The Rural Bait-and-Switch

One of my earliest posts on Bridging the Gap examined a measure of affluence in Upstate New York, finding that affluence largely clusters in towns with access to good jobs—especially suburban areas. The most recently available data shows the same patterns (darker blue more affluent, darker red less affluent).

I might have more to say about this map on a later day, but one takeaway in particular is relevant to this post. Geographically, the largest clusters of poverty in a region like Upstate New York—and indeed, across America—are in rural areas isolated from urban/suburban jobs or natural amenities like lakes or mountain resorts. With the decline of rural industries and labor-intensive agriculture, these areas have withered both economically and demographically. The people that remain are generally lucky enough to hold either white-collar positions (nurses, teachers, lawyers, etc.) or scarce remaining blue-collar jobs, or they’re supported by some kind of government funding. The latter can range from in-kind payments, to Medicaid/Medicare, to farm subsidies, to vocational education or (re)training.

Many programs and services intended to benefit rural populations, especially those who are older or poorly educated, are funded directly or indirectly by the federal government. For example, the US Department of Agriculture funds the Rural Housing Service, Rural Utilities Service, and Rural Business-Cooperative Service to “bring prosperity and opportunity to rural areas.”

Elsewhere, the federal government partners with states on the three rural development agencies. The most famous of these is the Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC), founded in 1965 to make long-term, sustainable investments in economic development within the Appalachia region. This region includes 14 counties in Western New York’s Southern Tier, 13 of which voted for President Trump—in many cases by large margins.

Now, let’s get to my bigger point.

Trump dominated in America’s rural areas due to a fairly complex set of cultural and economic factors (not to mention a healthy dose of desperation and gullibility). In speaking directly, if disingenuously, to rural populations who often feel neglected by policymakers, Trump offered what felt like a last hope to many voters. He never meant to keep his promises, though, and his proferred federal budget offers one of the biggest clues to the con.

(Granted, President Trump’s budget proposal to Congress takes a sizable ax to the usual Republican demons—cities, mass transit, the poor and minorities, public broadcasting and the arts, government-funded medical research, etc.)

This budget goes a step further, however, to aggressively target programs and funding streams that explicitly benefit the president’s rural voter base. For example, the budget would completely eliminate America’s three rural development agencies—including the ARC, covering counties where Trump garnered a stronger vote share than anywhere else in the country. Also on the chopping block: the Essential Air Service, which subsidizes scheduled commercial flights to small rural airports where they might not otherwise be economically feasible; and the Community Development Block Grant program, which (via states) funds such boondoggles as Meals on Wheels.

Meanwhile, the president continues to take frequent golf trips to his resort in Florida. At about $3.5 million a pop to taxpayers, he sure seems to have his priorities straight.

In many ways, Trump’s voters did something unforgivable. Back in November, I predicted that Trump would make things worse for the voters who had believed in his empty transformational promises.

Massive tax cuts for billionaires on top of pledges for huge infrastructure projects (some worthwhile, to be sure, but also the promise of a wall to keep out the only demographic actually moving to rural America these days)? Vindictive trade wars that may preserve an American job or two for another year, but that will also raise prices on cheaper imported goods—including those sold by big retailers disproportionately catering to small-town residents? … it’s an amazingly successful long-con by Donald Trump.

I’m still pissed at these voters who foolishly placed their petty hatreds higher than the interests of both marginalized populations and their own communities. But this—this vicious proposal to gut the lifeblood from the people who believed in something, no matter how misguided—is cynicism beyond anything I could have ever expected from an American politician. Nobody deserved this.

How We Protect Our Natural Heritage

My last post explored a landscape abused by resource extraction but slowly returning to nature. Today, I’ll look at three different models for how unique natural features can be protected to conserve an ecosystem or restore it to health. My examples come from stops made on a recent trip to visit my parents in Western New York, and each site represents a different mode of preservation and/or renewal. It goes without saying that this is far from a comprehensive list: even a private landowner who keeps their property pristine for less than altruistic reasons (as a for-profit game reserve, for example) can be considered a preservationist.

