A Liberal Dose, Dec. 19, 2024 "The Hand You Hold Is the Hand That Holds You Down"

 

A Liberal Dose

December 19, 2024

Troy D. Smith

“The Hand you Hold Is the Hand That Holds You Down”

 

By now, everyone knows about Luigi Mangione and Brian Thompson. Thompson was the CEO of a major insurance company who was assassinated by Mangione while in New York attending a conference. The killer’s identity was a mystery for a few days, although he did leave clues to his motive: he had written the words deny, defend, and depose on the bullet casings left at the scene, words associated with denied insurance claims.

Many people, myself included, were shocked by the public response. Social media was full of posts celebrating the murder, most implying that the victim deserved it and some implying the killer was a hero. Some people, in their posts, recounted their own hardships in dealing with insurance companies, ranging from denied claims to canceled coverage that led to intense pain, suffering, and in some case the death of a loved one. It was immediate, and it was intense. I overheard some people saying similar things out loud.

Many assumed that the killer, once caught, would prove to be a radical leftist (I’m surprised I didn’t hear more references to antifa). However, just like the two people who tried to assassinate Trump, he did not fit the expected stereotype. Mangione grew up in wealth and privilege, a member of a prominent and actively GOP family. His own social media presence has included praise for Joe Rogan, RFK, Jr., J.D. Vance, and Tucker Carlson. The turning point seems to have come when he had a serious surfing injury that led to a permanent back condition and a lot of pain. In other words, he was not an ideological Robin-Hood-like social bandit, as much as some on both the left and right expected him to be one.

Let’s go back to the public response, specifically the large number of people who immediately identified with the killer, demonized the victim, and celebrated the incident. Let me begin by stating categorically that I do not support political violence, nor do I believe anyone has the right -unless they are a legal judge or jury -to weigh in on whether another human being deserves to die. I believe firmly in the use of violence as a last resort to defend oneself or the lives of others, but not as a political statement.

That being said. There is a REASON this act has resonated with so many people, so strongly, and it has nothing to do with political parties. And the reason is this: just about everybody, unless they are independently wealthy, has a story about struggling with the policies laid down by the CEOs and other top executives of the healthcare industry. I’m not talking about the people who work at the hospital, they are tireless, dedicated heroes. I’m not talking about your local insurance agent -I know most of the ones in Sparta personally, and they are great people, many of whom are deeply invested in the community. I’m talking about the people at the top, who make decisions about how to make an extra dollar for themselves and their investors, and whose business decisions lead to suffering for middle-and working-class people. And it makes folks frustrated, and angry. Those feelings are something most people can identify with.

Let’s take that a step further. It’s not just healthcare billionaires that affect your life. Tick off some of the economic issues that make you angry. High gas prices? Oil companies are making record profits. High groceries? Those companies are making record profits. YOU are NOT making record profits. You are struggling to get by, more so every day. Some of you hitched your wagons to the promises of Trump, who said he would lower prices on day one. You might not have been paying attention, but in an interview last week with Time Magazine, Trump backed off on those promises, saying there is little he can do about high prices and he can’t promise to lower them. He also said he can’t promise that his tariffs won’t make prices go up. His pal Elon Musk said that their plans to cut spending will cause a lot of pain in the beginning. Other Republicans are already gearing up to come after your social security and your Medicaid, and your health insurance if you are covered by the Affordable Care Act.

The kind of people I’m talking about used to be called Robber Barons. They have been robbing you your whole life, making grandiose (but hollow) promises and telling you whatever they thought you wanted to hear, all in an effort to take more money out of your pockets and put it into their own, which are already stuffed full.

It is criminal, immoral, and just plain wrong to physically harm those people.

No, friends… you just need to stop voting for them. Watch those prices, folks, and see which way they go.

 

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech and serves on the executive committee of the Tennessee Democratic Party. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 Buy the book A Liberal Dose: Communiques from the Holler by Troy D. Smith HERE

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 12, 2024 "Perhaps Introductions Are in Order"

 

A Liberal Dose

December 12, 2024

Troy D. Smith

“Perhaps introductions are in order”

 

Before we get started this week: my Thanksgiving message didn’t make it into the paper that week. If you’re interested, you can read it here: http://bit.ly/41nC8ws. Now, on to new business.

Have you ever been on any of the Sparta-related pages on Facebook? I visit those a lot. I’ve noticed recently that there are some conversation threads on there where almost everyone talking has moved into our county from some other part of the country within the past few years. I feel that, generally, that has way more pros than cons. But it did drive something home to me- I can no longer assume that practically everyone in town knows me. Twenty years ago, I could assume that -or at least that it was more likely than not that anyone I ran into was either someone I knew or someone whose kinfolks I knew. That might’ve been because we had worked together at some point, or went to school together, or had been neighbors. Sometimes they knew me but I didn’t know them, because back then I was in the paper from time to time (and everyone read the paper then) for the western novels I wrote.

All this is to say: it’s entirely possible you, the reader, know me only from this column. And maybe you find yourself thinking “Where does this fancy, elitist college professor get off, preaching at me every week about politics from his ivory tower and his ivy halls?” Seriously, I know some people who think of me that way. For one thing, they probably don’t know just how much a humanities professor gets paid at a state university -I work more in kudzu halls than ivy ones. For another, though, they don’t know ME. So, I’m going to do something I do every couple of years on here, and introduce myself.

