58% of Undecideds Think Trump Is Better for the Economy

38% believe he is more qualified to protect American democracy. What's is going on?

Photo by Roberta Sorge on Unsplash

When we first came to Portugal, I marveled at how inexpensive olive oil was. As someone who cooks daily, having access to quality, affordable olive oil made me happy. A 3-liter bottle costs between 16 and 17 euros.

It costs between 29 and 34 today – this happened in two years. This has nothing to do with COVID. Local producers aren’t trying to gauge consumers. It has everything to do with droughts and excessive temperatures, sometimes making it impossible to harvest the olives. Olive oil prices all over the world are increasing in the U.S., and yet no one is ringing the alarm. When I say “no one,” I don’t mean the thinking part of our country. I don’t mean climate scientists; instead, I mean journalists whose words are read or heard by 50 percent of us.

50 percent of Americans, and maybe more, derive all of their facts from the right-wing propaganda of Fox News, Newsmax, and the hundreds of publications and news programs around the country that toe the whack-out-of-their-minds line of modern Republicans and Trump. I don’t expect ever that Fox News will be honest about climate change. Nonetheless, I am more than positive that many who work for Fox accept that dirty energy is killing the earth. Just because someone works at Coca-Cola does not mean they must like Coke, right? Fox News is a product like Pop-Tarts. 

What about the other 50 percent of publications, though? Why don’t the New York Times, the Washington Post, and more center-to-left news organizations create a daily drumbeat about how climate change alters our lives and what steps could be taken to slow these effects? The most politicized part of this narrative is the “how” it was caused. The right did a masterful job of stealing this narrative and creating a Loch Nessian-style myth that climate change was nothing but a figment of our imagination. Measures taken to mitigate its effects are just leftist attempts to enslave Americans. 

Soaring temperatures will create unbearable conditions for crops and workers. Severe storms and prolonged droughts will batter supply chains and disrupt the flow of trade. Escalating risk and uncertainty will make it more difficult to insure everything from a home to a new business venture.

“These are really big effects … and they are going to get worse,” said Max Kotz, a climate economist at the Potsdam Institute and lead author of the March study. “The clearest way we can limit that is just trying to limit climate change itself (Climate Change Making Bills More Expensive).”

This is not rocket science, folks. If certain products become more scarce because of the heat, then the demand for that product, all things being equal, will mean prices will rise.

How will the right and the politically disengaged react?

Already, some Americans are blaming President Biden for the rise in olive oil prices. Many scientists have already stopped speaking about the effects of climate change, as if they will happen sometime in the future. A scientist quoted in the New York Times last week said that it is safe to say that the life-threatening effects are already here. Many of us have felt the heat, and even more of us are seeing our bills go up as we either attempt to stay cool or because supplies of products like olive oil are being decreased because of the increased heat.

In March, a study from scientists at the European Central Bank and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research found that rising temperatures could add as much as 1.2 percentage points to annual global inflation by 2035. The effects are taking shape already: Drought in Europe is devastating olive harvests. Heavy rains and extreme heat in West Africa are causing cocoa plants to rot. Wildfires, floods and more frequent weather disasters are pushing insurance costs up, too (Climate Change Making Bills More Expensive).

Olive oil is a product that many MAGidiots don’t use. Real chocolate is also something they eat less of, but lower-grade milk chocolates soon will be affected. In the meantime, if Trump wins, which seems very likely based on the responses of undecideds (58% and 38%), climate change will continue to get worse, and climate inflation will ratchet up the prices of many everyday items. The vicious cycle will continue, and the viciousness will accelerate. 

We are heading in the wrong direction fast, and all this speaks to is the failure of American schools — and the power of Fox News. I know many probably think I simplify things too much by blaming Fox, but for 24 years, I have been screaming at anyone who would listen about how Fox is turning half of America into Russia. Half of America is now Russia; many in that half even prefer Putin.

Look at the results of a recent Washington Post poll. They asked undecided voters whom they called “deciders.” 

Trump is under indictment in Georgia and Washington, D.C., for his attempts to subvert Biden’s victory in the 2020 election, and he’s laying the groundwork to reject the results this year if he loses again.

And yet, by a nine-point margin, Deciders trust Trump over Biden to handle threats to democracy.

Nearly 4 in 10 voters favor Trump on this issue, while about 1 in 3 say they trust Biden, who has campaigned on protecting American democracy against a rising tide of authoritarianism at home and abroad. About a quarter of Deciders say they trust neither candidate, and 1 in 10 say they trust both (Do Swing Voters Share Your Priorities?).

58 percent think Trump would be better for the economy despite the simple fact that most of Trump’s policies only help the super-rich and will increase inflation. The extended lockdowns during COVID did nothing to alleviate the pressures of inflation, which the Biden administration did a good job dealing with; their lack of communication about what they were doing let the right seize the narrative on this.

The left is horrific when it comes to communication simply because life is complex, and solutions to the problems we face cannot be explained away with dummy soundbites. Nonetheless, this is what Trump does, and the cult believes him. Democrats always try to level with people or wow them with their expertise, which makes people feel stupid, and so they reject them. 

Imagine going to the movies, and before the film commences, some sweet, high-production short film tells a story about how the lives of everyday Americans on Main Street are being changed because of climate change. There is so much the left could be doing to deliver this message and sway public opinion. 

We just aren’t doing it for some reason.