A Liberal Dose, Dec. 22, 2022 "How America Became the Global Policeman"

 

This is part 3 of a four-part series.

Read Part 1 HERE

Read Part 2 HERE

A Liberal Dose

December 22, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“How America Became the Global Policeman”

Last week, I ended with a reference to two-time-Pulitzer-winning journalist Walter Lippman’s words in his 1947 book Cold War. He warned that the West’s penchant for seeing everything through the lens of communism-vs.-capitalism, without considering specific circumstances, would cause dangerous blind spots in national policy. In particular, he warned that the biggest challenge the West would face in coming decades would be a global surge in nationalism.

Remember, when a country gains hegemony they have to constantly be involved in issues all around the world in order to protect their (suddenly greatly expanded) national interests. It is like a pipeline in which a constant flow must be maintained, with no leaks or kinks, in order for it all to work. It is no accident I use a pipeline as an analogy, because in the 20^th/21^st century control of oil has been one of the foremost resource considerations for maintaining hegemony, first by Britain and then by us. Remember, also, third world countries tend to be controlled by first-world countries… in order to take their resources.

So when third world countries want to end foreign influence over their resources -perhaps by throwing off the yoke of colonialism and declaring their independence, or simply by taking over national control of their resources and cutting out foreign investors -it creates a kink. It obstructs the flow. It endangers the financial primacy of the hegemon; it conflicts with that hegemon’s national interests, even though it concerns a different nation who want to control their OWN interests. This is what Lippmann meant about nationalism being a challenge -all those formerly colonized countries around the world declaring their independence during the twenty years after the end of WWII, and trying to prevent outsiders from controlling their economies and resources. Of course, the Soviets were always willing to cheer such actions on and offer help, caught up as they also were in the Cold War mentality of East vs. West. But those third world countries were not necessarily looking at it that way- they were promoting their own national interests, as countries do.

In 1952 the people of Iran kicked out their dictator, the Shah, who had been closely allied with the U.S. and Britain. They elected a new leader, Mohammed Mossadegh, who announced he was going to nationalize the oil industry -cutting out American and British companies and putting the Iranian government in charge of their own resources. One year later he was overthrown in a coup orchestrated by the CIA and MI6. He was sent to prison, where he died three years later, and the Shah was put back into power… and the oil flowed freely to the west.

In 1950, Juan Jacobo Arbenz Guzman was fairly elected the leader of Guatemala. Generally considered a moderate, he did give land to peasants and nationalized the fruit industry. The United Fruit Company, based in the U.S., decried that as socialism… and soon the CIA engineered a coup, after which he was replaced by a dictator who protected the interests of American companies. Twenty years later, similar CIA actions put the brutal dictator Augusto Pinochet in charge of Chile.

Vietnam was a colony of France, and was brutally occupied by Japan during the war. A resistance movement, led by Ho Chi Minh, was funded and trained by the OSS (forerunner of the CIA). The Vietnamese thought that, when Japan surrendered, they could declare independence -but were instead returned to France. Despite being communist, Ho appealed to America for help, but we did not want to interfere with our French allies. So he turned to the Soviets and China for support -and eventually drove out the French. We took France’s place, not realizing that -communist or not -the real goal of Ho and most Vietnamese was nationalist. They didn’t want to spread communism -they just wanted their country back.

We would have huge problems for decades in Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America due to these 1950s actions.

To be continued.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, Dec. 15, 2022 "WWII and the Rise of American Hegemony"

 

A Liberal Dose

December 15, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“WWII and the Rise of American Hegemony”

 

Note: this is part 2 of 4. Part 1 can be read HERE

Last week I introduced a brief series of columns on the subject of hegemony. If you missed part 1, I will give you a quick review. Hegemony is when one among a cohort of powerful countries, usually as a result of being the least damaged in a catastrophic war, gains influence over the others by being dominant militarily, politically, and economically. This requires the hegemonic power to become a “global policeman,” engaged in wars around the globe to protect their national interests. The United Kingdom of Great Britain achieved hegemony during the Napoleonic wars, and held it for about 125 years. In that time, “the sun never set on the British Empire” and London was the financial center of the world. At the same time, in order to preserve that hegemony, the U.K. fought wars in Afghanistan, South Africa, Burma, Egypt, China, India, the Crimea… and the list goes on and on. Nonetheless, they maintained their hold and by the end of WWI in 1918 were at the height of their power.

