"In fact, Cramer, the traveling professor, is writing a book whose working title is: 'Understanding the Politics of Resentment'... 'I finally sent the revised manuscript back to my editor the Friday after the election,' she says. 'I was kind of joking to myself that if Scott Walker loses, I’m a little bit in a bind because I think I’ve gotten this wrong. But I think his win is sort of a continuation of what I had been hearing.'"
From "No end in sight to Wisconsin’s politics of resentment," by Paul Fanlund in The Capital Times. Cramer is Kathy Cramer, "a youthful and charismatic political scientist from the University of Wisconsin," who "ventured from her Madison campus office to coffee shops and gas stations in small Wisconsin communities" and "struck up conversations uncovering a pattern of simmering resentment toward those of us in Madison and Milwaukee."
ADDED: The Cap Times doesn't seem to want us to get to that article. The proper link didn't work, and then a link going to a Google search didn't produce a workable link. And I'm down in the comments telling people to read the article and address the topic and don't just rehash Ferguson or whatever has rubbed you raw lately. All I can say is go to the home page of The Cap Times and see the article title there.
I'll think hard before linking to The Cap Times in the future. Do they see they are getting traffic from me and act to fend it off?
AND: Now, I think I've got a working link in the original post. Interestingly, the headline has changed! It's now "Ferguson makes us think about Madison’s black-white divide." Wow! That didn't seem to be the subject of the article to me, and I was annoyed that my commenters were turning it into another Ferguson discussion. That is bizarre!
The teaser on the front page is now: "Paul Fanlund: Ferguson makes us think about Madison’s black-white divide/Missouri firestorm elevates topic of relations between races here."
The article wasn't even mostly about race. It was about class politics.... at least the last time I read the text. Maybe the text is different too. I happened to blog this piece 12 minutes after it went up. Maybe they were still tweaking it, spiking it with click bait. What a sad place we're in with the media titillating us with Ferguson continually. What good do they hope to do! I'm sure there are at least a few lefties feeling bad that the effort to forefront class inequity is failing.
MORE: Now, I've figured out that the article with the Ferguson headline is a different article, also by Paul Fanlund, and it went up in the last hour. I'm thinking the original article I blogged has been pulled and that other article put in its place.
UPDATE: Commenter George Grady said "Google has a cached version of today's article, for now anyway," and I've now redone the first link with that, so it can be read. I can't believe I wasted so much time this morning on this article the Cap Times wafted momentarily. Talk about your "politics of resentment." I'm blogging pure resentment right here.
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65 comments:
So she went and talked to Curious George.
So many threads on this blog fit the bill perfectly, she could have just come here to see the Madison hate.
I'm having trouble following the link, or otherwise finding a copy of the story that I can read, so let me guess: One major premise of the column is that the resentment mostly (or entirely) runs one direction. Do I get a cookie?
There's a lot to be resentful about presently: the wealthy have hijacked what minority portion of power (and wealth) had been held by the non-wealthy, and we are now a full-on plutocracy. The laws do not apply equally--as they never really have, but lip service was at least given to the concept, and in recent decades there were legal reforms that extended some protections to the masses...but no more. We spend trillions without thinking on machineries of death, yet can spare little for anything that will benefit the American people at large.
The game is openly fixed; our "democratic republic" is a game of three card monte, and we don't control the cards.
I am not even from WI and I was resentful of the boobs protesting in Madison.
"I'm having trouble following the link, or otherwise finding a copy of the story that I can read..."
I did the link a different way. Try it now.
Please look at the article and address that topic.
I don't want this post to be another back-and-forth about Ferguson. There are many other posts for that!
I put this up because it's something new, so don't rehash what has been said before.
I took out some comments so this post wouldn't be sunk. If I took you out, please don't be offended. I know the Cap Times has itself set up to make it hard to get to the article, but I think the way I redid the link will now work.
Just tried the link. No luck.
It's still not loading for me (I'm on an IPad so maybe it's me.
I did google and found a chapter excerpt from the book and skimmed it. As I expected it seems like a rehash of Frank's book, Wisconsin version.