The recreational public park

Public park lands are generally set aside to showcase a natural feature for recreational purposes. Stony Brook State Park, located in the far northwestern corner of Steuben County, featured prominently in my youth, although I hadn’t visited in at least a decade. Much like its more famous cousins, Letchworth and Watkins Glen, Stony Brook is situated at the “fall line” where the Allegheny Plateau drops off to a lower-elevation glaciated landscape. New York’s state park system contains a number of similar sites where streams or rivers carve deep gorges and cascade over spectacular waterfalls.

Prior to being purchased by New York state in the early 20th century, both Stony Brook and Watkins Glen had been ailing private resorts. In entering the public realm, these natural wonders were opened to the appreciating public while also being preserved from exploitative development. There are potential downsides to the public park model: large crowds may form during the summer peak season, putting pressure on natural features and habitats.

For our visit, unseasonably warm weather (60s in Upstate New York in February!) had failed to melt the slick ice along several trails, resulting in their closure. Still, our short, pleasant walk through the recreational portion of the park brought back some nice memories.

The mouth of Stony Brook’s gorge, with the waterfall inaccessible beyond the bend.

In the summer, the gates are closed across the dam to create a “natural” swimming pool.

The Poet’s Picnic, held in this Civilian Conservation Corps cabin, was an annual event for my family during my childhood.

A bridge across Stony Brook is built with stone slabs and wood planks.

The public preserve

Two neighboring public properties protect Keeney Swamp, a wetland about 15 miles southwest of Stony Brook in northeastern Allegany County. The Keeney Swamp State Forest and Wildlife Management Area (WMA) are not parks. These sites are largely undeveloped for recreational purposes; humans, while welcome to visit, are not their primary concerns. Together, they protect an extensive wetland area and a rare woodland habitat for balsam fir trees in Western New York.

The WMA also highlights the important role that activists can play in preservation. After four major beaver dams were breached in the early 1990s, a birding group in Allegany County noticed a significant decline in the diversity and abundance of water bird species. My dad (the Rivertop Rambler) and other members of the group extensively documented the effects of wetland habitat loss, submitted evidence to the state Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), and urged the DEC to reconstruct a wetland in the WMA. Today, a series of earthen levees and dams have recreated an ideal ecology for many species of native and migratory birds.

The open wetland created by the levee in the foreground is surrounded by forested hillsides.

The nonprofit conservancy

The Pfeiffer Nature Center, near Olean in southeastern Cattaraugus County, is an example of a private, nonprofit foundation that seeks to preserve the area’s natural and human history. The center’s Lillibridge Road property, where C. and I hiked with my parents, is home to a rare stand of old growth forest (never harvested for lumber) in the eastern United States. Hiking northeast from the parking lot, dense stands of forest give way to sweeping views from a ridge top in Western New York’s Allegheny plateau.

There’s no state or municipal interest in the Pfeiffer properties. If the political winds change and elected officials or a public agency decide to devalue parks, forests, or other preserves, Pfeiffer and its mission will (theoretically) stay true. However, while parks and other public lands are likely to be spared from development—at least in a state like New York—in perpetuity, the future of privately held lands may depend on the passage of ownership from one responsible hand to another.

Pfeiffer’s old growth forest stand contains beautiful hemlocks, white pines, and oaks.

The view to the north, while marred by utility lines, is spectacular.

I’ll leave my readers with a gratuitous shot from near the top of Western New York’s highest peak: the 2,548-foot Alma Hill in southern Allegany County. While Western New York isn’t generally known for its rugged terrain, Alma Hill and its surrounding environs are truly impressive.

Back to Beauty

C. and I decided to spend inauguration weekend far from the adulatory crowds gathered in Washington, DC to cheer on their favorite orange-haired strongman. I tipped my hat to the brave marchers and demonstrators who stood tall for a kinder America, and we headed out of town into north-central West Virginia for a long weekend honeymoon. Our home base was a bed and breakfast in the ghost town of Douglas, two miles down a winding road from Thomas, in Tucker County.

Tucker, once home to booming coal and lumber industries, has just 6,966 residents remaining (after peaking at 18,675 in 1910) and voted for Trump by a 50+ percent margin. We weren’t overwhelmed by white desperation and resent, though—far from it. Sure, we found some raggedy towns and saw the scars left by exploitative resource extraction industries, but we also found friendly locals, a thriving artist colony, and an amenity scene kept lively by hipsters, ski bums, and temporary DC expats.

(Stick with me: lots of pictures here!)