It all started to unravel with WWII and the beginning of the Nazi bombardment of Britain in 1940. The major cities of England were pounded into rubble and they lost many of their colonies to the Germans and Japanese. Most of those colonies were regained with the surrender of the Axis powers, but Britain was terribly weakened and within a few years after the end of the war many of their largest and most lucrative colonies around the world declared independence and broke away.

The Axis Powers (Germany, Italy, and Japan) were also pounded into rubble. Most of the other major world powers were also greatly damaged as the war unfolded on their own doorsteps: France, Russia, China… virtually all of Europe and Asia. Only one major combatant emerged relatively unscathed: the U.S.A. Yes, a lot of service members died -though a much smaller percentage of the population than in the other major countries -but, other than Pearl Harbor, there were no major battles fought on American soil. By the end of WWII, the U.S. had replaced the U.K. as the leader of the Allies and the “free world.” This was demonstrated in the summer of 1944 when representatives of all the allied nations met in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, and voted to change the basis of international currency exchange from the British pound to the American dollar. It was further cemented two years later when the new United Nations organization was headquartered in New York City. By the late 1940s, America had military, political, and financial dominance. The Soviet Union was a rival superpower during the Cold War, yes, but only the U.S. had hegemony. To prevent the Soviets from wresting that hegemony away, for the first time in American history a “military industrial complex” developed and a large standing army was maintained during peacetime, which has been the norm ever since.

U.S. government policy toward their former WWII allies the Soviet Union started to gel right after the war ended. In February, 1946, U.S. Ambassador to the U.S.S.R. George Kennan sent President Truman the famous “Long Telegram” outlining the belief that communist powers were ideologically incapable of coexisting with capitalism, and that therefore communism must be “contained” and not allowed to spread to other countries. Following the “Truman Doctrine,” the U.S. from that point forward would always side with anti-communist factions no matter the circumstances. This often led to tunnel vision, with many Americans thinking all communist countries were a united monolith with the same international goals. It also led to constant involvement in foreign wars.

In 1947, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist Walter Lippmann wrote a book called Cold War which warned that putting every single political event in the framework of capitalism-vs-communism would cause western governments to miss the true underlying issue… nationalism. Doing this in the 1950s would lead to catastrophe in the 1960s.

To be continued.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, Dec. 8, 2022 "What Is Hegemony? Understanding the Modern World"

 

A Liberal Dose

December 8, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“What Is Hegemony? Understanding the Modern World”

 

After several columns in a row that have been primarily about the current political climate, I’ve decided to go out on a limb and do a deep historical dive in order to provide a broader perspective on the big picture. As I am wont to do from time to time, this will be a multi-part undertaking. Actually, the topic I want to expound on usually requires a one-hour classroom lecture to cover -and it is something students have usually never heard of or thought about before. Nonetheless, putting it all into context can make a lot of things about the past century make a lot more sense.

The topic is hegemony: what it is, how it works, and what it means for us in the 21^st century.

Much of what I will discuss is based on the work of the late Thomas McCormick (one of the foremost scholars of diplomatic history), who refined the earlier work of Yale economic historian Immanuel Wallerstein (us academics have to cite our sources, you know).

