Sakset fra en forstandig amerikaner på en forum jeg frekventerer (og heldigvis er det mange av de på det forumet):
Any nation facing the level of economic inequality, and for most of the population, economic stagnation, like the USA does inevitably has some % of its citizenry turn to demagogues and extremism.
This was obviously true in the 1920-30's in Germany (and Naziism took awhile to root out after the war there too).
Today, a large % of Americans have't' seen a wage increase in real dollars in decades, young people are facing economic prospects and debt that put them in a likely worse position economically than their parents. America has among the lowest rates of upward economic mobility in the industrialized world-- far worse than most of Europe. Increasingly in America, the economic status you are born into determines your economic status as an adult.
Such a situation is ripe for demagogues. People who can't control their economic destiny start looking for others to blame. For older white Americans, that's immigrants and Blacks. For younger Americans, it might be corporations and billionaires and the "establishment." So when we say "let's blame Fox News' I think that's only a symptom of the underlying causes.
The data on economic stagnation, our high poverty rates compared to most wealthy nations, and especially our low rates of upward economic mobility are readily available for those who seek this information out.
En annen kommentar til denne:
All the rest are symptoms. American physical labor was way overpaid after WWII. Since then, many countries have come back into the global work force, increasing the supply of labor faster than the world could soak it up, especially with the technology revolution of the last 40 years. We enjoyed the aberration, but now our wages are on the downhill slide of reversion to the mean. That's a painful slide. If people feel they've been doing what they were told and it isn't working, you have to find someone else to blame.
Og en tredje:
As I said, many of us are puzzled. We are straying dangerously close to the politics line (probably over), but I'll say that the U.S., in particular has a history that lends itself to a smoldering racism and distrust of government by right and ultra-right wing elements. Couple that with a world that has changed and globalized significantly over the past several decades, leaving many of those same folks behind for a variety of reasons, and you have a situation ripe for the elevation of a Donald Trump. Something similar happened in your country in the 20s and 30s (en referanse til en post fra en tysker), though with different causes. For a modern country, often held up as the model for democracy, education, and technology, it is indeed hard to understand.
The reality is that, while we have some of that, by no means does it include our entire population. There is a significant percentage of the citizenry that is poorly educated, poorly informed, susceptible to being led by charlatans and conspiracy theorists. We cover up much of that with our overall economic success, but it simmers near the surface nevertheless. Trump turned up the heat just enough that it came to a boil. The question now is if that boil can be reduced back to a simmer, and then if those elements can be redirected by a next generation of leadership to participate in a healthy, constructive democracy. Right now I'd say the answer is no, because I don't see that leadership in the wings on either side of the political divide.
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