SUMMARY: While the left-wing pundits try to white-wash Trump’s victory and the rightward step the electorate took, we know it is so much dog whistling past the racism in our national character. Instead of rehashing post-2016 talking points, we should be looking at how we can overcome the Russian disinformation narrative and Republican voter suppression measures BEFORE 2026 gets here just in case our vote actually counts then.
KEY WORDS: Election 2024, Election 2026, George Wallace, Segregation Forever, Trump, Racism, Misogyny, Xenophobia, Immigration, Corruption
COMMENT: What’s your take on the reasons Harris lost to Trump?
We’ve elected Trump, AGAIN. And, we’re going through the same old hand-wringing, pearl-clutching, diner-visiting soul searching reaction as we did in 2016. Why are all of the the chattering pundits, the punditing politicos, and the politicking chatters on the TV recommending angsty solutions of really LISTENING to what people want and showing the people that Democrats are the party of the working class
Why and what the actual fuck? I’m left utterly stupefied and speechless. Everyone who votes for Trump knows exactly who he is and exactly what they are voting for. His appeal hasn’t changed since 2016. The economic angst of the Trump voter in 2024 is no more real than it was in 2016. To pretend otherwise is just so much theater.
In fact, to engage in this type of performative analysis is just so much dog whistling. The people doing it are giving cover to the racists and misogynists who voted for Trump by imagining that there is some other reason to vote for him. And, they are creating an illusory explanation of the reasons Trump won in order to provide better cover for those who voted for him.
We know when you say working class and people, you mean MAGA, which consists primarily of white people, especially non-degreed blue collar white people. And, we know there ain’t no amount of listening to those white folks that is going to make them vote for anybody else but Trump. Hell, in four of five states they wouldn’t even vote for the Republican Senate candidate, but they voted for Trump. They voted for abortion measures, and they voted for Trump.
We know what resonates with his voters:
- BLATANT RACISM. When he says that the entire country will become like Detroit, he don’t mean the Detroit of today, which is a successful city with a thriving middle class and minimal crime rates. He means the Detroit of the 1980’s that was in decline and riddled with crime and drugs, which all the white people fled and left only poor blacks. It is a barely muffled racist appeal. And, don’t think for a moment that their ain’t no racism in the Hispanic communities, but that is a post for another day.
- GLARING SEXISM. This is the guy who grabbed them by the pussy, sexually assaulted E. Jean Carroll, and disrespects every woman he encounters. Sexism and misogyny are as deeply, if not more deeply, ingrained in our national culture as racism. It resonates with women as well as men, but especially the very traditional Hispanic community.
- FLAGRANT XENOPHOBIA. Both his racism and misogyny come together in his xenophobic scapegoating of immigrants. Not just undocumented immigrants, but all immigrants of color. Everything you his voters hate and fear in the world tied up with a toxic bow.
- OPEN CORRUPTION. We know Trump is corrupt. He solicited a billion dollar bribe from the fossil fuels industry on national TV! He opened a hotel in downtown DC to take emoluments from. The motherfucker and his whole family are for sale multiple times over like a common street-corner hooker.
Just look at the last three elections:
- 2016: Hillary Clinton lost to Trump because misogyny actually outweighs racism on the hit parade of issues playing the country’s id. It weren’t no economic angst that drove Trump’s victory. That argument has not only been put to bed, it has been put to sleep.
- 2020: Nice old white guy Joe Biden beat Trump because old white guy.
- 2024: Kamala Harris not only loses to Trump, but actually loses the popular vote for the first time in twenty years! There ain’t no economic argument other than the fig-leaf that the Republican Party tried to hold out about better times under Trump.
- THE DIFFERENCE? Is it only me, or has anyone else noticed the BIGGEST differences between the these elections? Trump beats women! And, when it was a woman of color, he won the popular vote.
Trump voters are interested in two types of government only:
- White majority rule. As long as white people are in the majority, white people are going to do it.
- White minority rule. If white people are in the minority, then they’ll take what the minority of white people want, thank you very much. Ain’t goin’ be no People of Color out voting no white folks, no way, no how.
Why would Democrats listen to people who are willing to vote for white minority rule and the creation of a pseudo-democratic system? That’s running the election of 2020. We need to be looking at how Trump really won, not some white fantasy that will absolve our inner misogynistic racist of guilt over having preferred single-party pseudo minority-rule oligarchy to a thriving multi-ethnic liberal democracy over a willingness to destroy the climate’s ability to support the lives of eight billion people rather than let a Black-Indian woman sit behind the Resolute Desk.
The only thing that matters now is figuring out how to circumvent the effectiveness of Republican voter suppression measures and Russian disinformation because they’re never going to find a message with the emotional appeal of racism and misogyny.