By the way, at this point I usually show a picture of Jiminy Cricket dressed as Uncle Sam, as a way for students to remember how to pronounce the word: Hegemony Cricket. Let’s start with a dictionary definition. “Hegemony, n.: leadership or dominance, especially by one country or social group over others.” In modern, international terms, this does not necessarily mean a country that militarily conquers everyone else. Rather, it is one country in an international community of countries that, due to a special set of circumstances, develops primacy to the extent that the other countries defer to it, either out of respect or fear. This has only been possible in the modern era (that is, since Columbus, when the possibility of global interconnection arose).

Before Columbus, McCormick and Wallerstein wrote, there were two types of societies/economies: Subsistence (hunter/gatherers) and external (kingdoms and empires). The European discovery of the New World, motivated by desire for trade, led to global capitalism. This led to the establishment of first, second, and third-world countries, with the first-world being the most powerful. Third-world countries mostly were used to provide resources to the more powerful ones. And when subsistence or external systems encountered the capitalist system, they were always absorbed by it. It’s sort of like encountering the Borg or a zombie horde- resistance is futile. Native Americans, for example, got drawn into the trade system, as did Africans, Pacific Islanders, and others, and became dependent on trade goods, transforming their cultures- and ended up losing their resources as a result.

The natural order among first-world nations in a global capitalist system is to have a balance of power: several first-world nations competing, providing checks and balances, with no one on top for long. Think of colonial history, when the English, French, and Spanish were all jockeying for power for centuries, going back and forth.

Hegemony occurs when, usually due to war or catastrophe, several of those nations are seriously damaged but one is relatively unscathed, putting them on top. This happened in the early 1800s with the Napoleonic wars. France and Spain, and most other major European countries, were devastated -but England, which had no fighting on its shores and who led the victory over Napoleon, was unscathed. This led to Great Britain gaining hegemony, which requires three things: military, political, and financial dominance. For well over a century, “the sun never set on the British Empire.” Britain was THE world power. Thing is, the moment you gain hegemony you start losing it- because you have to strain your economy by engaging in wars all around the globe to protect your national interests and stay on top. You become the “global policeman.” Britain managed it… until WWII, when things changed in a big way, leading to a new nation having -and struggling to maintain- hegemony and the global policeman role.

To be continued.

 

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, December 1, 2022 "Heartfelt Convictions Over Party Lines"

 

A Liberal Dose

December 1, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“Heartfelt Convictions over Party Lines”

 

As the title I chose for this column indicates, it is a Liberal Dose -specifically, a reaction to the events of the day (and from history) from a left-leaning perspective. As Will Rogers famously said, I am not a member of any organized political party: I am a Democrat. I am the faculty adviser of the TTU College Democrats. I am also the faculty adviser for the TTU Students for a Democratic Society. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that I tend to support Democratic policies and candidates, which MOSTLY align with my own values. However, there are some areas where I am farther left than the Democratic Party, and some areas where I am not quite as far left as some of my friends. I thought I would spend a little time this week talking about some of the areas where I do not align perfectly with the average Democrat.

My biggest complaint with the Democratic Party is how cozy they are with Wall Street and big business in general. Not as much as Republicans, maybe… but darn close. I am reminded of the old joke that Republicans will outright mug you, and then Democrats will pick your pocket while they console you afterward. I am pro-labor, pro-union, pro-working class, anti-bigshot. Wall Street is not as political as some make it out- they do their best to buy off both parties, and leaders of both parties make it easy. That is why I voted for Bernie Sanders the last two presidential primaries. Incidentally, Thomas Jefferson insisted a whole new capitol city be built (Washington) instead of keeping the capitol in New York City… because the government was literally too close to Wall Street.

I think both parties are too quick to engage in military options, especially the use of drones. I believe that force, sadly, is sometimes a final and necessary option -but, too often, it is the first option and it is used for political expediency. By both parties. That said, unlike many on the left, I support the military. I just happen to think that they are too often used -and expended -for politics or for national gain rather than in defense. For that matter, unlike some of my own friends, I do not call for abolishing the police, nor for defunding them in the sense of doing so completely. I AM in favor of reform in the sense of better training. I believe that many police forces have become too militarized, in tactics, equipment, and outlook, rather than thinking of themselves as servants and defenders. Many act like they are soldiers patrolling an enemy warzone and become escalators instead of de-escalators. We are lucky in Sparta and White County in that regard, though in the past that was not always the case across the board. Sheriff Page has made great strides in the right direction. I do not personally know our present police chief, but longtime previous chief Jeff Guth is the most honorable, upstanding man I know, and Chief Goff seems to be of similar caliber.

