And Act Upon It Individually As Part Of The Regular Agenda: Fill & Download for Free

I’m seeing the common theme in many of these answers that, to paraphrase, reads as, “Buckle down on traditional Democratic policies, because if we just educate them… then they will finally get it.” This is to suggest that the working class are, as a whole, unaware of the policies to begin with. It’s condescending because it assumes ignorance, rather than seeking to understand why they have chosen to abandon the Democrats’ methodology.The first thing I would like people to understand is the nature of the bubble of comfort and security they exist within and their complete disconnect with millions of others. Quantifying it helps. The libertarian political scientist Charles Murray put together a short quiz testing the thickness of people’s social bubble: Do you live in a bubble? which was brought to the public by a partnership with the Public Broadcasting System. The quiz isn’t perfect, but I have seen few better wake up calls for millions of Americans. I would encourage everyone to take the test then post your answer to How do you score on PBS' "Do you live in a bubble" quiz? Did you have any answers that you care to elaborate on? and start to realize how disconnected many people are from the red parts of the map.If I had to guess why the disconnect, first I would say this is due to an insular urban society which doesn’t encourage interaction outside of the cities or with the urban poor, one which is actually very lacking in diversity despite it’s advocacy of it, particularly intellectually. It also has a large part to do with “the other half’s” depiction in the media. Cultural representation in entertainment is almost entirely one way. They feature upper-middle class socialites simply existing as if that was the norm.Consider the lifestyle of shows like How I Met Your Mother, where the cast includes people who can afford to live in nice apartments in New York City for years without jobs before becoming a) A successful architect, b) a powerful and influential environmental lawyer, and c) a famous news anchor d) a world traveled painter and e) Barnie. This is an extreme example, but think of the last time you saw a show about rural life that wasn’t one of these people getting lost on the way to another city or of a toothless redneck depicting rural “folk” as uncultured and illiterate, and possibly cannibals. Honestly, when was the last time you saw something that didn’t depict people living an “average” urban socialite lifestyle, which almost no one American has?I hope you didn’t just make the closest jump you could to Orange is the New Black, in which one of the main themes is the quintessential personification of how the left looks down upon working class “white trash.” Ask yourself even this, in a country with 200,000,000 Christians, when was the last time you saw Christianity displayed in a positive light, or acknowledging the many benefits to society that people of faith contribute, such as being the number one contributor to charity, both Christian and secular, as well as the greatest volunteers and providing more to orphans worldwide than any other source combined? I’m not just saying this as a Christian, I’m asking you to take a deep and reflective look at how you’ve seen hundreds of millions of people personified in the last two decades, and how you might feel if whatever group you felt as deeply about as Christians do about Christ being represented as horribly as these shows present Christians.Given that, we have to address the nature of the, “If we could just make them let us help them, they would connect better with us.” We need to evaluate the way in which Democratic “solutions” to problems have looked from the bottom. While not a visible problem to the Upper and Middle classes, many of these policies have fundamentally broken many of the foundations of living and caused worse problems for poor and working class people. Here are a few examples:Policies beginning in the 1960′s with President Lyndon Johnson’s “war on poverty” can be traced to significantly harming the family. At a time where poverty was already steeply in decline, programs were set up to aid single mothers. What they actually did, however, was to incentivize fatherless homes by paying mothers who have no father present in the household. If there is a single value which most working class people have, it’s family, and if there is one predictor of a bad life, it is being raised without a father. However, when the government began replacing the role of the breadwinner for families, it caused many single mothers to be wedded not to the father (or fathers) of their children, but to the state, ensuring not only that they would be trapped in American poverty, but also that they had to vote Democrat to ensure their continued lifestyle.This affected black Americans first and worst, and we are seeing the fruits of it today. It needs to be understood that directly after the Civil War and even until about 1910, American blacks had a rate of so called “nuclear family” households, with the father married to mother both living in the home with the children at a rate higher than even white families. In the 1960’s, when the so called “War on Poverty” began, the fatherless rate of black households rose to just 25% and a researcher named Daniel Moynihan called the situation of black fatherlessness a “disaster”. Why this is important is that Moynihan wasn’t some sort of Conservative, but a left leaning researcher working in the Johnson administration, a man who later went on to become a Democratic Senator from New York, and his report The Negro Family: The Case For National Action (better known as the Moynihan Report) outlined the threatening direction that this trend in black families would be taking.Now, the percentage of blacks raised without fathers is at 75%, well beyond the disaster point of 25% fifty years ago, and their communities are even more devastated after five decades of social welfare programs to fight poverty. According to Larry Elders, this is the number one cause of deprivation in the black community, far more than white racism. Why this is important to understand of the rest of the working class is that now the percentage of whites raised without a father in the household (such as was my experience) is now at 25%, precisely where Moynihan called it a disaster for the black communities.Continuing on, New Deal programs such as the the Federal Housing Administration, created in the National Housing Act of 1934 eventually worked to create a system of renters among the poor where rents became much more common than mortgages that actually lead to wealth creation. They also cloistered poor blacks in extremely cramped and extremely crime ridden housing blocks (see the Projects).Another New Deal Program, the Social Security Act created a system where everyone would receive a fair retirement plan, though they did not pay fairly into it. Furthermore, the heavy taxation imposed by the Social Security taxes caused millions to have little disposable cash to invest and save. Even at modest returns, almost all investment strategies outperform government payouts over the course of a person’s working life. So you have many who have earned enough to still be taxed, but ended up paying almost all their disposable income on a program that won’t exist when they are older and need it.Minimum wage has been a deceptively damning Democratic policy. This week McDonald’s unveiled self-service kiosks nationwide. This came in response to the “Fight for $15” Minimum Wage advocacy program propped up by numerous champions of the Democratic party and backed by union organization.[1]This of course, means a conversation about manufacturing. The state of American manufacturing is a hard reality. In part, jobs by expensive workers were shipped overseas in one form or another and in part, a large part, because of automation. Automation has made the output of the United States continue to increase, channeling wealth from the working class to the entrepreneur class as fewer and fewer jobs are needed. This is most evident in the Rust Belt, where the name itself decries the state of economic collapse. There, excessive payments for factory workers spelled a great life for the few workers who could qualify, but destroyed the entire local automotive industry and the caused disruption and destitution for millions of workers. Left leaning news organizations do a great disservice to this problem with a selective telling of the history, such as this graph by FiveThirtyEight.It’s misleading because it tells the story of America’s outpaced increase in manufacturing output, but give hope that jobs are also on the rise. It’s interesting that they choose 2010 to start the graph, since a much more honest look at the state of American manufacturing can be found by following the American Enterprise Institute[2].By looking at the second graph, we can see that, while we have produced something of a half million manufacturing jobs since 2010, job growth in manufacturing has stagnated since the 1970’s and collapsed in the 2000s. This collapse began, not coincidentally, around 2001, the same year that China joined the World Trade Organization. This sudden and dramatic decline in the costs of labor markets, is what sent many of the jobs Americans had come to take for granted at exorbitant hourly wages overseas or incentivized for innovations toward automation to remain competitive against foreign corporations in similar industries.Looking to other parts of the country, high minimum wages have decimated entire industries outright. Consider agriculture. A look at my part of the country historically will show thousands upon thousands of acres dedicated to cotton fields and cotton production (and no, I’m talking about the 1960’s, not the 1840s.) My grandfather actually managed the town’s last cotton gin, as those cotton fields are now gone because no one can afford to hire workers and there is no technology to replace their labor. So no, industry hasn’t been automated… it’s just gone, leading to millions fleeing the rural areas for crowded cities and competing for the fewer and fewer jobs being created there.