Good for you, Ben -- a gay, liberal man going into an uber conservative setting to gauge the mood and being treated with respect and good humor. I bet a conservative reporter at a liberal gathering would have had a very different reception.
Yep......just ask Andy Ngo. He can tell ya all about the love and tolerance of liberal/progressive gatherings.....and he has the x-rays to back it up......
What happened to Andy Ngo was a travesty for all journalists and the justice system. The real Asian hate comes from democrats in the city streets, court rooms, and school boards. Melissa Chen and Konstantin Kisin have the full details: https://konstantinkisin.substack.com/p/andy-ngo-antifa-and-the-breakdown
It would be interesting if a relatively unknown conservative reporter went to a liberal even to try the same thing. If it was a family event, like the Iowa State Fair, I think it would go pretty much the same. Most people aren't that bad.
Kevin Bae, it truly depends on the group / gathering, but just like here at TFP, commenters are both Right & Left of Center. Except for a few (a very few) who can’t seem to be civil, and we quickly recognize who they are! They are too easily offended & wear their feelings on their sleeve, resorting to labeling & can’t manage to show good manners & common sense. Overall, we are a good mix of Americans on this platform.
The Free Press offers us a “safe place😉” to come listen, perhaps learn and agree to disagree civilly. No fear of being cancelled! Thank you again, Bari!
I mostly agree, BUT it would depend on the event in question!
There was a little watched “reality” TV show several years ago called “Welcome to Waverly” which followed a group of diverse urban Left-leaning young folks as they spent a month or so working/living in a tiny town in flyover country. They were paired with a local person in a similar job, and participated in the local community.
Beyond some naïveté of the townies, BY FAR the most INTOLERANT, combative, and dogmatic person was a female “bartender activist” from Brooklyn (no, it wasn’t AOC). Honestly, everyone in a city should watch this (and hopefully absorb its lessons), as it shows how the partisan divide dehumanizes everyone and is really not about anything that truly matters.
You can watch a bit of Savanah Hernandez ( https://www.savsaysofficial.com/ ), who does similar "man on the street" style interview, and she doesn't get too much hate. Part of it is probably just being a Latina woman people assume she's supposed to be "on their side", but she's also quite respectful and never too condescending.
It has to be a white conservative. And he has to be obviously white and conservative for the experiment to work. Savanah is a young attractive woman. I would like to see a Ben Shapiro looking guy do this.
I love how he ridicules the rando kid for correctly stating that Biden raised gas prices, then asks RFK what the unhealthiest thing he ate was. Hard hitting journalism there.
On the whole, nice that he went. But the condescension is a bit much to stomach. I agree with one of the comments: would a conservative reporter have been treated as well at a progressive event? I would like to think so, but I believe we’ve seen clips of conservative reporters being assaulted, having various substances thrown at them and surrounded by red-faced near apoplectic mobs, screaming at them about “putting peoples lives in danger” for having a different opinion.
I would have preferred a serious attempt at actually understanding. Going somewhere to make fun of people is not outreach.
"I would have preferred a serious attempt at actually understanding"
When the price of diesel, gas and propane needed to run their equipment, and fertilizer necessary to increase production (all petroleum based), goes up excessively as it has under the liars and buffoons currently running the country, it makes producing food correspondingly more expensive. Small farmers will be the first to go under. The giant agribusinesses will buy them out and kill off another part of America's legacy. Food selection will decrease as choice is reduced to bland, genetically modified crops they prefer, crops that can survive being sprayed with herbicides and pesticides to reduce labor and production costs. They will ignore the environmental damage to the soil from chronic application of toxins as beneficial microorganisms are decimated. Ironically, when the adverse impact of that ecosystem’s destruction becomes apparent, politicians will blame it on climate change, and city boy fools like Ben will accept the deception as fact.
Food prices have already increased to the point that for far too many Americans, making healthy choices is no longer an option. I didn’t waste my time watching the video, but my guess is Ben didn’t ask any of the farmers what politicians can do to reverse that trend, let alone acknowledge it. I doubt that elitist fools like him and the politicians he admires will ever have such an epiphany.
I watched it and I'm not sure the gentleman had an agenda and not having one may have been the point. I didn't realize he was gay and I honestly don't know why that entered the conversation here. Like race - (and the thousand other American instances of death by hysterical grievance) - unless someone makes it an issue it honestly doesn't cross my mind. The video may be off-putting because it doesn't pick the scabs off any wounds. My knee didn't jerk once. The rise/disappointment for me was wanting the citizens to answer his questions with informed fact, which didn't happen, (the politicians either).
The sense of peace and community was striking. No masked faces. No green hair. No poseur rage. And, there would have been repercussions for senseless violence and vandalism. If anything, the video is an open argument against the fascist "woke" corporatist attempt to destroy our electoral college, and place the destiny of the people attending the fair in the hands of the flash mob/DNC/Davos surveillance state thugs trying to dismantle the Republic. The silence and complicity of the American MSM in obscuring the machinations of the DNC/EU Davos thugdom is criminal and should not be forgotten or forgiven. (Perhaps it is time Americans demand their airwaves back? Revocation and the reallocation of broadcasting licenses might be a place to start.)
This is, to your point, an opportunity to remember that we are a young Republic dependent and in large measure founded upon the belief in the judgement of an educated and empowered citizen farmer and frontiersman. And, we know that from the beginning wealth and finance has distorted and subverted our elected political leadership. Well, we were young and growing. This is a new age and an entirely new ball game. There is an obviously well financed war against the American Constitutional Republic and her citizens. Cities and industry gutted, education subverted, economy looted and abandoned, the last six decades has seen a well executed war against a self-reliant American middle class. What we call the "Democratic" Party is a cabal of political whores and would be despots. It has lined its pockets while holding America hostage to lie after manufactured lie. Trump aside, only the venality of a "banana republic" mass indicts a former president and chief political opponent to maintain power. Unstopped the chaos, looting and disintegration will continue until collapse. If the Republic and the Constitution stand "..we the people.." can survive anything.
I like your optimism. The reason the questions weren't answered is because he was asking children! The politicians, he just cut off after he got his "soundbite".
Your point is well taken. Wendell Berry’s The Unsettling of America is about the exact assertions you make. Farms and farmers are being sucked dry by agribusiness to the detriment for us all.
Check out Ben’s recent piece at the Pride event in West Hollywood from a month or so back. He’s just as irreverent with them as well. That’s why I think he’s a really important voice at the moment. He ridicules everything equally.
Yeah, William, I picked up the same vibe in this article. I suppose his “10 years ago” opinion of these “ignorant, stupid, deplorable, uneducated, Bible thumping & gun toting, MAGA Red Necks” were found to be nice folks.
I guess Ben Kawaller’s chance to “interact with one of the most exotic species of all: the Republican voter” at “America’s annual country circus” is a far cry from his “musical theater & Chi Pet” experiences.
Glad he came away realizing “many of whom, Trump voters or not, did not fall neatly into any ideological camp”
He wasn’t condescending. He made himself the joke. Ie not knowing a steer from a barrow! It was sweet and open. And yes, most people are good, though I think a conservative at a CITY event would get guff
I agree, the dripping condescension was off-putting, to say the least.
We used to have such fairs in the eastern states, but they've fallen out of favor. 4-H Clubs are tough to find, and few in metropolitan progressiveland have little clue as to how much work running a farm actually takes...or how risky running a farming business has become.
It's a shame, really, because much of what we enjoy to day would not be possible without their love of the land.
I dunno, in five minutes it seems that a deep discussion isn't going to happen. A friendly cruise around the fair isn't a substitute for the former but it doesn't pretend to be either, it is what it is. As for 'understanding' yes that would be nice -- both ways -- and I hope someone tries it eventually.
There's plenty of conservative YouTubers who go to, for example, college campuses and have similar interactions to what is shown in this video. It really depends on venue. If Ben had tried this at, say, a conservative Proud Boys meeting I doubt he would have been treated the same.
No doubt. However, while sometimes entertaining, those YouTubers are not doing journalism. I personally subscribe to TFP for journalism. If it’s going to be satire or comedy, I would prefer it be more clear or at least of higher quality. I don’t think sarcasm is a genre.
Ben was such a caricature of a politically cloistered New Yorker. His passive aggressive condescension was clownish. He was treated with far more civility by the Iowans than he deserved.
Seriously... my parents came from Brooklyn and they would never have looked down on anyone with the kind of condescension even voiced in this introduction.. “Deplorables?” Seriously, some self awareness of what has become of the city in which you live because of all of the dem policies might be in order.. It only took him a DECADE to consider that there was a different viewpoint than his own. I haven’t even watched the video yet and frankly I’m not sure it’s worth my time. TFP needs to craft its choice of reporters and stories a little bit better than this.
The working class people in Brooklyn and Queens have nothing in common with Ben, either. Good, solid, salt of the earth types. They'd be fine with the Iowa farmers.
