You know where this is going : Michigan. Not the lakes - although the Great Lakes have more than their share of problems.
The cultural dead zone : The Suburbs .
How did Michigan, of all places, get to a point where the elected government could stage a coup against their people and institute right-to-work evil? Because so many of them know absolutely nothing of labor history. From the Pullman riots to the relative peace of 1945-1970 was a long, sometimes bloody struggle.
And the history of it was just vanished. The plutocrats stood aside for a generation, while pumping out reams of propaganda. The means of transmission of folk history vanished with the public spaces and places where teens could interact with elders. Places that were systematically excluded from the antiseptic residential monocultures planted in the Auto Age. By 1980, peoples heads had been emptied enough that the White Folks litany could be pumped into a vacuum. The Class War was on, in secret. Victory has been complete. Even 30 years ago, could someone as clueless & odious as Willard Mitt Romney, with his constant denigrating of most of the population, his history of corporate evil, and his sheer cluelessness been allowed anywhere near a nomination? Maybe, but the stories that he ran on - the moochers, dependent, winks, nods, dog whistles & fables - would have at least drawn derision. Now? we are cursed with Very Serious People, who appear to have been raised in jars & don't even have scruples to lose to become pundits.
Corporate profits as a share of national income in red, wages in blue. See any improvement since 2009? This chart is almost enough to turn an O-Bot into a Firebagger. In any event, it's a call to action:
Wake up, and start knitting, all you zombies out there!
Also, too : The rest of the country, walking quietly down the chute.
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