Workers in this town may become victims of Trump's trade war,but they're behind him 'no matter what'

[workinclasszero]

By JENNY JARVIE JUL 05, 2018 | 3:00 AM POPLAR BLUFF, MO.

Jimmie Coffer, a machine programmer at the nation’s largest nail-making plant, voted for Donald Trump partly because he was confident he would bring manufacturing jobs back to America.

So the 39-year-old factory worker was shocked last month when 60 of his co-workers were laid off after the Trump administration imposed a 25% tariff on the steel his company imports from Mexico. Now, as his bosses cut back hours and warn they may have to let 200 more workers go in the coming weeks, he worries he may lose his job as a result of the president’s policies.

But Coffer is still gung-ho about Trump.

“I support him 100%,” he said last week. “In fact, I’d like to shake his hand. He’s doing a great job.”

“Most workers are behind Trump, no matter what,” said Diane Brogdon, 54, a machine operator who has worked for the company for 12 years.

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-missouri-town-tariff-20180705-story.html

[yardwork]

1. This is almost unbelievable. Except it's happening all over the country.

[Girard442]

2. But if Obama had showed up at the head of a fleet of car carriers bringing everyone a new one...

...well, you know.

[workinclasszero]

9. The only thing that explains it to me is their racial hate and hate of 'liberuls'

overrules even their own sense of self preservation.

Trump will destroy their jobs and their families and yet the fanatics in his cult will still gladly drink the purple kool-aid to the bitter end.

There is no reaching these people with logic, ever. They are brainwashed for life IMO.

[sarcasmo]

10. Cult 45

[Kittycow]

27. Good one.

Sad but true.

[Garrett78]

64. Someone should start a website with that name.

And then feature example after example after example of the cult-like behavior.

[maxrandb]

44. Hate Radio and faux News

No reaching these folks. Only hope is to limit the damage they can do and pray every day that they hurry up and die off.

It's a freaking cult!

[RestoreAmerica2020]

76. They all drank the kool-aid...and blindly follow non-name-know-nothing racist in WH...

President. Lyndon B.Johnson: "If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you."

[tblue37]

3. Personality cult behavior. Propaganda works, and these voters have been totally brainwashed

by our pervasive right wing media. To come out of their fog they would need the same sort of deprogramming that is required to rescue people from dangerous and abusive religious cults--and even in those situations the deprogramming doesn't always work.

[TheBlackAdder]

57. It sounds like the ones interviewed still have their jobs.. at least for now.

[bettyellen]

65. That's a very good point. Trump's erratic behavior leads them to think "anything could happen" so

They try to ride it out. In a way the lack of solid policy and norms is exciting for them- they’re like children needing constant stimulation, and Trump and he media have teamed up to give it to them.

[KPN]

80. Yep ... exactly.

[Phoenix61]

4. Dumb as a box of rocks

This is what happens when we allow our public school systems to go to crap.

[underpants]

19. Or, ironically, a bag of hammers

[Floyd R. Turbo]

51. You nailed it! 😏

[KPN]

81. Lol! Good one!

[NoMoreRepugs]

5. If you don't have hardcore Repug relatives or close friends one cannot possibly

understand how truly ignorant these goobers are - despite whatever education level they achieved.

[maryellen99]

17. I do and my husband and I are being ignored by his extended family

It’s all because I’m liberal and that I unfriended 2 of them over the kids being in concentration camps.

