Stop wondering why too many Americans vote for politicians who support Trump/MAGA/GOP policies. The exchange with this thinking Republican who votes her interest is probative.
Trump/MAGA/Republican policies win voters?
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Summary
The host in the video explores why individuals often support Trump, MAGA, and Republican policies, even when they conflict with their material interests. He shares the story of an email exchange with a thoughtful Republican voter who, despite cultural ties to her party, supports progressive policies like the CHIPS Act. At the same time, misinformation-driven stances on vouchers and COVID-19 are still evident. The host highlights Trump’s strategic triangulation and the media’s failure to inform voters as key factors influencing these paradoxical choices.
Key Points:
- Triangulation Strategy: Trump successfully appeals to voters by exploiting cultural grievances and tailoring messages on divisive issues like vouchers and COVID-19.
- Media’s Role: Misinformation and sensationalism in the media skew voter perceptions, preventing informed decision-making.
- Cultural Identity vs. Policy: Many voters struggle to reconcile cultural affiliations with the material benefits of progressive policies.
- Progressive Thinking: A Republican voter’s ability to prioritize policies over party loyalty demonstrates the importance of critical thinking in democracy.
- Policy Harm: Conservative policies, such as opposition to Medicaid expansion, actively harm the communities they claim to support.
Progressive Conclusion
The following portion of this article, which included the email exchange with the Republican lady, underscores the need for progressives to fight misinformation and connect with voters on cultural and emotional levels. By emphasizing the tangible benefits of policies and fostering critical thinking, progressives can build a coalition that transcends partisan identities and centers humanity over political allegiance.
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I received a sequence of emails from one of my Politics Done Right listeners that should be very informative. I love reader-initiated exchanges because they tend to be the most honest. I will call her V to maintain her privacy. She permitted me to post the exchange.
After watching the “Analysis of the Luigi Mangione Attack. Americans want guaranteed healthcare. Health insurance waste” episode, V emailed me the following:
Luigi did thousands, maybe millions of folks a favor by bringing this problem to the forefront. It was unfortunate that a life was lost to do so, but there are THOUSANDS of Americans that have had an early death and thousands suffering pain like he did due to the HORRIBLE A-Moral DENIAL of care by United, Humana and others.
Personally, my father met an early death due to Humana’s refusal of care. My friend died of esophageal cancer after Cigna denied the cancer drug he needed, “DELAY” and then after appeal finally approved it but the delay sealed his fate. These companies should be REGULATED and made to approve anything and everything that would be approved by Medicare.
Thousands of retirees on Medicare “Dis”-Advantage plans move to regular Medicare every year when they become really sick because of the denial of care by these corporations. The millions of $$ they are skimming off the top and the money they are “making” by denying care, could pay for everyone to have health insurance coverage.
When Obama tried to get Single Payor these big corps used millions to keep their scam of health insurance going by putting out tremendous amounts of false propaganda that it was government controlled healthcare. WRONG!
Single payor is simply good insurance without the gate keepers and required referral BS to get to see a specialist. Medicare SINGLE Payor does not come between the patient and their doctor.
It just pays for what the doctor ordered. NO DENY and DELAY! Don’t let OZ push retirees into FAKE insurance with Medicare Dis-Advantage. We want to keep Regular Medicare! Please cover the story ongoing!
Perhaps Mangione can be acquitted by a jury using a Temporary Insanity plea, due to the constant severe pain he had to endure. (Wish I could be on that jury) I obviously have NO pity for these horrible greedy leeches making so much money by leaving so many people to suffer and/or die so they can call that their “profits”.
Kind Regards,
V
After receiving the email, I replied to V asking for permission to post her response to our program. She responded with the following more comprehensive prose.
Hi Egberto,
Yes, anytime.
I am a lifelong registered Republican but have not voted for a Republican prez since I voted for Clinton. I consider myself a “Lincoln” Republican, or an “anyone but Trump” voter. I laughed when one woman interviewed said she would vote for Biden in a casket before she would vote for Trump. I said I felt the same way. I don’t know if you watch MSNBC, but Lawrence had a wonderful piece tonight about Joe Biden, and what he has done for our economy and basically that translates to our security too. (The Chips Act) and of course the excellent economy we have thanks to his management, including the lowest average unemployment in 50 years.
FYI, I suspect Trump is a Russian double agent. I do support Kennedy’s appointment to Health and Human Services. I strongly believe that we should be banning additives, preservatives and food colorings etc that are illegal in Europe. And the EPA and FDA have become too much of a revolving door with the food, chemical and ag industries. And the law not allowing import of cheap Jamaican sugar which was passed at the behest of the Sugar Barons in Palm Beach long ago, has hurt the American public greatly.
All the sodas, drinks and candies are now sweetened with high fructose corn syrup. All these things were sweetened with sugar when I grew up. This has caused tremendous obesity in our country, contributing to diabetes and other illnesses. The corn used is GMO corn that damages the liver and spleen, loaded with glyphosphate which causes Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma, and because it is a man made sweetener, the body has no enzyme to recognize the presence of all those calories, which is why it is causing so much obesity.
