[This is not an actual Trump quote, but someone’s characterization of Trump-speak. Still, I think my response remains a valid explanation of Trump’s popularity with his supporters.]

MG,Jr. (on Trump 1998, see picture): Probably 1/3 of the people voting for him think precisely the same thing.

Ella Garcia (on above comment): That doesn’t make sense. Are you saying there are Democrats that are voting for Trump?

MG,Jr response:

There are blue collar (craft & trade laborers, and non-professional workers, non-college types) and rural workers (wage earners [poorer], rather than dividend-earning [richer] investors), who can be:

1, anti-immigrant because they fear labor competition (that lowers wages offered for jobs that become harder to get), and

2, racially bigoted (which is often how poor people convince themselves they are intrinsically superior, and “deserving”),

3, who can also be religious (Christian) fundamentalists, and so also

4, often sexist (women are 2nd class people and need to be controlled by men, so abortion is “immoral,” and “murder” punishable by government)

who are ALWAYS suckered to vote for the Republican Party, which is controlled by very savvy college-educated Big Business/Wall Street types (bankers, financiers, defense industry executives, major media owners), who play on the fears and biases of these “hicks” and “rubes” and “white trash,” (which is how these Republican Party insiders think of their “voter base”) to get their Big Business-owned candidates elected (like Ronald Reagan [1981-1988], George H. W. Bush [1989-1992], George W. Bush from 2001-2008).

These “populist” Republican Party voters have been called the “Tea Party” in recent years, and they have come to HATE the rich snobs who play them for votes (for Republicans), and then never work to make an economy that provides them with decent jobs. Also, the Tea Party people HATE the rich/corporate R.P. snobs for never following through on any of the “punishments” the Tea Party people want to see inflicted on the “inferior” and “threatening” people Tea Partiers want to be “protected” and “distanced” from, and who “should” be prevented from competing with them economically (in the labor market): blacks, Mexicans, Muslims, “uppity” women.

The smarter and/or more thoughtful of these Tea Party Republicans (right-wing populists) want to up-end the Republican Party, and that is why they are so enthused about Donald Trump: someone who spouts their views and is NOT owned and controlled by the Big Business “East Coast Establishment” that has owned the Republican Party since the Civil War [since Abraham Lincoln, from 1859].

In that 1998 quote, “Donald Trump” said aloud what the Republican Party Establishment thinks but does not say aloud (to not anger “the base” and then have a mutiny), and many in that base now know this, and are voting for Trump PRECISELY because he is what the Republican Party Establishment DOES NOT WANT. Hillary Clinton is the most favorable (and widely popular) candidate today for the interests of the Big Business establishment (whether under the “Democratic” or “Republican” labels). So, right-wing populist Tea Party “disrupters” are voting for Trump to vote AGAINST the continued control of the Republican Party by the Big Business interests.

This is quite similar to Bernie Sanders’ voters, who are supporting Bernie (and hating Hillary) because they want to wrest control of the Democratic Party from the Big Business interests (called the Democratic National Council = DNC, a Big Business-financed party-control group founded by Bill and Hillary Clinton).

So, YES, there are plenty of grassroots Republicans who are voting for Trump because HE IS NOT A HYPOCRITE; he has “outed” the R.P. establishment (by saying aloud what they think in secret but deny publicly), which demonstrates he is not controlled by them, and that is a rebellion that the populist Tea Party people are excited to join.

What the candidates represent are the following:

Donald Trump — bigots in rebellion against control and exploitation of the (“superior” and “deserving”) working people, by Big Business (i.e., the East Coast Republican Party establishment);

Hillary Clinton — Big Business in a fool-and-control-the-public campaign to maintain the corrupt system they now have (of payoffs to politicians) for freedom to manipulate the national economy for their benefit (e.g., shamelessly exploiting labor), by ownership/control of the government;

Bernie Sanders — an inclusive (non-bigoted) rebellion against control and exploitation of all the people, by Big Business (i.e., the DNC/Wall Street establishment in the Democratic Party, as well as the long-standing Big Business establishment in the Republican Party).

