"When I ask voters in focus groups if they think Donald Trump is an authoritarian, the #1 response by far is, 'What is

[applegrove]

Sue Stone
@[e-mail]
" Republican strategist Sarah Longwell, who studies focus groups, told NPR, “When I ask voters in focus groups if they think Donald Trump is an authoritarian, the #1 response by far is, ‘What is an authoritarian?’” "

[BOSSHOG]

1. Okay Class, next question

What is a tariff? Can you say tariff? Can you spell tariff? Did you vote for trump without knowing what a tariff is? Show of hands please. Oh My!

[Tadpole Raisin]

31. If these people threw themselves on the floor, they'd miss.

Sheesh!

[BOSSHOG]

33. TR, thank you so much My Friend

I have never heard that but I’m stealing it.

[Polly Hennessey]

40. I'm stealing it too.

[Ferryboat]

61. Too good not to steal

Never heard before, certainly gets the point across.

[The Unmitigated Gall]

2. Ignorant fucking around

Still leads to finding out.

[Trueblue1968]

3. GOPs are Morons. My cat sweeters is smarter than they are !!!!!!

[dchill]

4. Actually, it's "What's a authoritarian?"

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

24. No, it's "an authoritarian"

The noun after the article begins with a vowel, so it's "an". If the noun begins with a consonant it's "a".

Examples: an apple, an orange an undertaker. A whistle, a teacher, a peach.



Poindexter, the grammar maven.

[Orrex]

25. With respect, I think you may have missed the intended commentary in that post.

[electric_blue68]

42. Oh, i didn't know that! 😄

[dchill]

56. You have completely missed my snark.

[Fiendish Thingy]

5. That is the perfect Occam's Razor explanation for this election. Nt

[RockRaven]

6. Alongside google searches for "when did Biden drop out" spiking election evening

and searches for "what is Project 2025" and "tariffs" spiking the morning after.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

15. Morons' morning after buyer's remorse. . . . . . nt

[womanofthehills]

21. They believe many didn't even know Biden dropped out

Lots of Americans pay zero attention to politics.

A neighbor’s husband recently died. All he wanted to do was talk politics.
She tells me after living with him, she hates politics and refuses to read or listen to the news.

[ShazzieB]

46. Oh dear.

Neighbor sounds like one of those people who think politics is some kind of esoteric jibber jabber that has nothing to do with "real life." If more people understood just how profoundly politics affects every aspect of our lives and bothered to inform themselves more fully, what a wonderful world it would be. *sigh*

[appalachiablue]

35. ++

[electric_blue68]

45. So....Google search?.....

"When did Biden drop out"?.

GAHHHH!!!

Try soooo hard from saying...
"you stooopid people!!!

[not fooled]

19. But I'll bet they think they know

"Nothing bad will happen from voting for Trump because we have checks and balances. The US is a democracy!"

They were told this as children but have no idea of what's actually been happening in this country.

[Timewas]

7. Soon

They will have a live example.

[Abolishinist]

8. Which is why the focus on the former being a "F(f)ascist"

was a worthless waste of time. Half of the people in the U.S. can't even SPELL the word, much less know its meaning.

And oh, by the way, I was interested in this many years ago and have 8 or 9 books on the subject by various authors, including Zeev Sternhell, Robert Paxton, and Stanley Payne. And guess what? Even THEY for the most part disagree on a universal definition of such.

Given that, what chance does "Authoritarian" have.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

18. What do you suggest should have been the focus?

[groundloop]

28. I'll jump in with an opinion on this.... keep it simple (pedophile, rapist, 6 time failed businessman.....)

I kind of thought hitting him with the 6 times he took businesses into bankruptcy would have been effective, since one of his big claims to being able to run the country is his business experience.

But damn, this guy is so horrible and vile all across the spectrum it's tough to know where to begin.

[Hekate]

9. Let me say it again: Stupid, stupid, stupid

Civics classes in high school are haaaaard, and booooring.

