Bigfoot, new doc on Paterson film

[progressoid]

2. I would like to see a venn diagram of the overlap of Trump voters and ... well ...

all the nutty things.

Looking for such a graphic took me down a depressing rabbit hole from which I found this masters thesis.
It was written in 2020. It comes to us via....ummm....checks notes....yup... Russia.




https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342438138_Populism_Conspiracy_Theories_and_Political_Preferences_for_Federal_Office_in_the_US

Sorry for the funky format. I copied from the pdf.

Government of the Russian Federation
FEDERAL STATE AUTONOMOUS EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION
FOR HIGHER EDUCATION NATIONAL RESEARCH UNIVERSITY
“HIGHER SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS”
Faculty of Social Sciences
Patrick Scott Sawyer
student
MASTER THESIS
Populism, Conspiracy Theories, and Political Preferences for Federal Office
in the US
Field of Study 41.04.04 Political Science
Master’s Program “Politics. Economics. Philosophy"

Abstract
Populism, Conspiracy Theories, and Political Preferences for Federal Office in the US

The onset of the “post-truth” era, characterized by the accretion of conspiracy theories and “fake news”, has generally coincided with a rise in right-wing populist groups and politicians who are often the receptors and propagators of such conspiracy theories. The proposed research project intends to focus on the way in which conspiracy theories are incorporated into populist rhetoric by politicians and its effect on their supporters, arguing that conspiracism is not simply a tendency of populism but also holds instrumental value; the populist radical right can use them to either demonize their opponent, resulting a lower tendency of voters to cast their ballot for them or produce a “rallying” effect whereby more voters flock to support the populist candidate. Given the lack of detailed data concerning adherence to certain conspiracy theories, the author incorporates a new method for studying conspiracism in political candidates: data concerning an interest in two political conspiracy theories emphasized by Donald Trump, the Clinton Body Count conspiracy theory and Birtherism, from Google Trends. Taking the case of Donald Trump’s 2016 Presidential campaign, the results demonstrate a significantly positive relationship between these two prominent conspiracy theories used in Trump’s political rhetoric and votes for him on the state level, which suggests that conspiracy theories play an important role in framing populist arguments.
In the second empirical chapter, the data acquired from Google Trends is merged with individual-level survey data from the 2016 Cooperative Congressional Election Survey so as to test for the “demonization” and “rallying” effects associated with conspiratorial rhetoric by investigating divergences in voting behavior based on whether there is high or low interest in the aforementioned conspiracy theories in their state. The utilization of a multi-level model demonstrates voters were less likely to vote for Clinton in states where interest in anti-Clinton conspiracy theories was highest, testifying to the existence of a “demonization” effect. Meanwhile, in those states where interest in Birtherism was highest, which was primarily used during the 2016 election as an attempt to mobilize a core set of voters, voters were more likely to vote in favor of Donald Trump. The results of both series
of tests testify to the significant role that conspiracy theories played in the 2016 election and provide evidence as
to the consequences of such conspiratorial rhetoric. Finally, through the use of quantitative methods, the current study comes to several conclusions as to the social basis of these two “populist” conspiracy theories. The anti-Clinton conspiracy theories, which included allegations of high-level corruption and plots by political and financial elites, were shown to be more effective on lower-income and lower-educated cohorts of voters, as the conspiracy theory could blame an outgroup for their impoverished state. Birtherism, on the other hand, which centers around the personality of the country’s first African-American president and alleges a Muslim plot, saw conservative voters diverge in response to the conspiracy theory, likely due to the importance that cultural issues play for them.

6 Conclusion
The rise of populist parties in Europe and North America, especially in the form of the populist radical right, is often accompanied in parallel by so-called “post-truth” politics. Indeed, a large number of studies have pointed to the robust connection that disinformation, conspiracy theories, and “fake news” have with the populist radical right (Jylha, Strimling, and Rydgren, 2019; Krasodomski-Jones, 2019; Silva, Vegetti, and Littvay, 2017). To the casual observer (and many researchers) it would seem as if conspiratorial ideation in the populist radical right was simply a tendency. The current research, instead, argues that conspiracism as manifested in political actors such as populist radical right politicians, holds strategic or instrumental value as well. It is not so relevant that Joseph McCarthy, for his part, saw “enemies from within” in every part of the American government, but that the consequences of this rhetoric permitted him to cleanse the political arena of political opponents. As Hofstadter (2008 [1964]) noted, a certain radicalizing effect takes place in which the “enemy” is viewed not in terms of interests or differing opinions, but as essentially “evil”, which justifies an attitude in which only the total defeat of the enemy will suffice. A similar dynamic is believed to have existed with America’s first populists; the usage,
manipulation, and propagation of the conspiracy surrounding the “Crime of ‘73” aided in providing a strong populist critique of the Democratic and Republican parties permitting the People’s Party to characterize them both as being “owned” by the same financial powers (Ostler, 1995). This permitted the party rank-and-file to help explain the GOP’s reluctance to respond to the farmers’ grievances, simplified global economic and social processes, and legitimized the formation of a new party in a time of crisis. This thesis has as its main point of investigation the political relationship between the populist radical right and conspiracy theories. Is it the case that they simply have a tendency towards conspiratorial ideation coinciding with their political ideology or can this framing serve a strategic or instrumental purpose beyond this? The current research investigates a more modern case, the 2016 Presidential election, which draws parallels in many ways to the two aforementioned cases. Donald Trump, whom analysts have nicknamed the “Conspiracist-in-chief”, has been known to invoke conspiracy theories on a regular basis, and made heavy use of them during the campaign. Two conspiracy theories of importance during the election cycle were the “Clinton Body Count” conspiracy theory, which alleges that the Clinton family is secretly responsible for the murder of many political opponents and whistle-blowers, and Birtherism, which alleges that Barack Obama was actually
born in another country and thus, was constitutionally ineligible to be President of the United States. This case was chosen in order to test two hypotheses and two mechanisms related to the relationship between the populist radical right and their usage of conspiratorial rhetoric; (1) Conspiracy theories were used by Trump, the radical right populist, as a prominent framing technique, resulting in positive political benefits; (1a) By “Othering”
political opponents through disinformation, conspiracy theories had the effect of rallying voters to support Trump; (1b) By “Othering” political opponents through disinformation, conspiracy theories led to a lower tendency of voters to cast their ballots for Trump’s political opponent Hillary Clinton; (4) The individual level effect is stronger in areas where there is a higher interest in conspiracy theories. In Chapter Three, the historical context, and political function of both conspiracy theories was outlined. In the case of the “Clinton Body Count” conspiracy and other related anti-Clinton conspiracy theories, the principle framing of this conspiracy theory demonized the Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton, whereas in the case of Birtherism, its continued invocation on the campaign trail had the effect of retaining “a consistent group of supporters” whose feelings of resentment and urgency spilled over from the Obama years.