[PleasureBot]

I fully agree. I think will be debated for a very long time what allowed the USA to get to this point where half the country has talked itself into authoritarianism as a solution to imaginary immigration problems.

For my money I'd say a combination of

1) Poor economic conditions & extreme wealth inequality provides fertile ground for political extremes on all sides.

2) Gerrymandering producing political candidates that are more extreme and more likely to agree with Trump.

3) Over representation of unpopulated rural states in Congress further tipping the balance of Congress towards Trump.

4) The decades long effect of propaganda networks like Fox, Newsmax, etc. producing a media bubble for half the country such that we no longer have a shared reality.

And some interactions between all those factors that exacerbate the problem.

[bryanlarsen]

For a root cause below this, I think people have lost perspective on just how good things are. Members of the greatest generation that experienced the great depression and ww2 would be smacking us upside the head if they were still alive. "poor economic conditions" hardly describes the US. It arguably has the best economy in the world.