's immigration policy with a good friend and staunch Republican, who is a devout Catholic and staunch supporter of "family values". By no means is he stupid. To me separation of kids of tender age from their parents is just inexcusably evil and bringing toddlers before a judge to plead their own cases is absurd. But I wasn't getting through. It's clear to me that these issues are beyond rational discussion.

 

I don't know about gullible,although....I pretty much agree with everything you have said here, MeAgain...Gullible is almost forgiveable.....I think it is lack of evolved thinking for f the bigger picture for everything.....or just plain not giving a damn about anything but whatever their selfish wants are at the time....and that is more nasty than gullible....and i have seen how some can be quite nasty.

 

I have to agree here. The Taliban are rigid in a religious way, and so are the Christian Right Republicans. In addition there are strange examples in Republican behavior which are hard to explain. For example: Eric Pretzel, the former Blackwater Billionaire, just met with Trump because he wants his private army to take over the war in Afghanistan. Eric wants to kill Muslims and to take control of their opium fields and their oil/gas pipelines. President Bush said there are rare earth minerals in Afghanistan. I'm assuming these Republicans have designs in this area as well. My Grandpa always said when Christians steal, they always claim to be blessed by God for newly acquired wealth.

 

Anyone who is still ragging on hillary as their excuse for having voted for, or trying to defend, donald trump:
news flash, that election, was damd near two years ago,
and she ain't got jack to do with your having been bitten by a rattle snake.

If you voted for him because you wanted to vote against hillary, or against a democrate or against a woman,
you can be against all those things I guess, I mean that's why we have elections.

But either you knew what he was when you picked him,
or you damd sure should have looked if you didn't.

To the small minority who thought a fascist tyranny was what they wanted,
and the even smaller bunch of whatever the hell they are who still do;

you've got what you wanted,
so why the hell are you still harassing people by whining about it?

(yes i'm just venting here. there was one of those bastards on the bus a couple of days ago, claiming, rather incohierently, that he was "preventing and injustice", really? never said quite what he thought he was preventing, he was rattling on something about someone having shot at an airplain, that supposedly hillary was in, from what he said, too far away to hit anything. i have no idea what that was about. has something like that been in the news lately, even on those fascist propiganda sites like britebart et al? i mean he was billigerantly demanding everyone listen to whatever he was going on about.)

(for what its worth, everyone cheered when he got off the bus, so i guess things aren't all bad)

 

I think they're less "stupid" than anti-intellectual. Some are highly educated, but often in highly technical "practical" areas like engineering, business administration, medicine, and law. They tend to view knowledge as a means to an end, that end being a good job and income, rather than being good in itself. The idea of reading philosophy, history, sociology and/or political science after graduation, if it's unrelated to one's vocation, is generally regarded as odd at best. Fields like that have low marketability, but are indispensable in understanding how society and its institutions work and in reflecting about values. To complicate matters, there is the crop of young conservative, objectivist and libertarian intellectuals inspired by National Review and the Cato institute. I find their thinking shallow and ideologically rigid, but they impress the college dropouts in the party. On various threads of these forums, we've seen college professors depicted as dangerous kooks who are into political correctness. Check out the discussion of plumbers vs. college teachers on the thread Are Republicans ruining higher education. Technical fields are fine, as are rocket science and brain surgery. But as you say, you can have, and we have had, Nazi rocket scientists, and Ben Carson has demonstrated how brain surgeons can be messed up in their thinking. Republicans tend to look down on scholars as impractical eggheads or "elitists" who can lead their kids astray. With attitudes like these, I see little hope for improvement.

 

London protesters giving trump a warm greeting

 

I think you are describing people who can't accept change.

 

And to top it off, Trump tried to take his harsh words about May back by saying his taped interview was "fake news".
Trump: US-UK ties at 'highest level of special
Trump Denies He Criticized British Prime Minister, Dismisses Interview as ‘Fake News’
Analysis | Trump denies he said something that he said on a tape everyone has heard