When Bernie Sanders said that the national election he is hoping for is between him and Donald Trump, he meant that such an election would be the result of the first part of his revolution having occurred: the Big Business controllers of BOTH the Democratic and Republican parties would have lost the the allegiance of the people (the majority). In that case, the national election (between Sanders and Trump) would be a contest to determine what kind of populist administration we would inaugurate in 2017: Trump’s right-wing nationalism (like early Mussolini, with some crudeness similar to that of Berlusconi), or Sanders’ all-inclusive democratic socialism (like the best of European systems).

To refresh your memory about the status of Campaign 2016: Hillary Clinton is the Democratic Party’s Nixon, and is the opponent that the Confederacy prefers Donald Trump to beat in the general election. Bernie Sanders is the candidate that the American people prefer to be the next American President.

Even though Hillary Clinton is the donna of an organized crime syndicate known as the DNC-controlled Democratic Party, many Americans are keen to vote for her.

What do I say to “proud Hillary Clinton voters” who protest over my characterizations of their candidate and their voting choice: if you know what your are doing, it’s criminal, and if you don’t know what you are doing, it’s stupid.

The criminals-for-Hillary are simply cold calculating careerists, logically pursuing self aggrandizement. For them the vote is an investment. The muddled-brained-for Hillary are “I will make history by voting for the first American woman president” cultists. For them the vote is a pathetic grasp at self-importance by association.

Why else join the parasites whose career hopes cling to the Tammany Hall DNC-Clintonite Democratic Party, and cling to the establishment’s duopoly in general? Why else vote for a continuation of the Wall Street owned, duopoly-fronted, Citizens United underwritten, American economic plantation?

Trump is leading a bigot’s liberation insurgency in a Pickett’s Charge against the right flank of the duopoly: the Republicans, and seeking to separate the “wheat” from the “chaff” — as he sees it — in the many-flavored mix of the American people. Sanders is leading a workers’ (wage earners’) insurgency in a broad assault on the duopoly across its entire line, and seeking to harmonize the many personal bubbles of self-centered world view within the American popular mix, with a unifying democratic-socialist vision.

If Donald Trump wins the presidency, The Wall Street ownership club will restructure a Republican Party around him, and through it slowly reabsorb him into control, like a Venus Flytrap gradually digesting a captive insect.

If Hillary Clinton wins the presidency, nothing changes. We will all continue to pick Wall Street’s cotton with Scarlett O’Hara Clinton (whip in hand) benevolently smiling down upon us.

If Bernie Sanders wins the presidency, the rebels in the Democratic Party will have won, or at least gained the upper hand, in the intra-party civil war between the socialist reformers and the corporate kleptocrats, and Bernie will carry on with the reform movement on a national scale.

There is an old saying: “you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.” After the primary elections of March 15, I see the American electorate as a sow’s ear, and I’m hoping the primaries between now and July change that view. Here is what I mean:

After the primaries of March 15, a friend observed: “Rubio and Kasich have both indicated that if Trump is the nominee of the Republican party, they may not be willing to support him, a dramatic break from tradition and previous pledges to do so. Presidential campaigns cost almost a billion dollars these days and many of the establishment Republican donors and PACs are starting to indicate that they may not be donating money to a Trump presidential bid. Trump may have to make good on his boast that he is self-funded. So far, he has been spending mostly other people’s money on his campaign, only about $250,000 of his own. It would be such sweet justice if he wound up bankrupting himself and lost to boot.”

Getting Hillary as president is no consolation for me. I’ll never vote for Hillary, and if the result is Trump, so be it. I will not be manipulated into voting for the oligarchy/plutocracy. Given a choice between voting for corruption (Hillary) or accepting chaos (not voting for Hillary, and Trump winning), I choose chaos. If America is not ready to reform itself yet, then maybe a few years of Trumpian political chaos will dispel some illusions and stiffen some spines in favor of renewed revolution.

