And like the show, a very disappointing ending, no doubt…

…there will no doubt be a mad scramble to fill the void that Limbaugh will leave in the AM radio universe.

The Iron Throne will soon be empty.
And the Game of Thrones begins.
Daggers, Poison, and Red Weddings, with Divine Sanction.

Of which 80% gets skimmed straight into Trump’s pockets.

As I have suggested elsewhere, I think there is also an almost freudian aspect to some people’s ‘Trumplove’.

There are people for whom supporting Trump is about money and/or influence, of course, but, for many, it is IMO tribal or freudian. This is perhaps why, whatever Trumps has done (good or bad), his support has remained at roughly 43%* for the last four years.

*I know Trump garnered just under 47% in the national popular vote last month, but I reckon that the difference can be accounted for by ‘reluctant Trumpers’ and/or biddable opportunists (or maybe deluded, dyed-in-the-wool Republicans who cannot see that their party is not what it was, although it is interesting to note that down-ballet Republican candidates generally did a little better than Trump himself).

An aside: 43% was the level of support for Hitler in the 1933 election in Germany. It is a tribute to the US political system that, while 43% was enough for Hitler, it is not enough for Trump. (And maybe one fortunate aspect of Trump’s MO is he seems able to enthuse only his base, plus those who feel that they owe him something; he will never win over a majority of Americans – he has disgusted too many of them, whether it is, among other things, the cheap and dirty attitude to women, the racism or the lame-duck killing spree.)

Trump has done little or nothing to assist the poorest working folk in
the US, but some of them love him and what he represents nonetheless.

Because He will stick it to their Enemies, real and imagined.
SPITE is in play, where who cares if I win, YOU LOSE!
Lose-Lose Situation but Who Cares?

Because (like the Dark Powers in Black Magick), Trump gave them what they wanted — a CHRISTIAN Supreme Court. No Roe v Wade, Prayer Back in Schools, a CHRISTIAN Nation…

That should be LORD in all-caps.

Your problem is that you are looking for “sanity” when it comes to die-hard Trump supporters.

There is certainly an issue with certain parts of the population feeling that they have been ‘left behind’. We saw this with the Brexit vote in the UK. The incoming administration certainly needs to seek to address this in whatever ways it can, although we all understand the constraints …

The origins of the warped senses of identity that drive people are, I think, very complex. Trump has done little or nothing to assist the poorest working folk in the US, but some of them love him and what he represents nonetheless. And white evangelicals are often pretty middle-class and of the view that the poor deserve to be poor. The whole Trumpangelical thing is extremely weird!

(My comment about Trump’s ‘redistributive public service’ was of course tongue-in-cheek. My guess is that those who keep throwing their money at Trump have money to throw around.)