I had a discussion with a right-winger last night about The Felon

[Metaphorical]

6. You likely lost him at "I've read ..."

Most right-wingers are not deep thinkers. They want to ignore the inconsistencies in their life, the cognitive dissonance. In their own minds, they are the good guys, defending their institutions and their president against the rabble and the rabble-rousers. They want stability in their beliefs because they see the world as black and white, and they are always on the side of white. Reading challenges those beliefs, forces them to see the world in more subtle shades of grey; this is also why they don't like most forms of humour except the most violent.

Trump does not appeal to deep thinkers. He wraps himself in the norms of the status quo even as he is busy disassembling that same status quo. This is why his most ardent followers like him - he shows them that they don't have to be intelligent to be successful, and that it is all right to be cruel, thuggish, petty, mean, and vindictive. He justifies their beliefs, encourages them even further down this path. He teaches that you can get away with anything, but only if you are Donald Trump. They want to be him, and that means NOT thinking.

That is how fascists are made.