Yes, that’s how these people think. I fundamentally disagree with it and thinks it’s destructive to society, but these people want to watch things get destroyed. This is why they also applaud cuts in welfare and the federal government. Anything that is part of status quo is considered part of the swamp, so it must burn.
Trump was heavily in debt before elected president. He's scammed his way out and is now rich from being president. Him an his billionaire lackeys run the country by edict. They are the swamp.
A lot of authoritarian countries label themselves as governments of the people and their figurehead as a brave warrior leading a permanent revolution against the ruling class.
Even when their figurehead has held onto power for several decades and executes 12 year olds who write "this gov sux LOL" on a bathroom wall for being a dissident, they keep claiming to be leading an uphill fight against some mysterious power above and half the country keeps loving them.
People love an underdog story. Frame yourself as a permanent underdog, even when you're not, and half of nearly any given country will love you. America now has people with hundreds of billions of dollars claiming to be oppressed underdogs. It should be insane. But people believe it. They'll believe it 20 years from now, too.
I distinctly remember listening to Limbaugh make fun of Trump while riding in a truck with my dad in the late ‘90s. Most of my image of the guy up until his run in 2016 actually came from people making fun of what an awful person and terrible businessman he was, and I probably heard more of that from conservatives than liberals, even. Like, he’s obviously a clown with sleazy used car salesman energy. Everybody knew, of course, because it’s so easy to see, and nobody denied it, it was assumed fact any time anyone talked about the guy.
Fast forward a couple decades and he’s god-king of the right. My dad, who also personally told me things about what a shitty person Trump was, back then, loves the guy and thinks he’s good at everything.
Countries don't have friends, they only have interests. Thinking in terms of a kindergarten and not in terms of geopolitics disqualifies you from serious participation.
Geopolitically, it makes even less sense. Ever since the pandemic it became evident near-shore and friend-shore measures are the only way to ensure resilient supply chains.
To put it simply, would you trust more the Europeans/Canadians/Mexicans to keep selling you something you really need, or Iran/China/Russia?
I think people were made to be disgruntled though, it's falsely directed anger. Whether or not that matters is irrelevant for now. From everything I've seen a lot of the anger was misdirected.
If things keep going the way they're going though, you might see some proper revolt sooner or later.
Except for the people who were doing fine with the status quo and just voted for Trump because he triggers the libs. They might have a wake-up call coming.