Why is it so hard for liberals to examine what is wrong with government instead of looking for pathology in citizens who distrust it?
I went to the front page and couldn't find the title. Couldn't find a search option, either. What department is it listed under?
Yeah that appears to be a different article altogether.
I read the article that is -- at least currently -- there:
"I do have a smidgen of empathy for white leaders -- political, philanthropic or direct service providers – who think they have done their best to improve things and feel underappreciated.
But only a smidgen.
Looking forward, blacks in Madison are owed a central role, and Ferguson reminds us that no matter how hard we whites try to see the world through their eyes, we, well, kind of can’t."
Am I wrong to read this as basically stating that whites don't really have an effective role in this, and should stop bothering?
Like it or not, Ferguson will be dominating conversation for some time to come.
The pathology of Black Culture is on full display there, and if you want to see resentment, watch tax-paying America eventually react to the ungrateful welfare layabouts.
And don't try to go to Black unemployment rates. The issue for Blacks is that they so many of them are unemployable.
This is a teachable moment for what can happen to a whole people when they trade thinking and reason for hair-trigger mindless emotion.
It can only end badly.
I am afraid to ask my 'Emotional Support Negro' about what any of this means.
I am Laslo.
Webmistress
I went to Bing and the original article and got a white screen. I love it.
On the other hand, Kathy Cramer Walsh sounds like a person doing interesting research and since the two of you are in the same University, maybe you could give us a hint when her research is published, since it was drowned out by the Cap Times.
Yes, I admit I count on you to keep me informed about Wisconsin. Mark me lazy. Alternatively, mark me as having ADHD and looking in lots of crevices.
Regards — Cliff
What good do they hope to do!
They don't hope to do good. They hope to do well.
His last paragraph says that "white" and "black" are genetically different and can never meet on equal terms.
Kind of like Thomas Jefferson's solution to the slave problem: "Liberate and deport?"
"Why is it so hard for liberals to examine what is wrong with government instead of looking for pathology in citizens who distrust it?"
The question, at least in Frank's book--as I was unable to load this article--is not assuming or searching for a pathology in citizens who distrust government, but wondering why citizens vote for the politicians and policies that are most inimical to their interests.
http://host.madison.com/news/local/madison_360/madison-professor-has-seen-madison-s-image-problem-first-hand/article_b86da35e-0d20-11e0-902a-001cc4c03286.html
The above link is a Dec 22, 2010 article about Kathy Cramer by Paul Fanlund. Seems to be about the same thing. Maybe he's just on a four year cycle.
"It was built broken"
An apt quote for the Cap Times website, from the TV show M*A*S*H. (You can find a good MASH quote for any need)
A frequent progressive candidate for public office in Wauwatosa posted on Facebook today about Paul Ryan's policies (as if he can enact anything) will send us to a Soylent Green society. Attitudes like his are becoming the norm amongst the urban progressive set.
But yep, the problem is those in the sticks who "resent" Mad/Milw.
In 2008 Obama ran on "the audacity of hope." Many voted for him because they were hopeful, but it seems to me that nearly all were hopeless.
Resentment is a useful political tool, and the biggest tools are the people who think "their side" is too highminded to try and use resentment to their advantage. Sure, the Right these days tries to use resentment against what they perceive as an out of touch, overzealous government encroaching on their ability to make a living or run a business or own a gun or smoke. They're generally resentful of policies that encourage illegal immigration that swamps our resources and leads to stiffer competition for jobs (not just as the migrant farm worker level, but increasingly in skilled jobs). And the Right is going to tap into that.
But the Left lately has used resentment FAR more than the Right does. Look at the racial resentment being stoked--the concepts of "racial privilege" and "microaggressions" that have become a commonplace way to take struggling black people and struggling Hispanics and convince them that society is rigged against them by an elusive entity, and associate that entity with the Right wing. (Note how much stress is made on how "white" the Right is, even where race is irrelevant to the discussion). The Occupy crowd and its offshoots with all this talk of "inequality"--as an evil in and of itself, rather than the more real problem of stagnating wages and tighter job markets--that is a far more pervasive use of resentment politics than anything the Right is using. The Left is hoping their resentment cocktail will be enough to keep the White House in two years.
