It's The Economy Stupid!

I am an old man, who has been retired a long time. When I was a kid, men who graduated from high school, could reasonably expect to get a job that after a few years would make them able to live a middle-class life with a house and a car and 2.5 kids. My generation saw that standard of living, more or less, to be the “American Dream”

There were a lot of manufacturing and vocational school graduates’ jobs that provided that standard of living.

But then, globalization followed the Pax Americana. As a policy really of all parties in the U.S. argued that free market capitalism, with some regulation, was part of democracy and freedom. But the downside of free markets is that if a company or any entity can make a product of comparable or perhaps even better quality, at a lower price, it will displace its higher priced, perhaps lower quality goods. Pax Americana included the idea of free trade, and foreign sources (starting I think with Japan) whose workers did not enjoy the standard of living that U.S. workers did, could produce products less expensively, especially labor-intensive products. And Americans chose and still choose low prices when they can. So foreign goods represented a serious threat to American companies. Their reasonable response was to start producing goods in those foreign environments when they could, so that these American company goods could compete with foreign sourced goods. That meant fewer American employees, and over time, the American laborer was significantly impacted in reality, or in fear of being personally impacted. So, for these people, Democracy – both parties – were failing them, even though those American laborers were being able to buy goods at much lower prices than if those goods were produced in America. Being able to buy cheaper goods, maybe more goods, and maybe different goods because of the lower prices, did not offset the loss of employment, or the fear of loss of employment.

My Economics teachers would often say, that “free market capitalism” claims to distribute scarce resources optimally, it does not claim to be fair or caring. So those economic trends hurt a large segment of the country’s population and as a result, there are a lot of people consisting of people who were displaced or disturbed by these global trends (not just Americans) who quite rightly recognize that our democracy did nothing to make their dislocation any easier. And they don’t view the market as responsible for their situation that they view as much worse than it was when I was growing up. They reasonably hold the government responsible.

I have family and friends who I not only love, but whose thinking and personalities I admire, who are strong supporters of Trump and recognize that Democracy in America will end when he is re-elected, and they think that is a good thing, They are hopeful that his government will be more responsive to their needs than our American Democracy has been. Now, there is a real movement in America to end Democracy and replace it with something that will be more responsive to their needs I think that is the foundation of MAGA. So MAGA has become a movement of hope for those who support it. And that is why the MAGA movement is so powerful, I believe. It gives its followers hope, and as a movement, it offers a camaraderie as well as hope. So Trump’s chances in 2024 are good, even though, or maybe because Democracy is at stake.

Even more grumpy….

that final paragraph is one for the ages

Theoldtimer said:

So MAGA has become a movement of hope for those who support it. And that is why the MAGA movement is so powerful, I believe. It gives its followers hope, and as a movement, it offers a camaraderie as well as hope.

Along those lines, you may be interested in this David French opinion piece from July, which PVW posted on MOL the other day:

The Rage and Joy of MAGA America (NYT)

DaveSchmidt said:

Theoldtimer said:

So MAGA has become a movement of hope for those who support it. And that is why the MAGA movement is so powerful, I believe. It gives its followers hope, and as a movement, it offers a camaraderie as well as hope.

Along those lines, you may be interested in this David French opinion piece from July, which PVW posted on MOL the other day:

The Rage and Joy of MAGA America (NYT)

this is why I never bother to read a French piece. this one is incomprehensible and pointless.

as far as I can figure out, these are the nut graphs

Why do none of your arguments against Trump penetrate this mind-set? The Trumpists have an easy answer: You’re horrible, and no one should listen to horrible people. Why were Trumpists so vulnerable to insane stolen-election theories? Because they know that you’re horrible and that horrible people are capable of anything, including stealing an election.

At the same time, their own joy and camaraderie insulate them against external critiques that focus on their anger and cruelty. Such charges ring hollow to Trump supporters, who can see firsthand the internal friendliness and good cheer that they experience when they get together with one another. They don’t feel angry — at least not most of the time. They are good, likable people who’ve just been provoked by a distant and alien “left” that many of them have never meaningfully encountered firsthand.

Indeed, while countless gallons of ink have been spilled analyzing the MAGA movement’s rage, far too little has been spilled discussing its joy.

er, what? The point of the piece seems to be that us non-Trumpers would better understand Trumpers if we recognized their joy. Joy at what? At being surrounded by other happy and delusional* Trumpers?

Unless I'm missing his point.

*"delusional" is not an attack. it's an irrefutable description of the Trumpers he's talking about.

wow - oldtimer is on board with ending democracy!  And replacement will be  . . . . . "something more responsive to their needs?"  What on Earth does that mean?  Bizarro world - but a common view in the MAGA movement.

drummerboy said:

er, what? The point of the piece seems to be that us non-Trumpers would better understand Trumpers if we recognized their joy. Joy at what? At being surrounded by other happy and delusional* Trumpers?

