Donald Trump's kryptonite: millions of active – and furious – Latino voters

[bemildred]

Barely a day goes by when Donald Trump offers Latino something new to get riled up about. In a “Cinco de Mayo” tweet on Thursday, for example, he declared “I love Hispanics!” in the caption to a selfie that showed him digging into a “taco bowl” at his desk.

“This can’t be serious,” said my Mexican cousin. “No words,” wrote a Cuban colleague. “No” and “disgusting” were just some of the other comments my Latino friends – both Democratic and Republican – posted after I uploaded a screen shot of the tweet to my Facebook page.

The presidential candidate started his campaign by saying that Mexicans are rapists and criminals. He then extended his hateful remarks to include those “coming from all over South and Latin America” and the Middle East, vowed to deport all undocumented immigrants and bar all Muslims, and proposes rescinding birthright citizenship and building a great wall between us Mexico. And yet, he is now the presumptive Republican nominee.

And it’s apparently dawned on him that he might need some of the approximately 27.3 million Latino eligible voters to cast a ballot for him if he actually wants to win.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/may/09/latino-voter-turnout-trump-kryptonite

[marble falls]

1. I hope they're even more active by Nov 8.

[Gothmog]

2. Latino voters will be voting against Trump in massive numbers

[bemildred]

3. I hope so.

If he manages to pry Latinos of all stripes away from the Republican Party as fully as the AA community already has been, it will all be over for the divisive politics of the last 60 years or so. You ain't going to win any more national elections here with race-baiting non-whites.

We may get another civil war out of it, too, but that needs to be put to rest finally one way or another, it's been 150 years now. We've had enough of the assholes running things here.

[gordianot]

4. Oh the Civil War most people get it wrong.

It was a clash between Equality-Civility vs Liberty (Do what you want). In theory Equality Civility won but the Liberty do what you want side has never been able to resolve their differences. Too bad both are necessary.

[bemildred]

5. "Do what you want" can lead to difficulties when you need to resolve your differences. nt

[gordianot]

6. That is a basic dilemma for the human condition.

....and is not that hard to understand but very difficult to fix.

[bemildred]

7. It's only difficult if you aren't willing to compromise.

If you are willing to compromise on the issues at hand, then equality and civility provide a sound basis to resolve them. If you for one reason or another aren't willing to compromise, then the matter will not get resolved, or will be resolved by force.

[gordianot]

8. Good summation that is what happens.

My favorite class to teach was the American Civil War. You would have got an "A".

[bemildred]

9. Thank you. I read a lot.

It's an old story. Nomad vs Agriculturalists, Mercenary enterpreneurs like Cortez vs settled states throughout the history of civilizations. Plains indians vs the farmers here too. We are not all that well domesticated yet. One of the best reasons to have an inclusive society is so you won't have anybody hacking away at you from outside. Everybody has something to lose if you do it right.

But this place started out with explorers and people looking to strike out on their own, to get away, and we still have a lot of that sentiment here.

[gordianot]

12. Some claim the American Civil war sprang from the English Civil War.

The Roundheads have commonality with the Union versus the landed gentry Cavaliers. Odd how universal conflicts repeat themselves. Yes A+.

[bemildred]

15. Yes, the "Cousins Wars".

Cromwell, American Revolution, American Civil War.

One of my nephews introduced me to that idea a few years back. Good book about it too.

I think it has a lot of explanatory power, it helps you see certain things, I like it, but I don't know that I'd want to predict anything based on it.

And those are my people, the pasty-whites, for sure, both sides.

[ailsagirl]

13. I think he's "stepped in it" big-time and there's no going back

I can't see how he can possibly redeem himself with Latinos-- they know the score

[bemildred]

16. Well, him for sure, this time around. nt

[MisterP]

10. and as we saw in East LA, Clinton's kryptonite too

[neeksgeek]

11. Just an anecdote...

Dinner with my wife's family last night - they are all Mexican, except for me and my brother in law.

Trump isn't getting votes from them. Nobody at the table thought the taco bowl stunt was very cute!

[ailsagirl]

14. Drumpf thought that's what he had to do to win their support

How insulting for them and how seriously asinine of him!!

Keep it up, Drumpf!!

[bemildred]

17. +1. nt