My wife and I spent most of the week in Glacier National Park, with spotty or no Internet. We were on our way home, stopped in the grocery store Roundup, Montana that advertised “Montana’s Best Doughnuts,” when my phone buzzed. It was a news alert with the Roe v Wade ruling, along with a profane text from my brother, something that accompanies most recent Supreme Court rulings.
Roundup, population 1,742, is the county seat of Musselshell County, population 4,669. Musselshell is 93% white, and Trump’s margin of victory was just a hair under 70% in 2020. Unlike many rural counties, Musselshell experienced slight population growth (roughly 200 people) between the last two census readings. Still, with a population density of 2.5 humans per square mile, there’s lots of room left.
Around 28% of Musselshell county is over 65, versus 16.5% of the US as a whole, though you wouldn’t know it from walking through that IGA store. The Roundup public schools (Go Panthers!) have a total of 166 students in attendance from K-12, and roughly 30 in the graduating class. At least a couple of those kids were working in the store yesterday, and more were waiting to buy doughnuts or deli food.
You might be surprised to learn that the doughnuts were pretty good. I wasn’t, once I saw the bakery in that store. It was clear that the bread and pastries were made from scratch, not trucked in frozen. The general rule of the upper plains is that a local bakery that is still in business is probably at least decent, because Northern European immigrants love their carbs. But take a good look before you buy, and don’t expect anything better than fruit filling out of a can.
The teenage girl checking us out had a combination of bright pink and jet black hair, false eyelashes, and some kind of top that featured a belt made out of black crosses. Not every kid in Roundup wears jeans and cowboy boots. (Her goth look was in sharp contrast to her polite and cheerful demeanor.)
It is hard to overstate the love and attention that rural towns lavish on their children. Local newspapers devote pages of coverage to high school sports and other school news. Many towns have banners hanging from streetlights, each with a picture of a member of the graduating high school class. Each graduate also gets a sponsored picture in the local newspaper, with a paragraph detailing their parents, siblings, and plans after graduation.
While driving out of town, I thought about how most of the kids we encountered would be like my wife and me — people who moved away from their small plains town and only came back occasionally to visit. There’s a lot of talk in Cletus safari pieces about how rural Republicans feel the condescension of city folk, and their resentment drives their votes. Maybe, but the constant exodus of their beloved young people probably cuts a lot deeper than whatever some urban snob writes in the New York Times. Rural towns pour their scarce resources into school kids, and most of them end up moving to either bigger towns in the state, or to big cities out of state. That’s real, not manufactured, rejection and loss.
The movement of rural kids is mainly driven by lack of opportunity in small towns, but I can’t see that the Republican desire to revert to Sharia Law will do anything but accelerate the exodus. It’s easy for a 70 year-old to put up an “abortion stops a beating heart” sign, a common sight along rural plains roads. It’s quite another thing to be a 19 year-old young woman who has to travel hundreds or thousands of miles to get an abortion, or to live somewhere they’ll get hassled if they want contraception.
Montanans were smart enough to enshrine the right of privacy into their constitution, so at least they won’t lose the abortion right because of a trigger law (unlike all the bordering states). But who knows how long that will last. And why stick around to find out? Better to get out of town, get a college degree, and move somewhere where freedom is more than a bumper sticker slogan.
Baud
Good post. In the olden days, old people could rely on the presence of an extended family. Now the only thing they have is each other and Fox News to feed their resentment.
mistermix
@Baud: Thanks. It was getting long but I should have also added that Musselshell County is an outlier in terms of population loss. The county to the east – Rosebud – lost almost 10% of its population. I would guess that Eastern Montana, as a whole, lost rather than gained, despite the overall population gain of the state.
geg6
We had a young woman from Montana who came to campus for one of our new student orientation days last week. She was all about coming to PA and seeing Pittsburgh and making friends with our very diverse peer mentors. We don’t get many Montanans as students, but of the few we’ve had since I started 24 years ago, none of them currently live in Montana or even a rural area. I know of one in Atlanta and one in NYC, for sure. I did not tell this young woman’s mother those facts when I mentioned her daughter was not our first Montanan.
debbie
My town’s not nearly as small as Roundup, but there are banners of high school seniors up and down Main St. I’m always surprised to look up while driving and see someone’s kid I know. There are parts of small-town America that are nice; I wish those were what stuck around.
E.
I was once the mayor of a town just like that. Your analysis rings very true. One of the most frustrating things however was how unimaginative and stubborn such people are about creating conditions that might keep their kids around. Or investing in their communities instead of bitching about their water bill. It was a hopeless cycle of grievance and resentment that became extremely tiresome to confront. We couldn’t even get a vacant lot turned into a park because the locals said it would attract drug users from the cities. WTF people. (It’s not a totally sad story — a well-healed group of local liberals bought the lot and now it is a privately run city park that some townsfolk refuse to enter.)
brendancalling
i expect a similar brain and wealth drain in Tennessee.
CaseyL
People who extol the virtues of living in rural small towns “because the cost of living is lower” don’t seem to understand the reason the COL is lower is because no one interested in having any kind of positive future wants to live there.
brantl
They are going to be startled at the exodus of young people out of these bean-eating , shit-kicker , bible-thumper states.
Starfish
@E.: Yeah, when tax-cut Jebus didn’t create jobs for their kids locally, perhaps they should have considered what conditions were really necessary for job creation, and try to create those.
brantl
@CaseyL: And love local pay is shit.
CarolPW
@brantl:
1) What do beans have to do with anything?
2) At least in California beaner was a racial slur for people of Mexican descent.
dmsilev
@CaseyL: Considering their professed love of “the market” as a solution for most everything, conservatives seem not to understand supply and demand.
rikyrah
Both my parents were born and grew up in the Jim Crow South. Small town Jim Crow South.
Both were part of the Great Migration out of the South to the North.
My father joined the Army, pre Pearl Harbor, because it was the best option for a poor Black man with any kind of drive. He was able to use part of his GI Bill to go to an HBCU after the war. And, then, he took that college degree and his veteran status, and got jobs at the Post Office, and then the VA. My father was one of the smartest men I ever knew. Taught himself what he needed to pass the CPA exam with flying colors. Of course, a Big Accounting Firm was out of the question. And, even a position in the IRS was closed to him, because he was born in the wrong skin color and decade.
My mother went into one of the three professions open to Black women back then: teaching. She followed her brothers to Chicago, and became employed with the Chicago Public Schools.
Maybe if my father had lived longer, they would have been part of the ‘Return Migration’ of Black people back to the South. My mother never stopped loving the little town she grew up in in Mississippi. The kids were forced to go several times a year to Mississippi to visit. Of the three of us, only my oldest sister loved it. The second sister and I despised every moment in Mississippi. Once my mother died, I vowed never to step foot in that state again. I have kept that vow.
HinTN
@brendancalling: The big four (Memphis, Nashville, Chattanooga and Knoxville) have great draws (higher education, urban amenities, great outdoor access, etc.) and they are growing. However, we’re just like the US in that these numbers are under represented in the state legislature, which happily tells them they cannot overstep their place in this dead red state. It’s a weird balance.
Starfish
@rikyrah: I grew up in Mississippi, and I have gone back once with my child. The town I grew up in had one major playground, and there was just really nothing going on. I am trying to figure out if I should go back and visit my mom this year, and it is a challenge.
brendancalling
Adding: my friend Liz has a PhD and was offered a creative writing position from Tulane in glorious NOLA, and from Penn State, which… well, it’s no NOLA.
She went w/Penn State and told Tulane that Roe was the deal breaker, so sorry—maybe when Louisiana joins the civilized world. And for real, what educated person is going to choose a shithole where they have no rights? That’s preposterous, and I hope southern state economies collapse as a result.
bbleh
Very much this. I know it’s unfashionable in some circles to link politics to age demography, but it’s no accident (I believe it was very deliberate) that Fox’s viewership has long skewed OLD, and that current Republican politics are inextricably linked to the unusually large percentage of Americans who are retired (we earned that Medicare and Social Security, not like you moochers on WIC and TANF!) and mired in a rosy mirage of squeaky-clean Leave-it-to-Beaver suburbs where none of the wimmin are uppity and none of those … other people are anywhere to be seen. And there are very few young people of my acquaintance — either from cities or from my current medium-sized Appalachian town — who don’t know all this and everything else you say perfectly well. Even here, if they don’t go to the city, they go to the university town, which is an island of blue and a bustling economic powerhouse.
