Troll the Libs

Making liberals tear out their hair is not an accident. 

It is policy. 

A youthful incident gives me a way to understand the MAGA world. They are teenagers, acting out. They are the team of students versus the adult kill-joys. 

At Medford

Alex McDonald

High School in the spring of 1967, the Vice Principal, Mr. Alex McDonald, announced a crackdown on kids smoking in the bathrooms. Some rowdy kids decided to do something about it, to hang him in effigy. One morning there it was, in the oak tree in the parking lot next to the school. There was a sign: "Everyone Run Alex To Hell." ERATH. For a few days the word "ERATH" got knowing nods. It was secret code. People said it in the halls with a snicker. "ERATH."

The rowdy boys thought it great fun.

I came to know Alex McDonald as an adult. He was a sweet, gentle man, who spend a lifetime as an educator. He remembered the incident. He laughed about it. He said it was kids having fun, making memories for themselves, being teenagers, rebelling against authority. "Teenagers do that kind of thing," he told me. 

This morning's opening page on the Fox News website is Tucker Carlson saying that Biden failed miserably in dealing with COVID. Why? Because even though most people are vaccinated against COVID, a record number of people are still dying from it and these deaths are a total failure of Biden's policies. 

He does not mention that the people dying (currently 93% of people in overcrowded Michigan hospitals) are unvaccinated people who get COVID guidance from people like himself. How dare he blame you unvaccinated people for getting the virus, he tells his audience. Yet incredibly, simultaneously, Carlson also says COVID is not particularly dangerous and Biden's efforts to deal with it are unnecessary overkill. Didn't he just say hundreds of thousands of people died? Didn't he hear himself?

Of course, one wants to scream.

Carlson does it with a straight face and a tone of unabashed righteousness. He knows that the intransigence of the Trump-Fox-MAGA audience has become a marker of tribal loyalty. He is now the rowdiest of the rowdy boys. You can't stop us from smoking in the bathrooms! It makes Biden look helpless.

Donald Trump, Junior, sends me email advertisements, with the subject "Triggering!" and "This is hilarious!" 

Let's Go Brandon. This is sweet for them. It is code for "Fuck Joe Biden" and everyone knows it. The rowdy boys have a way to be naughty but not-naughty, by saying it and not-saying it. We have a secret language! ERATH.

Twenty years after the event Mr. McDonald laughed about it. It turned out to be harmless teenage fun, except for the fire danger with the paper towels, and perhaps for the people who smoked in the bathrooms as teenagers because it was really cool to be part of the crowd. Some got addicted to the cigarettes, and then died young from something. That consequence is remote and ultimately on them. They took their chances and got unlucky, like the people who don't get vaccinated. The other issue, the authority of high school principals to keep order, was never in question. The adults were in charge. Teachers stood guard in the bathrooms. Mr. McDonald kept order. We graduated and went on with our lives.

It is different and worse for Biden. The teenage-style mocking of Biden does put his authority and credibility into question. Biden looks physically and cognitively weak. I wish it were not so. I know I irritate some readers by writing it, but I consider it a reality to address, not one to deny. A presidential leader needs to be able to explain things to the American public and to show them his policies are addressing the needs of the nation. Joe Biden seems incapable to doing it, alas. Biden cannot do an essential element of his job. 

Biden is easy to mock, and the mocking sticks, more than it ever did for Mr. McDonald.  Biden is being run to hell. 

We Boomers are aging out.

Help Wanted.

Boomers are retiring.

Boomers filled up the elementary schools, then the colleges, then the workforce. Now we are retiring.

For a decade now retired people have increased as a percentage of the population, beginning with the double-effect of Boomers turning 62 and the recession of 2008-10. COVID accelerated this trend. The labor participation rate fell from 63.2 of the civilian working age population to 60.8 with the onset of COVID in the spring of 2020, and is still down, now at 61.6%. That amounts to 4.2 million people who left the labor force below the expected trend line. St. Louis Fed   

There are two trends that bear notice. The first is the blue-line COVID uptick above trend. The second is the 25-year big-picture plateau of about 15.5% of the population being retired, to the abrupt up-slope beginning in 2008. That was us: Boomers retiring. Retirees grew to 18% of the population and now COVID on top of that.

