Obama nailed it. GOP anti labor policies led to fear/anger and Trumpism

[Recycle_Guru]

"You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.
And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations"

Those were Obama's words in 2008 at a Democratic fund raiser.

I have seen the hollowing out of America with my own eye as I have worked in supply chain and electronic manufacturing for most of my career.

White working class people had a certain expectation about what life provides for regular people who go to work every day and have families. A lot of that was stripped away by NAFTA, China MFN status and accession to WTO and a wholesale shipment of manufacturing to Mexico, China, Malaysia, etc.

Now the Republicans try to politically profit off of the misplaced bitterness THEY caused ny creating fake bogeymen for the regular American to be angry at--immigrants, LBGTQ+, liberal cities...

I just don't know how we reverse it a bit to attain closer to equilibrium in our country.

[Lunabell]

1. Fear of losing their white privilege too.

That "illegal alien" is going to take your job and replace you, is their mantra. It's their fault and they believe it. Meanwhile, ceos and share holders are making bank and the money is not "trickling down" like they claim. They steal your labor and blame it on the immigrants.

[Recycle_Guru]

2. precisely--double evil

[yardwork]

3. I agree.

[drmeow]

4. If they hadn't all voted for Reagan

their lives may have been better!

[Recycle_Guru]

5. exactly! even back then they made big shows of aggression

like when they ripped Carter's solar panels off the White House, fired striking air traffic controllers, deregulated many industries

[drmeow]

6. They also started

the policies which allowed firms to move manufacturing overseas with impunity.

Nixon was bad but I lay the blame for our current situation at Reagan's feet - all of it.

The fact that what Reagan started took 40 years to destroy this country doesn't negate his catalyst status, it merely underscores how good the country was BEFORE he got started!