No they didn't. Most people didn't vote in those elections. The percentage turnout in NYC is always miniscule because everyone knows the result ahead of time. AOC won received 16,898 votes in the primary win over Joe Crowley, who polled 12,880. There were more than 200,000 active Democrats in the district.
By virtue of earning the (D) next to her name on the ballot, she then coasted to victory in November with 110k votes - still in a district of more than 200k Dems.
I am very aware of what happened and in the last re-election she ran against a conservative black woman and they still stupidly voted for AOC. What has she done for the people in Bronx/Queens? Absolutely nothing.
I think that’s too harsh. Ben said in his intro essay that he would have thought they were deplorable ten years ago, but he no longer does. I found his attitude to be one of friendly curiosity, not condescension.
And that curiosity comes across in the video. People who haven’t watched the video shouldn’t comment. It’s hilarious, and you can tell that the Iowans he’s interviewing are having a good time with him, like the guy talking about drinks in gay bars, and the mom who’s son is answering questions, she’s falling out laughing, totally enjoying the exchange. Never condemn something you haven’t watched or haven’t read.
Ben comes across as a nice guy who likes people and has a sense of humor about himself. I wonder — has this changed him? Will he stand up for Midwesterners in discussions with his woke friends? Or portray them as participants in an “annual circus”?
Ten years ago, Ben was the deplorable...He was also amongst the deplorables just this past election...He supported the corrupt creep that now occupies the White House and the daft fruitcake installed in the CNO's former residence.
Exactly. Half the video was an episode of "Kids say the Darndest Things".
And public interest note to East Coast journalists: A very small minority of Iowa State Fair attendees are actually farmers, a good chunk are not Trump supporters and all of them are in on the joke that fried state fair food is weird and unhealthy.
I totally agree. He says he has more compassion than distain, but there seems to be quite a bit of distain left. On the other hand, he probably gave many Iowans a good laugh, while confirming their prejudices against big city types.
Ben doesn't need to go to Miami if he lives in LA. He could just drive east out to the apple and cherry ranches in San Bernardino. There are many farmers there who are also salt of the earth,
“Ben was such a caricature of a politically cloistered New Yorker. His passive aggressive condescension was clownish. He was treated with far more civility by the Iowans than he deserved.”
Ah, visited the people who feed the city dwellers who probably think food comes from a truck animal. Also the people who would survive a natural or man made (you listening sniffer in chief) national calamity. People who would fight for the country and their fellow Americans and even those less fortunate in other places.
Advice, and no did not watch the video. I don’t enjoy doing videos. Don’t ever think about picking a fight with those who know how to take care of themselves and feed you and would use you as compost. I consider those folks as the backbone of America.
I think Ben liked them too! You need to watch the video! And please, less hostility? Give Ben time to be exposed to the charm of "your" people. Then we can all be less hostile! Spread the love man!
Well, why not engage with people to find out if they are all the MAGA types you think they are? I don’t think this substack actually appeals to enthusiastic Trump supporters, but I could be mistaken. What I know for sure is that I’m certainly not one.
Agree with you. The FP is for those who can actually think and articulate thoughts. Left or right, so many areas to agree on and the FP helps identify those areas. Trolls just scream and complain and then retreat to their bridge.
Look! Look guys! Silly middle Americans showing pigs and eating fried food! Ask them stupid questions and chuckle at them-especially the kids. It’s better than going to your local zoo! So say the clowns who can’t feed themselves and who think the government is God. Bari just can’t quite shake her Ivy League condescension.
No doubt sir, no doubt. Middle America could in a sense be anywhere people are derided for wanting to be independent, hard-working, decent folks. I’m sure there are quite a number of people who would fit that description in NY and every other state in this Union.
If there were ever a better demonstration of the difference between Real America and the Coastal Elite, I'd like to see it. Open, friendly conversation from those whose lives, livelihoods, way of life - and even children - are under constant attack by totalitarians and perverts, versus dripping disdain and condescension from a man who literally couldn't survive a week without the products those people provide.
My friends and acquaintances - almost to the man - believe we are headed for a national divorce, if not a civil war, and I have resisted it - but every day I see what the Elite/Elitists think of the people who keep them alive and think to myself, "God, we are headed for a reckoning, and we are doing it headlong."
I dread it, but if it must be, it must be. As for the author and people like him? Channeling Mr. Cromwell, “Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go.”
As someone who spent the first thirty years of life in a small town on the edge of farm country in (ugh) Illinois and then the next thirty years in (ugh) New Jersey I am not at all surprised by Ben’s smug condescending presentation.
It was quite the culture shock moving to NJ.
And, it does not always equate to the difference between democrats and republicans.
But there is a cultural divide. The coasts are money and prestige driven. They are all in a hurry and consumed with being trendy, more likely to put emphasis on how evolved they are. They definitely look down upon their perceived lessors. You all know the narratives told for generations about farmers or factory workers.
I call them good midwestern values. The values are what are different. They don’t necessarily need a McMansion or expensive shoes or incredibly overpriced clothes or shoes to peacock how successful they are. They most likely don’t feel the importance of attending an Ivy League school to show how smart they are. They don’t look down on coasters, but probably think they are weird and superficial.
Coasters look down upon southerners too. I have found them to be more prejudiced than the west or southerners.
I find the same smugness in Nellie’s weekly roundups. I don’t think they can see it, they just believe they are better than. I find it sad.
My husband is from the Midwest, I grew up in CA. Midwesterners are great, but so are many Californians. My father-in-law read The Millionaire Next Door and I borrowed it from him. I think many midwesterners subscribe to that view of wealth and lifestyle. My husband and I do, it's very freeing. Maybe that's one of the reasons the people at the Iowa State fair are so happy.
The cultural divide is more between those with and without a college education than a particular geographic area. I live near NYC but Chicago is actually my favorite American city. And not all "Midwestern values" are what they're cracked up to be. I've heard more than a few of my friends from the midwest talk about people being "Midwestern nice," which seems to be the equivalent of someone in the South saying "bless your heart."
Your assumption is that people from the Midwest are uneducated? What no one goes to university there? They have not been properly indoctrinated to the right way of thinking?
My second problem with your assumptions is that Chicago reflects in any way the rest of Illinois citizens values. Chicago politicians have ruled and been corrupted the rest of the state for well o
Chicago has been corrupt for well over one hundred years. I know this as my great grandfather was a farmer 4 hours south of there and wrote about it in detail. Oh and by the way he went to college back in the late 1800’s. My family heritage goes back nearly two hundred years in Illinois. Most of which were farmers or educators.
I never heard of midwestern nice despite having lived there and have many family that still do. Curious. I would say that they are suspicious of strangers until they get to know them.
If Chicago is your favorite American city then I would venture to say that we would disagree about what constitutes niceness.
Lol I think no matter where you live you might encounter someone, relative or not, who becomes belligerent with alcohol.
I have driven across this country and generally found most Americans to be friendly even here in New Jersey, but there is always that twenty percent who are not. Folks are way more aggressive and quick to argue here.
The worst part is that they don't even understand that they depend on the people who grow food and build things. They are as oblivious as Marie Antoinette.
The far left are all vegans, vegetarians, and pescatarians. They think we shouldn’t be eating meat, and that raising cattle and pigs causes climate change due to them farting methane, so what we really need to do is shut down all those farmers who raise animals. So they don’t respect people who raise cattle or pigs or chickens or whatever to begin with. One should only depend on those who raise crops, not animals.
Other than the tomatoes I grow myself, most of the fruits and veggies I buy seem to come from Mexico or South America not the U.S. I know corn is grown here but that seems like it's mostly used to make junk food and selling it as a healthy vegetable is just an afterthought.
I don't think a national divorce would be a good thing. But, if you have a kid who goes to school and picks up the Gender Cult religion you feel that the country has already declared war on your family.
"But these days, when I think of the divide between red and blue, rural and urban, I feel more curiosity than disdain. And the idea of going to war (what else do we mean by “national divorce”?) with any of the people I spoke to—many of whom, Trump voters or not, did not fall neatly into any ideological camp—felt so very wrong."
I'm glad it felt wrong. Wouldn't it be nice if progressives (or whatever they are) called off the war they have going against the rest of the country? As it stands they are sure to find themselves "on the wrong side of history" which they proclaim to fear so much. I really liked Yuri's comparison of the Manson cult to the trans cult here: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-become-a-cult-leader
And, these days we are talking about a bunch of minors on synthetic hormones and the butcher block. Europeans have reversed course. See Dr. Grossman's book "Lost in Trans Nation".
That's what you wimps said about J6. And the King said before the American Revolution. And Hitler said about FDR and the underlying American will power . And Churchill.
Wait till we bring torches, pitchforks, and real live weapons next time. The same cowards that want to eliminate guns, except for their armed security guards, will fold like a cheap WallMard suit made in China....the same place Biden/Harris couldn't find with a map, compass, and flashlight.
Go find a CNN comment section. They need all the America-haters they can find.
You're right, they weren't treated like any other group. If only they were treated like the BLM rioters. Probably because they're white they were treated worse than other groups.
