As a Texan who couldn't imagine leaving, it is a nightmare to watch those in power sell our state for parts. Watching how Elon is blowing up public beaches for his shitty rockets, professors getting fired for the most mildly inclusive syllabi, and especially to see the public schools that raised me to be enshittified. It just makes me want to remind everyone from the outside that there are many, many of us who can't stand this and are trying to save our communities in the face of these powerful, rich vampires. We have beautiful canyons and rivers and forests and beaches, diverse communities and rich cultures, and despite the political challenges, it is a wonderful place to live.
Same here. I am a self-loathing Texan who loves his home state but passionately hates its politicians, laws, and much of its culture. I wish there was a real opposition party to make me feel like I had a choice and a chance at the (increasingly hard-to-access) polls.
Thanks Lauren for helping me mitigate my animus toward Texans, produced by the skewed imagery we get here in the east. There’s a need for us the decent to make contact as we don’t have our golf and yachting clubs for schmoozing over our plans for humanity. There’s a lot about education here, but between the lines, there’s the one we are now getting with some help from Mr Nolan. Alarmingly has the cliche’ about ALL of us unrich needing to recognize each other made compelling by the political developments described herein. By decent I mean those whose peace depends on the widespread wellbeing of others as opposed to their exploitation. An oppressive error for me in American culture is the equating of success with achieving superiority. We are faced with taking over our nation. This WE has to be relentlessly articulated. A re-education is in order.
Since I once worked at an elite college in the Northeast, I can attest that they have profited from this Southern strategy for a very long time. The 1,000 or so affluent families who ruled the South before the Civil War routinely sent their children to Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Dartmouth, and other elite colleges to be educated. That's how so many of their buildings got named after Southern politicians and leaders. After being educated, the offspring would return to run their parents' plantation or business. Local poor whites and, of course, slaves suffered. This history has been coming to light in recent years, much to the chagrin and shame of these institutions.
The game is indeed long. What's going on in Texas, Florida, and other Southern states is only the 21st-century version.
Lifelong Southerner here currently hiding in Atlanta. I saw this cycle over and over and over again when I worked for the TN general assembly. At least once while I lived there, city and state leadership opted to PAY a company millions of dollars on TOP of the tax breaks to bring their business to TN, and then the company just...opted not move. The money was gone. The jobs never materialized. And then these wackos would just turn around and do it all again! Anyway, thank you for this essay. It's like you took my interior rantings of the last two decades and nicely phrased them for publication. Keep up the good work.
In a burst of progressive thinking, my state, Washington, has approved a 9.9% tax on personal income above $1 million to take effect in 2028. Cue the predictable kvetching over millionaires fleeing the state and the Seahawks being hampered in their ability to lure quality free agents to play for them (Horrors!) I reply to these naysayers with Archie Bunker's time-tested aphorism: "Shut up you."
Fantastically well written as usual if ultimately a bit depressing as it is so true. And of course these wealthy parasites have many ulterior motives for gutting the public schools. Besides preventing any "liberal" brainwashing or ability for critical thinking, creating ineffective schools will "justify" the need for vouchers so parents can send their kids to better private schools. Never mind that most working class folks still won't be able to afford private schools (and they want have the capacity by design anyway). So the masses get more ignorant while also subsidizing the better off to continue to live in an alternate reality.
Since the 1950s, the top individual tax rate has dropped from 92% to 37%. The top corporate tax rate has dropped from 52% to 21%. Republican politicians work for the big money donors who finance their culture war political campaigns. The Republican base is simply used to provide the necessary votes.
Hamilton Nolan is oh so right. In Arizona's drought, land and the precious water in the unrefillable aquifers below it, was sold to Saudi Arabia to grow thirsty alfalfa that's turned into hay and shipped to Arabia. All this while, the locals' land and crops go dry. https://floodlightnews.org/saudi-owned-corporate-farms-are-draining-arizonas-desert-dry/
Still combatting Reconstruction. A lot of southern poor are black, and “heritage“ requires preserving slavery by any means necessary. Destroying the public sphere is one key way.
One of the reasons I moved out of North Texas is that the property tax burden was killing me, and I couldn't see continuing to pay $10k+ every year into retirement. From 2004, when I first moved there, to 2022, when I left, the state reduced its portion of school funding vs property tax funded from about 70%-30% to about 55%-45%. This was the main reason for soaring property taxes. The Republicans who control the state have always talked about reducing the property tax burden, but there is really no way to do that without drastically defunding the public schools or increasing the amount that the state pays in. They could also close tax loopholes that enable commercial property owners to drastically reduce their property tax burden, but as you note, they are part of the constituency that wants lower taxes and doesn't care much about public schools.
Yes-- and relatedly one of the reasons why teachers unions are so vital in red states in particular. They are often the strongest political force resisting the overwhelming incentive to defund schools in order to make the tax math work as Republicans want.