The Boomer boom is exaggerated because the birth rate was below trend during the depression and WW2.  

Again, two things bear notice. One is the bulge and the second is the relentless downtrend in births. The U.S. experienced about 30 births per 1,000 people 100 years ago, and now it is almost exactly 12 births per 1,000. My father, born in 1919 was one of five children, all of whom survived. My mother was also one of five live births, although a sister died in infancy. My grandparents, born in the 1880s, were members of even bigger families, my American grandmother one of 10.

One reason to retire is the simple inevitability of mortality. The white space on the right side of this chart is us, sooner or later.

If a Boomer hadn't yet retired, COVID was a good reason to get out of the line of fire. The disease targeted people our age and older. Companies were laying off and shutting down. And many of us got richer just by staying alive. Real estate and stock prices are up sharply. Maybe we are in a bubble and the wealth gains are transitory. It doesn't change the psychology. Every experience I had as a Financial Advisor for 30 years is that the moment an account statement prints a value, the clients consider that value to be theirs, in-hand, for real and forever and available to spend. Any drop in that value is considered an aberration, a surprise, a kind of theft, and a painful loss. People with assets priced high feel rich. With Zillow and neighborhood house sales confirming their real estate wealth, and their IRA statements confirming their financial wealth, people who were comfortable before feel even better now. The St. Louis Fed said,

By July 2021, households belonging to the 65-74 age cohort experienced an average return of $180,500, the greatest among all cohorts. They were followed closely by households between ages 55 and 64 with $167,000, and households 75 and older with $148,100.

Here it is, charted: 

The text and chart report averages, not the median. The authors note that the averages are strongly affected by "right hand skew," meaning the extraordinary wealth of the top fraction of 1%. Sill, we have all seen stock and home prices go up. Boomers are taking advantage of the situation. Chicago Fed

COVID accelerated a long-term trend of Boomer retirement, and the trend of fewer babies continues. It would have made political sense for the party of traditional families--the GOP--to have sponsored family-friendly policies like tax credits for children, for taxpayer funded day care, and generous parental leave programs. However, the GOP defined those as giveaways to the lazy--for Democratic "takers"--so they oppose them. We are outsourcing baby-making to immigrants, especially Latin Americans, but GOP politicians define that as a Democratic effort to create future Democratic voters and dilute the all-American bloodline. We outsource manufacturing to low-wage countries, and that, too creates controversy. Artificial Intelligence technology will continue to automate jobs, but leaders of both parties see Big Tech as a menace.

Our population is changing. We have a worker shortage. How we deal with this will shape the political issues of the next decades. If America gets through our current problems there will be no shortage of new ones for future generations. We are creating them now.

Kick-Ass Jesus

Evangelical Christians know God's plan:

Men are aggressive.
They fight. They protect. They grab pussies.

Women nurture.
They can be kind and gentle because men are tough.

There is a role for each gender. Jesus was a man's man, and so is Trump.

Most of the political world was surprised to read that Madison Cawthorn (R. North Carolina) urged women to raise boys to be "monsters."

I mean you can look at the testosterone levels of  young men today and they are lower than throughout all of history. . .. They are trying to de-masculate the young men in this country because they don't want people who are going to stand up. So I am telling you, all of the moms here, the people who I said were the most vicious and are in our movement, if you were raising a young man, please raise them to be a monster. [audience cheers.]

Meanwhile, Missouri Senator Josh Hawley told the National Conservatism Conference that the left defines traditional masculinity as "toxic." He said, "they want to define the traditional masculine virtues -- things like courage and independence and assertiveness -- as a danger to society." The result, he said, is that young men have retreated into video games and pornography.

Texas Senator Ted Cruz beat Hawley to the masculinity issue, having cooked bacon with the hot barrel of a machine gun, having trolled Bernie Sanders by saying he "identifies with every gender, simultaneously," having been a leader in insisting on binary gendered bathrooms, and by tweeting that "liberal males never grow balls." Cruz grew a manly beard.

This kind of talk is consistent with the Trump-ified GOP. Trump ran against George W. Bush's post-9/11 declarations that Islam is a religion of peace and Jeb Bush's "low energy" message of respect for Mexico and Mexicans. Trump was kick-ass opponent of Muslims, Mexicans, the Chinese, liberals, Black activists, "woke" people, progressives, the news media, and cultural elites. Trump defined himself by his open contempt for his opponents and by willingness to take them on. He has big hands, wink-wink.  GOP voters seem to like it. Potential Trump successors are adopting that tone.