Unless I'm missing his point.

jamie said:

wow - oldtimer is on board with ending democracy!

I saw nothing in Theoldtimer’s post that endorsed the views it described. Did you?

PVW said:

drummerboy said:

er, what? The point of the piece seems to be that us non-Trumpers would better understand Trumpers if we recognized their joy. Joy at what? At being surrounded by other happy and delusional* Trumpers?

Unless I'm missing his point.

If you have no curiosity about how other people think and experience the world, then the article isn't for you. I'm not sure if this is what you're driving at, but I'll note that curiosity about other people isn't an endorsement of their viewpoints or actions.

maybe my reading comprehension is poor, or I was looking for something that just wasn't there. I was expecting to learn about the source of joy for Trumpers. Or maybe that their anger is balanced by some justified joy. That maybe they're not as bad as they're made out to be. Or something.

The point is that I learned nothing about Trumpers from that piece.

Did you?

Republicans can't articulate a platform and MAGA people similarly can't articulate the reason for their support. I see no mystery here.

“The American dream” was really a nightmare for a lot of Americans. If you were a young white man who dropped out of high school or managed to get your GED you could easily get a job that paid you well enough to have your wife stay at home to take care of the two and a half kids, while you worked, and usually tinkered with your car on the weekends in your garage, after mowing the lawn….

But the liberals destroyed all your blissful ignorance of reality by making the wives independent, giving other races a shot at being able to “dream” with you, and even then you opposed anyone or anything that disturbed your deep sleep. They had to prove themselves that they were smart enough to do better than your GED certificates, you threw up hurdles for your wives, hoops for the “others”, roadblocks for the poor and hungry so they couldn’t get a good view of Lady Liberty. Your anger has not subsided with time, you sought refuge in your churches and bars imbibing alcohol that elevated your blood pressure and anger with like minded people like yourself to deal with your trauma of losing your comfy chair. Now you’re just plain old fed up and ready for war after losing all your other battles to control your wives and the people coming off the boat…damn liberals!

drummerboy said:

maybe my reading comprehension is poor, or I was looking for something that just wasn't there. I was expecting to learn about the source of joy for Trumpers. Or maybe that their anger is balanced by some justified joy. That maybe they're not as bad as they're made out to be. Or something.

The point is that I learned nothing about Trumpers from that piece.

Did you?

I did.

As French notes, for people who aren't Trump supporters, Trump folks sure seem angry all the time. And it's hard for me to imagine what the attraction is of always being in a bad mood. My go-to explanation for the perpetually angry as been that it gives them a sense of agency and power -- anger is a powerful emotion, and I think we have all had the experience of finding ourselves in situations beyond our control and finding some solace in being able to vent about it.

But that always felt insufficient. French adds an aspect I hadn't considered -- camaraderie and social belonging. That does make more sense to me as something that can sustain a political movement. Politics, after all, is not actually about ideas, it's about organizing people. Anger on its own probably isn't enough. Anger coupled with socialization I can see.

Exactly. And I bet the average Tea Party person couldn't describe the historical event the group got its name from in any detail. 

PVW said:

drummerboy said:

maybe my reading comprehension is poor, or I was looking for something that just wasn't there. I was expecting to learn about the source of joy for Trumpers. Or maybe that their anger is balanced by some justified joy. That maybe they're not as bad as they're made out to be. Or something.

The point is that I learned nothing about Trumpers from that piece.

Did you?

I did.

As French notes, for people who aren't Trump supporters, Trump folks sure seem angry all the time. And it's hard for me to imagine what the attraction is of always being in a bad mood. My go-to explanation for the perpetually angry as been that it gives them a sense of agency and power -- anger is a powerful emotion, and I think we have all had the experience of finding ourselves in situations beyond our control and finding some solace in being able to vent about it.

But that always felt insufficient. French adds an aspect I hadn't considered -- camaraderie and social belonging. That does make more sense to me as something that can sustain a political movement. Politics, after all, is not actually about ideas, it's about organizing people. Anger on its own probably isn't enough. Anger coupled with socialization I can see.

ok, but I'm pretty sure "camaraderie and social belonging." is not a David French discovery.

so they're brought together through their shared hatred and they laugh about it.

just seems like a big "so what" to me. Tells me nothing about them.

drummerboy said:

so they're brought together through their shared hatred and they laugh about it.

Just as you dismiss the ability of ordinary Christians to work their way through the questions that their faith poses, I think you give short shrift to the joy and hope that French and Theoldtimer are talking about. Hatred is a negative isolating force that’s distinct from positive attractive forces like a sense of community and common values. If you’ve ever felt both, you know the difference.

And if you want to break the hold of the former, you probably need to crack the latter first. French doesn’t have an answer for how to do that, except that negation isn’t it. You need, he says and Theoldtimer implies, to offer something.