***This brings up the actual ramifications of the Affordable Care Act for the working class. Around the time the ACA began rolling out, I was a retail store manager, and wrote the schedules. Corporate had enacted a policy shift in response to it. Basically, most of our full time staff were getting a ceiling of hours where they were encouraged to get below 29 hours a week. For all the part timers, we had to give cushion in case we stayed open late, so I was never allowed to give someone more than about 22 to 25 hours. The reason for this is that a full time worker who never worked over 30 hours a week would drop down to part time status, which was good. You see, if we have only a massive staff of part time employees, then corporate has no obligation to provide now even more costly benefits, including health care coverage.The net effect was that I had to keep the full time people full time, but didn’t resist at all if they started to dip below a floor of 30 hours and, worst of all, make sure that our part timers had no chance of advancement. There was no force on heaven or Earth that would get them to reach full time status. They couldn’t even trade shifts because that could put them over the 30 hours if they really needed the money. They were stuck making next to nothing and couldn’t even work extra hours to make ends meet. The logical consequence of this was that many of my employees worked two to three dead end jobs just like the one I provided them… none of which were obligated to provide them insurance, which meant that they would be among the hardest working Americans out there, but still have to pay a government-mandated fine for not carrying insurance.The Affordable Care Act, in essence, incentivized thousands of companies to reduce the labor of millions of people because that was what was best for the company. I want to hate the company I worked for for this, but seeing the economic projections, as well as looking at the implications of John Roberson’s If your health insurance changed after Obamacare, in what ways did it get better or worse, and how did the cost of it change?, I realize that they were just doing what they had to for their survival.Prior to the ACA my family paid $350/mo for excellent health insurance. We were limited to the hospital near our house apart from emergencies, but copays were $20–35 and nearly everything was covered after a small deductible. It even had maternity coverage.Fast forward a couple of years once the ACA was fully rolled out. Insurance with the same group costs more than $1000/mo. No more copays and easy deductibles; every medical bill is simply split with the insurance company 50/50, excepting a couple of things that the ACA has specific requirements for. This is competitive with other insurers.In thinking about this just for John’s family, but then imagining providing that kind of insurance for thousands, or even millions of their employees, I can’t help but say I understand. I’ll be honest, the company I worked for wasn’t doing great. They were international, but paying their people an extra $650 a month by way of insurance premiums… that’s something that might have reasonably destroyed the company.I’m still bitter about it, though. Back in 2012, it made me sick to my stomach to know how much we were abusing our employees. I’m betting there were a lot more people in Corporate who shed even more tears about it than I did, but they weren’t as free to move as I was and couldn’t seek a lifestyle that didn’t make them hate themselves. That and other experiences were enough to make me abandon my business degree and focus on education and writing about politics and Conservatism. I don’t make nearly what I made in business, but with the money I make working for the schools and the support of my patrons on Patreon, I am able to provide comfortably for our family and sleep well at night. I was just so disgusted with a system that was portrayed as helping poor people, but instead created a class of people that went from poor — to hopeless.Millions of people who could have had insurance were no longer able to get it, and millions of others lost what they had. Millions more who had it are now paying much more for it, and suffering economically as a result. The Affordable Care Act created an environment where the largest hirers in America could not afford to provide care to their employees.Following the collapse of the markets in 2008, it made it such that employers had no incentives to bring back full time workers. Instead, they were incentivized to work around the new proposed legislation, they had to use shady and inhumane tactics that hurt their own employees just to stay afloat. And they did.This meant that the economic struggles of 2008 and the unemployment that followed never corrected. It just remained stagnant for years, with millions of full time workers out of jobs, instead juggling three crap jobs, making no money to save, never seeing their families, and still without health insurance. The worst part was how foreseeable all this was, or maybe it was how this was communicated as some sort of a win.On the subject of unemployment, this hasn’t even been honestly reported by the broader media. Today, I received a notification that one of the news agencies I am subscribed to said that American unemployment is actually at it’s lowest point in many years. This, however, is misleading. What we have actually seen isn’t a real reduction in unemployment. What we have are many people who are chronically underemployed, stuck working many hours at multiple low-paying part times jobs where they are never able to be promoted to full time employment status. This is a direct result of the Affordable Care Act.As I said before, part of ACA was federally mandating that only full-time employees had to have health care provided, so many corporations just cut hours and hired more people to work part time. If you didn’t work in the limited and specialized fields of tech in the few growth cities, you were screwed. Also, many people who couldn’t find good work just left the workforce altogether. What’s important to know is that people who aren’t looking for work aren’t counted as “unemployed”. Also, for reasons that I find dubious, the message of “more new jobs” stopped counting underemployment and completely ignores those who left the workforce out of the unemployment metrics. A better indicator is looking at the Workforce Participation Rate, which is pretty clear.This was actually a national problem, and not just local to small towns, but felt much worse in the recessed parts of the country.Finally, technology, one of the only truly prosperous fields in the United States are incredibly left leaning and growing more so, and are, rather carelessly, working to disrupt other industries in a process which creates great wealth for a very select few, while destroying the jobs and livelihoods of millions of people[3].How this looks from the bottom is that a growing class of young and idealistic technocrats are driving them out of work and ruining their lives in pursuit of their own wealth and political agenda. I’m not saying personally that that is an actual effort being made by the technology industry, but seeing the gulf of disconnect I have personally experienced while working in Silicon Valley, I can agree that there is at least a valid argument for many working class in Middle America to be angry with the technically savy left.Furthermore, considering the failing education system, simply saying that these individuals should “work hard” or “gain new skills” no longer works as a method to actually produce people capable of surviving in a dynamic job market. First is a public school system which fails regularly to perform its basic job. This, I blame (as a public school teacher) on the lack of incentives for quality teachers and the lack of removal of ineffective ones. This is due mostly to the saturation of teachers unions in the education system, pushing for greater protections for veteran teachers even when evidence mounts that they fail at their primary duty, educating.We also spend far, far too much on very few children engaged in tasks that do not lead to greater education. Additionally, the entire industry has shifted towards leftist ideals of education which place no practical value on fundamentals or accountability for the individual, leading to a generation which are incompetent, but feel great about it.Compound this with a secondary education system where students are force fed lefitst values that don’t in any way create students capable of being successful in the workforce. I don’t know how people of the left are raised. Perhaps you were taught that college is about “gaining new ideas, or challenging assumptions”, something I find odd given the nature of suburban life, but the mantra of the poor was always “do well in school, go to a good college, and get a good job.” This was literally told to us thousands of times in our childhoods, so when quite the opposite was true, it disrupted the projected life plans of millions of young people and left them horribly disaffected with the education system altogether.Perhaps this explains, in part, why the tech industry and much of the media, characterized by young workers, is so heavily influenced by the left and also why research showcasing how left-leaning agendas are failing so many people is regularly repressed by research institutions and the media. That’s just a theory, but the left has to acknowledge that the evolution of American education into a place of far-left ideas in no way serves the needs of the American people who need jobs much more than degrees in Inter-sectional Feminism.So, to answer for how people of the left can begin to connect with the other half of the country I would say that first, they need to check their privilege and realize just how damaged the working class has been, their family structure, their housing availability, their job prospects, and most important, their ability to be upwardly mobile in the American socioeconomic spectrum.The saddest of any of this, I can see how, in almost every case, most of the left who fought for all of these initiatives believed they would be helping us, but when we said, “Hey, this crap ain’t workin’” we were told that our experiences were false, and our observations were biased towards hurting the poor. What they failed to understand was that our observations were biased, because we’re the poor and we were the ones being negatively affected by their help. Had they actually been affected by most of their policies, they may have seen things differently. That said, most of the problems we faced were/or/face are due to severe overdoses of “help”. If the American left wanted to connect with the working class, they need to accept at least the possibility that these programs don’t work. Then they need to start looking to acknowledge their own biases in thought and practice, and finally to realize that the lifestyles of the working class is not being something to ridicule, but something to understand.If I were to offer any suggestion, it would be to read the works of two authors first. The first being , Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis by J.D. Vance and the second is Please Stop Helping Us: How Liberals Make It Harder for Blacks to Succeed by Jason L. Riley. Both peel back the facade of, “If only we could get them the help they need,” and help the left get away from the mentality of superior benevolence over working class in general.