It's apparent in the fact that Trump is a beacon for the lowest common denominator citizen like Rocketslegend who can't even read the Bill of Rights. I guess Mr. Khan really does need to give Trump supporters a lesson in the constitution.
Here's two articles that look into the disconnect of a billionaire who lives in a literal gilded tower who still has a lot of support among poorer groups. http://www.usnews.com/news/articles...populist-why-the-rural-poor-love-donald-trump With roots in blue-collar Scranton, Pennsylvania, years as first lady of Arkansas and a 2000 Senate campaign that featured a "listening tour" of small-town New York, it's not surprising that Hillary Clinton's campaign website has a full page devoted to helping the rural poor, including a jobs and economic development plan. The son of a wealthy real-estate developer, Donald Trump grew up in New York City, and built his fortune in Manhattan, a world away from hard-luck towns upstate, like Auburn and Jamestown. His website doesn't say much about tackling exurban joblessness and despair; a white paper produced on his record focus mostly on trade issues, tax cuts and ethanol. Drive an hour or two outside of any major U.S. city, however – Washington, D.C., for example – and campaign signs for Trump dominate the countryside: nestled in soybean fields and thick woods; beside two-lane highways and shotgun houses. Support for Clinton is hard to find, if it exists at all. "I guess I want to say it's not terribly surprising," says Lisa Pruitt, a faculty member at the Center for Poverty Research at the University California-Davis. "I would say it's not terribly unusual" That's because, despite a strong grasp on rural poverty issues and more than a decade in the Ozarks, Clinton is an intellectual Democratic politician – anathema to God-fearing, gun-loving people in places like the Central Plains or down-east Maine. Voters in the American hinterlands don't much like where her party stands on hot-button issues like same-sex marriage, civil rights and abortion, and believe she's among the political elites who constantly look down on them. Trump, by contrast, is a brash Republican with a Noo Yawk tough-guy accent who loves fast food and hates political correctness. Though he lives in a gilded penthouse apartment and borrowed millions from his dad to start his career, Trump says he's rubbed elbows with construction workers, learned to operate a backhoe as a kid and built a business empire with his own hands. That common-touch image, coupled with his two-fisted, America First message and bold if vague promise to restore long-gone manufacturing jobs to towns like South Boston, Va., has rural voters flocking to Trump's campaign like birds to a freshly-sown cornfield. To understand why rural America believes their savior is a Manhattan real-estate mogul and not a Yale-trained policy expert who helped improve schools in a poor state like Arkansas, however, is to understand the American fault lines of class, authenticity and elitism, including how politicians see the rural poor – and how the rural poor see themselves. At the same time electoral math and the red-blue political divide also means neither party is likely to seriously address the needs of the rural poor in the South and the heartlands – so-called "flyover country," where Democrats haven't been competitive since President Lyndon Johnson came to ramshackle Inez, Kentucky, in 1964, to launch his War on Poverty campaign. J.D. Vance, author of the best-selling memoir, "Hillbilly Elegy," believes the reason Trump is big in small town America lies with attitudes of "political elites" like Clinton and President Barack Obama, her onetime rival and former boss. Though they have great policies and are well-intentioned, Vance said, they don't seem to respect or empathize with rural poor people. Vance pointed to Obama's 2008 campaign statement – hard-pressed, small-town voters with little opportunity "get bitter, cling to guns and religion and antipathy towards people who aren't like them," the then-presidential candidate said, behind closed doors – as Exhibit A. "It reveals an attitude that turns a lot of people away from the Democratic Party and turns them towards someone like Donald Trump" who says he understands them, Vance, an investment banker whose breakout book traces his hardscrabble upbringing in rural Kentucky and Ohio, said in a CNN interview. Despite policies that can help them, he said, "there's this sense that President Obama and, frankly, some folks in the