If we are to have any hope that we can actually elect Democratic majorities to the House and Senate in 2026, then we need to figure out how we can get our people to the polls in greater numbers than theirs and stop the rewriting of history as it happens.
If you’ve enjoyed this interpretation of Election 2024 and the resulting recommendations, please consider doing one or all of the following:
- SHARE this post you think would like it.
- LIKE or RATE this post using the buttons at the top and bottom of it.
- COMMENT on the post with your thoughts on what the Democrats should be doing right now or in preparation for Election 2026.
- FOLLOW the blog or join our email list:
Image Attribution
This image was found on Diane Ravitch’s blog using a DuckDuckGo Creative Commons License search.
The Psy of Life 
racism at it’s “finest” is once again the law of our land. I know exactly how my great aunt (A Jewess) felt in France after the Nazis invaded…..it is happening here only it is our own people who have given away our freedoms and not an invading army. Rules are changing quickly now. In Oklahoma the gov and the educ sec have put together an “office of Religious Freedom and Patriotism” within our state dept of education. It is fully staffed already even though the announcement was made a few days ago…..and the “rules’ for public schools are being changed as I type. It was bad enough when the idiots wanted to use tax funds to pay for Christian schools…and wanted huge windows placed in the toilets reserved for trans kids. I frankly hope I have a fatal heart attack before it all comes to fruition in the US….my cancer is too damned slow to kill me, and I am too weak to take my own life.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Howdy Suze!
I’m sorry to hear that you have cancer. My sister lived eleven years with her cancer. It is a tough road to walk, but you’ve got good people in your life to help you along and people like me at the periphery who will do what we can.
I’m just stunned and stupefied by the election. We are in for a very rough time that will extend well beyond the Trump years. He doesn’t have as long as many people may think; my bet is that he dies in office. I also recommend that he stay away from upper story windows, refuse all offers of hot tea, open his own Diet Coke cans, and watch out for people with umbrellas.
The damage that he’ll do to our nation and world will be fatal to millions, literally. I am just in such a dark place over it all. I cannot see any way through this. I cannot see any hope even in the 2026 elections since I reckon that the Republican voter suppression tactics and Russian disinformation worked so well that it gave him this “victory,” they’ll just do it again and again and again.
Blog on, Sibling!
Jack
LikeLiked by 1 person
It might be possible to assemble a modest size book of quotes from smart people since the invention of writing expressing the advice that if you want to discover what someone really believes and wants, don’t listen to what they say, watch what they do.
That is the problem with, “We have to listen to them.”.
Humans are amazingly good at taking their worst and darkest motivations (especially the fears that haunt their nightmares) and hanging them on more acceptable and “rational” hooks, like, “The price of eggs.”
As for the Russian disinformation, it may be that countering that could be better done by hackers and cyber warriors wielding the weapons developed by the criminals and spies of that realm. Some of that might even be profitable, if not legal.
One good thing about the likely impending consumer sticker shock from the Trump tariffs is that the distance between the cause and the effect will be short. The question will not be, “Are you better off than for years ago?”, but, “Are you better off than four weeks ago?”.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Howdy Bob!
The rational part of our brain is used almost exclusively to justify the decisions that our emotional brains have made. And, we’re terrible at figuring out what is true and what isn’t. We evolved to believe.
It will take legislation to protect us from Russian disinformation, so… um… don’t hold your breath?
Part of the problem with the Harris campaign was that it peaked in August when it needed to peak in late October. Same thing with the “are you better off” election argument. The awfulness has to happen in close enough proximity to the election to have an effect. If it is too far removed, then there is no effect.
That said, we couldn’t shake the effect that inflation from more than a year ago in time for the election. If Dems could learn that trick, well, then, maybe.
Blog on, Sibling!
Jack
LikeLiked by 1 person
The inflation effect was mainly because what people wanted was deflation of prices without deflation of incomes, which almost never happens. I’m struck over and over again by the myopia of the American voter, not being able to see beyond our borders when we are included in world scale events, like the COVID/post COVID inflation. They could not see that it wasn’t an American problem, but a world problem that America had to cope with. Biden prevented (with the help of the Federal Reserve) a deep recession and got to the soft landing. Alas, it is difficult to get across to low information voters how lucky they are that worse didn’t happen.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Howdy Bob!
I read somewhere, maybe it was Heather Cox Richardson’s Letter from an American on 14 November that informed voters broke for Harris by 6% and low-information voters for Trump by 19%. So, that tracks. Trying to prove that something was prevented, i.e. didn’t happen because of something done, is nearly impossible.