Thomas (pop. 565; 2,354 in 1910), a former coal town incorporated as West Virginia’s smallest city, has a terraced street network extending up the steep sides of the North Fork Blackwater River valley. The lower street of the business district (pictured) represents the gentrified portion of downtown and features art galleries, music venues, cafes, and organic food stores. The upper main street still faces neglect and decay.

The Buxton and Landstreet Gallery sits where Thomas gives way to hardscrabble former coal patch towns, including Coketon and Douglas. The building once housed the administrative headquarters of the Davis Coke and Coal Company.

Ruined coke ovens dot the banks of the North Fork Blackwater River like abandoned hobbit holes. The North Fork is still reeling from the effects of acid drainage from coal mines, although liming efforts are underway to raise the water’s pH and bring back aquatic life.

Davis (pop. 658; 2,615 in 1910) was a major center of the region’s lumber industry. After the virgin forests of the Allegheny Mountains were clear cut, fires swept across the high plateau resulting in permanent soil loss. Today, only boreal (Canadian taiga) vegetation can grow in some areas, although spruce and hemlock forests have recovered in others.

History meets crass modernity in Parsons, the Tucker County seat (pop. 1,431; 2,077 in 1940). Parsons is further removed than Davis or Thomas from the spending power associated with Canaan Valley ski resorts and second-home owners. While its population never dropped as precipitously, its modern-day economy seems much weaker and poverty is more in line with rural West Virginia norms.

The people and businesses were great, but those weren’t the big draws for us. At nearly every turn, we found landscapes of epic beauty in the “high Alleghenies.” Average elevations exceed 3,000 feet and the traditional spruce and hemlock mountain forests compete for space with boreal ecosystems defined by wind-swept heaths and bogs.

Southwest of Thomas, US route 219 overlooks the Cheat River Valley before descending near Parsons. From this vantage point, massive windmills loomed up hundreds of feet barely a quarter-mile to our right. Wind turbines are prevalent in the area, although the coal industry is a shadow of its past. The remaining mines are strip mines that seem to employ more heavy machinery than miners; mechanization across the industry makes it unlikely that Trump will bring back mining jobs.

State route 72 is a roughly east-west “highway”–in reality, a switchbacking paved road that seems to narrow to one lane at the most terrifying possible moments–connecting the Parsons area to just south of the Canaan Valley. It passes by several farms and through stunning high-elevation meadows.

Route 72 offers this view of Canaan Mountain (a relatively uneroded portion of the high plateau) to the north.

A barn in the foreground of Canaan Mountain gives a sense of scale.

Self-explanatory?

The Blackwater River–named for the dark tannins imparted by spruce, hemlocks, and bogs within its watershed–drops 62 feet from the plateau into the Blackwater Canyon.

For close to three miles between the town of Davis and the falls, the Blackwater is considered prime catch-and-release trout water, despite being heavily stocked and dependent on liming at Davis.

Shay Run, in Blackwater Falls State Park, is also a blackwater stream. Its smaller size allows hikers to get up close and personal as it runs through boggy flats.

A sphagnum bog sits at the edge of Shay Run. Many bogs on the plateau and in the Canaan Valley feature wild cranberries and Canadian blueberries.

Shay Run boasts a series of picturesque falls before it leaps over the edge of Blackwater Canyon.

A miniature spruce forest plays at the feet of the big boys, just feet from the canyon rim.

There are great views of Blackwater Canyon from near the park lodge, barely a mile below the falls.

The canyon becomes downright majestic just another two or three miles below the lodge overlook. Lindy Point offers a 270-degree view of the Blackwater (pictured here to the southwest) and two tributaries–including the North Fork, which was audible outside our window at the bed and breakfast.

Back home, I thought more about the people who live amid such natural splendor. I can certainly sympathize with folks whose livelihoods have melted away, even if they channel their frustrations in non-constructive ways. But as an environmentally minded outsider, I’m glad to see the natural order reasserting itself to heal the scars left by destructive mining and lumber industries.

I’ve reflected on the history of the mining industry previously in this blog. Douglas, our quiet home base, was once a smoldering, treeless hellscape where mine employees owed their lives and souls to distant overlords. I tried to imagine the miners’ elation when the company bosses announced a great commitment to their employees’ futures, and sold them all the homes they’d lived in for years. The next day, ownership shut the mines down completely and fired each and every person there who’d toiled to enrich someone else.

