if you want to understand America's voting behavior …

[LTMMC]

… then read one of the best books ever written about this strange aberration of the human species. How Americans became what they are today. Author is an American, Kurt Andersen, title of his book "Fantasyland" – How America Went Haywire – a 500-year history.

IMHO, if one searches for an explanation, for why close to 50% of Americans have voted for Donald Trump – after knowing beforehand who he is – one will be at a loss of understanding this phenomenon. Unless one reads Andersen's rationale.

His explanation: the hyper-individualism of Americans, coupled with the freedom to believe anything and everything. Including fables and fairy tales, demons, Satan and angels on earth. And quack religions of all kinds. Stuff that civilized people in other parts of the developed world have long since discarded, when they entered the age of Enlightenment, and became secular societies.

Not so in the US of A; it's unbelievable what Americans consider worthy of believing in and following. So unfortunately minds encumbered by organized religion – in the 21st century, mind you! – easily conjured up two guiding principles:

#1: Everybody is entitled to his own facts, and there is no such thing as a common truth. A truth based on science and rational thinking, which prevails in grown-up nations.

#2: Righteous people like them (holier than thou) are not only allowed to become missionaries for the rest of the world. No, such people have a God-given duty and obligation to become Billy Grahams or Pat Robinsons or Rush Limbaughs for/to their fellow Americans.

It looks right now like the tide has been stemmed almost, short of engulfing the USA completely, but just barely. And maybe with a lot of luck, America might someday become a secular nation. Like the Founding Fathers had hoped, like that is common for the rest of civilized nations. Other societies have reached this step, so why should Americans not make it also? But it seems to me it will still take a lot of time for this to happen.

My two cents worth, at least, for explaining Trumpism is America.

 

[Dribble]

Oh for fuck's sake...it is way easier than that...

Everything has a distribution. There is a mean and a variance around that mean. For example...dick size. The average erect length is 5.75 inches. That means half of the erect dicks are longer than 5.75 inches and half are smaller. Trumpsters are in the lower half of the distribution. Small dicks. So they over compensate and express themselves with hate, vitriol and anger. They should just accept their dick size. God gave them small dicks for a reason...what reason that is I don't know...i am not God. But the facts are what they are.

 

[Lazaran]

.
Yeah, the reasons people voted for Trump are pretty simple.

Race, religion, greed, guns, and football rivalry mentality.

Same as it ever was

 

[nowisthetime]

.
Yeah, the reasons people voted for Trump are pretty simple.

Race, religion, greed, guns, and football rivalry mentality.

Same as it ever was

Absolutely, as far as his few minority voters well, they suffer from internalized racism and are just as greedy, ignorant, deluded as his white supporters. Many Hispanics consider themselves white, and also look down upon other races, even hating on other Hispanics. Latin-America has a quiet (but not so quiet) issue with colorism. As for his black supporters, well, some black people hold misogynistic and anti-gay views. His supporters either don't think bigotry is a deal-breaker or suffer from some type of bigotry themselves. All in all, his voters are shitty people, you can see the way they behave on here.

They need to understand that we are NOT returning to the good ol' days when everyone "fell in line" and only certain people got jobs and the best life just for the color of their skin and nothing else. They can go and create their own little utopia and leave the rest of us the hell alone. They were that desperate to vote for a sexual deviant, perverted, incompetent, seditious thug. That's how mentally sick these people are, and that's why they are treated like human lepers. They really drag the country down.

 

[Aglaopheme]

It’s not 50% of Americans, it’s 47.5% of voters. That is a big difference. I agree with the rest of what you wrote. It’s by design and started with really tying religion to voting and has been hammered home by right-wing propaganda ever since.

 

[LTMMC]

It’s not 50% of Americans, it’s 47.5% of voters. That is a big difference. I agree with the rest of what you wrote. It’s by design and started with really tying religion to voting and has been hammered home by right-wing propaganda ever since.

I appreciate your setting me straight on these numbers, Aglaopheme. So possibly the share of Americans backing Trump is "only" 40%. Perhaps even less, when one considers everybody who acted only in her own self-interest, despite disagreeing with Trump on many matters.

I appreciate also your agreement with my "religion" thesis. Although it was Andersen - not me - who put down on paper all the facts about it. Thank you for your comments.

 

[nowisthetime]

So far, more than five million people voted for Biden than Dump.

I don't think an intelligent human being can look at Dump at believe he would lead the country better than Biden, after four years of mess and fuckery.

I think these people enjoy chaos, they are the real anti-American fascist sympathizers. They call us Socialists (not even knowing what the word means), that's cool, they are Fascists.

 

[Aglaopheme]

I appreciate your setting me straight on these numbers, Aglaopheme. So possibly the share of Americans backing Trump is "only" 40%. Perhaps even less, when one considers everybody who acted only in her own self-interest, despite disagreeing with Trump on many matters.

I appreciate also your agreement with my "religion" thesis. Although it was Andersen - not me - who put down on paper all the facts about it. Thank you for your comments.

Closer to 33%, and that is still just a percentage of people that are eligible to vote, not the entire population. Sorry, I am a data geek.

 

[jaF0]

Oh for fuck's sake...it is way easier than that...

.
Yeah, the reasons people voted for ... are pretty simple.

People are assholes.

 

[jaF0]

I appreciate your setting me straight on these numbers, Aglaopheme. So possibly the share of Americans backing Trump is "only" 40%.

Closer to 33%, and that is still just a percentage of people that are eligible to vote, not the entire population. Sorry, I am a data geek.

The United States is the third-most populous country in the world, with an estimated population of 330,052,960 as of August 2, 2020.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States

The Orange Turd got about 70 million votes.

 

[Aglaopheme]

The United States is the third-most populous country in the world, with an estimated population of 330,052,960 as of August 2, 2020.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States

The Orange Turd got about 70 million votes.

Close to 72 mil which puts him at around 22% using those numbers.

 

[jaF0]

Unfortunately that number includes children and those the Orange Turd considers worthless and uncountable. I don't really know how to find the current number of eligible adult voters, registered or not.

 

[Aglaopheme]

Unfortunately that number includes children and those the Orange Turd considers worthless and uncountable. I don't really know how to find the current number of eligible adult voters, registered or not.

All of the percentages you are seeing published are based on eligible voters not registered voters, like most voter data and data bases, comes from census data.

 

[LTMMC]

a comment on numbers and percentages

I respectfully wish to submit that none of all these estimates captures the horror of American presdential voting in 2020.

What I had tried to guestimate was what percentage of eligible voters who supported Trump despite knowing very well his character. With "support" I even include all who stayed home and did not vote against him, as one would expect from responsibly thinking voters.

And I claim that percentage is horribly high, unfortunately. Impossible to pin down precisely, but way too high anyway.

Even some of the Founding Fathers had realized that keeping a democracy alive, requires informed-ness and vigilance. And simply caring about democratic norms not being violated.