U.S. Elections 2016 - Polls in mirror appear closer than they are

[The Marquis de Leech]

I think it's more that objecting to people entering the country based entirely on a religious test comes across as a betrayal of US national identity (E Pluribus Unum;  Give me your tired, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free....). That's not to say that the US politics hasn't always had a nativist element - but how is Trump's stance on Muslims any different from nineteenth century hostility to Catholics?

(Also, lets note that up until 2000, US Muslims leaned Republican. The US Right had no problem with them then...). 

[mormont]

10 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

It takes two to tango, and a lot of it has been self inflicted. Hell, without the email scandal (and it is a legitimate scandal) I bet Clinton would be over 50% in the polls right now while Trump would be at 40% max. 

But it's undeniable that the only reason the email scandal has mileage in the media is because of the pre-existing narrative that Clinton is untrustworthy. So stating that the email scandal is self-inflicted is true, but it's not the whole story. (Also, I think you are overestimating its impact.)

7 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I don't know how you can claim Trump is less corrupt than Hillary. Trump openly admitted he has bought politicians in the past. So if he bought Hillary some time in the past, doesn't hat make him equally corrupt? People claiming the buyer of influence is less corrupt than the seller are simply fooling themselves.

Nor does it end there. Trump is funneling campaign money to his own businesses, he's paid legal bills with charitable donations. He's paid bribes and he's accepted them. He's probably the most corrupt candidate to run in decades. But so long as he can keep people talking about how corrupt Clinton is, he knows he can deflect most of the allegations against himself on this front. It's sad.

2 hours ago, Altherion said:

There are two groups that he has consistently attacked: illegal immigrants and Muslims. The first of these is not in fact a race, ethnicity or any other protected group (although the scum in the media do their best to make people forget this).

You are not this dense.

Trump is not interested in illegal immigrants from Scandinavia or Australia or Canada. His attacks on illegal immigrants are entirely about illegal immigrants who have brown skin. They are a front, a way for him to express and take advantage of racism and bigotry. We both know that. You're arguing about semantics because you know that, but you don't want to admit it. You're trying to pretend that a paper bag full of shit is paper all the way through. It isn't working.

[Jo498]

We had this before elsewhere: It is a very recent thing that we associate terrorism with muslims. The terrorism of the 1960s-90s was predominantly "nationalist" (like IRA, ETA, etc.), political extremist or both (PLO) or cranky loners (unabomber).

So I think one does not have to be leftist but simply realist to accept a certain amount of terrorism as a fact of life. (In fact, the traditional leftist stance seems to me somewhat different, namely pointing out that terrorism is the last resort of the less powerful in the current societal or international distribution of power.)

 

[butterbumps!]

13 hours ago, Patrek_Mallister said:

Do you spend a lot of time around Trump voters?

Given my location, I'm not personally around rally-attending Trumpkins.  Rather, my partner's elderly relative in a swing state, who is insanely racist, is insanely pro-Trump (I preferred to avoid this guy even before the election).  

The Trump supporters I'm around are, frankly, people who know better.  For example, people I went to undergrad with, who are definitely doing well in life and living in Mahattan, who fancy themselves gentlemanly republicans cut in the Reagan mold, who simply cannot bring themselves to vote non-Republican no matter what candidates are put forward.  And who, it turns out, are actually super racist, and in one case super misogynist (the only woman he likes being lectured by is Ann Coulter).   But they prefer when it's in a dog whistle form, rather than the openly cringe-worthy Trumply variety.   One is hiding behind the court appointment excuse on the "one-issue" of abortion; it's not sincere or well-reasoned in his arguments, especially considering Trumps breath-taking disregard for the Constitution at all.  There is always a magnificent amount of denial in the damage Trump is already doing to this country, and the fact that no one but his hired gun manager has been able to rein him in yet to mitigate his prodigious externalities, but "Hillary is a Dem and Clinton and a vote there is a loss of my identity!"  I've become very cynical of those supporting Trump for reasons of "court appointments." 

My anger finds a much larger target in these Trump-voters.

12 hours ago, Altherion said:

Have you actually talked to a substantial number of them or is this based on the media? The media generally shows these people at their angriest. Don't fall for it; if there really were tens of millions of bad people in our country, our society would not last long. These are ordinary people most of whom are more good than bad. They simply happen to hold a different set of beliefs and possibly belong to different tribes than you.

There's no shortage of pieces and best-sellers looking at the rally-attending Trumpkins to humanize them, explain their origins, scold asshole liberals like me to not call them "stupid," and so on.   And the "tribal-republicans" who know better make me just as, if not more, angry than the "typical Trumpkin."