Right now, we are stuck between a rock and a hard place. MAGA is completely menticided. Low-information voters are vulnerable to disinformation, voter suppression, and dog whistles. And, the Democratic base is severely voter suppressed. It combines to make it extremely unlikely to win.
Blog on, Sibling!
Jack
LikeLiked by 1 person
This is one segment on The New Yorker Radio Hour today that deals with the difficulty of getting people to vote for democracy: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/tnyradiohour/articles/the-authors-of-how-democracies-die-on-the-new-democratic-minority
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’ll listen to it here this afternoon. Thanks for the recommendation.
Jack
LikeLiked by 1 person
Jackboots and torchlight military parades on the way—
LikeLiked by 1 person
We’ve seen them before. The question really is whether we can overcome them this time round.
Jack
LikeLike
And this is what I wore the uniform of the country for 7 years for? This is what all those brave souls who died in all those wars to preserve democracy died for? I will not go to any Memorial Day services again until I get some sense that some form of working democracy has been restored.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I share your anger and disgust, John.
I am at a complete loss as to how we go about winning in 2026.
Jack
LikeLike
We have 66 days to enjoy things…after that, the impenetrable darkness begins.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well, we can already see how this is going to go. Fortunately, there are already rumblings of buyers remorse.
Jack
LikeLike
Buyers remorse will mean nothing and do nothing.. the die is cast, we are entering a Franco’s Spain era….
LikeLiked by 1 person
Howdy John!
Just before the 2020 election, I wrote two posts about how we should all be studying up on our non-violent resistance and civil disobedience. We are going to have to defy the government and actively resist what they are doing. It isn’t going to be marches and protests, but it has to be non-compliance with laws and other government actions.
It is going to be a rough couple of years. We’ll see if voter suppression wins 2026 for them. I’m guessing it will.
Blog on, Sibling!
Jack
LikeLike
Forget about democrats… that movement is dead forever except for a few holdouts who do not yet realize that they have no future to look forward to….Forget about the United States of America too and welcome to the First Right Wing Reich.
LikeLiked by 1 person
We had been living through the Age of Liberal Democracies. Now, we’re in the Age of the Global Oligarchy.
LikeLike
Trump was able to win, because of how he promised the people he could “make America great again”, and, he fooled the voters into believing how he could run the country better than the Democrats, and, because the U.S. citizens are, still, upset over how the U.S. supported Israel, even though, the country was, on the WRONG side in, the Hamas- Israeli conflict, and the U.S. had fallen into, another “Great Depression”, economic downturn, and, the U.S., simply isn’t ready, for a woman, to, step up into the office of president, and, all these factors combined, made the Democrats lose, BIG, and, the people of the U.S., will, PAY a very HIGH price, for electing an authoritarian like Trump into office, not to mention that, Trump checks, ALL the criteria for a, PSYCHOPATH, and the U.S. will, get SCREWEd for the, next, four years, as Trump will, employ the hands-free approach, isolationism, like post Vietnam War era, and the people will, pay for their, WRONG decision, they just don’t know it yet, and the voters, blamed the Democrats for, involving into the, WRONG side of the major world conflicts right now.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Howdy Taurus!
You’re right about that. Unfortunately, it is the world that will pay a high price. Putin will take Ukraine and destabilize Europe. China will take Taiwan and dominate Asia. The world will badly miss our carbon goals and the climate will fail in its ability to support eight billion people. We’ll see millions of people a year die due to climate-related disasters. The world’s population will shrink quickly as many parts of the equator become unlivable.
This is a total disaster for the US and the world.
However, I am compelled to point out that Trump won in 2024 for the same reason he won in 2016 and damn-near won in2020, racism and misogyny. The make America great again crap is just that, crap. MAGA knows it. All they care about is being as racist and misogynist as they wanna be. It really is that simple and tragic.
Blog on, Sibling!
Jack
LikeLike
Trump is a, one-trick pony, and, still keeps on, swaying the masses, using fear tactics, and, one of these days (and, it will take a very, very long, time), the people will, eventually, come to their senses, that, Trump is, a malicious, psychopath, who’s only good at, manipulating the people, and, the crowd of his supporters will finally, dissipate and, dissolve, but, that’s not happening, any time, soon…
LikeLiked by 2 people
Howdy Taurus!
The historical period I liken it to is the Late-Medieval Witch Hysteria. It only took five hundred years for that to run its course. In that time, there were entire villages murdered and villages where 80% of the women were murdered. We got a whole lot of crazy to get through before we match that. Unfortunately, it looks like we’re trying to.
Blog on, Sibling!
Jack
LikeLike
By that time millions of Americans will have died needlessly and tragically because of government bungling.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Every year, we’ll have people dying by the millions even hundreds of millions around the globe because of climate disasters. Death will haunt our every step.
LikeLike