It’s good to see nature return to such a place.

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To close, here’s a great band we saw perform live in Thomas, at a cool little place called the Purple Fiddle. They’re a five-piece outfit from Ann Arbor called The Ragbirds.

The Tradition Transition

As humans (and I trust that most of my readers are in that demographic), much of our experience is anchored in tradition. The best traditions hold us close to our cultural roots or our families, and our most cherished examples tap into some element that lends an almost primal sense of belonging or warmth. For the last two years on this blog, I’ve written about my favorite tradition: a Christmas Eve journey that starts with a walk up and over the wooded hillside to the south of my parents’ home, and ends with the classic German Christmas Eve family dinner.

Road sign in the woods, on a snowy Christmas Eve past (photo courtesy of Rivertop Rambles)

In recent years, some of the specific cornerstones of this larger tradition have faded as my paternal grandmother—a proud matriarchal figure—became gradually less physically and mentally capable of coordinating our family’s biggest annual event. Last year, I wrote about the shock of seeing her transferred to a nursing home and the near-final nail in the Christmas Eve tradition, as the big dinner was moved to Christmas Day. But the pre-celebratory hike still happened as it (seemingly) always had. My dad and I joined my uncle at the “car bar,” where we sipped good whisky and chugged cheap beer as we walked through the snowy woods.

But even the best traditions can come to an end, and the Christmas Eve ramble of the three Franklin (wise?) men came to an end this year. First, I was unable to join the family up in New York on the eve itself, so my sister, visiting from the Virgin Islands, was set to take my place in a surrogate walk scheduled for the preceding weekend.

Then, on the Sunday before Christmas, we received the news that my grandmother had died, apparently peacefully, in her bed. The walk was forgotten.

Grandma and Grandpa Franklin on Christmas Eve, with little Brent getting excited about presents (late 1980s/early 1990s)

From the DC area, it felt surreal. I’d been fortunate to catch grandma in one of her last relatively lucid moments, a couple months before, and we had all seen this coming for a long time. But still, she couldn’t actually be gone. Who would stand (or sit, brandishing her canes) at the head of the family and keep us rooted in our longest-held traditions through strength of will and belief in the value of cultural heritage? Looking back, it never did feel real until I stood at a small podium and tearfully thanked her for all she had given.

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Traditions are powerful, though, and if they disappear, they can still leave behind strong emotional residue. The Christmas Eve tradition and all of its components—the walk through the woods, the food, the drinks, the warmth—will remain one of my life’s warmest, most cherished memories. Even if it all fades, I’ll always remember my grandmother’s presence when I think of Christmas.

My grandmother was one of my most loyal advocates and always believed in the value of everything I did, no matter how seemingly trivial. She nurtured my musical ambitions and showed up to every single concert, even when it had to have been torture to listen to the other kids farting through their mouthpieces. She treated me for every grade in every report card and kept silly artwork from me and my sister for years.

My grandmother will remain inseparable from nearly all of my formative experiences: every holiday, every concert, every moment where she was there to indulge a young child in the way that only a grandparent can do. Her faith in me extended to every decision I made, even the one that took me away from the only home I’d ever known, for reasons I’m not certain she ever fully understood. She didn’t need to know why I was doing something; she knew, deep down, that it would make me grow, that it would advance me toward fulfilling the promise she’d always seen in me, and that I’d probably have a healthy dose of fun while doing it.

I know she was always proud of me, which is why I think she’d understand and appreciate why I wasn’t around for our family’s Christmas this year. Two days before Christmas, C. and I stood on a chilly riverbank in Washington with our parents, her brother, and my sister. We made promises to each other—some light-hearted, some trivial, but all intended to guide us through the rest of our lives. Those promises ended with an exchange of rings.

Two days later, our respective nuclear families celebrated Christmas together for the first time. It’s too soon to say whether this might become a new tradition. After all, a marriage is a give and take, and maybe sometime she’ll join me in whatever’s left of the old Franklin traditions. And maybe the best thing about a good tradition is that as its old anchors pass away, there’s a chance for renewal or for the start of something else wonderful.

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To my grandmother, thank you for everything. I will miss you every day.

To my wife, I can’t wait to see what traditions we cook up together.

To our families, thank you for being our anchors, and giving us our appreciation of family and tradition so that our lives together may be all the richer.