There’s a reason a lot of the Heartland™ is dying off, and it ain’t just that the extractive-industry boomtowns bloom and fade like early spring flowers. I frankly don’t see why anyone with any brains who is not a soulless sociopathic grifter would stick around a minute longer than s/he had to.
It’s actually kind of sad. But they have only themselves to thank for it.
Kent
Yep. Most of my extended family lives in small towns or rural areas. And I spent many summers growing up in deeply rural PA (Mifflin County, Amish country) where my mother grew up and I still have lots of family.
The lack of opportunity is just stifling and it is intentional for the most part. One outside family took bought an abandoned dairy farm and converted into a productive winery. Good grief, we can’t have that, so the county quickly passed a moratorium on anyone else doing the same. The restaurants I remember from my childhood are mostly gone and so is the nice IGA that was downtown, to be replaced by a Dollar General on the outskirts of town. Land is tightly held by families so that no “outsiders” can possibly come in and try something like an organic farm or artisanal cheese factory or anything remotely 21st Century. And God Forbid say a Mexican family wanted to open a restaurant or grocery in one of the abandoned storefronts downtown.
Population continues to decline and age. Soon there will no longer be any staff to even work at the retirement homes and nursing homes holding the people who created the situation in the first place
Kids who have any initiative leave for Penn State or points beyond and never return except for Christmas and Thanksgiving. Those who stay quickly turn into resentful MAGAt assholes clutching to their guns and F250s and raging randomly at the world.
guachi
I’m a Montanan. I went to college in Montana. There was a presentation for the parents and the school said that Montana’s biggest export was its kids and that the parents should be aware that the school was training their kids for jobs that would likely be out of state.
Marmot
I predict that since this thread doesn’t mention Texas, nobody will propose walling off a red state, encouraging it to secede, watching gleefully as its residents suffer from right-wing government “that THEY voted for.”
Prove me wrong.
Mallard Filmore
Since I am not an economist, I can only wonder how much of a contribution to the lack of small town opportunity is driven by the ability of large companies to suck business away from these towns. What laws protect and promote big companies over small companies ???
Starfish
@brendancalling: I know two people who teach at Tulane. From speaking to them, it seems like the school shrunk post-Katrina. I am not cheering on the idea of southerners losing access to higher education (and the ability to gtfo.)
Chetan Murthy
Boy howdy, I can relate. Grew up in Weatherford, TX and by 2000 I’d finally shaken off the brainwashing, and I told my mom (who still lives nearby) I couldn’t visit her in TX, but she could visit me wherever I lived instead. A kid I went to HS with turned out to be gay (he was closeted back then) and has also fled for safer parts. A good friend grew up in a far suburb of Houston, came out at age 21, and … same story.
And of course, my hometown went for TFG by (IIRC) 81%. Yeah, it’s a real headscratcher why smart open-minded kids don’t wanna come back home.
Kent
I spent a good portion of my adult life in Texas. Just for the sake of argument, what do you think the rest of the US would look like if we didn’t have to count two Texas senators, 38 Texas Congressmen, and 40 Texas electoral college votes?
Cameron
I suppose it’s possible to find a shithole in every state in the country if you really want to. I’d rather not.
Mallard Filmore
I have not seen any similar stories about Europe. Is it too small and overcrowded to have this small town problem?
JoyceH
@Marmot: Just out of curiosity, I was googling state legislatures. I had no idea that Missouri and Ohio, for example, had such wildly red legislatures! I think the Texas legislature is more flippable than some of these Midwestern states.
brendancalling
@Starfish: my main point was that an educated woman declined to teach at a prestigious school because of abortion laws. The rest was snark on my part—but I do think this will hurt southern economies. I have to imagine quite a few large corporations are struggling to figure out how to protect women employees. I know some have proposed funding out of state travel for abortions, but who wants to tell their boss something like THAT?
Chetan Murthy
@Marmot:
Happy to. Putin should stop bombing Ukraine, and come take Texas. I’m sure the Texans will all oblige, and we can take in the decent people first.
Before you tut-tut, I grew up there, and still bear the scars. My hatred for Texas and the indecent Texans I grew up around knows no bounds, my hatred is as the heat of a thousand suns.
CaseyL
Many underpopulated states and cities have launched programs to lure young people back, offering a range of subsidies aimed at digital nomads and people hoping to launch a small business.
I have no idea what effect this retrograde SCOTUS will have on those programs. For every woman who will refuse to live in an area where she is a second-class citizen (at best!), there will be more than one techbro happy to live somewhere the local girls and women don’t know any better.
Starfish
@Cameron: *Swoosh*
This just flew over your head didn’t it? The policy choices of places glorified by the rural diner safaris of New York Times journalists have not been great. Their kids are leaving and not coming back, but because the Senate was designed to be a rich man’s institution, we are at the mercy of a minority with very bad policy ideas.
Looking at what happens in those places is important. Telling them to secede is not fixing the problem. We need to invest sensibly in growing the minority party in those places, not dumping millions on completely unviable candidates, but on building a grassroots political party.
Mr. Longform
I am from a town of about 3,000, but it was in central Illinois – Chicago not too far off, college towns even closer, so there was always an exit, but that hometown is now a dying place just as if it were in the middle of nowhere. It is the Republican support of corporations and financial instruments and processes that harm the working class that have ruined rural America, and yet those rural Americans vote for them in huge majorities. I don’t know how you turn people into New Dealers without another Great Depression – unfortunately, I think we’ll be running that experiment pretty soon.
Tony G
@brendancalling: That’s right. These Godly “pro-life” zealots are either too dumb to realize, or just don’t care, that the workforces in most professions are at least 50% female now, and that these women will understand that states with strict abortion restrictions will be dangerous places to live in — even if they don’t seek an abortion. If a fertilized egg is a human being, then anything that damages that fertilized egg is an attempted homicide — a felony. Therefore, every miscarriage (every “spontaneous abortion”) will have to be investigated by the police as a possible homicide. Any medical procedure that has the potential to damage a fertilized egg will be avoided by most medical practitioners. Any activity by a sexually active woman that might threaten a fertilized egg will have to be avoided. What woman in her right mind will want to live in such a state? What man who cares about women will want to live there? Look for a massive brain drain from those states, most of which have crummy educational systems to begin with. Good luck running a 21st century economy with most of the educated people gone, goobers.
Starfish
@CaseyL: There was the $10,000 from Tulsa, and that is not enough for people to go back for this garbage. There was some discussion about maybe tribal lands might be a place for a clinic, but it doesn’t seem like that is going to happen. I would link a story about that, but I would be banished to the place where comments go.
Marmot
@Kent: Assumes facts not in evidence. Nobody mentions the state’s large congressional contingent when they’re spinning eliminationist fantasy about it.
And concerning the Senate, the same is true of any red state.
opiejeanne
@mistermix: my distant MAGA cousins live in eastern Montana, a place with so few trees that their little kids were frightened when they visited Missouri the first time. They live on land they say is owned by the local reservation (I don’t know how that works exactly), and bitch about that and that there aren’t as many ranger lookouts in use as there used to be . Satellites are used for a lot of fire detection now but don’t try to tell them that because they know it’s Obama’s fault.
For 20 years they’ve been trying to get me to come for the annual family reunion, and until I saw how demented they were I thought I would. Their town of Jordan is pretty small now and I think most of the people are in their 70s.
356 people now, an increase of 13 since 2010.
Cameron
@Chetan Murthy: Sounds like you agree with General Sheridan’s opinion.