Penis: "I guarantee you there's no problem

Evangelicals are Trump's most reliable supporters. Trump is an expression of a significant theme within that community, one based on an idea of a muscular Christ, a fighter in the battle of good and evil. This Jesus isn't a wimp. He doesn't turn the other cheek. He doesn't wash feet. He kicks ass because times are desperate and the faith needs defending.

One of the themes within Evangelical Christian thought is that the world is sharply gendered, with men given the responsibility of family leadership in decisions, as provider and as the protector against threats from outside. Women are the nurturer and keeper of the home. This isn't just cultural tradition. They consider it sacred revelation and God's plan.

Ripped Jesus

This traditional division of roles is changing in American culture. Women are in the workforce and are increasingly a family's primary or sole source of income. Women outnumber men in colleges. The #MeToo movement called out and shamed male behaviors that were once common in workplaces. Fewer and fewer jobs--especially well-paying high-status ones--require a young man's upper body strength. Evangelical Christians observe the displacement of traditional gender roles and are pushing back. Trump rides that wave; potential GOP successors are climbing aboard it.

Dead serious. Not Irony.

Social conservatism allied with Evangelical Christianity, in a kind of chicken-and-egg symbiosis. This era's re-positioning of Jesus from a spiritual "love-thy-enemy" figure into a fighter happened coincidently with the 1960s changes to the roles of women and racial minorities. Polls show social conservatives to be uncomfortable with the "browning" of America. There is also an  overlapping reason, which helps explain the increased votes the GOP is getting among Blacks and Hispanics. Gender roles. Formerly men were by default the "head of household," a term that seems old fashioned and discriminatory now in the world of census questionnaires. For Evangelicals, it isn't old fashioned. It is sacred. 

God's only begotten child is a son, and like Trump, a male. Many Evangelical Christians believe Trump to be anointed by God. A muscular, fighting Messiah is exactly what we need when sacred truths are under attack. God answered their prayers.

War in Ukraine.

Look at Ukraine from Russia's point of view.  

Who cares what they think? Russia does.

The trouble with having empathy is that it makes moral clarity more difficult. It is more comfortable to have good guys and bad guys. And, of course, we are the good guys.

Let's look at maps. First, a map of the railway system in Europe.

There is no need to overthink this because my point is simple and obvious at first glance. I could have used a map of lights at night or GDP statistics. Russia, in the eastern quarter of this map, is adjacent to an extraordinary concentration of economic and potential military power, and they are relatively lacking in it. Russia is next door to a giant, especially when the various countries included in that concentration are all working together. 

Map two is a topographical map of Europe. The Alps are visible and the "C-shaped" mountains to their east, the Carpathian Mountains, are as well. Both are a barrier to easy transport which is why they show as an edge to rail lines. Notice, too, the broad plain from France, across the Low Countries, Germany, Eastern Europe and into Russia. Someone could bicycle from the small Baltic countries or from Paris or Berlin straight into Russia without encountering any natural impediment.

Map three is the famous flow map created by French engineer Charles Joseph Minard, showing the route of Napoleon's failed and disastrous march across that flat plains to Moscow and back. The distance, the supply lines, the cold, and the Russian army stopped them. 

Map four shows the directions of Nazi attacks on the USSR, directly to the east to Moscow and to the southeast, around the Carpathian Mountains toward Stalingrad. About 25 million citizens of the USSR died in that war.

Americans take our national security for granted. We are surrounded by oceans on two and a half sides, by a friendly Canada on the third side, most of which is almost uninhabited, and by the deserts in the Southwest. The USSR--now Russia--has an entirely different situation and mindset. They are surrounded by potential enemies. Russians know it in their bones. Strategic depth is what saves them. We took it away.

In the collapse of the USSR a major nuclear power disintegrated, and yet we avoided world war. As part of mutual understanding, the USA and NATO made assurances to Russia that we understood its national imperatives for strategic space. We broke our word. The Baltic countries became part of NATO. We encouraged a revolution in Ukraine to install a Western-facing government and posited that Ukraine, too, become fully part of NATO.