[NoMoreRepugs]

18. Same with my wife and I - kind of a mutual state of Ignore for us with our family on both sides.

[CrispyQ]

20. My rabid rwnj cousin is college educated.

But he has some other serious strikes against him. Until recently, he had never traveled outside of a small area close to his rural hometown. He's addled with religion. He listens to hate radio & Fox news & reads alt-right sites. He would deny vehemently that he is a misogynist & a racist & he would point to his daughter & minority son-in-law as proof. Yeah, I know. He can't debate, only attack, & if he senses you are winning the debate, he just stops responding. He loathes liberals & thinks the worst about us–& I do mean the worst–we are total scum. And everything he accuses us of, the right has done exponentially more/worse, but he's completely blind to that. His hypocrisy is stunning. He's close minded in a way that is stupid, & he refuses to see facts right before his eyes. I've been "friends" with him on FB for three years & his hate as gotten worse. He expresses it more frequently & in harsher language. I finally unfriended him a few weeks ago with he shared a post from my page & then excoriated liberals & all his friends piled on. FU Cuz. ~insert flip-the-bird smilie here

I have a few other rwnj cousins, but they aren't as bad & I'll say the two things that I see different with them over the man above, 1) they traveled & were exposed to other cultures, & 2) they are not overly religious, if at all.

[CrispyQ]

6. We're on a precipice & could topple either way.

The entire article is worth a read, but this particularly stood out for me.

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/fintan-o-toole-trial-runs-for-fascism-are-in-full-flow-1.3543375

snip...

One of the basic tools of fascism is the rigging of elections – we’ve seen that trialled in the election of Trump, in the Brexit referendum and (less successfully) in the French presidential elections. Another is the generation of tribal identities, the division of society into mutually exclusive polarities. Fascism does not need a majority – it typically comes to power with about 40 per cent support and then uses control and intimidation to consolidate that power. So it doesn’t matter if most people hate you, as long as your 40 per cent is fanatically committed. That’s been tested out too. And fascism of course needs a propaganda machine so effective that it creates for its followers a universe of “alternative facts” impervious to unwanted realities. Again, the testing for this is very far advanced.

[Anon-C]

39. and the paragraph after...

But when you’ve done all this, there is a crucial next step, usually the trickiest of all. You have to undermine moral boundaries, inure people to the acceptance of acts of extreme cruelty. Like hounds, people have to be blooded. They have to be given the taste for savagery. Fascism does this by building up the sense of threat from a despised out-group. This allows the members of that group to be dehumanised. Once that has been achieved, you can gradually up the ante, working through the stages from breaking windows to extermination.

[CrispyQ]

42. It's sad that as a species we have a blueprint for how to accomplish this.

And that history keeps repeating itself. And now we have climate change nipping at our heels. In spite of the deniers, as a collective, we see it in the world around us. That will add to the fear which will stoke the hate. It's hard to see a good outcome for humanity in this century.

[lagomorph777]

7. They will say that until they personally are unemployed.

Then it's all about survival.

[yardwork]

16. They'll blame immigrants and minorities and the Democrats.

[MoonRiver]

25. When they're living in their cars, or on the streets, eating out of food pantries

and soup kitchens, they'll understand who their true enemy is. Hate to think it has to go that far, but this might be the case.

[lagomorph777]

33. If nothing else, poverty is the most effective voter suppression tactic of all.

The GOP has been using it for decades. Now it will backfire.

[qazplm135]

41. no...they won't

they are lost. Move on to other, much more fertile grounds.

[maxrandb]

52. No they won't!!!

They'll continue to blame minorities, liberals, progressives, the hippies and the gays.

It's like religion. If you're living in your car eating cat turds, it's Jesus' will. It's never their fucking fault, or their votes for the evil party they support...if we'd only understand, we should be damn thankful we have a car to live in.

They'd only be pissed that their neighbor had a sedan instead of a hatchback.

[ProfessorGAC]

61. Yep

It will automatically become someone else's fault. Their boy is "keeping out the immigrants stealing those jobs" and yet 60 of his co-workers are losing their jobs and it has nothing to do with immigrants.

Their jobs were NEVER in jeopardy due to immigration. But, their "anxiety" was caused by the fact that they knew that overseas competition could cost them their gig any day. Their boy talks about "fair deals" and they bought it, because their "job anxiety" was obviously the fault of other countries. ("Wait, i thought you just said it was because of immigrants&quot

Now, a trade war starts because of their boy, and when that shuts down the factory, they'll just find another third party to blame.