***So many people are misunderstanding my point on technology, that I need to clarify with an added item. No, I am not saying I want to stop the flow and growth of technology just to keep my life the way it is. I worked in a technology centric role in the Marines, later when on work in Silicon Valley’s technology industry made an effort to hang a pennant for MIT in my daughters room. It’s important that you know that she is three months old. She already has a library of computer programming, robotics, and video game design books for kids in her little library for when she is ready. That will surely grow. We have invested in this direction for her life, because I know no other avenues seem to be possible for her generation, so I want to start her early.That being the case, I am tired of the very selfish mentality for people disrupt any industry they can, rather than thinking about what problems they can solve. Taxis really weren’t a problem before Uber, but education is a problem. Yet they disrupt the taxi industry while education still sucks. Why? Because opportunism. The government spends trillions on education and half of it is waste doing inefficient things (I can’t remember if I mentioned I’m a public school teacher here people.) There is opportunity there to help support educators.Take this, for example, Grannies in the Cloud. Someone devised an app to make volunteer retired people able to link up with and tutor children across the world. This provides the one-on-one support all kids needs, but which teachers are completely too overworked to provide. My wife is a school teacher too, 3rd grade. She is responsible for around 50 kids and works over 70 hours a week for a job that pays ~32,000 a year. She doesn’t have the bandwidth to give each of her kids any more of herself. It just isn’t possible. Something like Grannies in the Cloud could provide the support that she needs to help her kids progress at their own rate, since the state system holds all kids back at the speed of the slowest learner.Working to improve these huge level problems, such as education through better and cheaper technology would also help greatly to solve the work problem by driving more people into the actual growth industries, something we’ve needed for decades. For that matter, why isn’t “job loss due to catastrophic technological change” an insurance industry policy that employers can provide to pay for reeducation? I don’t know why the great minds of the world are busy screwing around with reenventing the wheel, or at least the taxi, when so much bigger problems could be solved through the same use of their talents.So yes, I love technology. Technology is great and it solves the world’s problems. I seriously want my daughter to be one of the first people on Mars, or maybe just her robots. I don’t care, but I am more than a little resentful that the best minds in the world seem to be focused most on solving the problem of how best a wealthy and highly educated person can become a billionaire creating digital services for millions of people rich enough to own a new iPhone, while carelessly destroying the lives of millions of the nation’s poor.Be rich. Be as rich as you can. Design and build things, but do so after you ask how many people will you getting rich hurt, and if that number is far more than will be made rich, you really need to be held accountable for that. Can you get rich in some other way? Basically, what America, and the rest of the world for that matter, needs is a generation of socially minded tech entrepreneurs who have left their bubbles I mentioned earlier and look to the urban and rural poor to see how they can solve their problems, give them the avenues to elevation, and flatten the graph of American prosperity in a way that improves everyone’s lives and not just a few venture capitalists in Silicon Valley.Thank you for reading. If you liked this answer, please upvote and follow The War Elephant. If you want to help me make more content like this, please visit my Patreon Support Page to learn how. All donations greatly appreciated!Footnotes[1] Thanks To 'Fight For $15' Minimum Wage, McDonald's Unveils Job-Replacing Self-Service Kiosks Nationwide[2] https://www.aei.org/publication/october-2-is-manufacturing-day-so-lets-recognize-americas-world-class-manufacturing-sector-and-factory-workers/[3] This one stat exposes a fundamental 2016 divide between the parties

Trump supporters and Clinton supporters misunderstand one another because neither respect each other enough to acknowledge these two basic truths; that everyone has views which they came to under reasonable means, and that absolutely everyone believes they are acting for the betterment of others.Simply, everyone has good reason to think they are the good guys.I want to start off with stating openly that I am a Conservative who voted in this election for Donald Trump. I’m not a racist, nor is anyone I know that also voted that way. I voted that way because I am a small town Christian and I see poverty everywhere around me in a nation of paradoxical wealth. Secretary Clinton offered nothing for me, but President-Elect Trump at least listened to my constituency and promised to address our needs. That was my primary motivator.I am also friends with a lot of Lefty Liberals. That isn’t like saying, “but I have a token black friend”, no I am actively friends with a lot of people who are of wildly different political spectrums than me. The key thing, is that we can all still get along. We grow, we mature, and we change our mind. That said, my friends and I are rare, because the environment for years now has grown monumentally toxic… toxic to the point that many of you reading now are only the survivors of those who immediately didn’t leave the question or downvote when you saw someone say, “I was one of the millions of people who voted Trump.”That said, it’s an important conversation to have, because we have never had a more disconnected population with itself in the memory of anyone alive today. So yeah, I want to share what I’ve observed over the years, as well.Rational ConservativesProbably the best way that I have ever heard Conservatism described is that a Progressive wants to tear down the fence because a fence is there. A Conservative wants to know what the fence is holding back before they take it down.It’s funny, some days I don’t really think Conservatives believe in anything. Some days, I feel that all of us just sit around looking at ideas thinking they are all bad and then hitting the books, research, and historical record to prove it. The fact is, Conservatives are identified by caution. They see that the system works, even if they know it isn’t perfect. What they are afraid of is radical change that disrupts the system. To most Conservatives, history proves the example that too much radical change invariably leads to more change. Every new change redistributes wealth or burden to someone, so there are always struggles and compromises in change. For that reason, even at its best ideas never quite end up as envisioned and rarely for the better. On top of that, after the few planned changes, there are unintentional consequences, each requiring a response, and all usually deviating from a place that anyone designed, and again, farther in the end from what anyone actually wanted. Essentially, they aren’t willing to sacrifice the known good of many, for the potential betterment of a few, particularly when the risks to everyone aren’t clearly known.Most modern Conservatives follow the mantra of Ronald Reagan that the government doesn’t solve problems, but is the problem. They believe that, outside of the few areas which the US government excels at which the states cannot, such the creation of the United States Interstate Highway System, the US military, or carrying out the ruling of a fair justice system, the government is far more likely to screw up a good thing rather than create good. They believe in individual freedoms, because they believe that a person generally sufficient to know how best to direct their own lives. They believe in personal empowerment and freedom to pursue self-interest, because most systems advocated by Conservatives, such as Capitalism, take advantage of self-interest to make a better environment for everyone. They believe that, when a moral person is left alone, he will produce more good on his own than he will if mandated and managed by the government to do good.I want to be clear, Conservatives aren’t always content. There are usually many things wrong that they are clear observers to. We are often framed as being unsympathetic to the plight of urban blacks, or as is far too common a narrative, just racist and like it that way. This is an ignorant way to look at the world. The simple truth is that, far more often than not, our views are very, very complex on most issues we talk about, and have come to many of the criticisms we have based on far more than something as irrational as simple racism. Actually, I’ll just let one of the Conservatives who shaped my opinion the most about issues facing black Americans. Of course, when you listen to him conservatively you realize he explained far more about many other problems facing Americans too. Oh, and I just fact-checked. He’s black.When you listen to Larry Elder and other Conservative thinkers communicate freely, you hear a story very different than the narratives about Conservatives. They are very analytical and well reasoned. Of course, they are also boring as Hell. You, however, are a smart person who has endured this far, so there is hope for our movement because of people like you who don’t mind reading. What they aren’t are simple minded, or