More evidence of a corrupt media.
I would hazard the guess that the original article was deep-sixed because it hit too close to home. Ferguson is more nationalized and can be used to reinforce "white guilt" in a way that a study of class in Wisc cannot
When I did my military service, about midway between Harry Truman desegregating the armed forces (by Executive Order!) and Little Rock, I, being a recent immigrant and finding all Americans, regardless of color, passing strange, did not think much about the Black guys in the company, though, looking back, I am sure the American recruits found it strange to be serving alongside them.
Then the marbledomes in Washington decided it would be more efficient to rotate out whole divisions at a time, and those of us with more than 6 months to go were transferred to other units in Germany. So, one day I with a couple of others were coming back to the barracks and met one of the Black guys from or old unit in the company of some other strange Black guys, and in passing I said "Hi, Jim", and he turned around, grabbed me by the throat and pushed me up against the wall, while yelling something or other at me. He then let me go and left with his bunch, and I asked my friends, "What in the world was all that about? Jim had been drinking, but what the heck?" and they just laughed it off and said, "Jim just had to show off for his new friends. Don't mind it."
"The question, at least in Frank's book--as I was unable to load this article--is not assuming or searching for a pathology in citizens who distrust government, wondering why citizens vote for the politicians and policies that are most inimical to their interests."
Inimical to their interests, in Frank's opinion.
Robert Cook wrote -
"We spend trillions without thinking on machineries of death, yet can spare little for anything that will benefit the American people at large."
Social Security represents nearly a quarter of federal spending. That one program is the largest item in the federal budget.
Cramer is Kathy Cramer, "a youthful and charismatic political scientist from the University of Wisconsin," who "ventured from her Madison campus office to coffee shops and gas stations in small Wisconsin communities" and "struck up conversations uncovering a pattern of simmering resentment toward those of us in Madison and Milwaukee."
Obviously it's the nation writ larger with NYC and DC instead of Madison and Milwaukee at the center.
Google has a cached version of today's article, for now anyway:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:tgIUivN4iVsJ:host.madison.com/ct/news/local/writers/paul_fanlund/paul-fanlund-no-end-in-sight-to-wisconsin-s-politics/article_1265d3e2-d2e3-5e21-8caf-3bb77b102e15.html+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
Here in Colorado the Resentment led to a move by several counties to vote to set up a new state. Didn't work, but it brought to the fore the discontent outside of Denver/Boulder/Ft. Collins corridor. Might have even led to Cory's win.
G. Grady - thanks for posting that URL.
The (original) Fanlund piece is classic "Conservatives in the Mist" thinking. Why don't those yahoos in the sticks appreciate us? They must be getting duped by the Republicans! Interestingly, in the last few paragraphs the existence of a different narrative point of view is acknowledged, but it is quickly dismissed without discussion.
Well it was fun to read all the added updates!
Here’s my favorite part from the article:
So, I ask Cramer, what else resonated from all those conversations? She mentions race.
“When you respect people, it’s very difficult to see racism in what they’re saying or doing. Very, very seldom did people say anything that your average person would construe as racist. When they did it was, unfortunately, about Native Americans.”
But, she adds: “Race has often been used to argue against redistribution and wealth equality in American history. In times when a populist message gained momentum, opponents would counter that ‘they’re allies with those black people so we can’t possibly support what they’re saying.’ ”
While race was seldom an explicit topic, she says: “I think in the way that our country has argued about redistribution, it’s always been at some level about race.
“So, even when people aren’t saying awful things like ‘those black people in Milwaukee,’ kind of our collective sense of where resources ought to go is about the broader constellation of what groups we think are deserving. Unfortunately, it’s the way stereotypes work.”
So even though very few people actually did or said anything racist during her visits outside the Madison pale, and the few who did weren’t racist against the right people, it’s still obvious that they’re all racists, because they voted for Walker. Honestly, what more proof could you need?
