Thursday, February 16, 2017

What Trump supporters want

If you read this blog a few times, you know that I care about many issues–perhaps too many.  I worry about climate change, mass extinctions, deforestation.  Gerrymandering, voter suppression, and campaign finance are concerns.  Tax reform, school reform, and prison reform.  Minimum wage.  Employees’ right to organize.  Nuclear war.  Just yesterday Congress passed a bill to allow the mentally ill access to guns.  Perhaps a small issue, but I worry about it.  

What do Trump supporters worry about?  Even Republican members of Congress don’t seem to care about the E.P.A. or the ignorance of Betsy DeVos or illegal contacts with the Russians.  Eight committees to investigate Benghazi; none to investigate foreign influence on a presidential election.

Recent articles about Trump supporters report they are quite happy with the first month.   The happy people fall into four rough groups.  

The anti-immigrant crowd and the racists are pleased.  These are the people who think that Muslims are devils, Mexicans are drug dealers, and people without papers are voting by the millions.  They are happy with the restrictions, happy with the wall.  Better build a wall than a new spillway on the Oroville Dam.

Many businessmen are happy.  Build the pipelines, even if they go through Indian lands.  Eliminate environmental protections so we don’t have to worry about useless bog turtles.  Who cares if we wipe out endangered species.  Remove the Dodd-Frank protections.  Eliminate labor unions.  What is important is the bottom line.

Evangelical Christians are delighted.  These are the people who don’t care how many Syrian children die in refugee camps, or how many American children are shot up in gang violence.  What is important is the “unborn.”


The yahoos are satisfied.  Trump was elected to “shake things up.”  He’s “shaking things up.”  I don’t know what that even means.

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