[Rebl2]

11. Was pretty

sure there were no civics classes any longer.

[Hekate]

13. I recall that as part of the dumbing down of public education in my lifetime...

I recall some parental protests at school board meetings in Floriduh (and elsewhere, to be fair) a couple of decades ago where parents were complaining that their kids shouldn’t have to be forced to take subjects that were “too hard” and “not relevant” — and I wondered if anyone had the guts to ask those parents if they were saying their kids were too dumb for such coursework.

[groundloop]

30. Good point.

It's pretty remarkable that as other countries make their educational systems more demanding we've made ours easier. The oligarchs really do want to keep people stupid.

[Rebl2]

44. Yep

[appalachiablue]

41. Raygun attacked Civics and also Education after President Carter

established the US Dept. of Education in 1980.

It's been downhill since the old cowboy actor and right wing TV show host, Dutch Reagan.

Now another TV show host, round 2.

[Meadowoak]

32. They haven't taught civic classes since 1981.

[Rebl2]

10. Oh good lord

🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄

[Jack Valentino]

12. The correct answer is "Your Father and/or Mother ???"

That is the essence of an authoritarian--- and that answer would probably be understandable to those with limited intelligence---
an authoritarian is someone who treats you as if you are a child, and makes ALL the rules--

An authoritarian is someone who tells you what you have to do,
and what NOT to do,
and you damned well better DO it (or NOT do it)
and if you don't, you may suffer grim consequences
and possibly physical punishment!

[applegrove]

14. Nope. Your parents love you. They are not corrupt. They do not steal everything you have.

They do not kill people you love and punish generations of certain families or groups. They do not terrorize. Your parents do not make you so poor you eat dirt. Your parents are not authoritarians. Authoritarians do not treat you like a child, they treat you as a threat and an enemy.

[Jack Valentino]

17. Did you obey your parents ?

You sound like you had good parents. That's good!

I am making a presumption here that they made rules, and you had to make a decision whether to obey those rules or not--- and if you didn't, there would be some sort of consequences.

I was boiling the point down to its essence---
not exploring the worst limits of authoritarians----


but, since you want to 'go there'--
there are plenty of parents who didn't love their children,
and plenty of parents who murdered their own children.

Luckily those things don't apply to most parents,
any more than they apply to most national leaders.

[applegrove]

23. These things apply to all authoritarians.

[PatSeg]

16. Shit

Oh well, I guess I'm not too surprised.

[not fooled]

22. I'll wager many DUers

have a difficult time fathoming how catastrophically ignorant and dumb most people are. And how little attention they pay to understanding the forces that shape their lives. I'm a pretty cynical person but even I keep getting surprised as the evidence piles up.

[progressoid]

29. Yep. n/t

[PatSeg]

62. Same here

I've been around my share of fairly ignorant people, but I had no idea there were so many of them and in the past, such people usually weren't inclined to vote. They really had no interest in politics until it became a cult thing and I think social media had a lot to do with that.

[Karasu]

20. Wow.

I'm positively shocked. Shocked, I tell you.

[AverageOldGuy]

26. Which is exactly what I've been saying

Here are some typical words or phrases used by Democrats that I guarantee well over 2/3 of people do not understand.

Misogyny
Cis, or, cis gender ( I have no idea what this means)
Infrastructure
Glass ceiling
Fascism, or, fascist

And that’s just a few. We talk over their heads and are surprised when they dismiss us as snobbish elites.

[Orrex]

36. I've had that feeling for a while

Last edited Sun Nov 10, 2024, 12:48 AM - Edit history (1)

Academia-speak propagates through Democratic vocabulary faster than through the public at large, and it absolutely gives an air of out-of-touch bookishness and general elitism.

Contrast that with Trump's chiefly one-syllable vocabulary with a handful of bigger words ("tremendous," "beautiful" ), and it's not hard to see how people put off by perceived Democratic snobbery will latch onto his message.

Also helps him enormously with media-friendly soundbytes.

