“I’m supposed to change my opinion about a President that's doing all kinds of amazingly positive things because of a one-hour press conference?”
Supporters of President @realDonaldTrump in Michigan defend his performance in Helsinki alongside President Putin pic.twitter.com/qHajTTfL90
— Channel 4 News (@Channel4News) July 18, 2018
Here’s a tip… If you watch the above like these are the last four Trump supporters in the state, and that they’ve been banished to an island in the middle of Lake Michigan, it makes it a lot more bearable.
By the way, if the name Scott Hagerstrom sounds familiar, it might be because I interviewed him on The Saturday Six Pack just before the 2016 election. They don’t introduce him as such in this Channel 4 piece, but Hagerstrom was the Michigan director of the Trump Pence 2016 campaign.
29 Comments
What a surprise that they’re all white.
WHITE GENOCIDE
Trump is doing amazingly positive things by keeping brown people out of the gene pool.
BongzRUS Andrenochromeheresy CLINTON wear faceof children under pizzaplace
Take a trip up north. This is 90% of the people that live up there.
I know both these guys from Grindr.
They work as a team.
Call themselves Team Freedom.
Specialize in what they call “strict father” play. Lots of spankings administered by men in cardigan weaters smoking pipes.
The women are their wives. They’re oblivious.
This is why, when I went to college at Lake Superior State (which draws its student body primarily from the UP and Northern lower peninsula), I was in for a HUGE culture shock. I remember one time in a government class, we were talking about marijuana and how marijuana use should be penalized and the professor asked the class what an appropriate penalty should be and half the class though the death penalty would be appropriate and the other half thought life in prison. LOL I still remember raising my hand and saying “The $5 ticket seems to be working out well in Ann Arbor” to gasps from my classmates.
The irony of a pothead like HW aligning himself with those folks is not lost on me.
People in those areas talk a lot of stupid morality, but when you dig, there is a lot of weed smoking, drug use, and extramarital sex going on. It’s like they feel the need to look tough and righteous in public to cover up for the fact that they are doing other shit in private.
“The irony of a pothead like HW aligning himself with those folks is not lost on me.”
Jeff Sessions apparently has a secret plan to legalize weed throughout the country.
This is how tyrants rise to power. They convince their followers that anyone and everyone who disagrees with them must be part of some mysterious conspiracy of people out to prevent “progress”. No one can be right except the “leader”, who is always right.
https://twitter.com/BradMossEsq/status/1019946529417842691
Andrenochrome without weed is like bread without cheese.
IL, I actually got into an argument immediately following about if alcohol is a drug. It started with me asking them why they felt marijuana prohibition was desirable when prohibition of other drugs like alcohol were tried and failed. Their response, “alcohol is not a drug”
They weren’t even doing the other shit in private. The drinking on that campus was pretty bad. Drinking and driving was also tolerated. Rape too. Lots of “she was asking for it” but pot? Hang em!!! They also, btw, considered themselves logical in the same ironic way HW sees himself.
These comments are a great example of what happens when a group of people, who regularly employ the logic of bigotry, get together and have a conversation about Those Other People.
“Those Other People.”
I am not doubting the hypocrisy of urban people (see keywords Ann Arbor, black people), but the ways in which it manifests itself in the countryside is worthy of exploration.
Rural people profess high levels of morality in public while doing the opposite in private. Perhaps it is because they have a sense that the punitive outcomes of the rules don’t apply to them (i.e. the rules only apply to the poorest of the poor or black people), or that impossibly high community standards of morality push them to do the opposite in their private lives , or that the standards are high because the potential outcomes of private behavior pose a substantive threat and the standards somehow mitigate the impacts of personal behavior like extramarital sex or weed use.
In any case, I find it fascinating.
Yes, IL, social science is, of course, a worthy and interesting pursuit.
I think I will let my first comment stand though.
I am bigoted toward white supremacists and their aplogists and enablers, yes.
FF apparently thinks it is bigoted for a woman to object to rape culture. I am not surprised.
“I’m supposed to change my opinion about a guy that did all kind of amazingly positive football, because of 15 minutes on a doorstep in Brentwood?”
“FF apparently thinks it is bigoted for a woman to object to rape culture. I am not surprised.”
Really? Why am I not surprised.
Wherever there is white male power, the Mr. Flakes is there to protect it.
FF– Where did you grow up? Just curious.
Because I know at least IL and I grew up among ‘Those Other People.’ I at least have people who fit IL and Lynne’s characterization in my family. So this is not sociology or othering but observation drawn from lived experience. And honestly, my take on rural conservatives is they can take the criticism and even difference (so long as you are also white and straight and you are willing to take some ribbing), but they can sniff out pity and condescension from a mile away. They don’t need your defense. Their guy is in office. And he didn’t get there because urban liberals failed to feel sorry enough for them.
