Pat Buchanan's America

In the popular culture of the '40s and '50s, white men were role models. They were the detectives and cops who ran down gangsters and the heroes who won World War II on the battlefields of Europe and in the islands of the Pacific.

They were doctors, journalists, lawyers, architects and clergy. White males were our skilled workers and craftsmen -- carpenters, painters, plumbers, bricklayers, machinists, mechanics.

They were the Founding Fathers, Washington, Adams, Jefferson and Hamilton, and the statesmen, Webster, Clay and Calhoun.    

Pat Buchanan

On April 22, 2014 Conservative radio show host Dennis Prager penned a column in the National Review titled "From The Great Man Theory To Dead-White-Male Criticism Theory". I didn't read this article until a friend sent it to me in September of 2015. After reading it I wrote a series of articles about race and used his arguments as a springboard for the first installment titled "The White Washing of American History". In his article Mr. Prager waxed nostalgically about a time in American history when all of the heroes were white males and their atrocities were hidden from plain sight. He went on to attack the universities for teaching a version of history that called into question the founding fathers. For many Americans the myth of America as a Christian nation ordained by God is as real as the Easter bunny is to a small child. They reflexively attack anyone who dares to present historically accurate evidence that contradicts the notion of "American Exceptionalism". The quote I opened with comes from an eerily similar Pat Buchanan article published on May 26th titled "The Great White Hope". After reading his arguments I was convinced that many on the right are suffering from an acute case of paradoxical thinking which is defined as:

cognition characterized by contradiction of common logical procedures. Even though this form of thinking can be correlated with skewed thought procedures, like those appearing in schizoid personality disorder or some types of schizophrenia. It can additionally be utilized as a way of abstaining troubles or aversive beliefs in a positive way. They've fought the notion of white privilege so long that the moment whiteness doesn't afford what it use to they liken the push for racial equality to white oppression. 

The plight of white men in America is worsening at a time when racial minorities and women are represented in greater numbers across a variety of fields; however, the racial and sexual demographic shift the right complains about isn't truly reflected inside the power centers of America. Women, blacks, gays, Mexicans, and Muslims are blamed for the declining status of white men in America, but a majority of the causal links to this decline can be directly attributed to decisions made by other white men. The reflexive need to scapegoat the "other" is an outward sign of ignorance and cowardice. Instead of challenging the power structure in a direct and meaningful way too many choose to aim their anger at those standing beside them or beneath them on the socioeconomic scale. Now that large numbers of white men are suffering fates usually reserved for those of us on the underside of America's caste system conservatives are taking drug addiction, alcoholism, depression, shortened life expectancy, and suicide serious. The Republican debates were awash with one tale of drug tragedy after another. Carly Fiorina, Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, and Ted Cruz all told gut-wrenching stories about their families personal struggles with losing a loved one to drug addiction. The same politicians who thought incarceration was the solution to the inner-city drug epidemic have now shifted to policies geared towards treating the white men who've become the national face of these epidemics.

My whole life I've been told by conservatives and the conservative media that the very real instances of racism I've experienced weren't racism at all, but a combination of my overly sensitive perceptions about race and the legitimate economic realities facing Americans as a whole. I was told to ignore the statistics that chronicled the disparities in educational outcomes, employment, housing, incarceration, and mortality rates. I was told that those outcomes were due to the breakdown of the black family and Affirmative Action; in short: there's nothing to see here. The conditions too many inside the black community live in are a direct consequence of historical racial animus and the growing disparity in wealth accumulation. The condition many working class whites find themselves in is solely a product of our shared economic struggles. Global capital markets demand the cheapest labor force possible to insure high quarterly profits. This isn't an either or proposition. Americans, as a whole, are suffering from decisions made by the heads of multinational companies. The unemployment rate is half of what it was at the height of the economic crash, yet wages have remained mostly flat. The greed at the center of capital markets has reduced America's working class white population to an after thought. Money is more important to the powers that be than heritage, culture, and racial pride. The only thing sadder than this reality is the fact that so many working class whites refuse to accept that they've become victims of the one thing the wealthy elite in this country believe in more than "American Exceptionalism": capital markets.

Men like Pat Buchanan and Dennis Prager are so invested in the lies they've told their respective audiences over the years that truth looks like partisan opposition research. If you scan the channels on your television white men will still represent the majority of the people you see. If you show up on 99% of college campuses a majority of people you see with tenure are white men. If you read the above the fold stories in any major news paper the majority of those stories will be written by white men. Donald Trump's campaign is a symptom of the white male push to stem the demographic shift America is undergoing. Once the Tea Party proved to be ineffective at governing they changed their name to the freedom caucus, and once Donald Trump loses in November his base of angry white men will find another vehicle to vent their frustrations through. The inclusion of women and minorities to fields that are still dominated by white men is seen as proof of America's decline. I'm almost as frustrated with those on the left who try to legitimize and explain this line of argumentation as I am with those on the right who offer it as a reason for white male suffering.