So I’m hoping Kennedy will change many things which will improve folks’ health. (Especially children!) I hope he also gets BPA (Bis-phenol-A) out of the linings of cans (soup, veggies, soda etc.) as it leeches into the liquid and is the equivalent of Estrogen in your body, which causes breast cancer and prostate cancer. Both cancers are very prevalent in the USA.
I was also was incensed that workers were made to get the Covid shot to keep their jobs. I most certainly would not want to have been in the position of needing to suppport my family and be forced to have any shot to do so. So in that regard I commend Gov. DeSantis.
Additionally, for so long only the wealthy have been able to afford school choice for their children, as private school tuition was out of reach for the average family. The FL voucher law pushed by DeSantis now enables ANY family, even the poorest to choose where to send their child to school, as the FL voucher sysem will allow you to use the money that would have gone to the public school to send your child to the private school of your choice. I think this should be done on a national basis. I do not believe the teacher’s union claim that this is ruining public schools. Bologna! They will still get the same amount of money per child that they had before. So if there were 10 public schools in an area, maybe now there would be nine, but the budget per child is the same.
I could go on forever! Especially about the causes of inflation and the gonnif oil companies that caused 10% inflation worldwide the first year after Covid by keeping supply low to keep prices high, refusing to reopen wells. and the greedy corps that were all bragging in their quarterly analyst calls about increasing their profit margins. (Exxon CEO got a $10 mil bonus in May after Covid)
Thanks for getting back with me.
Kind Regards,
V
Our friend V soon after replied to a subsequent show titled “Kamala Harris lost because of two truths that aren’t mutually exclusive. Kari Lake! Really?” that closes the loop on the narrative I want to share with all about voters and the machinations that occur to their vote.
In all honesty they have truly tried. Is it their failure or the working class’ ignorance in electing Repubs that do nothing for them but pretend they care. Food on the table is much better than a false promise, which is what they get from Trump and his cronies.
Biden has built a great economic recovery from the bottom up and middle out. Read his speec form Dec. 10th and it is amazing that he has accomplished so much! Lowest average Unemploymet in 50 years. It helps to have a job! And the Infrastructure Act and the Chips ACT will be creating many high paying working class jobs for years to come.
Plus the Chips Act has helped secure our National Defense and also secure a supply chain for our manufacturing, protecting us from many disruptions like those during Covid.
Repubs keep giving tax breaks to the rich and big corps, further enriching the top1%. Had we gotten Kamala, she would have done all she could, but with the Republican gerrymandering of FL and NC and I’m sure elsewhere, they keep electing Republicans to Congress that thwart passing anything to help the middle and lower classes. And all these folks that voted for Trumpty Dumpty thinking that he cared about the middle and “working class” have been sorely fooled. He will again pass huge tax cuts for the wealthy and BIG greedy corps that have given us skyrocketing inflation with their ever increasing profit margins.
V.
Before Trump won the Electoral College, I wrote several articles on my blog and at Daily KOS pointing out that Trump used triangulation to appear populist to the working and middle class. To the working class, Donald Trump sounded more and more like Bernie Sanders than he did any Democrat or Republican. While he did not win the popular vote, he won enough votes in the right places to win the Electoral College.
Trump did not deliver. He paid the price with a landslide loss in the Electoral College and the popular vote (7+ million votes). After Trump’s attempted coup with a vicious insurrection by American terrorists, Trump, and his team began rewriting history as they created an alternate state of reality. They also started the process of triangulation. It does not work with thinking voters of either political parties. But it works well with low-information voters. And as Americans learn less and less about civics, the world, and more, they are easier to mislead,
If we read all that V represents based on the emails we exchanged, it is clear that had she not been a thinking voter, she could have been susceptible to Trump’s triangulation. First, I have tried to articulate that party affiliation has become more cultural than ideological. V still calls herself a Republican who has not voted for a Republican since she voted for Clinton. Yet, she supports the important and successful policies that President Biden signed. She supports Kennedy’s anti-Big Pharma and anti-Big Agribusiness critiques, which every progressive should agree with. While she does not express herself as an ati-vaxxer, she supports DeSantis policies of not locking down to mitigate COVID-19. V also believes that Republicans continue to give tax breaks to the rich while Kamala Harris would have done better for the working middle class.
As a thinking Republican, V has voted for balance in her interests. She does not fully agree with Democrats, but on balance, she understood what would most affect her. I blame the mainstream media for poorly explaining the failure of vouchers everywhere they are used. I will need a separate post to point that out. The media also did not provide the proper context for modified lockdowns that worked in Australia and other responsible countries in Central America that would have worked to shorten or stop the pandemic. Again, that requires another post.
I wish we had more voters like V. Full agreement is unnecessary if one can conduct an educated and respectful fact-based dialogue. It is what Trump, MAGA, Republicans, and NeoLiberal Democrats fear most.
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