Frank Rich: "No Sympathy for the Hillbilly"

[ApatheticAustrian]

No Sympathy for the Hillbilly
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/03/frank-rich-no-sympathy-for-the-hillbilly.html

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i know, i know, it sounds offensive but.....RTFThing and hate the author/"libtards"/whoever after it.

[Chief Justice Keef]

Matt Bruenig had a pretty great response to this (dumb) piece.

https://medium.com/@MattBruenig/women-and-people-of-color-make-up-the-majority-of-the-trump-coalition-e9bb20f65709#.9z92f6849

[ApatheticAustrian]

i am btw not sharing this piece cause i TOTALLY AGREEE!!!!!....i just thought it would be a lovely, controversial-as-fick, part of the debate.

[Citizen (The) Doctor]

Matt Bruenig had a pretty great response to this (dumb) piece.

https://medium.com/@MattBruenig/women-and-people-of-color-make-up-the-majority-of-the-trump-coalition-e9bb20f65709#.9z92f6849

Not to endorse anything Rich is saying but I'm not entirely sure what separating women away from "white working class" does to critique this piece. Can't women be white-working class? Furthermore defining "white-working class" as "without a college degree" is a really bad metric. Income is a much better one.

[JA]

https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/03/frank-rich-response-new-york-magazine-trump-ryan-chaffetz-obamacare/

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[Bismarck]

I still don't buy the "every rural voter is really a democratic socialist except that they're too dumb or racist" thing.

[Rjjr77]

Frank Rich is mediocre at everything he does and has managed to continually fall upwards.

[Antonio the Sixth]

i am btw not sharing this piece cause i TOTALLY AGREEE!!!!!....i just thought it would be a lovely, controversial-as-fick, part of the debate.

Whatever "debate" this disgusting garbage of a column contributes to is not a debate we should be having in the first place.

[angus]

No Sympathy for the Hillbilly

No wisdom gained from them either, apparently.  Hillbillies are definitely an underrated group.  The French lost their great empire for many reasons, not the least of which was the fact that they challenged a group of hillbillies at Dien Bien Phu in 1954.  And lost.  Badly.  Then, in less than a decade, the US--undoubtedly thinking it was better-prepared and smarter than the French--were engaged with that same group of hillbillies.  The US also lost its war against them.  Badly.  Score two for the hillbillies.

You're all invited back next week to this localiteeee
to share a heapin' helpin' of their hospitaliteee.

[Deblano]

"These hillbillies need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and get a job."

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

I like how he supports his argument by comparing these people to third-class Titanic passengers. Like, you know who the bad guys in that story are, right, Frank? Right?

[RINO Tom]

This is literally no different than a conservative writer putting out an article saying that the GOP should not care about Black people and that Black voters are too dumb to see how the Democratic Party screws them over; the difference is the conservative writer would face twenty times as much backlash.

[Ronnie]

People like this foolish, classist man make me wonder if Democrats will win back power for the foreseeable future, despite their various advantages.  I've read several articles with this kind of tone, and they all make me simultaneously angry and very worried.

[Oakvale]

Good to see some pushback against the bizarre media fellation of Trump voters because they once drove a truck.

[Wells]

The way to win over the votes you need to win isn't "screw you for voting for the other guy". And also what RINO Tom said is 100% right.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Good to see some pushback against the bizarre media fellation of Trump voters because they once drove a truck.

Yes, clearly the most serious problem with the mainstream media these days is that they pay too much attention and are too sympathetic to economically disadvantaged groups. That explains everything!

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

I'm just absolutely baffled that there are Serious People writing Serious Thinkpieces arguing that the problem is that the Democratic Party isn't contemptuous enough of people who don't vote for it. It really lends some credence to the idea that, when you're insulated from the actual outcomes of bad policy (e.g. by being a famous liberal pundit, or whatever Oakvale is), you start to view politics as a purely will-to-power (or will-to-feeling-superior, really, since wielding power typically requires winning elections) exercise rather than something that has real consequences if the bad guys keep winning.

[Oakvale]

The basic flaw with democracy is that at some point you've got to stop absolving voters and realise that a lot of people want terrible things. For every Trump voter who got conned there's at least two more cheering on his plan to throw every Mexican in the United States into a giant pit.

Good to see some pushback against the bizarre media fellation of Trump voters because they once drove a truck.

Yes, clearly the most serious problem with the mainstream media these days is that they pay too much attention and are too sympathetic to economically disadvantaged groups. That explains everything!

Airhead journalists are weekly dispatched in their millions to empty diners in Michigan or whatever to ask fat guys in MAGA hats if they still like Trump and then return to write fawning pieces about how this noble working man thinks lynching is good. This genre did not exist before November 8th and does not exist for any other demographic. Not sure where you got the rest of your wild extrapolation from but I understand the urge to sermonise.