Beware the Post-Election ‘What-Ifs’

Following the 2016 election, left-of-center Americans progressed variously through the five stages of grief. For some, the second stage, anger, took the form of a retrospective ‘what-if’ scenario. Anger, as in: “I can’t believe we [Democrats] had an untrustworthy corporatist shill, Hillary Clinton, shoved down our throats. If we’d have nominated Bernie, we wouldn’t be in this situation!” Bargaining morphed into a sort of what-if scenario: “What if we had nominated an honest, straight-forward candidate without the ethical and transparency baggage of Hillary Clinton?”

Full disclaimer here: I, too, wish it could’ve been Bernie. I voted for him in the Virginia primary, and I stand by that choice. But I’m not sure he would’ve succeeded either. A Newsweek reporter explored Bernie regrets after the election, and reported that Republicans’ general election campaign playbook on Sanders made their tricks against Hillary seem congenial and respectful. I wish our society truly supported Bernie’s stated values, even under close examination, rather than just embracing his ‘outsider’ status during the primaries. I wish ‘socialism’ wasn’t a dirty word.

Basically, while Bernie might have won the general election, it’s far from certain. I’m now inclined to think that Bernie would have tried and failed to go head-to-head with Trump on populism, only to find his opponent willing to stop at nothing to out-promise him—and, needless to say, outdo him on what many voters were actually looking for, which was a promise to restore white male privilege.

No matter who the Democrats nominated, though, we might very well have seen a different electoral map. Let’s explore.

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Election results depend on a viscous stew of thought processes and impulses among the voting public. These may be logical or policy-based for some voters—likely a relatively small minority—but are demonstrably emotional for the majority. Much of the wishful Bernie thinking has focused on the states that Hillary Clinton unexpectedly lost, and has ignored some of the states that she narrowly (or less narrowly) won.

No-doubt states for Clinton (>10%)

Let’s first look at the states that, frankly, either Democrat would’ve been able to count on. After that, we’ll look at those states that probably would’ve gone to Barry Goldwater (or, heck, Mussolini!) if he ran as a Republican in 2016.

State	Margin of Victory	Electoral Votes
District of Columbia	86.8	3
Hawaii	32.2	4
California	30.1	55
Massachusetts	27.2	11
Maryland	26.4	10
Vermont	26.4	3
New York	21.2	29
Illinois	17.0	20
Washington	15.8	12
Rhode Island	15.5	4
New Jersey	14.0	14
Connecticut	13.7	7
Delaware	11.5	3
Oregon	11.0	7
Total		182

No-doubt states for Trump (>10%)

State	Margin of Victory	Electoral Votes
Wyoming	46.3	3
West Virginia	41.7	5
Oklahoma	36.4	7
North Dakota	35.8	3
Idaho	31.7	4
Kentucky	29.8	8
South Dakota	29.8	3
Alabama	27.7	9
Arkansas	26.9	6
Tennessee	26.2	11
Nebraska	25.6	5
Kansas	20.6	6
Montana	20.6	3
Louisiana	19.7	8
Missouri	19.1	10
Indiana	18.9	11
Utah	17.9	6
Mississippi	17.8	6
Alaska	14.7	3
South Carolina	14.2	9
Total		126

Notice that there’s a big edge for the Democrat here. That was always going to be the case, but Hillary lost this election in the closer states.

Narrow-win states (<10%)

Clinton

State	Margin of Victory	Electoral Votes
New Mexico	8.3	5
Virginia	5.4	13
Colorado	4.9	9
Maine	2.7	3*
Nevada	2.4	6
Minnesota	1.5	10
New Hampshire	0.3	4
Total		50

* Maine has 4 electoral votes; the electoral vote in the state’s 2nd congressional district went to Trump.

Trump

State	Margin of Victory	Electoral Votes
Michigan	0.2	16
Pennsylvania	0.7	20
Wisconsin	0.8	10
Florida	1.2	29
Arizona	3.5	11
North Carolina	3.6	15
Georgia	5.1	16
Ohio	8.1	18
Texas	9.0	38
Iowa	9.4	6
Total		179

Add these closer states to the mix and you get the final electoral vote total: 306 to Trump (including 1 from Maine), 232 to Clinton. Electorally, it’s not all that close, although Clinton’s popular vote lead is up over 2.0 percent. Here’s where we can play with the ‘Bernie what-if,’ because some of the close states might have shaken out differently had Bernie carried the Democratic nomination.

