
Lost Cause: Seeing America Through the Losing Candidates’ Map - dthal
https://projects.propublica.org/graphics/lost-cause
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keeringplastik
Ok

I understand the rural/urban divide. I recognise the inherent value
differences separating farm country and the major metropolitan areas.

What I can't wrap my mind around is that the champion of these folksy rural
farmers and former factory workers, the hero of the common bud light swilling,
chevy driving, fox news watching red blooded, god fearing American turned out
to be Donald Trump!

Here is the epitome of big city, tax dodging, 80's tastless excess in the mold
of Gordon Gecko. A pompous and self absorbed celebrity from New York city. A
former Democrat and friend of the enemy with ties to wall street and the sell
out of the American worker.

Reading through some of the recent HN comments concerning this election is
disconcerting, as it shows that this divide is deep and has poisoned even this
normally reserved and cordial community.

However, tell me hacker news, why is Donald Trump the savior of traditional
American values?

~~~
hga
Look at all the stories of his good will and/or charity towards "little guys".
There's zillions from before the campaign, and plenty of the good will in it.

My favorite is of some guy with essentially no money in his pocket, with just
a package of hot dogs on a Martha's Vineyard beach. This random guy offered to
cook them next to the steaks he was grilling, and accidentally ruined them,
thereby feeding the poor guy a stake. I think sometime later the guy realized
it was Trump.

There's also the thesis that at some point Trump took the measure of our
establishment, including the GOPe, and decided to do something about it.

There's also a historical pattern of the top and bottom against the middle,
and now there's a new lower if not bottom group, ditto a new middle, the
professional class, and a great deal of (now?) mutual loathing between them
and the working class. So in that respect this is nothing new, this goes back
millennia.

~~~
keeringplastik
"Nice guy trump" isnt really the campaign he ran, or what got him elected.

Class conflict is a constant in politics, but still doesn't explain "prince
trump for the little guys"

~~~
meffie
Living in Ohio, the conversations I have with his supporters here always
started with the phrase "he is a businessman", a comment that always baffled
me. But that is the perception.

Something to consider; large gold letters on his buildings, golden toilets,
gaudy furniture, jets, and trophy wives. These are all cliche elements of the
"new rich", the common guy that made to the big time. Unfortunately, this is
appealing to a large segment of the population.