Chetan Murthy
@Marmot:
You gotta be shittin’ me. Of course the *most important* reason that decent non-Texans care about what happens in Texas, is that they can affect the rest of the country. I mean sure, we want for Texans to have decent lives, but first and foremost, first and foremost we want them to stop fucking up our lives and states.
frosty
@Mallard Filmore: You should read Fiona Hill’s memoir “There’s Nothing For You Here”, words her father sent her off with. Thatcher broke the mining industry in Northern England; the Free Market sent all our small-town manufacturing to China. Same problem: the jobs and opportunities were gutted.
So yes, it’s not happening only in the USA.
Chetan Murthy
@Tony G:
Massive numbers of highly-educated women in many technical professions. Like all the biotech/medical professions. We all know about the effect of unplanned pregnancies on women’s career prospects: that has an effect on the workforce, and the country (or state) that decides to amputate some large portion of its educated workforce is one that will suffer. And I’m talkin’ about straight money, not about decency, humanity.
Scout211
That definitely describes my case. I grew up in Iowa and couldn’t wait to leave the state for grad school. So I went to Tulane for my MSW but couldn’t see myself living in the Deep South in the 1970s after grad school. So I escaped to California and have lived here ever since with not one regret.
California isn’t perfect (no place is) but each passing year in the last decade or so, I am immensely grateful that I live here and am able to retire here.
I have commented here before that I am shocked by how far Iowa has fallen into the MAGA world, but so many people like me left and have never returned, so it makes sense. But it also makes me sad.
SFBayAreaGal
Sorry about being off topic. A commentator in one of the previous conversations posted a timeline showing why the Democratic party was unable to codify abortion rights. Can someone point me to the post. Running into so called Democratic women blaming the Democratic party for not codifying the right to an abortion.
Kent
What facts not in evidence? What is the current and projected partisan breakdown of the Texas Congressional delegation? Those are facts you can actually look up.
What would the partisan breakdown of the House be if Texas was taken off the map? And how many times in the past 50 years would Republicans have held the House without the help of Texas
I’m not arguing for Texas secession. But the rest of the country would likely be a better place for it.
Marmot
@Chetan Murthy: You misread. That doesn’t talk any smack about other red states—you just reserve that venom for Texas.
But yes, yes, I’ve read your accounts of growing up in small-town Texas, which has grown in your mind to describe the entire state. It’s irrational. You know it.
I grew up on the TX border, which while not idyllic, is not a thing like Weatherford, which is more Old South. Neither are other places I’ve lived or visited.
You could instead help us TX Dems with some of the time you spend grinding that axe.
EarthWindFire
I’m a Wyomingite who got out during college and never came back. Every word of this is true and I grew up in the big city of Cheyenne. My dad was a Dem legislator back when that was still possible and it was always the same conundrum. Keep everything the same but create jobs for our kids. It doesn’t work that way. Dad finally gave up on the state and moved 3 hours south of me in VA.
El Cruzado
@Mallard Filmore: It exists, with mostly the same contours. Shorter distance to an actual city wherever you are, less guns going around and a less lopsided electoral setup (most Euro countries still overrepresent rural areas but nowhere nearly as much as the US does) make things more bearable.
Mallard Filmore
@CaseyL:
“Digital nomad” … is that where one will take a job in Texas but still live in California?
Starfish
@SFBayAreaGal: A lot of Democrats are incredibly frustrated right now because Biden is Bidening.
CaseyL
@SFBayAreaGal:
Here you go, from commenter Fair Economist:
******
There has never been a time in the past 40 years when the Democrats could have codified Roe:
1981-2: Reagan was President
1983-4: Reagan was President
1985-6: Reagan was President
1987-8: Reagan was President
1989-90: HW Bush was President
1991-2: HW Bush was President
1995-6: Republican Congress
1997-8: Republican Congress
1999-2000: Republican Congress
2001-2: W Bush was President
2003-4: W Bush was President
2005-6: W Bush was President
2007-8: W Bush was President
2009-10: Tried but stopped by anti-choice majority in House.
2011-2: Republican Congress
2013-4: Republican Congress
2015-6: Republican Congress
2017-8: Trump was President
2019-20: Trump was President
2021-2: Tried but stopped by opposition from 51 Senators.
So that leaves 1993-4 as the only other time the Democrats MIGHT have been able to codify Roe. But they only had a 3 seat majority in the Senate, and that included the antichoicers Shelby, Nunn, and Nighthorse Campbell. So probably not then either.
There literally has not been ONE time in the past FORTY years where the Democrats had the power to codify abortion rights. Not ONE.
And that’s why it didn’t happen.
Marmot
The very next sentence, friend. “Nobody mentions the state’s congressional contingent when spinning eliminationist fantasy.” You assume they do.
Wrong. The justifications, like yours, only come after some “let them all die” spittle.
Adding: I want to acknowledge that you haven’t been eliminationist.
Bauds
realbtl
mistermix- If you were here last week you had rainy weather but a lot of water around Glacier.I’ve been here over 20 years and while NW MT is growing most of it is old fart transplants like myself. Besides everything else younger people are being priced out.
Bauds
frosty
@CaseyL: Beat me by four minutes!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@CaseyL:
I don’t remember this, though I do remember Bart Stupak. And that Senate never would’ve passed it. Obama had over a dozen Manchins, several of whom were worse than Manchin.
Baud
Test
Alison Rose
As a former goth, I’ll note that most of us actually have cheerful demeanors and are quite friendly people. We just enjoy the dissonance created by the juxtaposition of that with the look that screams “Gold Medal in the Depression Olympics”
Redshift
I recall reading a great post at Big Orange years ago from someone who had grown up in a small town. They made the point that while people there complain about city folk looking down on them, the reality is that urban and suburban dwellers don’t think about them at all (unless they’re trying to establish a theocracy or something.) It’s city dwellers who escaped from small towns who look down on them.
Their grievance about “culture” not being about them any more is particularly laughable. Compared to their share of the population, the number of movies and TV shows set in small towns or “the heartland” is wildly out of proportion. The grievance, like most conservative grievances, is about how it’s not all about them any more.
Baud
@Starfish:
Good. Court packing would be a juicy media distraction.
WV Blondie
I agree with everything you wrote – it’s West Virginia’s dilemma, too. We lost one of our House seats after this round of redistricting, so we have two now. When my parents first came here in the early 1970s, we had six.
BUT – and it’s a big one – one consequence is further concentration of political power in red states. They may have declining populations, but they still get two senators. That’s why our two are such POS.
I live in one of the two parts of the state (around Morgantown, and the Eastern Panhandle) that actually are growing. Unfortunately, a lot of the EP growth is RWNJs who want to live in a red state but keep earning big bucks in a blue state. What I’d like to see is an effort to get WV’s young folks to move back here, close enough to visit their families, but with enough experience in the outside world to want to change things here. (I know this is a bit rambling, but I’ve been stewing all day and just started on my first bourbon.)
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud:
also would get absolutely nowhere in the Senate– but I think the WH should have found some way to finesse that inevitable question by now.
Whomever
@Mallard Filmore: Actually the UK version of this is pretty much the same demographic that voted for Brexit, also affected by the Murdoch Brain Worms. (and now finding out the hard way that the Britannia does not in fact rule the waves anymore). Places like France to some degree have turned their rural countryside in Rural Disneyland, with lots of holiday houses for various people to visit, thanks at least partly to obsurdly generous EU subsidies, less rich parts of Europe are also emptying else. Australia has a rural decline that is if anything worse than the US but it’s less politically important because of differences to how the political system works there (and historically Australia has had the big coastal cities, the outback, and not much in between).
SFBayAreaGal
@CaseyL: Thank you so much. Hopefully this will quiten them down and lay the blame where it belongs
Another Scott
Thanks for this.
A good friend from work was from Bozeman. He never talked about it. It seems like a reasonably nice town now (we only went there as our starting point to Yellowstone).
