I have considered that notion for a long time, but ultimately dismissed it as pure nonsense. The fact of the matter is that people can be tricked and be taken advantage of. It is not condescending to point that out when it happens.
If someone gets conned into transferring all the money in their bank account to a stranger in Nigeria on the belief that it will "free up" millions that will be theirs, you cannot possibly make the argument that pointing out they got conned is condescending, that maybe that person knew what was actually in their best interest. They thought they knew, but they were, frankly, wrong.
The exact same thing happens with many poor people in our society: they get conned into voting for politicians who will absolutely screw them over. Furthermore, it doesn't happen once or twice. It happens repeatedly. And again, pointing this out is not condescending. It's just the truth.
Alright, glad we have you here to save all the stupid poor people from themselves. After all, if someone is poor, they must be stupid. Or lazy. Or both. FSM knows, they need some philosopher-kings to come along and show them the light.
I think part of it is the culture of believing you can be anything you want to be. It's the same reason the poor often vote against their interests in the US - they believe that soon they'll be rich and want low taxes and few regulations. That they are the exception.
Implied in every single sentence of this paragraph is and underlying sentiment of: "this is a false belief and they are stupid for holding it."
And ALL of that aside, nobody has really responded to my question of "why assume these people are wrong?" Except that camel guy who basically said "no, they're stupid so there is no reason to consider that."
So we're back where we started. I say that poor people who vote for lower taxes and the like, may actually be making a perfectly rational decision. It may not be a optimal decision if you only take financial outcomes into consideration but it may still be rational... because the people making the decision may not be basing it on financial considerations to exclusion.
This whole mindset of "you're too stupid to know what's good for you, so just let us smart people be in control and make things OK" is something that is very condescending and is repugnant to many (most?) Americans. Which is one good reason it's hard for politicians pushing such policies to gain ground. It might be better to actually, you know, talk to those people and try to understand what their principles, goals, and motivations are, instead of assuming that they're stupid.