"I asked my student why he voted for Trump"

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  • #64194
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    I asked my student why he voted for Trump. The answer was thoughtful, smart, and terrifying.

    RICK PERLSTEINJAN

    http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/01/donald-trump-2016-election-oklahoma-working-class

    This past October, I taught a weeklong seminar on the history of conservatism to honors students from around the state of Oklahoma. In five long days, my nine very engaged students and I got to know each other fairly well. Six were African American women. Then there was a middle-aged white single mother, a white kid who looked like any other corn-fed Oklahoma boy and identified himself as “queer,” and the one straight white male. I’ll call him Peter.

    Peter is 21 and comes from a town of about 3,000 souls. It’s 85 percent white, according to the 2010 census, and 1.2 percent African American—which would make for about 34 black folks. “Most people live around the poverty line,” Peter told the class, and hunting is as much a sport as a way to put food on the table.

    Peter was one of the brightest students in the class, and certainly the sweetest. He liked to wear overalls to school—and on the last day, in a gentle tweak of the instructor, a red “Make America Great Again” baseball cap. A devout evangelical, he’d preferred former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee at the start of the primary season, but was now behind Donald Trump.

    One day the students spent three hours drafting essays about the themes we’d talked about in class. I invited them to continue writing that night so the next morning we could discuss one of their pieces in detail. I picked Peter’s because it was extraordinary. In only eight hours he’d churned out eight pages, eloquent and sharp.

    When I asked him if I could discuss his essay in this article, he replied, “That sounds fine with me. If any of my work can be used to help the country with its political turmoil, I say go for it!” Then he sent me a new version with typos corrected and a postelection postscript: “My wishful hope is that my compatriots will have their tempers settled by Trump’s election, and that maybe both sides can learn from the Obama and Trump administrations in order to understand how both sides feel. Then maybe we can start electing more moderate people, like John Kasich and Jim Webb, who can find reasonable commonality on both sides and make government work.” Did I mention he was sweet?

    When he read the piece aloud in class that afternoon in October, the class was riveted. Several of the black women said it was the first time they’d heard a Trump supporter clearly set forth what he believed and why. (Though, defying stereotypes, one of these women—an aspiring cop—was also planning to vote for Trump.)

    Peter’s essay took off from the main class reading, Corey Robin’s The Reactionary Mind: Conservatism From Edmund Burke to Sarah Palin. Its central argument is that conservative movements across history are united in their devotion to the maintenance of received social hierarchy. Peter, whose essay was titled “Plight of the Redneck,” had a hard time seeing how that applied to the people he knew.

    “These people are scraping the bottom of the barrel, and they, seemingly, have nothing to benefit from maintaining the system of order that keeps them at the bottom.”
    “We all live out in the wilderness, either in the middle of a forest or on a farm,” he wrote. “Some people cannot leave their homes during times of unfortunate weather. Many still dry clothes by hanging them on wires with clothespins outside. These people are nowhere near the top, or even the middle, of any hierarchy. These people are scraping the bottom of the barrel, and they, seemingly, have nothing to benefit from maintaining the system of order that keeps them at the bottom.” His county ended up going about 70 percent for Trump.

    Concerning race, Peter wrote, “In Oklahoma, besides Native Americans, there have traditionally been very few minorities. Few blacks have ever lived near the town that I am from…Even in my generation, despite there being a little more diversity, there was no racism, nor was there a reason for racism to exist.” His town’s 34 or so black people might beg to differ, of course; white people’s blindness to racism in their midst is an American tradition. As one of the African American students in the class—I’ll call her Karen—put it, whites in her town see “racism as nonexistent unless they witness it firsthand. And then it almost has to be over the top—undeniable acts of violence like hate crimes or cross burnings on front lawns—before they would acknowledge it as such.” But it’s relevant to the story I’m telling that I’m certain Peter isn’t individually, deliberately racist, and that Karen agrees.

    Still, Peter’s thinking might help us frame a central debate on the left about what to make of Trump’s victory. Is it, in the main, a recrudescence of bigotry on American soil—a reactionary scream against a nation less white by the year? Or is it more properly understood as an economically grounded response to the privations that neoliberalism has wracked upon the heartland?

    Peter knows where he stands. He remembers multiple factories and small businesses “shutting down or laying off. Next thing you know, half of downtown” in the bigger city eight miles away “became vacant storefronts.” Given that experience, he has concluded, “for those people who have no political voice and come from states that do not matter, the best thing they can do is try to send in a wrecking ball to disrupt the system.”

