What's the Matter with Kansas?

As an American who lives outside of my home country, I am regularly called upon to explain to my European friends how so many in America can be against health care, how so many "common" people are voting for the Republican Party, what has happened to pro-labor policies; and how so many poor seem to be aligned, rather than opposed to, the voting policies of the rich. This book really answers those questions well. Furthermore, the writing style is fantastic. Every time one picks it up, it's nearly impossible to put down. I read the entire thing in just five days. The quick answer here is that Democrats used to have the votes of the common man, and of blue-collar labor, because they concentrated on economic issues. Around 1990 the Democrats stopped talking about economic issues because they needed to RAISE MORE MONEY FROM BIG DONORS. They stopped talking about minimum wage issues and business practices that hurt small workers. Those small workers only gave small amounts of political contributions anyway; therefore no one was really interested in them as a constituency. As a result, the issues the Democrats are left talking about are things like legalizing gay marriage and keeping abortion legal. According to this book, starting around 1990, the "new" Republican wing started talking about moral issues such as not dismembering babies, not teaching children about gay sex, in addition to capturing the whole part of the country which is "anti-intellectual" above all else. They captured the sentiment of "America has changed, and it's not the America I grew up with," angry white voters, who now define all problems in America as coming from "liberals who hate America and want to destroy it." Liberals are now defined as "educated 'experts' (scientists and professionals) who try to tell us what to think (on issues such as climate change and gay marriage), who drink wine, drive Volvos, and who are NOT LIKE US, THE COMMON PEOPLE." All these people who used to be the Democratic base are now voting Republican because the Democrats have forgotten them by taking economics out of what they talk about. The book is a provocative and interesting excellent read.

Odd: I finished the book less than 15 minutes ago, and found when I booted up the Amazon site, that I'd bought a hard-cover book. I hadn't noticed at all. But while reading KANSAS I didn't notice much of anything else outside the experience. It was a good reading experience. This is a writer who entertains as he informs, but doesn't condescend. His descriptions of his home city and his memories of it from childhood to the present, are colorful and fairly easy. Not a happy group of pictures mostly; the area has suffered, shriveled. If he has ferocious angers, acid envies and hatreds within him, we don't really see or hear them. His coming of age was deftly told; that is, when he first understood that he would never be one of the elite, and accepted it. Lingering, the realization that this book was published five years ago, and now its as though I'm looking at its conclusions through the near-derelect strip-mall spaces of one of the suburbs and small towns he shows us. And Frank shows us with clarity the effects that the business failures of big corporations have had, through the people he describes and interviews; the Backlash Republican Radicals. Their willful disregard of the effects of the forces that move them is tragic. It is as though they, the underclass, know they will always be scorned by those of the upper class, the Limousine Republicans, and so they firmly grasp that contempt and turn it inward in an act of Sepuku as if to say, Your contempt for us is our self-destruction, but our glory as well! And, Frank describes it all without sentiment, so that even in their folly, their hippocracy or their delusion, they have dignity. Still, I'm haunted by the final chapter of the book in which he appears to propose that perhaps a preponderant share of the destructive collapse of Kansas' civic pride is due to the fatal neglect by the Democratic Party, of its principal support and client, Organized Labor. Isn't it obvious? Completely nuts. Here, they're designated Liberals. It is true that for a time the cocuntry got sucked into the Thatcher-Reagan vortex of Liberal vs. Conservative spin, forgetting that all we ever were was Republican and Democrat, caught up in one national economy, and that toxic foreign conceit led to a growing self-delusion that blinded us to our self-interest, as we deafened ourselves with rancor that grew in foolishness as it grew in volume. Worse we allowed our civic dialogue to be poisoned by the Occult; that is, the propaganda of those who have faith without knowledge. Yes, we are in a time of rabid Anti-intelectualism. But then what? Greed, no matter how you rationalize it is not an ideology, and morbid selfishness is no way to run a participatory democracy. Or, maybe that's the point. Democracy = the tyrany of the masses. Plutocracy = the tyrany of the rich. Slavery is easiest; you have your mind made up for you and you eat scraps. Frank appears to the reader as a self-identified Liberal, and a man of sincere, balanced conviction. My feeling is that he resisted the temptation to speak out with strength. His temperament, probably. I don't feel his hot breath on my cheek, and in a way that's a pity. Certainly propagandists and pamphleteers can be and often are boring. People who cannot empathize with others are. Probably he chose wisely to self-censor in order that many, or at least more, might read and think where others would curse and turn away. I don't know. He's revealed a lot of the economic vs. cultural mechanism of so-called conservatism, and his book has been a great success. He has nothing to complain of. MORAL: The USA is a commercial (bait-and-switch) enterprise and strip-mall faith is a bi-product. Get used to it because its going to get worse.