Some smart jackal here made the point once that just about the only way to make money out in places with huge tracts of land like that is farming / ranching / oil / mining, etc. Progress and automation means that fewer actual people are needed to do those things, and if you don’t want to be one of them, then you have to leave. It’s been that way for thousands of years. Maybe things will change a little with the coming of ubiquitous 5G and WiFi6 and so forth, and ubiquitous rapid shipping, but it’s hard to imagine why it would except at the margins. Most humans aren’t hermits, and if the choice is between having a cabin on a 20 acre lot with a view of the mountains, and having a 3 BR/2.5BA house on 1/4 acre in the suburbs of a thriving city with good schools and amenities, well, …
My mom’s family was from a decent sized town (50,000 people) in central Ohio with a good mix of farming and fairly modern industry and a downtown that seemed to be doing Ok (or at least hanging on). I was only in grade school there a year or so, in the early-70s, but I could not imagine wanting to stay there as an adult – the world was so very much bigger than that little town. I’m sure that the vast majority of kids in Roundup feel the same – and even moreso.
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
Marmot
@Chetan Murthy:
No, it’s never about that. It’s always “catapult it into the sun” or “fuck those people for voting for Abbott.” You’re supplying post-hoc rationale that simply isn’t in the usual comments.
You could prove me wrong right now by wishing death upon Montanans!
Immanentize
@Mallard Filmore: I am, coincidentally, visiting my hometown area in upstate NY right now. When I was born, my family lived in a very small rural town called “Castle Creek” even though the creek in town, which ran through our property was actually Potato Creek. Grocery store owned by a neighbor went out of business when a chain store came about 5 miles away. Hardware/feed store destroyed by a Sears nearer to Binghamton. No businesses left there. In Texas, the story was Walmart — relatives in Brenham saw almost every store and business, but Blue Bell Ice Cream!, shut down by Walmart. Everyone grumbled, but everyone happily shopped there. Now one of the Walmarts is closing — ooopsie!
brendancalling
@Marmot: i just had that same conversation on LGM with some clown who said the PA Dems are worthless (the state org is indeed sucky, but not irredeemable) and it’s time to abandon them (“keep clapping harder) and build something better.
I was not kind in my response.
WV Blondie
@CaseyL: This should be posted EVERYWHERE! The list drives the point home better than anything I’ve seen so far.
mistermix
@realbtl:
Yes, had a couple of days with clouds and intermittent sprinkles and one rain day that we spent exploring Kalispell and Whitefish. Didn’t get eaten by a bear, which is the good news I guess.
The Kalispell independent paper had a listing for a nothing-special 1500 sq ft tract home for $825K so you’re not kidding about younger folks being priced out of the market.
mistermix
@Alison Rose :
Yeah, one of my daughter’s friends went through a goth phase and she is a very sweet young woman.
Immanentize
@Starfish: I said this yesterday — I wish I had the money to run a full page add in the NYTimes telling people for God’s sake don’t send your daughters to colleges in no abortion, no exception states. They also tend to have higher rates of intimate partner violence. Also, many locals near non-urban colleges hate the city kids who come for an education. I saw this in San Antonio TX, which is a huge city! So when will the students become targets? BTW this is happening in New Hampshire, too. It scares me what is about to happen.
Starfish
@Another Scott: When you talk to people who have families that have ranches, you realize that travel is one of the things that they can’t do. Have a neighbor or a dog sitter take care of a dog or two? Sure. Have a neighbor take care of 200 head of cattle? Not going to happen.
Redshift
@CaseyL:
The sad thing is, with the increase in remote work and federal funding for broadband (thank you, Joe!), a lot of dying towns and regions could have the potential to draw people looking for a lower cost of living. But the same changes that make that possible also mean that they don’t have to live anywhere that’s trying to legally mandate the 1950s (or the 1850s…)
Immanentize
@Chetan Murthy: Weatherford! Represent! I worked on a capital case out of Weatherford….
Marmot
@JoyceH: thanks Joyce! I agree—the TX lege is more flippable than Ohio, Iowa and others.
Just gotta get past the reflexive Dem hatred of all things Texas. Was it all that cowboy TV in the 1950s-60s?
TKH
@Mallard Filmore: The “yellow wests” in France come to mind, the rural former East Germany, the dying towns all over Italy where the mayor will sell you a house for $1 if you move there.
livewyre
@Kent: We’ve heard accounts already about how partition worked out in other countries. Counterproductive, to say the least. That’s leaving aside the question of principle – secession is joined at the hip with segregation.
There was never such a thing as separate but equal. The only motivation is to deny opportunity to those considered lesser. That’s what Build That Wall means. Like it or not, we rise or fall together.
Cacti
@Baud: Indeed.
Always best to take options of the table before even trying. Definitely shouldn’t make it a campaign issue. Dems might not win the good sportsmanship award if they did.
For all his faults, one of the things I appreciated about Bill Clinton is that the MFer knew how to fight dirty. Biden doesn’t have that in him.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Talk of Montana Goths reminds me of a Sarah Vowell essay. I remember laughing out loud when she picked her Goth name.
brendancalling
@Marmot: but who will grow the dental floss crop?
gene108
As several Muslims on Twitter pointed out yesterday, abortion is allowed in Islam up to four months and later for cases involving saving the mother.
The Dodd decision is from homegrown American conservative Christians wanting to impose their views on the rest of us.
raven
I might be movin’ to Montana soon
Just to raise me up a crop of
Dental Floss
Raisin’ it up
Waxen it down
In a little white box
I can sell uptown
By myself I wouldn’t
Have no boss,
But I’d be raisin’ my lonely
Dental Floss
Immanentize
@Bauds: You have finally embraced your multiple personality issues! Breakthrough!
JPL
@Immanentize: Since it’s likely the supremes will strip the federal government of business regulation, can the ruling trickle down to states and cities. Zoning is an issue business would love to get rid of.
Immanentize
@raven: what a great song. I was thinking about Susie Cream cheese just today….
Marmot
@brendancalling:
How does it go?
”You don’t see them fucking each other over for a goddamn percentage!”
The Repubs stick together. We need to too.
livewyre
@Cacti: I’ve seen your style of “fight”. You’re just here for the fresh meat and will as soon take a bite out of the one next to you as in front. We’re better off leaving that behind. Change, if you like.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Cacti:
What’s stopping, say, John Fetterman from making it a campaign issue? Does Val Demmings want an abortion-fueled issue to dominate her campaign when she needs to win back Hispanic voters to have a chance? I don’t know.
How does this relate to “fighting dirty”? Also trying to remember an incident of Bill Clinton successfully “fighting dirty”.
Immanentize
One of the great things about this dying Southern Tier, Triple Cities area in upstate NY is very excellent and not expensive Italian food. I am going to go meet some friends and eat some presently. Have a good evening and y’all be muffins, ok?
raven
@Immanentize: I hear the sound of marching feet down Sunset Boulevard to Crescent Heights. . .
Redshift
@brendancalling: Plenty of Dem organizations are run by stick in the muds who don’t want to do anything but what they’ve always done, but most “burn it all down” types refuse to understand how possible it is for a determined group to join and take over from the inside.
Of course, that requires work and commitment, and most “burn it all down” types are hoping to talk someone else into doing that part.
dnfree
Reposting this from below.
This abortion disaster is tied in my mind to the 50th anniversary of Title IX. The article below (which was published before the Supreme Court decision) talks about Title IX having an impact far beyond sports. Over time, it affected the whole image of what women could do. Roe v Wade was part of that, too—removing restrictions on women.
I’m thinking back to the very bright girl in 1962 who had to drop out of my high school as a junior, and who furthermore had to go from class to class and be embarrassed by telling each teacher, in front of her classmates, that she was dropping out because she was pregnant. This was mandatory. The not-terribly-bright father of the baby didn’t have to drop out, though. And I remember the girl my freshman year of college, 1963, who was sick a lot. We didn’t think much about it until she went home after a few weeks and word came that she wasn’t returning; she “had” to marry her boyfriend back home, as it was said in those days.
So, Title IX in 1972, Roe v Wade in 1973…50 years of progress for women. I think it’s no coincidence that the same evangelicals who believe women should be submissive are the ones who want to make pregnancy now have the same result it did in the 1960s.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/06/22/title-ix-anniversary-legacy/
Ohio Mom
@JoyceH: Yes, Ohio is gerrymandered to the Nth degree. It’s a growing cancer on a state that otherwise could have a lot going for it.