    When Peter finished with that last line, there was a slight gasp from someone in the class—then silence, then applause. They felt like they got it.

    I was also riveted by Peter’s account, convinced it might be useful as a counterbalance to glib liberal dismissals of the role of economic decline in building Trumpland. Then I did some research.

    According to the 2010 census, the median household income in Peter’s county is a little more than $45,000. By comparison, Detroit’s is about $27,000 and Chicago’s (with a higher cost of living) is just under $49,000. The poverty rate is 17.5 percent in the county and 7.6 percent in Peter’s little town, compared with Chicago’s 22.7 percent. The unemployment rate has hovered around 4 percent.

    The town isn’t rich, to be sure. But it’s also not on the “bottom.” Oklahoma on the whole has been rather dynamic economically: Real GDP growth was 2.8 percent in 2014—down from 4.3 percent in 2013, but well above the 2.2 percent nationally. The same was true of other Trump bastions like Texas (5.2 percent growth) and West Virginia (5.1 percent).

    Peter, though, perceives the region’s economic history as a simple tale of desolation and disappointment. “Everyone around was poor, including the churches,” he wrote, “and charities were nowhere near (this wasn’t a city, after all), so more people had to use some sort of government assistance. Taxes went up [as] the help became more widespread.”

    He was just calling it like he saw it. But it’s striking how much a bright, inquisitive, public-spirited guy can take for granted that just is not so. Oklahoma’s top marginal income tax rate was cut by a quarter point to 5 percent in 2016, the same year lawmakers hurt the working poor by slashing the earned-income tax credit. On the “tax burden” index used by the website WalletHub, Oklahoma’s is the 45th lowest, with rock-bottom property taxes and a mere 4.5 percent sales tax. (On Election Day, Oklahomans voted down a 1-point sales tax increase meant to raise teacher pay, which is 49th in the nation.).

    As for government assistance, Oklahoma spends less than 10 percent of its welfare budget on cash assistance. The most a single-parent family of three can get is $292 a month—that’s 18 percent of the federal poverty line. Only 2,469 of the more than 370,000 Oklahomans aged 18 to 64 who live in poverty get this aid. And the state’s Medicaid eligibility is one of the stingiest in the nation, covering only adults with dependent children and incomes below 42 percent of the poverty level—around $8,500 for a family of three.

    But while Peter’s analysis is at odds with much of the data, his overall story does fit a national pattern. Trump voters report experiencing greater-than-average levels of economic anxiety, even though they tend have better-than-average incomes. And they are inclined to blame economic instability on the federal government—even, sometimes, when it flows from private corporations. Peter wrote about the sense of salvation his neighbors felt when a Walmart came to town: “Now there were enough jobs, even part-time jobs…But Walmart constantly got attacked by unions nationally and with federal regulations; someone lost their job, or their job became part-time.”

    It’s worth noting that if the largest retail corporation in the world has been conspicuously harmed by unions and regulations of late, it doesn’t show in its profits, which were $121 billion in 2016. And of course, Walmart historically has had a far greater role in shuttering small-town Main Streets than in revitalizing them. But Peter’s neighbors see no reason to resent it for that. He writes, “The majority of the people do not blame the company for their loss because they realize that businesses [are about] making money, and that if they had a business of their own, they would do the same thing.”

    It’s not fair to beat up on a sweet 21-year-old for getting facts wrong—especially if, as is likely, these were the only facts he was told. Indeed, teaching the class, I was amazed how even the most liberal students took for granted certain dubious narratives in which they (and much of the rest of the country) were marinated all year long, like the notion that Hillary Clinton was extravagantly corrupt.

    “After continually losing on the economic side,” he wrote, “one of the few things that you can retain is your identity.”
    Feelings can’t be fact-checked, and in the end, feelings were what Peter’s eloquent essay came down to­—what it feels like to belong, and what it feels like to be culturally dispossessed. “After continually losing on the economic side,” he wrote, “one of the few things that you can retain is your identity. What it means, to you, to be an American, your somewhat self-sufficient and isolated way of life, and your Christian faith and values. Your identity and heritage is the very last thing you can cling to…Abortion laws and gay marriage are the two most recent upsets. The vast majority of the state of Oklahoma has opposed both of the issues, and social values cannot be forced by the government.”

    On these facts he is correct: In a 2015 poll, 68 percent of Oklahomans called themselves “pro-life,” and only 30 percent supported marriage equality. Until 2016 there were only a handful of abortion providers in the entire state, and the first new clinic to open in 40 years guards its entrance with a metal detector.

