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> because that's really all they have left at this point It's really not, the reason why they keep hammering it home is because his vocal support among the fri

> because that's really all they have left at this point It's really not, the reason why they keep hammering it home is because his vocal support among the fringes is unprecedented in the modern era. They've got plenty of things to attack him on - which they do.

imron 10y ago
A more cynical view is that they keep hammering it home because Trump's outreach to black voters is working enough that it has become electorally significant [0]. Polls show he currently has historically high support among black voters - and not just for himself, but out of any Republican candidate over the last few decades [1], and it's high enough that it could tip the election. 0: http://graphics.latimes.com/usc-presidential-poll-dashboard/ http://graphics.latimes.com/usc-presidential-poll-dashboard/ (scroll to 'by race/ethnicity'). 1: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/06/11/how-black-voters-could-determine-the-2016-election/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/06/11/ho...
- akhilcacharya 10y ago
  That's unlikely. The LATimes tracking poll is known to be unorthodox in its methodology, it's meant to track fluctuations in support more than actual support. Trump has not broken ~6% in any other swing state polls or national polls that I've seen, sometimes he's in 4th place behind Johnson and Stein. As it turns out, delegitimizing and spreading conspiracy theories about a wildly popular president in a community does not make people in a community fans of you. Most analysts don't think the outreach was targeted at black voters at all, but rather white moderates, who are more persuadable and numerous in number. 0: http://www.vox.com/2016/8/24/12587672/donald-trump-s-black-outreach-isn-t-for-black-voters-it-s-for-wavering-white-republicans http://www.vox.com/2016/8/24/12587672/donald-trump-s-black-o...
jessaustin 10y ago
...the fringes... Who is this? How can I tell who of my neighbors is in this group? Having made that determination, how should I treat those neighbors?
- sanderjd 10y ago
  This seems akin to feigned disbelief - you know the answers to these questions but are pretending not to. I'll bite anyway! > Who is this? How can I tell who of my neighbors is in this group? People who espouse beliefs far away from the median belief in the society. You can tell by taking to them about their beliefs, or often in my experience by having them talk at you about them or by looking at bumper stickers and flags they display, and then comparing the beliefs they espouse to your intuition of what the median belief is. Of course everyone's intuition of that is based on the people they themselves know, so "the fringe" ends up defined differently for different people. This can be controlled a bit by reading or being exposed to summaries of reports of society-wide studies, like polls and surveys. This is what the news should help with, but unfortunately people tend to choose news from inside the same bubble as all the people they know, so that doesn't work that well either. > Having made that determination, how should I treat those neighbors? With the same kindness you treat everyone else, but without having to agree (or pretend to agree) with our have any respect for their views. You "hate the sin, not the sinner".
  - jessaustin 10y ago
    Thanks for making the effort, but this definition is problematic in several respects. First of all, Trump is only a bit behind Clinton in the polls now, so either OP is wrong about Trump's supporters being those, as you put it, "far away from the median" (we typically call this "long tail") or the variance is much higher than any rational observer could believe. 538 gives Trump an 88.5% chance of winning the state where I live. The median voter here is a Trumpet. Second, the proposed method of making this identification is entirely subjective. I'm planning to vote either Green or Libertarian this election, because I oppose war, prohibition, and other travesties of the status quo. On the topics of most concern to me, I literally can't tell the difference between Clinton supporters and Trump supporters. How can I determine whose "sins" I should "hate"? Perhaps I should hate my own sins, even though they couldn't possibly be of support to Trump? This is quite disturbing to me, and the principle of charity had previously ruled out this reading of OP. With the same kindness you treat everyone else, but without having to agree (or pretend to agree) with our have any respect for their views. You "hate the sin, not the sinner". Incidentally, if any particular campaign takes this particular idiotic rhetorical stance, and then loses, and then wonders why? They'll be able to blame this particular idiotic rhetorical stance. In order to convince people of anything, one must speak with fluency in the people's terms. Your use of "sin" here would not be considered idiomatic by any Trump supporter I know.

imron 10y ago

A more cynical view is that they keep hammering it home because Trump's outreach to black voters is working enough that it has become electorally significant [0]. Polls show he currently has historically high support among black voters - and not just for himself, but out of any Republican candidate over the last few decades [1], and it's high enough that it could tip the election. 0: http://graphics.latimes.com/usc-presidential-poll-dashboard/ http://graphics.latimes.com/usc-presidential-poll-dashboard/ (scroll to 'by race/ethnicity'). 1: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/06/11/how-black-voters-could-determine-the-2016-election/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/06/11/ho...

akhilcacharya 10y ago
That's unlikely. The LATimes tracking poll is known to be unorthodox in its methodology, it's meant to track fluctuations in support more than actual support. Trump has not broken ~6% in any other swing state polls or national polls that I've seen, sometimes he's in 4th place behind Johnson and Stein. As it turns out, delegitimizing and spreading conspiracy theories about a wildly popular president in a community does not make people in a community fans of you. Most analysts don't think the outreach was targeted at black voters at all, but rather white moderates, who are more persuadable and numerous in number. 0: http://www.vox.com/2016/8/24/12587672/donald-trump-s-black-outreach-isn-t-for-black-voters-it-s-for-wavering-white-republicans http://www.vox.com/2016/8/24/12587672/donald-trump-s-black-o...

jessaustin 10y ago

...the fringes... Who is this? How can I tell who of my neighbors is in this group? Having made that determination, how should I treat those neighbors?

sanderjd 10y ago
This seems akin to feigned disbelief - you know the answers to these questions but are pretending not to. I'll bite anyway! > Who is this? How can I tell who of my neighbors is in this group? People who espouse beliefs far away from the median belief in the society. You can tell by taking to them about their beliefs, or often in my experience by having them talk at you about them or by looking at bumper stickers and flags they display, and then comparing the beliefs they espouse to your intuition of what the median belief is. Of course everyone's intuition of that is based on the people they themselves know, so "the fringe" ends up defined differently for different people. This can be controlled a bit by reading or being exposed to summaries of reports of society-wide studies, like polls and surveys. This is what the news should help with, but unfortunately people tend to choose news from inside the same bubble as all the people they know, so that doesn't work that well either. > Having made that determination, how should I treat those neighbors? With the same kindness you treat everyone else, but without having to agree (or pretend to agree) with our have any respect for their views. You "hate the sin, not the sinner".
- jessaustin 10y ago
  Thanks for making the effort, but this definition is problematic in several respects. First of all, Trump is only a bit behind Clinton in the polls now, so either OP is wrong about Trump's supporters being those, as you put it, "far away from the median" (we typically call this "long tail") or the variance is much higher than any rational observer could believe. 538 gives Trump an 88.5% chance of winning the state where I live. The median voter here is a Trumpet. Second, the proposed method of making this identification is entirely subjective. I'm planning to vote either Green or Libertarian this election, because I oppose war, prohibition, and other travesties of the status quo. On the topics of most concern to me, I literally can't tell the difference between Clinton supporters and Trump supporters. How can I determine whose "sins" I should "hate"? Perhaps I should hate my own sins, even though they couldn't possibly be of support to Trump? This is quite disturbing to me, and the principle of charity had previously ruled out this reading of OP. With the same kindness you treat everyone else, but without having to agree (or pretend to agree) with our have any respect for their views. You "hate the sin, not the sinner". Incidentally, if any particular campaign takes this particular idiotic rhetorical stance, and then loses, and then wonders why? They'll be able to blame this particular idiotic rhetorical stance. In order to convince people of anything, one must speak with fluency in the people's terms. Your use of "sin" here would not be considered idiomatic by any Trump supporter I know.