When this book first appeared in 2004, "What's the Matter with Kansas?" was hailed as a powerful explanation of the political divide present in the early twenty-first century United States. Journalist Thomas Frank, who grew up in the upper-middle class suburbs of Kansas City, explores how a state renowned for agrarian radicalism in the latter nineteenth century, to say nothing of socialist ideals in the early twentieth, became a bastion of conservatism by the turn of the twenty-first. His answer, cultural and values politics rather than economic politics have dominated the current political scene. Written in a breezy style, it will not satisfy scholars but it nonetheless presents a compelling introduction to the current political divisions of the United States. Frank begins by asking a simple question, why do people vote against their economic interests? The Republican Party, he notes, has a penchant for big business, lessening regulations, and a diminution of the social programs that defined politics from the New Deal to the Great Society. The genius of the conservative movement, and the reason for its success, required a draining of the quest for economic justice that had dominated that earlier effort from the political agenda. Conservatives replaced it with values and cultural issues that attracted working class voters. The centerpiece of this was the anti-abortion issue, but it also included symbols of patriotism such as flag burning and the Pledge of Allegiance, the sanctity of marriage and whether it should be extended to gays, the stories told of American history, religious conceptions and their legitimacy in the public sphere, and the science behind evolution and other issues that some find uncomfortable. At its core, the values agenda advanced by the Republicans allowed the party to capture beginning in the 1980s all three branches of U.S. government and to rule with virtually no coordinated and effective opposition as the twenty-first century began. To be successful, they had to divorce all of these issues from the economic ones with which Republicans are so often identified and to motivate voters to support their values agenda despite the economic measures also a part of the Republican political effort. Ironically, while making considerable noise about cultural values and hot-button issues, the Republican majorities have done almost nothing to reverse the policies that motivated voters to send majorities of Republicans to Washington in the first place. This may well be, one of the great mysteries of current American politics. At the time this book was published, the Republicans had controlled the House of Representatives for ten years, and all three branches of government since January 2003. Even so, no major legislation had been passed to reverse the situation that values voters abhorred. Most importantly, nothing had been done to reverse a woman's right to chose whether or not to have a baby. This was the most volatile social issue and the one which Thomas Frank and others believe should have been on the top of the Republican agenda. The fact nothing substantive has changed is because of a series of rifts within the Republican Party as it fights internally over agenda-setting. At some level, co-opting the values voters, according to Frank, was a Machiavellian ploy to gain the votes necessary to take control of the U.S. government. Thereafter, the party ruled in the interest of its big business constituency, and in the process stabbed at least twice the constituency of values voters by not enacting the measures they advocated even as they harmed them with their economic policies. This is an important book that deserves consideration. It is, of course, a journalistic account of the current political divisions of the United States. It is overwhelmingly anecdotal, and far from a systematic analytical work, but it is also suggestive and provocative. There is every reason to believe it will be referenced in the on-going political analyses of the twenty-first century.

I have lived in Arizona since 1985, and have very few memories of my life before then. Hence I have grown up in a Red state, and have been surrounded mainly by Republicans most of my life. Many of their opinions and beliefs puzzled me as they seemed contradictory, baseless, and often nonsensical. For example, I've met many white, male Republicans who, without any second thoughts, firmly believe that rich elitists use their wealth and power to elect Democrats who screw over America. Yet these same Republicans believe that rich people should not pay higher tax rates than poor people! Another example, I've met many white, male Republicans who absolutely hate other countries, especially poor Third World ones like China and India. Yet they will preferentially shop at places like Walmart that only stock items from poor Third World countries. At first I thought all of this was due to Arizona having a crappy public school system; this state is annually among the low end in terms of SAT scores, high school graduation rates, college attendance rates, literacy rates, etc... But I have been disabused of my illusions by this wonderful book. Its not just Arizonans that are dumb by voting Republican and against their pocket book; its Kansas and a whole host of other states. I've met so many Arizonas who really don't know how their tax dollars are spent; but are happy as long as they can buy automatic firearms, gays can't marry, and their kids have to pray in school. The author of this book dissects and analyzes this stupidity wonderfully and concisely. Everything from class views, to views on taxes and government spending, to ideas about right and wrong; this author has put his finger onto the pulse of the Republican electorate. I've often wondered what book to recommend to my friends who are puzzled by American voting patterns. I believe this book is the one for them. Overall, a great read; it does for the late 20th/early 21st centuries what Tocqueville's "Democracy in America" did for the early 1800s.