I think in any state where there are a couple of large cities and much less population in the rest of the state there is a lot of political resentment. Any candidate running who can win a large majority of the votes in the cities doesn't have to, and often doesn't, pay much attention to the voices of the rest of the people. The current attitude of the city dwellers that anyone with any sense or smarts would join them in the city is a source of laughter to those rural folks who provide the food they eat and the materials for the clothes they wear, and produce energy to keep the city's lights on. With the current level of information technology, the commerce of our cities could easily be spread out, and the cities razed to the ground. I'm not sure the city folk would survive long w/o the bumpkins, though.
"Social Security represents nearly a quarter of federal spending. That one program is the largest item in the federal budget."
Social Security is paid for out its own trust fund; it is not part of the general fund.
That aside, if we stopped spending trillions on machineries of death, all that money could be applied in manifold ways to benefit the American people. Every dollar spent on war or preparations for war is a dollar stolen from productive use for us. As President Eisenhower put it in his "Chance for Peace" speech in 1953:
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. "This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement. We pay for a single fighter with a half-million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people. . . . This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron."
This article does a bad job of conflating national and state issues. It talks about resentment to Madison and Milwaukee by rural citizens and then talks about national income inequality stats and CEO pay and how much money goes to red states v. blue states.
And the article doesn't even mention that Walker's recent opponent was a member of the undeserved wealthy, like Hillary.
Since income inequality increases during both Republican and Democratic administrations, why wouldn't you vote for he party that will tax you less?
That's not resentment, that's rational self interest.
Hmmm, nice quote, "ordinary people have been inundated by anti-government messages for decades".
Those darned ordinary folk. They are just so... you know.... ordinary.
(And gullible. Boy falling for that old anti-government message.) No, dear, just the anti-intrusive/counter productive/wasteful/crony funding part of this massive government.
Well, thanks Robert for spelling that out. If Ferguson didn't spend all that money on policing, then the city would have had the funds to subsidize convenience stores so that that town's youths would not find it necessary to steal cigars.......The resentment of some is an inchoate search for justice and inequality. Their resentment is actually a kind of virtue. The resentment of others is a clinging to outmoded and unfair ways of life from which they unjustly profit. And woe to those who cannot tell the self evident difference between these two groups.
Robert Cook wrote -
"Social Security is paid for out its own trust fund; it is not part of the general fund."
Like this makes any practical difference. Most pairs of pants have at least two pockets.
They spent the money in the "trust fund" long ago.
Social Security now pays out more than it takes in, and the difference is made up by "borrowing," i.e. "Bernanke money."
And this is only getting worse as the poulation ages and the workforce shrinks.
I have read the cached, actual article.
The article is, as usual, written by someone who lives in the usual bubble. The frame of reference is strikingly parochial.
It is also strikingly arrogant. A "conservatives in the mist" thing.
It is also strikingly ignorant. Actual American industries, that make real things, are operated by a distinctly conservative workforce, management, professionals and labor. New York, etc. are not industrial states anymore and the people in them that are still "industrial" are very conservative.
And the red-blue balance of payments story is a crock. Its distorted by, among other things, the fact that much federal corporate income tax, or the income tax of the real owners (the 1% or .01%) is reported from states with corporate headquarters, largely "blue" whereas their actual operations where they make their money tend to be in "red" places.
All in all the usual stuff from the hangers-on of Marie Antoinette.
In the face of these open insults I understand the urge to break out the tumbrils and the guillotine. Maybe we should take up knitting, in anticipation.
"Social Security is paid for out its own trust fund; it is not part of the general fund."
I'm disappointed in your, Robert (really, no snark intended). I thought you were better informed than that.
From the article:
"Do Republicans in Wisconsin really have any idea how to effectively counteract the macro forces of globalization and technology that overwhelm our once-proud manufacturing economy?"
No, probably not.
"Most of their actions just appear to be some variation on giving more to the very wealthy — incentives, tax cuts, slackened consumer and environmental protections, whatever they demand — and hoping something, anything, trickles down for workers."
But Republicans do know that your "solutions" of higher taxes, more redistribution, and excessive regulations will make things worse.
