Lots of ground to cover here, I'll pick a few and give my thoughts.
Why do people vote the way they do. I can speak for myself. My general philosophy on government is that is has some very important core responsibilities and then it should stay out of most other things as much as possible. In that sense I'm probably more libertarian than either of the two major parties but I don't really fit them either due to their extreme aversion to any government involvement and isolationist policies. More often than not I find myself in synch with republican policies on limited government but when it comes to social issues I am more closely aligned with the democrats. As a result I tend to vote for moderate republicans. If the evangelical wing left that party I'd probably be pretty strongly aligned with the republican party. That said, I evaluate each candidate individually, I don't chose based upon the letter following their name. I don't like a lot of what Trump stands for so I didn't vote for him. I didn't like Clinton either, I didn't vote for her. Each party has a base that will vote for their candidates with very little regard for who they run but a larger block than either of those consider themselves moderates or independent and could vote for either party depending upon how their messages resonate. I'm happy to be in that block of wishy washy swing voters
As to economic status and party affiliation. I'm sure a lot of people would consider me "rich" although I don't. I am definitely very comfortable but I don't have a private jet or mega yacht, I have a budget albeit one that allows me a lot of luxuries. By that measure people would consider my vote stereotypical. Take a look at the Billionaire crowd though, you have a few notable conservatives (the Kochs, Thiel, Adelson) but there are a lot of liberals in that set (Soros, Buffet, Gates, Zuckerberg, Brin, Bloomberg, Spielberg, Ballmar, Beniof, Steyer); republicans don't have a monopoly on "the rich," particularly those who have already established their wealth. On the flip side, we have a lot of economic mobility in this country and many people realize that. I wasn't born with a silver spoon in my mouth, I've built what I have, and I didn't change my core beliefs as my tax bracket moved. I think there's a notable set of people who currently make a modest living but aspire to have more, in that mindset a "soak the rich" perspective is short sighted. Finally, a lot of blue collar America has hobbies that democrats seem to increasingly oppose: shooting, hunting, fishing, hotrods, motorcycles, 4x4s, snowmobiles; right or wrong much of the country feels that these pastimes are under assault from the left. Being able to continue a hobby you love may be more important than the top tax rate or limits on corporate inversion. The votes reflect that.
Lastly, you mentioned damage to the environment. My personal viewpoint is that we have reasonable restrictions on behavior today that protect our environment and most new legislation in this arena provides small incremental gain at great cost. Our skies and waters are beautiful in this country and I want to keep it so. I don't think though that we need to forever drive tolerances for various potentially harmful compounds lower and lower. It's not the toxin, it's the dose. Whether arsenic is allowed at 112 or 64 parts per million in a stream (those may not be the correct figures, I'm going from memory) doesn't bother me, I'll drink it at either; but the cost of driving down to 64 could be very burdensome. Classifying some home owner's lot as a wetland and not allowing them to put in a fence when 95% of history has that area devoid of visible water is just an invasion of personal property rights. You didn't state this but I find the people who think we'll destroy earth to be arrogant. There have been multiple global scale catastrophic events on this planet through its history and the planet - and life - go on. We can make life difficult for ourselves or less pleasant but I don't fear even that with the reasonable regulation we already have in place. To me, environmentalism is a new religion and driven more by emotion and faith than facts.
My opinion, I hope that provides some insight.