The author is funny. But humor almost always has a victim, and the victim is his neighbor state (Frank was born in Kansas City, MO, apparently). Acerbic wit will make your friends laugh, but it will further alienate your non-friends. While I see (and agree with) the majority of his points, what the author misses is an explanation of "why" are Kansans so evidently "irrational" in their choice of party to support, despite the evidence that they should do the contrary. Thus, the book seems to me more of a complaint about the direction of Kansas' (and American) political evolution, as opposed to any real understanding of root cause, and possible solution. Parts of the book are condescending enough that I found it hard to read, overall.

Thomas Frank accurately describes the dominant politics of my home state of Kansas. Oddly enough, the thesis of the book can be described in a Wall Street Journal essay that was used to describe the Arab states in their conflict with Israel, titled "Where hatred trumps bread," where a manipulative ruling class has for decades exploited an impoverished people while simultaneously fostering them in a culture of victimization that steers this peoples fury back persistently toward shadowy, Cosmopolitan Other. In this tragic land unassuageable cultural grievances are elevated inexplicably over solid material ones, and basic economic self-interest is eclipsed by juicy myths of national authenticity and righteousness wronged. Kansans view the Cosmopolitan world as being against them and they fiercely protect their world from outside influences and "government intrusion" in their lives. But they do it with such hypocrisy. They rail against the culture of Hollywood, but go to just about any farm and you will almost always find a satellite dish bringing in HBO. Farmer's rail against an uncaring bureaucracy dictating to them how they should farm and take care of their land. They just want government out of their lives, and yet spend their winter months waiting for the mailman to bring their government subsidy check. Small town Kansans will fight against anyone mocking there choice of living the small town life, and yet will travel 100 miles to Super Wal-Mart to get groceries, rather than support their local hometown independently owned market. Kansans will forever mistrust a government and culture of Eastern Intellectuals and Hollywood know it alls. These are the same people that have proposed turning their home; the plains back to a park for the Buffalo (The Buffalo Commons), and who criminally charged them as murderers...of their own livestock (k.d. lang & Oprah)! The only flaw in Frank's ideas is that they only reflect the politics of those in Kansas who actually participate in the political process (i.e. vote). The majority of the state does not vote and do not participate. Only 54% of the voting age population of Kansas voted in the 2000 presidential race, 38% voted in the 1998 congressional elections. Of the few Kansans that did vote in the 2000 presidential election, 42% actually did vote for someone other than George Bush. The majority of Kansan's were horrified at the political turning point for the conservative republicans, the summer that Operation Rescue invaded Wichita. Every abortion-crazed nut came to our state and went nuts. Little did we know that the seeds this movement planted would grow up to rule us. The difference between the ruling Kansas conservative Republicans and the indifferent majority is that the cons willingness to fight and make a scene (because they view themselves as victims) and the majorities (self-sufficient, fatalistic) indifference and unwillingness to upset their family and neighbors...

