Irish Trojan in Tennessee

A thought on West Virginia

By Brendan Loy

There have been a lot of articles published in recent days with man-on-the-street quotes from West Virginia along the lines of, "I heard that Obama is a Muslim and his wife's an atheist."

Now, I'm not denying that this sort of sentiment is a problem for Obama, nor am I necessarily denying that it's a particularly severe problem in West Virginia. But can we please take this reporting with a little grain of salt, at least? I'm not sure whether these sorts of quotes tell us all that much about the electoral dynamic in West Virginia, as opposed to the psyche of the reporters writing the stories.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that, if you're a reporter, and you conduct enough man-on-the-street interviews, you can find some idiot to say "Obama's a Muslim" -- or even "Obama's a n***er" -- anywhere. You can find racists and xenophobes and conspiratorial crazies in California, New York, Texas, Illinois; you can find 'em all over the damn country.

Can you find them more easily in West Virginia? Perhaps. But you're also much more likely to publish their quotes in a story about West Virginia, because it fits the storyline perfectly. Indeed, such a quote is precisely what these reporters are looking for when they start conducting the interviews in West Virginia. Whereas in California or New York, they'd probably ignore the random racist quote, in West Virginia they go out, they turn on the yokel-detecting radar, they hold up a microphone to the redneckiest-lookin' redneck they can find, and -- voila! -- journalistic magic happens.

Again: I'm not denying the real, genuine significance of racism as a factor in Obama's problems, nor am I suggesting that Appalachia is devoid of racists. But please, let's not jump to the conclusion that, when Hillary wins tomorrow's primary by a margin of 70% to 30%, it means that 70 percent of West Virginia Democrats are racists, just because we read a handful of cherrypicked quotes that seem to validate that preconceived notion.

Hillary Clinton's supporters prefer her to Obama for a whole bunch of reasons, some of them cultural, some of them political, some of them overtly racial, some of them subconsciously racial, and some of them falling into various other categories. While I disagree with their choice (and I strongly disagree with Hillary's conscious or reckless exploitation of the prejudices that do exist), it's an insult to those voters to paint them all with a broad brush and assume the only reason they've voting for Hillary is because they hate black people, or people with the middle name "Hussein," or whatever.

It's possible to condemn prejudice without engaging in it, and that's what's called for here. Some people in West Virginia (and elsewhere) are voting on the basis of racism, and that sucks. Most others aren't, and we shouldn't assume that they are. And that's all I have to say about that.

UPDATE: Poblano writes:

I do want to write a little bit more about the notion that West Virginians are racist. ... [T]he short version is: yes, there are racist voters in West Virginia, but there are racist voters in every state. The primary determinant of the extent to which racism tends to be more manifest is education levels, and so the effects may be more noticeable in West Virgnia, a state with poor academic achievement. But there is no reason to believe that West Virgnians are particularly racist, relative to their education levels.

That seems right to me.

Question

By Brendan Loy

Can someone tell me what this symbol is? I see it constantly on cars here in Knoxville, but I have no idea what it means, and you can't Google a symbol. :)

UPDATE: Commenters have informed me that it's the South Carolina state flag. Well, you wouldn't expect an effete Yankee elitist Obama supporter to know that, now would you? ;)

[NOTE: This post was originally published at 8:28 AM on May 13, but I've bumped it backward in time now that I know the answer, to keep Cletus near the top of the homepage for a while longer. -ed.]

CNN Breaking News

By CNN

The number of people killed by a 7.9-magnitude earthquake in China has risen to nearly 10,000, state-run media report.

Wrong track

By Brendan Loy

The notion that eighty-two percent of Americans think the nation is on the "wrong track" is, to me, pretty stunning. Not to say I disagree. I just find the near-unanimity amazing.

If McCain is somehow elected (I almost wrote "re-elected" -- haha, there's a Freudian slip the Democrats would love) in this sort of environment, it'll be nothing short of a miracle. Of course, it would be his second political miracle of this election cycle...

Mr. Nuance

By Brendan Loy

Barack Obama's stated position on Israel is, I think, impressively, refreshingly nuanced, and entirely unobjectionable. Which doesn't mean there won't be objections from those who regard "nuance" as a dirty word, of course. But I'm pretty hawkish about Israel (and terrorism generally), and yet I honestly can't find anything wrong with what he's saying (at least what I've read of it).

Honest, non-demogogic conservatives/hawks/Likudniks: show me where I'm wrong. Like Ross Perot, I'm all ears.

Hillary's conservative populism

By Brendan Loy

Jonathan Chait:

The dying days of the Hillary Clinton campaign have brought the breathtaking spectacle of a candidate lashing out at every element of public life that has nourished her career. The über-wonk has disparaged economists and expertise. The staunch ally of black America has attacked her opponent for lacking support of "working, hard-working Americans, white Americans." People who thought they knew Hillary Clinton have gazed in astonishment: What has she become? The answer is, a conservative populist.

Conservative populism and liberal populism are entirely different things. Liberal populism posits that the rich wield disproportionate influence over the government and push for policies often at odds with most people's interest. Conservative populism, by contrast, dismisses any inference that the rich and the non-rich might have opposing interests as "class warfare." Conservative populism prefers to divide society along social lines, with the elites being intellectuals and other snobs who fancy themselves better than average Americans.

Consider this analysis recently offered by Bill Clinton in Clarksburg, West Virginia: "The great divide in this country is not by race or even income, it's by those who think they are better than everyone else and think they should play by a different set of rules." This is precisely the dynamic that allows multimillionaires like George W. Bush and Bill O'Reilly to present themselves as being on the side of the little guy. A more classic expression of conservative populism cannot be found.

Historically, the conservative populist's social divide ran along racial and ethnic lines. In recent years, overt racism has all but disappeared from mainstream political life, and even racial hot button appeals like the 1988 Willie Horton ad have grown rare. What remains is a residue of nostalgia about small towns--whose residents are said to have stronger values and work harder than other Americans, and who also happen to be overwhelmingly white. In 2004, after John Kerry declared that some entertainers supporting him represented "the heart and soul of America," George W. Bush embarked upon a national tour of small- and mid-sized cities, where he would say, "I believe the heart and soul of America is found in places like Duluth, Minnesota," or other such places.

Likewise, Bill Clinton recently declared, "The people in small towns in rural America, who do the work for America, and represent the backbone and the values of this country, they are the people that are carrying her through in this nomination." The corollary--that strong values and hard work is in shorter supply among ethnically heterogeneous urban residents--is left unstated. Hillary Clinton's statement about "hard-working Americans, white Americans" simply made explicit a theme that conservative populists usually keep implicit.

Read the whole thing.

Devastating earthquake rocks China

By Brendan Loy

As if Cyclone Nargis -- which some fear could kill a million people if disease sets in -- and Saturday's devastating tornadoes in the U.S. heartland (the latest in what is becoming a historically bad year for tornadoes) weren't enough, now a 7.8 magnitude earthquake has struck central China, causing an official, initial death toll of 107, which is expected to ultimately go much, much higher. There are reports of 5,000 dead in a single county, and 900 students buried at a collapsed school.

UPDATE: Make that almost 9,000 dead:

The 7.8-magnitude earthquake devastated a hilly region of small cities and towns. The official Xinhua News Agency said 8,533 people died in Sichuan province and more than 200 others were killed in three other provinces and the mega-city of Chongqing.

When an earthquake kills almost 9,000 people (probably more, in the end), and it's only the second-worst calamity of the month (by far), you know it's been a bad month.