So again, please, tell us about ho you connect to the rural Christian Conservative demographic.
On a related note, Lynne’s testimony sounds familiar. And I always felt those positions which were countered by their own behavior (like a doctrine v practice split) would have been vulnerable with more exposure to other points of view. In many ways the internet has helped with that, but there is still the social, peer group pressure to belong by agreeing on politics. This is heavy in A2 as well. It’s considered impolite in A2 to disagree with a neighbor or friend who is liberal/progressive, even though there is plenty of variation in beliefs. First, we self-segregate and then we become uncomfortable with disagreement or difference. That’s how the bubble works. And honestly, I just think we need to deal with each other more. And offer each other some basic humanity so long as it is returned.
But, unlike FF, I don’t think my political positions themselves or my observations about what is fucked up about Christian Conservative communities are a barrier to that. I think that’s more of an issue with people who perceive me to be on their side… aka liberals. Especially Ann Arbor and Ypsi liberals who skew heavily to self-congratulation.
The Mr. Flakes wrongly assumes that a criticism of rural conservative foolishness is somehow a defense of urban, liberal foolishness.
My hometown:
“The county has a history of being one of the most Republican counties in Pennsylvania. No Democratic Presidential candidate has won Lebanon County since 1936, when Franklin Delano Roosevelt narrowly carried it even as he won re-election in a landslide nationally. The only other time in the 20th century that the county didn’t support a Republican was in 1912, when Theodore Roosevelt carried it on the Bull Moose ticket.
Republicans are no less dominant at the state and local level. The row offices and all but one county commission seat are held by Republicans, and there are no elected Democrats above the county level.
Lebanon County was one of only four counties in the state to vote for Barry Goldwater in 1964, along with Snyder, Union, and Wayne counties.”
It’s 95% white. 99% Christian/Catholic. Average income is $25 grand/year
I hope to move back there someday.
FWIW, I have tons of family in rural NE Pennsylvania (more near Carbondale) and my favorite is the one cousin who has no filter and is kind of liberal and an atheist. He always tries to argue with everyone at gatherings while I and some of the other cousins who hold the same views but to be more diplomatic about it. He is always like, “Come on, Lynne back me up, you think religion is bullshit too” and I am always like, “I can see how it brings comfort to others but I dont believe, it is true” LOL
One thing I will say about the values of my family is that “family first” is more or less shared by everyone so even the cousin with no filter has no fear of being ostracized for his views. Goes both ways of course. I will put up with a lot more from them in terms of their racist sexist Trump supporting bullshit than I will otherwise. In the grand scheme of things, this is good because it helps everyone to engage with people with different views. I will admit to experiencing just a little schadenfreude at their anger and disappointment that Trump’s “Muslim” ban also was keeping Syrian Orthodox Christians out too.
Them: It is supposed to be a Muslim ban but it is keeping people of our faith out
Me: Doesnt feel good when a group you are part of is discriminated against, does it?
Who knows, maybe there will be some glimmer of understanding there?
All of that, Lynne. They do take care of their own. Their own being the operative term. The fear of others is so much stronger, and I think any exposure helps honestly. I’ve seen people become more socially progressive over time. Usually because someone they loved was gay, or got sick, or got pregnant, etc etc. This business of feeling more compassion for the groups to which one belongs is somewhat universal. Its also something democratic civilization should be moving us away from… Or any kind of humanist culture.
“I ride or die for mine” is a phrase I hear in Detroit and back home, but that I doubt I’d ever hear in Ann Arbor. They are too secure as to need such reassurances. Their compassion and principles come at zero personal cost. I never fully believe any person’s stated principles until they demonstrate sacrifice for them.
This op-ed, written by a Hillsdale prof and former Trump National Security Officer, appeared in WaPo. I don’t know why they published it. Maybe to upset us. It worked. I feel sick.
“It falls, then, to Trump. An executive order could specify to federal agencies that the children of noncitizens are not citizens. Such an order would, of course, immediately be challenged in the courts. But officers in all three branches of government — the president no less than judges — take similar oaths to defend the Constitution. Why shouldn’t the president act to defend the clear meaning of the 14th Amendment?”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/citizenship-shouldnt-be-a-birthright/2018/07/18/7d0e2998-8912-11e8-85ae-511bc1146b0b_story.html
Tangentially related, re the construction of citizenship and ethnic and racial identity, along the lines of so many heated conversations here with FF, etc– This is awesome.
http://www.cc.com/video-clips/mj2p6x/the-daily-show-with-trevor-noah-between-the-scenes—trevor-responds-to-criticism-from-the-french-ambassador