Paul Krugman is angry at farmers

Former Enron advisor and current New York Times columnist Paul Krugman is angry at farmers. What’s earned his wrath is that they vote for Donald Trump. He says they vote for Trump because they’re afflicted with “white rural rage.”

Let’s examine the components of Krugman’s catchy phrase “white rural rage.”

As for rural, it is certainly true that Trump does better in rural areas than in, say, downtown Chicago or Baltimore. Then again, everybody does better – wherever they are – than they would in the toilets of downtown Chicago or Baltimore.

It’s not obvious that the politics of these rural folk are dictated by their Green Acres. Plenty of suburbanites vote for Trump too. After all, farmers comprise fewer than six million people in the U.S., while Trump won over 74 million votes last time. If every single farmer voted for Trump, that would still leave him more than 68 million short of the votes he actually received.

So, are the suburbanites and urbanites angry too? Maybe.

As for white, it’s true that Trump does better with white people than with BLack people. But there’s a couple hundred million white people in America, and Trump got only those aforementioned 74 million votes.

OK, maybe more, but let’s not go there today. In any event, Trump clearly isn’t getting all the white vote.

Compared to most Republicans, Trump is doing quite well with racial minorities. Millions of the people who voted for him are Black or Hispanic or Asian. His supporters are – dare I say it? – diverse. Is this entire multicolored constituency full of rage?

Maybe.

Which brings us to the last of Krugman’s angry accusations about Trump voters – that they’re full of rage. That, he says, is because they’re losers in a changing economy and changing world. They’re deplorable. They’re bitterly clinging.

Indeed, many Trump voters are angry, but not for the reasons that Krugman suggests. They’re angry that their country’s borders are left undefended; they’re angry that the military is well woke but can’t even lose a war gracefully, much less win one; they’re angry that Biden runs up trillion dollar deficits and double-digit inflation to pay for “free” stuff for his favored constituencies; they’re angry that the whole Biden family sells political influence to foreign governments for millions; they’re angry that Biden wants to throw the Israelis into the oven in order to bribe a few terrorist sympathizers in Michigan to vote for him; they’re angry that Joe himself is obviously non compos mentis while his caretakers gaslight us with preposterous stories that he’s sharp as a tack as soon as the cameras are turned off.

Yes, it’s fair to say that many Trump voters are angry.

But note this, Mr. Krugman. You’ve probably never met a farmer, but they deal with their anger straight up. If they’re angry, they’ll express that anger by voting against Biden and for Trump.

What they won’t do is invent pop psychology to demonize those who disagree with them. None of these voters you diagnose as afflicted with “white rural rage” will diagnose you as being afflicted with “Jewish urban anger.”

They’re smart and decent enough to know that your religion, your place of residence, and your emotional state are not particularly relevant to their political disagreement with you. To them this is not a cafeteria food fight and not a jihad.

You could learn something about manners, Mr. Krugman, from these farmers you look down upon. Keep Manhattan, just give us this countryside.