The reasons why Trump has his appeal.

Why Trump has such appeal for so many, even with all his scandals, is no mystery.

Trump didn't happen in a vacuum. He is the result of a Republican base that over the last several decades, starting very much with Nixon's "Southern Strategy", has turned fundamentalist and inward clinging to racism, fear of changing demographics, and fear of changing traditional power structures in our society. The Republican base is made up very much of the "angry white male" (and in many instances the "angry white female" as well, though less so than the men) who feel their grip on traditional power structures is being taken from them. They once dominated and had the dominant culture. With decades now of right wing talk radio and Fox News, a huge right wing propaganda media presence has been set up to capitalize on and fuel this anger and resentment. In addition, right wing corporatists like the Kochs, the gun companies backed by the NRA, etc. have fed this hate and fear and its media machine with big money and big propaganda. This media feeds them sheer lies and hate talk which fuels their fear in a big way. Listen to the Trump voters' rhetoric. They talk about the world as they know it ending, about fear of having their guns taken away, about fear of having life as they know it taken away. The whole Tea Party movement was born of this fear and anger, as was the birther movement, both centrally rooted in right wing racism.

Trump folks are SCARED, ANGRY, and TOXIC. They feel that the traditional white and white-male dominated society they have always known is going away, and they are shitting their collective pants over it. THEIR WAY OF THINKING LOVES THE "STRONG MALE LEADER" figure. And Trump came into the R primary having studied FOX News and right wing radio, and he built his messaging on it. So they have responded very strongly. He has played right to it.

It is also true that many resent having lost factory jobs. But this goes deeper than that. It is mainly about the racial and demographics changes which have filled them with such fear, and so they have bought into messaging for decades which fuels that fear.

So this is why so many will still vote for Trump and why they won't listen to anything else. They are radical, toxic, filled with fear, filled with misinformation that they WANT to believe, and have established an ignorance-based, hate-based worldview that is simply can not be penetrated. Luckily, the sane among us outnumber them, and we must VOTE in this election and EVERY election.