You can't fix stupid.

[PossiblePasts]

74. No, it will just make them more irrational

Logic and reason left their mindset a long time ago. If anything, the worse things get the more hostile they will become.

[MoonRiver]

78. Hostile toward whom?

Rebukes are in charge of every branch of government.

[mr_lebowski]

82. Half of these dipshits don't even that, and even if they did they wouldn't care ...

They've been programmed to not blame the GOP for YEARS and over the last 3, to not blame Trump. To turn around and blame the GOP would be to basically accept the fact that they themselves made a mistake. They'll never do it, they're no capable of tracing the cause/effect. They'll be given a plausible storyline by Trump/Faux/Rush/Et Al, blaming their political enemies, and they'll buy it unquestioningly ...

Try talking to any of them about the 2008 crash and they'll all you tell it's 'cause Clinton forced the banks to make all them loans to the poors and the browns!' even though it's demonstrably BULLSHIT, they won't hear of it, they won't look at stats you give them, the proof you give them, they don't care. They have their little spoon-fed bullshit story that blames 'who they want blamed' and that's all they need to maintain residence their carefully constructed little stick-boy fantasyland.

[NewJeffCT]

83. sadly, you are probably right

but, if 300 people in the plant supported Trump before, it would be a big deal if he lost 5 or 10% of that support even - 15 to 30 people. Multiply that by hundreds of small businesses across the south and midwest and it can add up to something important.

[Luz]

8. He's worried he'll lose his job. Wait till he DOES, then we'll

see the belly-aching.

[exboyfil]

13. And Food Stamps and Medicaid are work dependent

and there are no jobs in the area.

[Garrett78]

11. Because it was never about economic anxiety.

Shame on those who said it was.

[exboyfil]

12. Take one for the team

You might want to ask yourself why the ruling elites aren't.

Also follow up question should be why do you support Trump's policies beyond the tariffs.

[pwb]

14. That is what fox tells them to say.

.

[MagickMuffin]

15. For all these folks I hope they don't go looking for a government handout

in the form of unemployment compensation, as that is a sign of being a WELFARE QUEEN. And we all know how much they hate government handouts.

[peekaloo]

21. Stand behind an elephant you will be shat upon.

But to enjoy it is a whole other thang.

cue up Living Colour's 'Cult of Personality'.

[muntrv]

22. That's because the "others" will suffer more than Coffer, Brogdon, etc. Hate is their logic.

[Thekaspervote]

23. Stupidity at it's highest

[Johnny2X2X]

24. Two steps behind

The Left by nature wants to see the good in people. It's a mistake here, there are millions of Trump followers that are way more gone than you could imagine, I'm talking ready to man the gas chambers to exterminate millions levels of being gone. There are millions of Trump followers who are excited for the coming civil war and see it as a chance to eradicate liberals by the millions and purify their country. You cannot reason with evil, that evil is here right now.

They want to see you killed, you cannot ask these people to use logic, they are blood thirsty and nothing less than blood in the streets will satisfy them.

[DBoon]

68. The left sees people as inherently rational

We believe people can understand when their lives are unsatisfactory, determine the cause, and do something about it.

Fascists worship irrational "blood logic". They believe in the power of hate, anger and fear. They despise the Enlightenment and its philosophy of reason.

[muntrv]

26. From the article....

Others accused the company of exaggerating the risks to workers and blamed the firm for importing steel from Mexico.



“Mass layoffs? I don’t believe it’s going to happen,” said Randy Wade, 42, a supervisor for a local vending company, rolling his eyes as he filled a cup with Coca-Cola at the soda fountain.



“If they’re going to do business in Mexico, they kind of deserve it,” he added. “They need to deal with Americans.”