I agree with you that a group of armed black people storming the capitol would have been treated differently, at least initially (the judges DO seem to be meting out punishment to those who participated even if the police didn't do much on the actual day) but you DID explicitly mention race when you said "I think it was because they were white."
This comment section is slowly deteriorating into just another forum to attack people and things you don't agree with. If you watched his video at a pride parade he treated those people the same as he treated the Iowa fair goers. The Free Press is supposed to be about balance and presenting different points of view for debate. I think they do that.
I agree, as in my comment above, that it’s important to hear differing, thoughtful viewpoints. I do not like mocking and condescension as a form of “outreach and understanding.” I did not see his other video. Perhaps I would have disliked that one just as much. If this is going to be a channel for comedy and satire, it should advertise itself as such. Since there was no “fair and balanced” context offered with this video, I had to evaluate it on its own merits - which I find sorely lacking.
Seriously, I could only judge this video on its own merits. Maybe the guy is also condescending to gay people at a pride parade, but he was definitely condescending to Iowans.
He was being honest. Coastal lefties *do* condescend and I'd rather he let that hang out that try to pretend otherwise -- but his friendliness was I think genuine.
You have a point there. How to say it then? He clearly views himself as superior, but then again most of us do. He states outright that he's far less inclined to make war on 'farmers' that he once might have been. Given more than five minutes, I dare say he'd want some deep engagement. What would you ask of him? Pretend that he doesn't think he's right and they are wrong? Would you do that? Seems to me it was a very commendable 'outreach' and I'm not picking nits about it. We need much more of the same IMHO.
Sheesh, me, I'd make an effort to engage honestly with either MAGA zombies -- who's leader is an outright criminal not to mention a narcissistic, incompetent, moronic egomaniac who hates democracy -- as well as people so mentally decayed that they think men can get pregnant. It's perfectly normal for monkeys to be completely insane.
I think that clearly felt sense of superiority (elitism) IS the problem. And no, not everyone feels that way. Thankfully. For some, (many I hope) myself included, that faux feeling of superiority is considered a character flaw. Why should people without the flaw be expected to put up with and be mocked by the people who have it? And yes no matter how entrenched my opinion is I invariably couch it, as I have in this comment, with "my opinion", "I think" or some similar qualifier. Only when reciting facts do I state it as objective truth. I read a lot of commentary on here from folks that claim they don't take a side and just wish everybody would listen to each other as they lecture on and on about their preferred position. Which is condescending and IMO (see what I did there?) nothing is more off-putting than condescension. It displays a complete lack of respect for the person being showered with the condescension.
"that clearly felt sense of superiority (elitism) IS the problem."
I'd agree it's a big part of the problem but not the only one. In any case, since it is so common, surely there's going to be no avoiding it and *at least* the author was honest about it, no? The author is at least open to persuasion, I think, and seems to harbor no hostility. IMHO that's a good start.
"with "my opinion", "I think" or some similar qualifier"
Glad to hear it, and I hope your example is noted. In any case, the author seems to understand that he needs to improve on that score and I'll accept his honesty. If we can only converse with people who are perfectly humble we won't have many conversations. Besides, people increasingly can't even agree on what the 'facts' are. As for me, I'll never judge a person on the strength of a five minute video anyway.
When I studied logic/rhetoric my professor taught that the first law of honest debate is CHARITY -- one gives the interlocutor the benefit of all doubts and as much charity and good will as one possibly can. One should assume that the other guy is probably as sincere as we are and one should treat him with the courtesy one would want in return. Agree?
"This comment section is slowly deteriorating into just another forum to attack people and things you don't agree with."
Yup. As we see here, righties can be just as ugly and rude and judgemental and closed minded as any wokie. Someone once said: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Can't remember who it was.
Dunno, they say he spent most of his time healing the sick and feeding the hungry, I think he might be accused of being a socialist. The Big Money boys seem not to have liked him.
No dispute there. On balance I'd say the pot is blacker than the kettle but I myself find that to be little consolation -- both are black. It's a cultural and moral race to the bottom, with righties (who used to be conservative) now behaving nearly as badly as lefties (who used to be socialists).
Well, I very much agree. It's sad but simply by swapping a few names like Biden for Trump or liberal for conservative this comment section sounds exactly like one on the progressive spectrum.
Bari, please spare us this kind of thing. This clown reporter was so unserious about learning about thee “other side”. He mocked with tone, looks and words. But at least my impression of city liberals remains unscathed.
I managed to preserve a minute and a half of that. He was playing to the people he knows. I've been going to fairs all my life, and always eat whatever new thing they are frying that year. I've watched pig racing contests, dog jumping contests, and competitive female lumberjacks, call the Lumber Jills.
I suppose we should feel grateful that he is not seething with hate and rage. That's progress of a sort.
I didn't see it that way. This is new territory for him. He's probably a little scared, and his snark is a cover for that. But he is putting himself out there, in his own way, and it's not inconceivable that even if he came back to whichever coast he lives on and said "these are DEFINITELY not my people", he also said "but they are not bad people either, like I thought."
That's progress. Real progress, I mean, rather than regression being called progress. Small steps still need to be lauded, even if they are laughably small.
Yeah, he goes back to his white wine and cheese parties and says "You wouldn't believe the bumkins I ran into last week. They drink beer and eat pork chops on a stick for Christ sake! Just looking at the food made my arteries harden."
Yes. Four years ago he would not have gone at all, and obviously the. NYT where Bari used to work would have been much more heavy handed, if they had tried the story at all. Headline: ignorant Deploreables still somehow support Traitor Trump.
No, Evans, as you've clearly shown, we must remember that only the liberals are the ones "seething with hatred and rage" not the fine, calm rational people who will make someone wear their ass for a hat.
"I wonder if TFP can do something to help me get the 4 minutes and 55 seconds of my life back that I just wasted"
Try watching some of Jesse Waters Street People Interviews on YouTube for a perspective on Ben's people. Your time won't be returned but you laugh so hard you'll forget about it.
Hahaha! I can appreciate the attempt to "bring the country together." Showing the "other side," (i.e., Liberal visiting Republicans) and not from a negative perspective, but an overall positive "lets get to know each other" vibe :)
Dear Bari, Your choice of stories lately has been seriously disappointing. Better start doing better. This guy was a schmuck. The only take away was that an obnoxious gay New Yorker went to Iowa and tried to bate the locals. This is worth a subscription how?
Does anyone know an email for feedback to TFP? I can’t find one on the website, only an email for “tips”. I very much enjoy learning different perspectives from opinions with which I do not agree, but this made me also rethink my subscription.
People on this thread are missing an important point....what you saw in action is gay camp which is a send up of everything. Go back and look at his reporting during the pride parade.....this on Iowa was tame in comparison.
I wonder where urban dwellers like Ben think their arugula comes from?
It’s really hard to take these people seriously: they live in a crime- and filth-infested concrete ghetto; they pay some of the highest taxes and rents in the country for that privilege; they elect and re-elect the stupidest politicians outside of California. Can they point to a single thing THEIR society is making better? Don’t think so.
If you want to read one of the dumbest and scariest pieces of legislation in history take a look at New York's so-called Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act. A recipe for disaster and more pork than there are pigs in Iowa. Subsidies galore for a 'carbon free future" that will ensure that the only things New Yorkers are free of is affordable and reliable electricity and natural gas to heat their homes. Sheer and utter madness.
It’s a sort of collective insanity. And there’s apparently no cure. What New York politicians are willing to do to the population in the name of saving the planet resembles nothing as much as the cultural revolution in China. If people have to die in the cold and the dark on the altar of the climate change orthodoxy, so be it.
So here’s an inconvenient question: what happens when the batteries in the first generation of electric vehicles all start to fail? Can you trade them in? I believe the stat now is that people tend to keep their cars about 10 years. Would you buy a used electric vehicle?
There are a lot of practical issues with EVs (especially if you like camping/nature or long road trips). However, the biggest issue for me is that the elements in batteries (coltan in particular, but increasingly also lithium and copper) are mined by slave child labor under some unimaginably bad conditions. If you consider "major issues affecting humanity," slavery is a rather more terrible one than climate change, IMO.
I agree. I cannot reconcile the “climate savior” role with the “child slave labor” one. To pretend the sourcing of the minerals is not a monumental ethical dilemma is beyond delusional.
I would love to see these hypocrites practice what they preach and outlaw all fossil fuel generated energy in their state and that would include fossil fuel burning vehicles and mandate everybody had to ride a bicycle or roller skate to work.
I used to live in New York writing software. I dunno if it is making society better (I'm going all Ted Kandinsky these days believing computers have basically destroyed us as a species). But high-tech is certainly a contribution coastal "elites" have made which the rest of the world uses. It's not any better for "heartland" Americans to look down on the coastal cities than the coastal types to look down on the heartland. Ultimately, people are people.