I struggle, though, with "they simply hold a different set of beliefs."  It is becoming infuriating to hear that "they simply hold a different set of beliefs," suggesting we should be tolerant, when those beliefs involve negating entire groups' humanity on the basis of gender, orientation and/ or race.   To sum it up as merely a "difference in beliefs" is not adequate.   Those beliefs are just morally wrong, and need to change.   

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As to your list of reasons, I think you are missing the most obvious one: it is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to flip off the elites. These people have very little control over their lives: orders come from so high up that the people ultimately responsible have almost certainly never even heard of them. This factory will close, this social institution will now be defined differently -- and none of this is up for debate, their only freedom is within the framework the far-off elites provide. To add insult to injury, they also serve as the butt of all the jokes perpetrated by the elites of academia (e.g. "privilege") and regurgitated by the urban upper-middle class and other liberals. That is, unlike the minorities (who also have little control over their lives and are badly off in quite a few respects, but these facts are at least acknowledged), these people are reviled by a substantial fraction of those in power as well as their fellow citizens -- and the social mores against such attitudes are the weakest out there.

Except, to go back to the second reason I gave, it is profoundly naive to see Trump as the right person for this job.   He despises the masses more than anyone.  He can't even be bothered to join wages to labor for those who work for him in some case.    He is not a populist, and has devoted his life to ripping these people off for his own profit.   He's giving them lip-service, but that's all.  By all accounts, Trump should be utterly reviled by the very people he's appealing to.  

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Now, along comes Trump. He tries to appeal to them, but, in and of itself, this is worthless -- politicians appeal to groups all of the time and very little changes for these groups. However, he is also politically incorrect which is much more interesting and rare. Finally, the political elites seem appalled by him -- not just Democrats (which would be par for the course during a Presidential election), but also Romney, the Bushes, Cruz, etc. Is it likely that Trump will make things better? No, it is not. But he is certainly upsetting the powers-that-be and this is the one and only opportunity most people have had to do that on a national scale in recent history.

ok, so let's burn it down for everyone.   I fear this is not a particularly sympathetic reason or goal either.

[Seli]

2 hours ago, Altherion said:

There's no perfection in this world. The choice is between Trump and somebody who has taken millions of dollars from Wall Street directly and tens of millions from all sorts of questionable sources via a foundation. I think most people badly underestimate the importance of the latter and the harm it causes to nearly everyone.

...

Ehhhh, that same Trump has taken (through his company, but it is not like that and the individual are possible to separate) hundreds in millions in loans from Wall street, some of which they lost through bankruptcies. And of course the company still has debts to international banks.

And of course that same Trump (well, his company) is well known for not paying sub-contractors, stealing money from the people that he owes.

The same Trump that refuses to do something as simple as releasing tax statements, so people have to dig around to make an educated guess on how deep into trouble he is or isn't?

As for foundations, the Clinton foundation is helping people. The Trump foundation seems to be a way for Trump to clean his reputation and hand out the money of other people in his name.

And you think that candidate has a moral highground?

 

 

 

[Jo498]

Isn't the interesting thing that so many people seem so pissed off by what they think of as "establishment" that they would support someone like Trump? I doubt that most of his supporters are that gullible. It's not that difficult to realize that he has swindled lots of blue collar subcontractors in his dubious business ventures and that the "Trump university" is a fraud. Isn't this a strong indication that the fault lines in this country are very deep and that very few of the established parties/politicians realize that, even less have smart ideas how to do anything about it? Somehow I do not think that viewing 30-40% of the populace as subhuman vermin is gonna help...

What's up if the next "anti-establishment" candidate is not a bumbling orange-haired buffoon but someone  charismatic like Rudi Gloder or Fred Halliot?

http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.de/2014/02/fascism-and-future-part-three-weimar.html

[TrackerNeil]

1 hour ago, Jo498 said:

What's up if the next "anti-establishment" candidate is not a bumbling orange-haired buffoon but someone  charismatic like Rudi Gloder or Fred Halliot?

http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.de/2014/02/fascism-and-future-part-three-weimar.html

Given that the orange-haired buffoon will likely garner at least 45% of the vote, I imagine that we'll make the next one god-emperor.

[SeanF]

America must be in a bad way, if each half of the population regards the other half as "evil in some way."  That's pretty much the view that prevailed in Spain in the Thirties.

Edit:  This election reminds me a bit of our vote on Brexit in the UK (I supported Brexit).  It was a very passionate debate, and yes, there were people who were willing to brand opponents as evil, or supporters of evil, and break off friendships, but that seems to me to be a big overreaction.