simply just prejudice.A Conservative who says that “affirmative action” is a bad policy isn’t just being racist; he thinks it legitimately hurts blacks and hurts the entire system as an aftereffect. A Conservative who argues the “wage gap” between men and women doesn’t hate women; they just look at many factors other than simple averages, such as the number of women leaving the workforce to start families, and the way that when given more freedom, women often choose not to take on various careers modern feminists prescribe for them. When they say that we have to increase border security with Mexico, it isn’t because they hate Mexicans; it is because of the overwhelming amounts of data that illegal immigration from Mexico does account for a vastly disproportionate amount of crime in this country and Mexican immigrant workers do displace many poor Americans from the workplace.We also aren’t simply intolerant of other ideas. Quite the opposite, we tolerate other ideas long enough to actually make a choice on whether they are good or not. Tolerance is an idea which suggests that no one can ever truly have a value, because that value may upset, offend, or marginalize someone else. It is one of the premises of multiculturalism that seeks to not suggest one culture could inherently be superior on the basis of the ideas which make it up. Frankly, Conservatism will say when a culture, on the basis of the ideas and values, more precisely the ramifications of those ideas… are bad. In all honesty, not even liberals or progressives really think that all cultures are equally valuable and equally worthwhile of our intellectual respect. They are just intolerant of a different set of ideas is all. Don’t believe me.Nazis. Nazi Germany was a culture. Can anyone tell me who thinks that the ideas of National Socialism, mixed with a healthy dose of eugenics, and the ever tolerant lebensraum was good? I mean, sure, let’s all learn from all cultures because all must have equal merit, which must be able to improve this America we’ve all grown to know so well. No, not all cultures have equal value and some are just terrible. America has a fundamentally great culture, with great ideas and ideals. These cause greatness in the American people and are why they are so successful today. Conservatives want to deeply vet anything new that can’t add to that culture of greatness. You can call that intolerant, but realistically, we are just the rational ones.The Reactionary RightMost people who join the Right don’t do so out of logic. Most come to the Right out of fear and anger. I am generalizing, but most people who join the right do so for reasons that probably center on some level of fear. Some of it is fear of change, fear of loss, and fear of the future. In some ways it is close mindedness, and in others, it can be revulsion, and no, that isn’t always bad.Let’s be honest, change isn’t always good. Consider Silicon Valley. There, every young Harvard dropout doesn’t get to disrupt some industry. If they are successful, they will make billions, but what will happen to everyone else? Consider Uber and Lyft. These ride-sharing programs are great at helping people make extra cash, and people get where they need to go. Economically, it’s fantastic, but for taxi drivers, it’s a real threat to their livelihood. Consider also if something, a disruption to the education industry were to happen. Maybe it would improve education, but it would surely put as many as 3 million teachers out of a job. A few people will be greatly rewarded, but many, many people will be harmed, perhaps even for a net loss overall. This isn’t that I am saying that we shouldn’t try to improve education, but I am making the point that not all change is good and what is good for some can be devastating to many, many other people. Even worse, people in the Rust Belt cling to the hope that factory jobs will return which have moved overseas. There is absolutely no good that can come from that. This is why so many people get radically concerned about job growth or just protection of what they already have. It is the kind of problem that can disrupt the lives of millions of people.That’s why many proposals and agendas of the various parties create partisanship. Something I wish more people would realize is that 90% of all legislation never cause any controversy. Everyone agrees that certain good ideas are just good ideas and no one in the broader public even notices that it happened. It’s the other stuff, the 10% of time that we disagree that people wonder how the world caught on fire. Consider it this way, you don’t often see major proposals for change coming from the Right. We try to build programs, but the major shifts come from the Left. As I said, most of these go completely unnoticed and no one really cares, but every now and then the Left proposes something that creates a radical response from many people who disagree. These people gravitate to the Right as a reaction to proposed policy changes which simply don’t mesh with some deep seated ideological belief, rationalization, or even the welfare of many people that the policies affect. To reiterate, many people join the Right for no better reason than concern, fear, or even anger. Honestly, that’s not wrong… because people have deep seated ideological beliefs, rationalizations, and many are affected very negatively by change and new policy recommendations.I think it pulls us all in, in the beginning. Speaking personally, one of the grounds that brought me to the Right first was my deep seated rejection of abortion. I have absolutely no hatred of women. I was raised by three women and no father. I’ve been married for 12 years since I was 18 and have a daughter. My dog and cat are also girls. I’m practically swimming in sea of estrogen on the daily. I’ve been deeply tied to the rights of woman my entire life, but it was my mother that taught me the sanctity of life, and it was my wife that we decided to wait 11 years to bring another person into this world. We very much understood that responsibility and were very careful the entire time we were together. So we very, very much appreciate the gravity of the decision to have sex. I’m just saying, it’s scientifically the only way that our species has been successful at reproducing itself. I also have deeply held spiritual beliefs, so even if they don’t have very interesting conversations about politics or art, an unborn baby is a living human being. No part of me considers that my stance that natal life is equal to that of adults in any way correlates with a belief that women should not have the right to work, that they should not have equal rights to the political process, and unequal protection under the law. I’m just not going to ever buy into the massive self delusion and denial that is the semantic game of calling an abortion clinic a “reproductive health center.”On the subject of Christianity and the Christian Right, I want people to remember 2004. Back then, LGBTQIA was a fringe topic even among the Democrats. At that time, we were closer to the point where the Clintons stood for “traditional family values”. In keeping with that, we have to remember that Christianity wasn’t some sort of dirty word, something that people had to be ashamed of. But what is it like to be a Christian today? I’m not arguing that the last eight years have seen for American Christians the type of persecution that other Christians around the world see. They have, however, been assaulted on many fronts by the prevailing culture of the New Left.We need to remember that for most of us 10 to 12 years ago, LGBTQIA was an acronym we had never heard of. The rights of the gay community wasn’t really something that was part of the common conversation outside of San Francisco. Then, in less than a decade, sweeping change has occurred which radically changed how we were viewed and the rights we experienced.In less than a decade, Christian values became a source of disdain, contempt, and ridicule in the broader culture. Because of many Christians’ opposition to gay marriage, the entire faith was recast in Hollywood, books, magazines, TV, and music as something to be despised. Christians were the worst kind of bigots. They were uneducated rednecks and hillbillies. They were vile, hateful monsters who wanted only to turn people to church at the barrel of granddaddy’s shotgun. You couldn’t see a Christian depicted positively in any show that came out in the last 10 years, no matter where you looked. At best, they were the judgemental housewife who prayed for you before having an affair of her own, the hypocrital Preacher’s daughter getting drunk and partying wildly every night, the pedophile priest, or the redneck Bible thumping illiterate drunk. In all my years in the Church, I have never seen any of these cases played out in real life, but any example Hollywood chose to point out became the depiction of the average Christian. This, in spite of the fact that the United States still existed with a majority of its population Christian and most far different the usual portrayal us on the screen.Perhaps you haven’t seen Orange is the New Black, but here is an example of a very long plot line that went to extraordinary lengths to stereotype Christians.Yeah, that’s problematic for a show preaching tolerance. Or perhaps this one, another Netflix original.It feels like Netflix wanted to say something. I believe it was, “Hey Christians. Make sure you register to vote.”It didn’t just become accepted to casually mock, belittle, or outright blaspheme Christians on deeply profound levels — it became cool. It became a game.There are fully 200,000,000 Christians in the United States today and the vast majority never protested a thing against any of the causes the left has championed. In fact, it would have been impossible for most of the agendas of American history, from the Abolition of Slavery, to Women’s Suffrage, Civil Rights, or any other social program to succeed without a majority of Christian approval and support. To be more clear, if there was anything Christianity absolutely didn’t want done, it would not happen. Certainly, to be sure, those that did, didn’t earn this sort of hate and resentment for the rest of us.That being the case, the United States experienced a drastic shift in the way it treated Christians in a very short time. That culture shock left many feeling burned and resentful. I know of no case in history where such a manifest culture change could