When Bari and her team were in planning meetings or whatever they do to come up with topics for articles, they probably thought or said, “you know, let’s show that we’re good people by lowering ourselves and going to a pig festival. We can bear to do without our beluga caviar and $200 bottle of wine until after we get back. Now, what is a pork chop?” The media class does not represent the majority of Americans
Medicine (including cutting edge treatments), TV, movies, music, dance, museums, publishing, banking, tourism, cutting-edge architecture, fashion/clothing, education, assimilating immigrants so that by the second generation they're productive and hard working, and much more.
[Edit: and of course technology, such as this web site that lets you post your opinion.]
As for crime, in terms of absolute numbers you're probably correct but per capita there are far more mid- and small areas that have much higher crime rates than cities like New York or L.A. or even San Francisco with all its problems.
And then, of course, you must add in the corruption that goes with those elite locations. No need to list them all, but the birth of the fake Russian Dossier, the coordinated fraud about the origins of the pandemic, and let’s not forget the inhuman treatment of patients in nursing homes,many of whom died when the “enlightened” governor of New York mandated the return of COVID patients to those facilities.
Great music, art and innovation are not limited to the crumbling cities. Some are simply captives there.
And you may have noticed, technology is finding new homes in other areas.
It’s fine to enjoy where you live. But decaying urban areas are less hospitable to the human species than less crowded ones.
The first kid was right. Biden did raise gas prices. In fact, because the economy is such a complicated organism, it wasn't by just saying "raise prices." His cumulative "green" energy policies have had the effect of raising prices.
We are importing fossil fuels from another country, which means we still need it, and despite the claims to protecting from Climate Change, we are getting it from potentially antagonistic countries, and countries on the SAME planet we are supposed to be protecting. How the hell does this make sense?
I was agreeing with you. The polices were named and that makes the difference. Otherwise it's just throwing shit against the wall to see what sticks. You can't talk about Trump's policies without citing the policies.
This was a 12 year kid who said “Biden raised gas prices”. He has no idea how it happened. It’s what he hears his parents complain about at the dinner table. It’s possible that his parents don’t know how it happened either, but I guarantee you their son doesn’t.
And that's without the added benefit of the global policies of isolating Russia and its energy supply and being petty with Saudi Arabia because Trump wasn't.
This was supposed to be a satirical hit piece on Republican voters, but it totally backfired. Ben is a condescending know it all. The wisest thing in the entire video was the pro Trump kid who said “I don’t know much”. The kids sincere humility was a refreshing counterbore to Ben’s I know it all attitude. The kid showed he is willing to learn, and open to new ideas. Ben thought he had made fun of this kid, but he failed badly. Ben, you are no Michael Moore.
East coast liberals don’t eat meat. Cattle produce methane gas and harms the environment. Don’t you know that? Hunting animals is cruel. Everyone should be a vegetarian. And not fixing your own vehicles gives jobs to mechanics. Job production! 😁
In order to be a successful family farmer, you need to be smart and work exceptionally hard. Many of these "ignorant rubes" are college grads who have terrific scientific and business skills.
And the kids who work tirelessly and proudly to raise and show livestock at county and state fairs should be admired and respected for their dedication, not mocked.
Why would you feel "awkward?" These people are just like the hard working class Americans of the urban and suburban East Coast, albeit with different accents. Have you never worked with them? Shared a beer? Played on a sports team? Dated their sisters? They just get their hands dirty. Otherwise, do you even know them?
Not sure what triggered Compost so hard about this video (having his eyes assaulted by real "flyover country deplorables"???), but he is sure braying loud today.
Bruce Miller, I really don't care *who it is, Comprof or otherwise. I'd really vote for some civility here. These comments are just getting more and more toxic. Herr Fork spoon, totally agree. Let's all try and make our points WITHOUT resorting to ad hominem attacks. (Did I spell that correctly??)
Good for you, Ben -- a gay, liberal man going into an uber conservative setting to gauge the mood and being treated with respect and good humor. I bet a conservative reporter at a liberal gathering would have had a very different reception.
Yep......just ask Andy Ngo. He can tell ya all about the love and tolerance of liberal/progressive gatherings.....and he has the x-rays to back it up......
Or try wearing a red MAGA cap in, say, Williamsburg or the West Village. NY lefties only pretend to be open and tolerant. They are anything but.
"Try that in a big town."
Well played, amigo. Credit where it’s due.
What happened to Andy Ngo was a travesty for all journalists and the justice system. The real Asian hate comes from democrats in the city streets, court rooms, and school boards. Melissa Chen and Konstantin Kisin have the full details: https://konstantinkisin.substack.com/p/andy-ngo-antifa-and-the-breakdown
wy does watching that make me want to see these people jailed for life
Lo!!
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/andy-ngo-right-wing-troll-antifa-877914/amp/
Liberals are not liberal so please stop calling them liberals or progressives. They are neither.
Exactly. They are not liberals, they are leftists who consider the classical liberals to be far right.
Well said and right on the money.
Lol!!!!!
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/andy-ngo-right-wing-troll-antifa-877914/amp/
It would be interesting if a relatively unknown conservative reporter went to a liberal even to try the same thing. If it was a family event, like the Iowa State Fair, I think it would go pretty much the same. Most people aren't that bad.
Kevin Bae, it truly depends on the group / gathering, but just like here at TFP, commenters are both Right & Left of Center. Except for a few (a very few) who can’t seem to be civil, and we quickly recognize who they are! They are too easily offended & wear their feelings on their sleeve, resorting to labeling & can’t manage to show good manners & common sense. Overall, we are a good mix of Americans on this platform.
The Free Press offers us a “safe place😉” to come listen, perhaps learn and agree to disagree civilly. No fear of being cancelled! Thank you again, Bari!
I mostly agree, BUT it would depend on the event in question!
There was a little watched “reality” TV show several years ago called “Welcome to Waverly” which followed a group of diverse urban Left-leaning young folks as they spent a month or so working/living in a tiny town in flyover country. They were paired with a local person in a similar job, and participated in the local community.
Beyond some naïveté of the townies, BY FAR the most INTOLERANT, combative, and dogmatic person was a female “bartender activist” from Brooklyn (no, it wasn’t AOC). Honestly, everyone in a city should watch this (and hopefully absorb its lessons), as it shows how the partisan divide dehumanizes everyone and is really not about anything that truly matters.
You can watch a bit of Savanah Hernandez ( https://www.savsaysofficial.com/ ), who does similar "man on the street" style interview, and she doesn't get too much hate. Part of it is probably just being a Latina woman people assume she's supposed to be "on their side", but she's also quite respectful and never too condescending.
It has to be a white conservative. And he has to be obviously white and conservative for the experiment to work. Savanah is a young attractive woman. I would like to see a Ben Shapiro looking guy do this.
Try it Kevin let us know how it goes!
I'm neither a reporter nor that conservative. Plus I'm a half-Korean multi-culti old man. I blend in wherever I go!
👍🏻
He kept it light and wasn't condescending.
Smokey and the Bandit
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNqmYFi-rrM
I miss that Norm McDonald!
Burt Reynolds?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEghu90QJH4
So good!! Miss him, too!
I love how he ridicules the rando kid for correctly stating that Biden raised gas prices, then asks RFK what the unhealthiest thing he ate was. Hard hitting journalism there.
Can you imagine Richard.
On the whole, nice that he went. But the condescension is a bit much to stomach. I agree with one of the comments: would a conservative reporter have been treated as well at a progressive event? I would like to think so, but I believe we’ve seen clips of conservative reporters being assaulted, having various substances thrown at them and surrounded by red-faced near apoplectic mobs, screaming at them about “putting peoples lives in danger” for having a different opinion.
I would have preferred a serious attempt at actually understanding. Going somewhere to make fun of people is not outreach.
"I would have preferred a serious attempt at actually understanding"
When the price of diesel, gas and propane needed to run their equipment, and fertilizer necessary to increase production (all petroleum based), goes up excessively as it has under the liars and buffoons currently running the country, it makes producing food correspondingly more expensive. Small farmers will be the first to go under. The giant agribusinesses will buy them out and kill off another part of America's legacy. Food selection will decrease as choice is reduced to bland, genetically modified crops they prefer, crops that can survive being sprayed with herbicides and pesticides to reduce labor and production costs. They will ignore the environmental damage to the soil from chronic application of toxins as beneficial microorganisms are decimated. Ironically, when the adverse impact of that ecosystem’s destruction becomes apparent, politicians will blame it on climate change, and city boy fools like Ben will accept the deception as fact.
Food prices have already increased to the point that for far too many Americans, making healthy choices is no longer an option. I didn’t waste my time watching the video, but my guess is Ben didn’t ask any of the farmers what politicians can do to reverse that trend, let alone acknowledge it. I doubt that elitist fools like him and the politicians he admires will ever have such an epiphany.
I watched it and I'm not sure the gentleman had an agenda and not having one may have been the point. I didn't realize he was gay and I honestly don't know why that entered the conversation here. Like race - (and the thousand other American instances of death by hysterical grievance) - unless someone makes it an issue it honestly doesn't cross my mind. The video may be off-putting because it doesn't pick the scabs off any wounds. My knee didn't jerk once. The rise/disappointment for me was wanting the citizens to answer his questions with informed fact, which didn't happen, (the politicians either).