    Peter thinks he’s not a reactionary. Since that sounds like an insult, I’d like to think so, too. But in writing this piece, I did notice a line in his essay that I had glided over during my first two readings, maybe because I liked him too much to want to be scared by him. “One need only look to the Civil War and the lasting legacies of Reconstruction through to today’s current racism and race issues to see what happens when the federal government forces its morals on dissenting parts of the country.”

    The last time I read that, I shuddered. So I emailed Peter. “I say the intrusions were worth it to end slavery and turn blacks into full citizens,” I wrote. “A lot of liberals, even those most disposed to having an open mind to understanding the grievances of people like you and yours, will have a hard time with [your words].”

    Peter’s answer was striking. He first objected (politely!) to what he saw as the damning implication behind my observation. Slavery and Reconstruction? “I was using it as an example of government intrusion and how violent and negative the results can be when the government tries to tell people how to think. I take it you saw it in terms of race in politics. The way we look at the same thing shows how big the difference is between our two groups.”

    To him, focusing on race was “an attention-grabbing tool that politicians use to their advantage,” one that “really just annoys and angers conservatives more than anything, because it is usually a straw man attack.” He compared it to what “has happened with this election: everyone who votes for Trump must be racist and sexist, and there’s no possible way that anyone could oppose Hillary unless it’s because they’re sexist. Accusing racism or sexism eliminates the possibility of an honest discussion about politics.”

    He asked me to imagine “being one of those rednecks under the poverty line, living in a camper trailer on your grandpa’s land, eating about one full meal a day, yet being accused by Black Lives Matter that you are benefiting from white privilege and your life is somehow much better than theirs.”

    And that’s when I wanted to meet him halfway: Maybe we could talk about the people in Chicago working for poverty wages and being told by Trump supporters that they were lazy. Or the guy with the tamale cart in front of my grocery store—always in front of my grocery store, morning, noon, and night—who with so much as a traffic violation might find himself among the millions whom Trump intends to immediately deport.

    I wanted to meet him halfway, until he started talking about history.

    “The reason I used the Civil War and Reconstruction is because it isn’t a secret that Reconstruction failed,” Peter wrote. “It failed and left the South in an extreme poverty that it still hasn’t recovered from.” And besides, “slavery was expensive and the Industrial Revolution was about to happen. Maybe if there had been no war, slavery would have faded peacefully.”

    As a historian, I found this remarkable, since it was precisely what all American schoolchildren learned about slavery and Reconstruction for much of the 20th century. Or rather, they did until the civil rights era, when serious scholarship dismantled this narrative, piece by piece. But not, apparently, in Peter’s world. “Until urban liberals move to the rural South and live there for probably a decade or more,” he concluded, “there’s no way to fully appreciate the view.”

    This was where he left me plumb at a loss. Liberals must listen to and understand Trump supporters. But what you end up understanding from even the sweetest among them still might chill you to the bone.

    .

    #64195
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    “One need only look to the Civil War and the lasting legacies of Reconstruction through to today’s current racism and race issues to see what happens when the federal government forces its morals on dissenting parts of the country.”

    yikes

    #64197
    Avatar photowv
    Participant

    “… I was amazed how even the most liberal students took for granted certain dubious narratives in which they (and much of the rest of the country) were marinated all year long, like the notion that Hillary Clinton was extravagantly corrupt…”

    #64204
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    “… I was amazed how even the most liberal students took for granted certain dubious narratives in which they (and much of the rest of the country) were marinated all year long, like the notion that Hillary Clinton was extravagantly corrupt…”

    Well 2 can play that game.

    How and in what way was HC “extravagantly corrupt”?

    I have no particular emotions about her either way. I found her lacking in several policy areas. So voting for her was like voting for Obama. It was just the best the 1 1/2 party system could do. Though to be honest the reviling she attracted struck me as strange. It didn’t seem to involve anything real in any demonstrable way.

    AND I always found the “extravagantly corrupt” routine just to be a right-wing narrative. Is there any good reason to doubt that?

    So how is calling her “extravagantly corrupt” NOT a dubious narrative?

    .

    #64208
    Avatar photowv
    Participant

    “… I was amazed how even the most liberal students took for granted certain dubious narratives in which they (and much of the rest of the country) were marinated all year long, like the notion that Hillary Clinton was extravagantly corrupt…”

    Well 2 can play that game.

    How and in what way was HC “extravagantly corrupt”?

    I have no particular emotions about her either way. I found her lacking in several policy areas. So voting for her was like voting for Obama. It was just the best the 1 1/2 party system could do. Though to be honest the reviling she attracted struck me as strange. It didn’t seem to involve anything real in any demonstrable way.

