Stuff to think about...(Article) "Were Trump Voters Irrational?" (by Keith E. Stanovich)

The article, (excerpts below) Were Trump Voters Irrational? written by Keith Stanovich dicsusses key ideas in the book,
The Rationality Quotient : Toward a Test of Rational Thinking, by Keith E. Stanovich, Richard F. West and Maggie E. Toplak

"In September 2016, in collaboration with my colleagues Richard West and Maggie Toplak, I published a book titled The Rationality Quotient. In it, we described our attempt to create the first comprehensive test of rational thinking. The book is very much an academic volume, full of statistics and technical details. We had expected our academic peers to engage with the statistics and technical details, and they did begin to do just that after its publication.

"But then the November 8, 2016 United States presidential election intervened.

"The nature of my email suddenly changed. I began to receive many communications containing gallows humor, like “Wow, you’ll sure have a lot to study now” or “We sure need your test now, don’t we?” Many of these emails had the implication that I now had the perfect group to study—Trump voters—who were obviously irrational in the eyes of my email correspondents.

"Subsequent to the election, I also received many invitations to speak."

... ...

"Rather than reply to these emails, or give all the talks requested, or affirm all of the leading questions addressed to me, I thought it would be more efficient to write this single essay and disappoint all of my progressive correspondents at once. I am very sorry, progressives, to have to tell you that the Trump voters were, in fact, not irrational—or at least no less rational than the Clinton voters. Several kinds of analyses in cognitive science support this conclusion."

... ...

"Failure to appreciate these nuances in rational choice theory is behind the charge that the Trump voters were irrational. A common complaint about them among Democratic critics is that they were voting against their own interests. A decade ago, this was the theme of Thomas Frank’s popular book What’s the Matter with Kansas? and it has recurred frequently since. The idea is that lower income people who vote Republican (not necessarily for Trump—most of these critiques predate the 2016 election) are voting against their interests because they would receive more government benefits if they voted Democratic. Many of these critiques contain the presumptions that, to be rational, preferences must be self-interested and that people’s primary desires are monetary. I have just discussed how rational choice theory contains no such presumptions, so on that basis alone the claim that such voters are irrational is unfounded."

"To my Democratic friends who demur from my conclusion here, I pose a thought experiment. Imagine that the candidates for a presidential election were Ted Cruz on the Republican side and Al Sharpton on the Democratic side. Now it is the candidate with the GG worldview who has the character and fitness-for-office issues. Who would you vote for?

When I am successful in forcing Democrats to give a response to this imaginary election, a substantial number admit that they would vote for Sharpton. They justify their choice by citing things that are very rational, given their worldview: they worry about appointments to the Supreme Court, abortion, and gun legislation. The Democrats justify their choice in much the same way as the Trump voters did when they eschewed disqualifying him on the basis of temperament. The Trump voters worried about open borders and encouraging cities to defy federal immigration law, etc.—they worried about threats to their CC worldview* in the same manner that the hypothetical Sharpton voters worry about threats to their GG worldview*. The calculus of decision theory is not precise enough to dictate a particular weighting of temperament and worldview in something as abstract and multidimensional as a presidential voting choice. After choosing Sharpton over Cruz, few Democrats would consider themselves irrational. Cognitive science would agree with them. But, in the same manner, when those with the opposite worldview vote for Trump over Clinton, they are being no less rational. On instrumental grounds, neither the voters choosing Sharpton over Cruz nor the voters choosing Trump over Clinton can be deemed irrational."

_________________________________

* "CC worldview" -- "the Country and Citizen perspective" (CC)
"Trump signalled to the electorate that he represented the CC perspective"

"GG worldview" -- the Global and Groups perspective" (GG)
"Clinton signalled to the electorate that she represented the GG perspective"

(PBS.org) "Why your alarmism over Trump is dangerous for democracy" by Shadhi Hamid *

* Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and author of Islamic Exceptionalism: How the Struggle Over Islam is Reshaping the World.

For decades we've been hearing from both sides that we need an outsider to solve problems in Washington. We've been asked to accept independent counsels, nonpartisan think-tanks, and a quack like Ross Perot and other fringe third-party candidates.

In this context, the election of Trump is perfectly rational.