The sense of peace and community was striking. No masked faces. No green hair. No poseur rage. And, there would have been repercussions for senseless violence and vandalism. If anything, the video is an open argument against the fascist "woke" corporatist attempt to destroy our electoral college, and place the destiny of the people attending the fair in the hands of the flash mob/DNC/Davos surveillance state thugs trying to dismantle the Republic. The silence and complicity of the American MSM in obscuring the machinations of the DNC/EU Davos thugdom is criminal and should not be forgotten or forgiven. (Perhaps it is time Americans demand their airwaves back? Revocation and the reallocation of broadcasting licenses might be a place to start.)
This is, to your point, an opportunity to remember that we are a young Republic dependent and in large measure founded upon the belief in the judgement of an educated and empowered citizen farmer and frontiersman. And, we know that from the beginning wealth and finance has distorted and subverted our elected political leadership. Well, we were young and growing. This is a new age and an entirely new ball game. There is an obviously well financed war against the American Constitutional Republic and her citizens. Cities and industry gutted, education subverted, economy looted and abandoned, the last six decades has seen a well executed war against a self-reliant American middle class. What we call the "Democratic" Party is a cabal of political whores and would be despots. It has lined its pockets while holding America hostage to lie after manufactured lie. Trump aside, only the venality of a "banana republic" mass indicts a former president and chief political opponent to maintain power. Unstopped the chaos, looting and disintegration will continue until collapse. If the Republic and the Constitution stand "..we the people.." can survive anything.
I like your optimism. The reason the questions weren't answered is because he was asking children! The politicians, he just cut off after he got his "soundbite".
Yep.
Your point is well taken. Wendell Berry’s The Unsettling of America is about the exact assertions you make. Farms and farmers are being sucked dry by agribusiness to the detriment for us all.
Check out Ben’s recent piece at the Pride event in West Hollywood from a month or so back. He’s just as irreverent with them as well. That’s why I think he’s a really important voice at the moment. He ridicules everything equally.
Well said.
Yeah, William, I picked up the same vibe in this article. I suppose his “10 years ago” opinion of these “ignorant, stupid, deplorable, uneducated, Bible thumping & gun toting, MAGA Red Necks” were found to be nice folks.
I guess Ben Kawaller’s chance to “interact with one of the most exotic species of all: the Republican voter” at “America’s annual country circus” is a far cry from his “musical theater & Chi Pet” experiences.
Glad he came away realizing “many of whom, Trump voters or not, did not fall neatly into any ideological camp”
“Country circus…” I found that lead off to be a smirking, off putting description of an event that highlighted people’s occupations and interests.
He wasn’t condescending. He made himself the joke. Ie not knowing a steer from a barrow! It was sweet and open. And yes, most people are good, though I think a conservative at a CITY event would get guff
I chuckled when he asked if she could tell he was from NY and she said.....a little bit... very cute
I agree, the dripping condescension was off-putting, to say the least.
We used to have such fairs in the eastern states, but they've fallen out of favor. 4-H Clubs are tough to find, and few in metropolitan progressiveland have little clue as to how much work running a farm actually takes...or how risky running a farming business has become.
It's a shame, really, because much of what we enjoy to day would not be possible without their love of the land.
I dunno, in five minutes it seems that a deep discussion isn't going to happen. A friendly cruise around the fair isn't a substitute for the former but it doesn't pretend to be either, it is what it is. As for 'understanding' yes that would be nice -- both ways -- and I hope someone tries it eventually.
Amen!!
Yep. And Trump people never did that to the "liberal media" at Trump rallies.
Were completely "non-Deplorable."
Trump owes the lying Democrat media no respect.
Oh....so that's how it works... "justified Deplorables."
98% of everything said about Trump/what he has done, etc. has been proven to be accurate.
Absolutely NO one owes the media an ounce of respect. Some people owe them money, but there is no respect due to them whatsoever.
boy that's for sure.
Oh,, you sick, sick fool.
Lol. Yep, so much "Non-Deplorable" behavior at Trump rallies
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2016/mar/10/donald-trump-rally-black-man-sucker-punch-north-carolina-video
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.rawstory.com/amp/neo-nazis-at-trump-rally-rough-up-black-woman-youre-scum-your-time-will-come-2649192971
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/article245894725.html
Amen - very well put. You took the words out of my mouth...
Perhaps more like this story:https://nypost.com/2023/08/17/a-journalist-is-attacked-and-smeared-and-the-media-cheers/
“I would have preferred an attempt at actually understanding. Going somewhere to make fun of people is not outreach.”
Exactly.
I was going to say exactly this so I just liked yours.
There's plenty of conservative YouTubers who go to, for example, college campuses and have similar interactions to what is shown in this video. It really depends on venue. If Ben had tried this at, say, a conservative Proud Boys meeting I doubt he would have been treated the same.
No doubt. However, while sometimes entertaining, those YouTubers are not doing journalism. I personally subscribe to TFP for journalism. If it’s going to be satire or comedy, I would prefer it be more clear or at least of higher quality. I don’t think sarcasm is a genre.
Whatever made you think TFP was for journalism? That’s like saying “The Daily Show” and “Last Week Tonight” are hard news.
It might be interesting remark how The Free Press has garnered far more conservative voices than progressive.
I am not sure Bari and Nellie thought that the draw would be so different.
You and I have seen very different college campus interaction videos.
Ben was such a caricature of a politically cloistered New Yorker. His passive aggressive condescension was clownish. He was treated with far more civility by the Iowans than he deserved.
Seriously... my parents came from Brooklyn and they would never have looked down on anyone with the kind of condescension even voiced in this introduction.. “Deplorables?” Seriously, some self awareness of what has become of the city in which you live because of all of the dem policies might be in order.. It only took him a DECADE to consider that there was a different viewpoint than his own. I haven’t even watched the video yet and frankly I’m not sure it’s worth my time. TFP needs to craft its choice of reporters and stories a little bit better than this.
For sure......I mean why not send Walter Kirn?......those are his peeps and he could have actually created a video worth watching......
The working class people in Brooklyn and Queens have nothing in common with Ben, either. Good, solid, salt of the earth types. They'd be fine with the Iowa farmers.
especially the immigrants from countries where Catholicism is present.
However they voted for AOC of all people.
They are brain dead, yellow dog Democrats.
No they didn't. Most people didn't vote in those elections. The percentage turnout in NYC is always miniscule because everyone knows the result ahead of time. AOC won received 16,898 votes in the primary win over Joe Crowley, who polled 12,880. There were more than 200,000 active Democrats in the district.
By virtue of earning the (D) next to her name on the ballot, she then coasted to victory in November with 110k votes - still in a district of more than 200k Dems.
I am very aware of what happened and in the last re-election she ran against a conservative black woman and they still stupidly voted for AOC. What has she done for the people in Bronx/Queens? Absolutely nothing.
What has she done for her district? As far as I can tell:
1) Kept thousands of Amazon jobs out as well as the business they would bring to neighborhoods
2) Demonstrated how to apply lipstick on Twitter
3) Gone on Colbert and late-night where's she's treated like royalty for the sole reason that she's considered hot
To be fair, you can say that about 500+ members of the House and their respective districts.
AOC's district is a wealthier part of Queens and part of the Bronx.
I grew up in the Bronx and lived in both Bronx and Queens. The wealthy areas are basically gone.
Can working class people afford to live in Brooklyn? I thought they had to live in New Jersey and commute.
I think that’s too harsh. Ben said in his intro essay that he would have thought they were deplorable ten years ago, but he no longer does. I found his attitude to be one of friendly curiosity, not condescension.
And that curiosity comes across in the video. People who haven’t watched the video shouldn’t comment. It’s hilarious, and you can tell that the Iowans he’s interviewing are having a good time with him, like the guy talking about drinks in gay bars, and the mom who’s son is answering questions, she’s falling out laughing, totally enjoying the exchange. Never condemn something you haven’t watched or haven’t read.
Ben comes across as a nice guy who likes people and has a sense of humor about himself. I wonder — has this changed him? Will he stand up for Midwesterners in discussions with his woke friends? Or portray them as participants in an “annual circus”?
Ten years ago, Ben was the deplorable...He was also amongst the deplorables just this past election...He supported the corrupt creep that now occupies the White House and the daft fruitcake installed in the CNO's former residence.
| It only took him a DECADE to consider that there was a different viewpoint than his own. |
Isn't that pretty common when you're young, though?
Can you imagine if a conservative "journalist" kept haranguing a 10 year old in Brooklyn about why he "hates Trump" because his parents told him to?
Exactly. Half the video was an episode of "Kids say the Darndest Things".
And public interest note to East Coast journalists: A very small minority of Iowa State Fair attendees are actually farmers, a good chunk are not Trump supporters and all of them are in on the joke that fried state fair food is weird and unhealthy.
Parents have show good moral examples.