    AND I always found the “extravagantly corrupt” routine just to be a right-wing narrative. Is there any good reason to doubt that?

    So how is calling her “extravagantly corrupt” NOT a dubious narrative?

    .

    ——————–
    I’m not the least bit interested in debating whether Hillary was “extravagantly corrupt” or not. To me it would be like arguing about whether the rams “extravagantly sucked” this year — clearly they did, and clearly she is. You disagree. No problem. We see it differently. I dont intend to debate it.

    I also had a problem with the authors use of simplistic econ numbers to explain some things away. Like he said WV was plus-five percent blah blah blah and the nation as a whole was plus-two percent, etc. That was not convincing to me. I’ve traveled all over WV and its really bad out there. Really, bad. The only jobs for unskilled workers are Walmart jobs and Fracking jobs.

    …zack you and i are both leftists and we almost always agree on the Practical Policies in the Real World. We both support Universal Health Care, and all the usual stuff Bernie talked about. All the real-world policy stuff. We both know the ‘groundwork’ has not been laid for the more ‘utopian’ stuff or for getting rid of capitalism etc. Its the nuts and bolts of progressive, incremental change that we always agree on.

    Where we are different is in things like this Clinton thing. Or ‘Deep state’ stuff. Or if i were to say “Obama is a mass murderer” (which i believe) you’d probably resist that kind of language. So, ya know, blah blah blah…

    w
    v

    #64210
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    Good article. Some thoughts:

    1. Corey Robin’s book is very good. I got a lot from it. I’ve also interacted with him online. Good guy. A leftist activist, and one of the main guys for the BDS movement.

    2. Everyone knows “both sides” engage in ongoing hyperbole about their opponents, and their records. But I think it’s safe to say “the right” takes this to another level, and its rank and file are far more likely to buy in to the exaggerations and “fake news” as well. Case in point: Obama technically ran against McCain but really against Bush. But Obama could legitimately say things were horrible. Bush’s last quarter saw a contraction of 8.9%, the world economy had all but collapsed, we were losing hundreds of thousands of jobs a month, and were mired in two terrible wars, etc. etc. Talking about that didn’t really require much hyperbole.

    But Trump’s run did. He consistently painted America as a hell hole, with our borders being overrun by millions of rapists and other criminals. He painted the economy as if we were in the midst of a depression, rather than a recovery, albeit much too shallow, and said our unemployment rate was 42% rather than 4.7%. He was still describing that supposed hell hole in his inauguration speech.

    His fans bought it. “Peter” from the article is an example of this.

    3. I’ve done more than enough “I can’t stand the Clintons, but” to last a lifetime. But I have to add that if she really were “extravagantly corrupt,” the GOP would have been able to sink her and Slick Willie. They went after both of them for the better part of the last 25 years or so, and even before that, when they were in Arkansas. They failed to indict them for anything, much less convict, despite being hell bent on bringing them down. That should tell us something. That failure isn’t necessarily proof, of course. But the necessary proof for their “extravagantly corrupt” isn’t there, either.

    Yeah, they’re probably garden-variety “corrupt” as these things go. But there’s never been any evidence that they were more than their peers.

    ___


    Animal House

    But you can’t hold a whole fraternity responsible for the behavior of a few, sick twisted individuals. For if you do, then shouldn’t we blame the whole fraternity system? And if the whole fraternity system is guilty, then isn’t this an indictment of our educational institutions in general? I put it to you, Greg – isn’t this an indictment of our entire American society? Well, you can do whatever you want to us, but we’re not going to sit here and listen to you badmouth the United States of America. Gentlemen!

    #64212
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    “… I was amazed how even the most liberal students took for granted certain dubious narratives in which they (and much of the rest of the country) were marinated all year long, like the notion that Hillary Clinton was extravagantly corrupt…”

    Well 2 can play that game.

    How and in what way was HC “extravagantly corrupt”?

    I have no particular emotions about her either way. I found her lacking in several policy areas. So voting for her was like voting for Obama. It was just the best the 1 1/2 party system could do. Though to be honest the reviling she attracted struck me as strange. It didn’t seem to involve anything real in any demonstrable way.

    AND I always found the “extravagantly corrupt” routine just to be a right-wing narrative. Is there any good reason to doubt that?

    So how is calling her “extravagantly corrupt” NOT a dubious narrative?

    .

    ——————–
    I’m not the least bit interested in debating whether Hillary was “extravagantly corrupt” or not. To me it would be like arguing about whether the rams “extravagantly sucked” this year — clearly they did, and clearly she is. You disagree. No problem. We see it differently. I dont intend to debate it.

