Posted on 05/16/2018 4:22:42 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Monday, the Washington Post surveyed a new book, a memo, and a detailed report for the Post itself, all of which take a look at swing voting patterns in parts of the country that went for President Obama in 2008 and 2012 and then shifted to President Trump in 2016. The Post attempts to synthesize the findings of all three items and concludes that people in these parts of the country feel a lack of respect both for themselves and for the president they voted for:
Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg, who helped orchestrate Bill Clintons 1992 victory, has obsessively studied the Reagan Democrats in Macomb for more than three decades. He went back after the 2016 election to understand how Trump won Michigan and recently returned to conduct another round of focus groups. Trump voters complain that there is no respect for President Trump or for people like them who voted for him, Greenberg writes in a new memo summarizing his latest findings, with Nancy Zdunkewicz of Democracy Corps
Respect is also a central undercurrent in The Great Revolt, a new book by Republican operative Brad Todd and conservative columnist Salena Zito
We voted for President Obama and still we are ridiculed. Still we are considered racists, said Cindy Hutchins, a store owner and nurse in Baldwin, Mich. There is no respect for anyone who is just average and trying to do the right things.
Our culture in Hollywood or in the media gives off the distinct air of disregard to people who live in the middle of the country, as if we have no value or do not contribute to the betterment of society, said Amy Giles-Maurer of Kenosha, Wis. Its frustrating. It really wants to make you stand up and yell, We count, except of course we dont. At least not in their eyes.
Dan Balz, The Washington Posts chief correspondent, spent the past 16 months interviewing voters in rural areas of the upper Mississippi River valley where Obama won but then broke decisively for Trump
One of the places I would agree with the hardcore Trump people, theyre tired of being treated as the enemy by Barack Obama, said Dennis Schminke, 65, a retired manager at Hormel, the company makes Spam in Austin, Minn., an area just north of the border with Iowa.
You can just imagine the respect people in San Francisco or New York City would have for a guy from Minnesota who makes Spam for a living. But the disdain is often more specific than that. One 54-year-old from Cleveland told the Post he switched parties because he just got tired of being called a racist by Democrats:
David Miller, a white 54-year-old Ohio voter at a polling place in Cudell Recreation Center in Cleveland, pulled a Republican primary ballot Tuesday for the first time he could remember to vote in the governors race. Like many other voters, he felt he had been left behind.
I mainly was a mainstream Democrat, he said, before describing how that started to change before the 2016 election. Every time I turned on the TV, theres a Democrat calling me a racist and I just got tired of it.
Which brings me to an opinion piece that appeared in the New York Times on Saturday. It was titled, Liberals, Youre Not as Smart as You Think. The gist of it is that progressives often fail to realize how off-putting their moralizing can be to people who dont share all of their views:
Liberals dominate the entertainment industry, many of the most influential news sources and Americas universities. This means that people with progressive leanings are everywhere in the public eye and are also on the college campuses attended by many peoples children or grandkids. These platforms come with a lot of power to express values, confer credibility and celebrity and start national conversations that others really cant ignore.
But this makes liberals feel more powerful than they are. Or, more accurately, this kind of power is double-edged. Liberals often dont realize how provocative or inflammatory they can be. In exercising their power, they regularly not only persuade and attract but also annoy and repel
Within just a few years, many liberals went from starting to talk about microaggressions to suggesting that it is racist even to question whether microaggressions are that important. Gender identity disorder was considered a form of mental illness until recently, but today anyone hesitant about transgender women using the ladies room is labeled a bigot. Liberals denounce cultural appropriation without, in many cases, doing the work of persuading people that there is anything wrong with, say, a teenager not of Chinese descent wearing a Chinese-style dress to prom or eating at a burrito cart run by two non-Latino women
Even if liberals think their opponents are backward, they dont have to gratuitously drive people away, including voters who cast ballots once or even twice for Mr. Obama before supporting Mr. Trump in 2016.