Finally, I am a gun owner. You could say I’m a gun guy. Unlike some on the left, I believe it is a fundamental right to have a gun to defend your home and family. On the other hand, that doesn’t mean there should be no regulations regarding what type of guns civilians should be allowed access to, nor does it mean you need three handguns and an AR-15 just to go to the Sparta Taco Bell. There should also be reasonable background checks.

That’s just a few things -I could make this a whole series of articles. Point is, there is no cardboard cutout liberal who aligns with everything the party does, any more than there is a cutout conservative. We should start seeing the variety and nuances in each other. And maybe in ourselves.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

 

 

A Liberal Dose, November 24, 2022 "Let's Be Thankful to Native Americans"

 

A Liberal Dose

November 24, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“Let’s be thankful to Native Americans”

 

 

Happy Thanksgiving. I love this holiday -the chill in the air, the comforting traditional foods, the emphasis on family.

A lot of my Native American friends are not as fond of it, for obvious reasons, and I understand. Around this time of year I get contacted by radio stations across the state wanting me to speak, in my official capacity as a historian, about the origins of the holiday. I always try to explain the political nuances of the tense relationship between the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag Confederacy, but that always gets edited out so I can answer the question “Yeah, but did they have pie?” This is because most Americans only want to take a quick, surface look at history, and that only to reinforce their feel-good myths. American Indians do not exist to them except as artifacts frozen in amber.

But they DO exist, and are going strong. They are about 2% of the U.S. population. That may not sound like much, but it is slightly more than the number of Mormons, almost the number of Jewish people, and twice the number of Muslims.

They are not just part of our past, they are part of our present and our future. And we owe them a lot. We owe them for all the contributions their cultures have made to our own. We owe them for all the agreements our ancestors made with them, all the promises broken. We owe them for all the contributions they continue to make. Did you know that Native American Indians are, by proportion, the group with the highest volunteer military enlistment in every American war for the past century? I am thankful for Native America, today and every day. We all should be.

There are several ways to show that gratitude. One is by learning about their history and culture, and appreciating it. Another is by honoring them. There’s a caveat to that last one, though. If you choose to honor Native Americans -without asking them -in a way that most of them find offensive, you are not honoring them at all. It is not really about them, then, it is about you and what you want. For example, most every indigenous person I know is offended by their image being used as a sports mascot. Especially “redskin,” that one is the very worst. It is an insult equivalent to the n-word. Yet there are still schools in Tennessee that use it.

Another way to show gratitude to American Indians is by learning about their present-day concerns and issues, and doing our part to support them. Did you know that until the 1970s Native children were still being taken from their parents and sent to boarding schools where they were not allowed to practice their culture, and where many died, or to orphanages where they were adopted out against their parents’ wishes? Did you know Native Americans were not free to fully practice their traditional religions until the 1970s, or that many states prevented them from voting well into the 1960s? Did you know that indigenous women are far, far more likely to be abducted, raped, and/or murdered than women from any other group -primarily because tribal police have no authority over non-Natives who come onto the reservation and commit such crimes? Did you know the Supreme Court recently reversed two hundred years of precedent and gave the state of Oklahoma criminal jurisdiction over reservations, or that a case is working its way to the court that would reverse the 1970s law that ended the practice of taking Indian children away from their tribes and putting them up for adoption?