Map five: NATO, showing the movement of troops into Poland and the Baltic countries in 2014, to reassure them of NATO's commitment. Russia responded by moving troops. It tightened its relationship with Belarus. It took back Crimea. It sent unmarked troops into eastern Ukraine, where the native language is Russian, not Ukrainian.

American exceptionalism.

Many Americans presume with unquestioned confidence that:

***World War Two was primarily fought and won by Americans defeating Germany from the west. 

***God gave a special providential blessing to America and no one else, but most certainly not to Russia.

***American-style liberal democracy of our civics textbooks is what we have in America, and we have a moral obligation to share the "American Way" because it is, objectively, the best.

From that naïveté and hubris came the American thought that Russia would sit back and allow the USA and NATO to put them into what their history tells them is mortal danger.  We felt entitled to do it. 

Their national pride tells them not to accept that. Incredibly enough, they don't think the USA pretty much won WWII single-handedly, they don't think America is the exceptional and all-good country, and they think we are hypocrites regarding our supposed liberal democracy. They have their own point of view. They think the USA was the aggressor, intentionally putting them into danger. They don't think we are the good guys. They think they are. 

It isn't surprising. Indeed, it is inevitable. We created a mess and are going to have to live with it.

Blame Biden

The Wall Street Journal Editorialized:

   Mr. Biden had no plan to deal with the large numbers of vaccine holdouts, other than to deride them. He missed his goal of getting 70% of adults vaccinated by July 4 but proclaimed victory nonetheless.

It sounds like a crazy strategy, but it seems to work in politics: Oppose government efforts to address a problem, and then condemn the administration for failing to overcome your opposition.   

The Wall Street Journal editorial page is the serious, grown-up opinion face of the Murdoch empire, read by educated policy-makers. Cable network Fox News is the tabloid version of Murdoch. Both versions blame Biden for the refusal of about one-third of Americans to get vaccinated for COVID.

Who are those refusers? There is a spattering of people on the wholistic naturopathic-medicine left and some Black Americans skeptical about the White medical establishment. But,  overwhelmingly, vaccination refusers are people who consume Murdoch news. Fox News hosts and guests frame vaccinations as government tyranny and questionable science. They condemn the CDC and Anthony Fauci. They cheer athletes who refuse vaccinations and who get COVID advice from Joe Rogan. They praise GOP governors who stop businesses like Disney from requiring vaccinations for cruise ship passengers. 

Biden's critics are correct: He did indeed fail to overcome the vaccination messages sent out by Fox and Trump. Those refusers are hospitalized and dying at a ten-to-one disproportion to the vaccinated. Someone must be blamed. Blame Biden.

Something similar is in the works for December. Watch for it. If the U.S. fails to raise the debt limit, the country will default on its debt, creating economic catastrophe. Money market funds will "break the buck" or freeze. What Americans understand to be "money" is in fact the debt we owe one another resting on a foundation of U.S. Treasury securities that mature and roll over. Republicans in congress are adamant that they will vote as a block to oppose raising the debt limit. It is "Biden's economy" and therefore Biden's failure if he fails to overcome GOP sabotage. 

Surely the blatant hypocrisy of blaming Biden for a mess openly planned by his opponents undermines this strategy. Right?  No. Voters are presumably smarter than gorillas, but maybe not.

Killed by a rival male

The primary duty of a male silverback gorilla is to protect his harem of several females and their children. Frustrated bachelor males jealously watch from a distance. Sometimes a bachelor charges into the group, grabs an infant from a mother's arms, kills it, then runs off. The mother grieves, and then, incredibly enough, sometimes leaves the harem to join that bachelor, the murderer of her infant. Why? Because the murderer just proved that the previous silverback harem-owner could not protect her infants from murderous bachelors. She joins the guy strong enough to kill babies, including hers.

That is the GOP message. If Biden is unable to  overcome the vaccine hesitancy of people who listen to Trump and Fox, and if Biden is unable to stop Republicans from sabotaging the economy by creating a debt crisis, then Biden is too weak to govern. 

The message to voters: Since Biden can't stop us, it is better to make peace with the saboteurs. 

 

Thanks.

Thanks to the people who show up to work.

Some jobs need doing.