I totally agree. He says he has more compassion than distain, but there seems to be quite a bit of distain left. On the other hand, he probably gave many Iowans a good laugh, while confirming their prejudices against big city types.
His bio says he now lives in Los Angeles. May I suggest Ben spend a little bit of time in Miami?
Ben doesn't need to go to Miami if he lives in LA. He could just drive east out to the apple and cherry ranches in San Bernardino. There are many farmers there who are also salt of the earth,
Two places not to live.
Miami is wonderful. Perhaps you mean NYC and LA ?
I would include NYC and Chicago and Detroit and San Francisco and Portland and Seattle and New Orleans and St. Louis and that enough for now.
“Ben was such a caricature of a politically cloistered New Yorker. His passive aggressive condescension was clownish. He was treated with far more civility by the Iowans than he deserved.”
Exactly
Ah, visited the people who feed the city dwellers who probably think food comes from a truck animal. Also the people who would survive a natural or man made (you listening sniffer in chief) national calamity. People who would fight for the country and their fellow Americans and even those less fortunate in other places.
Advice, and no did not watch the video. I don’t enjoy doing videos. Don’t ever think about picking a fight with those who know how to take care of themselves and feed you and would use you as compost. I consider those folks as the backbone of America.
I think Ben liked them too! You need to watch the video! And please, less hostility? Give Ben time to be exposed to the charm of "your" people. Then we can all be less hostile! Spread the love man!
Hostility? That's a stretch.
Terry Brown said "don't pick a fight...with those..who feed you and would use you as compost..." that sounds hostile to me...
Did you read the article? The author raised the subject of picking fights. You sound like you need to unwad your panties to me.
The video’s hilarious
Lol... yeah, Iowa is full of survivalist MacGyvers.
Fight for their country and fellow Americans? They don't even like America or any fellow Americans.
"Backbone of America." LOL! And you call others "elitist?"
Please go back under your bridge. Your taunts are not changing anyone’s mind.
Not here to change minds.
Here to expose hypocrisy and fact-check the MAGA echo-chamber.
What's a handful of a few "targeted responses?"
Well, why not engage with people to find out if they are all the MAGA types you think they are? I don’t think this substack actually appeals to enthusiastic Trump supporters, but I could be mistaken. What I know for sure is that I’m certainly not one.
Agree with you. The FP is for those who can actually think and articulate thoughts. Left or right, so many areas to agree on and the FP helps identify those areas. Trolls just scream and complain and then retreat to their bridge.
No, the FP is for people who think everything is "woke."
Look! Look guys! Silly middle Americans showing pigs and eating fried food! Ask them stupid questions and chuckle at them-especially the kids. It’s better than going to your local zoo! So say the clowns who can’t feed themselves and who think the government is God. Bari just can’t quite shake her Ivy League condescension.
EVERY state fair is like this, not just in Middle America. Even NYC has a 4H club.
No doubt sir, no doubt. Middle America could in a sense be anywhere people are derided for wanting to be independent, hard-working, decent folks. I’m sure there are quite a number of people who would fit that description in NY and every other state in this Union.
If there were ever a better demonstration of the difference between Real America and the Coastal Elite, I'd like to see it. Open, friendly conversation from those whose lives, livelihoods, way of life - and even children - are under constant attack by totalitarians and perverts, versus dripping disdain and condescension from a man who literally couldn't survive a week without the products those people provide.
My friends and acquaintances - almost to the man - believe we are headed for a national divorce, if not a civil war, and I have resisted it - but every day I see what the Elite/Elitists think of the people who keep them alive and think to myself, "God, we are headed for a reckoning, and we are doing it headlong."
I dread it, but if it must be, it must be. As for the author and people like him? Channeling Mr. Cromwell, “Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go.”
As someone who spent the first thirty years of life in a small town on the edge of farm country in (ugh) Illinois and then the next thirty years in (ugh) New Jersey I am not at all surprised by Ben’s smug condescending presentation.
It was quite the culture shock moving to NJ.
And, it does not always equate to the difference between democrats and republicans.
But there is a cultural divide. The coasts are money and prestige driven. They are all in a hurry and consumed with being trendy, more likely to put emphasis on how evolved they are. They definitely look down upon their perceived lessors. You all know the narratives told for generations about farmers or factory workers.
I call them good midwestern values. The values are what are different. They don’t necessarily need a McMansion or expensive shoes or incredibly overpriced clothes or shoes to peacock how successful they are. They most likely don’t feel the importance of attending an Ivy League school to show how smart they are. They don’t look down on coasters, but probably think they are weird and superficial.
Coasters look down upon southerners too. I have found them to be more prejudiced than the west or southerners.
I find the same smugness in Nellie’s weekly roundups. I don’t think they can see it, they just believe they are better than. I find it sad.
My husband is from the Midwest, I grew up in CA. Midwesterners are great, but so are many Californians. My father-in-law read The Millionaire Next Door and I borrowed it from him. I think many midwesterners subscribe to that view of wealth and lifestyle. My husband and I do, it's very freeing. Maybe that's one of the reasons the people at the Iowa State fair are so happy.
The cultural divide is more between those with and without a college education than a particular geographic area. I live near NYC but Chicago is actually my favorite American city. And not all "Midwestern values" are what they're cracked up to be. I've heard more than a few of my friends from the midwest talk about people being "Midwestern nice," which seems to be the equivalent of someone in the South saying "bless your heart."
Thanks Scott, I believe you proved my point.
Your assumption is that people from the Midwest are uneducated? What no one goes to university there? They have not been properly indoctrinated to the right way of thinking?
My second problem with your assumptions is that Chicago reflects in any way the rest of Illinois citizens values. Chicago politicians have ruled and been corrupted the rest of the state for well o
Nailed the attitude!
Chicago has been corrupt for well over one hundred years. I know this as my great grandfather was a farmer 4 hours south of there and wrote about it in detail. Oh and by the way he went to college back in the late 1800’s. My family heritage goes back nearly two hundred years in Illinois. Most of which were farmers or educators.
I never heard of midwestern nice despite having lived there and have many family that still do. Curious. I would say that they are suspicious of strangers until they get to know them.
If Chicago is your favorite American city then I would venture to say that we would disagree about what constitutes niceness.
My SIL is midwestern nice. God forbid she gets drunk and tells you what she really thinks of you. Bless her heart.
Lol I think no matter where you live you might encounter someone, relative or not, who becomes belligerent with alcohol.
I have driven across this country and generally found most Americans to be friendly even here in New Jersey, but there is always that twenty percent who are not. Folks are way more aggressive and quick to argue here.
Channeling Mr. Cromwell, “Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go.”
Brilliant!
The worst part is that they don't even understand that they depend on the people who grow food and build things. They are as oblivious as Marie Antoinette.
The far left are all vegans, vegetarians, and pescatarians. They think we shouldn’t be eating meat, and that raising cattle and pigs causes climate change due to them farting methane, so what we really need to do is shut down all those farmers who raise animals. So they don’t respect people who raise cattle or pigs or chickens or whatever to begin with. One should only depend on those who raise crops, not animals.
Other than the tomatoes I grow myself, most of the fruits and veggies I buy seem to come from Mexico or South America not the U.S. I know corn is grown here but that seems like it's mostly used to make junk food and selling it as a healthy vegetable is just an afterthought.
I don't think a national divorce would be a good thing. But, if you have a kid who goes to school and picks up the Gender Cult religion you feel that the country has already declared war on your family.
"But these days, when I think of the divide between red and blue, rural and urban, I feel more curiosity than disdain. And the idea of going to war (what else do we mean by “national divorce”?) with any of the people I spoke to—many of whom, Trump voters or not, did not fall neatly into any ideological camp—felt so very wrong."
I'm glad it felt wrong. Wouldn't it be nice if progressives (or whatever they are) called off the war they have going against the rest of the country? As it stands they are sure to find themselves "on the wrong side of history" which they proclaim to fear so much. I really liked Yuri's comparison of the Manson cult to the trans cult here: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-become-a-cult-leader
And, these days we are talking about a bunch of minors on synthetic hormones and the butcher block. Europeans have reversed course. See Dr. Grossman's book "Lost in Trans Nation".
Although I think that Gender Grooming has more in common with NXIVM than with the Charles Manson cult.
And they couldn't survive without the tax dollars, paid infrastructure from the "Costal Elites."
Lol! National divorce? Welfare Red States would collapse in a month.
That's what you wimps said about J6. And the King said before the American Revolution. And Hitler said about FDR and the underlying American will power . And Churchill.
Wait till we bring torches, pitchforks, and real live weapons next time. The same cowards that want to eliminate guns, except for their armed security guards, will fold like a cheap WallMard suit made in China....the same place Biden/Harris couldn't find with a map, compass, and flashlight.
Go find a CNN comment section. They need all the America-haters they can find.
Have you ever wondered why our intelligence agencies didn't put a stop to Jan 6?
Pelosi would not allow it.
Ha! Only about a zillion times. And then I remember who benefited from not doing so.