occur without it creating some reactionary backlash. That’s part of what happened in 2016. The Christian Right, many of whom were tired of being the butt of every joke and hateful stereotype of Hollywood, as well as rating none of the respect so many of the Left fought for with others, were looking for a leader. Trump wasn’t that man, but Pence was.People want to say he is the worst thing to happen in the world because he is going to lock up all the LBGTQIA in concentration camps where the Westboro Baptist are going to lead the Christians to pray the gay away. He won’t, that isn’t something that Christians care to do. What they do want is to no longer feel like they need to be ashamed of being Christians again. Quite honestly, Trump would not be in office without Pence, and Pence wouldn’t have been necessary had Kevin Spacey not spat on Jesus on the Cross.In a similar same vein, there are many that are pushed rightward by the concerns of political evolution. Gun-owner rights advocates have been emboldened by rhetoric from the Left which advocates for limitations on gun ownership. Gun owners are resentful when the vast majority of them aren’t involved in committing the acts of gun violence defining the debate, but are having their rights questioned. The almost constant denial of where the actual problems lies, with drug crime and gang warfare, doesn’t help either. This is not to mention that for many gun-owners, ownership goes beyond “tradition” and even personal rights, but an actual responsibility of citizenship. No, I’m not saying that all of them do, or that even most take the responsibility as importantly as they should, but the left’s denial of this position of millions has radically emboldened millions of the most reactionary individuals in the country.No that doesn’t mean they’re going to murder you, by the way. But they will vote you out of office in a heartbeat.Then there is a radically different group which has arisen in the same way. That of the “Alt-Right.” The Alt-Right! Oh dear.The Alt-Right are just that, Alternative Right. They came to the Right through nontraditional means, not as being particularly in support of any preexisting Right leaning agendas, but as a purely visceral response to the Left, particularly those on the Internet. They are individuals whose identity exists online, but who have responded to excesses of the Left against mostly Free Speech and Freedom of Expression in open forums. They have advocated a radical return to freedom against a culture of political correctness, trigger warnings, safe spaces, micro-aggressions, and college campuses sending away Conservative speakers for bringing in “the wrong sorts of ideas”. In that community they have fostered an almost anarchic level of resentment for authority and particularly limits of expression. In that environment, it has fostered some of the most distasteful cliques on the internet, earning a reputation for being the most racist, sexist, and bigoted among the ideology stereotyped for those qualities. That said, it created a caustic and biting community of hardcore anti-left polemics that everyone tried to dismiss, but through their memes and belligerent attitudes, completely born from reaction to social liberal excesses, they had a real impact on the election.Whatever the case may be, the reactionaries got the message. Whether they were opposed to pro-choice measures, the gun-rights advocates, the alt-right, or simply Christians tired of the drastic and sudden mockery and marginalization they experienced over the course of 8 years, the Reactionary Right took the message. Most of their lifestyles don’t lend well to large protests, but they did have freedom to vote.This is good for them, but it isn’t great because why they vote isn’t a good choice. They aren’t voting like Conservatives; they are voting with their gut and out of anger and fear of losing something. Many who joined the right did so as a response to some perceived threat to their values or their way of life. Others felt accosted or persecuted for just being who they are. In an environment where people were hated because of their beliefs, rather than acknowledged and invited to be part of the discussion, no one grows closer. The truth is that they don’t understand the policies of the Left, but they wish to undo anything which serves to remind them of the indignities they suffered in the fights for the other people’s rights. People who are threatened or mocked by a smug media, pretentious Hollywood celebs, or their arrogant friends on Facebook don’t act out. They retreat and become silent. They still vote, though. The types of people this creates can become dangerous to the political system and to others. In other parts of the world, this can be violent, but the American brand just means that they will react in a way that is hurtful to those who insulted, demeaned, and belittled before.This isn’t explaining away anything that Reactionaries have done or will do as insignificant or justified. This is just explaining why they happened and why they will happen in the future. Sound familiar?Ideological LiberalsThis is the group I would like to talk the most about, but which I have the least to say. The best summary I have for them is that they are probably among the best, kindest, and most conscientious of the American people, politically speaking. They, in my mind, represent the moral center of the American left. As a conservative, I have profound respect for the moral base that drives them. Their overarching philosophies I even agree with. I just think many of their conclusions are wrong, because often their philosophies don’t mesh well with realities on the ground.I often use the word, “Leftists”. This I define as those people politically to the left which use the arguments of equality to make claims about others and their beliefs, to dismiss those beliefs and those people, and to shame, belittle, mock, dismiss, and marginalize them for their beliefs. They are the people who regularly carry out and advocate self-destructive policies towards the country and the people they advocate for, solely to progress some ideal view of the world.What is important, is that I don’t say “Liberals”. I have never, to my knowledge, written anything bad about those would easily be described as Liberals. That’s because there is nothing wrong with Liberals. I’m going to, at this point, cite one my favorite answers on Quora that anyone interested in this question would also enjoy. It is also written by one of my favorite liberals, so it is worth a read through. As a Conservative, there’s lots in it I disagree with it, but it is still a great place to start. Ian McCullough's answer to Have liberals/progressives become intolerant of their opponents? If so, why? Before 1980, liberals worked with conservatives on lots of issues and rarely demonized their opponents.Liberals/Progressives these days are usually defined as having specific views around Equality. That is NOT the same thing as Tolerance."Liberal" and "progressive" are actually different terms that mean different things. Political media uses these terms along with "Conservative" as if they were the names of sports teams – but that is not what those particular words are actually about.Be Nice, Be Respectful is an important and valuable Quora policy. In American elections, however, that policy doesn't generally attract mass media attention, draw donations, and galvanize voters to secure victory. That's as true for "the right" as it is for "the left." At the end of the day, you have to win in politics.Generally speaking, and my liberal friends can correct me in the comments, Classical Liberalism centers around creating an environment where freedom of thought can exist. To paraphrase Ian, the term "Liberal" is often used interchangeably with a Democratic Party affiliation, which isn't accurate. My assertion is that, in common usage, American Liberalism and to a greater extent American Liberalism is more clearly defined by a set social values around equality and individuality. What makes the United States very interesting is that we have two very different groups that have evolved out of the “Classical Liberals”. The groups many call “Liberals” today, and “Libertarians. Both owe their roots to classical Liberalism and its ideas of promoting equality in voice and representation, but have divided, in a sense. Progressive Liberals focus on social equality, where they wish to ensure that all classes, ethnicities, genders, and people in general are treated equally by the government, whereas Libertarians focused their efforts towards ensuring economic freedoms so as not to limit the potential of anyone. This creates conflict in that, often Social Liberals allied with Progressives (which I will talk about later) advocate “leveling the playing field” by providing systemic advantage to certain groups and individuals, while penalizing others, in the name of correcting for past injustice. Economic liberals are vehemently opposed to this sort of “inequalities” because to them, it is both unequal and, while perhaps good for the individuals in question (though they will show evidence of how often it isn’t - see: The Painful Truth About Affirmative Action), they view these inequalities as bad for the economy overall, which means that what is good for a few is bad for everyone. That said, I find the argument fascinating, as it is two very different explorations of the same basic idea - freedom of thought and freedom of expression.That said, “Liberals” as I am using the term from here on out, means those of the “Classical Liberal” liberal variety, they are extremely important parts of our collective social fabric. Their ideas are why we have the freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, and the right of people to assemble peacefully. Their contributions to American culture are why we have tools like Quora, and maybe even more important, rules like Be Nice, Be Respectful. Often, people say that “be nice” rules are limitations on free speech, but on Quora, we have the best example of a design where people can grow and learn from each other without the caustic level of vitriol more common throughout the rest of the internet. I’m not saying Quora doesn’t have their problems. Often BNBR is enforced by moderators who themselves have ideological biases they struggle with in determining if something is harassment or just inconvenient facts. In other cases, it is the overwhelming presence of