Republican Party, too – they look down on people like me." By contrast, Trump, photographed eating a bucket of fried chicken on his private jet, seems more authentic, and has a message that resonates, Vance said. Just mentioning he's talked with hard hats at construction sites, he said, goes a long way towards breaking the ice among people who consider themselves hard-working, salt-of-the-earth Americans. "Nobody else is really talking to construction workers any more" about their lives and needs, Vance said."So it's not surprising that they support him." Pruitt concurs: "I think the same basically holds true for why they don't like Hillary," she says. Trump "has this straight-talking way that does speak their language. And they look at an Obama who is very neutral – he has no accent. All this [speaks of] privilege," Pruitt says. Although Clinton spent more than a decade in Arkansas and worked on children's education issues, a neutral politician "is who she has become," says Pruitt. "And I think it's very very hard for rural voters to relate to that." When she was running against Obama, the first major-party African-American presidential candidate in 2008, Clinton said she was the candidate of "hard-working Americans, white Americans" and boasted that "whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me." But that constituency isn't there for her this time around, perhaps because of her affiliation with Obama and the federal government they loathe. Consider: A recent CNN poll of white working-class voters found an overwhelming majority of them believe the government doesn't represent them (93 percent) and think that Washington is the reason for their problems (73 percent). Meanwhile, roughly half believe America's best days are in the past, that multiculturalism is a threat to their way of life and that government is doing too much to help racial and ethnic minorities. Despite her time in Little Rock, Clinton hasn't tried to reach those voters, perhaps because she knows she'd come off as a city slicker, says Beth Mattingly, director of research on vulnerable families at the University of New Hampshire. Poor rural communities are insular, she says, have pride in their ability to get through hard times and don't trust outsiders, even helpful ones. "A lot of people are struggling to varying degrees," she says. "Some of the work we've done in rural Maine –'Life is hard up here, the weather is hard, the work is hard the economy is hard.' But there's a sense that, 'We're all in this together.'" Seth McKee, a Texas Tech political scientist, says that insularity and sense of pride makes it hard for a Democrat like Clinton to break through – particularly since her image, and her party affiliation, is a turn-off poor whites. "You talk to some poor rural white voter – 'You should be voting Democratic because Hillary has a plan that would be better for you,'" McKee says. "The first response would be, 'Oh, yeah? I can't stand her or what the Democrats stand for.'" "They look at this group and say, 'I'm not like them, that's not my tribe. I'm not African-American, I'm not Hispanic,'" he continues. "On [economic] and race issues, they see themselves more as Republican. Inserting any policy discussion into that argument doesn't work." Add in presidential electoral-college math – red states in this column, blue ones in that column, first candidate to 270 wins – and it's probable that neither candidate will focus on rural poverty in this election cycle. "If you think about strategy and winning the presidency, so many [poor people] are located in states that candidates don't care about," says McKee. "A lot of them are in really red states" that Republicans take for granted and Democrats know they won't win. "They're sort of captured voters," McKee says. "They're ignored. They vote one party heavily, and they've got nowhere else to go. It's a bad place to be." Yet Vance says if both parties want to compete for votes among the rural poor – a move that echoes former Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean's "50-state strategy" – Job One is something Clinton has already done in New York towns like Oneonta, Utica and Schenectady: Talk to them, and listen when they answer. "I think the answer is to ask really tough questions about why they are resentful and what we can do to turn things around," Vance told CNN host Michael Smerconish. "Unfortunately, I think the political class has not done a good job at showing sympathy to these places. That's really all that you need to do."
