I need everyone angry to look at something, please? go here yea I posted this all over the place. Click on the button off to the left 'Change from 2012.' That is the 100 or so million Americans that have been left behind due to global trade, robotics, demographic shifts, the abandonment of "fly over country" and in general the people who have lost out economically over the last 20 years. Look at that map. Trump won because he saw that map as an opportunity and grabbed it by the pussy. The DNC abandoned these people to Fox News, regressive republicans, con-men and charlatans. IF there is going to be a Democrat/Liberal challenge to Trump, it will be in the engagement of all those red arrows. It is going to be a lot of work, but I think it can be done.
What do you mean by left behind? I keep hearing this on the news about the rural vote and how they feel disenfranchised. What exactly do they want? Who took what away from them? Why is now not as great as before? A lot of people say the economy, but wages are finally growing again, unemployment is down, and the economy is finally going in a positive direction after being wrecked for about 15 years. The median income for Trump voters is $72,000. I'm a big city college educated liberal and I will probably never have an income that high as long as I live. Don't tell me it's the economy. It's xenophobia, plain and simple.
The middle of the country and its 50-60 million potential voters was written off by the DNC 20-something years ago to chase money and bigger states. This left a void in the so-called "Flyover Country" that is now a Republican monolith. Median income may be 72K a year, but not out here it isn't. Know who the people I know are who voted Trump? 30K a year, drowning in debt, watching jobs go elsewhere, watching their kids move away and with them the energy to keep shit running. Health care is eating any income gains, nobody is moving into the area to generate increasing home prices so everyone in the rural Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio etc are losing money by owning a home. Some of these areas are fucked. The people living there know it too. And here comes a blow hard who promises to "Make America Great Again" like their mom and dad used to talk about, when there was money for paving the streets, when the farms all made buckets of cash, when the nostalgia goggles make everything look wonderful. The Dem's don't give a shit about poor rural white people. If that is true or not I cannot say, but leave the bigger cities and people will tell you that the only people who show up when it comes time to vote are the Republicans. So they vote for people that take away the benefits of living in a wealthy country. They defund the schools, cut the repair budgets, funnel tax dollars to the "Job creators" who just get wealthier while the rest of us eat shit. The answer to your question is about 7000 words long, needs links and tons of data, and I'm fucking pissed off at the DNC and my fellow liberals that I may just sit down and pound it out this weekend.
I still don't completely buy it. The numbers don't add up. There is simply no evidence that these voters are any more economically disadvantaged than the rest of society- the opposite is true in fact. There is only one common thread between them all- intense fear of immigrants and distrust of institutions. All of the problems you described apply to urbanites just as much. In fact, urban unemployment is worse. The whole thing is a myth.
Median income was $41,615 for men and $30,246 for women in 2015 (census table ). You're thinking of median househoid income, which is around $60k for white households (census again ).Median income may be 72K a year, but not out here it isn't. Know who the people I know are who voted Trump? 30K a year,
Should have stuck with Bernie... Oh friggin well, at least people have a reason to be interested in politics the next few years
How?It is going to be a lot of work, but I think it can be done.