Human Nature

[Alan V]

As a Democrat, I consider that a cynical assessment.  After all, before the other Democrats dropped out after South Carolina, they were splitting the Democratic voters between them.

As an independent, it strikes me as fairly plausible. Sanders had a small but vocal base here in Central Texas. While I doubt they voted for Trump en masse, I'm sure at least a few did -- and more to the point, many sat out the polling altogether.

At least Sanders was a real populist.  Trump was a wolf-in-sheep's-clothing populist.  It's just too bad that too many Americans fell for Trump's lies.

As I said before, Trump was a super-normal stimulus: a tall, white billionaire who said everything with confidence.  Too bad he was also a demagogue just trying to deceive people.

That's why I see the failings of human nature to be at the heart of our present political problems.  We are now deeply immersed in a huge national psychodrama.

And of course that does little to help climate change, brutal wars overseas, our democratic institutions, our economy, or even people's tendencies to rationalize bad decisions.