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In reply to the discussion: Anthony Bourdain eviscerates privileged Eastern liberals' for utter contempt of working-class [View all]gratuitous
(82,849 posts)We could have won a bunch of elections instead of just winning more votes. We offered rural America health care, higher wages, and better schools and roads. They threw it back in our faces because somebody somewhere they didn't like was also going to get to see a doctor, get paid more, and attend those schools and drive those roads.
Meanwhile, Republicans were full of promises about jobs in 2010, but six years later they've yet to deliver any jobs bill at all. Have our "working-class America" friends held them responsible for their broken promise? No? What are we supposed to do when we remind them of that? Based on their other responses, they're going to be stubborn and resentful of us for noticing that their elected officials have failed them, not that their heroes have fucked up.
Their imaginary fears about gun-grabbing and church closings haven't materialized, but the increase in wealth inequality has shown up, in spades. Just like we told them. They're enraged, but they're enraged at the people who've tried to make the country work better for them, not the folks who have thwarted every effort to make their lives better.
But maybe I'm not the person Bourdain is talking about, since I'm not from the east, not terribly privileged, and working class.