left and far left writers in social topics that define the site. Finally, there are the communities of Quora writers and especially Top Writers that exist outside Quora, who organize to vilify, falsely report, and collectively downvote answers they don’t like. While predominantly left leaning in nature, these individuals don’t espouse real Liberalism, but Quora’s BNBR policy does. When enforced well, it keeps the doors open to thought and growth. That’s why I think it’s important to seek out and find the best classical liberals, because, in my mind, they promote the best of American debate. One I would suggest following would be Dave Rubin.Radical ProgressivesThey are two things needed to begin to understand progressives. First, you have to realize that they are always “progressing” toward something. Most the rest of us aren’t, and I think that is important both for us to understand them, and for them to understand the rest of us. Usually, that something they are progressing towards is a shared sense of a perfectly egalitarian utopia. They have a perfect vision for a perfect world and that world is viewed through the lens of whatever social filter they looking through - be that sexual equality, racial equality, That’s a problem with American culture. American culture is about freedom. There is no direction, just people all moving toward whatever it is they want, and through individual prosperity, we hope to attain an adequate measure of collective prosperity.Second, you have to understand that they are “progressing” away from something else. Many of the right feel justified in saying that all the left hates America and scoff at the times where Progressives say that they love it. This was the subject of may answer to Are conservatives more “American” than liberals? The truth of the matter, though, is that I don’t think they do love America like Conservatives do. Many fall victim to the ideology of Howard Zinn and The People’s History of the United States. I say victim because The People’s History was a revolutionary rewrite of the history of the United States centered around pernicious and often very selective viewpoint of history from a very narrow ideological bias to communicate a very specific narrative. That narrative reads, page by page of how the United States in every moment of its history was responsible for, what the book would have you believe, were the worst atrocities in human history. What Zinn doesn’t mention is that the United States doesn’t operate in a vacuum. The decisions it made ought to have been judged against the history of what was going on in the world at the time, rather than the progressive values of today. It also shouldn’t have attempted to represent the “victims” of America as if they were merely acted upon by a malevolent force of the American Empire. An example, my state of Oklahoma. Modern history today tells only of the subjugation of the Indians, of how the white man destroyed their civilization, and that they were all forced from their homes and made to live in a no-man’s land, which was then taken away from them too. What never enters the narrative was that the Native Americans were not new to the foreign invention of war. They had it long before American settlement, and it was brutal. Oklahoma also wasn’t taken from them as part of Manifest Destiny. The Native Americans sided with the Civil War South. They contributed men and materiale to the fighting, and for that, they were punished very badly. And the Americans didn’t destroy their civilizations either; smallpox did. But the story of Zinn doesn’t take these things into consideration. Choices of the United States are made, and the suffering of others is listed, without always being truthful in linking those two artifacts of history. In the end, the narrative is clear - America is evil and the cause of all problems.But Zinn’s narrative is too insular. As I said, it only looks inward, and fails to see the big picture where it is usually clear that America shouldn’t have been judged nearly as much for the evil it did as much as for the evils it didn’t do, but which so many were clearly doing. In the end, I don’t know how more people who know nothing else of Zinn’s The People’s History could do anything other than hate the United States. That said, the book has motivated and captivated many among the Left, primarily the idealistic class of professors who aspire to great revolutions. It is to say that the United States is a deeply broken society because it has a history. Because of that, Progressives have placed a weight on the United States that can never be shed. These things happened, and therefore we must distance ourselves from the reality of these choices by upending all of the institutions which existed until everything is changed and nothing is left to feel guilty about. The undeniable fact is that, the only real way to squelch this desire for change is radical upheaval. This, to many, is Progress. They are progressing towards some bright idealistic future, or away from some dark evil of the past they can’t reconcile. Often these emotions create profound good, but often it’s just as much a retreat from the uncomfortable - the creation of questionable policies to reconcile a history they don’t like.I want to have more respect for the Progressive Left, and historically speaking, I do. They draw their same routes as the socially liberal brands of the Classical Liberals, focusing on a set social values around equality and individuality. At points in their history, they were one of the greatest motivators of positive change in America in relation to the rights of many individuals and classes. Everyone goes through phases where they need outside empowerment if peaceful transition is to be made. For this reason, alliances between those dis-empowered groups created strange bedfellows that worked together and got things done. In this way, they created the environment seeking to provide inclusion and tolerance for all people. But in recent years, the Progressives have defined a culture which is, ironically, intolerant of even the slightest notion of intellectual diversity, advocates bullying of all kinds to their political rivals, and will actively working to suppress rival ideas. In ways they’ve become a disgusting manifestation of their former selves.To unpack that we have to look at the new wave of Progressives. Following years of activism, many hard left radicals of the Civil Rights era and Third Wave feminists were recruited to teach at many of the country’s prestigious universities. Their years of activism paid off in that they had created an environment where, if you didn’t hire them, it must be because you were prejudiced. Many of these professors, to put it honestly, were radicalized in their beliefs and passed that on to students and the “learned community” through highly speculative and pernicious research papers that supported wild aims and their deep seated beliefs about the way the universe worked. Following decades of an increasing left leaning tenured staff at many liberal universities, their views became the official stance of many college campuses, and eventually, the only view. Lacking a healthy system of peer review, once the hallmark of American education, their wild theories became the accepted canon for a new generation of young and idealistic youth. What began with Social Liberals progressed beyond to something far outside even the realm of rational consideration for most people. What is the outcome of all this new Progressive theory?Anita Sarkeesian, a hard left feminist activist really did say that. At first, I thought it was just hyperbole by right leaning trolls, but then I watched the panel and she said say exactly that. When challenged by another panelist that she didn’t really mean everything, she buckled down and made clear, “No, I’m serious. I mean everything.” This from a person who runs an organization which hires no men. #JustsayinShe was speaking on a panel about “systems of repression”, a series of beliefs that, if someone from the Right had said it, would be laughed off as fodder for conspiracy theory. It is the notion that some invisible force, “the powerful” are creating a universe which they’ve cleverly hidden from all of us for all these years. It feeds into the concept of Intersectional Feminism, which attempts to bind together multiple schools of Progressive thought into a hierarchy of victimization. I really want to say I’m being hyperbolic, but that is exactly what it is. Women have it worse than men. Blacks have it worse than whites. All colors have it worse than whites, assuming we include the crimes of Europeans. Trans have it worse than Gay people, but Lesbians have it worse than Gays, and Muslims rank pretty high up there too. It is why so many people felt that it was fine to say that a person should be voted for President solely because he was black, and why we need a woman for President. I’m going to be honest right now, those two sentiments are respectively racist and sexist. But not according to intersectional prejudice. Intersectional prejudice says that these people are oppressed to such an extent that the common rules don’t apply, or at least not the way they apply to others. That’s why rubbish like this happens.How exactly do you rationalize with that? What’s worse, how do rationalize with millions who think that, because they have been empowered by the theory that itself calls you a racist if you attempt to challenge it.Research says there are ways to reduce racial bias. Calling people racist isn’t one of them.What’s more, accusations of racism can cause white Americans to become incredibly defensive — to the point that they might reinforce white supremacy. Robin DiAngelo, who studies race at Westfield State University, described this phenomenon as “white fragility” in a groundbreaking 2011 paper:“White people in North America live in a social environment that protects and insulates them from race-based stress. This insulated environment of racial protection builds white expectations for racial comfort while at the same time lowering the ability to tolerate racial stress, leading to what I refer to as White Fragility. White Fragility is a state in which even a minimum amount of racial stress becomes intolerable, triggering a range of defensive moves. These moves include the outward display of emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt, and behaviors such as argumentation, silence, and leaving the