Lots of reasons 2008 would do this.
- First black president
- People losing their houses and jobs due to financial crash
- Proliferation of smartphones and the Internet (remember dial-up?)
this post was submitted on 13 Feb 2026
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I think you should also include the Iraq War. Evangelicals set a lot of their identity in their belief that the War on Terror would be the final Holy War that would bring about the Kingdom of Christ (with them at the top, of course). But instead their holy war turned into an undeniable catastrophe in front of their eyes.
And also Jesus didn't come back like he was supposed to.
I'm thinking so much of it was the first one.
And when we say "polarization", I'm sure that's a bothsiderist way to say: "Republicans/conservatives getting even more crazy".
The effect of economic turmoil should not be underestimated. "That guy over there took my house" would boost polarization for sure.
A black man was elected president.
Bingo.
The Republicans/conservatives have always had a dark undercurrent and plenty of crazy in their midst and heaps of racism. They started to really rip that mask off when Obama was elected.
Then Pedonald started up with being King of the Birthers and we were really on our way...
Fox News was crafted…
A black man who was also the first Democratic president after the rise of Fox News. They were obnoxious enough with W in the white house, but then Obama was elected and the circus really started.
Faux (started in 1996) and hate radio spent a good deal of the 90s trying to take down Clinton. He totally consumed the right wing. Hillary was not wrong when she talked about a vast right wing conspiracy.
Oh, and it surely didn't help them get any less crazy when people were referring to Clinton as the first black President.
I think years of this hateful nonsense and conspiracy theories really came to a head when they watched W flame out to the point that they constructed a fake movement, originally called teabaggers, to pretend they weren't Republicans. The economy cratered at the end of W's reign, the Iraq War was shown to be the quagmire all the liberals told them it was going to be, and now a black man who they were told was a Kenyan usurper was here to clean up the mess.
The fact that most normal Americans really rather liked him drove them all the crazier.
True, the radio shows were definitely filling that role. The idea that the TV networks were left leaning was a big talking point for them.
I know Fox started in '96 and they were definitely already nuts with the "fair and balanced" stuff, but at least to me it felt like it picked up a lot of viewership during the Bush administration.
And that was literally the apocalypse for 50% of this country
I feel like it’s a toss up between this (old-school racism) and occupy wall street looking too scary to the bigwigs (who had to amplify racism and invent “woke” as a new wedge)
US citizens elected a change candidate who then proceeded to bail out the banks while people were going homeless, and the followed it up by handing over healthcare to insurance companies.
Obama jaded a generation out of the concept that progress could be made through politics. They became ample fodder for the nativist/ auth right movements which would follow.
"But why?"
Easy, a black guy became president and conservatives lost their fucking minds.
First black president- United States loses it's mind Find out covid is killing poor black people more than white people- America loses it's mind and calls mask mandates fascist Find out social programs benefit black and brown people- America calls them welfare queens and demands investigations and budget cuts. Sounds about ~~racist~~ America to me.