AND THIS:



Asked whether she would rethink her support for Trump if she lost her job at the nail plant, Brogdon said probably not. The tariffs ultimately would be good for the nation — even if it left her unemployed.



“Overall, he’s done good,” she said. “I’m not going to be selfish just because of me.”

[Kittycow]

30. "If they're going to do business in Mexico, they kind of deserve it."

Ironically, the parent company that bought Midland Nail originated in Mexico in 1952.

Anyhoo, it's easy to be a big talker until the anvil drops on your head.

[BlueJac]

36. Nutty mentality...

just blind followers. Most people that are like that end up in a bad way!

[enid602]

28. Thrilled

If these people are happy with the tariffs and trade wars, wait 'til they get a load of the gutting of SS and Medicare. They'll be thrilled.

[Cosmocat]

60. They will

Seriously... we all are going to pay for their depravity.

[SamKnause]

29. How do these ignorant people breathe without assistance ???

I hope none of them qualify for food stamps.

I hope none of them qualify for unemployment.

I hope none of them qualify for job retraining.

I hope they reap the benefits of what they voted for !!!!

Anyone working there that did not vote for Trump, you have my empathy.

[workinclasszero]

32. Thats the power of Big Lie propaganda 24/7 in this country

Big lie

Usage in Hitler's psychological profile

The phrase was also used in a report prepared during the war by the United States Office of Strategic Services in describing Hitler's psychological profile:

His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_lie

*****************************************************************************
Is this not the exact thing Trump does??

[Docreed2003]

31. An "Idiot Wind" is blowing across this country

[Iliyah]

34. Well I'm in the Los Angeles area and the hard core shithole

supporters that I personally know are changing their tune. Also, they told me that their relatives across country are also. So we shall see when being unemployed or working on minimum wage can't quite cut it for them. Obviously, shithole will blame immigrates and POC.

[BlueJac]

35. Cult followers...

these people are very dangerous to all Americans!

[Freethinker65]

37. You can't fix stupid. You can destroy critical thinking in public education.

[ChoppinBroccoli]

38. Their Ignorance Is Shocking

Literally just minutes ago, I saw someone make a comment that the "far left and the media" have brainwashed people to hate Trump, and that almost none of the people who claim to hate Trump can give you a reason why.

It's amazing to me that almost daily I see people saying the most irrational things, like they can't understand why everyone can't see what a great job Trump is doing. I even saw one person say that by the end of his presidency, they'll put Trump's face on Mt. Rushmore. Every time I see nonsensical crap like that, I feel like asking these people what color the sky is in their world.

[Garrett78]

49. They would tell you "I don't see color."

[qazplm135]

40. because this is about culture and race for them

not economics.

[workinclasszero]

45. I agree

I think in their minds they are fighting for white supremacy, and that comes before all else, family and jobs included.

It's a "holy crusade" reinforced everyday by Fox "news", hate radio and most likely Sunday in church as well.

[Garrett78]

46. Of course. That people ever argued otherwise is just embarrassing.

Right wing economics, right wing environmental policy, right wing health care policy and so on is not the basis for Republican support. If it was, the party wouldn't survive.

The vast majority of Republicans are voting against their economic interests because they are voting *for* their (perceived) cultural/social interests. If people haven't accepted that by now, I really don't know what to say.

[Quemado]

77. Bingo!

[smirkymonkey]

43. Un-fucking-believeable!

[Jake Stern]

47. Lived in SW Misery for 5 years

These are people who truly believe that this week's ticket will be the big winner and if it isn't then "God's just waiting on the right time" to bless them.

They don't care that their factory closes down due to Trump's trade war because Trump's gonna "kick all the illegals out" and open jobs for "Real Americans" so there will be plenty of work.

Those folks are a mess and I truly don't think they're salvageable.

