I am coming to understand the mindset of one who votes for a candidate who promises to "tear it all down." My life is dominated by forces I cannot control or understand. All the big ticket necessities (phone, car, etc) require multi-year contracts that I cannot understand for service/products that I don't know how they will work until I'm locked into them, which, predictably, usually disappoint.
My car is ergonomically built for something other than a human, thus it causes back pain, and my phone service from T-mobile is awful. Apparently, I have been *leasing* my phone, which means that after paying more than the phone would have cost to buy, I must return it at the end, and rather than paying $150 for early termination, early termination would have cost over $600. All of this was described in a contract which I was not given the opportunity to read before signing.
I owed thousands of dollars in taxes last year, and, after increasing withholding for both of us, we apparently are on track to owe thousands more this year.
In trying to start a business, I have more or less resigned myself to the fact that at some point, I will make some unforeseeable error that will run afoul of some tax code or some regulation which will result in a level of fines that will bankrupt me.
Marauding gangs of thugs can be seen and fought. They can even, sometimes, be reasoned with. They can be prepared for, defended against, and, even if they destroy everything you care about, you at least know what happened and why.
When the government determines you owe thousands of dollars in taxes or an insurance company tells you that you owe thousands to the hospital, it is a force of nature that cannot be resisted. But, what is worse, is that you feel like you should be able to do something about it. You can read the rules. You can read the contract.
But who has time for that? Who knows which rules to read? Who can afford to consult a lawyer to read it for them?
Of course, I don't support candidates like Trump, not because I like the system, but because I know that, rather than tearing it all down, he will just build it up even more and make it even worse.
And I don't support anarchists because, much as it seems appealing to be dealing with marauding gangs rather than the fear of bureaucracy, the fact remains that the constant danger of sudden death for myself and my family, really is worse than the lingering fear of the taxman or the insurance man or any other Man serving me with unpleasant papers.
In other words, my mindset is certainly growing closer and closer to that of the Trump voter. Only my understanding of the world makes me not like them. Worse, it means that I understand just enough to know that I really should be able to grasp this all but not actually enough to be able to do anything about it.