Employers are hunting for workers. "Help wanted." "Come join our team." I like seeing those signs.

Yesterday I needed help. The right front tire on my car looked low. I bent down to look at the tire and the problem was right there, visible. A screw just like this was stuck in the tread.

The tire was full enough to drive three miles to the tire store I have patronized for years, a store called Ed's Point S. I know Ed--Ed Miller--from Rotary. A nice guy. A civic benefactor, the kind of guy who owned a small local business and who got hit up by 4-H kids and Boy Scouts for donations. I don't know if he always said "yes" but be said "yes" to me when I asked him to support a Rotary project. I am grateful to him and to local businesses with local owners, not some corporate office in Kirkland or Bentonville. Thanks, Ed.

Ed recently sold the business, but Ed's name is still on the place. I am hopeful Ed keeps getting paid something for the "goodwill" he developed over the decades. He earned it.

They fix flats for free. They do it right then and there and they don't ask if you bought the tires from them, although I did. I suppose their business model is to hope people like me feel grateful. It works. I do feel grateful.

My car jack is the small cheap thing that comes with the car and it is mostly included for show, but I suppose, with real effort, I could get the tire and rim off the car on my own if my car were on flat, firm ground. Then, again with real effort, I could possibly get the tire off the rim on my own. It isn't easy with a heavy tire and light tools and I might get stuck at that spot. I have not patched a tire since I patched a bicycle tire at age 11 and possibly I would do it correctly, if I had a patch with me, and if I could get the tire re-inflated with a bicycle pump. I wouldn't feel safe driving at freeway speeds until a pro looked it over. 

It was way better for me to take it to a shop, if one were open.

Yesterday at 3:30 p.m., the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, the shop was open and a dozen or so guys were busily repairing flats, rotating tires, putting snow tires on cars, removing old tires and installing new ones. Whew! The place has car lifts and hydraulic wrenches, plus guys who know what they are doing. I am grateful.

Working in the open bay of a tire shop is not glamorous or easy work, but I was sure glad they were on the job. I hope they get well paid. I needed those guys. I say "guys" because everyone doing the work was male, and it took at least two to do the job. A second person rechecks the five lug nuts tightened by the guy who puts the tire back on the car, and each of them independently sign the clipboard saying they did it. It is safety check. I am grateful for that.

Full employment again. 

We have full employment. A lot of Boomers retired early, a lot of people--mostly women--left the workforce to deal with kids at home due to COVID, and we have reduced immigration. Working people have more market power than usual. I am OK with that, and if it causes some inflation I am OK with that as well. If we want people to do hard jobs well--and we do--then we need to pay them enough so that can afford to live good lives, even if it means working hard on the afternoon before Thanksgiving. I needed them, and they were there.

I am grateful.

The language of morality

"It would be nice occasionally if religious Democrats just said: 

'We believe everyone is equal in the eyes of God and under our Constitution. Our policies are motivated by a desire to secure the common good for the entire nation and equal dignity and rights for all people.'"

                      John Halpin, The Liberal Patriot 

"Paris is worth a mass." 

          King Henry IV of France

        

Joe Biden is a "Cradle Catholic" A cradle Catholic means someone born and raised in the Catholic faith, with Catholicism so thoroughly a part of the person's upbringing and culture and religious practice that they never chose the faith or came to Jesus from outside it. They are Catholics the way children born in a typical American neighborhood speaks English. English is their native language. Catholicism is Joe Biden's native faith.

Americans barely know that Joe Biden is religious, or if they know it they don't really believe it. Trump and Republicans are the brand associated with triumphal Christianity. Democrats have a problem with religion in politics. They seem afraid of it, as if it would make them sound like a Republican. 

I hope Democrats re-integrate religious language into their discourse, and I write as someone who is not religious. The moral language Democrats feel comfortable using is the language of academics, policy, and politics. They make moral values concrete by talking about "income re-distribution," "systemic racism," "micro-aggressions," and correct pronouns. Such language has purpose. It reflects the moral value of religious tolerance and respect for the non-religious. It reflects hands-off separation of church and state. The language come across as morally sterile. It is prose, not poetry. 

Fairness and kindness are natural human moral instincts. The justification for acting other than as rational, game-theory, marketplace maximizers of advantage is the moral dimension. We understand from our earliest childhood play with others and instruction from parents and other authorities that it isn't fair to cheat people, it isn't kind to disrespect people, even if one can get away with it. That little voice in our heads--or God in the sky--knows it is wrong.

