Why Trump v. Biden will be Decided by the Slowest Voters
davidgottfried.substack.com
By
David Gottfried
In this presidential race, we will have to decide whether we will continue to at least try to be a democracy or whether we will revert to feudal or fascistic forms of social organization in which blustering braggarts wielding clubs or spears or nuclear weapons call the shots.
Mr. Trump’s contempt for democracy needs little elaboration. I am not going to bother itemizing or summarizing the reasons why Trump is an anti-democratic nincompoop who at best seems to be a bad imitation of Jackie Gleason, on “The Honeymooner’s,” having a tantrum because his Big Mac burger was cold and who at worst seems to be Il Duce Mussolini risen from the grave like a vampire from “Dark Shadows.”
I don’t want to offend my readers (people tell me that I sound like a sarcastic son of a bitch), but if you don’t know why Trump makes sewer rats seem like disciples of St. Francis of Assisi, you make people with Down’s syndrome seems like candidates for a Nobel prize in quantum mechanics.
Biden has plenty of faults, but compared to Trump he approximates the divine.
Deciding this contest is a no-brainer. It is abundantly clear that Biden is the better candidate. Unfortunately, this race will be decided by the dumbest segment of the electorate.
Unfortunately, most of our elections are decided by the dumbest segment of the electorate.
Why the Dumbest Americans Decide Our Elections
The base Democratic vote and the base Republican vote are both about 40 percent. In other words, in a national general election the lowest a Dem can get and the lowest a Rep can get is about 40 percent. A cursory review of landslide elections proves that 40 percent is rock bottom in a two-person race: The LBJ rout of 64, the Nixon rout of 72 and the Reagan rout of 84 were all approximately 60-40 elections.
Most people stay within their camp and don’t change; they are perpetually Democratic or perpetually Republican. The 80 percent of the populace whose voting habits are fairly consistent are no paragons of intellectual ability, but they are geniuses compared to the twenty percent of the voters whose political leanings are eternally mercurial.
The ordinary dumb 80 percent can, at least, provide a rudimentary definition of the terms liberal and conservative. The ordinary dumb 80 percent are aware that Democrats allegedly care more about the poor. The ordinary dumb 80 percent can follow our inane and soporific political debates.
But the spectacularly stupid 20 percent will change positions like a leaf swayed by the slightest Spring zephyr. They may embrace political ads on television as if they were unvarnished gospel truth. They are people, like my ex-chiropractor, who think the Chinese attacked Pearl Harbor because their feeble intellects have made it impossible for them to understand that a Japanese person and Chinese person are not one and the same irreducible Chinaman of their egg roll imaginations. They may have honestly believed Bush and Gore when each sorry candidate, in his best approximation of Gomer Pyle (From “Gomer Pyle, USMC”) candor, said that he would keep social security money in a “lock box.” I submit to you that these people have such an addled sense of history and politics and economics, and are so obscenely stupid, that in the days when all Americans bowed before the same three networks -- and there was no cable news or internet – five consecutive nights of positive reporting for the democratic candidate would make these people democratic and five consecutive nights of positive reporting for the republicans would make them republican.
Sometimes, these voters simply vote on the basis of passion and emotion. For example, some pollsters found that a surprisingly high number of whites who supported RFK, for President, in the Spring primaries of 1968 supported George Wallace’s presidential bid in the autumn of 68, notwithstanding the diametrically opposed views of RFK and Wallace. Some pollsters said that these voters supported such antipodal politicians because they were voting on the basis of a flame of rage common to both Bobby Kennedy and George Wallace.
Sometimes this rage can point in the correct direction, as it did when American rage at the depression made us rally around FDR who railed against the monied class. But this rage can also make people support a Hitler, who railed against the Jews. And I wouldn’t want to put my hope and faith on such a mercurial beast as free elections where people may vote for the lunatic with the angriest speech. (Although I have strong doubts about the efficacy of democratic government, I certainly don’t want men like Trump stealing our elections.)
Sometimes, voters support candidates because of the most idiotic, idiosyncratic reasoning. For example, I knew one person who explained her support for Richard Nixon by telling me, “I’m for Nixon because Nixon was for Eisenhower (Nixon was Eisenhower’s vice president), and Eisenhower won World War Two.” This person got it into her head that Nixon, somehow, was more resolutely against the Nazis because of his affiliation with Eisenhower. Similarly, although I loved Robert Kennedy, I will readily concede that half of the votes he got were from people intoxicated with either his Irish Catholicism or his good looks. For example, I will never forget Robert Kennedy’s debate against Gene Mc Carthy a few days before RFK was assassinated. I can’t forget the debate not because of anything RFK said but because I can’t forget Ms. Buckley who was with me when I watched the debate (I was ten years old; she was my “sitter.”).
Every 30 seconds, Mrs. Buckley cooed, “Bobby is so cute.” She claimed she loved him because he was such a good and devout Irish Catholic, but I think she adored him because he made her wet her panties. Similarly, I will never forget the New York City mayoral election of 1969. . One day, all three candidates appeared at the Forest Hills Country Club. The Democrat, Mario Prococcino, and the Republican, John Markey, showed up in suits. The incumbent, John Lindsey, showed up in another kind of suit: A sleek swimsuit. Lindsey dived into the pool, and he won the election.
I don’t think either Trump or Biden are gonna show-up in trunks. (At the beginning of his Presidency, Bill Clinton was photographed jogging in short shorts, and his favorability ratings nose-dived, and stayed down, until the Oklahoma City Bombing in 1995.). I think the Dems ought to make Kamala Harris hit the gym, and the beauty parlor, so she’ll be bikini-ready for the cameras by the Summer convention.