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Would Bernie have pulled this off?

In my experience, the “Bernie would’ve won” argument has relied on his Rust Belt primary victories against Hillary and the assumed strength of a populist campaign in the region. The primary argument cuts both ways, though, and certain demographic factors would’ve worked against Bernie as well.

For example, I’ll grant that Sanders would likely have won Wisconsin. In her (some would say hubristic) overconfidence in the Midwestern ‘blue firewall,’ Clinton didn’t even visit the state—a traditional populist stronghold—after June. Adding Wisconsin’s 10 votes to the Democratic total gives the party 242. Let’s also give Bernie Michigan (16 votes), where his primary results were unexpectedly strong; and Maine’s 2nd congressional district, close to his New England political roots. He’s now at 259 votes. For the sake of this exercise, let’s also give him 20 votes for Pennsylvania, where anti-trade populism obviously resonated, for a total of 279 to the Democratic Party. Voila! Trump loses, and we can all rest easy at night.

Not so fast, though. Bernie didn’t perform well among minority groups in the primaries, and his brand of populism wouldn’t necessarily have enthused wealthier, economically moderate urban liberals. So let’s hypothetically take away Virginia, a Clinton state, because Democratic votes here are heavily reliant on black and Hispanic turnout, and on support from hyper-educated white voters living in densely populated northern counties. (The latter, it’s worth noting, tend to be rather fond of the economic status quo, which serves them quite well). Now the Democrats are back down 13 electoral votes, which leaves their candidate at 266 and puts Trump in the White House. Add Colorado to the list of switchers, for the same reasons as Virginia—or Nevada, for its heavy reliance on Hispanic turnout—and you can see the problem.

There were other states that Obama won and Hillary lost. Could Bernie have triumphed in Iowa, despite Hillary’s considerable margin of loss? Sure, I suppose. But Bernie might have lost by an even bigger margin in Florida and North Carolina, states whose Democratic populations are minority-heavy and where Bernie performed poorly in the primaries.

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As of early December, while some of us on the left have moved on to depression or even acceptance, others still seem stuck in the third stage (bargaining). We’re busy seizing on outside possibilities like an electoral college bailout or outrage over Russian hacking allegations, conveniently ignoring that both of these slim hopes rest on the willingness of a critical mass of Republicans to show some political courage. With such a significant caveat, I’m afraid that these hopes only prove that some folks remain in denial.

Happy Thanksgiving, from a Peaceful Place

Having exorcised a few demons with my last post, I’d like to offer my readers a postcard, of sorts, from a place of beauty. The Moormans River is a small stream in the James River watershed, flowing out of the Blue Ridge just west of Charlottesville, Virginia. Two miles upstream from the Charlottesville Reservoir, the Big Branch tributary spills over several rock ledges. Standing quietly below the falls, one hears only the water, songbirds, and a slight breeze (see video below).

As always, I’m thankful this year for my wonderful and supportive family; my lovely fiancee, and her family; my good friends; talented colleagues; and for those moments and places that make me feel happy or at peace in an otherwise loud, confusing world. Happy Thanksgiving to all of my readers.

With that, I’ll step aside and leave some mementos from a hike on a beautiful late fall day.

 

On Finding It Difficult to Write

With apologies to America’s most-often marginalized populations—including racial and ethnic minorities, members of non-Christian faiths, LGBTQ persons, and the poor of all demographics—what I’m about to say is as trivial as it gets. But part of my stated mission as a blogger, to write about the urban-rural divide, effectively withered away during the presidential campaign and on election day. In at least one important way, the gap has become too big for me to comprehend. If I don’t understand it myself, it’s hard for me to facilitate a greater understanding through my writing—to bridge the gap (if you will).

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I’ve lived in a major metropolitan area for more than seven years now, a significant portion of my adult life. Granted, there are several social quirks here I’ll never warm to. For example, there’s the “DC hello”: in many circles of career/politically ambitious (typically young) people, there’s a tendency to begin a conversation with “And what do you do?” An exchange of names or pleasantries comes second, once the other person’s social bona fides and/or career utility to the questioner have been established.