[Free Northman Reborn]

Well, Step one in understanding Trump voters:

Accept that a large chunk of people have a tribal mind set. It is a natural human inclination. (Not my intention to use the "appeal to nature" argument to justify it, but merely to explain where it stems from).

Step 2:

Accept that your anti- tribalism views are based on your particular ideology, and not inherently the morally correct position.

Note that in the above I'm not claiming that tribalism is something everyone should embrace, but instead pointing out that it is not something that should automatically be denounced as evil either. It is just a different, more defensive and cautious way of looking at life.

[Boris the Blade]

18 minutes ago, SeanF said:

America must be in a bad way, if each half of the population regards the other half as "evil in some way."  That's pretty much the view that prevailed in Spain in the Thirties.

Edit:  This election reminds me a bit of our vote on Brexit in the UK (I supported Brexit).  It was a very passionate debate, and yes, there were people who were willing to brand opponents as evil, or supporters of evil, and break off friendships, but that seems to me to be a big overreaction.

How is not wanting to associate with bigots an overreaction? Trump is a bigot, if you support Trump and are going to vote for him, you support his bigotry.  Why would anyone that is against racism, anti LGBTQIA hate, sexism / misogyny and xenophobia want to associate with people that are the complete opposite?

[James Arryn]

Comment more later, but to clarify one point of confusion...I meant I'd ended friendships over bigotry in the past, not specifically supporting Trump. Hasn't really come up, not sure how I'd react. It would definitely be a strain.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

18 hours ago, aceluby said:

Lol, this is a terrible argument.  

One data point with an impossible number of variables does not a trend make.

Clearing quote

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

24 minutes ago, Harakiri said:

How is not wanting to associate with bigots an overreaction? Trump is a bigot, if you support Trump and are going to vote for him, you support his bigotry.  Why would anyone that is against racism, anti LGBTQIA hate, sexism / misogyny and xenophobia want to associate with people that are the complete opposite?

Harakiri,

I don't like Trump or his ideology either.  I've been quite vocal in my opposition to Trump.  That said if you label everyone who disagrees with you "evil"... where can you go?

[Happy Ent]

1 hour ago, Harakiri said:

Why would anyone that is against racism, anti LGBTQIA hate, sexism / misogyny and xenophobia want to associate with people that are the complete opposite?

(If this is a genuine question:) This is easy. Read some Milo, say. Trump does not give a flying fuck about gay marriage. Clinton has been a vocal opponent against gay marriage. I am 100% sure she still is (ETA: despite her public volte-face on the issue). He doesn’t care. So if you care about such issues: Trump.

The greatest threat against women’s liberation in Europe right now? Greatest threat against Jews? Against homosexuals in the public sphere? Muslim immigration. No question. Trump would curtail that.

These are at least two, very valid reason, to prefer the socially liberal and anti-muslim Trump to the socially conservative and islam-friendly Clinton from exactly the perspectives that you mention (women’s lib, xenophobia, gay rights). They may not be good enough reasons to vote for Trump. (This is what I happen think: These reasons are not good enough. Don’t vote for Trump, he is utterly incompetent.)

(If this wasn’t a genuine question:) Never mind. 

[Lyanna Stark]

3 minutes ago, Happy Ent said:

(If this is a genuine question:) This is easy. Read some Milo, say. Trump does not give a flying fuck about gay marriage. Clinton has been a vocal opponent against gay marriage. I am 100% sure she still is. He doesn’t care. So if you care about such issues: Trump.

 

Disingenuous. She changed her position openly in 2013. This means according to your post people cannot change their views. HAS BEEN is key, and she has publicly changed those views. As did Obama, btw.

Ergo: whether your think, in your own chamber/office that Clinton is actually against it doesn't really matter since her policy positions are in favour of marriage equality.

[Boris the Blade]

28 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Harakiri,

I don't like Trump or his ideology either.  I've been quite vocal in my opposition to Trump.  That said if you label everyone who disagrees with you "evil"... where can you go?

See, it's not disagreeing with me. That wording of yours implies that they have a valid opinion. They dont. So do not white wash what it is or what they are. It's racism, it's misogyny, it's anti LGBTQIA hate. Their views are dangerous to those demographics and view them as second class citizen and not worthy of equality. And where can I go if I write off bigots as bigots? I can associate with people that aren't that I might disagree with on many other things. If you want to water down bigotry to just an opinion and associate with people that hold some disgusting views and view certain demographics or all as lesser, do what you like. I just don't consider that being ally and see it as a very privileged thing to do. Personally I have a hard time looking at that person or people again with out think about the shitty views they hold and how they think certain people are not worthy of equality or think they are inferior.