Native Americans are not our mascots, or our Halloween costumes. They are our brothers and sisters, our fellow citizens. We may not be personally responsible for what happened to them in the past -but we can stand with them in the present.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, Nov. 17, 2022 "Taking a Deep Breath After the Midterms"

 

A Liberal Dose

November 17, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“Taking a deep breath after the midterms”

 

Well, that went better than I expected it to.

As of this writing (Sunday), Democrats held onto the Senate and may actually pick up a seat in a few weeks if Hershel Walker loses in Georgia; the ballyhooed “red wave” Republicans were predicting for the House fell through, and at this point it is not even guaranteed they will take it at all. It’s down to the wire, and if they do it will only be by a handful of seats.

Also at this point, my worst-case scenarios have not materialized. I was fearful that Trumpy, election-denying candidates would win secretary of state races in swing states, putting them in a position to overturn legitimate voting results in those states in 2024. I was fearful that election-deniers in general would sweep into power all over the place, taking us one major step closer to the collapse of democracy, which rests on the assumption people who lose elections will admit it and go home. Almost half of the roughly 300 election-deniers running for office lost -including all those swing-state secretary of state candidates. With a handful of exceptions (such as J.D. Vance in Ohio), almost every candidate Trump had strongly endorsed lost, leading some to believe that the public is getting tired of Donald J.

My other fear was that there would be a huge uptick in political violence after the election. That hasn’t materialized, but it’s only been five days. I hope it does not. As I have been saying on here, I feel like we’ve been sitting on an increasingly combustible tinder-box for the last seven years. So far it seems like most of the Republicans who lost actually admitted it and conceded -which has always been a fundamental aspect of American public life, but after a few years of Trump feels like the good old days from some distant, bygone era.

I’ve seen multiple headlines stating that GOP party leaders blame Trump, and people’s fatigue with him and his wacky supporters, for them having one of the worst midterm performances in decades. There is speculation they are finally willing to risk his displeasure by shifting their future support to a possible presidential candidate with less baggage, namely Ron DeSantis. Perhaps feeling threatened, Trump has been escalating his online attacks against (as he calls him) “Ron DeSanctimonious.” DeSantis is a mixed bag. On one hand, he is not as mentally unstable, volatile, and openly corrupt as Trump -he seems less likely to order a military coup or start a nuclear war if someone made fun of his hair. On the other hand, he has all the worst and most dangerous policy goals of Trump and might be more competent at achieving them.

Here’s my take, at least for now. Donald Trump has been prematurely declared politically dead a dozen times, and every time it has proven to be wishful thinking (on the part of progressives and mainstream conservatives alike). Nothing that has happened in the last week changes the fact that a solid 30% or so of the American public are hardcore Trumpers no matter what he says or does. There is something about him (judge for yourself what it is) that speaks to them in a way normal politicians do not, and I don’t see them shifting their allegiance because party leaders say they ought to.

I believe Trump will run for the nomination -to stay out of jail as much as anything -and win it. DeSantis will fall by the wayside as surely as Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio did. And, once that happens, a Democratic win is guaranteed -because there is another 70% of the American public, half of whom despise Trump and another chunk of whom are finally getting embarrassed by him or, at least, tired of his drama. And once he loses, we will be right back to “Big Steal” conspiracy theories.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 

You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

 

Letter to Herald-Citizen on Mascot Issue- Nov. 16, 2022

 

A Liberal Dose, November 10, 2022 "Have We Reached Our Preston Brooks Moment?"

 

Note: this edition carries both my column from last week and this week's follow-up. HERE is a link to last week's column.

A Liberal Dose

November 10, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“Have We Reached Our Preston Brooks Moment?”

I am writing this before election day, but the election will have come and gone by the time it sees print. As I sit here on what to you was this past Sunday night, I can’t help but think that it is quite likely that the anger, and the violent rhetoric, which has me so worried will have increased -no matter who wins what, or who controls Congress. Last week I was outraged by the (very predictable to anyone paying attention) attempted murder of the House Speaker’s husband in their home. Little did I know what was coming -because, from some corners, it surprised even me.