    I also had a problem with the authors use of simplistic econ numbers to explain some things away. Like he said WV was plus-five percent blah blah blah and the nation as a whole was plus-two percent, etc. That was not convincing to me. I’ve traveled all over WV and its really bad out there. Really, bad. The only jobs for unskilled workers are Walmart jobs and Fracking jobs.

    w
    v

    WV,

    I think his point was if we compare apples to apples. Perception of reality tends to be dependent upon which party is in power, and it shifts wildly when that happens, even though the nation has barely changed at all.

    I’ve spent far too many years arguing with people on the right not to miss how everything suddenly becomes sunshine and roses when their team takes power, and suddenly becomes hell on earth when the other team takes power. The economy was much worse under Bush, especially in the beginning and toward the end, but most folks on the right didn’t raise a ruckus about it until Obama won the presidency. Suddenly, everything mattered again, like the debt, deficits, even — and this was the ultimate in hypocrisy — inequality, and poverty in minority communities.

    And we can all remember how Reagan was viewed in his day by his fans, and still is, even though he tripled the debt, took us from a trade surplus to a trade deficit nation, from a creditor to debtor nation, and launched the most aggressive form of neoliberalism to date. Wages had been stagnating for the rank and file since 1973, so he didn’t start that. But it did accelerate on his watch, as did part-time jobs, temp jobs, McJobs and so on. But conservatives still say the American economy was never better.

    We are just such a deeply divided nation, and too many people think a change of parties means a radically horrible or radically wonderful change to everything in sight. Mostly, things stay pretty much the same, give or take. Tragically. But people don’t perceive it staying the same.

    #64215
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    I’m not the least bit interested in debating whether Hillary was “extravagantly corrupt” or not. To me it would be like arguing about whether the rams “extravagantly sucked” this year — clearly they did, and clearly she is. You disagree. No problem. We see it differently. I dont intend to debate it.

    But the difference is this. The Rams DID suck last year. And I see nothing indicating Clinton was extremely corrupt.

    Over some things, it is not enough to say it’s a matter of perceptions. Cause sometimes, on some things, perceptions are wrong. Even if deeply believed.

    In terms of core beliefs, yes, truth is, those are beyond debate. In terms of core beliefs, about all we can do is “vote”…and then respect the differences we can respect.

    In terms of empirical statements about … say … degrees of corruption, yes they are open to scrutiny and issues of fact.

    For example, is Trump corrupt? I take corrupt to mean that they sell out the office they occupy and the laws they are supposed to uphold in the name of direct financial gain. Like a judge taking bribes to decide cases a certain way. And the truth is I don’t see Trump as directly corrupt that way.

    He’s a lot of OTHER things. But that’s just not one of them.

    And none of the following is accurate btw:

    Where we are different is in things like … ‘Deep state’ stuff. Or if i were to say “Obama is a mass murderer” (which i believe) you’d probably resist that kind of language. So, ya know, blah blah blah…

    No you;re wrong about that, in fact.

    My main thing in this sub-issue is to resist right-wing narratives. And here’s this entire article revealing some insights into how Trump backers think and why…and it ain’t purty…but, then, we end up with a difference over the empirical validity of statements about Clinton.

    And, it sure has gotten testy around here. I have been doing it too. What gives?

    #64217
    Avatar photowv
    Participant

    And none of the following is accurate btw:

    Where we are different is in things like … ‘Deep state’ stuff. Or if i were to say “Obama is a mass murderer” (which i believe) you’d probably resist that kind of language. So, ya know, blah blah blah…

    And, it sure has gotten testy around here. I have been doing it too. What gives?

    ———————-
    So you think Obama is a mass-murderer?

    Its testy because the Trump vs Clinton thing exposed differences
    among the leftists. No big thing. Just testiness.

    w
    v

    • This reply was modified 7 years, 11 months ago by Avatar photowv.
    #64222
    NewMexicoRam
    Participant

    If Hillary isn’t corrupt, why did the donations to the Clinton Foundation suddenly dry up once she lost the election?

    #64224
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    And none of the following is accurate btw:

    Where we are different is in things like … ‘Deep state’ stuff. Or if i were to say “Obama is a mass murderer” (which i believe) you’d probably resist that kind of language. So, ya know, blah blah blah…

    And, it sure has gotten testy around here. I have been doing it too. What gives?

    ———————-
    So you think Obama is a mass-murderer?