It's difficult for me to place the newfound suffering of working class whites ahead of those who've struggled with systematic oppression in America for hundreds of years. I empathize with their plight, but I won't stop pursuing racial and social justice because someone fell off of a socioeconomic ledge they didn't earn. America has undergone a major economic shift over the last 35 years; much of the economic pain historically felt by people of color has shifted to working class whites. I don't know If it's possible to bridge our racial and social divides in a way that would be acceptable to all parties involved. I'm certain black people aren't willing to accept less for the sake of racial harmony with dissatisfied white men, and my hunch is women aren't likely to do so either. I don't know how to connect with someone like Pat Buchanan when he writes:

The world has been turned upside-down for white children. In our schools the history books have been rewritten and old heroes blotted out, as their statues are taken down and their flags are put away. Children are being taught that America was "discovered" by genocidal white racists, who murdered the native peoples of color, enslaved Africans to do the labor they refused to do, then went out and brutalized and colonized indigenous peoples all over the world.

My parents were still attending segregated schools over a decade after the Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas decision was rendered. I know people who went to school districts in Virginia that chose to shut their doors to all children before they would educate black children. This America Donald Trump wants to take us back to and the right misses so much isn't a place I want to visit much less live. I understand that all of the really good jobs belonged to white men and that it was probably pretty cool to sit in a diner and not see anyone who didn't look like you, but those weren't great days and anyone who believes they were should never challenge the notion of white privilege: or as I like to call it for my overly sensitive progressive friends "advantageous societal predisposition". As bloggers we sometimes make the mistake of thinking we can solve society's problems in a few short paragraphs. Sometimes we just need to add our perspective to the problems we're facing so another voice of dissent can be registered. It's harder to cure a disease by treating each individual symptom rather than addressing the root cause of the illness. If a majority of the people on the right think like Pat Buchanan is it possible to change that thinking? Do we bear the responsibility for reaching out to them?

An Open Letter To Angry Trump Supporters

Dear Angry Trump Supporter: I get it. For the better part of forty years I've felt an anxiety similar to what you're experiencing now. Our anger isn't that different; it's connected to our shared inability to alter our day-to-day realities in any significant way. We share an uncomfortable truth: we're stuck reacting to the ebbs and flows of society because we're powerless to control them. You've seen sections of this country abandoned by the powers that be. Some of you have been suffering economic hardships in silence for decades. Pressing 1 for English is just a symptom of the cultural shift you've been forced to endure. Every other group in society champions their heroes: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Caesar Chavez, Grace Boggs, Betty Friedan, Harvey Milk, and Louis Farrakhan, yet it's not "politically correct" for you to show pride in your race or heritage. America has changed, and it's not benefiting you. You're called a racist for articulating your fears, you get blamed for historical atrocities you didn't commit, and you're accused of having "white privilege" even though you don't know how it works or seem to be benefiting from it. Up is down, left is right, and things are changing faster than you can adjust to them. I hate that you're in pain. I disagree with the way your anger is being manipulated for political gain, and I wish I could convince you that we (Blacks, Mexicans, Muslims, LGBQT) aren't your enemy, but it's probably too late for that. 

I've read dozens of articles chronicling the Trump "phenomenon". Some were garden variety in-group out-group armchair psychology that settled for calling you racists and idiots (some of you are), but those articles didn't interest me as much as the articles that sought to connect your populism to the deeper societal issues and economic realities you've been facing. The underlying cause[s] of Donald Trump's political ascension will be studied and debated for a long time across multiple disciplines. If your guy wins the Republican nomination his campaign will have changed the way future Republican candidates run their campaigns. In essences, your movement will have strong armed the Republican nomination process. This is good and bad. Giving your guy the nomination won't help you in the general election if you continue alienating the rest of us. 2016 could be the year we find out if you need any of us to win in a general election. Your party has only won the popular vote one time (2004) since 1988. My hunch is that a strategy of offending every minority group in the country could backfire, but I've been wrong before. 