Cacti
@livewyre: Biden’s commission of law professors to “study the issue” of court expansion, but make no recommendation was a true master stroke.
Sometimes it feels like Dems don’t even want to win.
livewyre
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It’s just a tale with no historical anchor. Fighting dirty means nothing other than rule by strength of will, in defiance of rights rather than defense. Conservatism, in other words.
CaseyL
@WV Blondie: I’ve used it to respond to Twitter complaints about the Democrats “doing nothing when they had a majority.” Had to save it as an image file first so it would fit, but that’s easy.
I hope Fair Economist is OK with our copying their comment everywhere!
Cameron
@brendancalling: PA Dems are worthless? How’d this person arrive at that conclusion? Yes, Republicans control the state legislature, and a lot of them are wingnuts, but they haven’t been able to do nearly as much damage as one might expect because most of (maybe all?) executive offices are held by Democrats. Plus, the situation seems to be changing, albeit slowly.
livewyre
@Cacti: You keep trying out the same lines like I don’t see what you’re pulling for. Good to see that you took my advice from the other thread, at least.
Marmot
@Redshift: Man I wish I wrote that! It’s true.
I mean, just how often have I gone out of my way to denigrate small-town America? Just when something crappy happens to me or mine there.
If friendliness abounded, I’d have no complaints.
Cacti
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Okay, grandpa.
Let’s all join hands and sing “we shall overcome”.
That will fix things right up.
It’s funny that you would use Fetterman as an example of why respectability politics are needed. His campaign thus far has mostly consisted of clowning the shit out of Dr. Oz on Twitter.
Nelle
@Starfish: I was a visiting prof for a year in Butte, Montana (Montana Tech). A young woman, a freshman, said, on the first day, “They said it would be more diverse and wow! it is!” I looked at the class of white kids and asked her to explain. She’d grown up on a remote ranch and only gone to school with cousins before that. And here there were all these people that she wasn’t related to!
My students were smart, hard-working, and many with very good survival skills in the wilderness and working hard on ranches and farms. They absolutely loved the land and sky, but the intrusion of the wealthy who were buying up much of western Montana and pricing Montanans out of their homes, not so much.
Starfish
@Cacti: The discussions of Republican violence at yesterday’s protests are too quiet.
There was that one police man who hit his female opponent last night.
Then there was the dude in a truck who ran over protestors in Iowa.
This is some violent sore winner garbage.
Redshift
@CaseyL:
I think you seriously overestimate the number of techbros who will want to live in places without the comforts they’re accustomed to, and where they’re definitely not the top of the hierarchy.
livewyre
@Cacti: Do you have any targets in mind other than those around you? How can we tell that you support what we do, rather than being here specifically to oppose us?
Cacti
@Starfish: Message to Dems everywhere:
Start punching back.
Marmot
@CaseyL: I coulda used that list yesterday at an abortion rights rally. Met several “I’ll never vote” or “voting sucks” lefties. Sigh.
Told one young man, “I used to *be* you. This is just sad.”
AliceBlue
@SFBayAreaGal: Codifying is no guarantee of permanance. Congress codified the Voting Rights Act, campaign finance reform and gun regulations. All overturned by the Roberts court.
Redshift
@CaseyL: Not to mention the fact that if they’d been able to pass it, this Court would rule it unconstitutional in a hot minute. It’s not a magic bullet to save us from doing the hard work of defeating the reactionaries.
livewyre
@Cacti: Way ahead of you.
Cacti
@Marmot: The Dems have two issues that could easily solidify support with the youngs:
Student loan forgiveness and decriminalizing MJ.
But our ancient Dem leadership won’t move on either of those, because reasons.
Nelle
@Marmot: When we moved to Iowa in 2019, three out of four Congressional Reps were D’s. Now the last one, Cindy Axne (our Rep) has a huge fight on her hand after redistricting. My son says that there is no way that Grassley can lose. Unless he forgets where he is and what he is doing. I think we hit him hard on his July 5 statement that he would be running the Senate on July 6. His opponent, Mike Franken, is hitting him hard right away, but oo-la-la, the money that the R’s are putting in place to keep him in his chair in the Senate. (Hint, throw money to M. Franken via ActBlue. I don’t think we’ll find a better candidate to take him on. And of course, we have the Far Left complaining that Franken is compromised by 36 years in the military and isn’t progressive enough. Come on, folks. This is Iowa. Take this and run with it.
David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch
@Cacti: Court expansion polls poorly in suburban swing districts. As a negotiating option or outright option, republicans would like nothing better than to be thrown into that B’rer patch.
Marmot
@Redshift: Absolutely. “Burn it down” is code for “I am lazy and upset—y’all should fix it NOW!”
Sure Lurkalot
@brendancalling:
Thanks for bringing this up because I wonder what people’s thoughts are. On the one hand, I appreciate companies stepping up to help with real money and time off but I can’t imagine having to divulge an unwanted pregnancy to a supervisor or HR. The company may be supportive but who knows about an given individual’s views? How would a person feel about having to get company approval for health insurance to pay for Viagra?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Cacti:
Yeah, you’ve been posting here a little too long to try the “angry young man!” costume. To borrow a line from Frazier Craine, it’s like watching Bob Hope dress up as The Fonz. You sound like a stupid adolescent lately, but I’d bet a large amount of cash you and I are on the same side of forty, at least.
I did?
How is saying “Expand the Court!” punching? Who gets hurt? I mean, it might be a better slogan now than it was a week ago, and it’s not as obviously stupid and counter-productive as other twitter-left slogans, but the idea that it’s a magic electoral bullet needs some evidence. Like, any.
David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch
@Cacti: Why are the youts interested in decriminalizing Michael Jackson?
Cacti
@David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch:
See how it polls now that 6 Catholic extremists are now targeting the rights of anyone they don’t like.
Uncle Clarence said the quiet part out loud in his concurrence (but for some reason omitted Loving v. Virginia).
Almost Retired
@Nelle: When I was a child in Iowa, my Main Street Republican Dad held a fundraiser at our house for Grassley, who was running for Congress for his first or second time. If you think he’s kind of a goober now, you should have met him then. At some point, he accidentally locked himself in our bathroom. To my everlasting shame, I let him out.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
ah, now I get it.
livewyre
@Cacti: You’re pretty consistent on message. Gonna guess paid, then.
No personality, reflexive opposition, superficial abuse when questioned – there’s something at stake for you that has nothing to do with the topic. It stands out a bit.
TiredOfItAll
Although I am long past childbearing age, I will not set foot in any state that bans a woman’s right to choose. Why would I venture to a place where I am not considered a citizen will full autonomy over my own body? I hope those states suffer catastrophic economic decline as their young people move out. And I hope the rest of us stop bailing them out. Apologies (and sympathy) to any jackals that live in those places, but seriously. Hell hath no fury.
Marmot
@Cacti: I’m not getting pulled into your circular firing squad bullshit.
Spend that time better by railing against Repubs—the actual fascists—in public and donating and getting out the damn vote.
zhena gogolia
@livewyre: No unbelievably he does it for free
Starfish
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: John Fetterman IMMEDIATELY made an ad about preserving Roe.
livewyre
@Marmot: This fire in particular isn’t in a circle, sad to say. We have ourselves a live one.
Nelle
@Almost Retired: That may be an unpardonable sin.
Cacti
@Jim, Foolish Literalist
What is the alternative to “Expand the Court”, sagacious one? Passing a bill codifying abortion as legal is subject to SCOTUS interference, and can undone the same way it was passed: simple legislative majority.
Plus it would require nuking the legislative filibuster in the Senate, which is a dead letter.
It’s time to make court expansion a campaign issue.
Otherwise, the alternative to “expand the court” is:
“Well, if we wait another decade or so, Alito and Thomas might be dead, and if we have a Dem POTUS and Senate, then maybe we can replace them with someone reasonable. But in the meantime, sucks to be you if you live in a red state.”