    Its testy because the Trump vs Clinton thing exposed differences
    among the leftists. No big thing. Just testiness.

    w
    v

    I think Obama continued some benighted pre-Obama policies both in the economy and in foreign policy. Of that there is no question. But to me being an American means you have to be dialectical. Johnson got us into Vietnam but also pushed through civil rights. Dialectical to me also means at times you have to work at seeing through the dominant bs narratives, and at times you have to make a practical choice IF there is no other choice. Saving the world doesn’t require us to go crazy.

    And remember, it’s about alliances. Always was.

    #64226
    Avatar photowv
    Participant

    And none of the following is accurate btw:

    Where we are different is in things like … ‘Deep state’ stuff. Or if i were to say “Obama is a mass murderer” (which i believe) you’d probably resist that kind of language. So, ya know, blah blah blah…

    And, it sure has gotten testy around here. I have been doing it too. What gives?

    ———————-
    So you think Obama is a mass-murderer?

    Its testy because the Trump vs Clinton thing exposed differences
    among the leftists. No big thing. Just testiness.

    w
    v

    I think Obama continued some benighted pre-Obama policies both in the economy and in foreign policy. Of that there is no question. But to me being an American means you have to be dialectical. Johnson got us into Vietnam but also pushed through civil rights. Dialectical to me also means at times you have to work at seeing through the dominant bs narratives, and at times you have to make a practical choice IF there is no other choice. Saving the world doesn’t require us to go crazy.

    And remember, it’s about alliances. Always was.

    ——————
    Yeah, see we disagree. So i wasn’t wrong. I said you would ‘resist’ saying Obama was a mass-murderer. And you just did that.

    I think he’s a mass-murderer.

    As far as your ‘alliance’ mantra, sure, I agree
    we should build alliances. But this is just internal-leftist-message-board
    talk. This is like ‘family’ here. We can call each other names, if we want. 🙂

    w
    v

    #64230
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    Yeah, see we disagree. So i wasn’t wrong. I said you would ‘resist’ saying Obama was a mass-murderer. And you just did that.

    I’ve never said that about anyone. Certainly it would apply to Nixon and Reagan. I just don’t use the term.

    And see I talk about alliances, and you play gotcha.

    No I mean alliances here. Cause…fighting all the time would end up making me lose interest.

    #64236
    Avatar photoZooey
    Moderator

    Okay, kids, shut up and go outside and play. Billy, clean up your room. I’m tired of telling you.

    #64240
    Avatar photowv
    Participant

    Yeah, see we disagree. So i wasn’t wrong. I said you would ‘resist’ saying Obama was a mass-murderer. And you just did that.

    I’ve never said that about anyone. Certainly it would apply to Nixon and Reagan. I just don’t use the term.

    And see I talk about alliances, and you play gotcha.

    No I mean alliances here. Cause…fighting all the time would end up making me lose interest.

    —————
    Ok, but i dont think of it as “gotcha”. I think of it as pointing out real differences. But i also dont think its a big deal. I never question our ‘alliances’ here. Its never an issue for me. Its a ‘given’ we have those fundamental alliances.

    w
    v

    #64254
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    Yeah, see we disagree. So i wasn’t wrong. I said you would ‘resist’ saying Obama was a mass-murderer. And you just did that.

    I’ve never said that about anyone. Certainly it would apply to Nixon and Reagan. I just don’t use the term.

    And see I talk about alliances, and you play gotcha.

    No I mean alliances here. Cause…fighting all the time would end up making me lose interest.

    —————
    Ok, but i dont think of it as “gotcha”. I think of it as pointing out real differences. But i also dont think its a big deal. I never question our ‘alliances’ here. Its never an issue for me. Its a ‘given’ we have those fundamental alliances.

    w
    v

    But you did not indicate to me a real difference. Which probably just means you have to say more. All I got so far is that you use more provocative, street-slogan language and I always tend to be more analytical and discursive. I am not sure that that isn’t just 2 different ways of talking about the same thing. Either way it’s not an open discussion of similarities and differences, it’s just both of us talking about how I use words, and not about the issues themselves.

    #64264
    Avatar photoBilly_T
    Participant

    I miss the days when Nittany would “cork” the discussion by just blaming Pa Ram and the Amish.

    ;>)

    #64281
    Avatar photowv
    Participant

    But you did not indicate to me a real difference. Which probably just means you have to say more. All I got so far is that you use more provocative, street-slogan language and I always tend to be more analytical and discursive. I am not sure that that isn’t just 2 different ways of talking about the same thing. Either way it’s not an open discussion of similarities and differences, it’s just both of us talking about how I use words, and not about the issues themselves.