Here's the second article. https://www.washingtonpost.com/blog...party-for-white-males/?utm_term=.a3f5d70a8bfd The GOP has become a pity party for white males A cottage industry of apologists for Donald Trump and his supporters has sprung up to excuse, justify, infantilize and pity his core group of white, non-college-educated males who lash out at immigrants and globalism more generally. Victims ignored by elites! The Emmy winners mock them! There are more than a few problems with this. First, conservatives used to stand up for “creative destruction,” the rise and fall of businesses and entire industries, which is an intrinsic part of a dynamic free market. If you’re not a hard-core Libertarian, the average conservative has considered the solution to this problem to be a safety net and tax, education and other policies that allow workers to rebound; it has never been to halt the marketplace or shift to a government-planned economy. The latter has been tried and has failed, as conservatives are quick to point out when ridiculing Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) or other anti-capitalist wags. It also exempts these voters from responsibility for their lives. The coal town is depopulated? Yes, that’s sad, but why are they not moving — as immigrants do — to where the jobs are? Second, the ills about which Trump and his apologists complain have little to do with the plight of many of their supporters (whose average salary is $72,000, much higher than that of the average Sanders or Hillary Clinton supporter). The things Trump demonizes — free trade and immigration — did not cause the decline of low-skilled manufacturing (automation did that); they have, however, contributed to the resurgence of high-skill manufacturing in the United States to such an extent that we have record numbers of unfilled manufacturing jobs. If Trump were railing about the lack of job training programs, that would be one thing, but he is not, of course. Constructive measures that do not involve attacks on others are of no concern to him. He’s simply casting about for targets for white, lower-class rage. Third, Trump’s defenders seem to demand that we treat members of his base delicately for fear of ruffling their feathers and damaging their self-esteem. When you play the “Hollywood makes fun of us” card, you get perilously close to political correctness and emotional feebleness, not things Trump and his ilk are supposed to promote. Even worse, complaining that other people don’t wish them “Merry Christmas” — and then transforming that into a war against Christianity — is victimology rarely seen outside the “safe spaces” on college campuses. Fourth, the pity party for lower-class white males excludes virtually everyone else. Are we expected to turn the economy inside out for the latter, even to the extent that it harms those who have prepared themselves for a competitive workplace — or who simply want to enjoy moderately priced consumer goods not priced out of their grasp by tariffs? Why concern ourselves with the delicate sensibilities of the “Merry Christmas”-deprived and not with Mexican immigrants (“murderers”), women (Trump thinks it’s a mistake to let wives work outside the home), African Americans (whose lives he insists are a “disaster”), the disabled, etc.? In elevating one specific group — older white males — Trump fails the test of a leader in a diverse, complex society in which we want to maximize benefits for the largest number of people. He seems not to grasp the demands of living in a prosperous 21st-century society –technical prowess, flexibility, cooperation and respect for others. It also happens to be dumb politics, as Gerald Seib points out: Suburban women “have in the past voted consistently Republican, and this year they are leaning heavily toward Hillary Clinton” says GOP pollster Whit Ayres, who works with Sen. Marco Rubio. Says one Trump adviser flatly: “Suburban women will decide this election.” Broadly speaking, the Trump appeal is strongest among older men without a college degree, and among those who feel particular economic stress. . . . Montgomery [County, Pa.] and the other suburban counties around Philadelphia have “a very, very diversified economy,” with high-tech, insurance, banking and retail activity, says Terry Madonna, a pollster at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa. While such suburbs don’t represent Trump country generally, that’s specifically true among suburban women, who don’t appear to warm to the Trump style. There is no virtue in pandering to Trumpkins at the expense of every other group and the country’s general prosperity. In making these white males (and only them) into victims and encouraging them to blame outsiders or menacing forces beyond their control, Trump does what Republicans used to accuse liberals of doing — pitting one group against another in a zero-sum conception of the economy. It is doing the Trumpkins no favors and it is heightening dissension in a country that needs to rediscover common values and shared endeavors and undertake some systemic reforms in government, education and criminal justice.
So it's a billionaire who lives in a literal gilded tower who still has a lot of support among poorer groups up against a multi-millionaire who lives in a figurative gilded tower and has a huge chunk of her support coming from poorer groups. Let's face it, there's not much difference between the two.....which is why Trump was a big Hillary supporter just 8 years ago.
This is something that's not new, this is what we call "White Fragility" This is why I say we have SJWs on both sides getting triggered by a bunch of things.
