rural
Raging Against White Rural Rage
In their new book, Tom Schaller and Paul Waldman write as if economic class no longer exists or matters.
I don’t like to slam books, especially those ahead of mine on the best seller list. It might seem like petty jealousy. But one recent release, White Rural Rage by Tom Schaller and Paul Waldman, is seriously flawed.
For starters, the authors write as if economic class no longer exists or matters. According to this book, all rural white people, or at least most of them, share similar racist attitudes. Class distinctions between bosses and workers, rich and poor, are meaningless.
Because Schaller and Waldman view the world through their anti-class, whiteness lens, they don’t consider the possibility that working-class voters share common attitudes across geographies. Contrary to their thesis, the research for my book found no discernable differences in attitudes on hot-button social issues between urban, suburban, and rural white working-class voters.
When Democrats, like Sherrod Brown, show the courage to fight against Wall Street’s war on workers they gain working-class support.
As Democratic Party pollster Mike Lux reports, “These voters wouldn’t care all that much about the cultural difference and the woke thing if the Democrats gave more of a damn about the economic challenges they face deeply and daily.”
Where’s the Beef?
Schaller put his cards on the table during an interview on MSNBC, during which he called rural Americans “the most racist, xenophobic, anti-immigrant, anti-gay geo-demographic group in the country.”
The authors also claim it is getting worse. In defending themselves in The New Republic, they write that “as the rest of the country moved away from Donald Trump [in 2020] rural whites lurched toward him by nine points, from 62% to 71%.”
But voting for Trump is not the same as being a bigot. In fact, the data in my book shows that white working-class voters, rural and otherwise, are growing more liberal, not illiberal on key social issues.
Anti-Immigrant?
“Are you in favor of granting ‘legal status to all illegal immigrants who have held jobs and paid taxes for at least three years and not been convicted of any felony crimes?’” (Cooperative Election Study)
White working-class in favor:
2010: 32.1%
2020: 61.8%
Anti-Gay?
“Should gay or lesbian couples be legally permitted to adopt children?” (American National Elections Study)
White working-class in favor:
2000: 38.2%
2020: 76.7%
Increasing Racism?
“Agree that most Blacks just don’t have the motivation or willpower to pull themselves out of poverty.” (General Social Survey)
1996: 56.8%
2021: 32.8%
Furthermore, our data, which is derived from three large multi-year voter surveys, shows that from 20-50% of white working-class non-Democrats are liberal on social issues.
What About Sherrod Brown?
If white rural racism is the key to all politics, then why do significant numbers of rural voters in Ohio support Sen. Sherrod Brown, who in 2018 ran about 12% ahead of President Joe Biden in 2020? In fact, Brown, who votes liberal on social issues up and down the line, ran significantly ahead of Biden in every rural county.
Brown’s connection to working-class voters might have something to do with his willingness to take on Wall Street for ripping off workers again and again. It works politically because enough of those supposedly bigoted white workers care a lot more about never-ending job instability than they do about wokeness.
In his excellent review (and evisceration) of White Rural Wage, Nicholas Jacobs, a political scientist, points out that:
Democrats who give in to the simplistic rage thesis are essentially letting themselves off the hook on the politics, suggesting that rural Americans are irrational and beyond any effort to engage them.
It’s not white rural rage. It’s not irrational rage either. Rather it’s very clear-eyed working-class anger as insatiable corporate greed tears up their lives.
When Democrats, like Sherrod Brown, show the courage to fight against Wall Street’s war on workers they gain working-class support.
Maybe it’s time for a little more Democratic Party rage?
Idaho Hospital Ends All Labor and Delivery Care, Citing Abortion Ban
"Consequences for Idaho physicians providing the standard of care may include civil litigation and criminal prosecution, leading to jail time or fines," said Bonner General Health as it closed its obstetrics unit.
Rural areas in the U.S. have faced a decline in hospitals that provide obstetric services for years, and the fate of one hospital in northern Idaho suggests that abortion bans could worsen the trend.
As The Washington Post reported reported Tuesday, Bonner General Health in Sandpoint, Idaho has been forced to announce the impending closure of its labor and delivery department, citing staffing issues as well as the state's punitive abortion ban—one of the strictest in the nation—and threats from state Republicans to make the law even more stringent.
The state's ban criminalizes abortion cases in almost all cases and threatens doctors who provide care with felony charges, suspension or termination of their medical license, and up to five years in prison. It includes potential exceptions for people whose pregnancies result from rape or incest and people who doctors determine face life-threatening pregnancy complications—but as Common Dreams has reported, such exceptions have led medical providers to withhold care until a patient is sufficiently ill, placing them in danger.
The threat of prosecution and pressure to withhold medical care from people who need it has contributed to the hospital's staffing shortage, said Bonner General Health in a statement late last week.
"Idaho's political and legal climate does pose as a barrier specific to recruitment and retention for OB-GYNs."
"Highly respected, talented physicians are leaving. Recruiting replacements will be extraordinarily difficult," said the hospital. "In addition, the Idaho Legislature continues to introduce and pass bills that criminalize physicians for medical care nationally recognized as the standard of care. Consequences for Idaho physicians providing the standard of care may include civil litigation and criminal prosecution, leading to jail time or fines."
Idaho Republicans have proposed classifying abortion as "murder from the moment of fertilization" and have called for bans that extend to people whose pregnancies result from incest and rape.
"Idaho's political and legal climate does pose as a barrier specific to recruitment and retention for OB-GYNs," hospital spokesperson Erin Binnall told the Post.
Patients in Sandpoint will now have to travel to Coeur d'Alene, about 45 miles south, to deliver their babies. The city now has the northernmost labor and delivery department in the state, and people living near the state's northern border may have to travel two hours to reach the hospitals there.
Bonner General Health announced its decision days after the podcast "This American Life" featured an interview with an obstetrician who has worked for several years at Bonner General Health but has considered leaving the state since Idaho's ban went into effect last June, after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
"I was looking at social media and somebody was talking about a person who is completing their OB-GYN residency and was looking to come to the Pacific Northwest," said Dr. Amelia Huntsberger. "And I'm like, hey, there's all sorts of openings in Idaho. And then I'm laughing out loud because I'm like, who is going to be finishing their residency training and being like, I definitely want to go to the state with the super strict abortion laws that criminalize healthcare?"
The Journal of the American Medical Associationpublished a report in 2018 showing that a lack of obstetric care in rural hospitals is associated with a rise in preterm births and more people giving birth in facilities where medical staff lack the proper training to assist with labor and delivery, such as emergency departments. High rates of maternal mortality are also associated with "maternity care deserts," which include nearly half of rural U.S. counties, according to the Commonwealth Fund.
Nearly 90 rural obstetrics units closed their doors between 2015 and 2019, with hospitals citing financial losses associated with high numbers of patients who use Medicaid as well as difficulty in recruiting and retaining doctors.
"This will be the beginning of a trend, I fear," said behavioral scientist Caroline Orr Bueno of Bonner General Health's decision. "We already have a maternal mortality crisis in the U.S.—we're the only country in the developed world where maternal mortality rates are increasing—and abortion bans are going to make it worse."