Leave the fantasy land of convention rhetoric, and you will find that small-town America, this legendary place of honesty and sincerity and dignity, is not doing very well. If you drive west from Kansas City, Mo., you will find towns where Main Street is largely boarded up. You will see closed schools and hospitals. You will hear about depleted groundwater and massive depopulation. Full Story »
Posted by Glenn LaBauve
One has to read the opinion piece and not just the title. Then you understand the title implies that the GOP policies are killing small town America, and Republican McCain is playing them for suckers. I grew up in small town America. Life there is a race between creating mini-factories for crystal meth and crystalizing the character and education of the kids so they can move to the city and work in a factory. The article captures a thread similar to this myth or meth meme that allows McCain to maim the mind.
Excellent as usual. Of course Thomas Frank is the one lone voice of the left, that Murdoch shrewdly just pryed into the WSJ opinion page. It's a minor miracle to see him there. Presumably Murdoch is no fool. He sees the times changing. Word has it that he has met with Obama recently to get him on FOX and that his wife and son are both Obama supporters.
The poll numbers from the Kansas Farmers Union were a real eye-opener; hopefully this article should explode some myths about small-town America.
Its interesting to see an anti McCain/Palin piece in the WSJ. The author points out where the rhetoric of the campain trail doesn't match the policies of the candidates. The forum where he does it give the argument more weight.
Dr. Frank thoughtfully makes the point that small town America has not done well under GOP policies. This is good opinion journalism in that his points are backed up with actual events and historical perspective. Many families in the heartland are working two jobs to get by, their youth fight our wars and they grow our food but it is because there are no alternatives with good paying jobs and better schools for them. Interesting that the Farmers Union gives Obama a 100% on his voting record and McCain gets a 0%. The article begs the question has to why families in the heartland would vote for the party that supports big agriculture that has been destroying their way of life and he has the opinion that they are being sold the ... More »
No attempt to hide the bias here, so the light evidence really stands out. It should have been easy to find support for some of the the unsupported claims. But it's not completely without sources. The fact about the Farmers Union checks out, but the "largely boarded up" claim might be tougher to prove.
This opinion piece has minimal journalistic value. Here the author gives a very one-sided account. At the end he says the Farmers Union rates McCain a zero. Of course: McCain opposes government subsidies for gasohol from corn and has said so in the farm states. The author gives no sign he understands even the simple fact that the cost of food would be vastly higher if his "small farm" world still existed.
I appreciate the style and relevance of this piece, but this is a defensive hack job by a member of the "loathsome array of snobs and fakers, "reporters and commentators," lobbyists and others who make up "the Washington elite."" Truthfully, small town America does not have pretty skyscrapers because they are small towns! Nice photo of a run down building, I guess there are none of those in Chicago, or Gary Indiana, or New York. Way to set the tone with a picture. A UNION giving a Democrat a 100% rating is amazing. Even more profound is that the same UNION didnt rate a Republican highly. I am just amazed, I wonder who this clearly unbiased source is more closely tied to? This article is insulting in its tone, agenda, and ... More »
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