133

Most of Trump’s personal donations come from retirees (www.washingtonpost.com)

submitted 1 year ago by ATQ@lemm.ee to c/politics@lemmy.world

20 comments fedilink hide all child comments

More than half of the $23 million-plus [Trump] raised has come from people who identify their occupation as “retired.” Other titles of people who gave the most contributions in aggregate include “attorney,” “CEO,” “sales” and “home maker.”

top 20 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[-] PrincessLeiasCat@lemmy.world 33 points 1 year ago

That’s awful but not surprising. I would wager that the Venn Diagram of people who donated and people who watch Fox News 24/7 is probably pretty close to just 1 circle.

Like the pillow guy and everyone else on there, they’re grifters playing on the fears of the elderly. It’s not unlike the scammer call YT vids where they take control of the computer.

It makes me sad because I do feel like this older demographic is more susceptible to the fear mongering so they are taken advantage of as a result, but while they’re sending money the rest of us have to suffer the consequences of their actions if it ends up tipping an election one way vs another. There is no good answer, sadly. Snake oil salesmen of some sort have probably existed since ear the beginning of modern civilization.

[-] Skies5394@lemmy.ml 16 points 1 year ago

It just wouldn’t feel so wretched if they weren’t the ones that told us growing up to not listen to everything we heard on the internet, or to always watch out for slick fellas looking to cash in on you, then them turn around and get taken for just that. Then they turn around and yell at us about how we’re now the ones being unreasonable for having listened to them all those years.

I feel bad they’ve been taken advantage of. But I don’t feel bad that they let themselves get to that point.

Everyone has to know when enough is enough.

[-] tiredOfFascists@reddthat.com 7 points 1 year ago

Yep, and don't forget that they're the ones who taught us to stand up for what's right, but now they stand up for someone who is clearly a career criminal and the worst kind of racist, and a lying, cheating theif. Their response to all that? A resounding "meh, politics. It's all political"

[-] PrincessLeiasCat@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

Yeah, you are definitely not wrong. My mom is one of them now and the brain rot is real, but also so much of my childhood makes sense. It was always there in some form.

[-] Hello_there@kbin.social 23 points 1 year ago

Fucking boomers. Like 50 % of the worlds problems

[-] TokenBoomer@lemmy.world 0 points 1 year ago

It’s not my fault

[-] kescusay@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago

Could you kind of just... remind the rest of the Boomers that the planet will continue existing after they're gone? And people younger than 60 would really like it to be liveable? That'd be great.

[-] TokenBoomer@lemmy.world -4 points 1 year ago

What’s in it for me?

[-] maos@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

Confirmed boomer.

[-] TokenBoomer@lemmy.world -4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Don’t worry. They won’t let anything bad happen. Someone will fix it. /s

[-] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 21 points 1 year ago

Whoever heard of a grifter scamming retirees?

[-] Hegar@kbin.social 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

This was my first thought - the religious and the elderly are always the best targets for grifting. The right has so few committed ideologues. Most of them are just in it to steal grandpa's pension checks.

[-] SpunkyBarnes@geddit.social 12 points 1 year ago

Indicative of declining critical thinking skills, as is voting against your own self interest, or clear evidence of the power of propaganda?

I vote for the latter. Fox is psyop masquerading as a news channel.

[-] lagomorphlecture@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Why not both? Anyone can fall for propaganda but the worse your cognition the easier it's going to be to get sucked in.

Edit: IN. Sucked IN.

[-] SpunkyBarnes@geddit.social 7 points 1 year ago

Sadly, I believe you’re correct, as I’ve seen firsthand its effects on someone without cognitive decline.

A few years ago my mother’s demeanor and topics of conversation (I lived 1000 miles away, but we spoke by phone frequently) changed markedly over the course of weeks.

Much more fearful, a sudden focus on border issues, illegals…took a minute to tweak, but then I asked if she’d changed news providers. Uh-huh, Fox it was.

[-] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 1 year ago

I saw this shift with my father as his age made him have to spend more time at home and less being physically active. He'd once given a pan-handler a twenty dollar bill when I was a young adult. I asked why so much. The answer: "If he's going to humble himself by coming to me to ask, he clearly needs it more than me."

I asked if it bothered him that it might be spent on drugs or alcohol. The answer: "If that's what he needs to get through the night, it's not for me to judge him." This quick exchange had a profound impact on me. I tried to model my values on it going forward. It taught me a lot about compassion.

Years later, he thought Trump was a joke in 2016. By 2020, his health in decline, he was on the Trump bandwagon. It made me so sad.

[-] HandsHurtLoL@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago

A couple of years ago, my mom somehow seemed very insistent about the "caravan" crossing the border. Turns out she had started watching Fox news when I didn't even know her to pay attention to news at all.

I was trying to explain to her that this was really small potatoes news since - at the time - I had seen very few headlines about it on the usual subs on reddit. I also encouraged her to strive toward empathy about why a person would leave their home and all their previous life to travel by foot through Mexico to the US. And then after more news came out, tried to point out that they were asylum seekers from a country the US had intentially interfered with to maintain control in the region. She never got super Trumpy, but she seemed to keep talking about the "border crisis" almost every time we had a discussion. I then flatly told her that this was a distraction because of mid-term elections.

Eventually, she abandoned Fox news, but I'm not sure if it was my brow beating or some other reason. She started watching CNN a lot and a few times that I'd walk through the living room in the evenings, Don Lemon's big head (or Chris Cuomo) was just always at this shrill tone of exasperation. One day I told her that just because we may agree with what's being said here doesn't make this news either. News shouldn't tell you how to feel about what's going on in the world.

I'm harkening back to my college journalism days when my professors bemoaned the 24-hour news cycle. Working in a newsroom, we would sneer at the way TV stations covered current events. And now, I don't know how or when we will ever get to a point where the news can be communicated during prime time that doesn't get editorialized to hell - on either side of the aisle.

[-] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 1 year ago

Edit: IN. Sucked IN.

Where's the tent for getting sucked off? Sounds more fun.

[-] Chickenstalker@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago

Good. Let them die off from hunger.

[-] mossy_capivara@midwest.social 2 points 1 year ago

this post was submitted on 29 Jul 2023

133 points (94.6% liked)

politics

18894 readers

6085 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive.
Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

• Register To Vote

• Citizenship Resource Center

• Congressional Awards Program

• Federal Government Agencies

• Library of Congress Legislative Resources

• The White House

• U.S. House of Representatives

• U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

• News