I believe you are overstating the economic gains made under Trump by a lot. It certainly hasn’t been much of a recovery from the great recession at any time since ’08 and especially for the growing numbers of those skirting the poverty line that were previously among the middle class. They are still just barely above water and the trajectory overall has been steady with none of the benefits promised from the massive tax cuts Trump pushed. When you do big things you had better provide big results. The luster wore off trickle-down economics in the crash.
One also doesn’t have to be a radical climate activist to understand that unleashing industry, especially fossil fuels, from all regulation is not going to end well for our country. Preventing coal mines from polluting our waterways with impunity offers no economic harm to any company that operates within the limits of common sense caution, but enabling that pollution certainly offers many costs to society that it shouldn’t have to bear, while also not adding any jobs.
It is more than obvious that Trump doesn’t care about anything not directly and immediately affecting him, and that is not the mark of a sane person, much less a great leader. Even those who viewed government as overreaching may have some deserved reservations about simply negating any oversight of vast areas of the economy and industry with a few strokes of a pen. Even the most conservative Presidents in the past have paid lip service to radical libertarians while understanding that they have few choices and governing more from the center. Trump flipped that on its head and is catering to the most radical extremes of conservatism to great cost to our natural resource bank and environment.
Trump won in ’16 because the nation was ready for big changes and the DNC offered up the most status quo politician possible, who also was the most unliked and unlikeable politician in recent history. If the majority of voters don’t believe they are better off, or that their children will be, their hunger for change will not be satiated and Bernie may offer them the direction change they want. Democrats have not provided much contrast to Republican ideology over the last few decades, so if Bernie can pull off a coup on the party he may find enough support to squeak out a win. His poll numbers in ’16 had him well ahead of Trump and Trump has certainly done little to shrink that gap.
