...so to take some of your points and try to rationalise them....

The rape...I guess they see it that in the US loads of pay out on civil cases, what matters is he wasnt convicted in a criminal court.


The central park 5 should have been executed.

I dont know enough about that one, or what he said.


He wanted Dr. Birx to investigate whether drinking bleach can cure Covid.

I guess they think he was just thinking out load the way he does????


He's proud of remembering the sequence "person man woman camera tv."

I think a lot of people like that he isnt an intellectual.


He claims that Haitians legally present in the MidWest are eating their neighbors' domestic pets.

Just an attention grabbing thing to say to make a point.....they can live with that.


I'm not sure I'd be taking notes on his analysis of the causes of inflation. OTOH I'd believe him when he says he's going to put up taxes for poor people, cut them for rich people, and put up tariffs while deporting illegally-present agricultural laborers, which will cause a spike in food prices.

People who concerned about immigration are probably sick of hearing it cant be done for the sake of the economy, the same as people on the left are sick of the same excuses.
I didnt know he had talked about tax rises for the poor, as for the cuts for the rich, there are plenty of people who wanted see lower taxes for everyone.

Unless you think his voters are idiots, which I don't, you have to grant that they aren't voting for him ironically. They actually want the anti-abortion, anti-immigrant, white supremacist, militaristic, protectionist, anti-education, anti-vaccine, anti-Ukraine, pro-Netanyahu, anti-childcare, anti-trans, anti-single people policies that he and JD Vance have promised. Trump obviously can't remember and doesn't care what he promised, but equally, his administration tried to do a lot of what he promised in 2016, and this time around they're far better prepared and more professional and experienced.

Anti single people could be sen as pro family, anti Ukrainian could be seen as saving Ukrainian lives, anti immigration, they would say anti illegal immigration, protectionist, they say as saving US jobs.

So I do agree they knew what what they were doing, but not quite in the way you framed it.