For some historical insights into how the electorate votes against its own interests and some lively writing, check out Thomas Frank's heavily sourced What's the Matter with Kansas? Frank quotes anthropologist, Robert J. Hackenberg, who speaks of "the acceptance of a marginal class, and passive exploitation of it, as a permanent feature of the social system by a nation's middle and upper classes." Somewhere along the way, fiercely liberal populists of the heartland transmogrified into fierce reactionaries, supporting the status quo and attacking the so-called liberal elite, blaming them for their economic woes and anything else wrong with society. This is a mindset where ideology trumps practical necessities. Frank refers to moderate Republicans as Mods (moderates) as opposed to more radical elements (today, we'd call them the Tea Party) as Cons (conservatives). I'd go with Cons as the moderates and Rads (for the far-right crowd). Frank makes passing mention of classic democratic liberalism, pretty much dead for decades. This debunks the Red/Blue division as our entire political spectrum has lurched right, making for Red/Pink contrasts. "New" democrats tend to be tepid centrists (e.g., Clinton, Obama). Frank aptly captures the "erasure of the economic" component which is absent from the current crop of neo-reactionaries. Leave that out and then "it is only possible to think the news is slanted to the left...if you don't take into account who owns news organizations.... The university campus can only be imagined as a place dominated by leftists if you never consider economic or business schools." These assertions provide a deflection from the true causes of working class poverty. Frank attributes this to bias, and can be compared to the logical fallacy of false equivalency. All these "aggrieved 'Middle Americans'...have to show for their Republican loyalty are lower wages, more dangerous jobs, dirtier air, a new overlord class that comports itself like King Farouk..." "Liberal bias exists because it must exist in order for the rest of contemporary conservatism to be true.... Bias has to be; therefore it is." One of the Republican candidates for the 2012 presidency, referred to colleges as "indoctrination mills." Anyone who has spent more than a short walking tour on a college campus knows this is nonsense. But in the world of these "Middle Americans," just saying something apparently makes it so. This is a self-entrapping delusional fantasy, where Frank's so-called "Cons" are impervious to reason or facts. Near the end of the book, Frank revisits his old Kansan town neighborhood where he grew up (Shawnee), that "has the feel of a place whose energy has been spent." A microcosm of the entire state, and even vast portions of the country as a whole. "After three decades of de-unionization and stagnant wage-growth [what remains] of the blue collar suburbs like this one look and act very differently than before." Frank's town "burns hotter than nearly any place in the state to defund public education, to stamp out stem-cell research, to roll back taxes, and to abase itself before the throne of big business. The only criticism I have of this fascinating book is that Frank's drum-beating can get a little like beating a dead horse. Readers will either see through the haze of deceit and deflection or not. When some people have made up their minds, you can't confuse them with the facts. What are we to make of this? That it's a successful political strategy, one of deflection and falsified enemies? That would be understandable, even make sense and be considered shrewd and brilliant, except that in the long run it is unsustainable to the point where such policy would bring ruination to all.

In "What's the Matter with Kansas?," journalist and historian Thomas Frank uses the example of his native state to ponder both how and why working-class and poor white Americans in the heartland vote for a party that advances policies benefiting wealthy individuals and corporations. In brief: Why do these people stand with Republicans when Republicans do not stand with them? The answer, which Frank provides with the blend of extensive reporting and satiric wit that's become his trademark: Because of a 'divide and conquer' strategy in which Republican politicians and commentators use not only hot-button social issues such as abortion, gun control and gay marriage, but also trivial matters such as where one shops and dines, and what make of automobile one drives, to enrage these people and direct their rage toward snobbish "liberal elites" that supposedly control America-and hate conservative, poor whites. (Those elites, for example, don't shop at Walmart, don't eat at McDonald's, drive Volvos instead of American vehicles and sip lattes-or worse, tea-instead of drinking coffee.) Absent from the above strategy, Frank notes, is any mention of issues tied to their dire economic circumstances. However, once elected, Republican politicians avoid the explosive social issues they exploited to inflame the working-class and poor white into voting for them-and instead turn their attention to those economic issues, such as cutting taxes for the wealthy, undoing business regulations and undermining the social safety net. If questioned about why they haven't made progress on those hot-button social issues, they blame-you guessed it-those "liberal elites." In brief, the GOP operates-and thrives-by blending "us vs. them" and "bait-and-switch." Frank adds that Democrats aren't free of blame in the situation, either. He accuses the party of deliberately turning its back on those working-class and poor white Americans whose causes they once championed-and dropping the class language it once spoke to distinguish themselves from Republicans-in order to remake themselves as a party just as pro-business as Republicans. He also accuses Democratic leaders of assuming the working class and the poor will vote for their party because there's nowhere else for them to turn. (Frank expands upon these charges in his later book "Listen, Liberal," which I've reviewed elsewhere on Amazon.) As a subtle rebuke to this sort of thinking, Frank notes the example of Democrat Kathleen Sebelius, who won the governorship by focusing on economic issues and avoiding social issues. The lone shortcoming of Frank's book is that it largely avoids the white-identity politics, the race-based sense of economic entitlement, and the anxiety and resentment that have played important roles in campaigns since this book's initial hardcover publication in 2004. That aside, it will still give readers much to think about-especially regarding the current state of the nation.