If it is Hillary that wins this November, then the Wall Street plantation will have weathered the storm of 2016 and Hillary will get a few years of cracking the whip — like Scarlett O’Hara — to keep most Americans picking cotton for Wall Street. I wonder what’s in those $225,000 speeches Hillary gave to Goldman Sachs, privatize Social Security?

However, Bernie Sanders has led a young generation to see the light, and they will persist against America’s corrupt gerontocracy beyond Bernie’s time in public life.

Trump is an American Mussolini, a blowhard who surfs high on the wavecrest of the accumulated frustrations of legions of underachieving less-educated white males (and females!) who are envious of wealth, impatient with critical thought, and who gain emotional uplift venting their noise in Trump’s bigots’ liberation movement. Trump is a branding expert who knows how to get maximum attention with minimum cost, he won’t have to spend much for a continuing campaign. The media will cover Trump religiously because he is total entertainment, brings in mega-viewership, and thus maximizes the networks’ ability to charge and get top dollar for advertising that frames the video clips of his antics. You have to think of capitalism as a disease, a virus of the mind that reprograms the body into an obsessive compulsive behavior of blind accumulation: zombies, the living dead of thoughtless grab.

For the general election campaign, Trump’s legion of fanatics will pony up if need be, especially if they are told it is to ward off the evil Hillary (and she is evil). Also, numerous of the Republican moneybags will want to put some of their chips in with Trump’s campaign stakes on the political poker table, because they will want to buy into some access in case Trump actually pulls it off and then has real power to grant favors. Remember: mental disease.

What I get out of the less-than-desired vote for Bernie in the primaries of March 15 — assuming that this is the trend from here on out — is the following.

1. The American political system is completely corrupt, which is a natural consequence of it being entirely in the service of a thoroughly corrupt economic system (of slavery, basically).

2. A majority of Americans — male, female, white, black, other — support that system, and are voting to keep it.

3. A majority of Americans — male, female, white, black, other — are not willing to vote for (support) a movement to reform America’s political and economic system, as is clearly shown by their unwillingness to vote (in majorities) for the Bernie Sanders campaign.

4. You can’t vote for the system and then whine about being a victim of it, and justifiably expect any sympathy.

That the electorate’s preference against reform (and redistribution) is entirely against its interests is obvious to all, and negates any justification to feel pity for this electorate. Spartacus gained history’s everlasting respect because he revolted against his slavery and lead a multitude of other slaves in a war to free themselves. Slaves who vote for their slavery gain neither pity nor respect, and their subsequent pleas for more scraps from master’s table will fall on deaf ears.

5. If you support the system, you share its characteristics.

Based on the primary returns to date, a majority of Americans — male, female, white, black, other — are corrupt, that is to say morally weak. They are not innocent and undeserving victims of capitalist exploitation (which they yowl about when it’s their turn to get screwed), they are enablers, the lowest grade of perpetrators but perpetrators nonetheless.

In this sense our democracy is working, the ruling class, which is selected by: acclaim, popular votes through consumption dollar choices, and ballot box choices, does in fact reflect the character of the electorate. If that character is one of corrupted morals and ethics, small-minded selfishness and intellectual mediocrity, then the ruling class distilled from the popular stew will also be a morally bankrupt mediocrity, and obsessively compulsive about self aggrandizement.

If we get Trump as president it will be undeniably horrible, where that “horrible” is in comparison to what could have been (what we could have been). A Trump presidency would be honestly bad.

If we get Hillary as president it will be a horribleness in denial of its true nature. A Hillary Clinton presidency would be dishonestly bad.

I would prefer not to believe what I have written above about the majority of the American electorate. So, I hope that voting in favor of Bernie Sanders increases significantly in the primaries to be held between now and July.