&gt;I would say, even more specifically than this, is that the American social arrangement literally contained the idea that even if you were the most downtrodden dirt farmer white, you were still de facto better than the queers, jews, blacks, mexicans, etc.<

I think that has been pretty apparent since Obama was elected. I think the wealthier end of the neo-confederate spectrum came to the happy conclusion that they could make a lot of cash off of fueling that poorer end anger, by direct donations and by running on a platform as such and legislating shit like tax cuts for the wealthy and deregulating business to lower cost regardless of the danger in doing so.