But there’s also, usually, a genuine respect for and willingness to understand other cultures and walks of life here in this city, even among many in the “DC hello” crowd. It’s partly an intellectual curiosity, but it’s also a sense, born of circumstance and necessity, that we’re all in this together. Black, brown, white; gay, straight; Christian, Muslim, Jewish—we’re all participants in the experiment called human existence. Plus, we’re all damn close to each other, physically, and we might as well get used to getting along.

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Then there’s the place that I left, physically and psychologically. In rural Upstate New York, I used to feel, a person met at a gathering would likely open a conversation by asking your name, offering you a beer, or lamenting the Bills’ latest terrible season. It was a friendly, simpler affect, distinct from the social-climber tendencies seen among ambitious urban millennials. If you’d asked me, I’d have told you that I aspired to combine this unassuming rural quality with an urbanite’s cultural openness.

Then 2016 came along, and my tendency to romanticize the people back home ran into a major obstacle named Donald Trump.

Many of my liberal friends—the kind who genuinely want to believe the best of all people—have said something like the following: “Well, we can feel that Trump voters made the wrong choice, but we need to show them some empathy, since they obviously were feeling disillusion/desperation/disaffectation/[insert the word of your choice here]. However, it’s incredibly dangerous to normalize what just happened, to cast this election as anything other than what it was: a backlash against the perceived erosion of rural white privilege and traditional gender roles. It’s dangerous to look at the neo-Nazis Seig heil-ing their new savior, and then dismiss them as outliers among more passive members of the movement that empowered them.

Believe me, I genuinely understand that many Trump voters believe that they had legitimate reasons, aside from racial or cultural animosity, to cast their vote as they did. Some are childhood friends, or neighbors, or even extended family members. Other folks, strangely, may not consider Trump’s rhetoric or behavior problematic. But many—perhaps most—of these folks cast their vote despite knowing, incontrovertibly, that their candidate espoused the worst racist, xenophobic, and misogynistic tendencies America could show to itself and to the world.

At best, a vote for Trump born from economic anxiety was a vote to exchange one injustice—the hollowing out of rural, small-town America to enrich agribusiness or multinational corporate interests—for another, more implacable and pernicious, form of injustice. This decision allows rural whites, who have long benefited from American structural biases (including the ability to win an election as a minority population), to take out their frustrations not on the capitalist class, but on the populations that have always carried the burden of what used to be considered American exceptionalism. In the great game of divide and conquer, the lower socioeconomic classes (no matter their race or identity) will continue to suffer as they tear at each other in a zero-sum game, while billionaires like Trump laugh their way to more power and hate groups lurk like vultures at the margins.

Perhaps most galling is that a Trump administration is very likely to make things worse—not just for traditionally oppressed groups, but also for white rural America. Massive tax cuts for billionaires on top of pledges for huge infrastructure projects (some worthwhile, to be sure, but also the promise of a wall to keep out the only demographic actually moving to rural America these days)? Vindictive trade wars that may preserve an American job or two for another year, but that will also raise prices on cheaper imported goods—including those sold by big retailers disproportionately catering to small-town residents? And I’m not even talking about the damage the next four years could do to democratic institutions and norms that were designed explicitly to protect citizens from predation.

Call me crazy, but it sure seems like a lot to risk for the dubious satisfaction of slapping down minorities or transgendered people for the crime of wanting to be treated like humans; or to show a certain ambitious, pantsuited politician that a position of authority is not a “proper” role for women.

It’s a profoundly selfish, short-sighted act, and it’s an amazingly successful long-con by Donald Trump.

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Back to this blog. Some of my best moments here have been when I’ve captured some essence of the rural culture—with all its warts, still something I felt deserved a voice—that my unapologetically liberal parents chose to raise me in. Now, my confidence in writing on behalf of this culture has been shaken, and I feel betrayed by many of the people whose communities and values I had chosen to believe in.

The election is over now, and it’s on all of us to see the next four years through. It’s also been nearly two months since I’ve written anything. I now wonder if my blogger’s block was a result of feeling this whole thing coming, deep down, like a slowly unfolding nightmare, when so many of my urban friends and colleagues couldn’t fathom such a degree of mean-spiritedness and authoritarianism.

I haven’t gone away, but it remains to be seen where Bridging the Gap will go from here. My continued thanks to my few regular readers, especially to those who actively keep the light on for human decency in Trump country (you know who you are).