The Great Revolt: Great Fiction

I was at the book store, where I am now only stopping by every two weeks. Not that it has many clients. I was sick of staring at e-books, so I got something on paper.

Well, don't buy that book. I was barely able to get anything new out of it as far as the mind of the Trump voter. And the revolt itself, well, it really did not materialize. There are several chapters theorizing on the Trump revolution, and even a permanent change in politics, between the people profile chapters.

The people are still angry, and they will vote for Trump. But their actions merely resulted in a populist president. Who has not delivered much to their rust belt. The book gives some useful back ground on the rust belt towns and cities. The economy has changed. The union jobs are not there anymore. But you can read all about that in a book that is not politically slanted:

JANESVILLE

The thing about the economy is, the US president does not have the power to stop manufacturing jobs going abroad. In a bad economy, the president can bail out industries to survive another few years and to even succeed in a good economy. Both Bush and Obama dealt with that, Obama the better.

The old people (yes, 70s mostly) interviewed are of the same mold:
1 not interested in politics
2 hard workers
3 watch Foxnews for info
4 mostly working class roots
5 they all voted by gut feel and dislike nearly all politicians
6 a smaller set are NRA people
7 one phrase turned many of them: drain the swamp
8 a good portion were finally converted at a Trump rally

There is plenty of theorizing from the authors about these communities, the role of Democrats and of unions. But there is not one person interviewed in the book who makes a sensible argument to prove that the Democrats were at fault for this. Someone or something caused the downfall of the rust belt. I would look to the 1% as the decision makers there.

Was it regulation then, that closed mines? There has not even been an environmental reason for the downfall of coal. It just is not the thing anymore. There is plenty of coal for electricity generation in Wyoming for instance, and fossil fuels have gone elsewhere with fracking. Just brought this up as a possible topic to cover. But no, it is mainly a discussion of disingenuous Hillary and honest "says what he means" Trump. A few times there is a mention of Hillary's lack of a plan. That is actually true, she had nothing new to add, just continue the Obama route. But Hillary is basically a politician, who bends her views with the times to get her party's support. Her personal beliefs may be very close to what she says. However, her calculated way of speaking comes off as dishonest.

Trump on the other hand, I believe, has no opinion on most matters. He just picks on the "vibes" of whatever group he sees as supporting. It is pure acting, a reality TV show. It is difficult to believe the Trump voters continue to believe him genuine. One election maybe, but three years?

Very few of them really understand how the federal government works, or the presidency. The general idea of a "good president" to them is one who completely disregards foreign leaders. Many still believe Trump was taxing china when Trump raised tariffs.

On page 84, a woman named Hutchins, one of the Rough Rebounders, as the authors call them, recites anti Obama text right out of Foxnews: "Oh my god, the end of this can't come soon enough. He keeps doing damage. He keeps doing irreparable damage to our country, financially. We were just out of control and everybody started expecting everything can be free."

You get the idea. There was nothing wrong with the Obama economy. Now we are in a recession. yes, jobs were going from coal and manufacture to service, But that is what they are still doing under Trump.

I had some sympathy for the Ohio pastor that did not hate Obama, but his wife did. There of course the "liberals had gone too far" and provided gay marriage and included birth control in health care. Really? My immoral behavior prevents your religious liberty?

There are relatively few people in the book that required much from the state, except that well over half of those interviewed are on Medicare. The government they hate so much (and Washington) is in fact taking care of them. Republicans have not ended social security yet.

The people in the book are retired, or running a shop or a service. I can imagine being in one of their shops and relating to them on that level. But I really could not have an intelligent discussion with any of them about politics. Reality will hit them eventually. But because of the delay in effects any president has, they will not understand what part was caused by Trump and what by his follower.

I am relieved, though, that many of these people are not true Republicans (though there is some fiddling here with that, many people claimed in the book to have been former Democrats were in fact always Republicans). Many are disinterested in politics, so once this outsider and "populist" is gone, they will not vote again.

I have only read half the book, so there may be some editing to this post as I struggle to the end. OK, the last three of four chapters were just propaganda, no interviews.

The book does deserve some credit in clearly listing the counties that flipped to Trump. It was in fact a Trump phenomenon. The long term drift to the right in the middle of the country is of course an equally strong factor. These states had been sort of DRIVEN to the right by grassroots activism and gerrymandering, such as the case of Kansas:

What's The Matter With Kansas?