The America Country music stars sing about is over. This country will never exist as it did in those television shows from the 50's and 60's. We aren't going away. Alexis de Tocqueville  understood all of this. He noticed how militant his fellow Frenchmen became as their standards of living improved during the French Revolution. One of the worst things you can do to a person who denies the effects of historical injustices is open the space for historically oppressed people to get access to freedom and economic opportunity. People don't freely go back to a status quo that puts the needs of their particular communities on the back burner for the sake of the majorities feelings. You're not responsible for the world you inherited: neither are we. The coalitions you see forming harbor some of the same mistrust between them as you might harbor towards all of us, but none of us are willing to go back to this place you seem willing to take us. When I hear "take America back" or "make America great again" I hear desperation. Those words are empty signifiers. If taking America back means it will once again be socially acceptable for a bigot to spit on my mother then: I'll fight you, not a metaphorical fight with words and ideas, but a real life out in the streets fight. If taking America back means my gay friends have to go back to their closets: then I know they'll fight you, and I'll help them. If making America great again means my brother's wife and his in-laws could be rounded up because being 4th and 5th generation Mexican-Americans isn't good enough for you: then I'll fight you. If I see a group of people harming my Muslim brothers and sisters: I think you get the point.

Here's a secret: all of us are feeling the pinch of global capitalism. You woke up in a nightmare that transcends race and class. Instead of blaming us for the greed that sent the manufacturing base of our economy to the developing world, and created the unsustainable boom or bust cycles we see in the market, why not ask us how we've endured the trauma you're feeling. I love you and hope you let your anger go. Don't let hate radio, Fox News, and right-wing demagogues strip you of your humanity. The sooner you understand the underlying cause[s] of your anger the sooner you can move on. The market economy is a lot like the in-group out-group distinctions some of the Americans you see as enemies face daily: they exist in invisible spheres that are hard to explain to people who aren't on the underside of them, yet you feel their effects. You could learn a lot from us; we understand what's happening to you better than you do. 

Have a Blessed Day!

Danny Cardwell

"I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone... they will be forced to deal with pain." — James A. Baldwin

Hate Radio As A 2nd Language: What Conservatives Said About The Univ. of Missouri

Growing up in a small southern town has blessed me with the gift of translating Conservative hate radio. I live in a town where a lot of people never learned that it's not acceptable to call a black man boy, and the Confederate flag is not a racist relic. For decades, people of color comprised less than 10% of the total population in my town; very few of them, no matter how educated or qualified, worked (or work) in any field other than hospitality or service. When combined, these factors create the perfect atmosphere for people to talk unfiltered. I speak English, I've taken Spanish in school, but my true second language is dog whistle. When people don't see you as an equal you get distorted communication: they say what they want, and expect you to say what they want to hear. I've studied the listeners of hate radio in their natural habitat. I'll use this skill to decipher some of the comments made about the student protesters and football players at the University of Missouri.

Rush Limbaugh: You find the major problem is that there are too many white people at this place. And they apparently are not nice enough or considerate enough to the 10 percent of the people there who are black. And so there has to be some changes.

Translation: You people don't know how lucky you are to be here. You guys are the lucky ones. We give you track suits, tennis shoes, and there's basketball courts everywhere. What else do you want?

Jazz Shaw: The Inmates Are Running The Asylum At Mizzou. Parents sending tuition money there deserve what they get.

Translation: I don't care how high your S.A.T. scores are you're still thugs and hoodrats.

MICHAEL BERRY: So now the president of the university has resigned. Now, think of the message this sends. Talk about the tail wagging the dog. The football players at the University of Missouri. The football players decide who the president will be? An institution of higher learning. You're doing research on molecular biology that may lead to a cure for cancer. You're doing aeronautical research, you're doing chemical research, molecular biology research. You're educating how many thousand people? And you're letting a few thugs decide who you're president will be?

Translation: This happend because you can't control your boys. You need to run a tighter ship. This is what happens when they start feeling themselves.

MICHAEL BERRY: Good, you do have a problem. But it's far bigger than the creative shaping of poop by somebody on your campus. You got a major problem with your priorities. If you can't reign in a few football players to shut their mouth and play football, else they lose their scholarship? You've got a real problem on your hands. You've got a problem of culture. You've got a problem of priorities, and you've got a problem of pandering.

Translation: No matter how much education you have, no matter how legitimate your claims are: you need to get over it and accept the way things are.

When Blacks riot we're told to follow the model of peaceful assembly. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is used as a cudgel to thwart young radicals. When educated young men and women use their Constitutional right to peaceably assemble and boycott they're still called thugs. This is a good thing: we need bigots to say out loud what their true feelings are. I love that the language has become so coded. The reason so many on the right hate politically correct language is because it's forced them to find new ways to say the same tired things. This is radical and I love it. Advantage allows one to avoid a lot of uncomfortable moments and conversations. Viral examples of blatant racism has forced some of our fellow citizens to pull their head out of the sand. All of this talk about racial animosity destroys the myth of a post-racial America. Confronting these problems in an honest way is part of the cure for them. We need to create an atmosphere where bigotry, no matter how subtle, is publicly called out and shamed.