    ================
    Well, i dont know how you can say there isn’t a ‘real difference.’

    I said, “Obama is a mass-murderer”

    And you replied:
    “I think Obama continued some benighted pre-Obama policies both in the economy and in foreign policy. Of that there is no question.’

    I mean, to me, you dont see him as a ‘mass murderer’ and i do. I mean there must be a reason why you dont see his drone strikes as ‘murder’. Or else you’d call them ‘murder’. So, i assume you see it differently.

    BUT, the major point to me, is Big Deal. I may come across as ‘testy’ but honestly this group is my favorite group on the internet. Always will be. I know we agree on all kinds of core, fundamental stuff. I never question that. I think sometimes you think that is being questioned or threatened. Not from me. I dont give a shit if you see Obama differently than me or if as you say its just a different language we use, etc. It doesnt change how i feel about you or this group of goofballs.

    I always, always trust the bonds we have built up on this board. It never enters my mind to worry about that or question it. We’ve been together since 98. Thats longer than any relationship Ive ever had.

    So, have some toast. Lightly toasted. With tea.

    w
    v

    #64283
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    Well, i dont know how you can say there isn’t a ‘real difference.’

    I said, “Obama is a mass-murderer”

    And you replied:
    “I think Obama continued some benighted pre-Obama policies both in the economy and in foreign policy. Of that there is no question.’

    I mean, to me, you dont see him as a ‘mass murderer’ and i do. I mean there must be a reason why you dont see his drone strikes as ‘murder’. Or else you’d call them ‘murder’. So, i assume you see it differently.

    BUT, the major point to me, is Big Deal. I may come across as ‘testy’ but honestly this group is my favorite group on the internet. Always will be. I know we agree on all kinds of core, fundamental stuff. I never question that. I think sometimes you think that is being questioned or threatened. Not from me. I dont give a shit if you see Obama differently than me or if as you say its just a different language we use, etc. It doesnt change how i feel about you or this group of goofballs.

    I always, always trust the bonds we have built up on this board. It never enters my mind to worry about that or question it. We’ve been together since 98. Thats longer than any relationship Ive ever had.

    So, have some toast. Lightly toasted. With tea.

    For the record, I have resented you ever since you tried to denigrate Vermeil in 98.

    This aggression will not stand.

    #64311
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    t what to make of Trump’s victory. Is it, in the main, a recrudescence of bigotry on American soil—a reactionary scream against a nation less white by the year? Or is it more properly understood as an economically grounded response to the privations that neoliberalism has wracked upon the heartland?

    To me…clearly and obviously both.

    And Trump is no solution to either thing, of course. He’s a worsening of both things.

    #64341
    Avatar photowv
    Participant

    t what to make of Trump’s victory. Is it, in the main, a recrudescence of bigotry on American soil—a reactionary scream against a nation less white by the year? Or is it more properly understood as an economically grounded response to the privations that neoliberalism has wracked upon the heartland?

    To me…clearly and obviously both.

    And Trump is no solution to either thing, of course. He’s a worsening of both things.

    ————–
    Agreed.

    w
    v

    #64347
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    t what to make of Trump’s victory. Is it, in the main, a recrudescence of bigotry on American soil—a reactionary scream against a nation less white by the year? Or is it more properly understood as an economically grounded response to the privations that neoliberalism has wracked upon the heartland?

    To me…clearly and obviously both.

    And Trump is no solution to either thing, of course. He’s a worsening of both things.

    ————–
    Agreed.

    w
    v

    Are you sure you agree? Cause…when have you ever called this a recrudescence?

    #64349
    Avatar photowv
    Participant

    Are you sure you agree? Cause…when have you ever called this a recrudescence?

    ——————
    Well, I always tend to be more analytical and discursive. Plus its all about Alliances to me. Not to mention Dialectical. Benighted, even.

    w
    v

    Did You Know?
    Recrudescence derives from the Latin verb recrudescere, meaning “to become raw again” (used, for example, of wounds). Ultimately, it can be traced back to the Latin word for raw,” which is “crudus.” (If you suspect that “crude” is also derived from “crudus,” you are correct; another well-known descendant is “cruel.”) In its literal sense, “recrudescence” is a medical word denoting a renewed outbreak of a disease. In extended use, it most often describes the return of an undesirable condition, such as a war or a plague, or the return of an undesirable idea.

    #64352
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    it most often describes the return of an undesirable condition, such as a war or a plague, or the return of an undesirable idea.

    Well, okay. Like throwing for 4 on 3rd and 5.

