Apple is aligned with Trump thanks to Tim Cook

The infographic is explaining broad cultural differences. If you think many people in liberal america are changing their laptops because of Tim Cook, you are out of touch.

NYT writes with a conservative slant

Again, this is about broad cultural trends. I know one of lemmy's favorite catchphrases is "America has a center right party and a far right party" - and I'm not saying that isn't true. But the people in these parties and the people occupying their associated social demographics see large differences between each other, which is what this infographic is about. American liberals, by and large, respect the NYT. They might disagree with its slant in one way or another, but if a god-and-guns conservative starts criticizing it over thanksgiving dinner, they will defend it tooth and nail. Meanwhile, American leftists are not represented in this infographic because they make up an incredibly small portion of the population, and are largely culturally irrelivant outside a few isolated and insular pockets.

HP is shit-tier hardware, but WhyTF is it red?

It is a stand-in for non-Mac PCs in general. They probably felt they had to pick a brand to counter "Mac", and HP only has 2 letters and so fit in the infographic better.

What makes Basketball inherently democratic/liberal? What makes Baseball republican/conservative?

I agree this is their weakest comparison. I assume they were going with basketball=black people, baseball=apple pie. A more apt comparison, imo, would be conservatives watching sports while liberals watch TED Talks or something.