Why Trump v. Biden will be Decided by the Slowest Voters
Why Trump v. Biden will be Decided by the Slowest Voters
Why Trump v. Biden will be Decided by the Slowest Voters
By
David Gottfried
In this presidential race, we will have to decide whether we will continue to at least try to be a democracy or whether we will revert to feudal or fascistic forms of social organization in which blustering braggarts wielding clubs or spears or nuclear weapons call the shots.
Mr. Trump’s contempt for democracy needs little elaboration. I am not going to bother itemizing or summarizing the reasons why Trump is an anti-democratic nincompoop who at best seems to be a bad imitation of Jackie Gleason, on “The Honeymooner’s,” having a tantrum because his Big Mac burger was cold and who at worst seems to be Il Duce Mussolini risen from the grave like a vampire from “Dark Shadows.”
I don’t want to offend my readers (people tell me that I sound like a sarcastic son of a bitch), but if you don’t know why Trump makes sewer rats seem like disciples of St. Francis of Assisi, you make people with Down’s syndrome seems like candidates for a Nobel prize in quantum mechanics.
Biden has plenty of faults, but compared to Trump he approximates the divine.
Deciding this contest is a no-brainer. It is abundantly clear that Biden is the better candidate. Unfortunately, this race will be decided by the dumbest segment of the electorate.
Unfortunately, most of our elections are decided by the dumbest segment of the electorate.
Why the Dumbest Americans Decide Our Elections
The base Democratic vote and the base Republican vote are both about 40 percent. In other words, in a national general election the lowest a Dem can get and the lowest a Rep can get is about 40 percent. A cursory review of landslide elections proves that 40 percent is rock bottom in a two-person race: The LBJ rout of 64, the Nixon rout of 72 and the Reagan rout of 84 were all approximately 60-40 elections.
Most people stay within their camp and don’t change; they are perpetually Democratic or perpetually Republican. The 80 percent of the populace whose voting habits are fairly consistent are no paragons of intellectual ability, but they are geniuses compared to the twenty percent of the voters whose political leanings are eternally mercurial.
The ordinary dumb 80 percent can, at least, provide a rudimentary definition of the terms liberal and conservative. The ordinary dumb 80 percent are aware that Democrats allegedly care more about the poor. The ordinary dumb 80 percent can follow our inane and soporific political debates.
But the spectacularly stupid 20 percent will change positions like a leaf swayed by the slightest Spring zephyr. They may embrace political ads on television as if they were unvarnished gospel truth. They are people, like my ex-chiropractor, who think the Chinese attacked Pearl Harbor because their feeble intellects have made it impossible for them to understand that a Japanese person and Chinese person are not one and the same irreducible Chinaman of their egg roll imaginations. They may have honestly believed Bush and Gore when each sorry candidate, in his best approximation of Gomer Pyle (From “Gomer Pyle, USMC”) candor, said that he would keep social security money in a “lock box.” I submit to you that these people have such an addled sense of history and politics and economics, and are so obscenely stupid, that in the days when all Americans bowed before the same three networks -- and there was no cable news or internet – five consecutive nights of positive reporting for the democratic candidate would make these people democratic and five consecutive nights of positive reporting for the republicans would make them republican.
Sometimes, these voters simply vote on the basis of passion and emotion. For example, some pollsters found that a surprisingly high number of whites who supported RFK, for President, in the Spring primaries of 1968 supported George Wallace’s presidential bid in the autumn of 68, notwithstanding the diametrically opposed views of RFK and Wallace. Some pollsters said that these voters supported such antipodal politicians because they were voting on the basis of a flame of rage common to both Bobby Kennedy and George Wallace.
Sometimes this rage can point in the correct direction, as it did when American rage at the depression made us rally around FDR who railed against the monied class. But this rage can also make people support a Hitler, who railed against the Jews. And I wouldn’t want to put my hope and faith on such a mercurial beast as free elections where people may vote for the lunatic with the angriest speech. (Although I have strong doubts about the efficacy of democratic government, I certainly don’t want men like Trump stealing our elections.)
Sometimes, voters support candidates because of the most idiotic, idiosyncratic reasoning. For example, I knew one person who explained her support for Richard Nixon by telling me, “I’m for Nixon because Nixon was for Eisenhower (Nixon was Eisenhower’s vice president), and Eisenhower won World War Two.” This person got it into her head that Nixon, somehow, was more resolutely against the Nazis because of his affiliation with Eisenhower. Similarly, although I loved Robert Kennedy, I will readily concede that half of the votes he got were from people intoxicated with either his Irish Catholicism or his good looks. For example, I will never forget Robert Kennedy’s debate against Gene Mc Carthy a few days before RFK was assassinated. I can’t forget the debate not because of anything RFK said but because I can’t forget Ms. Buckley who was with me when I watched the debate (I was ten years old; she was my “sitter.”).
Every 30 seconds, Mrs. Buckley cooed, “Bobby is so cute.” She claimed she loved him because he was such a good and devout Irish Catholic, but I think she adored him because he made her wet her panties. Similarly, I will never forget the New York City mayoral election of 1969. . One day, all three candidates appeared at the Forest Hills Country Club. The Democrat, Mario Prococcino, and the Republican, John Markey, showed up in suits. The incumbent, John Lindsey, showed up in another kind of suit: A sleek swimsuit. Lindsey dived into the pool, and he won the election.
I don’t think either Trump or Biden are gonna show-up in trunks. (At the beginning of his Presidency, Bill Clinton was photographed jogging in short shorts, and his favorability ratings nose-dived, and stayed down, until the Oklahoma City Bombing in 1995.). I think the Dems ought to make Kamala Harris hit the gym, and the beauty parlor, so she’ll be bikini-ready for the cameras by the Summer convention.
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