    .

    #64362
    Ozoneranger
    Participant

    You two need to rent a room.

    #64363
    Ozoneranger
    Participant

    In the past two years I pretty much lost interest in politics. My sole worry is the debt. I worry for my kids and grandkids.

    Anyway, watching the ascendance of Donald Trump was both fascinating and horrifying at the same time. Got me back into the game, at least temporarily.Really, he knew how to apply the false premise of “every thing is collapsing” (it’s not, at least yet) to the simmering anger of the right being the targeted relentlessly with the left’s race cudgel to the denialism of many that the country is becoming less white. It was a brilliant performance by a master snake-oil salesman.

    The kid in the coveralls bought it hook, line and sinker.

    #64365
    Avatar photowv
    Participant

    In the past two years I pretty much lost interest in politics. My sole worry is the debt. I worry for my kids and grandkids.

    Anyway, watching the ascendance of Donald Trump was both fascinating and horrifying at the same time. Got me back into the game, at least temporarily.Really, he knew how to apply the false premise of “every thing is collapsing” (it’s not, at least yet) to the simmering anger of the right being the targeted relentlessly with the left’s race cudgel to the denialism of many that the country is becoming less white. It was a brilliant performance by a master snake-oil salesman.

    The kid in the coveralls bought it hook, line and sinker.

    ——————

    Seems to me (shooting from the hip, here)the ‘system’ (whatever u wanna call it. i call it ‘corporotacracy’) gets-a-hold of americans the day they are born
    and starts inculcating them, drenching them, drowning them in ‘education’ and all the various corporate-media-forms-of-propaganda and flag-waving and BECAUSE the system does that (NOT because ‘people are stupid’) we end up, at the end of the day, with ignorant “citizens” who
    1) dont know shit about anything other than sports or entertainment or video-games, etc, OR,
    2 they become democrats who dont know shit about how the democrat-party destroys the poor, OR,
    3 they become republicans who dont even CARE about the poor cause they blame the poor for being poor.

    Now, granted,there’s lots of other small sub-groups, but them there three groups is enough to keep the system going, keep the Duplicats and Replicants in bizness, and doom the biosphere.

    Someday perhaps there will be a giant tomb-stone on the earth, that will be visible from deepspace. And it’ll say, Democrats and Republicans did this.

    w
    v

    #64367
    Avatar photoZooey
    Moderator

    Seems to me (shooting from the hip, here)the ‘system’ (whatever u wanna call it. i call it ‘corporotacracy’) gets-a-hold of americans the day they are born
    and starts inculcating them, drenching them, drowning them in ‘education’ and all the various corporate-media-forms-of-propaganda and flag-waving and BECAUSE the system does that (NOT because ‘people are stupid’) we end up, at the end of the day, with ignorant “citizens” who
    1) dont know shit about anything other than sports or entertainment or video-games, etc, OR,
    2 they become democrats who dont know shit about how the democrat-party destroys the poor, OR,
    3 they become republicans who dont even CARE about the poor cause they blame the poor for being poor.

    Now, granted,there’s lots of other small sub-groups, but them there three groups is enough to keep the system going, keep the Duplicats and Replicants in bizness, and doom the biosphere.

    Someday perhaps there will be a giant tomb-stone on the earth, that will be visible from deepspace. And it’ll say, Democrats and Republicans did this.

    w
    v

    Okay, so i am starting a new thread that says some things about this “marinade” people grow up in.

    #64370
    Avatar photowv
    Participant

    Okay, so i am starting a new thread that says some things about this “marinade” people grow up in.

    —————
    OK. I’ve just now decided though, that ‘marinade‘ is one of
    my all-time favorite words.

    w
    v
    =======
    “Ideally, what should be said to every child, repeatedly, throughout his or her school life is something like this: ‘You are in the process of being indoctrinated. We have not yet evolved a system of education that is not a system of indoctrination. We are sorry, but it is the best we can do. What you are being taught here is an amalgam of current prejudice and the choices of this particular culture. The slightest look at history will show how impermanent these must be. You are being taught by people who have been able to accommodate themselves to a regime of thought laid down by their predecessors. It is a self-perpetuating system. Those of you who are more robust and individual than others will be encouraged to leave and find ways of educating yourself — educating your own judgements. Those that stay must remember, always, and all the time, that they are being moulded and patterned to fit into the narrow and particular needs of this particular society.”
    ― Doris Lessing, The Golden Notebook

    #64372
    Avatar photozn
    Moderator

    You two need to rent a room.

    Enh. That never works.

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