I am a 1986 graduate of WCHS. I was born here, at the old hospital (which is now NHC). My mother was born here as well- both sets of her grandparents had moved here from nearby Jackson County before WWI. On my dad’s side, his family had lived around the Overton County/Jackson County border for generations. My dad was born on the Overton County side, and his family moved to Sparta in the early 50s when he was eight. The families of all four of my grandparents were in this region since White and Overton Counties were formed (in 1806), and possibly before.

As for me, I lived in South Florida for a few months when I was 19 (1987-88), then spent almost a year living in Brooklyn (1988-89), in both cases doing mission work with Haitian immigrants using the French I took from the dear Mrs. Sarah Jane Thurman (and getting better at it after a couple of years!) Then I moved back home, got married, and became a father. I had been buffing and waxing floors since I was 14, and continued to do so until I was 37. I wrote my first novel manuscript when I was 19 (mostly to entertain myself, as I was being locked in department stores overnight for up to 12 hours, and the work didn’t take that long). In my mid-twenties I started getting published in magazines and books, and won some awards. At age 32 I decided to find a better way to support my nasty writing habit, so I started college as a double-major in History and English, the first person in my family to ever attend a university. I graduated from Tennessee Tech in 2004, and in 2005 started grad studies at the University of Illinois, where I earned my master’s and then PhD (in 2011). Then I was lucky enough to get a job at my alma mater, and come back home to Sparta with my Minnesota-born wife and step-daughter. Since then I have played an active role in my workplace union.

Here's my point. I come from a blue-collar, working-class family, and I was a janitor for over 20 years. My family has been in these hills for over two centuries. I am proud to be from Tennessee, and proud to be from White County. These folks are my people. And if you’ve moved here, now you’re my people too. I am not some elitist, fancy big-city guy who thinks you’re dumb and that he’s better than you. I am one of you. I am on here talking TO you… I am never talking AT you. Thanks for listening.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech and serves on the executive committee of the Tennessee Democratic Party. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

Buy the book A Liberal Dose: Communiques from the Holler by Troy D. Smith HERE

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 5, 2024 "The Truth About the Economy"

 

A Liberal Dose

December 5, 2024

Troy D. Smith

“The truth about the economy”

This week I’m going to talk again about what I think the Democratic Party needs more of going forward: economic populism. I do not mean for that to replace championing the rights of oppressed groups, as some people are calling for, but rather for it to be something that is done as much, as often, and as strongly as championing oppressed groups. You cannot do one of those two things and neglect the other and still be an effective force for a strong and diverse society.

Let’s start by looking at some history. Study after study has shown that the economy improves more, and faster, under Democratic leadership than under Republican. This is because Republicans often make the economy worse, primarily by drastically cutting taxes on the wealthy. Will Rogers pointed out almost a century ago that Democrats get into office by promising to clean up Republicans’ messes, and when they are too slow in doing so they get kicked out and the Republicans are brought back in to undo what progress was made. This is exactly what just happened to the Biden/Harris administration. When Trump left office there was record unemployment and the economy was on the verge of collapse. Under Biden unemployment went down, wages went up, the stock market went up… but the average American didn’t feel it, because of inflation. Supply interruptions caused by Covid caused inflation to skyrocket, as did energy fears over the Russian invasion of Ukraine. In the last year or two, as various other economic indicators have been very positive, inflation has stopped going up at a precipitous rate… but that didn’t help people much, since the prices that had gone so high did not come down. So instead, voters chose to return to the guy who expedited everything crashing in the first place, and that is going to prove a very unwise idea.

Assuming that his narrow victory is a mandate, Trump is going to overreach very quickly. He has already started doing so, and he is not even in office yet. Quite a few Trump voters are going to be dismayed at some of the draconian steps he takes as soon as he gets into the White House, as their primary motivation in voting for him was inflation and not social warfare. Most of his voters, though, are going to be fine with all that. What they will not be fine with, and what is going to take them by surprise, is the fact he will once again run the economy into the ground, especially if he follows through on his promises about tariffs and mass deportations. Prices are going to go up, not down, over the next two years. Let’s mark it: this week the national average for gas is $3.01 per gallon, the average price for eggs at the time of the election was $3.37, and the average price of milk was $4.04. Average rent is $1559 per month, average home price $501,100, average vehicle price $48,397 (all those prices are going to be lower in rural Tennessee). Unemployment is at 4.1%. We do not yet know the 2024 poverty rate, as the year is not over, but as soon as we have it, let’s mark it and compare it to a year later. Let’s all check in on these markers in December of 2025.

By the midterms two years from now, there is going to be some buyers’ remorse. Democrats have a good chance to make substantial gains in Congress, and two years later to take back the White House. But only if they carry forth the right message. The message cannot be “I told you so.” The message cannot be “you’re stupid.” The message has to be “The Democratic Party cares about YOU, as much as about anybody else.” It has to be this: “The middle class and the working class have to all band together, along with empathetic wealthy people, against the fat cats who want to divide us in order to take even more money.” The Bible says the LOVE of money is the root of all evil, not money itself. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with being well-off. Teddy Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, and John F. Kennedy were all raised in wealth and luxury… but they all had empathy for the working people of America, and sought to help them, not to use them.

Too many liberals have lost empathy for the working class, or the ability to identify with them, and it shows. There is a sense of condescension for what was once one of the largest parts of the Democratic base. But there are plenty of union workers out there organizing, and showing us how to get things done. The rest of the Democratic Party needs to start following their lead.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech and serves on the executive committee of the Tennessee Democratic Party. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

Buy the book A Liberal Dose: Communiques from the Holler by Troy D. Smith HERE

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