Bingo, you win the prize!
I don't care about Jan. 6th.
Just wish they had been treated like any other group who would have done it. I think it was because they were white.
Lol.....Uh....there were plenty of real wepons at Jan. 6th.
You're right, they weren't treated like any other group. If only they were treated like the BLM rioters. Probably because they're white they were treated worse than other groups.
I think it should be called OBLM - Only Black Lives Matter.
Wow. Didn't say anything about race, Cynthia. But since you went there....
LOL!!!!!
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/06/capitol-mob-police-trump-george-floyd-protests-photos
I agree with you that a group of armed black people storming the capitol would have been treated differently, at least initially (the judges DO seem to be meting out punishment to those who participated even if the police didn't do much on the actual day) but you DID explicitly mention race when you said "I think it was because they were white."
Not at all. All the welfare peeps would go to CA!! No need to pay for anything ever!
Actually, 100% absolutely. Yep....everything in CA is free. Brilliant observation.
Man, if only there were a real life exampke of this...like a major airline shutting down it's only route to a red city near the Texas border....
Top states sucking up federal dollars are Red States.
And don't come back with that "per capita in-state expenditure" nonsense.
The facts are what the facts are.
No, everything is NOT agree. Only merchandise under $950.
Oops free
Yep. It's an epidemic ;)
This comment section is slowly deteriorating into just another forum to attack people and things you don't agree with. If you watched his video at a pride parade he treated those people the same as he treated the Iowa fair goers. The Free Press is supposed to be about balance and presenting different points of view for debate. I think they do that.
I agree, as in my comment above, that it’s important to hear differing, thoughtful viewpoints. I do not like mocking and condescension as a form of “outreach and understanding.” I did not see his other video. Perhaps I would have disliked that one just as much. If this is going to be a channel for comedy and satire, it should advertise itself as such. Since there was no “fair and balanced” context offered with this video, I had to evaluate it on its own merits - which I find sorely lacking.
The same sort of snarky, smarmy condescension that made me despise Jon Stewart.
I agree.
I had no idea he made a video at a pride parade.
Seriously, I could only judge this video on its own merits. Maybe the guy is also condescending to gay people at a pride parade, but he was definitely condescending to Iowans.
He was being honest. Coastal lefties *do* condescend and I'd rather he let that hang out that try to pretend otherwise -- but his friendliness was I think genuine.
Friendly condescension? You can't be serious. Condescension is not friendly.
You have a point there. How to say it then? He clearly views himself as superior, but then again most of us do. He states outright that he's far less inclined to make war on 'farmers' that he once might have been. Given more than five minutes, I dare say he'd want some deep engagement. What would you ask of him? Pretend that he doesn't think he's right and they are wrong? Would you do that? Seems to me it was a very commendable 'outreach' and I'm not picking nits about it. We need much more of the same IMHO.
Sheesh, me, I'd make an effort to engage honestly with either MAGA zombies -- who's leader is an outright criminal not to mention a narcissistic, incompetent, moronic egomaniac who hates democracy -- as well as people so mentally decayed that they think men can get pregnant. It's perfectly normal for monkeys to be completely insane.
I think that clearly felt sense of superiority (elitism) IS the problem. And no, not everyone feels that way. Thankfully. For some, (many I hope) myself included, that faux feeling of superiority is considered a character flaw. Why should people without the flaw be expected to put up with and be mocked by the people who have it? And yes no matter how entrenched my opinion is I invariably couch it, as I have in this comment, with "my opinion", "I think" or some similar qualifier. Only when reciting facts do I state it as objective truth. I read a lot of commentary on here from folks that claim they don't take a side and just wish everybody would listen to each other as they lecture on and on about their preferred position. Which is condescending and IMO (see what I did there?) nothing is more off-putting than condescension. It displays a complete lack of respect for the person being showered with the condescension.
"that clearly felt sense of superiority (elitism) IS the problem."
I'd agree it's a big part of the problem but not the only one. In any case, since it is so common, surely there's going to be no avoiding it and *at least* the author was honest about it, no? The author is at least open to persuasion, I think, and seems to harbor no hostility. IMHO that's a good start.
"with "my opinion", "I think" or some similar qualifier"
Glad to hear it, and I hope your example is noted. In any case, the author seems to understand that he needs to improve on that score and I'll accept his honesty. If we can only converse with people who are perfectly humble we won't have many conversations. Besides, people increasingly can't even agree on what the 'facts' are. As for me, I'll never judge a person on the strength of a five minute video anyway.
When I studied logic/rhetoric my professor taught that the first law of honest debate is CHARITY -- one gives the interlocutor the benefit of all doubts and as much charity and good will as one possibly can. One should assume that the other guy is probably as sincere as we are and one should treat him with the courtesy one would want in return. Agree?
"This comment section is slowly deteriorating into just another forum to attack people and things you don't agree with."
Yup. As we see here, righties can be just as ugly and rude and judgemental and closed minded as any wokie. Someone once said: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Can't remember who it was.
It sure wasn't a Democrat who said it. Think PC/Woke!
Dunno, they say he spent most of his time healing the sick and feeding the hungry, I think he might be accused of being a socialist. The Big Money boys seem not to have liked him.
Instead of diverting, please address my example of PC/Woke not doing unto others.
No dispute there. On balance I'd say the pot is blacker than the kettle but I myself find that to be little consolation -- both are black. It's a cultural and moral race to the bottom, with righties (who used to be conservative) now behaving nearly as badly as lefties (who used to be socialists).
I agree.
Well, I very much agree. It's sad but simply by swapping a few names like Biden for Trump or liberal for conservative this comment section sounds exactly like one on the progressive spectrum.
He is gay and campy......And yes, I loved the way he interviewed people at that pride parade.
And the funny thing is that alot of those people in the pride thing didn't get his humor/sarcasm.
Bari, please spare us this kind of thing. This clown reporter was so unserious about learning about thee “other side”. He mocked with tone, looks and words. But at least my impression of city liberals remains unscathed.
I wonder if TFP can do something to help me get the 4 minutes and 55 seconds of my life back that I just wasted......
I managed to preserve a minute and a half of that. He was playing to the people he knows. I've been going to fairs all my life, and always eat whatever new thing they are frying that year. I've watched pig racing contests, dog jumping contests, and competitive female lumberjacks, call the Lumber Jills.
I suppose we should feel grateful that he is not seething with hate and rage. That's progress of a sort.
He is seething with hate and rage......he just can't show it at the Iowa State Fair or he'll be wearing his ass for a hat. He's gay.....not stupid.
I didn't see it that way. This is new territory for him. He's probably a little scared, and his snark is a cover for that. But he is putting himself out there, in his own way, and it's not inconceivable that even if he came back to whichever coast he lives on and said "these are DEFINITELY not my people", he also said "but they are not bad people either, like I thought."
That's progress. Real progress, I mean, rather than regression being called progress. Small steps still need to be lauded, even if they are laughably small.
Yeah, I thought it was innocent fun. Sometimes we need to lighten up.
No. BillS, remember, here at the FP it is only the liberals that are "seething with hatred and rage."
There was palpable disdain, but no obvious hatred. A step forward?
Yeah, he goes back to his white wine and cheese parties and says "You wouldn't believe the bumkins I ran into last week. They drink beer and eat pork chops on a stick for Christ sake! Just looking at the food made my arteries harden."
Yes. Four years ago he would not have gone at all, and obviously the. NYT where Bari used to work would have been much more heavy handed, if they had tried the story at all. Headline: ignorant Deploreables still somehow support Traitor Trump.
Fair enough......I can get down with that. Have a great day!
No, Evans, as you've clearly shown, we must remember that only the liberals are the ones "seething with hatred and rage" not the fine, calm rational people who will make someone wear their ass for a hat.
Why would he be in danger?
Have you ever been chased by a wild duck? Frightening.
Or, a mother goose protecting her goslings.
Geese are vicious.
"I wonder if TFP can do something to help me get the 4 minutes and 55 seconds of my life back that I just wasted"
Try watching some of Jesse Waters Street People Interviews on YouTube for a perspective on Ben's people. Your time won't be returned but you laugh so hard you'll forget about it.
Hahaha! I can appreciate the attempt to "bring the country together." Showing the "other side," (i.e., Liberal visiting Republicans) and not from a negative perspective, but an overall positive "lets get to know each other" vibe :)
But still kind of condescending, no?
Totally.
Dear Bari, Your choice of stories lately has been seriously disappointing. Better start doing better. This guy was a schmuck. The only take away was that an obnoxious gay New Yorker went to Iowa and tried to bate the locals. This is worth a subscription how?
Does anyone know an email for feedback to TFP? I can’t find one on the website, only an email for “tips”. I very much enjoy learning different perspectives from opinions with which I do not agree, but this made me also rethink my subscription.
They read the "tips."
bait.
The other spelling implies something else. Although he may have tried that too...
oh, right. oops! sorry
People on this thread are missing an important point....what you saw in action is gay camp which is a send up of everything. Go back and look at his reporting during the pride parade.....this on Iowa was tame in comparison.
