Post by NFA on Mar 3, 2021 19:29:45 GMT 8
As an Industry Faces Destruction, It Grows a Voting Coalition
This blue-collar populist coalition will grow—despite the press incorrectly believing one person caused it and having the audacity to think they have the power to dismantle it.
By Salena Zito March 2, 2021
amgreatness.com/2021/03/02/as-an-industry-faces-destruction-it-grows-a-voting-coalition/.
This blue-collar populist coalition will grow—despite the press incorrectly believing one person caused it and having the audacity to think they have the power to dismantle it.
By Salena Zito March 2, 2021
amgreatness.com/2021/03/02/as-an-industry-faces-destruction-it-grows-a-voting-coalition/.
....
Here, metallurgical coal gets mined. It is used exclusively for the steel production that supports the construction of bridges, roads, highways, homes, factories, distribution centers, churches, and other businesses supporting the country’s infrastructure and economy.
...
It is still astounding to witness the contempt and disdain politicians and the press have toward the lives and livelihoods of people who aren’t like them, people who don’t live in their ZIP codes or attend the same universities they did.
People who work with their hands don’t start a conversation by asking you where you work. It is rare to find anyone here who would say your profession is irredeemable and that you need to do something they find worthy. Traditionally, when a job or an industry has a problem, they work on fixing it or correcting it rather than destroying it.
People often asked after the 2020 election what will happen with the Trump voters (Fisher and Charles voted for him twice). The thing is this complex conservative populist coalition existed long before it helped catapult Donald Trump to the presidency in 2016.
Trump’s win was, in part, the result of a culture that became detached from the people they served in various institutions, whether it was the government, the entertainment industry or the college campus. Many people ultimately rejected all of them.
But if you never understood that, if you always thought it was about Trump, you never understood who they were and why they vote the way they do.
And you never understood how someone who lives in the suburbs of Arizona or Kenosha, Wisconsin, or Miami could have anything in common with someone who works the mines in Appalachia. And you didn’t understand that because you didn’t care to, because you hoped for its destruction.
There will be two endings to this story. The first is industries such as coal or shale, or the creation of pipelines, will continue to get attacked and dismantled, costing people their jobs. As Fisher said, politicians and the press always need a bad guy.
And the other ending is this coalition will grow—despite the press incorrectly believing one person caused it and having the audacity to think they have the power to dismantle it.
Here, metallurgical coal gets mined. It is used exclusively for the steel production that supports the construction of bridges, roads, highways, homes, factories, distribution centers, churches, and other businesses supporting the country’s infrastructure and economy.
...
It is still astounding to witness the contempt and disdain politicians and the press have toward the lives and livelihoods of people who aren’t like them, people who don’t live in their ZIP codes or attend the same universities they did.
People who work with their hands don’t start a conversation by asking you where you work. It is rare to find anyone here who would say your profession is irredeemable and that you need to do something they find worthy. Traditionally, when a job or an industry has a problem, they work on fixing it or correcting it rather than destroying it.
People often asked after the 2020 election what will happen with the Trump voters (Fisher and Charles voted for him twice). The thing is this complex conservative populist coalition existed long before it helped catapult Donald Trump to the presidency in 2016.
Trump’s win was, in part, the result of a culture that became detached from the people they served in various institutions, whether it was the government, the entertainment industry or the college campus. Many people ultimately rejected all of them.
But if you never understood that, if you always thought it was about Trump, you never understood who they were and why they vote the way they do.
And you never understood how someone who lives in the suburbs of Arizona or Kenosha, Wisconsin, or Miami could have anything in common with someone who works the mines in Appalachia. And you didn’t understand that because you didn’t care to, because you hoped for its destruction.
There will be two endings to this story. The first is industries such as coal or shale, or the creation of pipelines, will continue to get attacked and dismantled, costing people their jobs. As Fisher said, politicians and the press always need a bad guy.
And the other ending is this coalition will grow—despite the press incorrectly believing one person caused it and having the audacity to think they have the power to dismantle it.