Wow, that was one heck of an article! The author managed to touch on every single stereotype of Republicans including a variation on the "vast right wing conspiracy" (he’s clearly part of an orchestrated national movement.).
Liberals just want to help! Why are these rural "folks" just too stupid to see that? They obviously don't know what is best for them and should do what we tell them, for their own good!
"uncovering a pattern of simmering resentment toward those of us in Madison and Milwaukee"
Those folks have been BRAIN WASHED! "First, that ordinary people have been inundated by anti-government messages for decades, especially since the Reagan presidency."
"Fourth, they are constantly told that government programs are distorted to help those who do not help themselves. Given the concentrations of minorities in the two largest cities, the racial subtext is always there. Many in outlying Wisconsin see themselves as distinctively hard-working and self-reliant and getting no government help. They do not perceive their own public education, Medicare, Social Security, highway infrastructure and so forth as the sorts of “handouts” they think flow to others."
What a tool! None of those things listed are "hand outs". People actually pay taxes to fund those things. If you think that is unfair, that these rubes suck up too much of "our" tax money without being sufficiently grateful, then show them what for and push for lower taxes too! If the taxes are lower, no more money to throw around. That will show them!
How, some may ask, do he and fellow Republicans win even though they oppose such steps as an increase in the minimum wage, widely supported in exit polls? Maybe because anyone with half a brain can see that increasing the minimum wage does NOT help those earning minimum wage. It causes a loss of jobs / hours and an increase in prices.
But the less-hopeful prognosis is that there is nothing obvious short of eventual generational change and a more diverse electorate that promises to counteract the angry individualism and anti-government sentiment that has taken such deep hold. If you don't approve of a big, fat government, you are an "angry individualist!
“Resentment” is the perfect one-word brand for the current political culture. He means Republicans of course! Liberals are too nice and have "right" on their side. They are not resentful at all. They work selflessly for the good of all!
“When you respect people, it’s very difficult to see racism in what they’re saying or doing. Very, very seldom did people say anything that your average person would construe as racist." Ah, but you and I know it is there. The rubes are nothing if not racists!
“So, even when people aren’t saying awful things like ‘those black people in Milwaukee,’ kind of our collective sense of where resources ought to go is about the broader constellation of what groups we think are deserving. Unfortunately, it’s the way stereotypes work.”
And don't miss the insightful closing! Perhaps no truly path-altering solutions exist, and that is saddest of all. So the resentment simmers on, and here and elsewhere, only conservatives have figured out how to fully exploit it.
I can understand why the pulled this and replaced it with another. How it made it online in the first place, tells much as well.
When they say firestorm, do they mean the literal arson attacks or the figurative?
Todd said: "I can understand why the pulled this and replaced it with another."
Without thinking, I assumed it was just a screw up. But I think you're right; they pulled it. If someone had the time, they could Fisk pretty much every paragraph.
The "resentment" article is quite interesting. A series of stereotypes about people the author thinks are stereotyping others.
Robert Cook:
Your quote from Eisenhower is interesting, and of course what he said is correct. Eisenhower had seen war and its cost close up.
However, because he was wise about the world, the obvious truth that Eisenhower spoke did not lead him to conclude that the United States should abandon its arms, or decline to maintain unassailable military power. Ike understood that war is more expensive and destructive than preparation to win wars, and he governed accordingly.
I am not even from WI and I was resentful of the boobs protesting in Madison.
Somebody was protesting boobs in Madison?
Where was Titus?
Robert Cook - think for a minute what would happen if the U.S. did not have such a strong military. THe security that was provided has been a huge factor in the significant improvements in the global economy, and associated overall standard of living, during the past 70 years. Think about what the USSR and China would have doen without the threat of nuclear retaliation. etc, etc.
This is just the standard narrative that liberals use to explain why they lost. Those white people are "scared" and "angry" and "fearful" and "racists". Resentment is just a dog whistle for all of the above. Republicans only win because they stoke and exploit the fear and anger of those racists white voters. Republicans never win because of their message or philosophy.
Liberals do this as a salve on their wounds from losing elections. Liberals are good, kind, have the best interests of the white working class people. But these people are too dumb, ignorant, and racists to see that, so they vote Republican.
