> And a part of me wonders whether the same daily outpouring of hatred you see dumped on Trump/Trump supporters has also created a very large class of marginalized, ridiculed people who are going to let us know exactly what they think come time to vote -- and like the Brexit we may not even see it coming, because we live in the Twitter, FB, MSM bubble that does not accurately sample the people.

I am skeptical of Trump's general election chances. His polling was reasonably accurate throughout the primary campaign season and I'm not sure voters in the general election will be more likely to hide their support of Trump than voters in the primary elections.

But you are absolutely right about the contempt poured on the classes that will vote for Trump. And you can see the extent to which that hatred and contempt has completely permeated the establishment, the media culture, and the sunny sides of the Internet - look at how many people on HN comment about how they are 'terrified' of Trump, or that he has no policy ideas other than Make America Great Again.

Look, I can absolutely, one-hundred-percent get behind not supporting Trump and not voting for Trump. But dig down deep: what terrifies you about Trump? He doesn't drink coffee or alcohol, he doesn't appear to have any mental issues, he doesn't have any kind of loose cannon reputation in his business dealings. And he's 70 years old, he's not going to change. And if you're cynical of Trump, you can definitely say that Trump is all about Trump. He builds all these big buildings and casinos and puts his name on them. Clearly, he cares about his legacy. He might have awful, awful policy ideas, but he's not stupid: he's not going to act against his own self-interest (to make his mark) and he's going to be limited by the power of the office of the Presidency. There would be reason to be discouraged if Trump won the election; there would be reason to prepare to do battle on many policy fronts, if Congress somehow isn't totally anti-Trump. But terrified? Why?

The fundamental reason is that Trump represents the same type of people in America that Brexit represented in the UK. You could group voters in America into two different classes: the traditionalists and the cosmopolitans. The latter group are more likely to be university educated. They're more likely to be immigrants. They're more likely to participate in online discussions. They have experience with people from all around the world. They dominate the media and the political establishment. America is little more to them than a patch of ground with a Constitution. You and I are probably cosmopolitans, and we pretty much rule the western world. And we live in a bubble.

The former group are usually older. They are often less educated. They and their families have lived in America for a hundred years, or even longer. Their America is more than a patch of land with a Constitution. It's a home, it has a shared culture, it has an official language, and they are proud of who they are and they love their culture. They know it wasn't that long ago the US was more than 90% white and the rest of it black. The same goes for the UK, except you have people whose ancestors have lived there for a thousand years or more. The new cosmopolitan, globalist economy has left them behind. They subsist on what little work they can find and often various forms of welfare.

Cosmopolitans celebrate multicultural London, where white British are now a minority. Traditionalists feel a vague sense of despair that their country has been taken from them without a fight, their culture extinguished one little bit at a time as the cosmopolitans tell them that this is how it's going to be, and they had better get out of the way or be called racists. Traditionalists want to know why it's so important to have a cosmopolitan London rather than an English London.

I live in Mississippi, which voted for Trump overwhelmingly. I'm an extreme edge case - I think based on the election results and exit polling, there were maybe five other white Obama voters in my county. Make no mistake, these people don't vote Republican because they think that Republicans have their back. They vote Republican because they feel that liberals in general have nothing more than sneering contempt for them as backwards hicks. They know perfectly well that Republicans are pro-business, not pro-traditionalist - thus why you see the Republican establishment in panic and revolt over Trump. Trump is a godsend to them. I don't think they believe that Trump will fulfill all his promises. They think they can't return to a pre-globalist world. What they hope is that he will be able to fuck the establishment cosmopolitans. They talk about Trump getting into the White House and finding out "what's going on" and sending half the government packing and the other half to prison. They voted Trump because they wanted to hear "you're fired!"

When you start looking for the contempt, you see it everywhere. For example, look at all the hand wringing about how Trump voters are white men - they must be racist, voting for their perceived self-interest. Yet when blacks voted overwhelmingly for Obama, voting for their perceived self-interest, it was noted, it is used as an election strategy, but there weren't thousands of news articles condemning them for being racist. (Except in niche conservative outlets that nobody cares about.) There are unbelievable amounts of contempt and hate poured on these people. It is not that their views are to be disbelieved, or refuted, or argued with: they are to be ignored, unspeakable, considered stupid, called racist. They are not even worth mentioning or talking about if you can get away with it, unless it's to make them a butt of a joke or to generate clicks for outrage.

I think Clinton will likely win, but the split between the traditionalists and the cosmopolitians will only grow worse. Maybe we can age out of it - I think the Internet has been a great cosmpolitian-izing force, whether you think that's a good thing or a bad thing. If not, I'm afraid it will come to a worse head than Trump somewhere down the line.

NB: I do see some value in the traditionalist worldview. I don't think free trade has been the savior I thought it would be. I'm not convinced the idea that people should uproot themselves and follow the jobs around is a great idea. And I suspect the big push for immigration has a lot more with benefiting big businesses by increasing the supply of labor than it does noble ideals about freedom of movement.