[Blue Owl]

27. They may just find out the hard way

[ailsagirl]

47. I expect they will. n/t

[Orrex]

34. But he sucks a microphone like a champ.

[aggiesal]

37. Idiocracy is a documentary ...

Stories like these makes me believe that my statement is accurate.

[Aussie105]

39. Loved the movie when I first saw it.

But it was funny and scary at the same time.

I saw the potential prediction of future reality and messages in it too.

And here we are!

The guys who wrote the script were either time travellers or Nostradamus reincarnated.
(Idiocracy (2006) Written by Mike Judge & Etan Cohen.)

[Aussie105]

38. Not very smart low information voters do

stupid low information voting when they vote.

All Trump did was to stir them up enough to actually vote.

That is all it took.

[love_katz]

48. This

Everyone keeps pointing the finger of blame at Democrats.

Our messaging is bad. We use big words so we're seen as elitist. We didn't get our points across clearly enough. We're too woke. Etc, ad nauseum.


Whereas, IMNHO, we are NOT the problem!
We didn't vote for this disastrous atrocity.

The people who voted for this mess are uninformed and mean spirited.

They bought into the flim flam, the con, the get-rich-quick scheme. They drank the snake oil ( the promise that " only I can fix it&quot . They swallowed hook, line, and sinker the promise that on " day one", all the "illegals" will be rounded up and kicked out, that the wars in Gaza and Ukraine will " be over in 24 hours", that grocery prices and gas will drop back to, what? 1980' s prices!?!


They are so stupid and uninformed that they don't understand that the con man walks away with all the money and benefits and the marks are left holding the empty bag.

It would be funny, if they weren't dragging the rest of us off the cliff with them.
And the mean spiritedness that I mentioned: that was the big selling point, that he would personally hurt all the people that they don't like.

We need to stop blaming Democrats. The Republican party is full of Republicans, which are mean, hateful, spiteful people who are itching to enact violence on anyone they don't like.
The fact that they are that way is not my fault.

[soldierant]

43. I subscribe (free subscription) to her Letters, but am a day or two behind reading.

Still, I mentally filled in the question correcly before reading thr full quote.

[PSPS]

49. For some reason, this post brought this to my mind. Maybe some comic diversion

[Doodley]

50. Trump speaks to voters like an 8 year old, because his mental age is 8, and they understand.

Maybe a lesson is there for Democratic candidates.

[The Roux Comes First]

51. Oh Pleeze - Where's My Daddie When I Need Him?!!

How pathetic.

[BigMin28]

52. If

Reality TV, American Idol and others, or a sports game involved requiring such knowledge to watch, they would all know. We as a nation, on average, choose to be exceptionally ignorant. Well they have fucked around, now we all find out.

[Polybius]

53. When I was a teenage voter, I probably would have said the same thing

And no Google in 1992 lol.

[pstokely]

54. would you have voted by tRump in 92 if you age 18-29?

the current tRump, not the tRump in Home Alone 2

[Polybius]

59. I was pretty uninfomed back then, but I doubt it

I did vote for Bob Dole because he "looked" presidential, but obviously Dole wasn't nearly as bad as Trump. By 2000, I was in the Gore camp. The only other Republican I ever voted for was Mike Bloomberg in 2005.

[electric_blue68]

55. "What is an Authoritarian?". Geeeeebz.😑

Told bad.... "dictatorian" isn't a word.

That may gave helped.

[DFW]

57. They probably think it is some small offshoot of....

Presbyterian or Unitarian.

[EnergizedLib]

58. Get a load of this one

Link to tweet

?s=46&t=TEkGdOYblbsNDtM5BiaFTQ

And they wonder why they’re looked down upon and their intelligence gets called into question?

[Rigpa108]

60. We need to bring back "Schoolhouse Rock"

An "I'm just a Bill" type video but one called "Am I an authoritarian?". Use that avenue for teaching civics to our kids. Maybe then future generations will benefit from that knowledge.

"Conjunction junction. What's your function?"