During the Bush years, I used to feel slight confusion about the message that was put out: less government involvement that would lead to bigger growth. Ideology aside, I felt that opposed a huge portion of their base: working-class whites. They were the union workers who received the benefits Republicans mocked. They were the ones whose jobs were disappearing overseas thanks to the globalization. They were the ones who needed unemployment, Medicare, and Social Security help from the government. So I couldn't understand why they were allied with Bush other than this demographic tended to be religious. Two terms later, I'm finding lots of articles trying to explain Trump's rise and some of them attribute it what I've been saying: Alienated by the Republican cause for the past few decades, they turned to someone who's against the Trans-Pacific trade agreement and promises to bring back the working-class jobs.

Some of the sources in these articles are high-ranking officials in the party, and they admit being blind sighted. It surprises me because I'm just some idiot sitting in her room and somehow none of them realized what I've been thinking about for over a decade. Perhaps because the Republican states were so loyal to Bush and his administration seemed so united that the bigwigs in the party assumed everyone agreed with Goldwater, Reagan, and Bush economics. (Who all admittedly were totally willing to increase taxes or government spending when it suited them.) And I fell for it too; if you asked me eight years ago about the Republican party, I'd say it wasn't a big-tent community and was more or less in agreement on most of the issues, just to what extent; in contrast the Democrats were just a mess of ideas amalgamated. Now I see what's confused me were actually tensions bubbling under the surface, finally coming to light. In a way it's somewhat of a relief to know the Republicans can also be a collection of different view points, but I just wish it didn't accumulate into someone like Trump. Well, it's definitely a low point for the party.