Redshift
@Marmot: I just don’t know what to say to people like that. Fine, you voted and you didn’t get what you wanted yet. How is not voting going to get you what you want? (I don’t want to assume I know what they’re thinking, but I get the sense that not voting for Dems is like boycotting a company but not telling them why. It makes you feel good to not be part of something you disapprove of, but it doesn’t actually accomplish anything.)
Voting is the bare minimum. It’s not enough by itself, but it’s still necessary.
Another Scott
@Starfish: Excellent point. That’s probably yet another reason why small family farms/ranches are dying. Unless the family has a dozen kids, there’s too much complexity for a family to handle on their own (keeping the various kinds of equipment running, the paperwork, the animal husbandry, the physical plant, the grounds, the planning, and all the rest). And everyone needs time off, but the animals always need to be fed…
My best friend’s father had a small farm outside Dayton. He farmed while going to school at OSU. One day he was out in the fields and suddenly doubled over in pain and couldn’t move. It took something like a couple of days for someone to find him and get him to the hospital for an emergency appendectomy… It’s a hard life, even now.
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
Cacti
@Starfish: Oh no, that might hurt a Republican’s feelings!
-Jim, Foolish Literalist
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Starfish: Okay. What does that HAVE TO DO WITH expansion of the Supreme Court, which I’m pretty sure I said was something I could imagine Fetterman campaign on, but something something respectability politics?
JPL
@Nelle: Iowa was also known for their excellent schools. I’m curious if that has changed, too.
livewyre
@zhena gogolia: Can you vouch? Because I’ve seen this one around for a long time with consistently less than nothing to add. Especially now, we need everyone to know what’s at stake. And we need to keep ourselves whole no matter where the attack comes from.
Omnes Omnibus
It’s nice to see everyone being decent to one another. Even before Cacti popped up.
Starfish
@Cacti: Republicans already have a system in place to amplify accusations about a “violent left.” They were looking for that last night, so they could blame violence on leftists. It doesn’t look like it happened even though a few black bloc types showed up to things.
livewyre
@Omnes Omnibus: At least now we know where to focus our affections.
lowtechcyclist
@E.:
A quarter-century ago when I was living in Bristol, VA, the town had some sort of easement or right-of-way along a stream that ran through town, and they proposed putting a bike path along it. And the same damn thing happened: the townsfolk came to the public meeting about it and talked about how it would attract drug dealers and the like. So that was the end of that.
I am SO glad I got the hell out of there soon after.
kalakal
@Mallard Filmore: Europe does indeed have a small town problem. It’s a combination of no jobs,and rural housing being bought up as holiday/2nd homes by rich townies. Scenic areas can have insane property prices.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Cacti:
Winning elections.
Give it your best shot and report back on your efforts
It’s not going to happen with this Congress. Joe Manchin doesn’t exist because I’m a mean old Boomer (and technically, I’m not a Boomer, missed it by a few years).
So I gave you too much credit with “stupid adolescent”?
Starfish
@Nelle: Running no one but white military types in these purple states is pretty uninspired. As the population is getting more diverse, the candidates are still all white, and we are talking about Uvalde (where the community leaders were all white and doing nothing while a population of color suffered) as if the national parties are not creating larger scales everywhere.
That Pete Buttigieg came from where he did and ran for higher office is pretty surprising.
Anotherlurker
@Immanentize: You could also go to The Highball (is it still in business?) in Johnson City and enjoy a delicious Spiedie!
Scout211
@Almost Retired: Great story.
When I was growing up in Iowa, my Republican father was a caucus member and often hosted the local Republican group in our home. It seemed like a big cocktail party to me.
@JPL: When I was growing up in Iowa, the statistic that Iowa had the highest literacy rate in the nation was drummed into us in school and oft repeated. There was another brag that was mentioned a lot, too. Iowa had the highest rate of college-educated farmers in the nation. That was decades ago and I don’t think either one is true right now. (Or maybe it wasn’t even back then).
Cacti
@Starfish: They’re going to say it regardless, so at this point, who gives AF?
If they want to fight, give them a fight. The time for an MLK/Gandhi approach has passed. See how Meyer Lansky dealt with the American Bund, or how London’s east end treated the British Union of Fascists at Cable Street.
lowtechcyclist
@brendancalling:
I hear they’re already having problems bringing in the crop, on account of the pygmy pony shortage. ;)
Omnes Omnibus
O. Felix Culpa
@Marmot:
I’m from New Mexico. Hatred of Texas is in the water here. ;)
That said, we’re rooting for Beto and the Texas Dems to win. Best of luck to you!
jefft452
@Marmot:
Have you ever considered that the difference is that Montanans whine less then Texans?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Omnes Omnibus: Yup, that’s good
Cacti
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: How does winning elections change the fallout from the SCOTUS decision, in light of the problems I pointed out with a legislative solution?
If something can be taken away by Act of Legislature, it’s not really a right, now is it?
lowtechcyclist
@CaseyL:
This. You can get all sorts of houses for cheap in places where there are no jobs within a hundred miles.
Starfish
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: We need hope that we can change the future in timelines that are less than a decade. What gives us that hope?
Being spammed to death by “Hey, they killed Roe, give us money” ain’t it.
Biden has been the eulogizer in chief, and that made sense in a pandemic where many lives were lost. Now it sounds like he is eulogizing the end of democracy. All the loopholes and unusual congressional maneuvers by Republicans, and all the “we can do very little” by the Democrats.
If a large change that we want is not possible now, what is possible? We need hope because people are not going to be running on empty and keeping up the enthusiasm.
The need for hope is not “wishing for the demise of the Democratic Party.” It is asking them to meet the moment and the people.
livewyre
At this point our pluralized succulent interlocutor may as well be called “Bait Bricks”. For more reasons than one.
livewyre
@Starfish: The moment is ours to meet. Looking for politicians to lead the public rather than to follow is always a mistake, as long as we live in a democracy instead of the opposite. Want better? Start better.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Starfish: You keep clicking the reply button on my comments, but then what you say has nothing to do with anything I said. Who are you arguing with?
ETA: for instance, I don’t know where this came from:The need for hope is not “wishing for the demise of the Democratic Party.”
Cacti
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Yeah, a nebulous message that commits to nothing in particular is just what’s needed as SCOTUS unravels the country.
dnfree
@Cacti: clearly it’s a bad idea to leave either the Supreme Court or Congress in charge of what our rights are. Executive orders can be overruled. Apparently there is no solution. //
livewyre
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Whether or not the bearers are well-meaning in their own hearts, there certainly are a lot of canned talking points going around. Since yesterday I’ve been a lot more inclined to disregard the details of the chaff in favor of what direction it’s being pushed in.
Cacti
You have the wisdom of a fortune cookie.
zhena gogolia
@livewyre: I can’t vouch but he’s been around here a long time
Another Scott
@Cacti:
Jennifer Rubin at WaPo (from May 5):
Looks like expanding the SCOTUS is not popular. How is making expanding the SCOTUS a winning issue for Democrats this November when only 44% support it?
Maybe folks who live and breathe electoral politics for decades know what they’re doing??
(Full disclosure – I want 15 justices on the SCOTUS. But I want more Democratic senators first, because with more Democratic senators much more is possible. And more Democrats is an achievable goal this November.)
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Cacti: the kind of maximalist sloganeering you think is electoral magic doesn’t tend to pan out.