I was not surprised that some conservatives (and Elon Musk, however we describe him) were repeating a totally fabricated story that Mr. Pelosi was attacked by a gay prostitute he had hired. I was not surprised that Donald Trump, Jr. tweeted a photo of a pair of underwear and a hammer, saying it was his Paul Pelosi Halloween costume. I wasn’t surprised that other people were posting similar bad jokes that minimized -and seemed to celebrate -the brutal assault of a senior citizen over politics, and more broadly made light of the very dangerous place Donald Trump has led us. I was surprised by some of the people who joined in. There is no minimizing, no successful false equivalency, of events like this and the attempted rebellion on January 6. My good friend John Gottlied, a couple of weeks ago, admitted that some Trump followers weren’t the most well-behaved, but that he had never heard of a conservative trying to kill a Supreme Court Justice. I assume he means the incident when people were protesting outside Kavanaugh’s house and one of them was found to have a gun in a case. They probably did have ill intent, and I condemn it. But I would point out that, A) conservatives have no current reason to be mad at the Supreme Court and B) a couple of thousand of them were too busy trying to kill the other two branches of government on live television. Many of whom also were armed.  It is not equal.

The jokes about Mr. Pelosi reminded me of an event that occurred on the floor of the Senate in 1856, during the lead-up to the Civil War. I, and many other historians, have used that incident to demonstrate that the country was on the dangerous path to war because they had stopped looking at each other as fellow Americans and human beings.

In brief, Massachusetts senator Charles Sumner (an abolitionist) had given a speech condemning the violence going on in “Bleeding Kansas” at that time between pro-and-anti-slavery citizens, as well as condemning slavery itself. I think he was totally correct. The problem was how he did it. He singled out SC senator Andrew Butler, who had recently had a stroke and whose speech was slurred, and essentially made fun of his stroke and made veiled references to his alleged raping of slave children. Butler’s cousin, Preston Brooks -who was in the House of Representatives -decided to challenge Sumner to a duel to protect his family’s honor. He was told that duels were for your social equals, so instead he beat Sumner almost to death with a cane while he was sitting at his desk on the Senate floor. He beat him until the cane broke.

Northerners claimed this as proof Southerners were brutal savages and could not be reasoned with. Southerners claimed it was proof Yankees deserved a good beating. From all over the South, people mailed Brooks new canes -one of them inscribed “good job.”

Political violence in Kansas led to more in the Capitol, with supporters of the perpetrator making it into a joke. It was all more kindling added to the pile, lacking only the final spark, which would be fanned by hatred.

I want to leave you with the words of Lincoln on his inauguration, when the flame had already started, and entreat us all to hear his words:

“The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, Nov. 3 2022, "Political Violence Marches On, Unabated"

 

A Liberal Dose

November 3, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“Political Violence Marches on, Unabated”

 

This is the last edition before election day. It is, therefore, my final opportunity to fulfill my promise from a couple of weeks ago to talk about what makes these midterms so important. As is so often the case, reality stepped in to make my point for me.

Last week a man broke into the California home of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, armed with zip-ties, duct tape, a hammer, and a list of targets. She, and her security detail, were on the other side of the continent and only her 82-year-old husband Paul Pelosi was home. The assailant tried to tie up Mr. Pelosi, who had the presence of mind to call 911 and leave the line open, which probably saved his life. He was hospitalized with a skull fracture, and his attacker taken into custody. Throughout the attack, the intruder had yelled “Where’s Nancy?” and told police his plan had been to tie up Paul and wait for Nancy to return home. It was soon discovered that the attacker, whom I won’t name, was a Trump-supporting, QAnon believing, January 6 endorsing ultra-right-wing conservative. He had been posting about conspiracy theories like “Pizzagate” and “The Big Steal”, and denying the Holocaust. He claimed his goal had been to kidnap Nancy Pelosi and bust her kneecaps with the hammer, so when she was wheeled into Congress Democratic politicians would see that "their lies have consequences."