In other words, the smug attitude taken by a lot of progressives on these issues is one reason why people who once voted for Obama wound up voting for Trump. And its very possible theyll do so again in 2020, especially if the left doubles-down on the condescension. Put another way, all Democrats have to do to succeed is put a cork in the smug, so why cant they seem to do that?
My own take is that the condescension being noted by people in the middle of the country isnt some sort of side-effect of progressivism which can be worked out. For many on the left, looking down on others is a feature, not a bug in their politics. There are a lot of people who bitterly cling to their anti-gun, anti-religion politics as a sign of their own superiority. Theres just no way to express that sort of moral superiority without having someone inferior to look down on. But the people they look down on can feel that disrespect and they dont like it very much.
Actually, it’s our Constitution and our Republic that are disrespected.
POTUS trump is just the Messenger.
Gee, what was their first clue?
More sycophantic writing from the never trumpets of hot air - its not diestepect at all.
Its because the left has become completely unhinged and abandoned America outright for a socialist utopia. They care not for law - they care not for the constitution - they care not for independent thought and most of all - they care not for liberty but an oppressive imposing government to be used at will against anybody that stands in their way.
In short - theyre unAmerican.
That is why Trump maintains his support and it confounds and pisses off the left that we would choose individuality and self-sovereignty over a candy land utopia.
A Candyland utopia that they’ve been promising for 70 years and NEVER delivered on.
Vote Trump—or let the Democrat Commies Impeach him and Pence and make Nancy P. President! She would select Hillary as her VP—Then resign.
the dems and their media allies have already doubled down and triple downed on calling anyone and everyone who voted for Trump and evil, deplorable being, not even a real person. You see it on CNN, MSNBC every hour of every. You see it every single “award show” where all the limousine liberals pat themselves on the back, and then attack those who watch their crap on TV, at the movies or buy their crappy music.
After the 2016 election, the NYT ran an editorial saying that they were going to engage in some introspection to figure out where they went so wrong in their predictions. From what they’ve done since the election, it appears that they concluded that they didn’t attack Trump and his voters enough.
Disrespected by the media, hollyweird, academia, the dem’s, and the rest of the leftist cabal; yes.
I was a bit disappointed in Trump signing the budget in which he didn’t get the funds for the border or wall but a more pressing issue of funding our military was accomplished so I decided to be patient for now.
Yes, what a surprise!
I still watch the election night results to see the smugness wiped off of the MSM faces!
Of course I will vote against Nan and Upchuck, but even if we lose the Senate, the Dems will never get 2/3 to impeach. In fact, if they try impeachment it could very well set Trump up for reelection in 2020. The backlash could be huge.
Translation: if progs didn’t act so immature, smug, angry and condescending, they would be able to convince more people to buy into their murderous Stalinist collectivism.
This imbecile could not be further from the truth. They will never get it nor admit it.
liberals are in local newspapers, talk radio newsrooms (not necessarily the hosts, though those exist too) and local tv “news” organizations.
many of them are young, new graduates of schools that have imbued them with the taint of statism.
“The nerve of those backwards Nazi cretins to think we unbiased heroes of the media have any disrespect for them.”
Bingo. All real Americans need to do to see the contempt in which Northeast/Left Coast Letists hold them is turn on the TV...or listen to any of a number of entertainers talk about politics or watch the lying MSM. Its right there on full display all day every day.
The article is right. Snobbery, condescension and a holier than though attitude are at the very heart of progressivism. They will never be able to stop. They will simply double down - as the media has done ever since Trump was elected. They will continue to scream that anybody who does not agree with them is a backward, hateful, racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, uneducated, knuckle dragging, inbred redneck deplorable.
and Trump will beat their asses again in 2020. It will be glorious. :^)
It’s amazing how people who have been proven wrong so often can still thibk themselves smarter than everyone else.
Wise analysis, Skywise.
The story decries only progressive “attitudes”, but as you point out, it’s their belief system as much as their haughtiness.
A truly unbalanced story meant to deceive.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.