What I heard from Trump supporters (2017) | Hacker News Reader

What I heard from Trump supporters (2017)

blog.samaltman.com

3 pointssurprisetalk12 comments

His appeal is his rejection of the status-quo. I get it. I thought the exit polling suggested that the economy and immigration were the big factors. I just have a hard time accepting that we have to put a person in charge that likely doesn't respect the democratic process in order to (supposedly) represent those who haven't been heard before.

My intention isn't to assassinate his character, but he was at one point facing non trivial legal charges, right? The conversation is just ridiculous because we're at a point where we have to talk about the validity of our judicial process?

I think the term "low-information voters" get thrown around as an insult, but the reality is that like, most people probably should just care about whether they feel they have enough money to be successful. I kept seeing this thing on reddit denigrating people for choosing Facism to save 50 cents on eggs. But this perspective fucking sucks. Purchasing power is probably 95% of general happiness and fulfillment for most people.

I think it's very rational to choose "This person might benefit me and my community specifically" over "our policies are more sustainable for the whole nation in the long term."

It’s only rational if your choice has the possibility of fixing the problem. This choice didn’t. All policy presented will make inflation increase or prices spike (lower interest rates, tariffs, reduced immigration and deportation, corporate consolidation due to reduced antitrust enforcement).

Hence, your low information unsophisticated voter.

Of course it's rational to vote for your interests. I'm just surprised about Trump's continued career, despite the litigation and January 6th. I guess next time our representatives will have to up the ante with their rhetoric, lies, and defiance, just like Trump. And after more of our political system starts to disintegrate and the Democrats get their way, we can also say "we were just voting for our interests too."

>> I wanted to understand what Trump voters liked and didn’t like about the president, what they were nervous about, what they thought about the left’s response so far, and most importantly, what would convince them not to vote for him in the future.

I would really like to understand why he considers this last question to be the most important.

Something I've noticed over the past 8 years is that there is never a shortage of think pieces like this published by liberals or leftists trying to humanize Trump supporters, to investigate and understand their point of view, etc.

Maybe it's a result of my own personal media bubble, but I've never, ever seen anything remotely similar in the other direction.

It's interesting to look at this list, because it feels like a lot of Trump supporters concerns about Trump are the same as the liberal concerns about Trump.

I 100% do not think that all Trump supporter's are _blank_ I think most are good people concerned about their family / living situation / community etc.

But, in a liberal free speech environment, how do you get people to not get the message that "all white men have privilege", or "All Trump supporters are Nazi's". I'm not going to say liberals have no fault here, but the conservative media's fear mongering about say Trans People far exceeds the amount that democrat politicians talk about trans rights.

I don't think that even most liberal women believe that men are more dangerous than a bear, but man that message went viral as shit.

It's worth noting that if 90% of Americans voted based on which policy they actually preferred, the remaining 10% of vulnerable voters would still have enough influence to make or break most elections. Platform only takes you so far, those last few voters have to be appealed to by prodding the amygdala into fearing the opponent more than they fear you.

Yeah, I think there are some things on the edges and long term strategy, but the reality is Biden won in 2020 because of the pandemic and Trump won in 2024 because of inflation. Those would have been enormous headwinds to overcome.

IMO the culture wars aspect is a side hustle. Trump is the (supposed) emergency brake for people trapped inside a society that glorifies progress as getting rid of someone's livelihood.

I don't disagree with you, but it's strange how I think my fear is the opposite, that especially aligning with silicon valley, that it will accelerate the society that glorifies progress and getting rid of people's livliehood.

Calves voting for their own butcher and all...

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