Ohio rust belt here. If you look at the Rust Belt, it’s the same roadkill with a different smell. Same family as the cannibal South, different origin story. Generations of Americans told don’t worry, there’s always the factory. Be dumb and breed. The factory rewards the genetics that clock in on time, does the task, doesn’t ask questions. Management called it a good worker. Darwin would call it something else. No critical thought of any form. Why invest in schools when educated people leave the factory? Factories leave anyway. Undereducated population stays. Begin the extraction cycle. Vote against yourself because TV told you so. We took a longer path to nowhere, but here we are.
Your comment perfectly encapsulates my rural Ohio hometown. The school district has been the least-funded of all area districts for decades. They haven’t gotten new money from the community since 1992. When elections roll around, a large swath of the community actively campaigns against any levy that’s proposed. Then those same people get pissed when the school board says they need to cut bus transportation or — God forbid! — sports. Meanwhile, our U.S. House rep (a famously brazen bootlicker of Drumpf) has done nothing for his alma mater or home community. Well, he did finally put a campaign sign in his front yard telling folks to vote for the schools, but everyone who saw it on Facebook said that the images were AI. When people pointed out that they had actually seen the sign and that it was real, the follow up was that some libtard put the sign there. At this point, Christ could return to speak up for the welfare and education of the community’s children and He would be shouted down as too woke.
It’s worse. Trumpists are doing all they can to disenfranchise citizens of blue states, attacking mail-in balloting, women’s vote, and poor people who don’t have US IDs. Meanwhile the red states that suck in more tax revenue than they give want to dominate elections for 50 years. It’s the enslavement of America. They love that stuff. The New Confederacy.
This reminds me of the much more benign dichotomy of how to attract tourists.
The first method, analogous to Southern Cannibalism, is to turn your town into a carnival. Line the streets with tourist traps and themed restaurants and drive your residents into hiding during the season. Make the place a mob scene of drunken tourists and have only low paying tourism jobs that disappear off-season.
The other method is to make your town an interesting and beautiful place with cultural events going on and add capacity so that strangers can share it. You get fewer tourists in total, but a better mixed economy overall and a higher standard of living.
We have all seen the first kind of tourist town. Far fewer of the second. It's hard to transition from the first to the second style once the place has a reputation.
They're doing it in NC too, with the newly GOP-dominated board of governors for the state's university system. It's such a shame, too - UNC's flagship university at Chapel Hill is world class. Or...at least it was. God only knows what it'll become after these fucking jackals are done with it.
As a Texan who couldn't imagine leaving, it is a nightmare to watch those in power sell our state for parts. Watching how Elon is blowing up public beaches for his shitty rockets, professors getting fired for the most mildly inclusive syllabi, and especially to see the public schools that raised me to be enshittified. It just makes me want to remind everyone from the outside that there are many, many of us who can't stand this and are trying to save our communities in the face of these powerful, rich vampires. We have beautiful canyons and rivers and forests and beaches, diverse communities and rich cultures, and despite the political challenges, it is a wonderful place to live.
Same here. I am a self-loathing Texan who loves his home state but passionately hates its politicians, laws, and much of its culture. I wish there was a real opposition party to make me feel like I had a choice and a chance at the (increasingly hard-to-access) polls.
Thanks Lauren for helping me mitigate my animus toward Texans, produced by the skewed imagery we get here in the east. There’s a need for us the decent to make contact as we don’t have our golf and yachting clubs for schmoozing over our plans for humanity. There’s a lot about education here, but between the lines, there’s the one we are now getting with some help from Mr Nolan. Alarmingly has the cliche’ about ALL of us unrich needing to recognize each other made compelling by the political developments described herein. By decent I mean those whose peace depends on the widespread wellbeing of others as opposed to their exploitation. An oppressive error for me in American culture is the equating of success with achieving superiority. We are faced with taking over our nation. This WE has to be relentlessly articulated. A re-education is in order.
Since I once worked at an elite college in the Northeast, I can attest that they have profited from this Southern strategy for a very long time. The 1,000 or so affluent families who ruled the South before the Civil War routinely sent their children to Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Dartmouth, and other elite colleges to be educated. That's how so many of their buildings got named after Southern politicians and leaders. After being educated, the offspring would return to run their parents' plantation or business. Local poor whites and, of course, slaves suffered. This history has been coming to light in recent years, much to the chagrin and shame of these institutions.
The game is indeed long. What's going on in Texas, Florida, and other Southern states is only the 21st-century version.
Lifelong Southerner here currently hiding in Atlanta. I saw this cycle over and over and over again when I worked for the TN general assembly. At least once while I lived there, city and state leadership opted to PAY a company millions of dollars on TOP of the tax breaks to bring their business to TN, and then the company just...opted not move. The money was gone. The jobs never materialized. And then these wackos would just turn around and do it all again! Anyway, thank you for this essay. It's like you took my interior rantings of the last two decades and nicely phrased them for publication. Keep up the good work.