Almost immediately, Fox News hosts were attempting to perform sleight-of-hand (AKA misdirection) by proclaiming the attack was proof Democrats were letting crime spiral out of control. As if anyone believed this was a random crime. As if no one remembered the hundreds of people clamoring in the hallways of our Capitol calling out “where’s Nancy” or stating on-camera that they planned to murder her… and several other people. I have spent column after column here warning that the political violence stirred up by Trump and his far-right enablers would probably happen again. This is just one example of it. If the police had not arrived when they did, we would probably be discussing a murder.

Some people are going to say that this attacker was just deranged, that his mental problems were the sole cause of this incident (and would somehow find a way to blame Democrats for that). Well, maybe he is. But is he any more or less deranged than the thousands of ordinary Americans who assaulted those cops at the Capitol? Or the millions who spew violent, threatening rhetoric across social media? I doubt it very much.

Some, on the other side of the political aisle from me, will downplay far-right violence by mentioning crime statistics in Chicago, or pointing to the handful of incidents when Black Lives Matter protesters were involved in violence. To say there is violence or dangerous rhetoric on both sides is not an equivalency when 90% of it is on one side in particular. And is spurred on daily by the guy these folks idolize for some unfathomable reason.

For petesake, those folks tried to kill cops and members of Congress -in broad daylight, on live television.

So there’s an important issue for you, political violence. Another one: absolute disregard for the law.

That should come as no surprise. Trump has been disregarding the law his whole life. And what greater disregard could there be than trying to hold onto power by directing a violent coup attempt? This is the Frankenstein’s Monster that we have unleashed, and it threatens to suck all the oxygen out of democracy.

I said last week that recently I have had some causes for hope, and I have. Some people have told me they are tired of it all, and want to go back to two parties disagreeing but working together for the good of the country. I hope that can change the tide. But some of the folks saying it is all “both sides” need to take a clear, hard look at where most of it is actually coming from, and own up to it. And certainly, most of all, not reward it.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 

You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, Oct. 27, 2022 "Please Allow Me to (Re)Introduce Myself"

 

A Liberal Dose

October 27, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“Allow me to (re)introduce myself”

 

John Gottlied started his first column by introducing himself and telling about his background. It occurrs to me that I never did that, I just jumped right in with the arguing part back in February, 2021. I think I was assuming that a lot of people knew me already -but this is a bigger town that it used to be, so I probably shouldn’t make such assumptions. I’ll remedy that now.

First, though, I want to say a couple of words about John. I’ve known him since the sixth grade. In fact, that sixth grade class at Findlay also included (among many others) our current state senator Paul Bailey and his future wife Amy. Now, I disagree with both John and Paul politically a good 75% of the time. Okay, with Paul maybe it’s more like 85%. But I still respect them both enormously, think the world of them, and consider them to be good friends. I can say that about a lot of people in this town, and I think many among us have lost sight of that attitude. That said, I thought John was an ideal person to counterbalance my opinion on here… because he will not take it easy on me. He will give me heck, and do so in a way that forces me to think. And that will go both ways, to the ultimate benefit of us both (whether we eventually agree or not). And we probably won’t even call each other names or threaten to shoot each other. That’s what America is, and what it should be.

All right, then, here’s my story.

I was born in Sparta in 1968. My mom was born here, too; my dad moved here from Overton County when he was eight. My grandparents were all from Jackson or Overton County, where their families had all lived for a hundred years or more. My dad’s dad, Doyle Smith, Sr., worked as a farmer for decades for Sam Breeding and his son Bob. Before that he had been in prison twice, once for making moonshine and once for selling it. My mom’s paternal grandfather, Andrew Dennis, worked at Hunter’s Funeral Home when the hearses were horse-drawn.

