Working-Class Whites Watch: Day 105

Anyone who is tuned in to the state of American politics knows that the most important demographic supporting The Stain are so-called 'working-class whites'.  And if you know that, then you probably also know that this demographic is suffering a great deal from 'deaths of despair', caused in part by opioid addiction:

“Much of the relationship between mortality and Trump’s performance is explained by economic factors; counties with higher economic distress and larger working-class presence also have higher mortality rates and came out strongly for Trump,” Monnat wrote. “In many of the counties where Trump did the best, economic precarity has been building and social and family networks have been breaking down for several decades.”

The Bloomberg article quoted above cites a study by Princeton University's Anne Case and Angus Deaton, which among other things states that "Controlling opioids is an obvious priority" in addressing the problem.

So you will probably be unsurprised to learn that The Stain is doing the exact opposite, proposing a 95 percent reduction in funding for the office leading the fight against opioid addiction:

 It's the latest item in the Trump agenda that addiction advocates fear would erode the government's ability to fight an epidemic killing more than 47,000 Americans per year. Since taking office, the Trump administration has fought to pass an Obamacare repeal bill that would result in millions more without coverage; fired a surgeon general who led an unprecedented study of the opioid crisis; proposed billions of dollars of cuts to public health funding; and signaled a return to the tough-on-drugs approach to fighting addiction.

This move seems to be motivated by The Stain's fundamental belief that it Obama did something, it must be reversed.  And if that's really the driving force behind his presidency, it's going to be a long 4 years --- not least for the working-class whites who helped put him there in the first place.

They Get It

I live in Minnesota's 2nd Congressional district.  Most of the handful of people reading this don't, so I'm going to start this post by showing you the results of the 2016 congressional election in our district:

Now, you probably don't know much about the policy views of Angie Craig or Paula Overby.  I don't, either.  But what little I do know about those two candidates leads me to believe that they are further to the left than your average Democrat.

I will also point out that in the five elections preceding this one, the Democrat had never come within 8 points of winning.  I personally invested a ton of volunteer hours for a candidate who lost by 17 points in 2006.  So Democrats can be excused for feeling at least a little bit of frustration over the 28,869 votes collected by independent candidate Paula Overby.  An argument could be made (and has been) that Overby cost the Democrats their best chance at winning this seat in over a decade.

The reason I'm talking about this is that it just so happens that I was in the same room tonight with both Paula Overby and Angie Craig, and politics was discussed.  In fact, politics and plans to defeat Jason Lewis were the whole point of the meeting.  So one might expect that there would be some tension between these two women.

But there wasn't.  To my knowledge, neither has announced a decision to run again --- or not --- in 2018.  But when Angie Craig made what sounded an awful lot like a campaign speech, I saw Paula Overby applaud.  And for her part, Angie made a special point of being friendly with Paula.

This is how it's supposed to work.  Paula and Angie (and I) all share a common goal: making sure that Jason Lewis is a one-term congressman, and making sure that Donald Trump is a one-term president.  It's clear that neither one of them has the time or the inclination to hurl insults at the other, or re-litigate the election outcome.

There are supporters of both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders who would do well to learn from Angie and Paula's example.

Write You Congress Critter: Oppose the AHCA

This is the letter I sent to my congressman, Jason Lewis, this evening.  All are encouraged to use it as a template for letters of their own.

Imagine my surprise when I read this evening that Paul Ryan is planning to move forward with a vote on the Republican replacement for the ACA tomorrow, May 4.  This, despite the fact that the current version of the bill has not been released to the public nor scored by the CBO.

I wonder what Jason Lewis, the radio personality, would have said if Democrats had passed the ACA under similar circumstances.  As you are no doubt aware, President Obama made a concerted effort to get Republican input into the ACA, allowing working groups in the House and Senate to debate for four months --- before it finally became clear that Republicans were negotiating in bad faith to delay the bill's passage.  And despite that, Republicans insist on spreading the falsehood that the ACA was somehow 'rammed through' Congress.

What would talk show host Jason Lewis have said if Democrats had voted on the bill WITHOUT releasing it to the public and WITHOUT waiting for the CBO to score it.  I imagine he would have spent considerable time attacking the Democrats for lacking transparency and for trying to ram a bad bill into law --- and he would have been right to do so.

So I wonder why it is that congressman Jason Lewis is planning to vote for this bill?

Setting aside legislative hijinks, what IS known about the bill is that it is a very bad bill.  Unless something has changed significantly --- and there's no reason to believe that it has --- it will still deprive 26 million Americans of health care, just like the bill which failed in March.  It will still slash $370 billion from Medicaid.  It will still lead to an estimated 17,000 deaths per year.

And now as a bonus, we've learned that in order to draw more support from Tea Party Republicans, it will also allow states to apply for a waiver of the 'pre-existing conditions' regulations of the ACA, a provision which has the support of 52% of Democrats and 48% of Republicans.  This despite the fact that President Trump promised just 3 days ago that those with pre-existing conditions would continue to be protected under the new law.

Of course, it's no fun kicking away grandma's cane if you can't top it off with a large helping of hypocrisy, served in the form of a provision that members of Congress will continue to enjoy all of the ACA's benefits.

Come on, congressman.  If you have any concern whatsoever about the well-being of your constituents, you cannot support this bill.  And if you do vote 'Yea' on it, please don't come back to our district and try to tell us with a straight face that you did it in the best interest of your constituents.  There is no reason for anyone to support this bill, unless they want to demonstrate their fealty to a president with a 42% approval rating --- or shovel obscene tax cuts up to the wealthiest Americans at the expense of the most vulnerable.


In fact, if you do vote 'Yea' on this bill, don't bother coming back to the district at all.  I know I plan to do everything I can that you don't have your job for long.