Quote:
Originally Posted by peter12
Well, the new libertarian economics has a lot in common with Marxism. Egalitarianism through citizenship is not a Marxist idea, but the essence of liberalism.
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The notion of the individual as separate from their measurable and fungible "product" is, in my view, THE idea behind Marxism. Marx and Engels just referred to that as product and its utilitarian value as "capital."
I think we are partly on the same page in terms of the "populist" roots of Trumpism, although I don't agree that there is any real substance behind Trump himself. Is he the mouthpiece of something larger, some populist ethos that he has (likely by accident) tapped into? Maybe, I suppose...
But I really think Trumpism is just the manifestation of white working-class rage, fuelled by a persistent and regional economic depression in some areas where the seeds for that rhetoric were already in place. These are voters who formed key parts of the GOP base, but who feel that the persistent trickle-down policies espoused by Romney and his ilk have really left them and their real interests behind. Ironically, even though they worship the idea of Reagan, they are actually rejecting Reaganomics, which saw its final manifestation in Romney's infamous "49%" tax plan in 2012.
This is why Trump does well in areas like Appalachia, or rural Pennsylvania, but poorly in urban centers, among college-educated voters, and among non-white voters. To the extent those demographics share these frustrations (and some do) they have already chosen to express their rage through the democratic party, not the GOP.