A collection of reader questions from the last few weeks.
I’m Isaac Saul, and this is Tangle: an independent, nonpartisan, subscriber-supported politics newsletter that summarizes the best arguments from across the political spectrum on the news of the day — then “my take.”
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One of my favorite parts of Tangle is answering reader questions.
Not only do they help me understand what Tangle readers are thinking and worrying about, but they often stop me in my tracks and make me think long and hard about my own views. They function not only as a temperature check on my readership, but as a gut check for me.
Unfortunately, I always get more than one question coming in a day (usually a dozen or so), so I can't keep up with all of them. But there are so many great questions out there that I want to answer. So, every now and then, I try to knock down a bunch in one swing with a reader mailbag edition.
So that's what we're doing today. I hope you enjoy it. And please, keep the questions coming! As always, you can reply to this email (it goes straight to my inbox) or fill out this form.
Q: It appears to me that most Trump supporters are incredibly gullible and believe most of what he says with no questions asked or no investigative efforts are made to search out whether or not he is lying. In my mind, after having been raised in ultra-conservative west Texas, this gullibility is connected to their religious faith, but I have no idea how to prove it. Church goers have a lifetime history of being told to believe what some religious leader says and believe without any questioning and that carries over to their political beliefs. Psychologists would call that gullibility. In your dealings with the conservatives and liberals, do you see or sense that connection?
— Nick from New Braunfels, Texas