Another question you always have to ask is: Compared to what? So many people hate the Clintons. I recall when Boy Bill was elected. I don't blame people for voting for him the first time. He's your guy and if you're married to the party then he's your husband. But the second time? After being impeached? Nixon wasn't impeached. I knew people who said they held their noses while voting for Bill and Hillary.

Now THAT is irrational.

". . .the second time? After being impeached?"
(3)

wasn't Clinton impeached DURING his second
term? So you can't blame the voters for
voting for him in the knowledge of the
impeachment.

"Nixon wasn't impeached . . ." (3)
No, but the anticipation of a sure impeachment
was what led to his resignation. It's said
that Barry Goldwater (R, AZ) and other high GOP figures convinced him of that certainty.

"people . . . held their noses . . ."

Well, I didn't quite indulge in that cliche' reaction, but I admit I did vote for HRC only as the lesser of two evils, and I was perhaps under
the influence of the time-honored American belief that voting for a third party or an Independent is wasting your vote. Your remark on Ross Perot seems to put you in that
category of voters who like to BE Independents but don't like to VOTE FOR Independents.

Perot was a quack. I wouldn't vote for him no matter what party he belonged to.

Yes, there's no assurance that Independents
and 3rd party candidates WON'T be quacks --
any more than there is in the case of the
"Majors". (I dont b t w subscribe to the theory
that Perot "handed the 1992 election to
Clinton;" nor that Ralph Nader "handed" it
to Bush II.)

Four Threats to Democracy

by Jared Diamond, from Governance An international journal of Policy, Administration & Institutions; Volume 27, Number 2, 2014. (open-access) https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/gove.12086

..."our fundamental problems are four interconnected issues combining to threaten a breakdown of effective democratic government in the United States."

Why should we care? Let's remind ourselves of the oft-forgotten reasons why democracy is a superior form of government (provided that it works), and hence why its deterioration is very worrisome. (Of course, I acknowledge that there are many countries in which democracy does not work, because of the lack of national identity, of an informed electorate, or of both)." The advantages of democracy include the following: ...

and

Sam Harris Making Sense Podcast, No. 161: RISE & FALL A Conversation with Jared Diamond (24 June 2019)

A POTUS is always ultimately an individual. He (and one day she) is to be judged, ultimately, on his/her individual actions and words. The party or ideology he/she is associated with are all beside the point, really.

All Presidents are, have been, and will be less than perfect human beings with less than perfect moral sensitivity, knowledge, intellectual capacity, integrity, courage, etc. They must be judged on a sliding scale.

Our present President has shown himself now to be the worst of the worst. He obviously is the most ignorant President we have had in the last one hundred years, and probably since our nation's founding. He is obviously a dangerous malignant narcissist who has no principles, rational or consistent political ideology or even common humanity or common human decency.

He has only one focus and one cause - himself and promotion of himself and his moniker. He was and would be a shitty ordinary citizen - the fact he has achieved the most powerful political position in the world is a disgrace and a horror beyond most people's political nightmares.

What more need to be said other than he must be removed from office for our nation to survive - removed hopefully in the next few months through impeachment, with our last hope coming next November to remove him by the ballot box. His reelection would be the death-knell for any kind of sane society to be imagined as achievable or sustainable by our nation.

There is no need for dialogue or compromise or any of the other former methods that could promote reason as our lodestar - our focus now is to remove the cancer and hope the body politic can then recover and heal.

We cannot move to another planet if this one goes into the toilet of history.

We must fix this problem or our nation will die, in spirit if not in fact.

But the second time? After being impeached?

Clinton was impeached in 1998. He ran for reelection in 1996. No one voted for Clinton after he had been impeached, because he wasn't impeached until the middle of his second term.

This is why no one outside your tiny ideological bubble takes seriously anything conservatives like you say. You don't deal in reality. You've constructed a fantasy world in which people "held their noses" and voted for Clinton after he had been impeached. Except they didn't. You're simply engaged in spreading falsehoods, and not only that, transparently stupid falsehoods. The prime purveyors of lies, falsehoods, and misinformation on this site are you, proximity1, and Carnophile. It doesn't matter whether the three of you are deluded, drunk, or are just lying, almost everything you all say is demonstrably incorrect.