I'm just absolutely baffled that there are Serious People writing Serious Thinkpieces arguing that the problem is that the Democratic Party isn't contemptuous enough of people who don't vote for it. It really lends some credence to the idea that, when you're insulated from the actual outcomes of bad policy (e.g. by being a famous liberal pundit, or whatever Oakvale is), you start to view politics as a purely will-to-power (or will-to-feeling-superior, really, since wielding power typically requires winning elections) exercise rather than something that has real consequences if the bad guys keep winning.

I am not a politician and don't feel the need to lionise the electorate. You have zero idea as to what degree 'bad policy' affects me but by all means continue your preening.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

The basic flaw with democracy is that at some point you've got to stop absolving voters and realise that a lot of people want terrible things.

Why? Okay, some voters want terrible things. So what?

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

I'm just absolutely baffled that there are Serious People writing Serious Thinkpieces arguing that the problem is that the Democratic Party isn't contemptuous enough of people who don't vote for it. It really lends some credence to the idea that, when you're insulated from the actual outcomes of bad policy (e.g. by being a famous liberal pundit, or whatever Oakvale is), you start to view politics as a purely will-to-power (or will-to-feeling-superior, really, since wielding power typically requires winning elections) exercise rather than something that has real consequences if the bad guys keep winning.

I am not a politician and don't feel the need to lionise the electorate. You have zero idea as to what degree 'bad policy' affects me but by all means continue your preening.

The way "preening", and similar accusations such as pretentiousness, get thrown around in arguments like this is starting to remind me an awful lot of the saw about the bro in "don't taze me, bro" not in fact being the one doing the tazing.

[heatcharger]

Good to see some pushback against the bizarre media fellation of Trump voters because they once drove a truck.

Yes, clearly the most serious problem with the mainstream media these days is that they pay too much attention and are too sympathetic to economically disadvantaged groups. That explains everything!

They only pay attention to whatever group they perceived swung the last election.  No one is paying attention to poor people in Baltimore because they don't happen to live in a swing state.  But if you're poor in Pennsylvania your problems matter.

This is actually true. There's also a strong racial undercurrent to how media covers voters. CNN decides to send reporters to diners in Scranton, PA to ask them about the world's happenings, but never to cities where they probably vote >85% Democrat.

[Associate Justice PiT]

People like this foolish, classist man make me wonder if Democrats will win back power for the foreseeable future, despite their various advantages.  I've read several articles with this kind of tone, and they all make me simultaneously angry and very worried.

     This is something I've been saying across many threads. While there certainly is time to change their tune, so many Democrats are coming forth and speaking about the situation with the same condescending tone that drove people to vote for Trump in the first place. If they learned their lesson from the party's collapse in the Midwest, they're doing an excellent job of hiding it.

[Rjjr77]

Good to see some pushback against the bizarre media fellation of Trump voters because they once drove a truck.

Yes, clearly the most serious problem with the mainstream media these days is that they pay too much attention and are too sympathetic to economically disadvantaged groups. That explains everything!

They only pay attention to whatever group they perceived swung the last election.  No one is paying attention to poor people in Baltimore because they don't happen to live in a swing state.  But if you're poor in Pennsylvania your problems matter.

This is actually true. There's also a strong racial undercurrent to how media covers voters. CNN decides to send reporters to diners in Scranton, PA to ask them about the world's happenings, but never to cities where they probably vote >85% Democrat.

That's crap, they send people to Cleveland and Cincinnati all the time.

[Associate Justice PiT]

People like this foolish, classist man make me wonder if Democrats will win back power for the foreseeable future, despite their various advantages.  I've read several articles with this kind of tone, and they all make me simultaneously angry and very worried.

     This is something I've been saying across many threads. While there certainly is time to change their tune, so many Democrats are coming forth and speaking about the situation with the same condescending tone that drove people to vote for Trump in the first place. If they learned their lesson from the party's collapse in the Midwest, they're doing an excellent job of hiding it.

Umm, perhaps his tone could have been less argumentative, but there is an element of truth that Democrats should not be completely placating voters in a handful of states just to win the electoral college.  Also, they shouldn't think that just because Michigan, Wisconsin, etc. were the closest states in this election that these are necessarily the states they must target next time.

     Reality is, this is a block of voters that used to be solidly Democratic, but has been trending Republican because they don't see the Democrats as caring about the issues they care about. Their concerns are not the end-all be-all, but it would be hard to put together a winning coalition by simply writing them. At the least, harder than it would be to put together a winning coalition by drawing them into the fold.

[Storebought]

How do you gain votes from an electorate convinced that tax cuts spur economic growth, and that healthcare costs can be lowered by letting insurance companies operate beyond state lines (whatever that entails...), that unionization of the manufacturing sector lowers workers' standards of living -- and all that other rot -- that their deeply held political principles are just shibboleths? Efforts by the Democratic Party to argue otherwise just amounts to Democrats lecturing voters that their false beliefs are indeed false -- and no likes a lecturing hectoring know-it-all.