[Happy Ent]

5 minutes ago, Lyanna Stark said:

Disingenuous. She changed her position openly in 2013. This means according to your post people cannot change their views. HAS BEEN is key, and she has publicly changed those views. As did Obama, btw.

Ergo: whether your think, in your own chamber/office that Clinton is actually against it doesn't really matter since her policy positions are in favour of marriage equality.

Oh, I’m sorry if I came off as disingenuous. I absolutely know (and did not want to hide or distort) that she is playing a different card now (for completely cynical reasons that have to do with tribalism). 

Want I wanted to express is that I’m utterly confident that she remains in her heart opposed to gay marriage, while Trump couldn’t care less about gay marriage. She is a social conservative. He is not. (They are both running party platforms that go against what I assume are their own core values. Both lie.)

Sorry this wasn’t clear.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

13 minutes ago, Harakiri said:

See, it's not disagreeing with me. That wording of yours implies that they have a valid opinion. They dont. So do not white wash what it is or what they are. It's racism, it's misogyny, it's anti LGBTQIA hate. Their views are dangerous to those demographics and view them as second class citizen and not worthy of equality. And where can I go if I write off bigots as bigots? I can associate with people that aren't that I might disagree with on many other things. If you want to water down bigotry to just an opinion and associate with people that hold some disgusting views and view certain demographics or all as lesser, do what you like. I just don't consider that being ally and see it as a very privileged thing to do. Personally I have a hard time looking at that person or people again with out think about the shitty views they hold and how they think certain people are not worthy of equality or think they are inferior.

And when those people make up 40% of the total population in a given area?  You are refusing to engage.  Refusing to associate and are adding the ingredients for... very bad times.

Civil discussion and civil discourse are important as vents to prevent much worse circumstances.  So, while I understand your frustration with people who hold noxious opinions, when the people who hold noxious opinions are labled as "other" and excluded from normal social interactions very bad circumstances can result.

Talking is a much better option.

[The Anti-Targ]

14 minutes ago, Happy Ent said:

Oh, I’m sorry if I came off as disingenuous. I absolutely know (and did not want to hide or distort) that she is playing a different card now (for completely cynical reasons that have to do with tribalism). 

Want I wanted to express is that I’m utterly confident that she remains in her heart opposed to gay marriage, while Trump couldn’t care less about gay marriage. She is a social conservative. He is not. (They are both running party platforms that go against what I assume are their own core values. Both lie.)

Sorry this wasn’t clear.

They are not equivalent positions though. Assuming Clinton is at her core against gay marriage, which is only a belief and you have no evidence, she is willing to lie about her true feelings and let secular freedom rule, because the USA is meant to be secular. Trump on the other hand it willing to lie to hide his ambivalence about gay marriage and encourage people to continue to strive to remove this freedom from people on the basis of religious conformity. Perhaps Trump knows these people are impotent to impose any law that bans gay marriage because the supreme court has spoken. But that's quite a risk, and it will not prevent people from suffering abuse or help to create a more tolerant society towards LGBT.

[mormont]

3 minutes ago, Happy Ent said:

Want I wanted to express is that I’m utterly confident that she remains in her heart opposed to gay marriage, while Trump couldn’t care less about gay marriage. She is a social conservative. He is not. (They are both running party platforms that go against what I assume are their own core values. Both lie.)

Sorry this wasn’t clear.

It's clear. It's just rubbish.

You have this circular argument that says you believe that Clinton is socially conservative on gay rights 'in her heart' because she at one time opposed gay marriage, and that she opposed it then because she was socially conservative. You then try to parlay that into evidence that her current stance is insincere. You don't consider or acknowledge the fact that Clinton is older and has learned more, that the social climate has changed, or that Clinton's general record in her career is of sympathy and support for gay rights. You want to ignore the context and simply try to build this argument from one data point. I don't know what your 'confidence' is based on, but it certainly isn't based on all of the available information.

On top of that, you take Trump's indifference to gay rights and try to paint it as a positive. Equally absurd. A man who doesn't care about gay rights will not worry about selling them out for political advantage. You go further and assume that Trump isn't a social conservative, because he's a liar. But you don't acknowledge that Trump's lies tell us nothing about his core values, except that he's a liar. Lying is a human behaviour, not a logic puzzle. Liars lie when and how it suits them to do so. If Trump's lies are furthering a socially conservative agenda, it cannot be that he is actually opposed to such an agenda. At best, he doesn't care and, again, will happily accede to that agenda, at which point it matters very little whether he's sincere.