Someone already answered that on this site today. [agnostic.com] Though I would add. That to a degree the problem is also with the metropolitan political establishment, who stopped even giving the impression that they were listening to the white working class, perhaps because they were affraid of appearing to play that very game. But of course not listening, or even apprearing not to listen, soon gives the impression of contempt, and nothing makes people want to look down on others quite as much, as feeling they are looked down on themselves. It is a self reinforcing cycle.

@Fernapple I think the answer is complex and many faceted. I also think that more Americans than indicated in polls support him, and that's why I don't believe them, or trust them. From an international perspective ( mine) the American psychology of individualism has turned inward, rancid and corrupt. American mythology about itself has become a lead weight which is slowly sinking America, and more Americans than we might think see Trumpism as hanging on to this mythology, which the rest of the world clearly sees for what it is: a farce. My point? It's not just the Trump base. I suspect, but fear, election night will prove this right.

@David1955 That may be very true.

@David1955 You also perhaps have to take into account the effects of, capitalist consumer culture. In order to make the greatest possible profits, many Americans it seems, have been conditioned to see their happiness and own personal worth as entirely dependent on what they buy. That certainly promotes a toxic individualism in those who fall into the trap.

Do you feel pity for us in the U.S.A.?