My hatred for Mark Cuban is at an all time high. I didn't think it could get any higher a couple years ago. Attention whoring himself for some media attention. sad.
No doubt, he's calling out your boyfriend publicly. I would think it weird if you DIDN'T hate him for having valid criticism of Trump.
It's very disconcerting that millions of Americans have allowed Trump to play up the conservative culture wars against race, abortion, women, and intelligence to some political apex in an attempt to get elected. There's little policy at all, there are no real plans to be seen that aren't completely mocked in all serious policy circles, there are no ideas that would actually make America better in much of any capacity. It's just incredible the degree to which people fall back to racist, sexist, anti-immigrant ridiculousness to fool themselves into voting for the most unqualified, unexperienced, borish, buffonish, clown show candidate in American history. It truly is idiocracy in action.
Ftfy. He has put forward policy; you just disagree about it. Basically the immature "if you don't agree with me you're wrong" train of though. Grow up.
We can disagree about tax policy. We can disagree about where to invade next. We can disagree about single payer. But when a substantial amount of Trump supporters want a return to some magical 1950's pure white America, a simple disagreement is too cordial for such despicable sentiments.
I just heard Rob Reiner ask a great question. I'll put my own take on it here. Is Donald Trump responsible for the Orlando nightclub shooting? For the bombings in NJ and NY? For San Bernardino? For the attacks in Turkey? Belgium? Paris? If he has a secret plan that will wipe out ISIS, why hasn't he brought it to the attention of our government, military, homeland security etc.? Why hasn't he brought this plan to people that will actually help? By not bringing this secret plan to people that can put it into effect to help, isn't he responsible every time ISIS carries out another attack? If he could wipe them out, why isn't he doing it?
LOL. The desperation to stop Trump on the left is becoming palpable. While I don't think Trump has any secret plan, its pretty obvious to most he will be considered "tougher" on them than the Obama/Clinton administrations have/will be. The panic is real. Even if he had this secret plan (which we all know he doesn't have) he can't carry it out until he becomes President since the current leadership certainly thinks he's a wacko and is doing their best to discredit him.
I don't think you get the point. If he's lying and has no plan, then he isn't prepared. If he's telling the truth then he's just letting people die with each subsequent ISIS related attack. If he had the plan he has briefings from people who have connections and carry out United States Security. Trump has the ability and connections to share his plan with the people in charge now. He doesn't have to wait until he's president. I don't think it's agreed that he'll be tougher on ISIS. The U.S. military has been taking out ISIS leaders, taking back ISIS territory in Iraq, halting attempted attacks left and right. Of course we've heard nothing from Trump on how he will stop ISIS.
Well the answer is obviously "No, of course not". When it comes to those ISIS inspired attacks, Obama and Hillary are a LOT more to blame than Trump and it's not close. Policies that Obama ran on led to the growth and expansion of ISIS and Obama policies ensured that ISIS could keep their stronghold. That went a long way towards creating the atmosphere where there could be outright ISIS attacks on foreign soil and ISIS inspired attacks elsewhere. Bush should catch some blame as well because despite Obama running on it and taking credit for it, he was the one that actually signed the deal to cut bait and run in Iraq, which is what really helped out ISIS.
Except Obama has never claimed to have a secret plan to wipe them out. If someone had that plan and didn't put it to use, wouldn't they be in part responsible?
If that person were in office and able to implement that plan and did not, sure. If that person is just a civilian with no power to implement his double secret probation plan to fix everything, then no. For the record, I think Trump's rhetoric is BS but trying to blame Trump for the failures of the Obama administration is even more BS?
This is NOT a liberal value. This is NOT a western value. This is NOT public condemnation. This is murder.
This is my biggest complaint about Trump, is he trying to create alternate reality. There are plenty of jobs, they just require more skills and aren't located in the same places as the past. Illegal immigration peaked several years ago. The globe isn't predicated to grow as much for the foreseeable future.
of course it is BS. But Trump has had national security briefings where he could have shared his secret plan with people who could get it done.