From the article:
First, that ordinary people have been inundated by anti-government messages for decades, especially since the Reagan presidency.
The anti-government messages began in the Continental Congress. Where has Mr. Fanlund been for the last 225 years? But he only want to blame Reagan.
This is why people outside of Madison, resent Madison. Their self appointed claim as the intellectual hub of Wisconsin bleeds condescension and stupidity.
Strange how protests, recalls, harassment and threats do not represent anger.
In her world you can only be angry if you do not vote Democrat.
Robert Cook, I think the phrase your searching for is
Lock Box
Robert Cook, the SS trust fund is a fraud. The money collected for the fund is not actually placed there. Instead, a one-of-a-kind treasury bond which can not be bought, sold, or cashed in without drawing on the general fund, is placed there. The actual money collected is placed in the general fund. This kind of subterfuge is considered fraud in the private sector.
ken in tx said...
Robert Cook, the SS trust fund is a fraud. The money collected for the fund is not actually placed there. Instead, a one-of-a-kind treasury bond which can not be bought, sold, or cashed in without drawing on the general fund, is placed there. The actual money collected is placed in the general fund. This kind of subterfuge is considered fraud in the private sector.
12/1/14, 3:18 PM
Can't be! Was it not Gore that told Bush and everyone else during the debates that all SS funds went into a "lock box" and was safe, secure and protected? It all MUST still be there!
"Conservative group officially formed Monday will push for right-to-work law."
Resent this.
http://www.wgem.com/story/27516757/2014/12/01/conservative-group-officially-formed-monday-will-push-for-right-to-work-law
the less-hopeful prognosis is that there is nothing obvious short of eventual generational change and a more diverse electorate that promises to counteract the angry individualism and anti-government sentiment
So, like someone (Oprah, maybe) said not too long ago, we just have to wait until all those old white people die off before things get better.
No resentment there. Nope.
Eleanor said...
"I think in any state where there are a couple of large cities and much less population in the rest of the state there is a lot of political resentment."
Well, I certainly would not object if Washington wanted to annex Portland. And as for Salem, every time I drive through it, I think what a great place it would be to test a nuclear bomb. Then there is my own little Pyongyang on the Willamette, Eugene. Sigh.
Oregon was actually a great place to live, before the Californians moved here.
Todd,
That is not how I remember it. Gore did not say lock box in the present tense. Rather that if elected he would put social security receipts in a lock box. It was hilarious and probably fiscally impossible on its face, but it did constitute a reason to vote for Gore.
Since Gore lost, if social security has any solvency problems, it's once again (all together now) BUSH'S FAULT.
Social Security is paid for out its own trust fund; it is not part of the general fund
Au contrare morally bankrupt bob.
Remember the Great Society? Guess where the money came from to finance it. The money you have been paying in has gone to support your parents. The only money in the SS trust fund are IOUs from the fed.
try again.
say, speaking of Ferguson, I see that some Gentle Giants Bound For College were Peacefully Protesting by beating a Bosnian man to death with hammers.
The game is openly fixed; our "democratic republic" is a game of three card monte, and we don't control the cards
Lemmee guess, the solution is a dictatorship of the proletariat?
We spend trillions without thinking on machineries of death, yet can spare little for anything that will benefit the American people at large
cause The Stimulus, Solyndra, Cash for Clunkers, the weatherization program, weren't just cover to pass tax money from the middle class to the Democrat Party supporters?
How droll
CWJ said...
Todd,
That is not how I remember it. Gore did not say lock box in the present tense. Rather that if elected he would put social security receipts in a lock box. It was hilarious and probably fiscally impossible on its face, but it did constitute a reason to vote for Gore.
Since Gore lost, if social security has any solvency problems, it's once again (all together now) BUSH'S FAULT.
12/1/14, 4:46 PM
My memory could be faulty (ask my wife) but I recall Bush making the point that SS was not all there and that it needed to be protected and Gore countered with something to the effect "what a rube, SS is in a lockbox and completely safe" and the MSM supported Gore's position.
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