Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think he was referring to you. I can't speak for Trump, but when I hear him say that, I think of the ANTIFA types. I think of the radicals. The people that hate this country. And they do. It is showing up with increasing frequency, and MSM just rarely covers it. If a person is not shown this side of things, they won't be able to get a feel for what's coming. NYC, if you aren't following the radical left, Trump's message won't make any sense. I don't really think east coasters are the crazy ones. Most people I know from the NE have a love of this country, even if they are quicker to point out the flaws and buy into some of the progressive lines. However, the progressives on the California, Washington, and Oregon coast have lost their mind. I think it's a good predictor of where we are headed. My sister in law included me in a group text that asked us all to question what we're really celebrating today. Super long message full of pretentious BS.

Now, I want to acknowledge that there are those on the right who just use scare tactics to rile up their base and boogieman the radical left. I am not that guy. Up until recently, I saw a thread, but wasn't concerned by it. Lately, I'm seeing the veil being torn away. I'm seeing defense of violence. Seeing justification for radicalism. Seeing censorship. Group think. To make it worse, I'm seeing more radicals gain institutional power, especially of editorial control of news. I'm seeing the funding pouring into openly marxist organizations. Combine that with my interest in history, and the signs are becoming clearer that American may be unable to recover from this.

I'm going to share a metaphor, which rarely works online, but I'll give it a shot. I was a pretty hardcore surfer for a while. I got pretty good. One of the hardest things to master is reading the ocean. You can tell how good a person is at surfing, more often than not, by how soon they start paddling for a wave. When you're out past the breakers, and you see the best guy start paddling, you follow him. To me, it looks no different that the rest of the ocean, but he sees it coming. Eventually, I can see what he sees, but if I had waited to paddle, I would have no hope of catching that wave. There would be a lot of people who were worse than me, that didn't move because they still couldn't see it, and they'd miss their chance. This situation feels similar. I am watching these events play out in the future, and I suspect there are some bad times ahead. Some folks, much smarter than me, were seeing it coming, but most are still sitting there thinking it's a calm day.

Also, the bolded point you referenced above may be rhetorical as I might be limited to anecdotes and historical examples to prove it. I agree that there are real issues we need to face as Americans. But, I don't believe the most vocal are really trying to solve those issues as much as they are trying to use them to divide us and gain power. Again, that's not all, but it's enough to be dangerous.

---