I graduated from WCHS in 1986. I went into mission work for the next three years, part of it spent in South Florida and part in New York City, working with Haitian immigrants. I served in French-speaking congregations, building on the three years I studied French at WCHS (one of them informally) with the beloved and lamented Mrs. Sarah Jane Thurman. That time spent working to help immigrants was one of the most valuable experiences of my life. Meanwhile, I supported myself (and later my family) by janitorial work for over twenty years. In my twenties I started to take writing seriously, and eventually got published in various magazines and anthologies, then having my novels published. It didn’t go a long way toward paying the bills, though, so at age 32 I started college at Tennessee Tech as a double-major in English and history. From there I went to the University of Illinois, where I earned my master’s and Ph.D in history. I was lucky enough to get a job at my alma mater and move back to my home town.

That’s the abridged version. I am a product of these mountains and hollers, and love them deeply, as I love Sparta and Tennessee. I want only the best for everyone in them. I have a particular passion for the rights and needs of the people who grew up poor like I did. That passion extends to the Natives who were driven from here, to my black friends who also grew up here, to the immigrants (of every shade and religion) who have come here for a better life. To the gay and trans folks. To the recent arrivals.

And it extends to you.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, October 20, 2022 "Vote to Support Our Schools, Our Teachers, and Our Kids"

 

A Liberal Dose

October 20, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“Vote to support our schools, our teachers, and our kids”

 

Late October, which means a young man’s fancy is wending toward the great Fall Classic…yes, election day. There is a lot riding on this midterm election, some of which I will discuss in coming weeks. For the most part, though -at least on a national scale -most of those decisions will hinge on decisions made in other states. But we still have a chance to make a big difference here in Tennessee.

I have to say, as scary as things have looked in the last few years, I have recently been seeing reason for optimism here in my little home town. I am encountering more people who are tired of the vitriol and the full-scale ideological warfare and who are willing to listen to what the other person has to say, and are then willing to once again “disagree without being disagreeable.” I have met more people who have expressed, once again, a desire to support the best person for the job rather than the one who has the right letter beside their name on the polls.

That’s why, this week, I am writing about something that I think a big chunk of our citizens agree on, and with which we can help make a difference.

I’m talking about education, and about treating our public-school teachers with appreciation and respect.

They have a hard job. They have to control a classroom of energetic kids, stretch their supplies to the limit and augment them out of their own pocket (which doesn’t have much in it), deal with sometimes unreasonable or angry -or absent and apathetic -parents, and spend their off-hours preparing classes and grading tests and homework. People talk about them having the summer off, but they spend a good deal of that time preparing for the coming school year. Plus, during the other nine months they work 12 or more hours per day, so it balances out to a year-round job anyhow.

And, more and more since the turn of this 21^st century, they have to do it all with the state government interfering left and right, adding to their burdens while cutting their budgets. At present, this includes a governor and a state legislature that wants to tell teachers how to do their jobs, including how to teach about the things they went to college to learn how to teach. What they can talk about, what they can say, how they can say it. It is a legislature that decides -for every school in the state -not only what books they can have in their library, usually with very little if any knowledge about said books, but that has decreed that teachers have to go through the libraries in their own classrooms and catalogue every book in them by hand -on top of their already maxed-out schedules, without falling behind. In some cases we’re talking about a couple of hundred books. More and more teachers are finding it easier to just… not have books in their classrooms at all.

And the governor. We have a governor that wants to pull funding from already suffering public schools -including rural ones like ours -to set up private charter schools at taxpayer expense that can get around state standards, to advance a particular political agenda. He brought in a private company -from Michigan -to set up those schools, and the guy in charge said the most reprehensible, insulting things about our public teachers. And to this day Bill Lee has not condemned those statements. On the contrary, there is a move as of this writing for a state commission Lee set up to overrule the many local school boards in Tennessee who voted against that company’s schools, and in favor of our teachers. Let that sink in.

OVERRULE YOUR SCHOOL BOARDS.

When you vote for governor, don’t just go blindly down the ticket. Remember all these things, and vote accordingly.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.