stress-inducing situation. These behaviors, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium.”So that we are clear, from the Conservative standpoint, or even that of the Liberal, this theory of “white fragility” basically uses the term “defensive” to marginalize all forms of rational debate against the assumptions of the speaker, in this case, the Progressive Left. It’s wildly hypocritical and creates a formula for convincing those who adhere to it that they never be incorrect in their thinking because their straight white cis-gendered male is only ever capable of agreeing or being defensive i.e. “fragile.” And yeah, this is a real thing and if you’re reading this, affects what you read on the site. This comment came out in a thread about a post literally about the way that many Progressives in the Quora Top Writer community have abused their privilege to make the community sites completely untenable with exactly this sort of intellectual intolerance.It’s cool. I’m good. I’m curious where I’ve even spoken on autism, but whatevs’. Basically, like our Liberal friends, Progressives are the nicest people in the world. At least, they believe they are. They have high aspirations and the best of intentions. They want everyone to be happy and live a better life… or at least an equal one. It could equally suck, but at least it’s equal. But they aren’t as open to a different view of what that perfect life should look like and they don’t deal well with others letting them know that some of their ideas have been tried and they have failed, some to horrific ends. If anything ruffles their feathers, or if you disagree with them in the slightest… you’re a racist, bigot, misogynist, homophobe, Islamophobe, ableist, literally Hitler, and of course, fascist.The point is, Progressivism empowers people to do some nasty things, which I’ve spoken about before, in fact, it was the primary subject of my answer to How did Donald Trump win the 2016 Presidential Election?, as well as Jonas Mikka Luster's, Rafindra Setiawan's, a bunch of fed up Conservatives, and whoever this guy is.Look, I am not saying to dump your Progressive friends, but don’t be surprised if your progressive friends dump you once you read a few different books and start explaining your new view. The point is, Progressives are progressing toward something, and though they have those best of intentions, they act in ways which aren’t respectful of others, even alienating to the point that it creates vicious enemies. They label Conservatives and those who disagree as racists and bigots without even understanding what Conservatives advocate. In their community, they have fostered an environment of hate for those who have different experiences, think differently, have different solutions, and s. In the environment of tolerance they preach, they are among the most intolerant there is. That is to say, in the words of George W. Bush at the police memorial for 5 slain police officers, assassinated in the middle of a Black Lives Matter protest.'Too often, we judge other groups by their worst examples while judging ourselves by our best intentions.”I began this section by saying that I have no problem with Liberals. I have a problem with Leftists. They are those who have taken their ideas about equality and used them to empower a generation of intellectual hate speech. They’ve created monsters out of ideas and people which they closed themselves off to understanding years ago. Meanwhile, those that were alienated silently gathered…And now we have a new President.Now, a message for everyone.I appreciate everyone for making it this far. We now live in a world where everyone thinks the other guy looks like Nazis. No part of me is pretending this is a great explanation of political science in America, but it is way better than everyone is a Nazi.This answer goes mostly to the Millennials. They are overwhelmed with the desire to do good, but they have no deeper understanding groups of evil-doers other than that the Nazis were evil. Ask them to explain their actual ideas or what kind of government they propose.This is an almost criminal act in a world of instant access to limitless information, where almost everyone can say “The Nazis were bad because Jews”, but fail utterly to describe the complex relationship between the National Socialist Party and Germany (two separate entities), the goals and rationale for Lebensraum ( a word you’d be surprised you don’t hear very often if you knew what it meant, given how often its administrators show up in conversation), the difference between the Luftwaffe and Schutzstaffel. Nor can they clearly compare Hitler to any other terrible person, many of which would compare much better to our current political machinations than the National Socialists. For example, let’s compare and contrast Stalin’s Soviet Union with Maoist China, or Pol Pot to what happened Rwanda. Also, what was happening in China during the Holocaust? Does that deserve some mention? Finally, all this talk avoids the terrifying reality that when you really study the history, you begin to see just how rational so many of the Nazi policies were from the German perspective. When we forget that, we do a great job of saying that everything evil is evil, but we have completely lost the ability to see evil just like when it is actually staring us right in the face.But we don’t know how to do that. We just know that if we don’t agree with it, it’s evil, and if it is evil, what is the most direct path to Nazis.Granted, I’d like to think I’m not a Nazi. I’m not racist and don’t want to, you know, purge anyone. Of course, I always see those Nazi types the news says are out our rallies. I’ve never seen one, but the news keeps saying they’re there somewhere (…subtle suggest media bias and editorial review… let them stew… subtle reminder of CNN collusion with the Democratic National Convention Chairperson Donna Brazile… let the message sink in… and done.) I honestly don’t think any of my political rivals are Nazis either. I think many are bullies and that they are spoiled by a world which has coddled most of them too long from reality, and that many of them live in an intellectual bubble. That’s not a Nazi - at worst it’s a brat. I am troubled with the culture of the regressive left in their constant attempts to silence any form of intellectual disagreement, (something very un-Liberal to do,) but I am not ready to call any of them Nazis for that. Because that’s stupid.What’s smart? Trying to figure it out. Not jumping to conclusions or stereotypes, and not being a dick about politics. Looking again at the graph below, it’s important to remember that, while I think I’ve made arguments for the different parts of the graph, we can never clearly identify the scale. At any given time we may have a much larger dark blue section and the light blue overtaken or even shifting to the right. We may have the pink dominating the right with very little blue at all. We may see the entire map almost nothing but red and dark blue. That would be very bad by the way.If anything, I think we need to take this election and look to cool down with the rhetoric. This is going to rely on the Rational Conservatives and the Ideological Liberals. They are going to have to rein in the far ends of this bump. Conservatives have to control the outrage and fear of the Reactionaries, guiding them to not create the same resentment that created them, and instructing them in what it means to be Conservative. The Classical Liberals have to take charge of the rampant abuses of free speech and unchecked ideological crusade of the Progressives. They need to learn, because you obviously haven’t been teaching them, that we will disagree, but you don’t have any right to combat disagreement with hate speech and nasty rhetoric, nor is that even rational. Four years from now, we are all going to go through this again, and I would like that time to just not suck nearly as much as this one. The only way we are going to be able to do that is to eliminate our mutual extremists and start seeing each other eye to eye again.I also know that I am too late for the answer competition. Oh well, I needed to get this out. Either way, I will post it to my Patreon and be fine. If you enjoyed this answer you can check out my post The American for more like it, or follow my blog War Elephant for more. If you found this truly helpful and would like to help me keep writing informative answers like this, please consider donating to my patron: Jon Davis is creating A Military Sci-Fi Novel, Articles, and Essays

Here is the simple, direct answer:The Narcissist needs ‘supply’ like the rest of us need food, NOT like the rest of us enjoy compliments, as it might appear on the surface. Too long without this ego supporting fuel and they become desperate, like a starving refugee of famine is for food.The Narcissist receives this supply from many sources throughout the day, all derived from the calculated manner in which the Narcissist goes about life:Compliments, or even mere admiring looks, from strangers on the street, over the Narcissist’s attire and grooming (and looks, if appropriate) - quartary or tertiary supply at best.Those with whom the Narcissist purposefully interacts, socially, on any sort of regular basis (and to do so in a voluntary manner implies the success of the purpose) are those who are the secondary supply sources - the people upon whom the Narcissist can depend to give him positive fuel in the form of continuing compliments, emotional support (by believing and displaying concern over all the fabrications the Narcissist contrives about his personal life), and various other derived benefits supplied by the source to the Narcissist: freebies (buying the coffee, paying for the movie tickets, etc.), sex (the secondary supply may or may not be aware that the Narcissist is in a relationship), as well as relief from boredom; and alibis, if needed.There is a sub-category of secondary supply known as The Flying Monkey Brigade - those individuals of low moral character who become enamored enough with the Narcissist (or those whose moral character is warped to the point that they seek the behavior for its own ends) that they willingly and actively engage in campaigns against whomever the Narcissist is enacting a punitive sentence. These flying monkeys eagerly try to gain favor with the Narcissist by commiserating with the Narcissist about the ‘awful treatment’ being received from the Main