DaveSchmidt said:

drummerboy said:

so they're brought together through their shared hatred and they laugh about it.

Just as you dismiss the ability of ordinary Christians to work their way through the questions that their faith poses, I think you give short shrift to the joy and hope that French and Theoldtimer are talking about. Hatred is a negative isolating force that’s distinct from positive attractive forces like a sense of community and common values. If you’ve ever felt both, you know the difference.

And if you want to break the hold of the former, you probably need to crack the latter first. French doesn’t have an answer for how to do that, except that negation isn’t it. You need, he says and Theoldtimer implies, to offer something.

horsesh!t

who said the following?

“people who feel the government has let them down, the economy has
let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what
happens to their lives and their futures; and they’re just desperate for
change. It doesn’t really even matter where it comes from. They don’t
buy everything he says, but – he seems to hold out some hope that their
lives will be different. They won’t wake up and see their jobs
disappear, lose a kid to heroin, feel like they’re in a dead-end. Those
are people we have to understand and empathize with as well.“

10 to 1 neither you or oldtimer guessed Hillary Clinton, in her "deplorables" speech.

Do you really believe that you can turn around a MAGA Trumper by offering them some policy?

This is beyond naive. They heartily embrace the political philosophy that has sold them down the river. They are a mass of competing contradictions and delusional views of realities.

Understanding their joy is not the solution to reaching them. And I have no practical answer as to how to do that either. My impractical answer is reshaping our information systems.

I recommend reading the following, which focuses on rural MAGA

https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2024/04/the-strawman-that-will-never-die

https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2024/04/the-white-rural-rage-question-ii

drummerboy said:

Understanding their joy is not the solution to reaching them. And I have no practical answer as to how to do that either. My impractical answer is reshaping our information systems.

Ah -- there's where I think we're talking past each other. I don't think the article was necessarily attempting to propose any solutions or course of action. Sure, understanding is often part of trying change something, but it also stands on its own as something valuable for its own sake. Millions of our fellow citizens support Trump. I find value in trying to better understand why, regardless of whether that directly touches on how to keep Trump out of office.

PVW said:

drummerboy said:

Understanding their joy is not the solution to reaching them. And I have no practical answer as to how to do that either. My impractical answer is reshaping our information systems.

Ah -- there's where I think we're talking past each other. I don't think the article was necessarily attempting to propose any solutions or course of action. Sure, understanding is often part of trying change something, but it also stands on its own as something valuable for its own sake. Millions of our fellow citizens support Trump. I find value in trying to better understand why, regardless of whether that directly touches on how to keep Trump out of office.

well, yeah, I basically don't disagree, but that's why my last comment about the article was "so what?".  I just don't think he told me anything useful or insightful.

drummerboy said:

Do you really believe that you can turn around a MAGA Trumper by offering them some policy?

Like PVW, I don’t think French and Theoldtimer were necessarily talking about policy. French, at least, seemed to me to have something more like outreach in mind — some sort of tangible show of commitment to understand these Americans and to avoid assumptions, like the one jamie made about Theoldtimer.

I don’t know if that would work, either. An attempt to understand what French and Theoldtimer were saying was as far as my opinion went.

A recent book related to topic, short and a good read, regrettably also without "solutions," other than maybe to hold on to ideals, and each other, however difficult.

David Finkel, An American Dreamer: Life in a Divided Country

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=finkel+american+dreamer+review

Jaytee said:

“The American dream” was really a nightmare for a lot of Americans. If you were a young white man who dropped out of high school or managed to get your GED you could easily get a job that paid you well enough to have your wife stay at home to take care of the two and a half kids, while you worked, and usually tinkered with your car on the weekends in your garage, after mowing the lawn….

But the liberals destroyed all your blissful ignorance of reality by making the wives independent, giving other races a shot at being able to “dream” with you, and even then you opposed anyone or anything that disturbed your deep sleep. They had to prove themselves that they were smart enough to do better than your GED certificates, you threw up hurdles for your wives, hoops for the “others”, roadblocks for the poor and hungry so they couldn’t get a good view of Lady Liberty. Your anger has not subsided with time, you sought refuge in your churches and bars imbibing alcohol that elevated your blood pressure and anger with like minded people like yourself to deal with your trauma of losing your comfy chair. Now you’re just plain old fed up and ready for war after losing all your other battles to control your wives and the people coming off the boat…damn liberals!

Well said Jaytee

Theoldtimer said:

Well said Jaytee

I believe that globalization is good for the whole world and all benefit from it, but I do see that those whose lives were and are being disrupted by it, suffer, and I think Keynes would argue that the Government should do something to assist those who are harmed by that change. But then, government should do a lot of things. If those Elite school graduates in Congress would read the Federalist Papers, I think they would conclude that the second amendment was meant as part of our national security policy and a Militia is no longer necessary so the right to bare arms can be infringed. Just my view.

Blank.