What good is it to pander to people with a slogan that has no chance of becoming a reality before January 2023, and then, even with the best mid-term results imaginable, very little. You think Chris Coons and Angus King are gonna go along with “EXPAND THE COURT!”? I doubt it. And if they did, what sort of broader court reform bill do you think could pass? One that gives Joe Biden five seats immediately? Game this out for me. I am, as you have said, a dumb and crusty old codger. Explain to me what your fantasy bill looks like. What’s the process?
livewyre
@Cacti: Are you responding to me because you recognize me, or because you don’t?
kalakal
I have a lot of inlaws in Ohio in the area roughly between Circleville* and Greenfield. Originally all farmers, as my wife’s parents generation has died off they’ve nearly all sold the land. Greenfield is truly sad, dirt poor, no jobs except in healthcare or at the State Pen. Recently downgraded from city to town as the population dwindles. What makes it so sad is the main street still has a lot of old buildings as evidence of when it was a thriving, growing place. A big problem is the way all the old farms are bought up and incorporated into huge mega farms by big Ag. If you’re young you’d have to leave even if you wanted to stay, there is nothing there
* My wife as a child came 2nd in the Circleville Little Miss Pumpkin contest, her cousin won. It’s still a sore point. There really isn’t much going on in these places
Nelle
@JPL: Absolutely. Gov. Reynolds has tried to divert public school money to private charters for several years now, but the rural R’s (who have no charter or private schools) have blocked her. She targeted the no voters with challengers, gathered up obscene amounts of money and got enough of them out in the primary that she is sure that she will get her little project of tax diversion through in the next session.
We pay the highest property tax here that we’ve ever paid and it frosts me that some of it will go to religious schools. More than 500 teachers have resigned in Des Moines area schools for this coming year. She has lowered the requirements to be substitute teachers also.
livewyre
If pushing to expand the court before the midterms causes Democrats to lose, Cacti supports it. If making protests deadly causes Democrats to lose, Cacti supports it. That’s the subtext.
Cacti
Hmmm…what has changed drastically since the last poll was taken that affects over 50% of the US population?
You are citing polling data from a time when the world was literally a different place. It’s akin to citing a poll of US opinions toward Afghanistan as of September 10, 2001.
Cacti
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Actually, short, stupid sloganeering is great politics. “Change you can Believe In” ring any bells?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Cacti: also, didn’t you used to be a ride-or-die Obama guy? When did you go all Bern-It-All-Down?
FTFY
frosty
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: @Cacti:
Fetterman IS making it a campaign issue. This is in the email Giselle sent this morning:
“John is running for U.S. Senate to end the archaic filibuster and be the 51st vote we need to codify Roe into law.”
Seems pretty clear to me.
livewyre
Why not wait to see more polls from afterward? Why not observe the situation before deciding what to do? Why the urgency? Where’s the strategy? Guess.
Cacti
January 6, 2020 when the right wing attempted a coup d’etat.
geg6
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Fetterman has been making it an issue for weeks. He has a brutal ad with Mastriano clips saying the most disgusting, misogynist crap. I have seen this ad approximately 5000 times now. He has several others that are more about him and that have a great sense of humor.
Say what you will about Fetterman but his campaign has been very good.
dnfree
@kalakal: We moved to a very nice small city in Illinois in 1985. We moved there for my husband’s job, but there were several potential employers with IT departments for me. By the time we moved from there a couple of years ago, many large employers had left town. The largest employers left were the hospital and the school district. That’s never a good sign.
It’s still a nice town, but without good jobs for a variety of people, most jobs are low-paying and the school district is not what it used to be. No matter how cheap housing is, telecommuting families aren’t going to move somewhere with mediocre schools.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@frosty: my comments, the conversation I was having, was very specifically about expanding the Supreme Court.
And (for the third time) it’s an issue I can imagine Fetterman using with success. I suspect it would be trickier for Val Demmings
ETA:
Court expansion? For the fourth time now, that is what I was talking about. Not Roe. Not abortion rights. Not the filibuster. Expanding the Supreme Court.
Nelle
@Starfish: Go read some of Franken’s ads. He’s on the attack with specific policies. You go with the best of who stepped up to run. I don’t think the party went out and said, Hmmm, how can we find a military type to run. He beat a fine, progressive unknown rural doctor and a 33 year old woman who won a Congressional seat in 2018 and lost it in 2020 and made a mess of getting signatures on her petition to run and only yammered about term limits. He was the most likely to beat Grassley of the bunch.
Cacti
Is that a serious question?
The urgency is because Sam Alito declared that state legislatures are now empowered to declare women as birthing chattel.
And so far, the response of Dem leadership is “give us money and we’ll promise to do…things”.
Ruckus
@Cameron:
It is possible. Human beings will be human beings till their last day.
My thought is that small rural towns have a feel to them that resinates with some people. They know everyone they went to school with. They know most everyone in town because there are likely only a couple of churches, a local bar or two, an American Legion post or something like it, possibly a local grocery store. The local hospital is 2 towns over, it’s quiet at night, there’s little for the kids to get into trouble over. It takes no effort to live there, you know everyone, you belong. Move to the big city, or highly populated area, like say, LA and you might still know some people but life isn’t as calm, quiet, relaxed. There’s a tension to it, a number of possibilities exist, even if you never rise to them. There are often a variety of grocery stores, drug stores, life is not all that actually different, but it sure feels like it.
Of course faux news has to tell everyone else how bad city life is, how the criminals run rampant and destroy everything.
livewyre
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I mean, “opposing” fascism by supporting fascism isn’t exactly new, to be fair. “Nach Hitler, uns.” I could see it. The mention of 9/11 seems apt – that radicalized a lot of folks in that direction as well.
livewyre
‘@Cacti: No, I mean, why the urgency all of a sudden – action before planning? I have an idea why, just curious what your answer is.
Cacti
You just asked the same question a slightly different way.
The response is the same as previously.
Suzanne
FWIW, the UN estimates that it was in 2007 that for the first time in human history, more people lived in cities than in rural areas. This trend is absolutely worldwide.
I think it is borderline monstrous for parents to expect their kids to come back to crappy towns. It’s abusive.
livewyre
@Cacti: It’s the difference between “what’s there” and “what appeared”. Nothing shows up without a reason. But I agree that the response is the same.
Chetan Murthy
@Marmot:
Oh I did. In 2020 I sent $21k (maybe it was $22k) to Texas. The majority of my political contributions. And what did I get for it? *Squat*. Ditto 2018. Oh, and why do I reserve my venom for Texas? B/c I *grew up there* and notwithstanding what you say, Weatherford isn’t the “Old South”. It’s not Nacogdoches, my dude. It’s not Jasper. And *yet* it’s still a racist hellhole.
Montanans don’t have the outsize influence on my life here in California, that Texans do. Oh, and I’ll leave it to the Montana refugees — I reserve my entire bile for Texas. Oh, and for good reason.
Look: sure there are decent people in Texas.
YOU DECENT PEOPLE HAVEN’T DONE SHIT. IT’S WORSE THERE THAN WHEN I WAS GROWING UP.
I have the proof, but cannot share it, though if you want to know, send me email at [email protected], and I can tell you about it on that private channel. But quite simply, it’s getting worse. Worse.
So please spare me your “oh, we’re good people here, you pillory us unjustly”.
Cacti
@livewyre: More of that fortune cookie wisdom.
livewyre
@Cacti: You, for instance, didn’t show up without a reason.
Cacti
@livewyre: Be the good you want to see in the world.
Suzanne
Yes, thank you. The advice to “vote, donate, organize, FIGHT!!!” is not wrong… but Christ almighty, you’re talking about young people possibly enduring a generation or more without rights, when abortion means you need one in a week or two. It may be the best advice that there is…. but holy shit, it is terrible. It’s almost not a solution at all.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
so from the lack of relevant responses can I assume that John Fetterman is not, as of this moment, taking my advice and making court expansion (I wish they’d call it reform) a campaign issue?
The more I think of it, the more I think he should. I’m told he’s done some meaningful stuff as head of the PA state parole board. He could tie judicial reform to justice reform. Roberts and Rehnquist, and for all I know Burger before that, have testitified to Congress that we don’t have enough judges, which delays justice, which is justice denied. Expand all the courts, not just teh Court
gwangung
@Cacti: Loan forgiveness as a unifying tactic?
It appeals to SEGMENTS of the voting coalition, but it’s not a unifying issue (particularly when the majority of your coalition aren’t college educated).
frosty
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Oops on my part. I tend to agree with the tweet that Fallows quoted instead of leaping straight to expanding the court as a policy.
