Sorry, it’s not the Democrats fault that rural voters support racist, sexist and snake-oil Jesus policies. That’s the fault of the stupid, selfish, small minded voters who vote, repeatedly, for the party which openly espouses those policies.
3 Likes
The Governor of Oklahoma has placed a Medicaid expansion initiative petition bill on the primary date on June 30. Since it involves primaries for state offices, some locales won’t even have a primary election. He’s counting on the low turnout to counter the record number of petition signatures for this measure. https://nondoc.com/2020/04/17/sq-802-stitt-sets-election-date-on-medicaid-expansion/
1 Like
You can’t blame somebody for believing shit is Shinola if they never know the difference. Nobody tells red state Americans outside the big cities that their Republican leaders are crapping all over them. I watched Missouri go from Blue to Red. The Democrats ceded the rural communities and exurbs to the Republicans. Then they fought over the suburbs. Much of the time the Democrats didn’t mount a challenge in the suburbs unless it was a presidential campaign. In off year elections it was virtually impossible to get support for a suburban candidate from the state party.
That all happened during the years of Republican ascendancy and the Democrats didn’t have any money, but the tables have turned. The Republicans have run out of ideas. They are holding on by cheating at the polls. Democratic ideas should be ascendant everywhere. Writing off rural Americans the way you do, is just counter productive.
2 Likes
Nobody tells red state Americans outside the big cities that their Republican leaders are crapping all over them.
It. doesn’t. matter. Plenty of Dems tell these people they’re being crapped on. They just won’t listen to it. And even if Dems didn’t point it out, don’t you think they would’ve figured it out by seeing it with their own eyes?? What the f*ck does it take?
And you’re being real condescending to your fellow travelers in thinking that they don’t know the difference. They sure as sh*t DO know the difference.
3 Likes
You are assuming those rural people hear anything that isn’t filtered by their local Republican owned newspapers or Republican controlled radio or television. Fox News is the liberal outfit as far as a lot of rural people are concerned.
Guarantee, OK will remain red. That’s how dumb these people are.
They cannot see any connections between their miserable lives and those whom they elect.
Mass unemployment has a value to billionaire employers. It takes the fight out of workers and makes it easy to keep paying them peanuts.
3 Likes
And nobody bothers to tell them because we just assume they invincibly ignorant. 
They are ignorant alright but you and a lot of Democrats seem to want to keep them that way.
They’re told, again and again. Cultural issues – race hatred, for one – overrides any kind of rational thinking.
That’s here and in other countries. That’s how autocracies get seeded.
ETA: Try, just try to talk sense to some blue collar guy who votes Trump. I have. Then you’ll know what I’m talking about.
1 Like
I have been. You are right, it is hard, but Covid-19 has given me an opening when talking to my farming cousins. They are not at all pleased with Trump. When issues hit close to home they respond the way most of us do. Covid-19 hits close to home for most of them.
1 Like
Yes, yes, yes, a few wake up on their own, but that’s the only way it happens.
They’ve got to be hurting and have to recognize the source of the hurt. Like an addict who hits bottom. That’s how “wave” elections happen. Some never learn. He’s still at 42%.
Un-friggin’ believable.
2 Likes
They are psychologically locked-in to the Trump Party in the same way that Battered Wives remain with their abusers even when given the opportunity to leave (Better the Devil you Know…)
Add to that the intense propaganda they are fed daily telling them they are all “VICTIMS” of the “Intellectual Elite on the Coasts” (you know, them smarty-pants with College Degrees) who hate their “down-home ways”.
It creates a “Bunker Mentality” of being constantly under siege and Trump presents himself as “The Savior” who will lead them all to Nirvana where they will get their “justly deserved REVENGE” upon those smarmy “Elites” who are trying to tell them how to live their lives.
It ties in closely with their firmly held Religious Beliefs in “Saviors” and “Going to Heaven” since, as Trump and the Grifter Ministers they put their belief in constantly remind them that THEY are the “Real Americans” and will get ALL the Presents on Christmas Day once Trump is re-elected.
It is a very immature mindset, but it is prevalent in at least 35% of the Country.
4 Likes
If someone doesn’t know the difference between Republican racism, xenophobia, and hatred and Democratic inclusiveness it’s because they are a racist, xenophobic hater inside. If these Fox News fanatics are not repulsed by what Trump and his supporters say and do, it’s because they think the same way. The differences really are obvious.
The problem with Dems. is that we have a difficult time understanding that not everyone is a good person. There are a lot of selfish, shortsighted a*holes in the world. Most, not all, Republicans are in that category. And, thankfully, since like attracts like, over time they have come to congregate in certain reliably, racist, red states (I know a few very decent folks from Missouri who simply got up and left permanently.)
What Dems. need to do is to recognize that there are evil folks in the world (all of whom vote Republican), fight to defeat them, and stop trying to change their toxic personalities because that ain’t gonna happen.
2 Likes
My mom is from a ranch outside a town of 500 and that’s one of the largest towns in the county. I still have family out there and you know what? They have access to social media. They have access to satellite tv. You know what they don’t have? A local newspaper that is their only possible source of news. No, they get the same damn paper that we get here in the city just with an added section for events in the western half of the state. The problem with these “oh they just don’t know any better” excuses is they are unbelievably patronizing and condescending. They are adults in a god damn democracy educating themselves on their vote is part of their civic duty. But we are suppose to feel sorry for them because they keep choosing to shoot themselves in the foot to vote for candidates that promise to indulge their racial and religous bigotries?
2 Likes
From the Economist:
2 Likes
43.5.
1 Like
I would like you to tell me the difference between people who believe that “those libtards in the cities want to take our rats” and folks who believe “the dumb hicks in the country aren’t worth our time of day and they get what the deserve.” I think they are all God’s or Nature’s children and they all deserve our compassion. I guess you believe otherwise. For you life and politics is a blood sport. If so, I feel as sorry for you as I feel for Trump’s MAGA martyrs.
2 Likes
And you think they are children who bear no responsibility for the consequences of their electoral choices. No one is holding a gun to their head forcing them to vote for Republican candidates. That is a choice they make and when they make that choice they aren’t the only ones who face the consequences of those choices. Indeed people in red states like minorities or immigrants or the LGBT community often get hit even worse. And we are just suppose to overlook and excuse their choice to inflict that harm? Wave it away as them not knowing any better? You say I’m dissmissing them as dumb hicks, but that is the exact opposite of what I’m doing. I don’t think they’re dumb and that is exactly why I’m not willing to excuse away the harmful consequences of their choices.
Edit: And yes politics is a blood sport. How many Americans are going to die today as a result of the incompetence of those leading this country? How many died during Maria? Katrina? Iraq? Afghanistan? How much suffering has occured because of Republicans working to handicap and undermine the ACA? So yes for many people politics is exactly a matter of life or death or significant suffering, anyone saying otherwise is operating from a position of profound priviledge.
3 Likes
So many persons just don’t get this. In some perverse way, an explication like yours gives further validation of their hatred of “elite” and people who went to college.