[LonePirate]

66. I wonder what sort of jobs these morans think immigrants hold down in this country.

Do they think immigrants are crossing the southern border and taking highly skilled jobs that pay $75K+/year, thus forcing the native-born bigot at the nail factory to scrape by on $45K/year?

Immigrants are forced to do the extremely labor intensive work for bottom dollar wages that (white) Americans by birth refuse to do. I would love to see/read some journalist asking those bigots that very question.

[Jake Stern]

69. Ask them if they'd work at the chicken plant

and watch 'em wrinkle up their nose and say "Ewwww! No!"

[kimbutgar]

48. It will be hilarious when they have to apply for unemployment's and food stamps and will

Be denied because Indiana has limited unemployment benefits. How is Twitler gong to help him pay for housing, food and gas? Let’s ask him in a few months how he feels?

[Garrett78]

55. He'll feel the exact same way, and he'll blame Democrats for anything that ails him.

The vast majority of Trump supporters, after all that he's done and said, are unpersuadable/unreachable.

[kimbutgar]

62. Sadly you are correct

[Blue_Tires]

50. So what can you do when you can't even force them to understand?

You say fuck it, write them off as losses, and do everything you can to get OUR people out to vote in greater numbers...

[workinclasszero]

54. Bingo

[Garrett78]

58. Yep. We simply have to outnumber them.

We have to combat and overcome voter suppression and gerrymandering, Russian meddling, a highly irresponsible infotainment industry/mainstream media and just outnumber the opposition at the ballot box.

[Coventina]

53. Anyone who tells me I should reach out to these people....

can KMA.

[no_hypocrisy]

56. Reminiscent of the Berliners still fighting while Hitler was pacing in his Bunker.

[TNLib]

59. Natural Selection

[dbackjon]

63. The ignorance of the typical Trump voter is overwhelming

The ignorance of the typical Trump voter is overwhelming

[Vinca]

67. This is what a cult looks like. The guy would drink the poison Kool-Aid in a heartbeat.

[Sneederbunk]

70. Thank you sir. May I have another?

[area51]

71. There are none so blind

as those who will not see.

[matt819]

72. Because if they don't

Then non-white people will be getting stuff that is the birthright of white Americans.

And they'll see no disconnect when they have to start collecting welfare, just like some non-white people, and they'll bitch about work rules to collect such benefits, and see no contradictions.

Call it, what? Stupidity? Bigotry? Racism? Cult?

There is no reaching these people. The only people that Dems need to reach are the 37,000 voters in just a handful of counties in PA, WI, and wherever else that swung the electoral votes. Sure, Dems should have a 5-state policy, but the reality is that those people are lost - in so many ways.

Which is why I keep coming back to the reality that we are no longer one country.

I was in the grocery store the other day and in the used book bin (used to raise money for non-profits) was a book by the late AFrican-American Republican senator from MA, Edward Brooke. The title? Bridging the Divide.

How quaint. How much divide bridging is possible today? Zero. Zilch. Nada. None. That's not the hallmark of a stable society.

[TeamPooka]

73. I noticed the reporter didn't talk to anyone who actually lost their job yet

Amazing quotes of theri attitudes...

“Mass layoffs? I don’t believe it’s going to happen,” said Randy Wade, 42, a supervisor for a local vending company, rolling his eyes as he filled a cup with Coca-Cola at the soda fountain.

“If they’re going to do business in Mexico, they kind of deserve it,” he added. “They need to deal with Americans.”"

They need to revisit all these folks in another year or so....

[Solly Mack]

75. They'll never be behind him in the unemployment line.

Because he won't ever have the need but he is for damn sure making sure they will.

So, go ahead - stand behind him while he runs your family into the ground. Then you'll whine about how foreigners are taking your job when it was you who voted to give your job away.

[Turbineguy]

79. That's the beauty of propaganda.

It's destroys rational thought.

[Cha]

84. They're not smart to be fans in the first place.. so

yeah.. going down with the Titanic seems like the next step. They're a dumb ass cult.