For most Americans, the language of morality is the language of religious texts and traditions. People brought up in a faith tradition learned words that shape their moral instinct. For example, "income re-distribution" finds expression in the command "Thou shall give the workman his hire lest he cry against thee unto the Lord, and it be sin unto thee," (Deut. 24), and "the workman is worthy of his hire." (Luke 10)  Public benefits translate into Matthew 25 feed the poor, clothe the naked, that which you do for the least of these brothers of mine. Those words have power.

Democrats under-perform in votes of regular church attendees. Some of this is the abortion issue. Some churches decided that life begins at fertilization, and that has been made sacred, and therefore non-negotiable. It goes beyond that. Democratic thought leaders and spokespeople have been dominated by the educated left progressives--mostly secular people--not the spokespeople of communitarian Catholics, liberal Protestants, or the Black clergy. That is a problem for Democrats. Public policy is done for the benefit of  the common good, and consideration of the common good is a moral choice. Most people are moved by the familiar language of morality.

I predict that the Democratic candidate who unifies Democrats and the nation will speak in moral terms. Martin Luther King did not lead the Civil Rights movement by saying that the policies would be clever and effective. He said they were the right thing to do. I also predict a successful Democratic leader will freely use language from the Bible, because that is the common denominator of moral language. 

Won't leftist non-religious people like me be put off by religious language? Most will not. The religious language will reflect values we share. We are accustomed to religious language and some of it is lovely. 

Prepare yourselves for a "not-guilty" verdict in Arbery case

     "Yes, I still think the chances of them being convicted are about zero."

         Prediction by a lawyer who practiced in Arkansas.

Kevin Drum's blog is a typical example of opinions that I see and hear in the establishment media: 

"Unlike Kyle Rittenhouse, the Ahmaud Arbery case is open and shut." 

No it's not. The defense knows its jury. 

The establishment media commentators on the Arbery case reiterate facts and law that would lead a trusting reader or viewer to think that "justice" will prevail, in the form of guilty verdicts. They reiterate the facts as they interpret them: Three White guys profiled a helpless Black man who was alone, unarmed, jogging on the streets of a White neighborhood. The White guys, armed with shotguns, used pickup trucks to run him down, finally cornering him -- "like a rat" as they put it -- by surrounding him with their trucks, shouting at him to stop or they would "blow your fucking head off." Then, when facing a shotgun pointed at him, in desperation, Arbery grabbed at the shotgun barrel and was shot and killed. The shooter addressed a passerby, describing the man he shot: "He's an asshole."

It was a modern day lynching by people who did it proudly. They videotaped it. The local police establishment did a quick investigation of the people they knew well from prior employment, found no crime, and hid the video evidence, which came to light only after it was leaked to the media.

The case checks every box of White liberals' frustration at the justice system's racial disparities, but the facts of this case give liberals hope, buttressed by the media coverage. How could the jury possibly find them not-guilty? And so, with a guilty verdict, America will be spared the inevitable outrage and public unrest that would come if the three men got off. 

Or not.

The defense attorneys approach is a poker player's "tell." This case will not hang on the facts or the law. If the defense ever referenced race directly, I have not heard it. Instead, it is done in code. They describe an "idyllic" community, with friendly neighbors. Crime was unknown, until recently. The defense attorneys positioned these men as part of that paradise, good citizens, good neighbors. These alert protectors saw a suspicious man so, of course, they carried guns for self-defense when they chased him so they could politely request he stop to answer their legitimate questions.

The defense attorneys' are giving the jury members permission to vote their guts and protect their team. Arbery is "other," a low-caste other. He is no "jogger"--a descriptor of middle-class self-care. He was a criminal interloper. Laura Hogue, one of the defense attorneys, said, "He was no victim." He wore "khaki shorts, with no socks, to cover his long dirty toenails." 

Video: 24 seconds

That confirms the "tell." She was not avoiding the lynching trope. She was leaning into it. The local citizenry was doing on their own what the slow, technicality-burdened legal system confounds, and the more reason for the three men to have done what they did. The defense implication is that you good citizens on the jury know what is really going on. A young buck was up to no good and they took care of business the way you sometimes need to do, like killing a dangerous animal shot out season. Or a criminal on the run. Or a runaway slave. They had seen Arbery in the autopsy photographs. He had long, dirty toenails. He wasn't one of us. He was one of them.