J R in WV
@rikyrah:
I was in the US Navy when my ship was sent to Pascagoula, MS in 1972. We spent nearly a year in Mississippi while I worked long shifts on the ship. I was on the ship for her first mission out of the yard back to the original home port in Florida, and caught a plane to Mobile when I was discharged.
We packed up a U-Haul and headed home. I think I’ve been in MS while traveling East to West or vice versa. Was like moving back to 1935 when we got to Pascagoula. The liquor store had a big sign over the cash register: “All Proceeds From Sales to N**rs Will Be Contributed to the United Klan of MS” Needless to say, we didn’t buy anything there!
There was a good all you can eat catfish farm nearby. You can only eat so much catfish, even tho it was pretty good.
Another Scott
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
WESA.fm (from March 20):
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
J R in WV
@SFBayAreaGal:
We codified voting rights, the Supremes void that act. We codified other liberal positions, the Supremes voided that too. If we codified abortion rights, why on Earth would anyone think the RWNJ Supremes wouldn’t overturn that???~!!
Kent
@Baud: Exactly. Never going to happen without killing the filibuster and that isn’t happening with Manchin and Sinema. So why distract everyone with pipe dreams.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Another Scott: wow, I’m kind of surprised, not so much at Lamb, but that Fetterman wasn’t at least open to the idea. Runs counter to his brand, but so does his support for fracking
lowtechcyclist
Because they won’t write a check that they can’t cash on court expansion? Even if we do well this fall, the likelihood that we’ll have enough votes for expansion in both houses is slim. So build ’em up, let ’em down, we can always use another cycle of that.
Plus it would wind up being turned into a sideshow by media types who would rather talk about anything besides what Roe repeal really means.
Another Scott
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: He wants to win, and I’d be surprised if 44% of voters in PA support expanding the SCOTUS. He’s not going to get too far in front of where the voters are.
Cheers,
Scott.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Another Scott: Right, that’s one of the reasons I hate the “EXPAND THE COURT!” sloganeering, on-line progressives think every issue needs to start at the top and start at 11. But there’s a serious case to be made for broad judicial reform and I think between his regular-guy affect and a weak opponent in a swing state is a good candidate to start that conversation.
lowtechcyclist
@Cacti:
Maybe try advocating this in a different forum, one that skews a bit younger? I know I’m far from the only jackal who aged out of the ‘punching’ demographic a long time ago. I’m in my late 60s and I know there’s a lot of people in their 60s and 70s who are regulars here. I’m in very good shape for my age, but physical conflict is still right out for me.
O. Felix Culpa
@lowtechcyclist:
Heh. In a forum called Acting Out for People Who Aren’t Actually Interested in Making a Difference and Want to Guarantee that the Dems Lose and/or End Up in Jail or Dead for a Really, Really Long Time. Is that the forum you mean?
Wag
This post brings to minds one of my al-time favorite Talking Heads songs, The Big Country.
“Then we come to the farmlands
And the undeveloped areas
And I have learned
How these things work together
I see the parkway
That passes through them all
And I have learned
How to look at these things and I say
I wouldn’t live there if you paid me
I wouldn’t live like that, no siree
I wouldn’t do the things the way those people do
I wouldn’t live there if you paid me to“
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@CaseyL:
No well-meaning, earnest program will substitute for the absence of airports, limited access points by road/rail or the absence of the sort of amenities upwardly mobile 30-40 somethings want or expect (good groceries, restaurants, sport/gym programs, liquor/wine retailers, boutique clothiers). A McMansion and a boat you have to haul just doesn’t cut it for most, unless that’s your highest aspiration.
geg6
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
He has been making it an issue but more from the point of view of killing the filibuster. He’s discussed in the primary debates and in forums. I live here. I have paid attention to him for a long time. I know people who know him. He’s good at this stuff and has effectively portrayed himself as a very liberal Democrat who is not and never will be beholden to the party elite or to the far left. I’ll be shocked if he doesn’t win.
Ksmiami
@Starfish: the lack of fight, fire, messaging and organizing among the Democratic leadership has been profoundly inadequate on this rogue psychotic SC
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@rikyrah: I am always surprised when I see pictures of Ole Miss or someplace else in the deep south and it looks lovely. I always think of Mississippi etc. as dark, ugly places because of the ugly racial history there
ETA: I have never been to the deep south and it is doubtful I will ever go. The only reason I can think of is seeing the Green Jay (bird) which lives (in the US) in Texas on the border with Mexico. For the same reason, I was astonished to learn Austin was a cool, liberal place. Have since realized that often the college towns (and big cities) in a red state will be the most liberal part of it.
Eolirin
@Suzanne: The only other alternative is death. So we persist.
That’s really all there is to it.
Ksmiami
@Starfish: agreed. We need a new leadership team
stinger
@Starfish:
The Democratic candidate for Iowa governor is Deidre DeJear, a Black woman. You could throw a little cash her way!
randy khan
It should not go unmentioned that sometimes, maybe often, parents want their kids to leave small, rural towns. They know there isn’t much future there, too. It may not make them less bitter, though.
jenna
@Chetan Murthy: I’m a born and bred small town Illinoisan who ended up in Texas when my husband’s job took us here. We’re hanging on for two more years until my teen graduates and then we are getting the hell out of dodge. I know I should stay and work to change it blue but damn, I hate it here – so if we could hold off secession for 4 more years (until my older kid graduates college) it would be much appreciated
Jesse
@kalakal: +1. One thing I’ve learned, having lived abroad for about 10 years now, is that a lot of the same structural issues that exist in the US are also present in Europe, too. If you go way out into the boonies here in Germany, you’re not necessarily gonna like the people you find there. And for the same reason that you’re probably not gonna like it if you go way out into, say, rural Arkansas.
Jesse
Maybe it’s just me but I think people are overlooking another option for codifying reproductive rights: a constitutional amendment. Sure, a huge lift. Would take years. But that’s how you *really* stop the SCOTUS from just throwing it out, or an R congress + R president just scrapping a law.
Xenos
@Jesse: I live near Germany, and plan to retire in France. Between the yellow-vesters and the Le Penists you have such a similar dynamic to the Magats and the fascists in the US. Without an electoral college pushing power out to the periphery (it was a good idea at the time, but that is another argument) these forces just can’t outvote the cities, at least not very often.
But rural decay and lost heavy industrial zones provide a strategic reserve of bitter, resentful people here, too. And the hatred of Parisians in rural France sounds very familiar to these American ears.
Large chunks of Spain are effectively depopulated, and there is talk of converting a long belt of Eastern Europe into an wilderness park, as you might as well get some value from the land other than subsidizing bitter farming families there.
WeimarGerman
@Marmot: Unlike MT, TX has millions of disenfranchised Dems. Just look at Beto’s performance in the Governor’s race where he’s only single digits behind. As someone in Uvalde said ‘we’re not a Red state; we’re an oppressed state’.
A state that produced Molly Ivins can’t be all bad.
WeimarGerman
@Jesse: I dont understand how an amendment that needs ratification by a super majority of states is an easier lift than 50+ Senators to end the filibuster. End the filibuster then take on the big things: eviscerate Citizens United, make DC and PR states, pass Voting Rights Act, expand SCOTUS to 13 and done.
Once reveral of Citizens United, and VRA pass, it’s unlikely the GOP can return in sufficient numbers to reverse these changes.
GoBlueInOak
California – it’s so expensive because nobody wants to live there anymore.
The Lodger
@Starfish: They were looking for antifa/black bloc to show up on Jan. 6 too. They never did, and some day I’d like to see th he comprehensive story of why not. The police vs. rioters story would have turned out much, much different if any of the militant left were present.
Aaron
@Mallard Filmore: Plenty of small towns in europe that have been left with a small population with an average age of 70+ that have been loosing population for decades.
Captain C
@brendancalling:
@Marmot:
The answer to this, of course, is “So what are you doing to make this a reality, and how do you plan to stop the Republicans from trashing the place in the interim, and to protect their potential victims?” If they don’t have good answers to both, they’re not serious about anything except expressing their impatience.