Supply, and are happy to offer their services in the campaign of retribution in ways such as befriending the Main Supply as an undercover spy; outright spying on the Main Supply as a stranger; harassing the Main Supply via phone calls, texts, emails and on social media; etc.Frequently, the goal of the Flying Monkey is to supplant the Main Supply as Primary Source, though it is rare that these simians understand the truth of the nature of the Narcissist. They are often temporary fallbacks for the Narcissist if the Main Supply gets wise and dumps the N, but it is exceedingly rare that these creeps replace them outright, though they may be encouraged to believe so while the Narcissist shops around for the true replacement. Do note - very significant- these secondary supply sources will never, ever see the Narcissist without the mask on, unless it is an error on the part of the Narcissist, or it serves some specific purpose the Narcissist has.The Holy Grail for the Narcissist is the Primary Source, aka Main Supply. Like Indiana Jones in the cave filled with innumerable and varying chalices, so the Narcissist sees those to whom he or she has a specific kind of attraction: all, individually, appear to be perfect for the purpose, yet the only way to know which is the ‘one’ is to fill it up and drink its contents. Unlike the movie, however, if it is a wrong choice, it is the vessel, not the one drinking from it, that is drained to a husk and left in a discarded pile of ash.My definition, in this answer, of the concept of ‘Main Supply’ is: one specifically chosen by the Narcissist, and not a default individual, as is often the case when a family member is in the role. Most Narcissists choose individuals for whom the role of Romantic Lead is designated, the criteria of which can vary, and can be based on factors such as attractivness, sexiness/sexual attraction, social standing, social connectedness, wealth or earning potential, wit, intellect, etc. - all qualities that will elevate the Narcissist ( either actually, or in the mind of the Narcissist ) in the eyes of those on whom the Narcissist places value and importance. The individual Narcissist’s criteria is usually some combination of these (and/or more) combined with the outward impression (by the targeted person) of sincerity, openness, and a trusting nature.Consciously, or not, (there are some who hold fast to the belief that Ns are not aware of their choices) the Narcissist chooses for the Main Supply, someone who proves him or herself to have the inner strength and integrity to stick around. In other words, someone with ‘staying power’. This is established by means of the testing of boundaries, early on, by the Narcissist. I won’t expound upon the arguing camps and their opinions on the psychology of the targets of Narcissists here, but the blurring of their boundaries by the Narcissist does NOT imply gullibility, nor poor self esteem, nor co-dependence on the part of the candidate, though these things MAY be inherent to the target, so called because, regardless of the Narcissist’s sincerity in the belief that the Narcissist is falling in love, the end game for the Narcissist is always to have his or her agenda followed and fulfilled - the same which can be said for the politician and the thief, both roles every Narcissist develops quite well in the arsenal of tools each possesses.The Main Supply (MS) is definitely the ‘’go-to’ gal or guy for the Narc regarding, for a while, almost everything. They need a pick-me-up ego boost? MS is the one who delivers it the best - full of sincerity, warmth, affection, admiration. Did I say ADMIRATION!? Yes. That’s the one they like the most. During the love bombing phase they grease you up one side and down the other so good, you’re like an ear of corn spinning on a stick, the Narc licking the entire length back and forth with the very tip of the tongue. Now who wouldn’t readily give admiration to someone who treats a person like that??Narc needs an ego boost? YOU’VE been waiting for what feels like eternity for the chance to tell the Narc, again, how wonderful - fucking wonderful - he or she is, without feeling like you’re coming on too strong . Check! Narc done got his fix!Narckie Narc a horney little fluffer nuffer? Hmmmm? Is that right? WEEEELLLL, isn’t (s)he the luckiest Narc in the world? How’d he/she know you were just thinking of yet another position for doing the nasty that would win you two the ‘Most Intense and Connected Sex Ever’ Olympic Games?!!Is your Narcissist feeling nostalgic and interested in sharing stories about his past with you, in return for your stories about your past (naturally)? That sounds like the perfect evening doesn’t it? The amazement on his face when he realizes how very (and I mean VERY) much alike the two of you see things, since your childhoods almost mirror each other, most especially concerning your tough times.Yes, the Narcissist loves to regale you with stories of the past, usually describing an idyllic childhood when things were a strangely fucked up combination of events of nostalgic perfection, and horrific, unrelenting torture like no one else ever had or could possibly fully understand. Remember, this is the love bombing phase, and this is the time of luring in, disarming , and conditioning of the target by the Narcissist. This may be the only time you will hear the Narcissist relate his or her back stories in a manner that actually broaches sincerity and an even keeled perspective on the events related, to the extent that the Narcissist is capable. Much of it may even be close to the truth concerning facts. This is so as to not run you off. Later, when you’re on the hook and the situation calls for it, the nostalgic tales will assume a tone of grandiosity and an imperious viewpoint, while the tales of abuse will be told in full Victimhood mode, often while finding a way to tell you how close you come to doing the same exact thing to the Narcissist in the context of your own relationship with the Narcissist.A final word on the love bombing stage- this is the time that the Narcissist is gathering data for your dossier , and these phoney intimate exchanges are an easy way for the Narcissist to gain information about you. Be assured: this information will be used against you later. Things you disclose as ‘likes’ will become the things - so many of them- that you have in common in your backgrounds. This is so the Narcissist can mirror you back to you, yourself. Intimate facts about yourself and your life disclosed in these pillow talk sessions will be filed away for later use to embarrass you, or worse, if there is potential to do so in the information provided. This may also be the only time that you truly feel that the Narcissist is actually listening to you in a way that seems sincere and with interest in you and your perspective.So here’s the big thing that sets the Main Supply apart from all the others: the Main Supply is the only one who will get to see the Narcissist with the ‘mask off’ so to speak. This may occur in a few different ways:As an unintentional slip of the mask on the part of the Narcissist, usually occurring due to being caught off guard during a particularly stressful period. If early on, the target usually makes some rationalization for it and the incident (red flag) is downplayed and moved past in the context of the relationship.The mask is off when the Narcissist is actively and directly devaluing the Main Supply, such as during an argument in which the partner is being told how worthless, etc. the partner is. It is on during gaslighting, and during most of the mindfuckery to which the Narcissist subjects the Main Supply.The mask is off more and more once the relationship has reached the point in the devaluation phase where the Main Supply either obviously knows the true nature of the Narcissist, or has become so dysfunctional due to the cognitive dissonance and trauma bonding, that the Narcissist feels no need to continue to invest the enormous amount of energy needed every minute of every day, to maintain the mask when the two are alone together. It is firmly in place, however, whenever others are present. This can be a true Jekyll and Hyde type experience for the Main Supply, and one would imagine it could also be a very dangerous time as well , concerning the mental and emotional state of the target. Suicide is certainly not unheard of among the recipients of Narcissistic Abuse.Of course, no matter how similar are the NPD traits in all Narcissists, each is a unique individual, each with his or her own individual Narcissistic composition and developed coping mechanisms, as well as the rest of who they are beyond the NPD. As such, nothing true about one Narcissist is infallibly true about all Narcissists. Even so, enough time observing Narcissistic behaviors and reading the stories of recipients of their abuse, both here on Quora and from other sources , will give any astute observer a reliable impression of what Narcissistic abuse looks like, and how devastating it can be to those of us who are on the receiving end. It should also enable the astute individual to understand how difficult it can be for someone not a recipient of such abuse, who also has no real education about the topic of Narcissism, to completely lack the ability to recognize a Narcissist in normal, every day interactions with one. This is due to Narcissists’ inherent acting ability and determination to pass off the deceitful persona of their masked identity as the authentic individual underneath the mask. Their success is in large part, after all, attributable to the fact that among those from whom the Narcissist is desperately trying to hide the real person of the Narcissist, is the Narcissist him/her self.I hope these observations, based on my own experience, provide something helpful to you. If you are ever faced with the realization of being involved with someone who may be a Narcissist, and you are able to do so - run! Remove yourself from the situation as expeditiously as possible and do not look back. Even if the person is not a true Narcissist, you will be better off, safer, and removed from the potential dangers of Narcissistic abuse. And don’t feel badly about it! Anyone who exhibits the disgusting and selfish behaviors exhibited by true NPD individuals , to the point that someone else even wonders about a diagnosis, is a person who is a potential abuser and is better left out of consideration as a friend, lover or confident.