I usually defend Bari but I am with you on this one.
I wonder where urban dwellers like Ben think their arugula comes from?
It’s really hard to take these people seriously: they live in a crime- and filth-infested concrete ghetto; they pay some of the highest taxes and rents in the country for that privilege; they elect and re-elect the stupidest politicians outside of California. Can they point to a single thing THEIR society is making better? Don’t think so.
If you want to read one of the dumbest and scariest pieces of legislation in history take a look at New York's so-called Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act. A recipe for disaster and more pork than there are pigs in Iowa. Subsidies galore for a 'carbon free future" that will ensure that the only things New Yorkers are free of is affordable and reliable electricity and natural gas to heat their homes. Sheer and utter madness.
It’s a sort of collective insanity. And there’s apparently no cure. What New York politicians are willing to do to the population in the name of saving the planet resembles nothing as much as the cultural revolution in China. If people have to die in the cold and the dark on the altar of the climate change orthodoxy, so be it.
So here’s an inconvenient question: what happens when the batteries in the first generation of electric vehicles all start to fail? Can you trade them in? I believe the stat now is that people tend to keep their cars about 10 years. Would you buy a used electric vehicle?
Currently about 20% of EVs are traded in for the old fashioned fill-er-up cars teenagers, grown men, hot chicks, and my grandfather loved.
I'd bet over time that number grows. Especially when someone points out that it requires 2 tons of coal to run an EV 15,000 miles.
There are a lot of practical issues with EVs (especially if you like camping/nature or long road trips). However, the biggest issue for me is that the elements in batteries (coltan in particular, but increasingly also lithium and copper) are mined by slave child labor under some unimaginably bad conditions. If you consider "major issues affecting humanity," slavery is a rather more terrible one than climate change, IMO.
I agree. I cannot reconcile the “climate savior” role with the “child slave labor” one. To pretend the sourcing of the minerals is not a monumental ethical dilemma is beyond delusional.
So we sacrifice some poor third world children to save the world. Choices must be made! /s
"what happens when the batteries in the first generation of electric vehicles all start to fail?"
Sometimes there's a lot of fire and smoke.
https://www.carscoops.com/2023/08/chevy-bolt-ev-that-missed-battery-recall-spontaneously-combusted-on-mass-driveway/
Yikes 😲
I would love to see these hypocrites practice what they preach and outlaw all fossil fuel generated energy in their state and that would include fossil fuel burning vehicles and mandate everybody had to ride a bicycle or roller skate to work.
I used to live in New York writing software. I dunno if it is making society better (I'm going all Ted Kandinsky these days believing computers have basically destroyed us as a species). But high-tech is certainly a contribution coastal "elites" have made which the rest of the world uses. It's not any better for "heartland" Americans to look down on the coastal cities than the coastal types to look down on the heartland. Ultimately, people are people.
Well said. You nailed it!
When Bari and her team were in planning meetings or whatever they do to come up with topics for articles, they probably thought or said, “you know, let’s show that we’re good people by lowering ourselves and going to a pig festival. We can bear to do without our beluga caviar and $200 bottle of wine until after we get back. Now, what is a pork chop?” The media class does not represent the majority of Americans
Well said. You made me laugh.
🤗
Medicine (including cutting edge treatments), TV, movies, music, dance, museums, publishing, banking, tourism, cutting-edge architecture, fashion/clothing, education, assimilating immigrants so that by the second generation they're productive and hard working, and much more.
[Edit: and of course technology, such as this web site that lets you post your opinion.]
As for crime, in terms of absolute numbers you're probably correct but per capita there are far more mid- and small areas that have much higher crime rates than cities like New York or L.A. or even San Francisco with all its problems.
And then, of course, you must add in the corruption that goes with those elite locations. No need to list them all, but the birth of the fake Russian Dossier, the coordinated fraud about the origins of the pandemic, and let’s not forget the inhuman treatment of patients in nursing homes,many of whom died when the “enlightened” governor of New York mandated the return of COVID patients to those facilities.
Great music, art and innovation are not limited to the crumbling cities. Some are simply captives there.
And you may have noticed, technology is finding new homes in other areas.
It’s fine to enjoy where you live. But decaying urban areas are less hospitable to the human species than less crowded ones.
Except for medicine, all those things are relatively unimportant for the survival of the species.
This is true. My town of 70,000 is on the map of most dangerous cities in the US. Meanwhile, rural Amish country is just a county over.
Those farmers seem like nice people.
Most people, when afforded the opportunity, are "nice people." Most does not include all.
The snark at children was unnecessary.
The first kid was right. Biden did raise gas prices. In fact, because the economy is such a complicated organism, it wasn't by just saying "raise prices." His cumulative "green" energy policies have had the effect of raising prices.
Before Biden, we were oil independent and we exported it. Now we aren't oil independent and we import it.
Obama did everything he possibly could to stifle oil production in the US.
We are importing fossil fuels from another country, which means we still need it, and despite the claims to protecting from Climate Change, we are getting it from potentially antagonistic countries, and countries on the SAME planet we are supposed to be protecting. How the hell does this make sense?
It doesn't make sense but it does to a Democrat.
That's the most coherent explanation I've heard. You can't just say, Biden raised prices.
His policies sure as hell did.
Could you reference my post so I see what you're talking about? Thanks.
"You can't just say, Biden raised prices." His policies raised gas prices so you can say Biden raised prices.
I was agreeing with you. The polices were named and that makes the difference. Otherwise it's just throwing shit against the wall to see what sticks. You can't talk about Trump's policies without citing the policies.
This was a 12 year kid who said “Biden raised gas prices”. He has no idea how it happened. It’s what he hears his parents complain about at the dinner table. It’s possible that his parents don’t know how it happened either, but I guarantee you their son doesn’t.
And that's without the added benefit of the global policies of isolating Russia and its energy supply and being petty with Saudi Arabia because Trump wasn't.
All of it intentional.
This was supposed to be a satirical hit piece on Republican voters, but it totally backfired. Ben is a condescending know it all. The wisest thing in the entire video was the pro Trump kid who said “I don’t know much”. The kids sincere humility was a refreshing counterbore to Ben’s I know it all attitude. The kid showed he is willing to learn, and open to new ideas. Ben thought he had made fun of this kid, but he failed badly. Ben, you are no Michael Moore.
I'd like to see an east coast liberal:
1. Fix a car, tractor, etc.
2. Farm a plot of land
3. Capture/kill their own meat without a guide
4. Raise children that aren't trans, neurotic, entitled, or lazy
5. Work 364 days a year (only Christmas off)
Please try any/all and tell me again how stupid these deplorables are.
East coast liberals don’t eat meat. Cattle produce methane gas and harms the environment. Don’t you know that? Hunting animals is cruel. Everyone should be a vegetarian. And not fixing your own vehicles gives jobs to mechanics. Job production! 😁
As an east coast Republican, I would feel a bit awkward there too.
However, these are the fly-over people that are often mocked as ignorant rubes.
We rely on them for way more than we'll ever know.
Infinitely more than any coastal "influencer"
In order to be a successful family farmer, you need to be smart and work exceptionally hard. Many of these "ignorant rubes" are college grads who have terrific scientific and business skills.
And the kids who work tirelessly and proudly to raise and show livestock at county and state fairs should be admired and respected for their dedication, not mocked.
Why would you feel "awkward?" These people are just like the hard working class Americans of the urban and suburban East Coast, albeit with different accents. Have you never worked with them? Shared a beer? Played on a sports team? Dated their sisters? They just get their hands dirty. Otherwise, do you even know them?
Yeah, and they rely on Blue States to subsidize their red wlefare state, build their infrastructure, etc.
What Infrastructure do farmers use, genius? Their products are shipped by trucks. To feed the denizens of Democrat run urban disasters.
The whole state, genius. Especially roads.
Nope. Plenty of farmerd and agriculture in Blue States.
Farmers pay taxes that support roads. Every state has them. You're a braying fool.
Not sure what triggered Compost so hard about this video (having his eyes assaulted by real "flyover country deplorables"???), but he is sure braying loud today.
I'm sure the DNC pays him for his idiocy. Maybe he needs vacation cash?
Not triggered at all. Just enjoy hearing about the "Middle America/Red State elites"....right?
You were doing ok until the "braying fool." Unnecessary. I'd to see a moratorium on name calling.
But it's Comprof. L'idiot du village. Our very own court jester.
Bruce Miller, I really don't care *who it is, Comprof or otherwise. I'd really vote for some civility here. These comments are just getting more and more toxic. Herr Fork spoon, totally agree. Let's all try and make our points WITHOUT resorting to ad hominem attacks. (Did I spell that correctly??)
Nope. Their taxes do not fund enough development in their states, you braying fool.
They have to suck off the tax-teat of Blue cities/states to fund their infrastructure, braying fool.
The lack of lucidity in your posts bespeaks a deep and troubling deficiency of thought. As if you know anything of economics.