Election Day is here. As you watch the results, ask yourself – why do people vote for Trump?

Commentary

Trump: “In my opinion, these patriots did nothing wrong. Instead, the FBI & Justice should be investigating the terrorists, anarchists, and agitators of ANTIFA.”

Yesterday, otherwise known to readers of Around the Block, as the “One Day More” day, I watched videos where Trump supporters in Texas surrounded a Biden campaign bus, intimidating the people in the bus, even trying to run it off the road.

I then read and heard Donald Trump praise these people and call them “patriots,” while tweeting:

“In my opinion, these patriots did nothing wrong. Instead, the FBI & Justice should be investigating the terrorists, anarchists, and agitators of ANTIFA.”

At a rally in Florida, much to my horror, but not to my surprise, the dishonorable senior senator from Florida, Marco Rubio, said at a rally, “I saw yesterday a video of these people in Texas. Did you see it? All the cars on the road, we love what they did.”

Another more sober, and definitely saner, Florida elected official, Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg, responded to Trump and Rubio with five words: “This is how democracy dies!”

So on this Tuesday, as we wait anxiously for the votes to start coming in on this most consequential election of our lifetimes, I again began to wonder, why would anyone vote for Trump?

For quite some time now, I’ve tried to answer my own question. In that effort, I came up with the four most probable explanations:

1. Trump promised his MAGA-hat wearing fans that he has and will cut their taxes;
2. Trump’s unfettered, and often wrong-headed, support of Israel, right or wrong, has convinced a group of single issue voters, conservative Jews and Christian evangelicals, that he is Israel’s greatest friend and supporter;
3. Trump has given pro-lifers the Supreme Court they need to overturn Roe v. Wade; and
4. Trump is a racist and appeals to other racists, white supremacists and people who desperately want their 1950’s America back.

Numbers two and three are legitimate, if misguided, in my opinion.

Speaking about number two, Israel, recently I reminded an Israeli friend who argued how good Trump has been for Israel…”Perhaps,” I said, “but he’s not the President of Israel; he’s the President of the United States. And with virtually every other action he’s taken, he’s done egregious damage to this country and the world.”

Regarding number three, abortion, maybe our most contentious social issue, all I can say is, why was Roe v. Wade Constitutional for 47 years and not now? What changed, except for the makeup of the Supreme Court?

As for taxes, as I reported in Around the Block two days ago, most Trump supporters earning less than $75,000 a year (65% of taxpayers) will see their taxes raised next year and beyond; they were snookered, according to Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz, by the “Snake-oil Salesman-in-Chief.”*

(*My sobriquet, not Stiglitz’s)

And so on to number four, the most difficult to discuss out loud and, arguably, most disputable issue.

Are these Trump supporters really racists? Are they really that afraid of “the other?” Do they really think that America was a better place when African Americans suffered from systematic, government supported discrimination; when Jews were restricted from where they could live, or visit, or stay; and when immigrants from places other than “Norway” were hardly ever seen?

Are they?

Well, maybe this will help provide an answer to my understanding of this aspect of the American character.

I’m reading a book, “The SS Officer’s Armchair – Uncovering the Hidden Life of a Nazi,” by Daniel Lee. The book, according to the publisher, is “based on documents discovered concealed within a simple chair for seventy years, is a gripping investigation into the life of a single S.S. officer during World War Two, encapsulating the tragic experience of a generation of Europeans.”

As you can imagine, there is much in the book about the virulent and historic anti-Semitism in Germany, an anti-Semitism that was both sponsored and encouraged by the Nazi regime.

Sponsored and encouraged. Sound familiar?

But there was one passage in the book that shocked me. A passage that gave me an unexpected view of the American character:

Let me run that by you again in case you missed it.

“As it turned out, most (leading German lawyers) found the American system too racist to attempt to replicate in Nazi Germany.”

I don’t know about you, but when there is a country that can be called too racist for even Nazi Germany, you know you’re in trouble. And when that country is America, it’s double trouble!

But, has that attribute of the American character been completely expunged? Think about that on this election day. And remember, as you watch the election returns, if you voted for Donald Trump you also voted for the American Nazi Party, the Aryan Brotherhood, the Boogaloo Boys, the KKK, the Proud Boys, The Daily Stormer, and many, many more of their ilk.

And lest you need reminding: There are not “very fine people on those sides!”