In a burst of progressive thinking, my state, Washington, has approved a 9.9% tax on personal income above $1 million to take effect in 2028. Cue the predictable kvetching over millionaires fleeing the state and the Seahawks being hampered in their ability to lure quality free agents to play for them (Horrors!) I reply to these naysayers with Archie Bunker's time-tested aphorism: "Shut up you."
Fantastically well written as usual if ultimately a bit depressing as it is so true. And of course these wealthy parasites have many ulterior motives for gutting the public schools. Besides preventing any "liberal" brainwashing or ability for critical thinking, creating ineffective schools will "justify" the need for vouchers so parents can send their kids to better private schools. Never mind that most working class folks still won't be able to afford private schools (and they want have the capacity by design anyway). So the masses get more ignorant while also subsidizing the better off to continue to live in an alternate reality.
Depressingly bang on.
Greed paves the road to idiocracy.
One gentle correction - paved.
Since the 1950s, the top individual tax rate has dropped from 92% to 37%. The top corporate tax rate has dropped from 52% to 21%. Republican politicians work for the big money donors who finance their culture war political campaigns. The Republican base is simply used to provide the necessary votes.
Marvellous piece, Hamilton. Should be distributed on pamphlets in the south.
Hamilton Nolan is oh so right. In Arizona's drought, land and the precious water in the unrefillable aquifers below it, was sold to Saudi Arabia to grow thirsty alfalfa that's turned into hay and shipped to Arabia. All this while, the locals' land and crops go dry. https://floodlightnews.org/saudi-owned-corporate-farms-are-draining-arizonas-desert-dry/
Plantation Nation.
Still combatting Reconstruction. A lot of southern poor are black, and “heritage“ requires preserving slavery by any means necessary. Destroying the public sphere is one key way.
One of the reasons I moved out of North Texas is that the property tax burden was killing me, and I couldn't see continuing to pay $10k+ every year into retirement. From 2004, when I first moved there, to 2022, when I left, the state reduced its portion of school funding vs property tax funded from about 70%-30% to about 55%-45%. This was the main reason for soaring property taxes. The Republicans who control the state have always talked about reducing the property tax burden, but there is really no way to do that without drastically defunding the public schools or increasing the amount that the state pays in. They could also close tax loopholes that enable commercial property owners to drastically reduce their property tax burden, but as you note, they are part of the constituency that wants lower taxes and doesn't care much about public schools.
Yes-- and relatedly one of the reasons why teachers unions are so vital in red states in particular. They are often the strongest political force resisting the overwhelming incentive to defund schools in order to make the tax math work as Republicans want.
Ohio rust belt here. If you look at the Rust Belt, it’s the same roadkill with a different smell. Same family as the cannibal South, different origin story. Generations of Americans told don’t worry, there’s always the factory. Be dumb and breed. The factory rewards the genetics that clock in on time, does the task, doesn’t ask questions. Management called it a good worker. Darwin would call it something else. No critical thought of any form. Why invest in schools when educated people leave the factory? Factories leave anyway. Undereducated population stays. Begin the extraction cycle. Vote against yourself because TV told you so. We took a longer path to nowhere, but here we are.
Your comment perfectly encapsulates my rural Ohio hometown. The school district has been the least-funded of all area districts for decades. They haven’t gotten new money from the community since 1992. When elections roll around, a large swath of the community actively campaigns against any levy that’s proposed. Then those same people get pissed when the school board says they need to cut bus transportation or — God forbid! — sports. Meanwhile, our U.S. House rep (a famously brazen bootlicker of Drumpf) has done nothing for his alma mater or home community. Well, he did finally put a campaign sign in his front yard telling folks to vote for the schools, but everyone who saw it on Facebook said that the images were AI. When people pointed out that they had actually seen the sign and that it was real, the follow up was that some libtard put the sign there. At this point, Christ could return to speak up for the welfare and education of the community’s children and He would be shouted down as too woke.
It’s worse. Trumpists are doing all they can to disenfranchise citizens of blue states, attacking mail-in balloting, women’s vote, and poor people who don’t have US IDs. Meanwhile the red states that suck in more tax revenue than they give want to dominate elections for 50 years. It’s the enslavement of America. They love that stuff. The New Confederacy.
This reminds me of the much more benign dichotomy of how to attract tourists.
The first method, analogous to Southern Cannibalism, is to turn your town into a carnival. Line the streets with tourist traps and themed restaurants and drive your residents into hiding during the season. Make the place a mob scene of drunken tourists and have only low paying tourism jobs that disappear off-season.
The other method is to make your town an interesting and beautiful place with cultural events going on and add capacity so that strangers can share it. You get fewer tourists in total, but a better mixed economy overall and a higher standard of living.
We have all seen the first kind of tourist town. Far fewer of the second. It's hard to transition from the first to the second style once the place has a reputation.
They're doing it in NC too, with the newly GOP-dominated board of governors for the state's university system. It's such a shame, too - UNC's flagship university at Chapel Hill is world class. Or...at least it was. God only knows what it'll become after these fucking jackals are done with it.