The Arbery case is another iteration of the Kyle Rittenhouse case. Conservative media has made Rittenhouse a hero because the men on the street deserved what they got, since they were out among rioters and arsonists. The Arbery jury is asked to look at the facts and the law, but there is a deeper judgment going on. That uppity Black guy was in a neighborhood where he didn't belong. The local good-guys took care of business. You don't punish them for that.

City Boy, Country Boy

"See the USA in your Chevrolet
America is asking you to call.
Drive your Chevrolet through the USA
America's the greatest land of all."

     Chevrolet Commercial, sung by Dinah Shore, 1953

So happy. So upbeat. Seeing the USA was a pleasure trip. One nation, indivisible. Click

It is different now. 

Nick Kristof, a candidate for Oregon governor, is attempting to bridge the divide between city and rural. He grew up in rural Yamhill, Oregon, found success at the highest levels in the educated, professional, urban world, and now hopes to use his bone fides as a rooted country boy to bind the wounds of a troubled Oregon. I would like Kristof-- or someone else-- to pull this off. Like him, I grew up on a family farm, worked on it in summers, had a fancy education, and then came home to do politics and farming. Like him, I now own the family farm. 

Kristof campaign photo

I sometimes feel like a foreigner on my farm. Town and country are different worlds. Precincts in Ashland registered an 85% vote for Biden in 2020. Two precincts over into a rural area, the voters gave Trump 74% of the vote. Ashland skews toward educated, professional people--people doing well in the world where Kristof thrived. Outside Ashland, rural people skew heavily toward the people Kristof grew up with, less educated, poorer, people who often work outdoors. If Kristof communicates that he is an anthropologist, an observer of rural disfunction, he will surely lose big. No one wants to be an exotic specimen or an object of pity. He needs to pull his past into the present and be credible in both worlds. He is on a tightrope.

John Coster

John Coster is a city boy and part of the "knowledge-worker" world, where he, like Kristof, succeeded greatly. He manages high-technology electrical contracting projects around the world. Coster has also done missionary projects in Latin America, Africa, and Central Asia. He wrote me about feeling like an outsider in his own country.

Guest Post by John Coster

Working in different countries over the years has taught me the importance of learning the cultural norms and values of the people in each place. One of the biggest challenges is decoding their rules of logic. 

I was recently surprised to find how little I really understood about a big swath of American culture – the rural kind. Most of my professional life has been around industrial construction and technology and usually in large metropolitan areas. My connection with nature has mostly been with sports like boating, skiing, scuba diving, and backpacking (or as my son would say “rich people pretending to be homeless, but with really nice gear.”)

Recently I have been getting into archery. I have never hunted but fortunately a friend was willing to coach me. His property is in Northeastern Washington State – about a 5-hour drive from Seattle and about a million miles away culturally. I decided that I would immerse myself and learn how local people have done this for 100+ years. This meant scouting out promising spots and talking to other hunters I’ve met in the woods and in the surrounding small towns. 

I think of the world I inhabit as the life of the mind. It’s about evolving ideas, innovation, technology, geopolitics, economics, philosophy, and even theology. My connection to the land and place is limited to my little backyard garden, the local farmers market, and trying to buy fair-trade and organic produce. 

What strikes me about places like Colville, Kettle Falls, Chewelah, and Deer Park in eastern Washington is how closely tied everyone is to the land and place. Most private jobs are in timber, lumber mills, mining, ranching, farming, and trucking. People work on their own cars, trucks and farm equipment. It’s not just how people make a living; the land is a core part of their identity and rhythm of life, and it has been so for generations. They actually hunt, fish and garden (and can) for food. Real (physical) self-sufficiency is a good and noble thing, and they are proud they can do it.

The numbers tell an unsurprising story: Stevens County is significantly older, whiter, less mobile, and less economically well-off than the rest of the state. Most of the population lives in less-dense unincorporated areas of the county. You can buy 20 acres of land for under $100K.

