I was in a doctor’s office in Barrington IL today. Also seated there were two men, late ’50s or early ’60s. Their clothes were casual but expensive looking, like you see on a country club golf course. (I used to carry bags, in High School). They began talking about politics, One asked the other who he favored in the Presidential race. The second answered, “I don’t know, whoever is the Republican nominee”. The first man asked the second if he had seen some election special on Fox News. The second said, “No, like I said, whoever is the Republican nominee. I’ll tell you one thing, it won’t be Sanders. That guy would raise our taxes!” The second agreed that taxes were the most important issue and “Democrats just want to raise taxes.” Neither mentioned Clinton, neither positively nor negatively. The only choices for them were Sanders or any Republican and it definitely wouldn’t be Sanders.
So, what I got out of this is a rebuttal of the theory that Republicans would desert in hordes if Trump were the nominee. These were not know-nothing Tea Party blue collar whites. These were not neo-Confederate Bundy clones. These were affluent suburban white guys, moderately or very rich, it’s hard to tell. The only issue of any importance was taxes, despite the fact that they obviously had the money to pay them. They just had no interest in anything but money.
For reference the wiki page says “The racial makeup of the village was 96.16% White, 0.62% African American, 0.13% Native American, 2.00% Asian, 0.01% Pacific Islander, 0.31% from other races, and 0.77% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2.33% of the population. The median income for a household in the village was $83,085, and the median income for a family was $102,120. Males had a median income of $80,232 versus $38,795 for females. The per capita income for the village was $43,942.” Goldman-Sachs CEO and US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson attended Barrington High School and apparently still has a house (I’ll bet it’s an estate) there.