to James Wolcott

re: Red State Babylon

If the blue states are sinkholes of moral decay, as right-wing pundits insist, how come red states lead the nation in violent crime, divorce, illegitimacy, and incarceration, among other evils? To a bus-riding innocent on Manhattan's stroller-filled Upper West Side, it looks like a case of hypocrisy meets stupidity.
by James Wolcott
November 2006
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2006/11/wolcott200611

Jimmy,

I can call you Jimmy, right? After all, I do live in one of your "red states".

The number one reason the republicans have been winning those “red states”? They talk to the people, not at the people.

I’ve worked for 16 years to change attitudes in my local area, and I have had a decent amount of success. And looking at the polls for this state, and the south in general, I believe that there have been a whole lot of people doing the same. And I’m going to tell you, it would have been a whole shit-load easier if people here weren’t continually being talked down to by their “betters” in the “elite northeast and west coast”. Telling them they’re “dumb”, voting against their interests, religious nuts, and, in general, a lower class of people. Shit, Jimmy, who you gonna vote for? The guy who talks to you, or the one who talks at you?

Jimmy, when was the last time you had to pick up a shovel for a paycheck? When was the last time a medical emergency forced you to lose your home? And just a question. Ain’t the financial center right there in Manhatten, and serviced by “elite northeast power brokers”? I’m sure you’re aware of it. You know, the one that sucks the economic lifeblood from this area to give to the investment classes.

Kids can’t afford a house here, Jimmy. Speculation and investment have driven land and home prices far out of reach for the working person, even with a wife and husband working in a lot of cases. Not too many unions, so wages aren’t all that terrific. And the only low prices are at the Dollar General and the Wal-Mart. You know why all that extra cash was lying around? The bush tax cuts. The rich had a lot of money on hand, and the stock market was dead, so they parked the money in real estate. And the rest as they say, is history.

Yeah, we work hard all week to raise the family, and then knock back on the weekend. Mow the lawn (still growing here, what’s it like up there, Jimmy?), do an oil-change and tune-up on the pickup, knock back a few beers watching college football, and then off to the local track Saturday night to watch their hometown heroes race around in their gasoline chariots. Sunday’s for church and NASCAR, or pro-football. Or maybe fishing with the kids.

So, what do you want, Jimmy? We don’t have a lot of buses down here to ride in, even Greyhound’s gone.

Do you remember bush’s Social Security “reform” circus a couple of years ago? Well, it’s back. Just waiting in the wings for the election to be over. People here, for the most part, don’t have pensions. Their retirement is going to be Social Security. I make sure they notice that in all these proposals, that no one is calling to raise the ceiling on income subject to the SocSec tax to, say $150,000, instead of the $90,000 now current. A quick fix, I say, and let’s move on to more pressing matters, like Iraq, health care, employment, and housing.

Jimmy, did you know that the majority of military and contractor deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq came from the south? Around me, many families have members in the armed forces, reserves, and National Guard. The president bush policies affect them all. With just a constant lean on them, I’ve watched many of them become more and more dissatisified with the bush and his republican party. But I’ve also watched the democratic party give up on a lot of local races. The election is won in the republican party primary. How’s about squeezing out some of that extra cash you got, Jimmy, to help organization work down here? Maybe make it a bit more competitive.

Now, I’m not saying your article paints a false picture, Jimmy. It’s true. But your acid pen would work better if you were writing from the inside instead of the outside, as it were. Why don’t you come down for a visit? You only have the superficial picture that the media paints, focused as it is on the famous, the infamous, and the power brokers. And that’s not the reality being lived here below the scenes. Desperate families living from one crisis (natural or otherwise) to the next, and hoping that Johnny does come marching home. That’s the condition of the working class, when you boil away the platitudes and fancy rhetoric.

Ain’t none of us any better than the other. That’s the thinking that got us into this mess in the first place. Working people have been turned from a primary asset to a corporate liability. They’ve become all too easily disposable. And that’s happening nation wide, not just in the “red states”. Just as in Hitler’s Germany, and Lenin’s Russia, when people are cast adrift, they become open targets for demagogues. It’s no different here, and the bushistas are no different in their absolutism. And neither are “intellectuals” in their disdain for the “lower classes”.

The cause you profess would be better served if you were to choose your targets, shall we say, a bit more carefully. The real enemies to your way of life are the republicans. They are running us to bankruptcy and ruin. Not that I think the democratic party is a whole lot better. We can deal with them after we’ve broken the republicans into their constituent parts. But that ain’t gonna happen if we continue to define the conversation along class lines.

If we treat people as our social and all-too human equals, we get results. Perhaps its time to think about shifting the paradigm from celebrity to reality.

Redneck City,
Florida