Many with whom I spoke think the problem with government overreach comes with increasing environmental and other regulatory rules that have fundamentally curbed their freedoms and threaten their livelihoods. The signs of long-term economic decline are everywhere. Many people remember when these places saw better times and most blame big government. They see everything through a pragmatic lens. They don’t have the luxury of living the life of the mind.

When I asked people what they liked and disliked about living here, I was told (often with averted eyes and hushed tones) that it was pretty idyllic until politics made things ugly about five years ago and even more so with the Pandemic. In small towns everyone knows each other, and neighborliness has a kind of social currency. But civility is more fragile than many thought and I was told by two young mask-wearing baristas that they were often verbally assaulted for wearing them by otherwise pleasant middle-aged people--some of whom they have known for years.

I haven’t seen one sign for a Democrat.

Nick Kristof is screwing up

Nick Kristof, the NY Times columnist, is making an amateur mistake.

I offer him advice he sorely needs: make some enemies.

Nick Kristof is a celebrity, at least among the people who read the New York Times and watch the serious Sunday shows on TV. He is famous, and I am not. Nevertheless I am going give campaign advice. Stop talking nice-nice mush. Stand for something. 

For Oregon. For what else?

Kristof has a shot at being governor because there is a lot of restless feeling that we need a change. Portland is the epicenter of liberal protests and even Democrats are tired of it. The homeless encampments on sidewalks and median strips are miserable for the homeless and it degrades civic life for everyone. Outside the metro area, people feel the current Democratic administration is tone deaf and Portland-centric. A fresh face outsider has a shot.

To Nick Kristof: 

Nick, you are new at this. I realize fully that your instinct is to say things people agree with. Point out obvious problems and say you are one of us. It is what you are doing now. Stop. You are also proving to people that you are a writer, not a governor.

Kristof sends me fundraising letters. I am a prime prospect. I am on the list of donors to Democratic candidates and I subscribe to the NY Times. I see what he says. He reminds me again today that he grew up in rural Oregon and that he loves the state. 

Peter, I’m running for governor for the same reason I became a journalist:

To turn the world’s attention to the most critical issues of our time, while doing everything I could to help the people I encountered during my work.  

And this, in an email earlier this week:

Parents with children struggling with homelessness because of an unfair system.

Families kicked out of their homes because our government has left them behind.

Disillusioned voters who desperately want leadership to do better.

Peter, I’m always going to be a listener. It’s who I am.

Mush, mush, mush. Worthless. Don't say we need a leader. Be the leader. I will leave to Kristof's intelligence and conscience to present his own policy ideas, but I will give examples of what would put Kristof on the map as a person willing to try solutions, not as a sensitive observer.

Example: Say that misery in timber country has taken place because forest environmentalists have erred in focusing on over-harvesting and not on fires. Say we need to cut way more trees. This would surely disappoint some people but would thrill others. The objections by some environmentalist are an essential feature, not a bug. Let them slam you, Nick. You can talk about timber-town despair, about the unhealthy smoke, and the CO2 from forest fires. Your opponents will say you are a timber beast. You can respond you care about both jobs and climate. You will win some and lose some. You will get your 40% of the Democratic vote, more than enough to win the primary. In the general election downstate timber towns will like what you say, and maybe you won't lose four to one the way Democrats do now.

Example: Say you want to buy Lloyds Center and turn it into a massive homeless shelter. Say you will clear the streets in 60 days. No more sleeping on public property. It is dangerous and unsanitary. Some people will object. What about the neighborhood impacts? Say you will concentrate police and social services attention right there. Some people will think, at last, a solution. Others will say it is cruel. You will say inaction is cruel. The criticism you would get is a feature. Dare to make some people angry and the public would realize you represent change, not dithering.  

Asking questions is safe. Try giving answers

You don't like those two ideas? Fine. I did not expect unanimity. Your disagreement is a feature. See? Now you are engaged. At least now people would see a candidate for governor willing to break eggs for the omelet of a better Oregon. 

Nick, you can raise $100 million dollars and it won't get you elected if the money is spent telling people you have empathy. We know that about you. We want to know if you are a change agent. If you rouse up some angry opponents, Oregonians might think this Kristof guy is a Democrat willing to challenge some frozen-in-place interest groups on both left and right and get things done. That guy can win.

Be that guy, if you have it in you.